“Yeah.”
“Oh my God. I’m sorry. I figured you’d be up at the crack of dawn this morning, with everything that’s going on.”
“It’s just graduation,” Mackenzie said.
“Ha! I wish that’s all it was,” Colby said in a slightly hysterical voice.
“Are you all right?” Mackenzie asked, slowly sitting up in bed.
“I will be,” Colby said. “Look…do you think you could meet me at the Starbucks on Fifth Street?”
“When?”
“As soon as you can get there. I’m heading out now.”
Mackenzie did not want to go – she really didn’t even want to get out of bed. But she had never heard Colby quite like this. And on such an important day, she figured she should try to be there for her friend.
“Give me about twenty minutes,” Mackenzie said.
With a sigh, Mackenzie got out of bed and took care of only the basics in terms of getting ready. She brushed her teeth, tossed on a hooded sweatshirt and running pants, put her hair in a sloppy ponytail, and then headed out.
As she walked the six blocks down to 5th Street, the weight of the day started to sit on her. She was graduating from the FBI academy today, just before noon, nestled in the top five percent of her class. Unlike most of the graduates she had gotten to know over the last twenty weeks or so, she would not have any family in attendance to help her celebrate this accomplishment. She would be on her own, as she had been for most her life, since the age of sixteen. She was trying very hard to convince herself that it didn’t bother her, but it did. It did not create sadness within her, but a weird sort of angst that was so old its edges had become dulled.
As she reached the Starbucks, she even noticed that traffic was a little thicker than usual – probably the family and friends of other graduates. She let it slide right off her back, though. She had spent the last ten years of her life trying not to give a damn about what her mother and sister thought of her, so why start now?
When she stepped into the Starbucks, she saw that Colby was already there. She was sipping from a cup and staring contemplatively out the window. There was another cup in front of her; Mackenzie assumed it was for her. She took a seat across from Colby and made a show of how tired she was, narrowing her eyes in a grumpy fashion as she took the seat.
“This is mine?” Mackenzie asked, taking the second cup.
“Yes,” Colby said. She looked tired, sad, and all around grumpy.
“So what’s wrong?” Mackenzie asked, skipping any attempt Colby might have of beating around the bush.
“I’m not graduating,” Colby said.
“What?” Mackenzie asked, genuinely surprised. “I thought you passed everything with flying colors.”
“I did. It’s just…I don’t know. Just being in the academy burned me out.”
“Colby…you can’t be serious.”
Her tone had come with some force but she didn’t care. This was not like Colby at all. Such a decision had come with some soul-searching. This was not a fluke, not some drama-filled last gasp of a woman plagued with nerves.
How could she just quit?
“But I am serious,” Colby said. “I haven’t really been passionate about it for the last three weeks or so. I’d go home some days and cry by myself because I felt trapped. I just don’t want it anymore.”
Mackenzie was stunned; she hardly knew what to say.
“Well, the day of graduation is one hell of a time to make this decision.”
Colby shrugged and looked back out the window. She looked beaten. Defeated.
“Colby…you can’t drop out. Don’t do that.” What was on the tip of her tongue but she did not say was: If you quit now, these last twenty weeks mean nothing. It also makes you a quitter.
“Ah, but I’m not really dropping out,” Colby said. “I’ll go to graduation today. I have to, actually. My parents came up from Florida so I sort of have to. But after today, that’ll be it.”
When Mackenzie had started the academy, the instructors had warned them that the drop-out rate among potential agents during the twenty-week academy session was around twenty percent – and had been as high as thirty in the past. But to think of Colby among those numbers simply didn’t make sense.
Colby was too strong – too determined. How the hell could she be making such a decision so easily?
“What will you do?” Mackenzie asked. “If you actually leave all of this behind, what do you plan to do for a career?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe something along the lines of preventing human trafficking. Research and resources or something. I mean, I don’t have to be an agent, right? There’s plenty of other options. I just don’t want to be an agent.”
“You’re actually serious about this,” Mackenzie said dryly.
“I am. I just wanted to let you know now because after graduation, my parents will be fawning all over me.”
Oh, you poor thing, Mackenzie thought, sarcastically. That must be so terrible.
“I don’t get it,” Mackenzie said.
“I don’t expect you to. You’re awesome at this. You love it. I think you were built for it, you know? Me…I don’t know. Crash and burn, I guess.”
“God, Colby…I’m sorry.”
“No need to be,” she said. “Once I send Mom and Dad back to Florida, all the pressure will be off. I’ll tell ’em I just wasn’t cut out for whatever bullshit assignment I was handed off the bat. And then it’s off to whatever I want, I guess.”
“Well…good luck, I guess,” Mackenzie said.
“None of that, please,” Colby said. “You’re graduating in the top five percent today. Don’t you dare let my drama bring you down. You’ve been a very good friend, Mac. I wanted you to hear this from me now rather than just noticing that I wasn’t around in a few weeks.”
Mackenzie made no attempt to hide her disappointment. She hated to feel like she was resorting to childish tactics, but she remained silent for a while, sipping on her coffee.
“How about you?” Colby asked. “Any family or friends coming up?”
“None,” Mackenzie said.
“Oh,” Colby said, a little embarrassed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know – ”
“No need to apologize,” Mackenzie said. It was now her turn to look blankly out the window when she added: “I sort of like it this way.”
Mackenzie was underwhelmed by graduation. It was really nothing more than a formalized version of her high school graduation and not quite as classy and formal as her college graduation. As she waited for her name to be called, she had plenty of time to reflect back on those graduations and how her family had seemed to fade further and further into the background with each one.
She could recall nearly crying while walking to the stage at her high school graduation, saddened by the fact that her father would never see her grow up. She’d known it through her teen years but it was a fact that struck her like a rock between the eyes as she had walked up to the stage to receive her diploma. It was not something that had stirred her as much in college. When she had walked the stage during her college graduation, she had done so with no family in the crowd. It was, she realized during the academy ceremony, the pivotal moment in her life when she decided once and for all that she preferred to be alone in most things in life. If her family had no interest in her, then she had no interest in them.
The ceremony