No, thank you.

The second the front door closes behind me, I slump against it. I take a deep breath and stare for a long, long time at the glow of Christmas lights the neighbors forgot to take down.

OceanofPDF.com

From: [email protected]

Subject: Macbeth reflection paper

Dr. Hannaday,

I’m focusing my paper on Lady Macbeth as the fourth witch. Some parts of the text support this interpretation—do you mind taking a look at what I have so far? The file is attached.

Sincerely,

Cam

From: [email protected]

Subject: who is cute

U doc u cute u really cute u sooooo cute

From: [email protected]

Subject: Please disregard

Dr. Hannaway,

My roommate accidentally ate the wrong batch of brownies and locked himself in the bathroom with my phone. Please ignore any emails I might have sent.

Cheers,

Ashton

From: [email protected]

Subject: Thermo paper

Extension plz.

The following week is soul-crushingly busy, with both the run-of-the-mill grind of adjuncthood and catching up on the work I missed during the interview. No worries, though: in between proctoring exams and teaching the wonders of the Fraunhofer diffraction, I still carve out opportunities to agonize over whether I got the job, when I’ll know whether I got the job, how I’ll know whether I got the job, and who’ll tell me whether I got the job. See? Excellent multitasking skills. Almost as though I’m not a human disaster juggling several subclinical mood disorders at any given time.

The iTwat becomes my faithful companion, lest I miss a call, an email, a text message, a Vatican smoke signal informing me that my days of pain are gone:

Welcome to MIT, Elsie, says Monica’s disembodied voice, ready to groom me as her successor.

You’re now part-icle of the Physics Department, Volkov guffaws, hands on his belly.

I hear you stole George’s job, Jack tells me, clucking his tongue from a whole foot above me, smiling only with those beautiful, genetically improbable eyes of his. You and I should really learn to get along.

It’s all in vain. Whenever I pick up, it’s telemarketers. Phishing scams reminding me to pay a warranty on the car I do not own. Lucas, calling to bitch about Lance. Lance, calling to bitch about Lucas. Mom, calling to bitch about Lucas and Lance. On one memorable occasion, Dana calling to ask my opinion on whether my brothers would agree to have sex with her at the same time. “Why’s everyone so into threesomes all of a sudden?” I ask, and then hastily walk away when the secretary of the UMass Biophysics Department looks up from the exams she’s archiving.

I try to call Greg, but he doesn’t pick up or answer my texts, which sends me into an additional spiral of anxiety: I’ve ruined his life. He’ll hate me forever. But I can’t force him to accept my apology, so I sublimate the nervous energy into refreshing my email: a beloved, if fruitless, hobby. No mit.edu address appears in my inbox—just students on the verge of mental breakdowns at 11:34 on a Wednesday night because they forgot whether chapter 8 will be covered on the test (Pls pls pls say no, Dr. H.). Because it’s grad school application season, a few even make it to office hours to ask for recommendation letters. When I point out to a Boston University senior that he failed my class, he blinks confusedly and asks, “Is that a no?”

On Thursday night, halfway through loading the dishwasher, Cece catches me trying to unlock the home screen with my elbow.

“That’s it.” She picks up the iTwat and slides it in her pocket. “I’m confiscating this till tomorrow.”

“No. No, please! I really need it.” I sound defensive and whiny. What a combination. “It’s my Linus blankie.”

“You’ve developed a transitional object in your late twenties?”

“A what?”

“Security blankets, teddy bears, you know. That stuff kids latch on to when they’re anxious, they’re called transitional objects.”

“Where do they transition you to?”

She gives me a consternated look. “The merciless ravages of adulthood.”

It actually helps, not being able to stalk the social media of the entire MIT search committee for one evening. Monica posts only about the papers her grads publish, anyway. Volkov hasn’t been active since 2017, when he retweeted a “Thank God Newton wasn’t under a coconut tree” meme. George, if that’s his real account, is all about pics of his lunches (which look annoyingly delicious). Jack, of course, is not on social media.

Which is fine. Because he’s in my head—plenty. Not that I know why. First, I’m not sure I believe anything he said. Second, I’m almost sure I don’t believe anything he said. Third, he’s still the guy who wrote that hoax paper, and fourth, he wants another candidate to get the job. Fifth: no. Just no. Sixth, if I believed anything he said, three, four, and five would still be valid.

“No. I didn’t see him during the rest of my interview,” I tell Dr. L. when I visit him in his office.

He smiles, pleased. His turtleneck is the same dark gray as his hair. “Very well, Elise. And what about your talk? Did you change it like I told you?”

Dr. L.’s feedback can sometimes be a tad out of touch. For instance, I don’t think that writing the entire history of liquid crystals research on a slide in 8.5-point font is a good idea, but:

“I did,” I lie. When he smiles again, I savor knowing that I pleased him, but the moment I step out of his office, guilt sweeps over me. For deceiving him. Or maybe . . . maybe for having admitted to myself that I find Jack, who ruined my mentor’s career, attractive—viscerally attractive, in a way I didn’t think I was able to notice.

It occurs to me on Friday night that the attraction has little to do with him being tall or handsome, and everything to do with how perceptive he is.

Jack sees me—a puppet who maybe, just maybe, is a real girl after all.

And because he sees me, I cannot interact with him safely. And that’s why I’m not willing to think about the things he said to me. The way he looked. The dimple. His hand sliding up the inside of my thigh, warm, inexorable. Elsie. You know what I want to do to you? I shake my head. I’ll spare you the graphic details. I’m sure you can imagine.

Okay—yes, there have been dreams. A dream. Graphic. Detailed. A little sweaty. But no, nope, no. I have other things to get an ulcer over. Time’s arrow. Climate change. The lack of government accountability and transparency. My professional future. I can choose what to stress about, and Jack’s not it.

That’s what I tell myself until Saturday night, when it all comes to a head.

•   •   •

“Sometimes I wonder why I wasn’t born in the early seventeenth century, which really hinders my ability to wear a ruff in public and practice leech-based medicine. Or in ancient Rome, where I could have spent my days in a socially acceptable cycle of reclining, eating, puking. But then I experience wonders like this in IMAX, and I know, I just know, that I was meant to be alive in this day and age. My reward for an upright, leechless existence.”

I blink at Cece, eyes still bleary from three hours in the theater. When we walked inside, the sun was up and the last week’s worth of snow had finally melted. Now it’s pitch black, and Cece’s catching a whole new batch of flakes with her tongue, like the Florida-born dork she is.

I do love her. Quite a bit. And that’s why I sacrificed my precious Saturday afternoon to the gods of Faking It and spent it watching the original version of the famed 1968 Kubrick masterpiece, 2001: A Space Odyssey. One hundred and sixty excruciating minutes of solar system screen saver pics set to . . . Vivaldi, maybe?