The Thunder Beneath Us

by Nicole Blades

  “Exactly. She wanted to edit the reference out of my story. That and the other five hundred and ninety-seven words I wrote, basically. And she’s always bottlenecking everything that I try to do. You know what, I’d bet a fucking Birkin that she’s stealing my ideas and presenting them to JK as her own brilliance. Susie never did that bullshit.”

  “Why are you even writing about the Bulgarian love lock—so gross. That job of yours . . .”

  “I know. I could do better.”

  “Come on, Best. It’s vaginas and penises and tittays all day. What’s better than that? Plus, you regularly get to sit and giggle on morning TV—in full hair and makeup, I should add—with that silver fox. That man is hot as hell. He’s been on my could-get-it list since I was in middle school.”

  “I’m sure Robot Joan is going to put an end to that too.”

  “That would be a dummy move. You’re beyond fabulous on TV. People love waking up and seeing your gorgeous face talking about how to get off.”

  “It’s not all sex stuff.”

  “Um, the Bulgarian love lo—”

  “I’m just saying I also write about health and science and psychology.”

  “Best, you’re the one always complaining about being the vajeen queen. I’m just saying that you’re good at it. The James magazine people know that. Even this Robot Joan woman knows it, which is why you’re a threat and she’s trying to make you throw up the white flag.”

  “Maybe I need to break out of my lane, then. Do something big and important, outside of my vajeen purview.”

  “Start by never using the word purview again, please.”

  “You sound more like your sister day by day.”

  “Twin power, baby.”

  “Not a compliment.”

  As always, Kendra’s laugh starts to chip away at my scowl. I feel my face sliding back to calm. She catches her breath, clears her throat. “Look, are you serious about quitting this time?”

  “Quitting? I’m not quitting. I’m talking about showing off my wingspan.”

  “By dunking a basketball or something? Wingspan? Jesus, Best.”

  “Listen, you’re riding my nerve right now, Kendra.”

  “What do you want—you’re talking about purviews and wingspans. This is not Best Lightburn language.”

  “That’s what I mean. I’m going show the Robot that there’s more here than penises entering vaginas. Whatever. I’m going to pitch that honor-killing story.”

  “Good Christ. That story is awful. Like I said last month, just give up on that story already. Why get into all of that?”

  “Because I’ve been working on this for almost four months, Kendra. And I’m so close to getting through to her, getting an actual phoner with the surviving daughter. I know I can get this interview and the Robot—scheme all she wants—can’t swipe this story from me and claim it as her own. This story is it for me. It’s weighty and compelling and heartbreaking. It’s meaningful. It’s a meaningful story that I have to write. I need to write it.”

  “It’s also an ad-killer. Do you think brands are going to be clamoring to buy space next to that gruesome story?”

  “We’ve run other edgy stories before. Like the S-and-M guide or the new sex-positions illustrated guide. And then we did the anal-sex thing—”

  “Right, Butt Seriously. Who can forget that one?”

  “You know what I’m saying, Kendra. We’ve done other stories before that were pushed up against the line that you’re not supposed to cross. The advertisers didn’t recoil, clutching their pearls.”

  “That’s sex. This is murder and religion—specifically Islam, which is not having a banner decade, my friend. It’s grisly. How are ads for mascara and tampons or worse, the pill, going to hold up next to a story like that?”

  “But I’m not talking about the grisly stuff, the killings. It’s going to be about living, about moving from death to life, without shame or guilt.” I spin around in my chair and notice a figure looming by the door. No idea how long they’ve been there, but they have good timing. “Kendra, I gotta bounce.”

  “Please think this through, Best. That honor-killing thing is not a good idea,” she says in a rush. “Not even a little bit.”

  “Miss Singh, please, let’s do this lecture later, okay?”

  “Wait, one more thing—is writing fashion content for our site still out of the question? ‘Cause we just launched a new Tumblr. You’d crush that shit. You know I’m always good to talk to people here, pull strings, twist arms, crack skulls.”

  “From vadge to fashion?”—I whisper—“Oh, that’s exactly what I need to do to establish myself as a serious journalist. Let me just go. Shadow at the frosted pane.”

  “Meet us later? Me, Flavio, and some friends are hitting Pop Bar.”

  “Maybe. I’ll see what time I get out. And this better not be some blind-date bullshit, Kendra. Grant’s just down, not out.”

  “You sure about that? Did you see the latest post on Tell Me More? Grant King is getting the Where’s Waldo? treatment. Not a good look for your man.”

  “Do I have to say it in Bengali next, Kendra? I have to go.”

  “Fine. Just don’t threaten me with the Bulgarian Love—”

  “So much. I hate you too much. Bye!”

  I can already sense who’s at the door: Robot’s assistant. She smells like black licorice and oppression.

  “It’s okay to knock, Kristen.” I slide the door open and try to keep my smile easy.

  “I know, sorry. I saw that you were on the phone. I didn’t want to disturb you.”

  “What’s up?”

  “Joan wants to see you.”

  “About what, did she say?”

  “She did, and I wrote it down, actually on a sticky note that I was going to leave on your desk if you were out or on your door if you were on the phone or something, like just now, but I forgot it on my desk along with the FedEx stuff I have to drop off at the mailroom. I was thinking about heading back to get it, but then figured I should probably just wait and tell you instead of running the risk of you stepping away while I stepped away and then missing you altogether. Sorry.”

  I’m dizzy. “That’s okay. Do you remember when she wants to meet?”

  “Yes. Now.”

  “Next time, don’t bury the lede.”

  “Sorry, there’s just a lot of catch-up and the last girl didn’t leave much of anything to help me transition.”

  “That’s because there was no last girl. Susie didn’t need an assistant.” Reel it in, Lightburn. She’s a direct line to this woman. “But clearly there needs to be one, right? So that’s good.”

  “Right. Thanks. And sorry about the long story.”

  “No apology needed, Kristen.” This faux-smiling thing physically hurts. “Thanks for letting me know.” Oh, shit. She’s lingering. “So . . . you should probably do that mailroom stuff now, right?”

  “Yeah, crap. Yes, ohmigod. Sorry. Thanks.”

  The massive yellow door is ajar. Susie’s old office is totally transformed. What was cool and cozy (and kooky in some spots) is now cold and starchy. Gone are the soft mood lamps, the mustard paisley chair, the blue, button-tufted mini-sofa, and that ridiculous, empty wooden birdcage. Just vanished. Where Susie had a collection of wild photos that told their own stories, the Robot has just two pictures in thin, simple frames—facing her. The one I could glimpse is black-and-white, old, with a tall person leaned up against a bicycle. The other one is slightly larger, horizontal, and angled so that you can only make out the edge of a waterfall and some jagged, dark rocks. Everything else on her oversized glass-top desk is about work: folders, galleys, pens (mainly red ones) jammed into a steel cup.

  On the ledge behind her stuffy wingback are the required smoke-up-your-ass plaques and awards—hers largely pertain to sports journalism and being a black woman—plus her farewell Sports Illustrated mock cover was hung most prominently. Even in that photo, she’s cheerless, holding some manila
folders against her boring blazer. One of the coverlines on the faux mag mentioned her “severe” Mets fandom. That was, like, strike 18. I mean, baseball? Jesus. When she shared this tidbit as one of her great loves at that first edit meeting, it was like, my kingdom for a cow patty to hurl at her chest. But I actually played it shrewd and told her that I was a brokenhearted Expos gal, “You know, back when they were from Montreal.” Complete fiction. Like my father, I never liked or respected the game. We use to give Benjamin so much shit for watching baseball and then—the nerve—asking to play it when he started high school. He was good too, but then there wasn’t a sport created that Benjamin Lightburn couldn’t master. Sometimes, when I first moved here, I would turn on a late-night Yankees game on the clock radio—AM—just to have in the background, white noise to help me sleep. But I would end up dreaming about Benjamin, and I couldn’t have that. Now when I can’t sleep, I grab a pill or drink NyQuil.

  More than bonding over the silly sport, I told the Robot the baseball lie so I could slip in the part about my being Canadian, a Montrealer, and rather unlike the usual black American women she’s encountered in the office over the years. Yeah, no go. She has remained as uncharmed and impenetrable as when we first met.

  I knock on the open door anyway. It’s what I always see Kristen do. The Robot’s not alone. Miyuki, all horse teeth and glitter eye makeup, is sitting to her right. Three other senior editors—Ashley, Isabelle, and Maggie—are also there, with their skinny legs crossed twice, trying to look effortless on the edge of those hard chairs.

  “Just finishing up, Best,” Robot says.

  The others are looking at me, head to toe. I need to concentrate. No fear, no flinch. “Sure thing. Do you want me to come back later?”

  “No, just hang out there in the hall,” Robot says. “We’ll only be a minute or so more. Editor stuff. Don’t want to bore you.” All of her smiles look penciled in.

  I can sense Miyuki gloating, feel her relishing every minute of this bullshit inner-circle moment, and I want to spit. “Of course. No problem. Just give me a shout when you’re ready.”

  “Oh, actually, Best,”—the Robot says; she sounds almost pleasant—“could you close the door for us? Thanks.”

  My name is not Alfred Pennyworth. Bitch, please.

  “Sure.” I know my smile looks plastic, but I doubt the Robot can tell. I make sure to keep it spread evenly across my face while pulling the door toward me.

  This is fine. Waiting in the wings gives me a chance to straighten up, breathe out the bitter and focus on the work, gather my words. I see Trinity zipping around in the background. We make brief eye contact, and she points her finger gun to her temples, pulls the thumb trigger. I send her a quick up-nod and start a light pacing near the Robot’s door. As the minutes click by, agitation stirs. I can’t hear anything coming from the inside. What are they, whispering?

  Pacing is over. Now I’m staring at the door, plain and overt, hoping it magically tells me something. (The fact that all of the top editors have heavy, yellow doors—not frosted sliding ones—is probably some mind game. I’m sure there’s a funded study that can back me up.)

  Kristen’s still not back at her desk. She truly is useless. Just as I take a step towards her little assistant area to see what I can spy, the Robot’s door opens. Maggie’s the first one out, as usual.

  “Hey, girl-pie,” Maggie says.

  Yeah, I don’t know what it means either. She says it every single time we cross paths. She’s either oblivious to how grating it is or she already knows and couldn’t care less. I vote it’s the latter; Maggie takes assholery to new levels. She’s a thoroughbred Upper West Side New Yorker. Old money, father’s side. This magazine gig is about annoying her grandparents. She also uses her mother’s maiden name, just to add more salt to things.

  “Maggs, what’s up?”

  “Same old hustle, you know. On my grind. But it’s all good.” (Note well: Margaret Martin is a walking urban dictionary. She makes sure to use all of the words all of the time, pushed together like a run-on sentence. I can only nod when she gets going.)

  Isabelle and Ashley float out next. Here comes a compliment from Ashley in 3, 2 . . .

  “Such a cute belt, Best.”

  “Thanks, Ashley. I’ve had it forever.”

  “You always say that. Still cute, though.”

  Ashley and Maggie head off. Isabelle’s close behind them, but stops and turns back to me. “After your meet, stop by my desk, okay?” she says. Isabelle is lukewarm and flat in her delivery most days, all about business. She’s also German, so I just pin it all on that. “I’ll have a big folder and tons of links for you on Heidi,” Isabelle says.

  “Wait, links on Heidi?”

  “Oh, Joan and Miyuki will fill you in. Talk later.” Isabelle starts down the hall before I have a chance to step over the turd she just dropped on the carpet between us.

  This drive-by-shooting-style of assigning stories to me used to happen a lot when I first got here. Ashley told me it was because the Yellow Doors really liked my voice. “They say I write like a slightly more knowledgeable best friend, full of cool, but minimal condescension,” she said. Plus, I write that shit quickly. Things I learned from my super-brief internship at GQ before James snatched me up one month in. The two most important rules of magazine writing: 1) Locking in on tone, and 2) meeting your deadlines. Oh, and one more: Knowing how to stifle an eye roll. But that’s more a useful lesson for general life. That last one definitely comes in handy when working under a loveable narcissist like the one Janice Kessler.

  Example: JK came in one morning wearing these shoe-boot sandals. And they were all of those things at once—a shoe, a boot, and a sandal. A reporter from the New York Times was shadowing her for part of the day, doing a story on our magazine’s issues issue (domestic abuse). The reporter, a man, noticed her shooboodals (let it settle). He called them provocative, I think. After he left, JK turned to me and said: “I’m so glad he noticed my shoes. There are only six of these in the world. I had these shipped in from Saudi Arabia two weeks ago.” Eye roll of life issued; totally undetected.

  “Best, come on in,” Robot says. “Oh, you didn’t bring a notebook?”

  Fucking Kristen. “No, sorry. I didn’t know what this was about and Kristen didn’t—”

  “Do you want to borrow a sheet from Miyuki?”

  “I’m good. Thank you, though.”

  The way I held my tone just then, my relaxed jaw and softened brow—that’s some award-winning poise, cultivated with care by Miriam Annette Cumberbatch Lightburn. My mother—the original version, not the hollowed-out one you’d meet today—was a master at that kind of thing. She never let on that underneath those sweet grins and gentle eyes, there was a dragon, breathing fire, judgment, disapproval, and bitter loathing. My father often joked about it, this illusion, and called my mother Teebee, short for tamarind ball. I didn’t get it until we took our first family trip to Barbados. He made a big production out of buying us kids a bag of tamarind balls—brown and small and rolled in fine sugar—to try that first afternoon there, as we headed back from the beach.

  “Chil’ren,” he said, his Trinidadian lilt turned up on high, “I want all yuh to wait and bite the tam’rin at once, together. And I wan’ take a pick-cha with yuh ma pose up behind all yuh as you do it.” He was all teeth, standing there, backing the rocky road, gripping his clunky Canon and counting down from three.

  It was so bitter, this dishonest treat. Our faces puckered as my father laughed and laughed. All into the evening, it would erupt from his belly and spill out over his face. Soon enough, it spread to us and we started laughing too—even my mother chuckled. I remember Benjamin elbowed me: “Do you think he’s ever going to stop cracking up about this?” I told him, “Never. We’re going to get sick of hearing it.”

  I wish I could remember what it sounded like, that laugh. I wouldn’t get sick of it. Never.

  The Robot looks over at Miyuki, like she�
�s waiting for the go light to flick on. “James and I have been talking and we want to get the jump on the next big-issue theme,” Robot says. “James and I really believe that we can use this issue—this whole book, really—to shed light on real and profound challenges that our girl is going through.”

  The Robot is talking to me, but constantly looking over at Miyuki . . . who is still fucking sitting in here, sparkling like a fake gem. And “our girl”? That’s classic JK-speak. She always refers to the reader as “our girl.” I’m nervous again. I don’t know where this whole thing is going.

  “The senior editors and I were brainstorming new themes to cover this year, and we’ve got a pretty great list going. Isabelle tells me that, in years past, you’ve been a key player in the big-issue issue, so we’ll have you do the anchor in the feature well again. We really want to hit the ground running this time and go showcase here. I’m thinking we can throw some story ideas at the wall today, see what sticks. Then go off, sharpen our pencils and come back to it.”

  What in the entire fuck? How many cornball clichés can one android use in fifteen seconds? That was ridiculous and gratuitous. Yet there’s Miyuki, grinning and nodding like she’s in a minstrel show.

  “Did you have anything to throw out now? I know you didn’t bring your notes.”

  “Actually, I do have something, an idea that I’ve been cooking for a bit. We’ve covered diseases, disorders, and various abuses in issues past—domestic was a big one; we actually did it twice.” I pop up two fingers and try not to cut my eyes at this basic bitch. “We’ve also focused on addiction. JK’s charity, of course, played large there. But I wanted to look at the thing that too often connects most of these issues. The thing that allows so much of these disorders, these addictions, to fester and too often leaves the victims drying up in the corner in silence. It’s shame. Guilt is in there too a little, I guess, but it’s really about the shame of it. I say we do a no-shame issue, where we help the reader do away with the useless thing for good.”