Somewhere along the way, she’d lost her ambition. Somewhere along the way, it had just seemed easier to fade into the background, to become unmemorable. It was probably when she had stopped being Sabrina Choe and started being Sabrina Blum. At the time, she had just turned thirty, and changing her last name didn’t seem like such a big deal, even if, when you looked at her, she was clearly more of a Choe than a Blum. Maybe if she’d been able to get her book published, she would have felt different—if she’d actually made a name for herself as herself, then perhaps the stakes of becoming someone else would have felt higher.
She patted the bed next to her, looking for her phone, and finally found it under her pillow. There was a notification from Chase, alerting her that the payment on her Visa card was over thirty days late. She frowned as the words swam in front of her briefly, then squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and reopened them. Better. Now if she could only remember which Visa that was…For a while she’d managed to keep track of everything, opening store cards to get the 10 percent discount and keeping the balances on their other cards low enough that Dan wouldn’t notice—she was the one who paid the bills anyway—but lately, she was starting to think that maybe things had gotten a wee bit out of control. First the Barneys card had been suspended because she’d forgotten to make the minimum payment, and then she’d been turned down for a J. Crew card—a J. Crew card!—when she’d applied, and she knew she needed to make a minimum payment on the Delta SkyMiles AmEx by the fifteenth or that card was going to get shut off too. It was at the point where she preemptively cringed when her monthly statements arrived in her inbox, because she knew the money in their actual checking account was dangerously low and she had to make sure their mortgage payment would clear. Somehow, miraculously, Dan hadn’t caught on yet. But she needed to figure out a way to make more money, and quickly. Soon she would just swallow her pride and give that woman she knew from grad school who had a big job at InStyle a call and see if she had anything—anything—to assign her. Because soon the only thing she was going to be able to write was a personal essay called “I Made My Family Go into Debt Because I Resented My Husband and Couldn’t Resist That Really Cute Isabel Marant Dress (Hey, It Was on Sale!),” which she’d probably have to publish on the Huffington Post for free.
When she was Katya’s age, the parameters of “success” seemed much more clearly defined. Or maybe there were just fewer options. When she first got to New York, all she wanted was to make enough money to be able to pay rent without overdrawing her account or taking a cash advance from a credit card or asking her parents for money. But with each stage she reached, it seemed like there was something else on the horizon, just one raise or one new job away—that soon, she could be someone who owned clothes that required dry cleaning and got weekly mani-pedis and shopped at Alexander Wang sample sales and took Pilates classes and had an apartment that allowed pets that was also big enough to have people over for dinner or throw a party, and she could afford to hire someone to come clean the apartment every two weeks and rent a share house in the summer and go on yoga retreats in Tulum. Then when she had kids, it was like a whole new edition of the New York Olympics, one that she felt she was definitely not medaling in.
She had a few Facebook notifications, so she opened the app and saw that there were new posts in a private group she’d joined a few weeks ago called YUNG MILFS NYC. It was a group of a couple thousand women, most of whom seemed to be five to ten years younger than she was, who all had kids in New York. Her friend Penelope, who she had secretly categorized as her prettiest and coolest mom friend, had added her. And they really were MILFs—lots of them seemed to be actresses or models or just extremely attractive women who had married young. They weren’t boring Upper East Side women either; most of them lived in Williamsburg or Bushwick or Greenpoint, and there was a lot of talk about how judgmental the older moms were. (Sabrina felt dangerously close to being put into this category.) The first couple of new posts were standard YUNG MILF fare—crafternoon playdates, a humblebrag disguised as a question about a four-year-old who was reading already—but then there was one that made Sabrina sit up in bed so quickly that her head started spinning. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes again and then opened them after a few seconds and read the post:
Ladies, so I’m in a bit of a spot at the moment. The hubs lost his job a few months ago and I’ve been looking for some ways to pick up extra cash from home. Anyone have any suggestions that aren’t illegal? Or at least, not so illegal that I could get in actual trouble. ;)
She scrolled through the first few comments, all of which said something to the effect of “Sooo sorry to hear that! Thinking of u!” but a post a few lines down caught her eye.
Hey girl, was totally in the same boat last year. Sucks. But let me tell you, you’ll get through it!!! Don’t be grossed out, but I started selling my dirty underwear on Craigslist. It’s super easy and you can probably make $400 to $600 a week depending how much time you want to put into it. Message me if you want more details! ♥
Now the original woman’s post had been hijacked by commenters debating whether it was okay to sell their underwear; some women were saying it was anti-feminist, while others were worried about what would happen if their husbands found out. Some were convinced it was too dangerous. But others—several others, Sabrina noted—were asking for more information. Finally the first commenter replied:
I sell on Craigslist for anywhere from $50 to $75 each plus shipping, depending on what I’m selling. I write something short and dirty where I talk about how I’m sooooo hot and how I get soooo wet (lol) and I post a pic of myself in the underwear I’m selling—I have one pic of me in a thong that I use and one pic in boy shorts. Those are the most popular ones but every so often you get a guy who’s really into granny panties so you might want to have some of those on hand too. You can get cheap ones online. Usually I say I’m a hot MILF but sometimes I’ll do other characters, like college girl. Sometimes they’ll ask you for more pictures, up to you if you want to send them a face shot. Once they pay you, you get the underwear dirty (however you want to do that…), put them in a Ziploc bag, and send them off. That’s pretty much it! Let me tell you, it was a total godsend when we were in a tight spot. I don’t do it so much anymore, now that I have a full-time job, but I do have a few loyal customers who I’ll make special arrangements for. ;)
Sabrina stared at the comment. She went to Craigslist on her phone and typed in used panties in the search field and watched dozens of ads come up. Holy shit. All this time, a super-easy solution to her problems had been right here in front of her, and all she had to do was take a selfie and post an ad.
Dan still hadn’t shown up or texted—she probably had at least half an hour until he came home. She turned on all the lights in her bedroom and rummaged through her underwear drawer until she found a black lace thong. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d worn it, and as she put it on she felt a thrill. She stood in front of their full-length mirror, turned her butt to it, and snapped a picture of herself. It was blurry. She tried again, positioning the phone so it was angled more toward the mirror. This would be easier with a selfie stick.
The next one was better. She opened the photo and made sure her face couldn’t be seen and that she hadn’t inadvertently included any images of herself or, God forbid, anyone in her family in the photo. Was she really going to do this? She was. She sat down on her bed and opened the browser on her phone, went to Craigslist, and selected “Post an Ad.”
Sexxxxy Asian Mom Selling Sweet Used Panties $40.
Start low, she told herself. She also needed a new email address for her new business. She went to Yahoo and opened a new email account, [email protected], and went back to Craigslist and posted her ad. She got excited when she got a notification that an email had arrived at her new address, but all it said was Your ad has been posted! A few more minutes went by, and still nothing. Were all the used-panty fetishists asleep for the nigh
t? She felt giddy, like she was extra-drunk. Then, all of a sudden, the emails started coming in.
hi beautiful im looking for 2 prs, need to have strong odor
will u cum in the panties before u send them?
Will pay extra for an in-person meeting
Hi, sexy, she typed in response to the first email. Just let me know exactly what you want. I’m here to please you. :)
She had just hit send when she heard the lock on the door click and the sound of Dan shuffling into the house. She quickly logged out of the Yahoo email and closed the Craigslist tab, so when Dan came into the bedroom she was just looking at the website for Amelia’s school. “Hey. You’re still up?”
“Just looking at the new parent portal for Slope Montessori.” Dan started undressing. “Why were you at work so late?”
Dan sighed. “Just typical Deanna and Rich bullshit. They want us to be publishing around the clock, but they haven’t hired someone to be an overnight editor, so we’re there till God knows when editing and scheduling posts to go up all night.”
“Huh. That is annoying.”
“Plus, we’re getting ready for this year’s TechScene Fifty, and they want to do breakout posts on a few founders, which I could not be less excited about.”
“Why?”
He didn’t answer her, just sighed dramatically and went into the bathroom and shut the door. She heard running water, then the toilet flush, then running water again. She closed her computer and placed it on the floor next to the bed. Dan came back into the bedroom. “Why do they even have an executive editor if they’re never going to listen to him? I told them there is no point in giving someone like Mack McAllister more press, the guy has barely done anything and we write about him like he’s Steve Jobs.” He paused. “Sorry.”
Sabrina usually mounted a halfhearted defense of Mack whenever Dan launched into a diatribe about him, but now she was silent.
“The tech world builds these people up like they’re gods just because they got some VC funding and they’re somewhat good-looking, and then it just perpetuates the cycle because they go to South by Southwest and talk about how great their app is but no one ever bothers asking if anyone is actually using it or if the company is making any money. No one cares, though. That’s the crazy thing. It’s basically all a house of cards waiting to fall.”
“I’m really tired,” Sabrina said. “Can we talk about this later?”
“Do you really like working there?” Dan got into bed. “Like, really. If the company closed down tomorrow, would you be sad? Would you miss your job? Would you miss your coworkers?”
“What a thing to say, Dan.” She refused to meet his eye.
“Look. I’m glad you have a job. I really am. I just…I just wish it was with someone else, okay? To me he just represents everything that’s wrong with startup culture.”
“But you work at a startup!” Sabrina said. “TechScene is a startup.”
“That’s not the point. I think Rich and Deanna are actually good people. And we’re building something necessary and important.”
“Don’t tell me you really believe that bullshit. Now you sound like the rest of them.” Dan was silent. “I’m turning out the light.” She clicked off the table lamp next to her side of the bed and the room was in darkness. She waited for him to respond—he always wanted the last word—but instead he just turned over onto his side, facing away from her, and soon she heard his breathing become slow and rhythmic.
12
Boundary Hunter
yo
The notification flashed across the top right-hand corner of her screen. It was Dan, direct messaging her in Slack. She sighed. It was 6:23 p.m. and she was so close to finishing a post about a new app for New York apartment listings that was billing itself as the “Tinder for apartment listings”—you swiped through photos of apartments the app preselected for you based on preferences (size, location, et cetera), and if you chose one, you’d find out immediately if you were qualified to rent it based on information the app had saved about your income, roommates, guarantors, and so on. If she finished soon, she might be able to leave by seven. What could Dan possibly want? She clicked over to Slack and typed:
Katya: hiya. what’s up?
Dan: almost done here?
Katya: yeah just finishing up this one thing
Dan: cool, lmk when you’re done. i’ll walk out with you.
Katya: you don’t need to wait for me
Dan: it’s fine, i have a couple emails i need to send. just ping me when you’re almost done
She sighed again. Now she felt like she had to hurry things along because Dan was waiting for her. She halfheartedly typed a sentence into her post, then deleted it. She sat for a minute, drumming her fingers on the desk—a nervous habit that she tried not to do when there were other people around—and finally typed:
FindMyPad is entering an already crowded market for apartment rentals in New York City. Billing itself as the “Tinder for apartment listings” is a canny attempt to cater to the demographic it wants to serve. The only thing standing in the way of success is its ability to keep an updated database of listings and keep out the spammers. If it can do that, Craigslist might finally have a worthy competitor for our hard-earned security deposits.
She read over the last few sentences again, gave a little nod, and hit save.
It had been two weeks since she’d taken the photo of Isabel’s phone, and so far, Katya had done…nothing. Every time she thought about contacting either Mack or Isabel to ask them about it, she started feeling nauseated. And the Sabrina complication was another layer that made it even more awkward. Katya was usually unwavering in her conviction that she was doing the right thing—not always the easy thing or the predictable thing, but the right thing. She was confident, too, that the bad guys and the good guys in this scenario were entirely clear—Isabel was dating Andrew now; one of the texts had said don’t tell me u don’t miss this, strongly implying that they were unwelcome. So why was she having so much trouble actually doing anything about it? Instead she was spending her time on posts like this one—posts that would get her points for breaking something exclusive but that weren’t anything truly ambitious. The FindMyPad news had landed in her lap, thanks to a well-timed text from Teddy Rosen, who told her that Gramercy had just made a seed investment and they were about to launch their product.
Katya: wanna go over my post before I publish it?
Dan: that was fast!
Katya: ha I guess. i’ve been working on it all afternoon.
Dan: ok what’s the link? I’ll take a quick look and then let’s get out of here.
Three minutes later, Dan messaged her back:
looks good. go ahead and pub.
She reopened the post and hit publish, waited to make sure the post was actually up, tweeted it, sent it to Trevor to post from @TechScene, and then unplugged her laptop and put it in her messenger bag. She shoved her phone in her back pocket, double-checked her bag to make sure she had her headphones and wallet, and stood up, pulling on her black leather jacket. Dan was already standing at the end of her row of desks. The office had started to empty out, but she saw Christina staring intently at her screen a few desks away, and Brian, headphones on, typing so hard on his keyboard she thought it might break.
When they got downstairs, Dan already had his cigarettes out. “Smoke?” Katya nodded, taking the offered cigarette out of his pack and allowing him to light it. She inhaled. It was dark out, and starting to get chilly. The early signs of New York winter, when it was never still light out when you left work. She’d have to remember to wear her fingerless gloves tomorrow.
“Let’s get a drink,” Dan said suddenly.
Katya glanced at him. “I’m kinda tired,” she said, even though as she said it, she wasn’t sure if it was really true.
Dan laughed. “How can you be tired,” he said. “You’re, what, twenty-three years old?”
“Twenty-four,” she said.
“Sounds pretty crazy,” Katya said. The thought of staying out until sunrise was nauseating.
“Well, it was nothing compared to having kids. You don’t know tired until you’ve had kids.”
Couldn’t thirty-nine-year-olds just be old and tired and not talk about it constantly? Having children didn’t feel like something she had to start thinking about for a long time—maybe ever. She was rarely around kids—every so often she’d see some in her neighborhood, either teenagers causing trouble or well-dressed toddlers who looked like miniature versions of their parents, wearing Converse sneakers and Fleetwood Mac T-shirts. She was hardly ever even around parents, come to think of it, except for Dan, who was not exactly positive about the effect that children had on one’s life.
“I wouldn’t know, I guess,” she said.
“Look, I love my kids, but…let’s just say, try not to have any before you’re at least thirty-five.”
“Noted,” Katya said. Thirty-five seemed about as far off as fifty, or a hundred. She would die if she was still working at TechScene when she was thirty-five. Actually, if she was still working at TechScene when she turned twenty-six, then something was probably wrong.
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