Chapter Text
Stale coffee, the endless clacking of keys, and a dull throbbing behind her tired eyes crowded May’s senses; a miasma that seeped into her slowly and threatened to swallow her from the inside out. The soulless ministrations of her nine-to-five at the Joja Support Center had worn her down over the years.
That slow drizzle of dread had filled her bucket to the brim on that fateful winter day. What made the surface tension finally break and spill over came in the form of her manager— Jolene: a woman in her mid-thirties that took her job far too seriously, and the cruelest person May had had the misfortune of meeting in her life— dropping a stack of paperwork onto the overworked girl's desk just twenty minutes before her shift was supposed to be over.
With a false smile, Jolene let May know that she needed to have the extra work finished before she clocked out for the day.
”But it’s the end of the day,” May croaked, exhausted. “It’s impossible for me to finish all of this without staying late for hours.”
Jolene feigned a sympathetic expression. “Well then you’d better get started, hm?”
First, came sobs muffled into her hands as she sat on the bathroom floor. Then, came rage. It wasn't fair. May had been told by her professors that she had a promising future ahead of her, but they were all liars. She had ended up with a job that sucked any and all ambition out of her. The world had turned against her, and it felt like her ribs were being broken apart by her racing heart.
How embarrassing, she thought, to be found with tear stained cheeks, curled up on the grimy bathroom floor by a poor custodian. Or worse, her demon of a manager. She had to pick herself up, but she wouldn't return to her desk. May knew that sitting in that chair one more time would lead to her falling into true despair. She wouldn't be able to crawl out of that hole this time. She had no motivation left in her.
All May could think of at the time was her granddad: the one and only presence in her life that stayed steady as a stone. But he was gone, and she didn't know what to do without his guidance. Should she have quit her job and scrambled to find something that wouldn't cause her to fall behind on rent? Should she have gone crawling back to her parents with a one-way ticket to the other side of the country? And if she chose the latter, would they be ashamed of her?
Her granddad's last letter to her that she had been too scared to open was the only thing on her mind, and breaking that intricate wax seal felt like a point of no return. The sight of his eccentric font was enough to make her hiccup. Her fingers trailed over the paper as if she could find his voice through the indents of his words. The contents of that letter caused her to fully break.
His final wish was to have her care for his farm in the valley she practically grew up in. Every summer was spent there from the time she could run, until she became a tween. Regret filled her throat as she thought about how long it had been since that farm had been left to the whims of nature.
For hours, May stewed in this complicated concoction of emotion, and slowly, her resolve steeled. This could be the answer to her pleas to the universe for something, anything else than the purgatory she was due to return to in less than five hours at that point.
She made the decision to accept her granddad's wishes and move to Pelican Town before she had the time to back out. She had developed the habit of second guessing most of her decisions, afraid of what the consequences would be. But she had to do this for herself more than anyone else.
As soon as the sun rose, May called the office and abruptly quit her job. No two week notice, no regrets. Her heart was aflutter with relief and a bit of adrenaline. If she wasn't so overwhelmed and sleep deprived, she would have laughed at how pissed off Jolene sounded. Hanging up on her was the second act of reclaiming her autonomy, and it was deliciously euphoric.
Riding on that feeling, May dialed the number her granddad scribbled at the bottom of his letter. She hadn't seen Mayor Lewis in over a decade, but the sound of his voice was the same, as far as she could remember. Warm and a tad gravelly. He was more than happy to welcome her back, sounding relieved under all of his joviality. She wondered what he would look like now, comparing the blurry images of a man with sandy blond hair and the beginnings of grey threading through a thick mustache.
Arrangements were hastily made for her to move in, and a week later, she was stepping onto the soil of Stardew Valley, wondering if she had truly made the right decision.