I Quit My Job Today
by Precipitate8
I quit my job today. All these people I’ve worked with for a year, in constant fear of what they thought about me and how well I was feigning sanity, all these people now dispose of themselves as friends. As I leave for the last time, I feel strangely full of remorse, as I may not ever see them again, even though I had always thought I cared less about any one of them.
Especially Juliet. Juliet is the tall blonde, with dainty maneuvers and delicate hands. She has a blushing red innocence as she laughs, barely picking at a salad with an arched wrist and manicured fingers manipulating a fork. Her eyes always make her appear to be daydreaming about kittens, and flowers, and newborn babies, when you realize you’ve been staring at her eyes too long. She’s the kind of girl that puts on classy lingerie for her husband, to try to satisfy his every desire.
This girl had never been rejected. This girl had belonged to Daddy and now she belonged to her husband. I would sometimes watch the outline of her body as she bent over to get something out of a bottom drawer in the laboratory, following the line from her feet, up her legs, over her hips, back into her waist, and just over her tiny bust line, a perfectly fragile complement to the rest. This process would be broken by her standing up and complaining that the diamond in her wedding ring was so large that it kept ripping her latex gloves.
She will misplace data, and pass it off that she is a stupid airhead. She reads Keroauc, Wilde, Camus, and lesser known contemporary works of intellectual stature. She never gets sarcasm unless no one else can get it and it needs to be explained. She has porcelain skin and a very pretty face.
Juliet thinks I don’t like her. I am very brief and obviously uncomfortable around her. In kind, she is always uncomfortable around me as well. One day it was just the two of us in the lab and we had finished our work early, so I suggested we bake some cookie dough left in the kitchen freezer. Working together and barely talking we made white chocolate chip cookies, and when she handed me one from the batch, I could see both our hands trembling from the weird, uncomfortable tension between us. Juliet is married. She does not exist.
Why is she pretending to be something other than smart and capable? I am so confused. Before I left today, we were alone and she told me, in her aristocratic southern accent, “I’ve never seen you so…happy.” But I had to look away because I was staring into her eyes again.
I wanted to tell her about my confusion. I wanted to know why she acted dumb and prettied her self up and revelled in childish innocence. I wanted her to reply that, “Everyone chooses who they are. I have made my choice.” I wanted to tell her thank you and blow her a kiss. But instead, I watched her drive away forever, leaving me to my void. Today, I said a silent goodbye to Juliet Levy.
