In Five Years

by Rebecca Serle

  I put down my phone and roll to him. “What?”

  “Oh, you’re serious? Dannie, you’re not serious.”

  “Of course I am.”

  He shakes his head. “Not even you could plan and execute a wedding in a month.”

  “Who says we have to have a wedding?”

  He raises his eyebrows at me, then squints them together. “Your mother, mine. Come on, Dannie. This is ridiculous. We’ve waited four and a half years, we can’t just elope now. Are you kidding? Because I really can’t tell.”

  “I just want to get it done.”

  “How romantic,” he deadpans.

  “You know what I mean.”

  David sets his phone down. He looks at me. “I don’t, actually. You love planning. That’s like… your whole thing. You once planned a Thanksgiving down to pee breaks.”

  “Yeah, well…”

  “Dannie, I want to get married, too. But let’s do it the right way. Let’s do it our way. Okay?”

  He looks at me, waiting for an answer. But I can’t give him one, not the one he wants. I don’t have time for our way. I don’t have time to plan. We have five months. Five months until I’m living in an apartment my best friend wants to buy, with the boyfriend she wants to buy it with. I need to stop this. I need to do whatever I can to make sure it never comes true.

  “I’ll be a planning machine,” I say. “It’s all I’m going to focus on. How does December sound? We can have a holiday wedding to match our holiday proposal. It’ll be festive.”

  “We’re Jews,” David says. He’s back on his phone.

  “Maybe it will snow,” I say, ignoring him. “David? December? I don’t want to wait.”

  This makes him stop. He shakes his head, leans over, and kisses my shoulder blade. I know I’ve won. “December?”

  I nod.

  “Okay,” he says. “December it is.”

  Chapter Eleven

  I have a giant case dropped in my lap on Thursday. One of our biggest clients—let’s just say they revolutionized the health-food store—wants to announce an acquisition of a delivery service company on Monday, before the markets open. David and I were supposed to go home to Philadelphia and tell my parents the December plan in person, but it’s never going to happen this weekend.

  I call him at eight, while crouched over piles of documents in the conference room. There are twelve other associates and four partners barking orders and containers of empty Chinese food surrounding me. It’s a war zone. I love it.

  “I’m not getting out of here this weekend,” I tell him. “Even to come home to sleep. Forget Philly.”

  I hear the TV on behind him. “What happened?”

  “Can’t say, but it’s a big one.”

  “No shit,” he says. “Whol—”

  I clear my throat. “I’m going to be sleeping here for the next three days. Can we do next weekend?”

  “I have Pat’s bachelor party.”

  “Right. Arizona.” They’re going to drink beer and practice target shooting—neither of which David has any interest in. I’m not even sure why he’s going. He barely sees Pat anymore.

  “It’s fine,” he says. “We’ll just call and fill them in. They’ll be thrilled either way. I think your mom was starting to give up on me.”

  My parents love David. Of course they do. He’s a lot like my brother, or what I imagine he’d have turned out to be. Smart, calm, even-tempered. Michael never got in trouble. He was the one making chore charts when we were kids, and he did model UN before he even learned to drive. He and David would be friends, I know they would. And it still stings me that he’s not here. That he won’t ever be here. That he didn’t see me graduate or accept my first job, hasn’t been to our apartment, and won’t get to watch me get married.

  My parents bugged David and me incessantly during the first two years of our engagement to set a date, but less so now. I know how much they want this for me, and themselves. David’s wrong—at this point, they’d probably be fine with City Hall.

  “Okay. My dad might be in the city next week.”

  “Thursday,” David says. “I’m already taking him to lunch.”

  “You’re the best.”

  He makes a noncommittal noise through the phone. Just then, Aldridge walks into the room. I hang up on David without saying goodbye. He’ll understand. He used to do the same thing to me all the time at Tishman.

  “How’s it looking?” Aldridge asks.

  Normally a managing partner would not ask a senior associate how an acquisition of this magnitude was “looking.” He’d go directly to a senior partner in the room. But since Aldridge hired me, we’ve developed a real rapport. From time to time, he calls me into his office to talk about cases, or offer me guidance. I know the other associates notice, and I know they don’t like it, and it feels great. There are a few ways to get ahead at a corporate law firm, and being the managing partner’s favorite is definitely one of them.

  Most corporate lawyers are sharks. But I’ve never heard Aldridge so much as raise his voice. And he somehow manages to have a personal life. He’s been married to his husband, Josh, for twelve years. They have a daughter, Sonja, who is eight. His office is peppered with photos of her, them. Vacations, school pictures, Christmas cards. A real life outside those four walls.

  “We’re still in due diligence but should have some documents up for signature on Sunday,” I say.

  “Saturday,” Aldridge hits back. He looks at me, an eyebrow raised.

  “That’s what I meant.”

  “Did everyone order food?” Aldridge announces to the room. In addition to the Chinese food cartons on the conference table, there are burger wrappers from The Palm and chopped salad containers from Quality Italian, but in the middle of a big deal like this, food is a constant necessity.

  Immediately, all fifteen lawyers look up, eyes blinking. Sherry, the senior partner managing the case, answers for the room. “We’re fine, Miles,” she says.

  “Mitch!” Aldridge calls for his assistant who is never more than ten feet away. “Let’s order some Levain. Get these fine people a little caffeine and sugar.”

  “We’ve got it covered, really—” Sherry starts.

  “These people look hungry,” he says.

  He strolls out of the conference room. I catch Sherry’s eyes narrowing before she dives back into the document that’s in front of her. Sometimes kindness under pressure can feel like a slight, and I don’t blame Sherry for reacting that way. She doesn’t have time to console us with cookies—that’s a privilege for the very high up.

  The thing many people don’t realize about corporate lawyers is that they are nothing like what you see on TV shows. Sherry, Aldridge, and I will never step foot in a courtroom. We’ll never argue a case. We do deals; we’re not litigators. We prepare documents and review every piece of paperwork for a merger or an acquisition. Or to take a company public. On Suits, Harvey does both paperwork and crushes it in court. In reality, the lawyers at our firm who argue cases don’t have a clue what we do in these conference rooms. Most of them haven’t prepared a document in a decade.

  People think our form of corporate law is the less ambitious of the two, and while in many ways it’s less glamorous—no closing arguments, no media interviews—nothing compares to the power of the paper. At the end of the day, law comes down to what is written, and we do the writing.

  I love the order of deal making, the clarity of language—how there is little room for interpretation and none for error. I love the black-and-white terms. I love that in the final stages of closing a deal—particularly those of the magnitude Wachtell takes on—seemingly insurmountable obstacles arise. Apocalyptic scenarios, disagreements, and details that threaten to topple it all. It seems impossible we’ll ever get both parties on the same page, but somehow we do. Somehow, contracts get agreed upon and signed. Somehow, deals get done. And when it finally happens, it’s exhilarating. Better than any day in court. It’s written.
Binding. Anyone can bend a judge’s or jury’s will with bravado, but to do it on paper—in black and white—that takes a particular kind of artistry. It’s truth in poetry.

  I come home once on Saturday just to shower and change, and on Sunday I drag myself home well past midnight. When I get there David is asleep, but there’s a note on the counter and takeout pasta in the fridge: cacio e pepe from L’Artusi, my favorite. David is always really thoughtful like this—having my favorite takeout in the fridge, leaving the chocolate I like on the counter. He spent the weekend at the office as well, but since he moved to the fund he has more autonomy over his time than I do. I’m still at the mercy of the partners, the clients, and the whims of the market. For David, it’s mostly just the market, and since much of the money his company handles is longer-term investment, it takes a lot of the harried day-to-day pressure off. As David likes to say: “No one ever runs into my office.”

  I have two missed calls and three texts from Bella, whom I’ve ignored all weekend, and, in fact, all of last week. She doesn’t know David and I got reengaged on the living room floor, and that we are officially planning a wedding for December—or we will be anyway when we have a second free.

  I text her back: Just getting in from an all-weekender Call you tomorrow.

  Despite the fact that I haven’t slept in close to seventy-two hours, I don’t feel tired. We got the signatures. Tomorrow—or today, actually—our clients will announce that they have acquired a billion-dollar company. They’re expanding their global reach and will revolutionize the way people shop for groceries.

  I feel like I always do after we close a big case: high. I haven’t done cocaine, except for one ill-advised night in college, but it’s the same sensation. My heart races, my pupils dilate. I feel like I could run a marathon. We won.

  There’s an open bottle of Chianti on the counter, and I pour myself a glass. Our apartment has a big kitchen window that looks out over Gramercy Park. I sit down at the kitchen table and gaze out the window. It’s dark out, but the city lights illuminate the trees and sidewalk. When I first moved to New York, I used to walk by the park and think that someday I’d live near it. Now, David and I have a key. We can go inside the park anytime we want. But we don’t, of course. We’re busy. We went the day we got the key, with a bottle of champagne, stayed long enough to open it and make a toast, but haven’t been back since. It’s pretty to look at through the window, though. And the location is convenient. Very central. I promise myself that David and I will take some iced coffees in there and do some wedding planning soon.

  It’s a beautiful apartment. It has two bedrooms and high ceilings, a full kitchen and dining area, a TV and couch alcove. We decorated it in all grays and whites. It’s calming, serene. It looks like the kind of apartment that gets photographed. It’s everything I ever wanted.

  I look down at my hand, still wearing that engagement ring. And now, soon, a band. I finish my wine, brush my teeth, wash my face, and crawl into bed. I take the ring off and set it in the little bowl on my nightstand. It sparkles back at me, a promise. I vow that first thing tomorrow, I’ll call a wedding planner.

  Chapter Twelve

  I leave work at seven on Monday, a full hour before I should, and meet Bella at Snack Taverna in the West Village. It’s this tiny bistro, the best Greek food in the city, and we’ve been going there since we moved to New York—way before I could afford to.

  Bella is back to being fifteen minutes late. I order us fava beans drenched in olive oil and garlic—her favorite. They’re on the table when she arrives.

  She texted me back this morning and demanded we have dinner tonight. It has been too long, she said. I feel like you’re avoiding me.

  I rarely leave work early, if ever. When David and I make dinner reservations they’re always for eight-thirty or nine. But now it’s a little past seven, still light out, and I’m sitting here. Bella has always been the only person in my life who can talk me out of my norm.

  “It’s so hot out there,” she says when she arrives. She’s wearing a white brocade-and-lace dress from Zimmermann and gold lace-up sandals. Her hair is up in a topknot, some loose strands dangling down her neck.

  “It’s a swamp. Summer always happens so suddenly.” I lean over the table and kiss her on the cheek. I’ve sweated through my silk shirt and pencil skirt. I own basically no summer clothes. Luckily the air-conditioning is on full blast in here.

  “How was the weekend?” she asks. “Did you sleep at all?”

  I smile. “No.”

  She shakes her head. “You loved it.”

  “Maybe.” I scoop some beans onto her plate. I have to know: “Did you guys hear anything more about the apartment?”

  She looks at me and frowns, and then her face dawns recognition. “Oh, right! There’s this other one I think I want. It’s this totally savage place in Meatpacking. I honestly didn’t know they had anything like that left there. Everything is so generic now.”

  “You don’t like the Dumbo loft?”

  She shrugs. “I’m just not sure I want to live there. There’s only one grocery store, and it must be freezing in the winter. All of those wide streets that close to the water? It seems kind of isolated.”

  “It’s close to every train,” I say. “And the view is spectacular. There’s so much light, Bella. I can see you painting there.”

  Bella squints at me. “What’s going on? You hated that place. You told me I shouldn’t even consider it.”

  I wave her off. She’s right, though. What am I doing? The words keep tumbling out, like I have no control over them. “I don’t know,” I say. “What do I know? I’ve lived within ten blocks for the last decade.”

  Bella leans forward. Her face splits into a sly smile. “You love that place.”

  It’s raw space, but I have to admit it’s beautiful. Somehow industrial and energetic and peaceful, all at once.

  “No,” I say. Firm. Definitive. “It’s a pile of plywood. I’m just playing devil’s advocate.”

  Bella crosses her arms. “You love it,” she says.

  I don’t know why I can’t just condemn it. Tell her she’s right—it’s freezing and too far and absurd—then drop it. I should be thrilled that she has forgotten about it. I want her to forget about it. I want that apartment to disappear into the atmosphere. So far I’m doing a good job at preventing that fateful hour. If the apartment disappears, so does what happened there.

  “No, it’s true,” I say. “Dumbo is far. And Aaron said it would need a ton of work.” The last part is a little bit of a lie.

  Bella opens her mouth to say something but closes it again.

  “So things are good with you guys?” I venture.

  Bella sighs. “He said you had a nice time at the apartment. Like maybe you liked him a little better? He said you seemed friendly, which is entirely out of character.”

  “Hey.”

  “You’re many things,” Bella says, “but friendly never really comes to mind.”

  I have a flash of Bella and me, newly minted New Yorkers, in line for some ludicrously expensive club in the Meatpacking District. Bella had lent me one of her dresses, something short and bright, and it was cold, although I don’t remember the season—late fall, early winter? We were without coats, as we usually were in the years surrounding twenty.

  In this slice of memory, Bella is flirting with the door guy, a club promoter named Scoot or Hinds, some sound not word, someone who liked when hot girls showed up, liked when Bella did. She’s telling him she just has a few more friends she wants to bring in.

  “They like you?” he asks.

  “No one is,” Bella says. She shakes her hair off her neck.

  “Her?” Scoot points to me. He’s less than impressed, this I can tell. Being Bella’s friend has always felt a little bit like standing in her shadow. It used to make me insecure, maybe it still does, but over time we found our things, our shared ground, our complimenting balance. Standing in front of that club
maybe we hadn’t, yet.

  Bella leans forward and whispers something into Scoot’s ear. I don’t hear, but I can imagine what it is: She’s a princess, you know. She’s royalty. Fifth in line to the Dutch throne. A Vanderbilt.

  It used to embarrass me that Bella had to do this. It embarrasses me that night in Meatpacking, too. But I never tell her. Her proximity is my gift; my silence is hers. I make her life smooth and solid. She makes mine bright and dazzling. This seems fair. A good trade.

  “Come on in, ladies,” Scoot says. We do. We enter Twitch or Slice or Markd. Whatever it was called, it’s gone now. We dance. Men buy us drinks. I feel pretty in her dress, although it is a little too short on me, a little loose in the chest. It hugs in the wrong spots.

  At a certain point, two men come up to hit on us. I am not interested. I have a boyfriend. He’s in law school at Yale. We’ve been together for eight months. I’m faithful to him. I think, maybe, I’ll marry him, but it is a passing thought.

  Everywhere we go Bella flirts. She does not like that I don’t. She thinks I am withholding, that I do not know how to have a good time. She’s right, but only sometimes. This form of fun does not come naturally to me, and therefore feels impossible to engage in. I am constantly trying to learn the rules, only to realize that the people who win don’t seem to follow any.

  One of the men makes a comment. Everyone laughs. I roll my eyes.

  “You’re so friendly,” he says. It sticks.

  At the restaurant now, I scoop a fava bean onto a small piece of crispbread. It’s hot, and the garlic pops in my mouth.

  “Morgan and Ariel met Greg on Saturday,” Bella says. “They loved him.”

  Morgan and Ariel are a couple Bella met through the gallery scene four-ish years ago. Since then, they’ve become more David’s and my friends than Bella’s—mostly because we’re better at making dinner reservations and staying in the country. Morgan is a photographer who does popular cityscapes and had a coffee table book called On High come out last year to much fanfare. Ariel works in private equity.