“For Christ’s sake, June! Are you completely stupid? These are last year’s figures! I asked for this year’s intake! Can you get it right this time?” Then he turns around, mutters something about having to do everything twice around here and marches back down the corridor.
It was a shocking performance, and if I’d had time to turn away, I would have. But it’s too late now. It would only add to June’s embarrassment. So I stand there, inches from her desk, a smile plastered on my face like nothing’s wrong, or if it is, I didn’t notice.
She reaches for the bundle with a trembling hand and pulls it slowly towards her. She looks like she’s going to cry with her head down and her black curls falling forward, almost hiding her face.
“He’s a bully,” I say simply. “He speaks like that to me all the time.”
I don’t know why I say that since it’s not true. I just want to soften her humiliation. I certainly don’t think Clyde should speak to anyone like that and I make a mental note to pull him up on it later.
June looks up, crimson patches blooming on her cheeks. She tries to smile, and fails. Her chin wobbles. “I doubt that very much.”
“You’d be surprised.”
“It’s not even my job,” she says. “His secretary is off sick and I’ve been asked to step in.”
I lean forward and whisper, “I searched his desk for a stapler once, and I found a penis enlargement pump. Top left drawer, under that stupid little tray he keeps his paperclips and rubber bands in.” I stand up. “Just think about that next time he talks to you like that.”
We both know I just made that up. She drops her head and laughs silently, and it takes a moment for her to recover. When she looks up again, the smile is real.
“Thank you,” she says, still trying, and failing, to stop grinning.
I wink at her. “My pleasure.”
I tell her about the alumni dinner proposition, then head back in my office and type up the minutes so they’re ready to email before I leave to meet Alex.
Then Mila comes in. There’s a guffaw of student laughter outside and she closes the door.
“Anna, do you have a moment?”
“Of course, Mila. Please.” I indicate the seat opposite. “How can I help you?”
She looks skyward, like she’s thinking about it. I wait, my hands knotted together, a benign smile on my face. I’m going for the mentor-to-mentee look, even though I’m wondering if she’s going to ask me to do something. Pick up one of her tasks. Find someone to mark her exams. Organize the alumni dinner.
“How can I help?” I repeat.
“I wanted to tell you myself, make sure you were okay.”
“Oh?”
She looks sideways, takes in a small, sharp breath, closes her eyes briefly, and I know now it’s going to be bad. For me.
“I got the professorship. I found out this morning.”
I manage to stretch my lips thinly over my teeth and into a smile. My knuckles have turned white and I feel my chest rise and fall as my pulse races. I repeat the words in my head, in case I got them wrong the first time. I got the professorship. Nope, no change, stomach still clenched. I’m trying to think of something to say and we just stare at each other in silence for a while.
“I didn’t know you’d applied.”
“Yeah, it was on impulse, really—just a last-minute thing. Geoff suggested it.”
“He did?” A last-minute thing? It takes weeks, months, to put an application like that together. Is she going to say she wrote the application twenty minutes before the deadline? I don’t get it. Does she want me to feel even worse?
Then it occurs to me maybe there’s more than one professorship this year after all. Maybe I too will find out today.
“So they announced it?”
“This morning. And Anna, let me say that I was completely surprised. Shocked, really. I was sure it would be you, and it should have been you. I don’t know why they gave it to me. I keep expecting someone to tap me on the shoulder and say they’ve made a mistake.” She gives a small, self-deprecating laugh.
There are probably things I should say, but I can’t speak. It’s like my throat has clammed up and nothing will squeeze by except maybe my last breath.
“I know you must be disappointed.” She tilts her head at me, checking to see just how disappointed, presumably.
“Not at all,” I manage, finally. “I’m very”—I was going to say ‘happy’ but it gets caught—“pleased, for you.”
“Really?”
“Of course! Why wouldn’t I be?”
She puts a hand on top of her chest, just below her throat. “Oh, thank god. I was really hoping you’d say that but I was a little bit nervous. Especially since you were one of the people who interviewed me when I first started.”
“Yes, I remember.”
“You’d think the more senior person would get it first—I would have thought anyway, so I’m glad you’re being so good about it.”
There’s a lone paperclip on my desk, and I see myself in my mind’s eye straightening it out and shoving it in her cheek just to shut her up. “Don’t be silly! It’s fabulous! I couldn’t be happier. Well deserved. Congratulations.” I get up, because I’m starting to shake and I’m afraid she’ll see it, which would only add to my humiliation.
She gets to her feet. “Thank you for being so good about it,” she says again.
I can’t get to the women’s toilets fast enough. I lock myself in a cubicle, close the seat and sit down. I’m breathing too fast, too loud. I drop my head in my hands and time my breaths, wait for my pulse to slow down. I press my fingers against my eyes. Of course I didn’t get it. I haven’t published anything in years. I just teach, work, sit on useless committees and take minutes. That’s not a track to full professor. That’s a track to full-blown idiot-moron-gofer-errand girl. And what was it she said? A last-minute thing. Geoff suggested it. Why would he do that when he’d already suggested to me that I apply, and there was only one position available?
Except he didn’t suggest it, did he. But he sure didn’t stop me when I brought it up. Quite the opposite, I would have thought, considering all the extra work I’ve been doing these last few months which will make a good impression on the committee, Anna. They love a team player.
At the sink I splash water on my face and dab at my eyes. I recover myself enough to go back to my office, only for Geoff to stick his head round the door a moment later.
“Ah. Anna, can I have a word?”
“Is this about Mila? Because I think it’s great, really great. Wonderful news.”
“Yes, good, so you know.”
“Yes, couldn’t be happier for her.”
“Okay. Good. Oh, by the way, did you type those minutes?”
“In your inbox.”
“Well done, good stuff.”
I want to go home and curl up in my bed, go to sleep for a year or two, but I can’t because I have a class. Maybe I could say I’m sick, ask June to get a replacement teacher for the afternoon. One of the post docs.
No. Mila will know it’s because of her, and then she’ll think I’m upset and she’ll be making cooey noises at me: Oh! You are upset, Anna. I’m so, so sorry. I wonder if Mila will offload some of her classes on me now. Of course she will.