The Excuse Artist

Every Tuesday at 7:30 PM, the "Life in Progress" group met in the crumbling community center off Maple Street. The building had once been a church, then a theater, then something involving crystals that nobody talked about. Now it housed various recovery groups, each with their designated room and coffee setup.

Room C's fluorescent lights flickered intermittently, casting everyone in a sickly pallor that matched their collective mood. Six metal folding chairs formed an uneven circle, and in the center sat a small table with a nearly empty box of grocery store cookies.

Leo Crawford was twenty minutes late, as usual.

"Sorry, sorry," he said, sliding into the last empty chair. "You wouldn't believe the traffic. Some kind of accident on Fifth and—"

"Save it for sharing time, Leo," said Vivian, their facilitator. In her sixties with cropped silver hair and eyes that had seen every excuse in the human repertoire, she'd been running this particular group for eight years. "We've already started."

Leo mumbled another apology and settled in, scanning the room. The regulars were all there: Nadia with her immaculate notebook and pen collection, Marcus hunched in his chair like he was bracing for impact, elderly Mrs. Chen who never spoke but nodded at precisely the right moments, and Ray, who somehow managed to look both rumpled and perfectly put-together in his paint-spattered overalls.

The only person Leo didn't recognize was a young woman in a wheelchair to his right. Mixed-race, early twenties maybe, with bright blue streaks in her dark hair and a tattoo of mathematical equations snaking up her arm.

"As I was saying," Vivian continued, "today we welcome Zadie to our group." She gestured to the newcomer, who gave a small wave. "Zadie, would you like to introduce yourself?"

"Sure." Her voice was deeper than Leo expected, with a slight rasp. "I'm Zadie. My therapist thought this group might help with my... situation." She made air quotes around the last word.

"We don't pressure anyone to share more than they're comfortable with," Vivian said. "But this is a safe space for working through our challenges."

Zadie's mouth quirked. "My challenge is that I'm really good at explaining why things aren't my fault."

A ripple of uncomfortable recognition passed through the circle. Leo shifted in his seat.

"Then you're in the right place," Vivian said. "We're all experts at that particular skill."

"World-class," Marcus added softly.

"Leo was just about to share," Vivian said, turning the group's attention his way. "Since you're late, you get to go first."

Leo straightened. He'd prepared for this, rehearsing in the shower that morning. "Well, I did what we talked about last week. I applied for the promotion at work."

"That's wonderful," Nadia said, her pen already moving across her notebook.

"I didn't get it."

The energy in the room shifted subtly. Leo could feel their collective anticipation.

"They gave it to Darren," he continued. "Which is complete—" He caught himself, seeing Vivian's expression. "I mean, I was disappointed."

"Of course you were," Vivian said. "What happened next?"

This was the part Leo had practiced. "I talked to my boss afterward, like we discussed. Asked for feedback." He took a breath. "He said I don't take enough initiative. That I'm always explaining why projects are delayed instead of finding ways to complete them."

Ray nodded slowly. "Sounds familiar."

"But here's the thing," Leo leaned forward, "there are legitimate reasons those projects were delayed. The design team missed deadlines, IT keeps changing our access permissions, and Darren—the guy who got the promotion—keeps dumping his overflow work on my desk."

"Did you tell your boss that?" Marcus asked.

"Of course! He said..." Leo hesitated, remembering the conversation. "He said everyone deals with those same obstacles. But others find ways around them instead of reasons they can't be overcome."

Silence filled the room. Leo glanced around, finding thoughtful expressions on every face.

"What do you think about that assessment?" Vivian finally asked.

"I think it's unfair," Leo said automatically. "They don't understand what I'm dealing with."

Zadie made a small sound that might have been a laugh. When everyone looked her way, she shrugged. "Sorry. It's just—you remind me of me. Before."

"Before what?" Leo asked, somewhat defensively.

"Before I realized I was fighting for my limitations." She gestured to her wheelchair. "When this happened, I became the excuse queen. I had a bulletproof reason why I couldn't do anything. And you know what? Everyone accepted it. No one questioned it."

"That's different," Leo said. "You have a real—"

"Everyone has real obstacles," Zadie interrupted. "The question is whether you're defining yourself by them."

"I don't—"

"If you fight for your limitations," she said, voice gentle but firm, "you get to keep them."

Leo fell silent, her words landing with unexpected weight.

"Where did you hear that?" Vivian asked Zadie.

"My physical therapist. He had it on a poster in his torture chamber—I mean, therapy room." She smiled slightly. "It annoyed the hell out of me at first. Then one day, I realized I was his star patient... at making excuses."

The group chuckled, tension breaking.

"Let's hear from someone else," Vivian said, eyeing her watch. "Nadia, how was your week?"

Nadia looked up from her notebook, where she'd been color-coding something with her collection of pens. "I didn't call my daughter."

Leo blinked. This was new. Nadia had been talking about calling her estranged daughter for the three months he'd been attending.

"What stopped you this time?" Vivian asked, her tone carefully neutral.

"Nothing." Nadia capped her pen with deliberate precision. "That's just it. I ran out of excuses."

"What do you mean?" Leo asked.

"I've been coming here for two years," she said, meeting his eyes. "I've had every reason why I couldn't call: it wasn't the right time, she'd be too busy, I needed to prepare what to say, Mercury was in retrograde—"

"That was mine," Mrs. Chen interjected, surprising everyone. She rarely spoke.

"Sorry," Nadia smiled. "The point is, last week I sat down with my phone and realized I'd run out of reasons. They all sounded hollow, even to me."

"Did you call her?" Ray asked.

"No." Nadia looked down at her notebook. "I still couldn't do it. And that's when I understood—the excuses weren't preventing me from calling. They were protecting me from admitting I was afraid."

The room went quiet again. Leo felt a strange tightness in his chest.

"Afraid of what?" Marcus asked softly.

"That she wouldn't forgive me." Nadia's voice wavered. "That all these years of distance were my fault, not circumstances beyond my control."

Leo found himself nodding, though he hadn't meant to.

"That took courage to admit," Vivian said. "Thank you for sharing, Nadia."

The session continued, each person chronicling their week's battles with self-deception. Ray had finally painted something new after years of saying he'd lost his inspiration. Mrs. Chen had told her son she couldn't attend her grandchildren's recitals anymore because she didn't want to—not because of her "bad hip" that somehow never bothered her when bargain hunting was involved.

Throughout it all, Leo found himself watching Zadie. She listened intently to each person, occasionally jotting notes on her phone, but offering no further insights about her own situation.

When the hour ended, people gathered their things slowly, reluctant to break the spell of honesty that had settled over the room. Leo lingered, helping Vivian stack the chairs.

"She's something, isn't she?" Vivian said quietly, nodding toward Zadie, who was talking with Marcus near the door.

"Who is she?" Leo asked. "Really?"

"A quantum physics professor at the university. Had an accident in the lab a few years ago." Vivian straightened a crooked chair. "She gives guest lectures now on probability and choice theory."

"She doesn't seem like someone who'd need this group."

Vivian gave him a look. "Everyone needs somewhere they can be honest, Leo. Even quantum physicists."

After helping clean up, Leo headed for the parking lot. The evening air was cool, spring finally asserting itself after a stubborn winter. He spotted Zadie by the ramp, apparently waiting for a ride.

"Need help?" he asked, then immediately regretted it. "Sorry, that was—"

"Automatic?" she supplied, smiling slightly. "It's fine. I'm just waiting for my Uber. Driver says he's two minutes away, which in Uber time means anywhere between thirty seconds and half an hour."

Leo laughed. "I could give you a lift. I promise I'm not an axe murderer."

"That's exactly what an axe murderer would say." She studied him, then nodded. "Sure, thanks. Canceling now..." She tapped her phone. "Lead the way."

As they walked—Leo consciously slowing his pace—an awkward silence settled between them.

"So," he finally said, "quantum physics?"

Zadie groaned. "Vivian told you? She's worse than my mother."

"Is it that bad, being known as a brilliant scientist?"

"It's bad being known as 'that brilliant scientist who blew up her lab and ended up in a wheelchair.'" She said it matter-of-factly. "That's how people introduce me now. Like it's my full title."

Leo unlocked his car, an aging Subaru littered with coffee cups and fast food wrappers. "Sorry about the mess," he said automatically. "I've been meaning to clean it, but—"

He stopped, hearing himself. Zadie raised an eyebrow.

"But you've been busy?" she suggested.

Leo sighed. "Yeah. Something like that."

Once they were both settled—Zadie had declined his awkward offers of assistance with practiced grace—Leo asked for her address. She lived in the faculty housing complex near campus, not far from his apartment.

"So what's your story?" she asked as they drove. "Everyone in that room has one. The reason they keep making excuses instead of changes."

"I don't know if I have a story," Leo said. "I'm just... stuck."

"Everyone's stuck for a reason."

Leo focused on the road, considering. "I had plans, I guess. Big ones. Was going to start my own design firm by thirty."

"And now?"

"Now I'm thirty-four, still working at the same company I joined out of college, still saying I'll start my portfolio website 'next weekend.'" He grimaced. "Pathetic, right?"

"Sounds human to me," Zadie said. "What happened to the plan?"

Leo shrugged. "Life, I guess. My dad got sick right when I was building momentum. I moved back home for a while to help my mom care for him. By the time I returned, my contemporaries had all moved ahead."

"I'm sorry about your dad."

"He's okay now. Cancer in remission." Leo signaled for a turn. "But I never got that momentum back. It was easier to blend into the background at work, do the minimum. Keep saying I'd start my own thing someday."

"While blaming the universe for holding you back?"

Leo shot her a look. "I thought you were a physicist, not a psychologist."

"Quantum mechanics and human behavior have more in common than you'd think," she said. "Both involve endless potentials collapsed by observation and choice."

They pulled up to her building, a modern complex with good wheelchair accessibility. Leo put the car in park but left the engine running.

"Can I ask you something?" he said. "What happened? In your lab?"

Zadie was quiet so long he thought she might not answer. "It wasn't actually my lab," she finally said. "It was my colleague's. He'd been working on a particle acceleration experiment for years. I pointed out a fundamental flaw in his methodology."

"And?"

"And he ignored me." Her fingers tapped against her leg. "But I couldn't let it go. I kept documenting the problem, warning about potential outcomes. Nobody listened."

"So you were right," Leo said. "The experiment failed?"

"Oh, it succeeded exactly as designed." Zadie's smile was sharp-edged. "And created exactly the instability I'd predicted. I was working late, trying one last time to prove my calculations, when it happened."

"That's not your fault," Leo said. "That's on them, for not listening."

"That's what I told myself, too. For months." She looked at him directly. "Want to know the truth I finally admitted in therapy? I could have prevented it."

"How? You said no one would listen."

"I could have gone public. Taken my concerns to the department head, the board, even the press. I had the evidence." She sighed. "But I didn't want to make waves. Didn't want to be the troublemaker. It was easier to document my concerns—to cover myself—than to actually fight for what I knew was right."

The weight of her words settled between them.

"So your excuse was..."

"That no one would listen. But really, I didn't try hard enough to make them hear." She unbuckled her seatbelt. "The accident paralyzed my legs. But it was my excuses that kept me from moving forward afterward."

Leo absorbed this. "And now?"

"Now I'm teaching again. Publishing research. Living." She reached for the door handle. "Fighting for possibilities instead of limitations."

"That sounds..." Leo searched for the word, "...exhausting."

Zadie laughed, genuinely this time. "It is. Some days I want nothing more than to crawl back into my cocoon of perfectly valid reasons why I can't move forward." She opened the door. "But I've lived there. The view sucks."

Before getting out, she paused. "You know what's interesting about excuses?"

"What?"

"They're always true." She met his eyes. "That's what makes them so dangerous. Every single reason I had for not pushing harder was factually correct. My colleague outranked me. The department valued his work. Speaking up might have damaged my career."

"So what's the alternative? Ignore reality?"

"No. Acknowledge it, then decide whether it's going to define your choices." She maneuvered herself expertly out of the car. "Thanks for the ride, Leo. See you next Tuesday?"

"Yeah," he said. "See you then."

Leo watched her wheel toward the entrance, surprisingly quick and fluid in her movements. As he pulled away, his phone pinged with a notification from his calendar: "Portfolio Website – Start This Weekend."

He'd set that reminder to repeat every Friday for the past two years.

At the next red light, Leo picked up his phone. His finger hovered over the notification, ready to swipe it away as usual. Instead, he changed the reminder: "Portfolio Website – One Hour Tonight."

It wasn't much. But it was something different from the endless cycle of planning to plan.

As he drove home through the quiet streets, Leo found himself thinking about Zadie's words. All his excuses were true—the overload at work, his father's illness disrupting his plans, the competitive design market. But maybe their truth wasn't the point.

Maybe the point was what he was using them for.

His apartment was dark when he arrived, exactly as he'd left it that morning. Half-finished mugs of coffee dotted various surfaces. A pile of laundry sat in the corner, neither clean nor dirty enough to demand immediate attention. His desk—an expensive investment in his "someday" design career—was buried under bills, magazines, and take-out menus.

For the first time in years, Leo saw his space as a stranger might: the physical manifestation of suspended potential.

He set his keys on the counter and looked at his phone again. 8:47 PM. Not too late to keep a promise to himself.

Leo cleared a space on his desk, opened his laptop, and began.