14. Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fourteen
Now
A s soon as I get into my room, I throw my purse onto my bed and storm through, trying to find my work bag. Thoughts crash through my mind. What work does Noah have that I don’t? What if I’ve had important things pop up in my email folder, and I haven’t even bothered to check? I hate feeling like I’ve dropped the ball. I pride myself on being the person who gets things done the moment they’re asked. I rush, I expedite, I priority ship.
What if I open my computer and don’t have any work to do? That would mean, for some reason, they must have forwarded everything to Noah. I shakily take my laptop out of my bag and set it on the desk. I stare blankly at the screen, nerves buzzing, waiting for it to come to life.
The newly loosened muscles in my neck begin to tighten back up, and my right leg bounces up and down impatiently. Before I can log in, a prompt pops up on the loading screen.
Update required. Estimated time: 28 minutes.
A wave of nausea washes through my body, and I bury my face into my hands. My heart rate accelerates, and my breathing becomes shallow and quick. The ringing in my ears is the telltale sign that I’m on my way to officially losing control. Control of my body, control of the situation, control of my life.
The rational part of my brain fully understands that a computer update is nothing to have a panic attack about. However, in these moments, all rationality gets buried deep by all the fears and failures that rush up to the surface. It’s not about the update. It’s not about Noah or work. It’s all about my lack of perfection.
My emotions are circling on themselves, and I feel the familiar loop of hopelessness starting to take hold.
I am not proud of myself.
I am not capable.
I am not enough.
These are the mantras I’m more used to. These are the ones that have a deeper hold on me than the ones my therapist has me say. These are the ones that have been on repeat in my mind ever since I was a kid.
In these moments, they’re truer than any other words in the world. I am not enough. I am not enough. I am not enough. These four words feel as if they are permanently etched into my heart.
I push myself up from the desk and walk over to the balcony. The glass door slides open effortlessly and I step outside. The humid night air blankets me from head to toe, and the salty smell of the ocean rushes into my nose.
I rest my elbows on the railing and try to get a hold of myself. Deep breath in. Count one, two, three, four. Hold it for seven. Exhale one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.
Again.
Inhale.
Hold.
Let it all out. A slight tingle begins in my arms as I feel the breathing exercise working. I’ve had panic attacks for years now. Spurred on by my parents’ high expectations and demands of excellence, and then continued by my incessant need to ensure that everyone around me thinks I have everything figured out all the time.
Since I began therapy, these attacks have chilled out quite a bit. They’re happening less than they used to, which is good because they got really bad for a while. I really am trying to fix myself. I wake up every day, repeat my positive affirmations, and try to force myself to alter my negative thoughts. Every day I attempt to improve something, even if it’s small.
A lot of the time this works wonders, but if there are times when I find myself overwhelmed or not in complete control of a situation, or if my self-perceived perfection is put into question, I rapidly fall back into these pits of worthlessness.
I could blame everything on my past, my Type-A personality, or I’m sure there is a granola girl with a nose ring out there who would tell me that I could trace it all back to my star sign. But at the end of the day, I’ve come to accept that it’s just the way I’m built.
Star sign aside, I do understand that I cannot afford to keep spiraling out of control, and I have to stop letting my negative self-image take over. I know it doesn’t serve me, and it actually always ends up making things so much worse, but it’s still hard sometimes.
The fog in my head begins to clear, and the tightness in my chest eases. I haven’t lost myself like this for a while now, months even, so all of it feels so stupid and confusing. Noah telling me that he has some work to do shouldn’t have sent me into this tailspin of panic and self-doubt. Why did I let myself do this? I shake my head, marinating in the disappointment.
Closing my eyes, I try to coax out some positive thoughts. So what if Noah is working tonight? So what if he has a ton of work to do and ends up working every day this week? Maybe he’s behind. Maybe he’s just bad at his job.
I feel a small smile tug at the corners of my lips. I don’t actually believe that though. If he’s anything now like he was when we were younger, I know he’s good at what he does. Damn, this isn’t working.
I lay everything out. Let’s say that our bosses did in fact give Noah some important work to do. I don’t know what this could implicate, but maybe it’s not as damning as it seems.
I shouldn’t automatically assume that just because they called him here to Hawaii at the last minute and gave him some extra tasks to do, it means they think he’s better than me and want to take me off the account.
Breathing in deeply, I continue to work through my emotions. Let’s go even further. Let’s say that is the case. What if our bosses do decide to take me off the account? Would that really be the end of the world for me? Do I not think I would be able to re-evaluate things and recover? Of course I would. I know I would.
This is something I’ve always wanted. For as long as I can remember, I’ve made it my goal to become an attorney. But I’m the first to admit that as often as I love it, I dislike it just as much. The long hours. The constant preparations and research. The endless amount of red tape and workarounds. It’s a lot to handle. To make matters worse, it was only a few weeks ago that I was so upset at being looked over for making partner, and now I find myself questioning if I’m in this career because of my love for it, or if I’m only doing it because once I set my mind to something I have to see it through.
God , I’m so confused. Why am I like this? All my thoughts are so mixed up. I rub my eyes with the palm of my hands. It all feels like too much. I grab the railing with both hands and gaze out at the vast moonlit ocean. The rhythmic in and out of the silvery waves calms the unsettled feelings gripping at my chest. The predictability and balance of it all eases the worry that’s threatening to take hold.
I don’t want to do this right now. I don’t feel like deconstructing all of my life choices and possibly redesigning my entire future at the moment, so I close my eyes tight and shake my head. I can’t have these thoughts bury themselves too deep; I just need them to go away, I just need to do what I always do—shove all this worry deep inside and convince myself that I will work it out later.
My computer chimes from inside my room. Finally. Taking one final deep inhale, I open my eyes and put on my happy face. Walking back into the cool air-conditioned room, the computer screen is the only light on, so I stare at it like a moth to a flame as I attempt to make my way across the dark room to the computer desk.
Just as I’m about to reach the desk chair, my foot finds the strap of my work bag and sends me flying face first into the ground. The worst part is, that stupid coffee table that I moved earlier to this very same spot, tries to catch my fall and the corner of it slams hard into my left thigh. A hilarious mixture of laughter and pain is forced out of my body as the absurdity of the day’s events, coupled with the sudden adrenaline rush, punches me in the gut.
Wiggling myself up into a sitting position, I rest my back against the desk behind me. I look down at my leg and see a gnarly bruise already starting to take shape. Shit, man, this really hurts.
A breathy chuckle escapes from my chest, as I picture the graceful show that I just performed. I’m so glad that no one’s here to see it.
Reaching my hands behind me, I blindly feel around the desk for my laptop. I locate the corner and carefully bring it over my head and set it on my lap. Opening my email folder, I see that my inbox does have a few new messages, but at first glance, they don’t appear to be anything special.
I read and reread each new email thoroughly. Everything that has been asked of me is unimportant and could definitely wait until I get home. Nothing is pressing. Nothing is urgent.
Although I may be unsure about what I want for my future, I do know with full certainty that right now, I want to beat Noah Riley. I will do everything in my power to make sure I’m number one. This is going to be fun.
Tonight, I’m going to complete all my pending tasks, even the ones that don’t need to be done for weeks. Then, I will re-examine all the work that I’ve already done for Dumont and go through every single detail with a fine-toothed comb. I’ll rework and improve it every way I possibly can. Then, with any time I have left, I will detail and plan some other useful projects that are sure to further cement me into the forefront of the partners’ minds as a proactive team member and strong leader.
A loud growl comes from my stomach. Holy moly, I haven’t eaten anything all day. My mind has been so preoccupied with going to the beach, seeing Noah, getting the massage, seeing Noah again, and then coming back to my room to work, that I honestly haven’t remembered to eat at all.
I move to get up and am promptly reminded that my left leg is still completely dead. Well, that sucks. Looks like this is where I’m going to stay for the rest of the night. I feel that gnawing sensation grow in my stomach from hunger.
Grabbing my work bag from where it rudely decided to trip me, I dig around, hoping to find something inside. A pencil, my charger, some loose change…aha! I feel the wrapper first and pull out an ancient protein bar that has been floating around in the bottom of this bag since God knows when. It’s so old that the label is all worn off and smooth, like river rocks that get polished from centuries of getting tossed around in the water.
Hesitantly tearing off the corner of the wrapper, I give the bar a quick inspection. It looks fine. Good. Next, is the sniff test. Okay, thank God, it has no smell. I’m going to take that as a good sign because naturally, I assume that if it is rotten, it would probably smell bad, right?
I bring the bar up to my mouth and take a small mouse-sized bite. Surprisingly, it’s still chewy. I can’t entirely distinguish the flavor, but if I close my eyes, I can almost pretend it tastes decent.
Once my dinner is finished, I get down to business. I pull out my charger, don my headphones, and dive headfirst into my work.
I am going to win .