The Boys' Club

by Erica Katz

  He shook his head vigorously. “You were the most amazing child. Everybody loved you. All of your nannies. They loved you so much that they couldn’t take it.”

  “Take what?” I suddenly felt warm, and let the blanket slip off my shoulders.

  “When you had to do exactly what you wanted to do when you wanted to do it. It’s served you well. You were a champion swimmer, got into the best schools, and now you’re at the best firm. You simply . . . will your life to happen, it seems. But Ada left after you jumped out of that tree and broke your leg. Farrah left after we took her skiing with us and you took off down the black diamond without so much as a word to any of us. Cynthia left once you went on a hunger strike in an attempt to force us to get you a puppy. They all loved you so much they couldn’t stand to take care of you when you didn’t follow the rules.”

  “I ate when everybody was asleep,” I mumbled. I pulled my sleeves down over my hands self-consciously and rubbed my right forearm. “What’s your point? That I scare off everybody who gets close to me?” I could hear my voice becoming shrill.

  “No no no, sweetheart,” he said, and rubbed at my back again. “The point is . . . well, two things. First, you always created your own path, your own rules. I’m sure you will do the same at Klasko. And second, why would we have nannies if your mother was home, taking care of you?”

  I squinted to see the glaringly obvious. “Mom worked when I was young?”

  “Your mother was at Dunns & Simons in the city until you were six.”

  I furrowed my brow as he continued. “She stopped being a full-time architect to be a full-time mother. It’s what she wanted, but she also worried you were too much to leave with anybody else. And she was the only one you ever really listened to. She wanted to be a better mother, and that meant not being an architect. She was absolutely a career woman. But it never meant as much to her as you do.”

  My lower jaw hung loosely. The tears had stopped, replaced by a sense of anxious dread that I had somehow misjudged the people who had raised me.

  “She worried about me?” I knew she had, of course. But it was oddly comforting to say out loud. It dispelled my feeling that I was a cheap, disposable surplus commodity in the world.

  “She worried about you because she saw herself in you! The way mothers do. The way parents do. We worry about you all the time, even now. Whether the subways are safe. Whether you’re sleeping enough. Whether you’re eating enough.” He shoved a container of noodles at me. I laughed and sniffled. “Whether you’re happy,” he finished softly.

  I rested my head on his shoulder and stared up at the water stain in the ceiling, a reminder of the leak it had sprouted when I was in eighth grade. I was having a sleepover with Sandy Cranswell when we were in a “best friends” phase, and rather than having pancakes and watching television on a lazy Sunday morning, we were carrying buckets up from the basement to catch the water and dumping them out the back door before they overflowed.

  “I can’t believe I kept Mom from working. And you guys would have had a second income . . . you might have been able to retire by now,” I said, sniffling, still staring at the ceiling.

  I felt him sigh. “Alexandra, we did just fine. We have more than enough. I love my work. We’re happy.” I held my father’s gaze and finally nodded. Satisfied, he exhaled. “Now I’m going back to bed. I have rounds at seven tomorrow.”

  “Night, Dad.”

  I watched him meticulously cover the Tupperware and place it back exactly where it had come from, the refrigerator light illuminating the Klasko & Fitch shirt he wore so proudly.

  “You’re one of my two favorite people in the world,” he said as he closed the fridge door. “You should get to know my other favorite one. She likely has a better idea of what you’re going through than you think.”

  He smiled as he walked back toward me, kissing the top of my head before disappearing up the stairs.

  The sun was just coming up as I heard my father’s car engine start in the driveway. I peeked out of my curtains and made my way down the hall to my parents’ bedroom.

  Low voices were wafting from the television into the hallway. I opened the door slowly to find the shades still tightly drawn. The beige carpeting was as soft as ever under my feet, and the light-blue chaise where I used to lie to watch my mother apply makeup looked just as inviting as it had back then.

  My mother, who was propped up on her pillows in bed, reached for the remote and clicked off the TV. “Good morning, Bunny! Did the TV wake you?”

  I shook my head. “No. I was up.”

  She patted the mattress, and a deep sense of comfort washed over me as I hopped into the bed and settled into my father’s still-warm imprint.

  “I broke up with Sam.” My lips quivered as I rested my head on my father’s pillow and turned toward my mother. “Well, he broke up with me.”

  She nodded. “Are you okay?”

  “Dad told you?”

  “Are you okay?” she asked me again.

  “I wanted to tell you . . .” My voice was unsteady.

  My mother reached out and touched my cheek with her palm. “Sometimes we don’t say things out loud because we don’t want them to be true.” She contemplated my face. “You will be okay.”

  “I’m so sad,” I admitted, mostly to myself, and blotted the stream of tears spilling from my eyes.

  “Breakups are sad.” Her obvious words were oddly comforting.

  “Are you mad that I couldn’t make it work? I know how much you love Sam.”

  My mother stared at me for a long moment. “I love you, Bunny. And whoever makes you happy, but only because he makes you happy and only for as long as he makes you happy.”

  “You wanted me to marry Sam. You said it was just cold feet.”

  She shook her head. “One day, if you want, you will have a child of your own. And you’ll understand that her health and happiness is the thing that matters most in the world. You have always been so . . . restless—so resistant to the idea of becoming too comfortable, too normal. What did you want me to say, Alex? Yes! Run away! Break up with him! No.” She shook her head. “No, my job was to give you a calm baseline. You’ve always done exactly as you wanted to, anyway.”

  I recalled her seemingly offhand response when we had dinner, understanding how much thought she’d put into it. I finally nodded, my eyes locking with hers, a palpable connection that I hadn’t felt in years passing between us.

  “I don’t think I can make it at Klasko,” I blurted out. “I feel like . . . it’s breaking me.”

  “Shhhhhh. Don’t be absurd. My beautiful, bold girl.” She patted my hair as I cried. “You are far stronger than you think. Maybe Klasko is not the place for you. Maybe it’s just a stepping stone on your way to your next adventure. But you’re not broken. You just need some time. You’re still new there!” She spoke with her lips flush against my forehead, so I could feel her words. I closed my eyes and allowed them to resonate.

  Chapter 25

  That Monday morning, a tease of summer weather momentarily fooled me into thinking I had hibernated away the remainder of the bad dream that would be my first seven months at Klasko. In reality, I had yet to match into a practice group, and the temperature was expected to cool again the following day. But my weekend at home with my parents had quelled the anxiety that had been building in me since the gala. I walked the length of the marble lobby surer of myself than when I’d wobbled out on Friday.

  When I got to the forty-first floor, Kevin was leaning against the wall outside my door, scrolling through his phone.

  “Hey, sorry—were you waiting for me?”

  “Hey,” he said, his face brightening. “Yeah. Didn’t want to go in there without you.”

  “Next time, you should feel free.” I beckoned him into my office, where I dropped my bag and hung up my coat. He closed the door behind him and then took a seat. “So, what’s up?”

  “Nothing. I just . . . nothing. I just wanted to
say hi. See how you were,” he said, then looked above my head and out my window.

  “Good. I’m good. What about you?” I asked, forcing enthusiasm into my voice.

  “No, I’m really asking.” His eyes met mine. “You seemed . . . off . . . that night at the bar with Jordan.”

  “It was just a bad day,” I assured him. “It’s a bad few months before we match. Anyway, we’re in the final weeks now. Come the end of April, we’ll all know where we belong.”

  “It didn’t have to be that stressful. This place makes you think you need to—”

  “No offense, but M&A isn’t like other groups,” I told him, calling my computer to life. “I don’t expect you to understand, but trust me, it actually is more stressful in M&A.”

  “I disagree,” he stated plainly. I turned my gaze back to him as he continued. “I do M&A too. Almost exclusively. That night I saw you, Jordan was taking me out to celebrate a really rough deal we had just closed.”

  I stared at him, feeling betrayed. “Why didn’t you ever mention this?” And why didn’t Jordan or Matt?

  “I didn’t not mention it on purpose. Or maybe it was on purpose, I don’t know.” He smoothed his hair behind his ears, looking more and more like Jordan with every motion. “I like you, and I want to be your friend. I saw how you and Carmen treated each other, and I didn’t want any part of it.”

  My cheeks flushed. “Carmen is my best friend in our class!”

  “Really? When you got an invite to Miami, she told the whole class you got it because you were sleeping with Jaskel. With friends like that . . .”

  I sat there stunned for a moment before forcing out a short laugh. Part of me had always known she was the source of the rumor. But the other part of me was crushed. I wondered how many more lessons in the ugliness of human nature I’d be forced to endure.

  “Alex, you know how much work the group has. They have room to take on at least five new associates a year. And they do want associates who will go out and party with them. But they need associates who are good lawyers.”

  I stared back at him, recalling the countless times Didier, Matt, and Jordan had told me that all that mattered was my work. “You should have told me you were ranking M&A,” I grumbled. I needed to be angry at something other than my own behavior.

  “Maybe you’re right. But we’re both going to match, so who cares?” He coughed, then changed the subject. “More importantly, how are you doing?”

  “I’m okay. Really. Just going through some personal stuff right now, but I’m hanging in.”

  Kevin nodded, seeming to accept my brush-off. “Yeah. Okay. Good. We all feel the pressure. I mean, I took the not-so-subtle free gym membership as a hint and gained thirty pounds of muscle. I changed my hair. And my clothes—”

  My phone rang. “Peter Dunn” flashed on the screen. “I have to grab this,” I said apologetically, and Kevin stood to go. “For what it’s worth, you look good,” I called after him.

  “Hi, Peter,” I said, feeling a new sense of calm and control after my conversation with Kevin and a weekend with my parents. I wondered if Carmen had gone to management about him. Maybe I should go. Start putting up my own boundaries. Making my own rules.

  “Hi. I’m swamped, but can you send a few NDAs to Gary? I just updated them for the year and made some changes. They’re saved on the system. And can you call Quality to make a pickup at Starlight?”

  He sounded like business as usual. I guess Carmen either hadn’t talked to anyone yet or no longer planned to. In the past two weeks I had performed all associate tasks on my Stag River deals flawlessly. But I knew I would have to speak up eventually if I was asked to do any work directly for Gary. I closed my eyes, readying myself for the speech I had rehearsed on the train back from my parents’ house. I would prefer to no longer work for Gary Kaplan directly in any capacity. Though I’d like to continue working on Stag River matters he’s not involved with. If this means I can no longer work on Stag River deals more generally, so be it. I will find replacements on all my active matters. I . . .

  “Sure,” I said hesitantly, still playing out an idea that had started percolating in my mind.

  “Great. Thanks.” He hung up, and I stared at the phone for a moment before deciding not to call Quality. Instead, I grabbed my coat.

  “Anna!” I called, and she popped her head up. “I have some appointments uptown this morning. I’ll be on email.”

  I hailed a cab as I wriggled into my thin trench coat and slid into the back seat. “Seventy-Second between Park and Madison, please,” I instructed the driver, then leaned back, the edges of the duct tape covering the leather’s tears sticking to my back. Anxiety coursed through me, and my rational brain insisted I’d see Gary Kaplan waiting outside his building. But every instinct I had told me I’d find something different.

  The Starlight Diner awning was a well-worn navy canvas, with faded gold stars dotting the background. As soon as I entered the small restaurant, I saw a rotating cylinder displaying a carrot cake dotted with walnuts and the obligatory carrot made of frosting, pillows of meringue atop a bright yellow gelatin filling, and a variety of chocolate-based confections. A stocky gentleman with his neck draped in a large gold chain and cross and a thick black mustache greeted me.

  “I’m meeting somebody,” I told him. I’m just not sure who. I smiled politely and scanned the restaurant. A few of the red leather booths were filled; I saw an older couple bent low to their soup bowls, two young moms tending to their children while struggling to carry on a conversation, a beautiful young woman with soft, strawberry-blond waves, and three teenage boys huddled around one of their phones, laughing. But Gary Kaplan was nowhere to be seen.

  I looked back at the young woman, who sat wrapped in a pale-blue oversize pashmina as she stared out the window. Her face was placid, but the fingers on her right hand picked nervously at a cuticle on her left. I focused in on her and noticed that her posture was awful—she was hunched over the table in a way somebody dressed that expensively would have been taught not to be—and she seemed to be fighting tears. I watched as she grabbed for her water glass, which shook so wildly in her hand that she placed it down again without taking a sip.

  I nodded to the host and made my way to her, then stood next to her booth for a moment as she looked up at me expectantly. She was radiant, with delicate features and the clearest blue eyes I’d ever seen.

  “Are you waiting for a Quality car?” I asked softly. I prayed she would have no idea what I was talking about, but I saw a muted terror behind her eyes before her expression went studiously neutral. Shit. It was her. I didn’t know who she was or what she was doing. But this was who I was looking for. To bring myself to eye level with her, and hopefully reassure her, I took my coat off and slid into the booth opposite her.

  She stared at my waist rather than my face as I sat, craning her neck over the table as her face filled with panic, her eyes darting wildly.

  “It’s okay,” I said, and held my hands up. I had never in my life elicited such fear in another human. “I’m not here to hurt you, I promise.”

  “I wasn’t going to say anything. I’m just waiting for a car.” She looked off into the distance, her legs still on the seat.

  “I’m just . . . say anything about what?”

  “You’re with Klasko,” she said accusingly.

  I quickly realized what had frightened her and ripped my Klasko security badge from the waist of my skirt before tossing it into my purse.

  “No,” I said quietly. “No. I’m not . . . Not right now. I’m here . . . I want to help.”

  She allowed a sarcastic laugh to escape her lips. “I’m sure you do,” she hissed, rising out of her seat. “Klasko! That name is all over those fucking NDAs I sign.”

  I slid across my seat and took a step toward her. When I placed a hand on her shoulder, though, she visibly winced, and I instantly pulled it back. She opened her pashmina quickly to rewrap herself, and I spotted an angry red bru
ise with purple borders peeking out from the top of her shirt. It was the kind of mark that made me swallow hard and lose my breath—the kind that would be black in a week and green the next and yellow the one after.

  She saw me notice it and retreated deeper inside the plush blue cashmere, sitting again. I slid slowly into the seat next to her.

  “I’m Alex,” I said, not knowing where else to begin.

  “I’m just waiting for my car,” she said, and I gave a small shake of my head to communicate that her car wasn’t coming. Her shoulders slumped.

  “What did he do to you?” I whispered.

  She smoothed a few red-gold strands away from her perspiring brow and looked me dead in the eyes for a long, pregnant moment. “I can’t,” she finally whispered, taking out the personal NDA for Gary R. Kaplan with which I was all too familiar, the firm’s red letterhead shouting from the top of the page.

  “NDAs can’t prevent somebody from reporting a crime,” I assured her. “They’re null.”

  She straightened slightly. “I’m not sure it is a crime. I go willingly. I sign up for it.”

  “Well, you can tell me. Consider it attorney-client privilege,” I told her. Please don’t point out that Gary is actually my client in this scenario.

  She doubled over again in a wave of pain, and I placed my hand over hers. She flipped her palm and squeezed mine tightly until it passed.

  “I think I need a doctor,” she said quietly. Her eyes focused and unfocused, and before I even knew what was happening, I was in a cab with her to Lenox Hill Hospital.

  I had never taken somebody to the emergency room before, and though I tried my best to fill out the forms, she was so delirious with pain that I didn’t trust most of her answers. According to her Miami driver’s license, she was Kristen Molloy. According to her, she was allergic to all pain meds. “Except morphine,” she added with a laugh. I erred on the side of caution and wrote “might be allergic to pain meds.” I felt like I was watching myself from outer space as I argued with the nurse at the front desk, then moved on to a physician’s assistant, who took one look at her and ushered us into a room with a promise he’d be back with a doctor as soon as possible. I propped Kristen up in front of me and gently removed her blue wrap from her shoulders and began to undo her white button-down so she could put on the robe the PA had provided. As her shirt fell slowly open, her alabaster skin darkened down her torso into angry shades of red and black. I felt tears spilling out over my cheeks despite my attempt to be stoic.