Johanna

If there were an easy way out, Johanna would take it. She was beginning to feel like a coyote with one leg in a bear trap. She could see herself, laying there, staring at that one unfortunate leg, contemplating chewing it off. She knew how much it would hurt, but she wondered how much she would regret it, if at all.

She could hear faint footsteps, growing louder with each beat, so she sat upright. A small-faced man with round wire-rim glasses and a bushy mustache poked his head in.

"Are you going to be finished before tonight, Johanna?"

Johanna pretended to study something and then looked back up at him. "Hmm, maybe. We'll have to see."

He nodded and disappeared, leaving Johanna feeling caged and trapped again. She spun her chair around in a circle and then stared at her desk again. There was a short stack of papers on one side and a messy array of half a dozen sheets on the other. In the middle sat her keyboard and computer screen, which stared back at her with a black, empty gaze. On the other side of her desk were two chairs angled towards her, as if two invisible people were sitting there, having a deep conversation with her.

She could see them now, a woman with fine lines embedded in her face, marking the outlines of a smile and a hearty laugh, and a man with thick black hair, just starting to go grey around the edges. He leaned forward, looking over his imposing glasses at Johanna, asking her if she knew what she was doing. He seemed a little intimidating from appearance, but his eyes bespoke the kind of concern that stemmed from a deep, pure love. The woman laughed, but not cruelly, tossing her long, untamed brown hair over one shoulder. She insisted Johanna always knew what she was doing, she just simply wasn't worried about the outcome.

Johanna furrowed her brow. She was worried. If she wasn't worried, she would have already made the leap. She was about to protest the woman's claims out loud, before she realized her parents weren't really there. They weren't having this conversation right now, they were having this conversation five years ago, with a blue laminate dining table between them, not an office desk.

With the setting clear, Johanna rehashed that conversation in her head. She had protested her mother, claimed that she was worried, and tears had welled up in her eyes. Her father noticed and reached across the table to hold his daughter's hand. He didn't say anything, but he made Johanna feel a million times better instantly. Her mother had stood and walked into the other room, moving some dishes and making some noise, but coming back empty-handed. She leaned in the doorway, absorbing the scene in front of her, the man she loved most in the world, comforting her one and only daughter. The one and only daughter who wanted to pick up her things and move hours away from everything she knew, to a city she had never been to. A city that never slept, a city that moved and breathed as if alive, and a city that would swallow up this innocent, naive little girl and spit her back up in a matter of months. This woman, a mother to three boys and one girl, lived her life carelessly. She refused to worry, to consider the worst situations, or to prepare for possible ill outcomes. She had raised her daughter to approach things the same way, but she could see now that her baby girl had picked up habits from her over-thinking, always-prepared father. This girl, who used to laugh and dance barefoot down the sidewalk, was now worrying, truly concerned, and planning ahead.

Letting out a long-overdue sigh, the kind that welled up from her very heart, Johanna's mother walked back to the table and sat down. In the next few hours, both of her parents relented and agreed that this move really was the best thing for Johanna. Over the next month, Johanna packed all of her belongings into her little car and drove halfway across the country to start her dream job in her dream city.

Almost exactly five years later, she found herself feeling trapped, sitting in a chair, in front of a desk. The window behind her looked out at this dream city of hers, but all she could see were buildings and windows and smog.

Johanna wiped a tear off her face before she realized she was crying. She spun her chair around to face the window, knowing that she couldn't hold back the tears any longer. She wished that her parents were with her, right then, to tell her what to do.

She knew what they would have said, though. Her mother would say to follow her heart, to do what makes her happy, and to go where the light is. Her father wouldn't say much - he never did. He would make sure she was prepared, and he would worry about her, but he would never have told her what to do.

So what would make her happy? Where was the light? More tears rushed forth, momentarily blinding Johanna. She knew where the light was. She knew what she needed to do. She needed to chew her leg off.