Author’s Note
My coworker, Isaac, encouraged me to enter a flash fiction contest last month. I wrote this story called “Today, I Pull My Life Together.” Fittingly, I woke up in the middle of the night and submitted it an hour past the deadline. Oops.
This story is part fiction and part nonfiction. It expresses real emotions I processed as I transitioned into a new living space last month. If I’m honest, I didn’t feel “settled in” until at least three weeks after my move. You’ll find before and after photos under the blog post. 🙂
Today, I Pull My Life Together: A Short Story
My bedroom is supposed to be my refuge. It’s supposed to be a place to unwind. As my company’s newest project coordinator, I’m a mouse chased around the office all day: everyone coming after me with frustrations and app glitches and ideas for revamping the system. When the day is over, I need my place of safety.
Instead, my stomach recoils as I step through my bedroom door. I maneuver around towers of open boxes and stacks of folded clothes. My new dresser sits in a large box unopened in the corner. A cup of Baja Blast lies on its side, staining a storage lid blue.
This is the picture that greets me every evening. Sometimes, I give up and go to bed. Other days, I clear out a few boxes, put some things away, assemble a nightstand or something. Try to pull my life together.
My standing desk came together before my dresser. “This girl has her priorities straight, alright,” I think with a cold laugh at myself. But my manager approved me to work a day or two from home each week, and I don’t want to waste that opportunity. Maybe this room can still be a refuge.
During an online shopping spree, I splurged on a fancy walking pad. Now it sits under my standing desk. Its box is next to it, taking up maybe 20% of the room’s surface area. But I can’t recycle it until I know the walking pad works.
If it works, will that release the pressure building up inside me? Will I not feel so trapped anymore?
I just need batteries for the remote.
I search the same five boxes that I searched yesterday. I know that I had a pack of AA batteries I never used. But where could they be? They aren’t with the hardware and odd ends that I keep in one box together. Any of these boxes could make sense, but they aren’t there. So I check the box with the iodine and too many shampoos and lotions. I dig through my sweater duffle bag. I search through my kitchen supplies and even my snacks. No batteries.
I hear my mother’s voice in my head. “Well, they have to be somewhere, don’t they?” She would always have my siblings and me turn the house upside down if anything were missing.
The scissors? They have to be somewhere. The missing sock? It has to be somewhere. The frozen chicken nuggets? They’re somewhere in that freezer. We certainly haven’t used the whole bag already!
Sometimes we would find it, and sometimes we wouldn’t. But this time, my siblings aren’t here. My energy drips away like the remains of my Baja Blast.
Mom’s voice continues to nag me as I pull up Amazon on my phone. In a few taps, I’ve added a pack of AA batteries to my shopping cart.
“I’m sorry, Mom. I wish I had my life together, but I don’t.”
Before/After Photos
August 1
August 22
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