Free Now

Standing alone in the cereal aisle, I try to convince myself that I am not anxious and everything is fine. But I'm looking at prices and I can feel my heart beat faster, my body becoming warm and slightly sweaty beneath my windbreaker. I scan rows of colorful boxes with cartoon characters printed on them, marketed to small children. In the past if I couldn't decide what I wanted I'd buy three boxes, or I'd get decision paralysis and leave empty handed.

This is my first time in the store since I quit my job earlier this week. The job market is ass right now, so I stand there in the grocery store fully aware that the worst is yet to come. I now have no income, and I have minimal savings. I should be buying groceries carefully, walking around with the calculator on my phone open to make sure I don't go over budget. Instead, I'm clueless. I have no plan. I grab a box of store brand frosted flakes and walk to self checkout. I don't buy anything else. I pay with exact change.

I open my box of cereal as I walk outside to my car, reaching my hand in and grabbing a handful of crispy, sugary flakes and shoving them in my mouth like an animal. The night is pleasantly cool, just warm enough to be comfortable, with a light breeze. It's almost midnight, so the parking lot is nearly empty. Who goes to Walmart on Saturday night?

I find my car and flop down in the driver's seat. I could go home, but I haven't told my roommates that I quit my job yet. I doomscroll on my phone, waiting to drive home until I'm sure my roommates are asleep in their rooms. My tiktok feed has ended up on skinnytok, so most of the videos are of extremely thin, tan, blonde girls trying to sell me supplements and green juice and telling me to spend $45 on a pilates class. Maybe I'll lose weight if I'm too broke to buy food.

My phone chimes. It's from Evan: Are you at Walmart right now?

I blink, look around. I don't see anyone watching me, which creeps me out even more, even though Evan isn't a creepy guy. Then I see his car across the parking lot, his old white Lexus. I can see him in the driver's seat. I wave. He waves back, then gets out of his car, so I open my door and get out of mine too.

We meet in the middle. I'm briefly embarrassed by my yoga pants and dirty hair, but relax when I see that he's in sweats. I realize that he probably watched me shovel frosted flakes into my mouth, and I die a little bit inside.

"Long time no see," he jokes. We saw each other two nights ago, ran into one another at a nearby bar. He was at a work happy hour, I was drowning my sorrows in vodka martinis. When he came over to say hello, he knew I was upset, but I didn't tell him what about. Thankfully I'd had my wits about me enough to go home after three drinks.

"Yeah, been awhile," I reply, matching his light tone.

"What are you doing here so late?" he asked.

"I needed a snack. You?"

"Toilet paper."

I can't help but giggle, and he smiles too.

There's a brief silence, then he asks, "Do you want to smoke a joint?"

"Okay," I said.

I follow him to his car. He digs around in his glovebox for a minute, then pulls out a plastic baggie with two joints in it. He removes one and grabs a lighter from his center console. He lights the joint, takes a long drag, then passes it to me. The exchange feels familiar and comfortable.

We pass the joint back and forth a couple of times, not talking. We lean our backs against his car. I feel a warm glow spread through my body. "I quit my job," I said.

Evan turns to look at me, eyes wide. "What did they do to you now?" he asks. He remembers, has heard my stories about getting screamed at, and comforted me when I cried every morning before work and again when I got home.

"Asked me to clock out and keep working again."

"That's illegal and you should sue them." I've heard him say this exact sentence hundreds of times over the last three years.

"I'm too lazy for that," I said.

"I know," he replies.

We're quiet for a moment, then I say, "I'm not going to be able to pay my rent." Suddenly my eyes fill with tears. "I'm scared. I didn't think this through."

As with most men, my tears alarm him. He quickly pulls me in for a hug, but I don't cry any more. He releases me, and I continue. "I don't know what I'm going to tell my roommates. Or how I'm going to tell my parents. I never told them about anything that happened."

"Is there any chance your roommates will understand?"

"Sam might, but Alena definitely won't."

Evan sighs and runs a hand through his hair. "Well, I'm sorry about that," he said. "Is there anything I can do?"

I think for a second. "Buy me some salt and vinegar chips?" I suggest.

He smiles and rolls his eyes. "Fine," he says. "Let's go."

We walk back into the store. By now, he has the munchies too, so we stop at the candy aisle, where he grabs a bar of chocolate and sour patch kids. I find my chips and we head to self checkout. There's a normalcy to it all that I can't ignore. I'm yearning. I suddenly want to stand very close to him, so I do while he scans our snacks and pays with a debit card. He doesn't appear to notice me.

Back outside, I realize that this is where we would normally go our separate ways. I don't want to, so I blurt out, "Do you want to come over?"

He hesitates. "I don't think so," he says. "I'm really wiped out."

His rejection stings. He sees the disappointment in my face, and backpedals. "Maybe for a drink," he says.

Suddenly I feel bone tired. "That's okay," I said. "It's probably not the best idea anyway."

He walks me to my car. When we get there, I want him to kiss me so badly it hurts. I don't know why I want this. Instead he tells me to text him, I thank him for the chips, and he walks back to his car.

Alone again. Now I have a bag of chips and a box of cereal. I think about staying here all night, scrolling social media on my phone and eating, alternating between sweet and salty, passing out once my eyes won't stay open. Somehow I'm both wired and exhausted.

I drive home, Bon Iver playing quietly in the background. At home, the apartment is dark, much to my relief. I grab a glass from the cupboard and fill it with tap water because Alena accused me of drinking all of our bottled water. She's probably right.

In the bathroom, I splash freezing cold water on my face. I want to take a shower, but it wakes Sam, whose bedroom is right next to our bathroom, so I don't. I quickly brush my teeth and go to my room, closing the door behind me.

I crawl under the covers and let my body relax. I'm safe here in my bed. The door is locked, I'm unseen, no one can find me here. That's what I thought when I was a kid. I close my eyes, and my mind drifts to work, to the moment I quit. The look on Shira's face, because with me gone she had no one to abuse but herself. Part of me hopes she gets out too, but the other, meaner part of me hopes she rots there forever.

It was satisfying, the look on her face after I said, "You know what? I quit." And I took off my badge, threw it on her desk, and walked out. It was an immensely satisfying moment, one that had been brewing for almost three years. I stopped at my desk, grabbed anything of mine that I cared about keeping (mostly photos and trinkets I'd used to decorate my cubicle with the hope of making it less depressing - it didn't work), and left. I thought quitting would take the weight off my shoulders, but it didn't. It replaced it with a different kind of weight. Before, I just wanted to get through an entire day without being yelled at or berated. Now I just want to pay rent and still be able to feed myself.

We were fed a dream. Go to college and you'll have a good life. Without a degree, you stand no chance. I feel bamboozled because no one told me how hard it would be, existing in the modern corporate workplace. Paying bills, being responsible, while the world crumbles around me. How silly it all seems, because we all end up in the same place anyway.

Cool air drifts through the open window. I close my eyes.