A Plain Woman

Sandra Smith was a plain woman with a plain life. She worked in an office, in a large building of offices, in a neighborhood with many office buildings just like it. Every day, she ate one of three sandwiches for lunch: tuna, turkey, or a BLT with honey mustard. She clocked in at 8 am, and caught the train home at 4:35 pm. Two days a week she stopped at the market around the corner from her apartment building to buy groceries. She ate dinner in front of the TV, and fell asleep with a book in her hands. Her light brown hair curled under predictably at the ends, and her brown eyes saw the world through a pair of rectangular brown frames. All appearances pointed to Sandra as a plain, yet pleasant, woman. Some might even call her “mousy.”

But Sandra Smith had a rich inner life.

When she was not deeply engaged in her own life, which was most of the time, Sandra lived her life in daydreams. She had several favorites, and they rotated throughout the day. There was her first major TV interview, for instance. Sandra rehearsed the same answers to the same questions in her head, one day to Jimmy Fallon and the next night to Oprah. Usually she was explaining her motivation for her latest book or coyly hinting at details of a relationship with whatever her current celebrity obsession was. Sometimes she imagined herself as a villain, enacting precise and extravagant methods of revenge on anyone who had slighted her (either real or imagined). Other times she played the hero, befriending a lonely kid whose favorite uncle just happened to be a very grateful Henry Cavill, or rescuing a lost dog and getting a huge cash reward that was just enough to pay off all her credit cards. But of all her daydreams, her favorite was dancing.

In her mind, Sandra was an accomplished dancer. Self taught, mostly, and such a fast learner. Often in her daydreams, a handsome and talented man would chance upon her in her studio, and upon hearing what a short time ago she had begun dancing, he would remark, “No! It simply cannot be!” Sandra would explain her astounding progress with an offhand joke about being single and having a lot of time on her hands. And the handsome man’s eyes would narrow, and he would smile, and say, “No. It simply cannot be.”

Sandra imagined her dancing would open every sort of door for her. To love, to money, to independence. It would make her easier to talk to. More desirable. Stronger.

In reality, Sandra found her own body to be awkward and cumbersome. She sometimes tried to dance, alone in her apartment, but despite being totally alone she still somehow felt embarrassed. Her body moved in a rigid, lumbering way, and her arms always managed to stay pinned to her sides. It was not freeing like it was for younger and more beautiful women in the movies. It was fraught with insecurity and internalized shame.

But in her mind, Sandra was a star. Sexy, athletic, and unnervingly talented—and all on top of her full time job as a corporate accountant! At any given point in the day, whether working or sitting on the bus with her headphones in, Sandra was dancing. Her body moved almost imperceptibly to the music in her head, shifting and moving in time with the images that played in her mind.

In her mind, she was powerful, graceful, sensual. In her life, she was a cog in a machine she willingly aligned herself with, rendered invisible by the regularity of her everyday existence. And it was at her job Sandra most often found herself lost in daydreams.

It was at work, in the break room, that Jimmy started up a conversation with her. She had just gotten coffee, and on her way out she opened the door for him. He said hello, and she watched him as he walked past her to the pot of coffee at the other side of the room. A green light shone at the top to indicate a freshly brewed pot.

Jimmy said something about the weather, and Sandra replied with something equally boring, all the while staring at the green light. It reminded her of the lights at her best friend Jessica’s party in seventh grade. They were tacky LED lights, but they were totally “in” at the time, and they wrapped around Jessica’s living room at the ceiling and the floor. It was a memory Sandra revisited often, rewriting it, erasing the parts she regretted and replacing them with new ones. In this version, she hung back from the rest of the crowd, watching her peers dance but casually refusing to participate. It made her look aloof and mysterious in the coolest of ways, and only made people want to get to know her more.

In reality, Sandra did not casually watch as her peers partook in the intoxicating ritual of adolescence. Instead, she partook as well. And she danced. She danced with all her heart, twisting her body to the rhythm of the music, her eyes closed, her arms above her head. She felt more alive that night than she ever had before. And when she opened her eyes, everyone she knew was laughing at her.

“Sandra, did you hear me?” Jimmy said.

Sandra shook her head, tearing her eyes away from the green light on the coffee pot and reorienting her mind to the present situation.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“The company is closing,” Jimmy said again. “Andrew just got an email, they’re officially announcing it tomorrow.”

“What?”

“Yah, crazy, huh? We’re all gonna be out of a job in like… I dunno… a month or two? What do you think you’re gonna do?”

In fact, it was a month and a half. And Sandra did not have any idea yet what she was going to do.

Sandra found herself, one month and 16 days after that particular conversation, sitting aimlessly in her apartment at 11 am. She was suddenly devoid of routine, devoid perhaps of purpose, and at a total loss for how to proceed. The last time she did not have a clear plan for the next steps in her life was… well, never.

That first day she spent in a perpetual daydream. Depending on her mood, which rose and fell like the tides every few hours, she was either beginning her new career as a dancer, or she was dying of cancer. In either case, she was utterly wanted, even if it was only because she was soon going to die.

The second day, Sandra took her daydreams outside and sat in the park. She ate her usual breakfast bagel on a bench instead of the train to work. A few hours later, she bought lunch at a nearby bistro, and didn’t even order a sandwich. After lunch she walked around the city aimlessly for hours. She browsed department stores, bought a drink at every coffee spot she passed, and ate her dinner based on the food truck recommendation of a random passing stranger. By the end of the day, she realized she hadn’t daydreamed in hours. She felt, simply, full.

That night Sandra lay awake for hours, not daydreaming, but thinking. Thinking about the future. About how wide open and full of possibilities it was, possibly for the first time in her life. From the moment she entered high school at least, Sandra had planned every move she made. Her life was utterly predictable, strictly controlled. A neat and tidy box of her own making.

Finally, she sat up in bed. She wandered into the dining room, where the tiny green light from her fully charged laptop was all that illuminated the small space. She sat at the table and opened it.

Once she had a friend named Karen whose life was full of adventure. Sandra lived vicariously through Karen, who used her vacation time to do exciting things instead of visiting her parents in Michigan. Once, she even came back from vacation with a new tattoo. She had been to something called the Full Moon Party on an island in Thailand. Endless crowds of people, dancing, and drinking on a moonlit beach. It was the most exciting thing Sandra had ever heard of.

She looked it up, and twenty minutes later found herself staring at a United Airlines checkout screen. Her finger hovered over the mouse for what seemed like ages. Finally, she just did it. One ticket to Thailand—day after tomorrow.

Three days later, Sandra walked onto a busy white sand beach in Koh Phangan. The sun had not yet set, but bodies crowded on the beach, jostling together as they stood in line at the many booths lining the beach selling mixed drinks in small plastic buckets. Sandra strolled past the hordes in order to walk along the edge of the water, allowing the waves to lick against her sandaled feet. She stopped and looked out across the ocean, breathing deeply and smelling the salty air. Every inch of her felt alive, as if her spirit was using muscles it never knew it had before. She closed her eyes, listening to the steady beat of techno music behind her as the sun went down, and then turned back toward the beach and joined the party.

And Sandra danced.

Surrounded by hundreds of sweaty, happy people, Sandra danced like she had never danced in her life. Her arms raised above her head, she jumped, twisted, and shook to the music as it reverberated through her chest and into her feet. The crowd moved like it was one organism, and Sandra felt dizzyingly anonymous as she moved along with it. Soon she found herself dancing with a stranger, a handsome man whom she never would have dreamed of approaching in her normal life. But here, on the beach in Koh Phangan under the full moon, his hands gently grazed her hips as he danced with her, and he smiled in admiration at every move her body made. And her body was not awkward. It was wild. It was powerful.

Behind the handsome man, a DJ stood on a raised platform, green lights flashing above his head and throwing the crowd into a strange, shining illusion. For a moment, Sandra felt like she could fly.

“Sandra, did you hear me?” Jimmy said.

Sandra shook her head, tearing her eyes away from the green light on the coffee pot and reorienting her mind to the present situation.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“I said they’re replacing the computers down on the third floor with all new ones. You think they’ll replace ours next?”

Sandra stared at Jimmy’s face. His smile was wide and eager like a child. Sandra felt a sudden and bizarre feeling of disgust toward him in that moment.

“I think I’m quitting,” she mumbled, looking around at the room she stood in with new eyes.

“I’m sorry?” Jimmy said.

Sandra looked him in the face again. “I quit,” she said. “I fucking quit!”

Jimmy stood bewildered as Sandra flung her full cup of coffee into the trash can and ran out of the break room. She gathered her things from her desk rapidly, almost in a panic, and fled from the fourth floor accounting office to the streets below. Once she was on the sidewalk, she breathed deeply, grateful for the unconditioned air in the her lungs. Then she walked all the way home.

The full moon was only one week away, and she had plans to make.