Great Big Beautiful Life(65)

“No,” I say. “No. That’s not what this is about.”

On my next glance, I see his skepticism.

“It’s about…work,” I say, as vaguely and innocuously as possible.

His features tighten and he turns his gaze forward again. “Ah.”

“Sorry,” I say. “I know we can’t talk about it.”

There’s a long silence before he says, “We can’t talk about her. But we can talk about you. If there’s a way to do that, without…” He trails off, but I know what he’s saying.

The problem is, I’m not sure there is a way to separate the two: what Margaret’s saying and how I’m feeling. It’s all braided tightly together.

The thing that’s gripping me right now, the part of Margaret’s and my last conversation that I can’t shake, isn’t just her sadness, her melancholy, her air of loneliness, or even the way the poised, confident octogenarian had become almost childlike in front of me, but the fact that, for the first time, I felt sure she was telling me the truth.

The whole truth, not a modified version with select bits and pieces tweaked or dodged.

It’s interesting, how this part of her family’s history—the part most firmly planted in her point of view—is also the most honest.

It’s nearly the opposite of what that famous quote suggests. There might be three versions of any story, but does that mean that hers is any less true?

Maybe truth is less about a compromise of conflicting viewpoints and more about an integration of them. The thought discomfits me. I’ve always wanted to make my interview subjects feel seen and heard, but there’s also been a comfort in believing I’m nothing more than a conduit, a funnel, for the truth to pour through, a sieve catching and dispelling any unnecessary bits.

It changes things, to think that maybe everything is necessary. Maybe truth can’t be whittled out of a pile of research but instead has to be built from all of it, no spare pieces left behind, absolutely nothing discarded.

And if that’s the case, how can I possibly succeed—at this job, or any other?

From the passenger seat, Hayden sighs and scrubs a hand over his face. “I wish I could help you.”

“I’m okay, really,” I promise him. “I guess I’m just…do you ever doubt the job?”

One inky eyebrow curves up. “Doubt the job? How so?”

I shake my head. “I don’t know. Forget I said anything.”

There’s a long pause, no sound but the highway whirring under our tires as the sun beats down on the glass and the kudzu-covered trees whip past us on either side of the road.

“I haven’t seen you like this before,” he says with a small, tight frown.

“What? Mopey?” I say. “It doesn’t happen much.”

“Is it because you’re going to see your mother?” he asks.

My stomach clenches and relaxes. “I don’t know,” I admit. “Maybe.” It hadn’t occurred to me, but it feels true.

When I’m with my mom and sister, no matter how many times I promise myself I’ll handle things differently, I always catch myself sliding into the defensive when it comes to my job. Trying to legitimize it in their eyes.

“It’s not like she’s rude about my work,” I clarify. “She really isn’t. It’s more just…what she doesn’t say.”

“That she’s proud of you?” he guesses.

My cheeks flame. “I’m thirty-three. Why do I care?”

“Everyone cares,” he says.

I give him a look.

“Fine,” he says. “The vast majority of people care.”

“When do you think you stop?” I ask. “When you’re forty? When they die?” I shoot him a teasing look. “When you win a Pulitzer?”

He scoffs quietly. “No, not then. Because then, suddenly, they’re incredibly proud, but they’re proud of the accomplishment, not of the work. So you feel like you have to keep accomplishing instead of just creating. It affirms the idea that the value in what you do is how people react to it, and not just in the making of it. I’ve written stuff I’m really proud of that hardly anyone read. I’ve written stuff I’m proud of that no one liked. That doesn’t mean it didn’t deserve to be written.”

Now I’m genuinely smiling, my mood lifting almost instantly. “That’s a nice thought.”

His huge shoulders lift in a shrug. “It’s true. How many of your favorite shows got canceled? How many of the best albums barely sold when they came out? I mean, It’s a Wonderful Life was a box office flop in its time. If everyone who worked on that movie had known, could see how things were going to pan out in the short term, would they have even bothered to make it? And then the world would’ve lost out on something beautiful. Just because something doesn’t make money or win awards doesn’t mean it doesn’t have value. Or doesn’t deserve to exist. The job is alchemy. You take a hunk of rock and you try to turn it into gold, and the gold isn’t even really the point.”

“Right, because the goal is immortality,” I joke.

“It’s permanence,” he says. “Not, like, having your name on the side of a fucking airplane or skyscraper, or some shit like that. But bringing something intangible into the world that can live on without you. Something bigger than the person who made it. And even then, the goal is secondary to the process. The process is for us. It changes us in ways that can’t be measured. At least, that’s what I’ve always thought.”