Plain Jane

Jane was good at a lot of things. But she was very good at only three things. They were:

1) Holding her breath. Four minutes and three seconds was her personal best.
2) Bowling. Her average was a 230.
3) Pretending to be happy. Or more specifically, pretending to not be miserable.

Yes Jane was very good at pretending to be happy. She mastered the art of delightful small talk. Her craft was honed during countless elevator rides and drunken office parties. When people asked about her job, her family, or her life overall, she simply affixed her perfect smile and recited her well-rehearsed soliloquy on how fucking happy she was.

Even with her "close friends," Jane was ostensibly happy. She pretended to ooh and aah over her friends' work woes, their new boyfriends, or the new cashmere sweaters they bought at Bloomingdale's. Their conversations were more like empty noises than real conversations. The more she spoke about herself, the more hollow her chest felt.

And every night, she would come home to her empty, spotless apartment, jog on her treadmill for an hour, shower, and make herself a turkey rye sandwich. Then without fail, she would cry for about two hours. Afterwards, she would wipe her eyes, brush her teeth, wash her face, and go to bed.

It was all very routine. The cycle would repeat the next morning. And repeat. Jane took a special pride in this gift she had, the gift to pretend.

That was until one day. One point five hours into her nightly crying spell, there was a soft knock at the door. She grabbed a tissue and opened the door with a "what?"

There was a man there. "Are you okay?" he asked.

"Yes," she said, covering her blotchy face with her tissue.

"Okay. I was just leaving my buddy's apartment and heard you and just wanted to make sure everything was all right."

"I'm fine," she said.

"You don't seem fine," he pressed.

"I'm fine," she repeated. "Um, I'm just going to get back to--"

"Get back to crying?" he said. She looked at him. Did he just smirk?

"I'm Jared by the way. May I ask your name?"

She was not obligated to give her name to a completely random stranger, but she did. "Jane," she said, "Plain Jane." He blinked at her. God, why did she get Tourette's whenever a not-so-ugly guy spoke to her?

"Hi Jane," he said.

"Okay gotta go bye," she said closing the door on his smirk.

She went back to her couch and box of tissues to resume crying. She still had twenty-five minutes left. She sat there and waited. Nothing happened.

"Goddamn it," she muttered to herself. Goddamn that smirk. That guy. What's his name. Jared.