19. Ned
NED
Ned stands across the street from Newbury’s campus and adjusts his tie.
He’s not nervous. He gave a job talk just last year.
Did rounds of interviews with faculty and smiled and chatted his way through lunches.
Met undergrads and graduate students and shook hands and laughed at jokes, and he landed a job from it, didn’t he?
Though that had been at Adams, not at Newbury University. And he wasn’t showing up begging for a position because Abbot is simply so amazing that he can negotiate an entire second salary.
Of course, Abbot got him the connection to Steve that landed Ned an interview at Adams. And Abbot had to help Ned finish his dissertation when he couldn’t do it on his own. And he had to drag Ned through that statistics course when Ned could barely understand the first assignment.
So maybe the truth Ned doesn’t want to admit is that his career is literally nothing without the man.
Which should leave Ned feeling grateful, he’s sure, and not like he’s two inches tall.
Beverly meets him in the hallway with a smile and a handshake, walking like she belongs in this building, on this campus.
Ned tries a smile and hopes it doesn’t come out as a grimace. “Thank you so much for having me,” he says.
She was friends with Abbot’s mom. Ned studies her like new details will emerge just by virtue of knowing that one fact.
It’s useless. Whatever is behind the iron bars of all that Abbot won’t share, she’s not exactly spilling.
What was he expecting? Photos of Abbot as a kid and an explanation of why he is the way he is? Ned’s lucky she’s here at all, and certainly that he’s being greeted for a job talk by a dean and not some grad student sent to fetch him.
“I’m glad to have you back. I do really mean that.
Everyone I’ve talked to has great things to say about you.
And not just Chris. I reached out to some folks at Adams,” Beverly says as she leads Ned down the hall.
“Which, I admit, were awkward conversations since they wanted to know if I have additional openings.”
Ned keeps his smile on. Great. So everyone at work will know he might have an out, while they’re still scrambling. And that there is at least some interest at Newbury for a qualitative researcher, of which Ned is neither the most experienced nor most attractive candidate.
Though they can probably pay him less. They know he’s desperate and they’re already going out on a limb to entertain the idea of hiring him, so whatever offer he gets will have to be good enough, since he won’t have any leverage to negotiate.
Which is also wonderful. Ned could be fully employed with no work gap, and make less than he does now, keeping him that much farther from ever being able to move out of his parents’.
Not that he needs Beverly to know that.
“It was so great to meet your wife last week. She was a huge help,” Ned says. “We’re looking at some properties with her, got it set up for this afternoon, actually. Really, we were just caught off guard when we first talked to you.”
“I’m glad she was helpful. I know she loved meeting Henry, and yes, she told me she’d be seeing you two soon,” Beverly says, ushering Ned into the small lecture room.
Most of the chairs are empty. There’s a handful of students and only a couple faculty he can spot, or at least none he recognizes from their pictures on the department website.
Which is fair. He wouldn’t take time out of his afternoon to go to a talk for a guy coming in on a spousal hire, when he could be doing literally anything else.
“And I apologize if I got us off on the wrong foot. I was confused after the conversation I had with Chris and Charles,” Beverly says. “Right up here, we’ll just give it a minute to see if anyone else can make it.”
Can’t Ned just start, to get this over with? But no, and he has to be cheerful while he stands here and sweats. Is she staying to watch? Surely she has more important things to do.
“I love Chris,” Ned says, when yep, she just stands there. “I don’t see him nearly enough anymore, being down here in Boston.”
“Well, let me tell you, he’s your biggest fan. Henry’s too. He was so excited to talk my ear off about your future together and how excited he is that you’ll be getting married.”
The hot flush of nervous sweat turns cold. “I’m sorry? What?”
Beverly smiles. “I talked to him again the other day. I was curious about having a couple working together in the department, and wanted to know how you two managed it at Callahan.”
No, the other part of what she said. Ned needs a clarification. No, a correction. And a laugh and an explanation that she misspoke.
“I didn’t get the whole story from Charles, but Chris filled me in,” Beverly goes on. “All about how you two were dating, and now you’re settling down together. He’s so happy for you, and he really put me at ease about taking your hiring to HR, much more than just looking at properties.”
Don’t ruin this, Ned tells himself. Just smile and move on and let Beverly think whatever the hell she wants to think. Ned needs this job. Peggy needs Ned to have this job. He doesn’t have room here to do anything but plow forward, head down, eyes on an offer letter.
But instead he asks, “Married, you said?”
Beverly waves a hand. “On the road to marriage. Or the intention behind it, at least. The university doesn’t have an actual requirement for a legal marriage, of course.”
“Of course,” Ned echoes.
He’s not smiling. He needs to be. But when he tries, it feels awful on his face and Beverly is just standing there, glancing at her phone, clearly more concerned with her email than with splintering open the careful balance of Ned’s life.
Chris. Thinking they’re getting married. Or going to get married or whatever the fuck he and Beverly talked about.
Which is fine. Yeah, it’s fine. Helpful even, to allay Beverly’s concerns. Chris knows they’re together, and certainly knows they’re serious enough that Abbot wants to leave Callahan to move to Boston. So what’s the difference between that and assuring Beverly they’re in this for the long haul?
It’s Chris. He’s the difference. Chris’s mind works in one direction, and Ned knows exactly what that is. And his mouth works twice as fast as his brain, and Ned’s already turned his phone on do not disturb, which is lucky because he probably has a half-planned wedding he doesn’t know about yet.
No, it’ll be fine. Ned sets his laptop on the lectern as gently as he can.
His hands are damp. Giving this talk today is already enough, thanks very much to the damn universe.
Chris is just doing what Chris does, exaggerating everything he’s excited about.
Beverly heard what she wanted to—what she needed to, really.
She has to sell their relationship to HR, and Chris did them a favor.
Married, Ned thinks. Shit.
“You can go ahead and start.” Beverly takes a seat in the front row, setting her phone on her thigh.
Ned takes a long breath, hooking his laptop to the projector with fingers that fumble the job.
He scans the room as the screen turns from the blue of standby to his opening slide and tries to remember what he’s supposed to say.
His name, he’s sure. Who he is. What he’s doing here, talking to this small scatter of people amidst mostly vacant seats.
“I’m Ned,” he says to the room, sure his voice is too loud and belatedly realizing maybe he should have said Dr. Coppola.
But it’s too late now, because he’s started and he has to keep going.
“Thank you so much for having me. I’m going to talk about research I’ve done into first-generation college students, with a focus on retention.
I’m seeing some interesting trends here at Newbury that we’ll take a look at today, too. ”
Flattering trends, he’s made sure to include. About how well the university is keeping its first-gen students enrolled year after year. He hits the wrong key to advance a slide and it’s an awkward moment before he gets it right.
No. Stop. He can’t mess this up, and he’s starting all wrong. He needs to get a grip, and to focus, and to get Beverly on board with his talk, because she’s sitting there with her phone balanced on her thigh, the screen lit up and her eyes darting to it once and then twice.
Ned circles in front of the lectern and leans back against it, looking through the handful of people to catch the eyes of some of the youngest. “Newbury University, right?” Ned asks. “Anyone else grow up hearing about this place?”
The barest of nods, and he forges forward.
“So my folks live right across the river, my dad runs an auto shop, and my mom’s done a couple different things for work.
Nobody in my family went to college, and when we were high school seniors, my best friend didn’t even apply.
Of course, now he has no student debt, so maybe he took the right road out of high school. ”
There, a little chuckle. Reeling them in with the dark humor of loans is always guaranteed to work.
“I went to take the SAT, and everyone else had water bottles and snacks and extra pencils—I know, ancient history, because you undergrads today don’t have to painstakingly fill in those little bubbles, since you get tablets or whatever now.
But that was my first introduction to this other world kids my age lived in, prepared for this test while I had to borrow a pencil sharpener after the first break. ”
Beverly’s looking up at him now. Good. Boarding school, Ned remembers. She was on the other side of the divide he’s talking about, he’s sure.