Page 14 of Wish I Were Here
“I have my orientation for new faculty members today.”
“It’s awfully, early, no?” Luca clicks on his phone to check the time and then he looks back up at me. “What time does it start?”
“It starts…” I mumble, knowing he’s going to judge me for this. “It starts at nine o’clock.”
His dark eyebrows shoot up against his bronze forehead. “You know it’s not even seven right now, don’t you?”
“Of course I know.”
“Of course you do. And you probably also know that the university is eight minutes from here.”
“I like to leave early. It gives me plenty of time to get organized.” I don’t mention that it’shisfault I’m so afraid to be late because it almost happened last time. I know he won’tagree with that assessment. Luca probably thinks that if you show up on the same day as the meeting, you’re showing up on time.
“You didn’t think leaving at six would be better?” he asks with a smirk. “Just to see the sunrise?”
I cross my arms over my chest.
He cocks his head and gives me a grin so wide it practically reaches all the way to his ears. “You thought about leaving at six, didn’t you? Come on. Admit it.”
I huff, but don’t answer.
“You did.”
Fine. Ididthink about it.
“Listen, if you need a ride, I can take you.”
“No. That’s really not necessary.” I narrow my eyes. “Besides, you need to stay here and get the elevator fixed.” Has he forgotten about it already?
“It’s no trouble. It will actually work out because I can swing by Dante’s house on the way back to drag him out of bed.”
“Maybe you should stay here and call Dante instead.” I shake my head, remembering Sal huffing up the stairs. “I can take the bus. My app says it will be here in five minutes.”
Luca shrugs like he doesn’t care one way or the other. “Suit yourself.” And then he reaches down to fluff the pillow that Mrs. Esposito in 6D gave him. Is he going to take another nap?
I remind myself that I have other things to think about and head out the door.
The bus comes right on time, and in fifteen minutes, I’m sitting in the lobby of the university’s human resources building. In order to kill time before my orientation starts, I pull out my laptop and get started on my research paper that I’m collaborating on with Dr. Gupta. Except that Dr. Gupta has yet to really collaborate with me. I emailed him a couple of questions last week, and he directed me to his graduate assistant. So I’m pretty much on my own.
Eventually, a number of other faculty members file into the lobby for the orientation, taking the chairs around me. At precisely eight fifty-five, an attractive middle-aged white woman in a stylish black suit enters the waiting area.
“Hello, all!” she says, her voice projecting around the room. “I’m Helen Hardy, and I’m your human resources representative for today’s orientation. Welcome to the university!” Helen has a blend of competence and enthusiasm mixed with a dash of goody-two-shoes-iness that leaves me no doubt she was her high school class president and college dorm resident advisor before she segued seamlessly into human resources. I like her immediately.
A few of the other new faculty members murmur, “Hello,” but most just nod and sip their coffees as if they’re not up for exclamation points this early in the morning. I guess these are the professors who will be teaching the evening classes.
I sit up straight and give Helen a wave. “Hi, Helen. It’s nice to be here.” I’ve been up since five, after all. I hate to leave her hanging.
She directs her wide smile in my direction and keeps talking. “We want to make sure that we stick to our schedule today”—Yay.Ilovesticking to a schedule—“so we’ll headinto the conference room in a moment. But first, I just want to point out that we have an incredibly diverse group of new faculty members from departments all over the university joining us here today.” Helen glances down at her clipboard. “Medicine, social work, biology, English literature, communications, computer science, nursing, chemistry…” She gasps. “My goodness, so much brainpower in one room.”
I raise a palm to point out that she accidentally missed mathematics. My department. But I remember the schedule, so I drop my hand back into my lap. I can mention it to her at the break.
Helen begins calling out the names on her clipboard. As each person stands, she checks it off on the paper and directs them into the conference room behind her. Slowly, each faculty member filters out of the waiting area until I’m the only person who remains seated in the chairs.
“And… that’s it for today.” Helen peeks at her clipboard and then back at me.
“What about me?” I nod at her clipboard. “You didn’t call my name.”
Her eyebrows knit together, and she stares at the paper now, tapping her pen next to each name. “I believe I got everyone on my list. What’s your name?”
