This is the third installment of a four part series.
Meena is back in her apartment, in her bed. She opens her eyes and sees a familiar sight: her ceiling fan.
“Thank goodness! What a crazy dream!”
A deep baritone voice slices through the darkness.
“I hope it was a hot one about me!”
Meena screams and jumps ten feet out of her bed.
“Who’s there!” she barks, trying to sound menacing.
“Meena baby, relax. It’s me.”
She turns on the nightstand lamp. A handsome familiar face smiles back at her.
“Scott?”
“In the flesh, well…” he chuckled “…not exactly. I’m the spirit of Decisions Present.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I just told you.”
“We broke up years ago….aren’t you engaged, or something?”
“You’ve been checking up on me! Can’t get over Big Daddy, can you?”
“Oh get over yourself, Scott. Tanya told me a couple of months ago. I didn’t ask. She offered up that little tidbit.”
“Yeah sure…we can play that game.”
“Scott, what do you want?”
He holds both of his hands up. “Ok, ok, back to the task at hand. You and I are going take a little trip.”
“I'm not going anywhere with you.”
“I’m afraid you don’t have a choice in this, it’s my show.”
“Get out of my house!”
Meena storms across her bedroom and opens the door. Scott is standing there, with a big toothy grin on his face.
“What the…?”
“I told you baby, I’m a spirit. You can’t get away from me…” he taps the side of his head, “I’m in here!”
“Stop playing around!”
“Sure, your wish is my command.”
A torrential wind starts to blow. Meena covers her face. When the wind subsides, she opens her eyes and finds herself standing in front of a nondescript five story gray building in the middle of a corporate park. It's where she works.
“What are we doing here?” she asks Scott.
“How long have you worked here, Meena?”
“What does that have to do with anything?” she says defensively.
“Just answer the question.”
Meena sucks her teeth. “Fine, six months.”
“What do you do?”
“Are you serious? What is this, 20 questions?”
Scott stares at her.
“I’m a telemarketer.”
“Do you like working here?”
“It’s just temporary.”
“Until when? Until you get that dream job, right…what was that that again?” he taps his chin with his index finger pretending to think. “Oh, yeah, I remember, you were going to be in the Ice Capades, right?”
Meena rolls her eyes.
Scott snaps his fingers. They are now in front of the mall.
Meena’s head is spinning. “Can you warn me when you do that next time?”
Scott laughs and points to the building. “How many jobs have you had in here?”
“I don’t know…at least three.”
“At least three? That’s somewhat accurate. Try eight.”
“Ok, genius, eight.”
“Did you last more than a year at any of these jobs?”
“I don’t know, why don’t you tell me? You seem to know it all.”
“No…not one single job.”
“Is this examination of my work history supposed to mean something? I like variety.”
“Variety my ass. You were fired from five of these places.”
“What’s your point, Scott?”
“Open your hand.”
Meena does as she’s told and opens her right hand. Scott gently places a dollar in it.
“What’s this for?”
“Some cash, so you can buy some direction.”
“Scott, you can kiss my ass, you know that?”
“Why don’t we save the fun for after, OK baby?”
Meena cuts her eyes at Scott.
“Seriously, Meena, you’re not happy. Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles and Helen Keller could see that. You work a shit job doing bullshit making minimum wage. You keep waiting for this miracle to happen that’s going to transform your life and make it what you want. You keep thinking everyone else is getting “the breaks” and here you are 35, aimless and broke. You did this to yourself.”
“What are you talking about? I didn’t do anything.”
“That’s exactly my point. You didn’t do anything. You didn’t try, you didn’t go for more. You didn’t even try to get jobs that were more in line with what you said you wanted. Do you even remember what that was? I do.”
“You do?”
“Of course I do. In high school, you were such a great writer. I thought for sure you were going to write the great American novel…you know, something that would have blown folks’ socks off. You had it in you to do it.”
“You never said that to me before.”
“What do you want girl? I was a kid. You think you’re gonna get heartfelt emotion from a 17 year boy? Think again. I believed in you, in your talent. But you never did anything about it and as we got older, your life became about complaints – about everything. You’d complain to me about jobs and supervisors and your parents “not understanding”. It was always “them”. You just kept doing the same thing, expecting a different result.
“That’s not true Scott, and you know it.” Meena’s voice was starting break.
“It’s not?”
“You know I enrolled in that Creative Writing class at El Camino College.”
“Oh, yes, that’s right. And after your first critique from a professor, you dropped the class, dropped school, dropped everything. That was it.”
“You didn’t hear what the professor said!” Meena insisted.
“So what? The big bad teacher scared you off from your dreams. You really showed her, right? Look at the jaw-dropping success you’ve created since running away!”
“Fuck you, Scott.”
“Nah, thanks anyway though. Been there, done that, got a t-shirt and a key chain.”
“You were always such an asshole.”
Scott suddenly became serious. “Apparently, not enough of one.”
Meena turned her head and looked at him.
“Look, we were together for 9 years. Neither of us was going anywhere. I figured I was holding you back. I wasn’t the big brain in high school, you were. I didn’t have a fraction of the talent and potential that you did. I was just a guy that was going along to get along – to be with the girl he loved. I felt so lucky that you chose to be with me. After a while, it just felt like you and I just weren’t going to get there together. Don’t get me wrong, Meena. I was in the same place as you: no direction, no purpose.
“You thought about that stuff?” Meena asked.
“Yeah, I did. Well, when we first graduated not very often. We were kids having fun, right? We had little jobs and enough money to cover the stuff we wanted to do, what else did we need? I lived at home with my parents and so did you, what else was there to worry about, right?”
“Yeah…”
“But then I woke up on my 27th birthday and realized that my younger brother was graduating from college the next week, I felt like shit. He’d moved out 2 years before and already had a great job lined up. It dawned on me that my kid brother was going to be making tons more money than me and it hurt like hell.”
“I had no idea.” She said.
“Until that day, I really didn’t know either. I just knew that I had to start getting my stuff together, otherwise I’d be…well, what you are now…”
“Thanks a lot, Scott.”
“Seriously, that’s why I’m here Meena. To help you see that it’s not too late to turn this train around."
“How do you know that?”
“Because, I did it. In the eight years since we broke up, I got my driver’s license, I finished college, I bought a house and I started my own Internet business. It was hard as hell. There were times when I wanted to give up, but it was completely worth it. Best of all, I’ve lost my title as the family “fuck-up” and my mother has stopped looking at me with pity in her eyes.
“You’ve done all that?” she asked skeptically.
“Yeah, I did.”
“After we broke up?” Meena was starting to come undone. In their relationship, she’d always been the “smart one”. Out of the two of them she was the one who was going to succeed. If he made it and she didn’t, well there could only be one logical conclusion…
“I was holding you back.” She said quietly.
“No, no Meena. I really think we were holding each other back. We just got stuck in a rut and we had to be apart so that both of us could get out of it. We weren’t meant to conquer the world together.”
“Well, at least it hasn’t gotten to the point where my mother looks at me with pity.” Meena said.
“Wanna bet?" Scott asked as he snapped his fingers.
In a blink, their surroundings change. They are standing in the middle of her parents’ kitchen. Meena gets annoyed.
“Dammit Scott, I said to warn me when you do that!”
Scott snickers.
“Why are we here?”
“I think you need to hear something.”
“Are we in 1992?”
“No, genius, I’m the Spirit of Decisions Present, remember? The operative word being PRESENT.”
Meena raises her hand and gives him the middle finger.
Scott ignores her.
“Your mother’s on the phone, I thought you’d be interested to hear what she’s talking about.”
Meena walks into her parents den. Her mother is sitting on the couch, looking tense, obviously talking to one of her friends.
“Meena was over yesterday…”
“Yes, she did borrow some money.”
“I know, Clara, but what can I do? I have to help my child. I can’t just leave her to fend for herself.”
Her mother switches the phone to the other ear, a clear sign she’s been on it a while.
“I thought by now that Meena would have it together, but she’s so much like my sister, Phyllis. I loved Phyllis, but she could never get it together. It seemed like she thought the world owed her something, what that was I’ll never know. Meena adored her. She thought “Auntie Phyl” was so cool, but “Auntie Phyl” didn’t have a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of. Meena never knew this, but she was always borrowing money, swearing to pay it back…when Friday came, or when she got a new job, but of course, that never happened. She seemed to think that because I was doing decently for myself and I had a husband, it was almost my job to help her. I don’t want the same thing to happen to Meena. I’m worried about her, Clara. She’s well on her way to being just like Phyllis and her father and I can’t do this anymore. Hell, my THIRTY FIVE YEAR OLD daughter doesn’t even have a damn driver’s license!”
Meena’s eyes start to sting, her chest tightens. Deep down, she knew her parents wanted more for her, she just didn’t realize they thought she was pitiful. Not only did her parents think it, but obviously their friends thought she was a joke too.
