Purpose in Napkins

MAY 2021 | CREATIVE WRITING (NONFICTION)

For the past two hours at the Expat, there’s only been one customer, and I don’t understand why the owner won’t send one of us, hopefully me, home. I can’t be on my phone, but I sneak it anyway because I desperately need to finish - you guessed it - this story for this class.  

I don’t know why this assignment is taking me so long; maybe it’s because I feel like nothing is good enough to share or submit. I want to be a good writer so badly. I want my words to make others feel something they don't let themselves experience. I want to be Fitzgerald at Walker's for the third read with a single tear as the sun is setting. I want to be Dickenson on two hundred-year-old scraps of paper floating, scribbles on napkins tucked into corners, waiting to be praised for their genius. 

Instead, she laughs at me while I reroll the clumpy silverware in striped linens. Dry conversations between servers and bartenders echo the restaurant as I silently pray for no guests so Jerry can send me home. I’m not sure if it’s “working” or if the coincidence is too ironic to pass, but the restaurant is still empty. I keep asking while Jerry keeps cursing.  

I linger behind walls to review my work, and I feel discouraged. I struggle believing I could ever be a good writer. Growing up my mom always told me that can’t communicate. At all. Forget “being good” because apparently, I couldn’t even “be”. That’s pretty tough thing to hear, and it’s no wonder I doubt myself so much. It took changing my major five times and some good grades on half-assed English papers to make me believe that maybe I can communicate. But that confidence shrivels as I mull over my assignment composed of shit sentences; sentences that drag around my feet like a ball and chain, clanking loudly and accomplishing nothing.  

Two hours pass, and they are terrible, filled with anxious dread I haven’t felt in a while. Overstimulated, too much caffeine, and not enough nutrients exaggerated my anxiety, and my anti-depressants weren’t helping me out very much.  

It’s seven; people finally show up. The influx of customers distracts me as I attend them, quickly but calmly (outwardly), and my hope was to leave work around nine, until a couple comes and sit in my section at 9:15, and my hope, along with my peace, vanishes.  

I keep biting the skin around my fingernails in worry. I need comfort. I need a person, so I text my person how stressed and hungry I am.  

Two minutes pass, I check my phone again. A Venmo notification reads:  

“Elijah paid you $20.00 – ‘Pls get din & write’”. 

My eyes begin to water in appreciation. I had just bought my flight to leave for my camp in Maine, and I won’t get my paycheck for a couple of days. I needed this even though I’d never ask.  

I hope my couple will leave fast, so I can grab something to eat before everything closes. They don’t, which is fair, but they’re nearly causing me a panic attack. I’m being dramatic; they’re fine - very nice people, but I just wished they had chosen a different night to eat out late. A night where I don’t feel like I’m losing my mind over a stupid assignment.  

I get off at 10:35 and walk to my car. I look for gluten-free places still open, but everything’s closed. What do I do? I don’t have any substantial food in the condo, and I know I’ll break down if I go home alone.  

I text Elijah back that I need a hug. And he says I should come over.  

I drive to “Pineview” – it’s not really a neighborhood, but that’s what the people who live there call it – and park outside of their duplex. I drag my feet up the stairs and walk into different house: the living room has drastically changed from its normal three-year-living look. The twenty-seven stolen road signs no longer hang from the walls. Primer smears the former chalkboard wall as paint cans and roller brushes lie upon a haphazardly placed tarp. The overhead light was on, dispersing this clinical white light that I’ve never seen, and the couches are closer in the center, to finally clean underneath them, I guess.  

My breath catches and a sob silently chokes me as I stare in astonishment. Water begins to fill my eyes, and I hurriedly search for a phone charger so that I can continue writing my personal essay, but everything’s displaced, and I can’t find one.  

What do I do? Panic high-fives my heart, dispersing a pain – that familiar crippling ache that screams “WHERE ARE YOU” – as my brain retaliates with impulsive looks to Chris’ empty room.  

There’s no charger here.  

I walk downstairs to the basement when Andrew’s emptied room stuns me a little.  

A moment passes while my eyes stare and my fingers brush what once was there. It’s strange without Lego pieces, biology textbooks, Bible verses and Costa Rica pictures missing from his room. But I don’t have time to get nostalgic; I push that ache away and enter into my boyfriend’s room, looking the complete opposite. Clothes are scattered everywhere, cords to an amp and other musical equipment lingers around the floor while fourteen empty cups stand on his nightstand. I shake my head (maybe next year he’ll be clean) and look for his charger. Nothing. Damn it. I can’t even find a fucking phone charger – and I text Elijah back asking for one.  

I return to Andrew’s room and sit on the carpet. Hobbes keeps rubbing his face against my hand, needy for scratches. I try holding him, but the fickle feline isn’t interested in cuddling.  

Footsteps indicate one of my boys; Elijah emerges from the staircase.  

“Hi.” I speak quietly.  

He moves close to me, wraps his arms around me from behind, like the time in January I showed him my favorite poem, and he kissed me, and the next night we went on our first date.  

“What’s wrong?” 

I don’t know how to articulate something so trivial yet spirit-crushing. I try to steady my breathing as tears collect in my eyes, again. 

“I was supposed to turn in an assignment – my creative nonfiction short story – last night.” 

“Uh-huh.” 

“And I didn’t.” 

“Okay.” 

“I’ve been trying to finish it, but I’m so behind.”  

“Mm-hmm.” 

“Especially because my workshop is tomorrow and my story isn’t even done.” 

“Okay.” 

“- and our professor hasn’t emailed the class our individual stories to read over and I think it’s because I haven’t submitted mine yet and my classmates are upset it’s untimely and I know this is all my fault and I feel so bad.” 

Elijah and I are facing each other as he gently caresses my face, wiping a streak from my left eye, tilting my head back to look me in the eyes.  

“Hey, it’s okay,” he strokes a lock of hair away from my face. “It’s okay, this happens. Do you think you can finish it tonight?” 

“Yes. I think.” 

“Then, okay, great. You can just send it tonight, and your professor will email everyone in the morning. What time does your class start?” 

“12:30.” 

“Oh, you’ll be fine!” he smiles.  

“Okay.” I sniff. 

He kisses my cheeks, the left, then the right. He places his forehead on mine. “I understand feeling upset by this situation – I’m not trying to belittle your feelings or anything, I just want you to know it’s okay, you’re going to be fine, and I love you.” 

I nod.  

“Besides, it’s a fucking Maymester. They can get over it.” 

I laugh, unconvinced and still feeling guilty, but grateful for his affection and his words. 

3 o’clock’s dinosaur chicken nuggets weren’t enough to sustain my ravenous stomach; I ask Elijah if he could make me something. He leaves to scavenge something as I try to write again.  

I’m trying to get over that fact that this has to be perfect – or even good for that matter – but I can’t. It’s like I have to prove to myself that I am a good communicator, despite what my mom says or what my peers could think.  

“Beasley!” 

Chan’s voice echoes down the stairs. A smile bursts from my face; I haven’t seen him in a while.  

“Hi, Chan!” 

A short conversation ensues; I planned on staying in the basement, trying to finish my work, until Chan tells me he’s leaving tomorrow at 6:30 in the morning.  

“Will you be back before Monday?” 

“No ma’am.” 

I drop my phone and run up the stairs to find our student commencement speaker leaning against the wall in his classic fashion: a baseball t-shirt, circle glasses, and straight jet-black hair underneath a faded red ballcap.   

Dashing up the steps, saying nothing, I squeeze his chest tight.  

“I leave on Monday.” 

He holds my embrace. “I’ll miss you, dude. Excited for you to go to Maine!” 

I give my best laugh. “Me too. Have fun being a real adult-” 

The stairwell door opens and a bright-green dinosaur shirt and jorts plops down to the landing.  

“It’s a darn shame that you gotta go to Maine all by your lonesome, with no one else from our house going with you.” 

Andrew laughs and keeps up Chan’s stupid bit. He asks me when I leave. 

“Monday.” 

“Sweet. Dawg, I’m so excited.” I see chaotic enthusiasm light his cheesy mustached-face as the thought of camp approaches. 

We all speak over each other for a minute when Chan asks Andrew if he wanted to smoke. 

“Smoke what?” I ask.  

Naturally, they don’t answer me, but bring down some cigarillos. Andrew has the great idea to smoke them inside, and Chan giggles as he lights Hogue’s roll.  

It’s so strange to see Andrew celebrating his last night in his home; it’s so weird looking at him and remembering this shy, scrawny, unintentional misogynist from high school into this funny, social, understanding person now. He’s changed so much. I mean, so have I. I came into college as blonde homecoming princess, the “Good Samaritan” of her class, the girl with hundreds of volunteer hours, UGA’s honors student, a microbiology major, and (hopefully) AXO’s future president. That’s how I described myself; that’s how he would have described me. 

Thankfully I’ve now found a firmer ground to build myself on than a resume filler. It just took stripping all my accolades away to uncover it.

Elijah comes down with a plate of tortilla chips, melted cheese, and shredded chicken. I thank him earnestly and shove them into my mouth while he complains, “Why? Why? Why in our house? Why next to my room?” and the boys keep laughing. He does too.  

The smoke fills the room, and it’s hard eating a stale plate of late-night gringo nachos with a tobacco taste infusing into my mouth. Elijah opens the window; Chan turns on the shower; Andrew chuckles and asks Chan, the guy who cooks his eggs on low heat, “did you think steam would displace the smoke?” 

Elijah turns around, “Listen man, we would have to steam clean this whole damn room, not just leave the shower on!” 

I continue eating and laughing. I haven’t spent time with all of them in weeks – I’ve been so busy - and I forgot how much fun I have.

Elijah makes a joke about feeling like he’s at his grandma’s house, and I laugh. He always makes me laugh. All of them do. I love them, and all of them love me, too, despite our radically different they are from each other. They make me feel like a member of the house, like I belong to 145 South Hampton Pointe because of them.  

Belonging is one of our greatest desires in life, but I believe this goes beyond simple acceptance in an individual relationship; everyone needs some Thing greater than themselves to fulfill our belonging need. You’d think that our Thing would be this house, but it’s not. My friendships with them and their friendships with each other were before and will be after this house. It’s a place for bonding, but it’s not our Thing. The Things that are greater than ourselves fashion us an identity, whether that's being a UGA bulldog or being in the LBGTQ+ community. This isn’t to say that you can’t be both, you can (and you usually are), but that the house on the hill isn’t theirs, isn’t my identity.  

The other two remaining roommates, Colin and Mike, come down and stir a ruckus as the smoke’s intensity grew. The girls next door pop in and Tyler Grey too, of course, while TJ gives Andrew and me a H.A.G.S. hug, and chaos proceeds to unfold in waves of loud, some intoxicated, voices.  

As quickly as everyone came, everybody disappears. Chan’s calling it a night, and I see Andrew and Chan hug for a very long time, and I would try to tell you how I felt, but I’m trying to make it through this story without sobbing, sorry.  

Chan gives me a quick side hug goodbye, and hop up the stairs. I leave Andrew on his floral couch and find his kitty on the sofa upstairs. I kiss Elijah goodnight, and I leave. 

Our Thing, I guess, isn’t really a thing at all, but a Being. Every member of the house and I know the same Greater Being. According to our Greater Being, our identities are fucked-up children who are still deeply loved. According to our Greater Being, who manifested as flesh to die for us, we are loved and called to love others. The Greater Being has taught us love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, and my friends and lover who know this same Being show me a portion of Its Love through forehead kisses, cinnamon tea, and spaghetti on the walls. 

According to my Greater Being of Love, I’m a communicator. I’ve always been a communicator. I've always been creative, I've always had an intriguing interest in expression, and I’ve always loved connecting and compelling people through my words. My God of Love fashioned me this way, not as Fitzgerald, not as Dickenson, but as Caroline Grace. Maybe my purpose beyond loving God and loving others is for this: to write. Maybe there will be a time where that purpose will be fulfilled, and I won’t need to prove to myself that I can; I’ll just know.  

Until then, I’ll keep rolling napkins.