43. Morgan
Chapter 43
Morgan
I was so fucking done with work.
We were still two months from our Christmas event, but I was already being asked to share daily updates with the leadership team, and it was all the very last thing I wanted to be doing. I was so over it that I’d actually taken a break to read Mum’s latest email, all about her yoga certification and how she was starting to offer classes on her travels. That explained her latest postcard, which had been a beach with old-fashioned lifeguard hut on it, with the words “Nama-stay in Malibu” written in the sky.
I took solace each evening in my freelance work. I had finished the other projects Greg had referred to me, and I was now working on design mock-ups for a website for someone else in their Facebook group who was opening a used bookshop. I’d had to learn a lot about web design – accessibility, coding limitations, responsiveness – but just like when I’d been doing the Game On! Branding, I was enjoying learning about it.
I was only four days away from leaving for the Ren Faire, and two away from having to give the software company a decision. I’d managed to buy myself some time by negotiating the salary; my promotion at the rescue had definitely helped give me some leverage. They hadn’t quite been able to match it, but they’d closed the gap enough that it wasn’t a dealbreaker, especially given how much cheaper housing was in York.
That was a problem, too. Now that the house had sold, I needed to look in earnest for a place to live. And ideally it needed to be pet friendly; Pablo was just a week away from being moved, and I had every intention of taking him with me. So I needed to make a decision now about where I was going to live, which meant making a decision once and for all about where I wanted to work. I’d broken up with Jack over the fact that I was thinking about moving to York, so why was it taking me so long to pull the trigger?
Okay, that wasn’t fair. I hadn’t broken up with Jack because I wanted to move to York. I hadn’t been planning to break up with him at all, actually. But the moment he gave me an ultimatum, I was right back to feeling tied to another person like I had with Cara all those years. And given how much freedom I’d found, how much I loved being the one calling the shots in my own life, I couldn’t give it up. Wouldn’t, even.
I’d been all but ready to accept the job before my girls night with Chloe and Fatima. I’d even drafted an email. But that night had reminded me that life here wasn’t just about Jack, which made saying goodbye to it feel infinitely more complicated. So the email continued to sit in my drafts.
* * *
I was sitting at the manspread desk – despite the promotion, I still hadn’t been moved out of the Fundraising Corner – when someone I recognised from around the office walked over, a laptop tucked under her arm, her locs just tickling the tops of her shoulders. I caught her eye, and she waved in confirmation that she was coming to talk to me.
“Hey, you’re Morgan, right?” she asked.
“Yeah, hi,” I said, holding out my hand as I stood.
“Kim,” she said, her handshake firm yet brief. “I work in design.”
I stood up a bit straighter – I’d spoken to design over email, but I’d never actually met anyone from the team.
“How can I help?” I asked, trying not to sound too interested.
She pulled her laptop out from under her arm and opened it, setting it on the desk next to mine. There was a mock-up of a web page – the home page of the R escue website, from the look of it – with low-resolution versions of my illustrations for the gala dotted around.
“We loved what you did for the gala,” she said, “and we want to use it for the website. But as you can see, we’ve just used the screen grabs we could access for these mock-ups. Do you think you could send us the vectors?”
I felt a swell of pride at seeing my work on the website, even if it was low-res. But my creative wheels started turning immediately, seeing how the illustrations we had weren’t going to be quite right. We needed way more versions of the animals, and maybe some other illustrations. Otherwise it would look like polka dots of animal faces.
“I mean, I can,” I said, “but I feel like you need some variation, right?”
“Yeah,” Kim said, squinting down at the screen. “I was thinking the same thing. I can try to match your illustration style, I guess.”
I cringed – hopefully just inwardly – at the idea of someone else using those illustrations; trying to emulate them.
“Or I could just help with it?” I asked.
“I mean, that would be great,” she said with a smile, her voice high and hopeful. “If you’ve got bandwidth for that?”
Aaaaaaaand there was the catch. Of course I didn’t have bandwidth . Because I was too busy planning the Christmas event, which I hated.
“Let me double check,” I said; I couldn’t bring myself to say no without at least speaking to Simone. “I’ll let you know by tomorrow?”
“Oh that’s fine,” Kim said, closing the laptop and tucking it back under her arm. “We’re so underwater right now, it’ll probably be a few weeks until we get to work on this.”
I might not have a few weeks , I thought, but I just smiled and promised her I’d email her with either the vector files or confirmation that I could work on it myself.
Almost as soon as she was out of sight, I tiptoed over to Simone’s office, peeking through the window to see if she was inside. She was leaning forward over the desk, her head in her hands. It didn’t look like the best time, but I knocked on the door anyway.
“Come in,” she said, sitting up straight and putting on what, for her anyway, passed as a welcoming expression. “Oh hi, Morgan, how’s the leadership update for today coming along?”
“Uh, yeah, fine,” I said as I shut the door behind me. “It’ll be out by four as usual.”
She gestured for me to sit, and I did. She tried to ask me another question about the Christmas event, but I cut her off; if I let this turn into a logistical catch-up, I knew I’d lose my nerve.
“So, Kim from design came to see me,” I said. “She wanted to use my illustrations from the gala for the website.”
Simone nodded. She was only half paying attention, looking down her nose at her screen rather than at me, scrolling through something. “They were very good. I’m not surprised.”
“Thank you,” I said. “The thing is … well, they need more of them.”
Simone flicked her wrist dismissively. “Oh, I’m sure they can handle it,” she said. “Don’t let them worry you.”
I took a deep breath in. “Actually, I want to help them.”
Simone stopped scrolling and slowly turned her head, looking over her glasses at me. She looked me over for a long moment, narrowing her eyes as she took me in. I tried to look as calm and collected as possible, but I couldn’t quite control my shallow breathing.
“You know how busy we are with Christmas,” she said. “I don’t see how it would be possible to do both.”
I didn’t say anything yet; I could tell she was thinking.
“This is exactly what happened with the gala,” she said, probably remembering, as I was, how I’d burst into her office with my tablet in hand to ask if I could work on those designs. I felt even more passionately about it now than I had then, but I knew Simone, and I knew she wouldn’t appreciate another outburst. So I held my nerve.
“That’s right,” I said. “I really love the design projects.”
“More than the events themselves?”
She was so incredibly straight to the point. And whether it was because I had another offer to fall back on, or just knew what I wanted, I decided I would be direct, too.
I nodded. And mentally shat my pants, but she didn’t need to know that. I kept my face looking as unbothered as possible.
“Do you … want to work in design?”
“Ideally, at some point, in the long term … yes.”
“I see,” she said, sitting back in her chair and taking her glasses off. “I didn’t know that about you.”
I shrugged. “I didn’t either, really. Not until recently.”
She tapped one arm of her glasses to her lips, which were pursed in thought. She stayed that way for what felt like minutes, before she started nodding.
“Well, I can’t lose you until after the Christmas event,” she said. “You’re too far down that road. But if we can hire someone quickly enough to start working on the next event before then, I can make it work. I’ll put you in touch with the Design Manager so you can start interviewing in the meantime, though I suspect it’ll be more of a formality.”
My eyes went wide. Wait, what??
“Sorry,” I said, struggling to comprehend whilst my brain was busy doing pirouettes, “you’re just going to give me a design job? You’re not firing me?”
Simone laughed. “Fire you? Absolutely not. I’m gutted to lose you, in fact.”
“You are?”
“And no, I’m not giving you a job. But based on the fact that they want to use your designs for the website, I can’t imagine you’ll have a hard time getting it. I’d say that’s pretty good leverage, in fact.”
I stared at Simone for a long moment, appreciating her more than I ever had. This was the second time she’d done me what felt like a massive favour. I’d always been a little bit terrified of her, but it turned out she was my greatest ally in this place.
“I don’t relish the idea of having to hire your replacement,” she said, and I offered her a suggestion almost before she’d even finished the sentence.
“Chloe Barlow,” I said. “She’d be brilliant at it.” I didn’t even know if that was true, but based on how jealous she’d been of my promotion, I knew she should have the chance to try.
“Great,” Simone said with a huff, “so I’d just have to find a replacement for her instead. You know I still haven’t filled Cara’s role, and I haven’t even touched your backfill yet. That would be half my fundraising team gone.”
I shrugged. “Just an idea.”
“Okay, well, you’re giving me more work to do,” Simone said, waving me away. “Now get out, and keep an eye on your email.”
* * *
The decision should have been easy now; Simone had teed it up for me, and all I had to do was close the deal. I knew I could, too. For once in my life, confidence wasn’t the problem.
But when I thought about turning down the York job, staying at the Rescue, I couldn’t help but picture myself crawling back to Jack. I’d still be here, in his hometown. We’d still see each other every Monday night. And I’d still be madly in love with him.
And I was in love with him. I hadn’t said it back, because in the middle of our breakup had felt like the worst possible time to roll out that sentiment. But of course I loved him back. I’d been in love with him for months; since long before he had come to love me. Which is what made all of this so horrible.
As I sat on my window seat on Saturday morning sorting books into keep and donate piles – I was trying to get ahead of the monumental task I knew was ahead of me whenever the sale eventually went through – I thought about the concept of the fork in the road, and how many different places this decision could lead to. If I stayed, maybe Jack and I would get back together. Or maybe it would be too hard to be around each other, and we’d have another fall-out, this time in front of our friends. Or maybe he’d find someone else, and I’d be forced to watch their love unfold in front of me.
Or, if I moved to York, maybe I’d find someone else. Maybe I’d watch from afar or hear through friends when Jack eventually moved on. Or maybe I’d spend the rest of my life regretting leaving the one person I’d ever truly loved.
And that was just Jack. There were multiverses of possibilities, all of them laid out in front of me like the books I was combing through. I wondered in how many of them I was the one sending the postcards, and in how many I was still receiving them. I wondered in how many I was truly happy.
I picked up my phone, and it took me until my finger was over her name that I realised I was about to text Cara. She had always been the one I talked to about things like this. About everything, actually. But I hadn’t heard from her in months now. And I realised, as I put my phone down again, that I didn’t actually care anymore what she thought. She didn’t know Jack, and she didn’t know me. Not this version of me; the version who was taking things into her own hands for once.
No, I was the only one who could figure this out. I just wasn’t sure how to go about it.
The next book I picked up was the copy of The Hobbit Jack had bought me, because of course it was. The book that, more than any other for me, symbolised both my yearning for adventure and my ache for the man I loved.
The clouds shifted, and sunlight poured in over my face; the bad weather had broken, and it felt like we were going to get a bit of proper autumn for the next week or so. Not that I’d get outside at all to enjoy it; realistically, I’d be working, preparing for the move, packing for the Ren Faire, or just generally moping. Plus, I didn’t have Jack to drive me to whatever little adventures I wanted to have; he’d really been the catalyst for all the exploration I’d done over the summer.
But I realised, putting the book down, that that was bullshit. The whole reason I’d broken things off with Jack was because he was keeping me from getting to go on the adventure I wanted, right? So why was I letting his absence keep me from anything at all? Anything we’d done together, I should have been able to do by myself. And not just able, but willing.
I started by making myself my favourite chicken and blue cheese sandwich, eating it in the back courtyard that Jack had helped me clear. As I ate, I pulled out my phone and started making a list of everything we’d done together, seeing how hard it would be to do it myself. There was kayaking on the Wye … but the kayak rental place in town had shut for the season a couple of weeks ago. We’d been wild swimming … but I couldn’t actually figure out where we’d gone. We’d gone quad biking … but that had been his quad bike, and all the hire sites I found had a minimum party size. Then there was the hike…
Just when I thought I wouldn’t be able to figure out where we’d gone hiking, I had an idea. I opened up my photo gallery and found the picture I’d taken from the top; my phone had recorded the location. I pulled open my maps app and found the spot the photo was pinned, then used satellite and street views to find the car park.
But it was nearly forty minutes away, and in the middle of nowhere. There was no bus route that would get me within even a thirty-minute walk of the base of the trail.
I spent a short moment annoyed with myself for not knowing how to drive, but I was determined to do something – anything – for myself, so I picked the phone back up and rang the local taxi company. It took me five minutes to get the guy who answered to take me seriously.
“Fifty quid,” he said finally. “Each way.”
I was almost certain he was trying to talk me out of going, but I was nothing if not stubborn, so I booked the cab for ten minutes later and rushed upstairs to change. I had a point to prove.
* * *
An hour later, I was at the base of the hike Jack and I had taken all those months ago, forking over even more money to the taxi driver so he would wait for me. If I went out and back instead of doing the loop, I figured I’d be okay with the cash I had taken out for the Ren Faire.
As soon as I left the car park, I knew I’d be saying goodbye to my trainers after I was done; the entrance to the trail was basically a mud pit. But I kept my eyes fixed on the ridgeline, and over the next hour, I made it to the rock pile at the summit. My legs were on fire, and I could feel my face going pink in the sun, making me even more nostalgic for those summer adventures. I sat on the edge of the rock, overlooking two separate countries, and let myself feel the way I’d felt the first time I’d been here: invincible.
I’d wanted to hike this hill by myself, and I’d made it happen, at no small cost, literal and physical. This was what I wanted. This was the feeling I was chasing. This pride? I’d felt it secondhand in games, or in books. But I’d only felt it a few times in my real life, all within the last few months, and I wanted as much of it as I could get.
There was the first time we’d climbed this hill. The first time I’d gone swimming with Jack. The moment I’d sent Greg the Game On! logo. The night that I’d finally got over my own fear of how he’d react and kissed Jack. That was what I wanted.
And I realised, sitting there with my feet dangling off the edge of the world, that neither job, neither path in the fork, would get me any closer to that. No single decision would make or break the ability I’d found to chase what I wanted. To lean into the euphoria of living life on my own terms. I felt sure, for the first time ever, that I could find this feeling no matter where I was; no matter where I lived; no matter what I did for a living.
Like Jack had said on that rock by the river, and when he was pleading with me to stay, it wasn’t about some big quest. It was about approaching life with a spirit of adventure. And somehow, somewhere along the way, I’d acquired that spirit. I didn’t need anyone or anything else to help me find it: not work, not Cara, and not even Jack. For the first time, maybe ever, I understood what independence actually meant. And what it didn’t mean.
I pulled my phone out and snapped a selfie, and then a panorama; I knew I’d want to draw this moment later. Because as soon as I realised that I already had everything I needed inside me, I knew exactly what I wanted to do.