Every night, before the shift begin there's the countdown. Franco wants to know how many days there are until vacation.
I tell him. "There are X weeks and Y days".
We argue, he's sure I've got it wrong, there have to be less, and he goes to the calendar and double checks. I'm right. I'm not too bad at remedial math.
I tell him, a heads up, a warning, that I have no intent of returning after the vacation. The vacation is the end. I don't know what I'll do, I only know the job is killing me, that I can't be here day and night any more, that the vacation is the vacation and it's also the end, sometimes he agrees, he hates it too and thinks the same, other times he tells me that I'll never leave, that I'm one of them now, that I'll change my mind after the vacation and I think about another winter here, the 13 and 14 hour days without break or day off over Christmas, think about the cultural void of another missed theater season, think about not seeing the children, and it scares the hell out of me...