Girl Before a Mirror

by Liza Palmer

  “Depending on what work we get initially, we’ll have to think about hiring. A receptionist, interns, support staff. It’s going to be—”

  “Amazing,” Sasha says, turning the place mat around with the logo. The logo. XIX. It takes my breath away.

  “Oh, Sasha. It’s perfect,” I say.

  “I know,” she says, smiling. She folds the place mat up and slides it into her purse. “I’ll dabble with it a bit. Finalize it.” She pulls her lunch back over and digs in.

  Sasha and I meet with Preeti that night and she’s beyond excited. She can work her magic over at Quincy and move Lumineux over to the newly formed XIX straightaway. She’ll set up a meeting. She says it’ll be easier for her to sell it because it’s me at the helm and XIX will be in New York. Apparently, Holloway/Greene being in D.C. has always been a sticking point for the Quincy higher-ups. And fortunately for us, Audrey’s screwup will encourage Lumineux to jump ship that much more.

  As I’m getting ready for bed that night I get a text from Lincoln. It’s a picture of his computer keyboard covered in tea and he’s giving it the V sign, which I quickly look up on the Internet and learn that that’s basically the British middle finger. I cringe. Spilling tea on my keyboard. My worst nightmare. I walk into the bathroom and brush my teeth. As I’m looking at my hair in the mirror, I spy one single gray hair—right in front, of course. Before I pluck it out with a vengeance, I take a picture of it and send it along to Lincoln.

  Two weeks later, with Sasha no longer at Holloway/Greene, we head up to New York early to meet with Helen. We’ve sent our business plan ahead for her to review. On the train ride I give notice on my apartment and start poking around to find a new one. My heart rate slows down. Because moving? I’m good at.

  Do I schedule a dinner with Michael and Allison? Or is this just another aspect of being an adult? It’s a two-hour train ride, we’ll still have our book clubs and the kids’ birthday parties, as well as the impending birth of their newest. And what about Hannah and Nathan? How does that work? Hey, let’s have dinner and how’s that separation I’m not supposed to know about going? I’ve got time, I’ll figure those out. And Ferdie. I can’t deal with Ferdie right now, because believing that moving to New York is treating him as an adult seems very far away. I still want to Bubble Wrap him and make sure he’s okay, and I know that’s called enabling now, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t feel completely foreign to not do those things. It took everything I had not to clean out his apartment now that we know for sure he’s not returning. He has to take care of it. He has to take care of it. But if I could just e-mail him this company’s information that does this sort of . . . No. Walk away from the to-do list, Anna.

  Sasha and I stand in front of Helen’s drool-worthy brownstone on the Upper West Side. I hold the slip of paper with the address, my workbag slung over one shoulder, my purse tucked just underneath it. Sasha pulls me over and looks at the address again.

  “Central Park is just—” I say, motioning to the beautiful park just behind us.

  “I knew people lived here, I just didn’t know I knew people who lived here,” Sasha says.

  We walk up to the imposing limestone face and brick façade, careful not to touch the Grecian columns and in awe of the triangular pediment looming large above us. We pick our way up the marble steps, taking in the elaborate topiaries adorning either side of the imposing brass door. There’s a call button on one side.

  “What time is it?” I ask.

  “Nine twenty-seven A.M.,” Sasha says, checking her phone.

  “Okay,” I say, pushing the call button.

  “Yes?” the voice asks.

  “Anna Wyatt and Sasha Merchant to see Helen Brubaker?” A buzz and I push open the heavy door. We step into the black-and-white marble-tiled foyer. Beautiful floral arrangements pepper the hallway as chandeliers twinkle and illuminate the room high above. To the left are a couple of French doors and a woman behind a reception desk. Sasha and I proceed with caution.

  “Helen will be right down. Can I get you anything? Tea?” the woman asks.

  “Tea would be lovely,” I say. Sasha and I settle onto a white tufted couch. White. Everything is white.

  “Do you take anything?” the woman asks.

  “No, thank you,” I say. The woman looks from me to Sasha.

  “Nothing for me, thanks . . . thanks you. Nothing for me, thank you,” Sasha says. The woman walks to the left of reception and into a little kitchenette.

  “It’s okay to ask for the beverage you want. It lets them know that you belong here,” I say.

  “I just feel so guilty, you know?” Sasha whispers. “Like who do I think I am, right?”

  “It’s okay to let her do her job, and you deserve to be here,” I say.

  “Okay,” Sasha says, situating herself in her chair. The woman comes back with my cup of tea. Fortnum and Mason, just like in Phoenix. “If I could trouble you?” Sasha says. “I’d love a coffee.”

  “No problem at all. What do you take?” the woman asks with a smile.

  “Soy milk and sugar, please,” Sasha asks.

  “Just like Helen,” the woman says, smiling. Sasha beams.

  “Just like Helen,” Sasha repeats once the woman excuses herself to the kitchenette.

  “Fancy,” I say, letting the scent of tea calm me. I close my eyes and inhale.

  “I hope I don’t spill. Everything is white white white,” Sasha says.

  “Have you ever spilled coffee before?” I ask.

  “What? No, of course not,” Sasha says.

  “So, there’s no precedent. You’re not a coffee spiller,” I say.

  “Right. I am not a coffee spiller,” Sasha repeats.

  “And if you do? It’s white, they can bleach it out. You don’t think that receptionist has one of those bleach sticks in her desk right this very moment?” I ask.

  “Right. She totally does. They can bleach it out,” Sasha whispers to herself. The woman comes back with a cup of coffee for Sasha. “Thank you ever so.” The woman smiles, albeit a tad confused. I’m holding back laughter as I turn to Sasha. “I don’t know. I’m out of my mind. I can’t . . .” She blows on her coffee and I know her hands are shaking by the tinkling of the teacup on her saucer. Sasha laughs and I can see she’s lightening up a bit as we sit and drink our beverages in Helen Brubaker’s perfect white waiting room.

  “We should do something like this. I love it. And we could totally do it on the cheap. A waiting area that’s feminine. Flowers. Tufted couches. Tea in teacups.”

  “Right. It’s so interesting because my worry was that it would seem unprofessional, you know? Like a girls’ clubhouse, but I don’t feel like that here,” Sasha says.

  “No way, it’s the ex—” The woman’s phone buzzes and a yes, ma’am, and a sure and a straightaway. She hangs up and tells us that Helen is ready.

  “Follow me, if you will,” the woman says, walking out of the reception area and down the marble-tiled hallway, under the sweeping chandeliers, and the smell of stargazer lilies and fresh-cut flowers wafts as we pass conference rooms and copy rooms and offices.

  Two grand doors at the end of the hallway. I can hear Sasha’s teacup saucer begin to chatter again. I turn around and just smile. A deep breath. The woman opens the doors and motions for us to continue in. I thank her and she clacks back down the hallway.

  “Come on in,” Helen says, coming out from behind her desk. The windows. The Persian rugs. The walls lined with filled bookcases. All you can hear are Sasha’s and my clattering teacups. “Here. Put those down before you spill something.” Helen gestures to a meeting area on the opposite side of her desk. It’s situated in a little nook surrounded by bay windows with a lush patch of green just outside, a fountain bubbling in the distance. Little birds flit and bathe themselves as we situate ourselves around the table.

  “Thank you so much for seeing us,” I say.

  “I’m your mentor. This is me mentoring,” she says. The
woman comes in and sets a pot of tea down in the middle of the table. She hands Helen a perfectly made cappuccino with a heart in foam on the top. Sasha and I shoot a look at each other. “I know. She spoils me.” Helen takes a sip of her coffee, licking her top lip of foam with a dainty shrug. “So, you two are opening your own agency.”

  “Yes. I had this conversation with Chuck Holloway—Charlton Holloway’s son and the next in line—where he said that I was great at marketing women’s products. At the time, I took it as an insult.”

  “As you do,” Helen says. Another sip.

  “I wanted the important accounts. The ones on the website. The ones—”

  “For men,” Helen says.

  “Exactly,” I say.

  “And now?” Helen asks.

  “We changed the landscape with Lumineux. We took your lead and valued women instead of shaming and belittling them,” I say. Sasha passes over her sketches of our logo.

  “Nineteen. Nice,” Helen says.

  “We’ll set up right here in New York and we’ll make our mark as the agency for women, by women,” I say.

  “But a lot of those corporations are run by men,” Helen says.

  “And for that, it comes down to money. They want to make it and we can get their products into the grocery carts of the decision makers: women.” Helen takes out the business plan I sent her. Sasha and I look at our own copies. Crunched numbers. Research. Forecasts. Outlooks. Helen flips through the business plan. I sip my tea, trying to stop my hands from shaking.

  “I had a chance to review it; it’s good work,” Helen says, turning page after page.

  “Thank you,” I say, looking over at Sasha. She looks terrified.

  “So, let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. This isn’t the adorable montage in a romantic comedy where you find a perfect office space in some quaint exposed-brick building that doesn’t actually exist. There will be no line out the door. There will be no social life or life at all outside of starting this business. You both will live and breathe Nineteen. There will be no holidays or weekends. The buck that stopped with your boss or his boss or somewhere else up the pecking order now stops with you. From the light bill to the ordering of tea to the hiring of staff to the wooing of new clients to the firing of that one secretary who’s super nice but just terrible at her job to the attending of meetings to the arguing with contractors to the paying of bills and more bills and then more bills, it all comes down to you. And as partners, it will be fifty-fifty. Not Wyatt here talking as Merchant passes over a beautiful drawing with shaking hands. You, my dear, are going to have to step up.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Sasha says.

  “Why are you doing this? Do you know the answer?” Helen asks Sasha. I look at Sasha. I’m ashamed. Of course, I never asked her that. Sasha sets down her teacup and slides forward in her chair.

  “When I was at NYU I used to have this vision. I was walking through an office and I was smiling and nodding to the staff. Oh, hello, Miller. Nice day out, Webley. Have that on my desk by the end of the workday, Glickman.”

  “You made up names for your imaginary staff?” Helen asks.

  “Of course,” Sasha says.

  “Go on,” Helen says, unable to keep from smiling.

  “I was respected. I was respectable. I know I’m good at my job, Mrs. Brubaker.”

  “Helen, please.”

  “Helen,” Sasha says with a childlike squeal. “I know I’m good at my job, Helen.” A smile to me and I can’t help but smile back. “But that always seemed to come second or even third or fourth to who I was screwing or who people gossiped about me screwing or if my skirt was too tight or if these mean girls decided that I had slept my way to the top instead of earning it, which I knew I did. I don’t know. What finally got me? It’s the utter shock when people see how good I am at my job. They can’t put it together, so they usually chalk it up to a one-time thing or that I had someone else do it for me. Anna sees me. She sees me.” Sasha looks over at me and smiles. I smile back. “I want Nineteen to be the kind of office a woman like me can stride through.”

  “Well said,” Helen says.

  “Thank you,” Sasha says, her voice easy.

  “Okay. Location. I wouldn’t get too precious about it. While Red Hook and Greenpoint and that Brooklyn business is really hot right now, you are going to have to think about your clients. Corporate America wandering around Bushwick is not what you want.” Helen buzzes her receptionist. The woman appears through the grand double doors with a folder. Helen thanks her and the woman disappears. “I had my realtor look into a few spaces for you. I know. You’re welcome. I centered on the West Village, the Meatpacking District, Soho, and I know everyone’s talking about NoMad, but to me that’s just depressing Midtown. But there are a couple of office spaces included because I had to play nice with my realtor. She’s meeting you at the first place on the list”—Helen checks her watch—“in thirty minutes.” She stands. “Now. In this folder is also a list of contractors and handymen and everyone I’ve worked with in the past.” Helen hands me the folder. “Close your mouth, dear. This is mentoring.” She walks out from behind the table. “Leave your teacups.” Sasha and I gather our things and follow her down the marble-tiled hallway. “All of the places you will see today are within your budget. A few of them have the option of residential living space just over them or behind them. I find that works for me.” Helen motions to the sweeping staircase, which probably leads to her home on the upper floors of the brownstone. “I will throw you an opening gala and invite everyone I know. We will throw it here or in your new space. Your choice. It will be a networking opportunity and you will need to have the staff and resources available to serve their needs.” Helen has walked us out onto her front stoop. A black town car pulls up in front of her brownstone. “This is Marcus. He’ll be your driver for today. I know, you couldn’t possibly. Oh, but you will. And you’re welcome.” Helen extends her hand to me. Then to Sasha. We are speechless. “And I’m hiring you. Please have contracts drawn up as soon as possible and when you’re properly attired, we will meet and talk about the exciting future of Brubaker Enterprises and Nineteen.”

  Stunned silence.

  “Chop, chop. Marcus is waiting.” Helen walks us down to the car, opening up the back door.

  “Thank you,” I say. Sasha mutters a stunned thank-you just behind me.

  “You’re welcome,” Helen says.

  “Why . . . I can’t . . .”

  “You’re the good guys, Ms. Wyatt. That’s why.”

  She tucks us into the backseat of her town car and we’re off to meet with her realtor and I will never stop clutching this folder to my breast or holding Sasha’s hand or how did this happen and . . .

  “We’re the good guys,” Sasha says. She looks over and smiles.

  “I guess we are,” I say.

  24

  Helen wasn’t kidding. For the next two months, Sasha and I ate, slept, and breathed Nineteen. I put all my worldly belongings in storage, making sure to snap a photo of the stacked chaos and sent it to Lincoln. My bed was a cot in the back of our new office space in the West Village—another photo to Lincoln. His response to that one was a photo of a ripped pair of tweed pants. Right down the back seam, his hand poking through. He accompanied the photo with the words “Walked around in these all day.” I texted back that I would have loved to have seen that. I had to brush my teeth in the kitchenette and joined a gym so I’d have somewhere to shower. I snapped another photo of the delightful pair of shower sandals I bought at the local drugstore and sent that along to Lincoln, too.

  With the construction going on around us, Sasha and I set up a makeshift office with card tables and folding chairs so we could handle the Lumineux campaign. We immediately felt the impact of not having the support staff we luxuriated in at Holloway/Greene. Our days were spent running errands and copying contracts and answering phones and what do you mean the toilet is backed up and when in the world is that pounding go
ing to stop and oh my God, we’re out of tea?

  When the contractors finally finished my living space, I was able to move my stuff to the upstairs of the XIX offices. Sasha moved back in with an old roommate from her modeling days. She was excited about it, said that living on her own—especially during a Time-Out—felt a bit lonely. I know the feeling.

  Ferdie and I spent Thanksgiving and Christmas together at the Recovery House. They have extra rooms for relatives and staff. And then I spent New Year’s Eve seriously questioning my life choices while freezing my ass off sitting on that cot with nothing but a space heater, my constantly full e-mail box, and a picture Lincoln sent of himself, alone and still at work. He’d even bought a sparkly hat. I texted him back a picture of me with a couple of deflated balloons left over from the impromptu party Sasha and I had after we landed another client. They’d been rolling around the break room for days. In the picture I’m holding the sad balloons and wearing the jaunty faux fur trapper hat I’d started wearing to help with the cold.

  The shame spirals are violent and come from out of nowhere. I really would have thought that after months of investing in XIX they would lessen. They haven’t.

  With the rush of seeing our letterhead for the first time also came the voices of who do you think you are? When we hired a receptionist, I felt the burden of her livelihood as I burned the midnight oil. A meeting with our new accounts manager and I knew for sure he thought we were amateurs. Sasha brought on a couple of new hires for the art department and immediately I tried to inappropriately impose sage advice on them. Pass the coffee? Don’t you mean do unto others as you would have them do unto you, Skylar?

  On my last trip down to D.C. to visit Ferdie, I met with a saleswoman I always liked from Holloway/Greene. I made her an offer she couldn’t refuse. And when she accepted, it was all I could do to not kiss her full on the lips. Sasha brought in a few interns from NYU who looked like they should be playing Little League, and all I could think was how much more they’d be learning at a place like Holloway/Greene. See, I knew how to be a great employee. I knew how to bring in accounts for the bigwigs upstairs. I knew how to impress the professor. I knew how to serve the Holloways of this world. And I thought I would be the perfect boss right away, and I’m completely frustrated that I don’t know how to be in this new life 100 percent and stride through XIX like I own the place (which I do). I thought not only that the training montage was over, but that the fight was going to be a breezy knockout. Why then do I still feel like a fraud when the little intern trembles as she tells me my three P.M. is here to see me?