by Anna Yen
I tried to muster up a flicker of enthusiasm. “What’s the idea?”
“It’s called Clicktone.”
“Clicktone? That’s pretty catchy. What does Clicktone do?”
“It’s an online exchange where people can trade their unwanted gift cards.”
I weighed Daniel’s idea and asked myself whether I’d use such an exchange. They don’t expire. They’re becoming more and more popular. But here’s the wrench—how many gift cards do people get every year? Not that many.
“How will you make money?”
“Advertising. And a small fee for every gift card trade.”
“Okay, well before you can sell advertising, you need users, don’t you? Users are really expensive to acquire. So where are you going to get funding?”
“I don’t want funding. That just gives investors a chunk of my ownership.”
Pigs get slaughtered.
Daniel opened his menu and glanced through the appetizers as he continued, “Anyway, getting users won’t be a problem. I’m going to use my Stanford alumni network. This is going to be a viral thing. Friends will tell friends.”
He’s been reading too much Wired magazine.
“Who’s going to build the technology for this online exchange?”
“I’m going to teach myself to code software,” Daniel replied. He never questioned his intelligence or skills—you had to give him that—but still, that was the stupidest thing he’d said yet.
“Are you sure about this? You’re going to give up your job right now?”
“If not now, when? What am I doing that’s so important, anyway? It’s not what I’d imagined.”
“You’re saving the environment!”
“Wellllll . . .” Daniel waved his hand as though the environment wasn’t so important after all.
There was something more behind this new life plan, and I needed to know what it was. I remembered Daniel’s expression a few weeks ago when he saw my paycheck stub in my purse. He was looking for my car keys, but his raised eyebrows and pursed lips told me he got a blow to his ego instead.
“Why are you doing this, really? For the money?”
“Ha, no, of course not. It’s just way more appealing to me than being wrapped up in the red tape of environmental politics.”
Daniel was still looking at the menu as though his new life plan weren’t a big deal. For the first time I saw the child that he was. I wanted to protect him from what I knew would be a failure, but it was clear that he’d made up his mind. My only option was to accept his decision and help him—For better or for worse, right? But my heart sank like a rock as I heard my mom’s voice in my head:
“Men need to have their ducks in a row before they’re ready for marriage, dear.”
“Daniel,” I said in an effort to get his attention. “At least let me introduce you to—”
“I don’t want your help. I want to do it myself.”
“But—”
“Sophia, I know more about this than you do,” Daniel declared.
“Ha! Okay, right. Sorry, I forgot,” I said sarcastically. A few years ago I might have actually believed Daniel, but now I knew better.
Mom’s voice came into my head again:
“Men don’t want women who are smarter than them. They need their egos stroked.”
If Scott were here he’d stand up and dismiss Daniel with just a look. But Scott didn’t want the things I wanted. He hadn’t spent a lifetime looking for Prince Charming, waiting for the person who would make her half a whole. I could crush Daniel under one stiletto with the force of what I knew, but did I want to?
Pick your battles, Sophia. Bite your tongue, Sophia.
But I couldn’t.
“Except you don’t,” I said.
“What’s that, babe?” Daniel was sipping a glass of wine that had just been placed in front of him. He peered at me innocently over the rim.
“You don’t know more than I do. Least of all about running a startup. I’ve watched the best, and worst, in action.”
I waited for this to escalate into a fight. But Daniel didn’t seem to have heard me at all. He was buried in the menu, finger trailing along the offerings. Suddenly he looked up brightly.
“Oysters?” he asked. “I feel like celebrating.”
Later, as I drove home to my parents’ house, I called Audrey whimpering.
“What’s wrong? You okay, Sissy?” she asked. “Are you sick?”
“No!” I snapped. “Stop asking me that. You guys always think I’m sick, and I’m fine!”
“Okay. Jeez.”
I began to cry. I could barely hear Audrey through the phone as she asked me again to tell her what was wrong.
“Daniel,” I managed. “He’s going to try to start his own company, which means he’s never going to ask me to marry him! You know what Mom says about men and their stupid ducks! Marriage is totally off his radar.”
“Oh, Jesus, Sophia. Are you still on that? You haven’t talked about wanting to get married for months, thank God! Besides, isn’t it too soon to be thinking about marriage? How long have you two been together?”
“Over a year and a half!”
“Oh,” she said, sounding disappointed. “Well, have you guys discussed marriage?”
No.
Audrey read my silence and responded appropriately. “Look, you may want to get married, but I think you like the idea of it more than the man you’re dating.”
I knew Audrey was being protective. She hated seeing me hurt or upset. Still, it felt good to argue. I could always count on my big sister for that. “That’s easy for you to say! You’re married and you have Ava!” I shouted. “You’re such a hypocrite. Of course I want to be married. I’m just not in such a hurry anymore.”
“The grass is always greener,” she said.
Audrey would never understand why I wanted to get married so badly. I didn’t blame her—I couldn’t really explain it, either, other than that marriage was the next “thing” to do, and Daniel was the closest way there. Besides, the thought of life without him seemed unbearable. Health problems, long hours, even Scott Kraft I could handle. But heartache and loneliness were a different story.
It was Audrey’s idea for me to take the day off. “Tomorrow your eyes will be swollen from crying,” she’d said the night before. “Come up to the city and have lunch with me at the office.” Between the conference call script debacle and Daniel, I felt like I was following in IR person number six’s footsteps, so Audrey’s suggestion sounded like a good one. Besides, I had been thinking about getting a new look—a smarter, sleeker one rather than the country-club fashion that Mom filled my closet with—so the next morning I headed to Union Square. A couple of hours later I arrived at Audrey’s office on the nineteenth floor of the Transamerica Pyramid still pouting a little despite a new, short bob-style haircut, two shopping bags full of on-sale winter clothes from Saks Fifth Avenue, and a less full one representing my jump on a new spring wardrobe from Neiman Marcus. Audrey was on the phone barking at someone, likely one of her traders, so I sat down. Without getting off the phone, she slid an unmistakable robin’s-egg blue box across her desk, which I caught with my right hand and an excited smile. There was a small enclosure card that read: Never wait for a man to buy you a diamond. Love, Audrey.
I opened the trademark Tiffany & Co. box to find a three-carat pear-shaped diamond solitaire that hung from a simple eighteen-inch white-gold chain.
Gasp!
All thoughts of Daniel fell away as I unclasped the necklace and pulled each end around my neck. When I looked up at Audrey, she was shaking her head in disgust, shooing me out of her office so she could finish her phone call. It was so typical of her, of our family. Have a problem? Fix it and get over it.
Although Jonathan, Daniel, and even Kate had counseled me to “just give Scott the bullet points like he asked,” I was determined to rewrite the Treehouse earnings call script because if I didn’t, I’d be forever known a
s a “terrible writer.” So over the next weekend I spent hours reviewing my old roadshow notes, trying to remember the cadence of Scott’s voice, the exact words that he’d used, and the topics he seemed passionate about; those were the ones he’d want in the script. Then, channeling Scott, I began to type, delete, and then retype for two days straight.
On Monday, three days before our earnings call, I waited until Ashley gave me the okay before I went to see Scott. When she did, my new spike heels snagged on the fibers of the commercial-grade carpet and I could hear them whisper prick, prick, prick as they carried me into his office holding a newly revised conference call script.
“Nice dress,” Scott said. I was wearing a new, simple black Armani sheath dress and sleek Manolo Blahnik sling-back heels, both purchased the day Audrey gave me my diamond.
“Oh, thanks. I was wondering if you’d look at this new draft of your script.”
“You already sent me the bullets.”
“Yeah, but I took another shot at it.”
“I don’t have time to review it,” he said without looking up from his computer.
“I worked hard on this, Scott. You don’t have to read it now, but promise you’ll take a look at it before the call.”
His eyes turned toward me, narrowed and glaring. “You’re upsetting me, Sophia.”
“You are upsetting me!” I said. Despite my better judgment, I could feel my voice rising. “Help me help you.”
“You’re yelling.”
“Scott, you don’t know real yelling until you’ve met my mother. I can really yell, and this isn’t it.” There it was, my best Penny Jenkins–approved, from-the-abdomen voice. I wanted him to know I meant business.
“Hmmph. I’ll believe it when I see it,” he said before reaching out for the document. He spent a few minutes scanning my work as I stood there; his face showed no expression. When he looked up again, his silence made me want to run and hide. I’ll just be in my office looking at the job listings, thanks. But then Scott gave me a nod and said, “Better. Much better. It works. Has Jonathan seen this already?”
“No.”
“Okay. I’ll make some edits, but it looks pretty good. Send it to me and please cc Ashley and Jonathan.”
I did nothing to hide my huge smile. He said please.
Ashley walked in as I strutted out of the office. “Doesn’t she look great today, Scott? That bob and black dress suit you,” she said. My mom had said the same thing earlier that morning—it was the first time she hadn’t picked at me before I left the house.
“She does look good. That’s a great look for you, Sophia. Simple black outfits are always in style. But kill the costume jewelry.”
Scott might know a lot of things, but he sure doesn’t know a real rock when he sees one.
“Got it,” I said, embarrassed at the attention. But there were worse things in life than being styled by Scott Kraft.
I let myself into Daniel’s apartment after work, planning to make a quiet dinner for two after I kicked off my shoes. Even hearing about Daniel’s progress on his startup—as minimal as it was—sounded good to me. The whole I know more than you about everything nonsense still nagged at me, but I had been trying hard to put it out of my mind. Because if I couldn’t forget it, maybe he wasn’t so charming after all. I could hear my mother now: I told you so.
“Wait until you hear what happened today with Scott and Dylan,” I called out. I put my purse down on a strange shoe box with my name on it, then found Daniel in his room.
“What’s up with that box by the door?” I asked.
Daniel shook his head and sat down on the bed. “This isn’t going to work, Sophia. I can’t be just some bit player in The Sophia Show. That’s not what I want. I packed your stuff up for you.”
My thoughts immediately went to my insecurities—did he want someone taller? A blonde? Someone smarter? “Did you meet someone else?” I asked.
It would have been easier for me to hear if another woman were the reason this was all happening, but instead Daniel said, “I’m tired of living in your shadow.”
“What? That’s ridiculous.” Even as I said it, though, it felt untrue.
“Every time we’re with our friends, or your family, we spend the whole time talking about what you’re doing,” Daniel continued. “Or what Scott Kraft is doing. It’s as though I’m just along for the ride. No one seems interested in Clicktone, not our friends or even my own family.”
That’s because it’s a stupid idea, you moron.
Daniel was referring to our recent dinner with Mr. and Mrs. Weinstein. The same dinner where his mom had handed me her copies of The Joy Luck Club and Wild Swans and said, “Oh, you’ll love these.” I envisioned adding them to the stack of other unread Chinese-themed books she’d given me. Thankfully, before she could corner me into a discussion about them, Daniel had changed the subject.
“I’ve got Clicktone’s shopping cart built,” he’d said very enthusiastically while our appetizers were being served. But Mr. Weinstein had only nodded politely at his son before changing the subject: “Can you give us a hint about which actors will be the voices for the new characters in your next movie?”
The truth was that my life was more interesting than Daniel’s. At that moment, anyway. There was no doubt he was book-smart and hardworking, but I was savvy and even more hardworking. Let’s face it—I was also just plain more entertaining than he was. But none of that meant we couldn’t be together. Did it?
“How long have you felt this way?” I asked.
“It doesn’t matter,” he mumbled, looking at the floor. Then, with tears welling in his eyes, he said loud and clear, “We don’t have a future together.”
I stared at my bare feet; I couldn’t look at Daniel’s face. Couldn’t believe the words I was hearing. Had I done this? Mom’s lifelong words of advice entered my thoughts:
Men need their egos stroked, dear.
You need to let the man be the man, dear.
You can be right without letting him know you’re right, dear.
But how was I to play that role and be the woman who could bring home the bacon and fry it up in a pan? That was the person my parents raised me to be, but they never actually told me how I was supposed to pull it off.
I left without the box. He could have my things. I didn’t need them anymore.
I cried unabashedly for two weeks. Straight. At work, at home, in restaurants. With anyone that would listen. My heart was filled with grief, pure grief, and I couldn’t believe how badly I hurt. I couldn’t sleep, eat, or drink, and my blood sugar levels were all over the map. I felt all alone even though my parents were on the other side of the house; I knew I couldn’t talk to them. They were certainly not disappointed at Daniel’s absence and didn’t understand why I was. It was almost one o’clock in the morning when I rang Kate.
“I wasted all that time. Almost two years! I thought he loved me,” I sobbed.
My best friend whispered ever so quietly into the phone, “Hang on. Let me go into the other room so I don’t wake up Mark.” Then, seconds later, in a more audible tone, she said, “Oh, Sophia, I’m so sorry you’re going through this. You just have to dive through it. Just take a deep breath and jump.”
“I’m trying. I really am,” I said. I knew I’d have to pull it together soon because even I was tired of hearing myself talk about the demise of my relationship with Daniel.
“You just weren’t ready to say goodbye, so you’re upset that he was the one to say it,” Kate reassured me. “But you would have done it when you were ready. I know you would have.”
That all made sense, but it didn’t help at all. The worst part was that I couldn’t pinpoint why I was so devastated. I bought a journal to write down my thoughts: Dear Daniel letters that told him how much I missed him, simple statements like I hate you, and pages and pages of all the things I might have done to drive away my boyfriend.
If it really was because of my career, will all Prince Cha
rmings have the same view? Can’t I be a great girlfriend and have a career?
The following week, whether it was because of the lack of sleep or the bad breakup diet I’d adopted, my stomach began to ache.
“What’s wrong with you?” Scott asked one morning as he and Jonathan passed me in the hallway outside our offices.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re all hunched over. And your eyes—they’re all puffy.”
“Daniel broke up with me.” My eyes began to tear.
“Oh, Jesus,” Scott said, rolling his eyes.
“Look! I’m allowed to be upset. And if you don’t like it, then fire me!” I said, knowing he wouldn’t.
“Don’t mind him, Sophia. You are always welcome to express your emotions here,” Jonathan said as he gave me a hug. “The world would be a better place if everyone were more sensitive.”
Scott was less sympathetic. “I told you,” he snapped. “I told you I didn’t like that guy. You’re partly to blame, though. You are putting out the wrong energy, Sophia. If you don’t reflect on that, you will continue to attract the wrong people.”
I furrowed my brow. At least being angry at Scott was one way to make my tears stop. “Oh, come on, Scott. What energy am I transmitting? You seemed to like my energy when you met me.”
“You transmit a very transactional energy. Very get-things-done.”
“What does that mean?”
“You heard me. Energy is like a magnet. Whatever you transmit attracts that very thing back. So Daniel was never going to be the one for you because you weren’t putting that vibration out there.”
“Excuse me, but how do you know?” I asked.
“I just know. You have to feel what you expect to have, not what you want. Otherwise, you’re just focusing on what’s missing—and that’s negative energy. Make a list of the three most important elements you want your relationship to have, then visualize you and your future partner living as that couple. Actually try to feel what it will be like to be with the right person who loves you unconditionally. Focus on that and you’ll start to vibrate. And when you vibrate, the energy you emit will attract whatever it is that you’re looking for.”