Page 4 of Tour Wars
“Go away.”
“Come on, Em. Don’t you know you shouldn’t drink alone?”
“I wasn’t drinking alone.” Did he think she was that pathetic? When he raised his eyebrows, her scowl deepened. “Dusty was with me. She and Stuart left a few minutes ago.”
“Right. So?” He pointed to the barstool.
“Whatever. But I’m not going to talk to you.” She downed the rest of her mojito in a hasty gulp, shivering as the rum coursed through her system. She was tempted to get up and leave but didn’t want TJ to assume he’d driven her away. Instead, she foolishly ordered another cocktail.
She was hoping he’d let her drink in silence, but he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. “How’d your interviews go?”
“Terrible. Is that why you’re here? To rub it in? I’m sure you aced yours.” She waited for him to tell her how well they’d gone. How he’d wowed the hiring committees with his knowledge and experience. Because he was nothing if not boastful.
He scraped a hand through his tawny brown hair. “I’m not usually lacking in self-confidence, but…”
Truly, that was the understatement of the century.
“I didn’t feel great about them,” he said. “Too much is at stake. You know?”
For once, this was something they could agree on. “Yeah. There are hardly any listings, and only four are tenure-track.”
She’d gotten a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach when she reviewed the available postings. Landing a job as a tenure-track professor—a position with guaranteed job security in the cutthroat world of academia—seemed as elusive as discovering a lost tomb laden with golden artifacts.
TJ drove out a harsh sigh. “There aren’t a lot of museum posts, either. If I can’t line up something, then I’m screwed.”
“There’s always contract archaeology.” Before starting grad school, she’d spent a year working in cultural resource management, or CRM, doing salvage archaeology in Arizona. Even if the pay hadn’t been ideal, she’d gotten hands-on experience conducting records searches, ground surveys, and excavations on sites designated for construction.
“You did that before, right?” he asked. “Would you consider it again?”
“Maybe. Now that I have a graduate degree, I could be a project manager, but…”
“But it’s not the dream, is it?”
She shrugged. “You’ve seen the stats. Most archaeologists end up in CRM.”
Some people—like her friend Rick Langston—preferred it to the academic grind. But if she went that route, her dad would be so disappointed. Though she’d warned him an academic gig wasn’t a sure thing, he’d already started referring to her as “Professor Flores” in the family group chat.
By pursuing a teaching career, she was carrying on the legacy left by her mom, who’d been a devoted third-grade teacher until her untimely death from a car accident sixteen years ago. A loss that had left a painful void in Emilia’s heart. Even though her extended Mexican American family provided her with plenty of love and support, no one could ever take her mom’s place.
“There’s always the post-doc option,” TJ said. “That’s my fallback. Get a sweet post-doc for a year or two, then look for something more permanent. If that fails, there are fellowships to travel and do research overseas.”
While she didn’t want to boost TJ’s ego any more than necessary, she couldn’t deny his idea had merit. “That’s not a bad plan. A paid stint in the Mediterranean would be awesome.”
“Wouldn’t it, though? Any preference on where you’d want to work?”
As hesitant as she was to reveal too much of herself to him, she couldn’t stop the response that slipped out. “Italy. Nowhere else comes close.”
In addition to working on three excavations there, she’d spent five months on a conservation fellowship in Florence. She’d never been happier than when surrounded by all that history and culture, not to mention the delicious food.
“I’m gonna look into those travel fellowships,” she said. “You okay with a little competition?”
“I’ve never been afraid of competition. You know that.”
“You don’t have to sound so smug about it.” She downed the rest of her cocktail in a quick swallow. Time to put an end to this miserable day. But when she eased off the barstool, her legs wobbled, and her head spun. She clutched her stomach, fighting off a sudden wave of nausea.
What the hell? She’d only had three drinks. Or was it four?
Four. Or five, if you counted the tequila shots she and Dusty had done earlier. Just enough to push her over the edge. Clutching onto the stool for balance, she tried to right herself. At least she’d had the sense to change out of her heels.
