Chapter 2: Epic Fail

As soon as I opened my teller drawer, my heart started pounding.

All of my strapped and loose cash was there from the day before, in neat little rows.

How could you have left it out again? How could you have made such a stupid mistake?

Everyone went silent. They all knew what forgetting to put one's cash in the vault meant.

"Let's start counting," Kris, the head teller, whispered.

My insides writhed as Kris and I pulled the straps off the stacks of 100s and 20s to run through the money counter . We needed to account for every penny.

You didn't even lock your drawer!

My fellow tellers, Megan and Amanda, tried to small talk about their plans for this weekend, to cover up the general feeling of embarrassment. Every once in a while, they glanced over at me, and I hated their stares of pity. The world went blurry as tears threatened to spill over my eyes. My nose turned its characteristic shade of clown-nose bright vermillion that let the world know how pathetic I felt. I excused myself and went to the bathroom. My hands shook as I opened my bottle of Xanax. I swallowed one with tap water.

When we finished, and all the money sat safely locked in the vault, Dawn, the bank's manager sat down with me in the meeting room. With the Xanax kicking in, I felt an odd sense of detachment, like watching myself through a TV screen.

Can't get fired, can't get fired, I have never even been late before, can't get fired…

"Ariel," began Dawn. "I want you to know that you have been an exceptional member of the team."

I nodded numbly.

"And during your time here, you have made a valuable contribution to the family of Frost Bank."

Oh god. She was already talking in the past tense.

"I also want you to know that this is as hard for me to do as it is for you."

I doubt that very much, my thoughts so acidic you could make lemonade with them. You get to keep your job.

"But since this is your second time to leave your cash out overnight, we will have to let you go."

Why weren't my lungs working anymore?

"Now, because you have a history of working hard, excellent service, and following the rules, I want you to know that you will have full references from all of us."

But not full benefits.

"You can even say that you left by mutual agreement," Dawn said. "And maybe this will give you the opportunity to focus on your new job at the library!"

Please, for godssake, do not sound cheerful right now.

She gave me some papers to sign. My pen scrawled across the page, marking an end to my first job out of college.

As I drove home, numbers pinged in my head. Rent, groceries, electricity, car payment, insurance, and gas; internet, cat food and litter, tuition payments. Psychiatrist appointments. Therapist appointments. Prescriptions of Xanax, Buspirone, Celexa, Abilify. A merry-go-round of expenses.

When I walked in the door, Nolan, my boyfriend, was deep into a game of Smite. I heard explosions and deaths of various gods and goddesses from mythology.

"Hey babe, how was work?" he said, not taking his eyes from the computer screen.

"I got fired," I mumbled.

He paused the game and swiveled around in his chair.

"Aw babe, what happened?" He began to walk toward me.

All the tears I had been holding back unleashed. I dropped onto the futon and told him everything. He held onto me and stroked my hair. Once the worst of my sobbing was over, he made me my favorite tea, earl grey with lavender. I sipped, letting the warmth dissolve my shredded nerves.

"Everything will be alright," he said. "We'll figure out what to do."

I wished I could believe him.

*

That night, Nolan talked me down from a full-blown meltdown. He had already seen me in a wretched, unhinged state before. When I completed my "exit counseling" for my students loans from undergraduate, I had a panic attack.

I had $30,000 in federal student loans to pay for my tuition at Rice University. As interest rates and principal balances and forbearance warnings danced before my eyes, I began to realize how long it would take me to pay off my debt completely. The moment that hit with gut-wrenching clarity was when the fine print stated that my debt would never be discharged, even if I died; they would simply transfer it to my "guarantors," ie, my parents. So it didn't matter if I was six feet in the grave, somebody would have to pay the fucking piper.

I hated being in debt. It was punishment for having the audacity to want a higher education. Every time a notice from Nelnet pinged my inbox, it felt like a cold, clammy hand was squeezing my throat slowly but firmly. While I was in graduate school, I wasn't obligated to pay it back, but that just meant that the hand wasn't actively closing its fist. However, I knew it could.

Having that debt felt like a constant shadow hovering over me, just waiting to consume my life. I would feel fine about making $12.50 an hour and feel like I had my head above water…until the brick weighing 30 grand dragged me into dark, abysmal tides.

The knowledge that you owe an entire year's salary to an independent party eats at your brain after a while. Student debt was a dark, malevolent cloud that could strike me. Having substantial debt feels like your life belongs to someone else. When you owe money, it feels like every financial decision is a bad one. Don't spend more than $100 on groceries, get the old edition of the textbook, and never spend extra money on movies, music, books, tv, or anything remotely related to entertainment.

About a week later, I sat at the reference desk, completing my assignment for my Collection Development class. If you had a small $10,000 budget for a special collections library, which books would you purchase and why?

Every once in a while, I glanced over my shoulder to see if my supervisor were near. Technically I shouldn't do school work during my shift, but the temptation to work on an online class with the internet sitting right in front of me was too much to pass up. Besides, I loved Collection Development.

As I sat at the desk, I was feeling more optimistic than I had the week before, until a sinister voice slithered across my brain.

"You owe so much money…you'll never pay it off…you will live on ramen and canned green beans the rest of your life…"

Quiet voice, I'm trying to use the standards of content, reliability, relevance, timeliness, and accuracy to make up a collection for a fake library.

"You will not be able to pay the rent," it continued, oblivious to my desire for it to shut the hell up. "You'll have to move back in with your parents in Podunk, Texas. You'll be lucky to find a job as a shelver…"

My optimism evaporated. I glanced around. No one close except the student bent over a Calculus textbook. I should probably do the walk-about, I thought. In a minute.

My hand moved on its own. It opened up a new tab in Chrome.

Website: Craigslist.

Location: DFW.

Search term: stripper.

"Entertainers wanted!" read the ad with a busty blonde woman as the thumbnail. "We'll pair you with a seasoned dancer for you to shadow. No experience necessary! Apply in person! Always taking applications!!!"

The gears of curiosity began to turn and clank in my mind. Didn't strippers make loads of money in the movies? Didn't everyone always say, "Well, if this doesn't work out, I can always be a stripper,"?

I only work 19 hours per week, I reasoned. $16.78 isn't enough to pay the bills.

Baby Dolls, read the ad. So much for being against the infantilization of women, I chastised myself.

"Just go up there," said the voice, this time much more seductively. "Do it for a day, and if you hate it, you can quit."

Confession #1: I loved it.