If You Can Get It

by Brendan Hodge

  When Jen sat down in front of her laptop, the news from PocketDJ had apparently hit the wires. E-mails flooded in.

  “I saw the news release about Apple investing in AppLogix—is that good or bad for your PocketDJ project?” “Heard that thirty people got walked from AppLogix today. Are you okay?” “All of us in the hardware development group got laid off this morning. Are you in the same boat?” “My boyfriend is getting a recruiting company going. Let me know if you want a referral.”

  Jen found herself curiously distant from the flurry of news and requests. By Monday, if not sooner, she knew these would be urgent to her. But after the last few hours, they seemed a distant concern. Instead, the sisters made dinner, then baked cookies and watched Die Hard.

  Jen had thought it would be Saturday—when Katie went off to work her shift at Starbucks—that her state of joblessness would suddenly become painful again. Instead, she cheerfully went for a run and stopped by Starbucks for coffee near the end of Katie’s shift.

  Sunday evening, she found herself thinking about how long the inventory being aired in would last, and when the sea-shipped Players would arrive, and suddenly the reality that had seemed distant smote her with its fullest force since her long walk across the parking lot: I don’t have a job.

  She had seldom stopped looking for the next job over the last ten years. There had always been a certain exhilaration to thinking, “I’ve been at this job long enough. I could be looking for my next opportunity.” But now, for the first time, she was one of the great unwashed horde of outsiders: those who were looking for jobs but did not have one. Tomorrow morning would roll around, and it would not matter to anyone but her whether she got up or not.

  “Your profile has been viewed by 19 people in the last 15 days,” LinkedIn assured her. But when she consulted this list, she found that half of these were among her fellow sufferers, other people late of AppLogix who were “now looking for my next great opportunity”. In the past, her LinkedIn profile had been like an employment lottery—that slim chance hovering on the horizon of probability that someone would contact her and offer her a better job than her present one. Several times this had, in fact, worked. She had made no effort to find AppLogix; they had found her. But now it seemed a capricious friend. I, too, can summon career prospects from the vasty deep, but will they listen when I call?

  “What am I going to do?” she asked Katie.

  “They’re still hiring at Starbucks. Do you want to take a temporary job there while you’re looking?”

  For a moment, she imagined herself as the ideal bootstrapper, taking a service job rather than sitting idle. There she’d be, mixing lattes and cheerfully greeting people at the drive-thru—until, after just a week or two, she’d overhear two patrons discussing a business plan and provide some staggeringly good piece of advice. Or, as she handed an iced coffee to a harried executive, something about Jen would stand out from the usual tattooed and pierced people behind the counter, and the customer would ask her, “What are you doing working here?” “Oh, I’m just doing this to fill a few weeks while I look for a new job.”

  The fantasy shattered as she considered exactly how she would have reacted to the story of a Starbucks barista “between jobs” in the tech industry. Heartlessly or not, her world was even less inclined to take seriously the holder of a “between jobs” job than the “actor” waiting tables. That, at least, fit a certain stereotype.

  “There’s nothing more permanent than a temporary solution,” she said, clearing her mind of these fantasies. “Besides, if I take a job, I’ll have to give up unemployment benefits.”

  “That’s dumb,” Katie observed curtly but had no further advice.

  In defense of sanity, Jen quickly developed a routine: Get up at 6:30. Take a three-mile run. Clean up. Put on business clothes. Make breakfast and coffee. Sit down at the laptop to consult job listings, check e-mail, search for new professional connections.

  By the end of the first week, she had had several inquiries via e-mail, filled out multiple applications, and even had one interview scheduled for the following week. She had let all the recruiters she was connected with know that she was “looking” and forced herself to exert a conscious effort not to check back each day to ask, “Anything yet?”

  Although she assured herself that it would be normal to take up to three months to find a job, the difference between her accustomed level of activity and her current one was so sharp that it made her panicky. Her world closed in, and before she talked to anyone outside her enclosed, jobless existence, she had to remind herself, “It’s been nine days now. Two days since I scheduled that interview. One day since I talked to that recruiter. Three hours since I sent that e-mail.”

  The clock of her anxiety ran far faster than that of the world outside, and she feared that in a moment of unawareness, she would reveal her isolation from the outside world by saying something that would constitute an admission that an hour was long to her, a day an eternity, a week unthinkable.

  “I need to get out,” Jen announced on Friday evening. “I need to see people.”

  Katie, who had taken to heart Jen’s decree that they would eat out less, was creating chaos in the kitchen under the guidance of a book titled The Raja’s Garden: Exploring the Delights of Indian Home Cookery. “Where are you going to go?”

  “I don’t know,” Jen admitted. “Out.”

  “Are you going out for dinner, or will you eat here and go out afterward?” Katie asked, with an edge of annoyance in her voice.

  “I’ll definitely eat here,” Jen reassured. “That smells really great. What is it?”

  “Dal palak. And rice.”

  “I wouldn’t miss it. I’m going to go check around. Someone must be doing something tonight.”

  “A wine bar?” Katie asked, when Jen pitched her plans over dinner. “Who’s going to be there?”

  “I dunno. Dan said maybe a couple dozen people. I know a few of them from when I was at Stanford for my MBA. There’ll be wines to try. Snacks. Nothing crazy. We’ll probably be done by midnight.”

  Katie shrugged. “Everyone will be ten years older than me, and I have to be at work at five tomorrow.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Katie nodded. “Yeah. You go ahead. It’ll do you good to get out for a bit.”

  “Thanks.” Jen reached across the table and touched her sister’s hand. “This food is really good. Thank you.”

  Katie smiled. “I’m glad you like it.”

  “Hey, don’t worry about the dishes. I’ll take care of them when I get home, or in the morning. Go ahead and relax for a while before you have to go to bed, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  The tasting room of the Budding Grove was moderately crowded when Jen arrived. Besides Dan Fischer, she knew none of them well, but there were several she had met before. A glass of wine found its way into her hand, and she mingled. The scene seemed so much a part of her world before the layoff that, somewhere during her third glass of wine, she found herself answering the question “So how are things at AppLogix?” with an extended and enthusiastic description of the PocketDJ Player project. The plans that she had described so many times over the last year rolled off her tongue in well-practiced phrases, until she realized what she was doing and ended the story abruptly with “But then Apple bought a stake in AppLogix, and the leadership team decided hardware wasn’t in our future. So that was that, and we’re all looking for work.”

  She felt a hand on her shoulder and turned to see Dan.

  “How are you doing?” he asked.

  “I’m doing great! This evening is just what I needed. I’m glad I called you up.”

  “I’m glad it’s helping, but you’re getting just a little loud,” Dan advised.

  “Am I?”

  “Just a tiny bit. Let’s go find a booth and talk. It’s been a while.”

  Dan guided her away into a quiet niche. Jen had turned apologetic.

  “Was I loud? I’m s
orry. It’s been a really rough week. Very loud?”

  He shrugged. “No more than some others. It’s a wine bar on a Friday night. But we haven’t had a chance to talk in a while.”

  “Thanks.” She stared down at her glass and felt the gloom trying to take hold. She shook it off. “What have you been up to?”

  “Oh, the usual. Everyone hates a lawyer, but everyone needs one sooner or later. How about you? How’s the job hunt?”

  “It’s okay. I’ve got an interview on Tuesday.”

  “Where?”

  “Aspire Brands. They’re starting up a line of computer bags, and they’re hiring a product-line director.”

  “Director is what you’ve been wanting for the last year, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah . . . I dunno. Like you say, this sounds like just what I’ve been wanting. And it’s moving fast. They want someone to start by August. It just sounds a lot like the AppLogix job did: trendy company getting into a product category they haven’t done before. That, and . . .” She shrugged and looked away, feeling uncomfortable meeting Dan’s gaze. “I’ve had so much time to think about these things over the last week. I keep having this fear I’ve topped out. Everyone has their level of potential. What if I’ve hit mine, and this is as good as it gets?”

  Dan cracked a half smile. “That’s just tiredness talking. I don’t think you’re washed up at thirty-three.”

  “That’s why it scares me. Just the sound of it is so pathetic. Promoted to the level of my incompetence.”

  “Hey, cheer up.” He reached across the table and lifted her chin. “Loud was okay. Let’s not start on morose.”

  Jen smiled wanly. “Okay. There’s nothing more pathetic than being the fragile girl at the wine bar anyway.”

  “That’s the spirit. Now, it’s getting late. Are you okay to drive home?”

  “Yeah.”

  “All right then. Good luck on that interview.”

  “Thanks.”

  The evening air was cool and cleared her head. She stood by her car, taking deep breaths and feeling, already, that she had made a fool of herself.

  One week out of work—she reflected with disgust—and I’m practically sobbing on Dan’s shoulder over a glass of wine. Way to go, girl.

  She took a last, deep breath, concluded that she was ready to drive home, and got into the car. The streets were empty and quiet. The garage door opened its maw obediently and swallowed her and the coupe. She ascended the stairs and let herself in quietly, knowing that Katie would be leaving for work in less than six hours. Going into the kitchen, she found the counters clean, the dishes done. A note from Katie sat beside the sink: “I thought you really did need a break, so I took care of the cleanup. Hope you had a great time out with your friends. See you tomorrow.”

  The kitchen’s glistening cleanliness blended with the memory of Dan’s hand under her chin. She was not alone. People cared.

  Monday morning found Jen, as per her routine, in business clothes and sitting at the kitchen table. She was looking at the phone, a number already dialed, summoning up the confidence to hit Call, and reflecting, as she did so, that she would have made the call without a moment’s hesitation if she had still had her job—if she had not needed so much to make the call. She exhaled and put the phone to her ear.

  “Search Solutions. Can I help you?”

  “Hi there. My name is Jen Nilsson. I’m calling for Lauren Baird. Is she available? I’m returning her call.”

  “Please hold while I see if she’s available.”

  Relentlessly innocuous music blared at her for a minute until the receptionist returned abruptly to the line and stated that she would put Jen through.

  “This is Lauren.”

  “Hi, Lauren. This is Jen Nilsson. You’d sent me a note about a product-line manager position and said to call anytime.”

  “Jen!” the voice on the other end of the line greeted her with the overwhelming familiarity of the professional networker. “Good to talk to you. Yes, I’ve got an opportunity that I’m trying to fill here, and from your profile I thought you might be a fit for it. Do you have a few minutes to talk right now?”

  “Sure.”

  The conversation followed familiar lines. Was she willing to relocate? Yes. Can we just talk a bit about your experience? Jen described her recent work history. What are you hoping for out of your next position? She did her best to tailor her answer to the few hints that had been dropped about what this job might be like and to suggest that she had clear ideas and standards. Shouting, “Look, right now I just really need a job!” would not be the right answer. What were her salary expectations?

  “I’m not in this just for the money. The biggest issue for me is finding the right opportunity. But, of course, I expect compensation to be competitive and to recognize the importance of the position.”

  Lauren acknowledged the cleverness of this response but firmly asked how much Jen had made at her last job, to which Jen could not but comply.

  At last, Lauren performed the ritual reveal: “Based on our conversation, I think that you could be a good fit with our client. They are a manufacturer of premium power tools named Schneider and Sons, located near Chicago. Would you be interested in my forwarding your information to them so that you can be considered for this opportunity?”

  The name meant nothing to Jen, but, since power tools had not heretofore been an area of great interest to her, this was not an indicator of the company’s worth one way or another. She felt a momentary disappointment that it was not a company she knew or a field that she found interesting. Her goal right now, however, was simply to get offers on the table.

  “Yes, I’d definitely be interested in having my information passed on and hearing more about the role there. Actually, I have ties in the Chicago area. My parents live not far from Chicago, and I have other family back there as well. So that area would be a great fit for me.”

  They closed the call with the usual assurances. Jen set the phone down and sighed out her tension. Talking about herself was almost addictively gratifying, but the stakes made each call an utterly draining experience.

  After a few moments of slow breathing and walking around the apartment, Jen sat back down and typed up all the details of the conversation for her prospects file. This made the fourth prospect that had reached the point of her résumé’s being sent to the hiring manager. Thus far, she had only the one interview scheduled, and none of the job prospects gave her enthusiasm. Still, they were jobs. And a job was what she needed.

  The headquarters of Aspire Brands was up in the City. Jen drove over to where she could catch Caltrain and made sure she allowed herself plenty of time. Nothing untoward occurred, so rather than arrive forty minutes early, she found a coffee shop in which to cool her heels and calm her nerves until closer to the interview.

  The building, when she reached it, was glisteningly modern, and in front of it, an utterly abstract tangle of iron beams stood twenty feet tall astride an inverse fountain. In the lobby, Jen announced herself to the receptionist, provided identification, and was rewarded with a visitor’s badge.

  “Here’s your schedule,” the receptionist said, handing over a clipboard. “It looks like you’re a few minutes late for your first interview. Kim Martinez from Human Resources is waiting for you in the atrium.” She waved a hand in the direction of a tall, slim, dark-haired woman who was already approaching the front desk.

  Jen felt a brief wave of panic. She was ten minutes early. Wasn’t she? She started to pull out the printed schedule, then thought better of it and hurried to greet the woman approaching her.

  “Jen?” the woman asked, extending a hand.

  She shook the hand firmly. “Yes. Kim?”

  The woman nodded. “Trouble getting here?”

  Jen focused on keeping any sound of nervousness from entering her voice. “You know, there must have been some kind of mix-up. The schedule I was sent had the first interview starting at ten o’clock. Luckily, the re
ceptionist gave me a clipboard with the updated itinerary, so I’ll be okay from here on out.”

  Kim shrugged. “They must have updated your schedule and forgot to send a copy to your recruiter. Well, that’s how things are here. Fast-paced. Two things you’ll have to be comfortable with if you’re going to fit in at Aspire are speed and change. Change, change, change! Our corporate value for the year is ‘Dealing with Ambiguity.’ Come on, we’ll talk as we walk to your next interview. That way, we can still get fifteen minutes in despite this scheduling mix-up. Now, my goal is to see if you’d fit in well with our culture here at Aspire. Can you tell me what you liked most and least about your last job?”

  She set a rapid pace. Jen struggled both to keep up and to answer her questions thoroughly.

  “Now, your next interview,” Kim announced, cutting Jen off in the middle of a discourse, “is with Alexia Astov. She’s the senior vice president in charge of our flagship Sylvia Lytton clothing brand. She’s also been one of the executive sponsors for the Courier brand revival, so while this role would not report to her, she has a major stake in finding an outstanding candidate to see the project through.”

  They came to a stop outside a curving glass wall that enclosed an office of unsettling elegance. A woman of uncertain age but unquestionable pocketbook was talking animatedly to the speakerphone from behind the massive desk, whose design resembled a flattened amoeba made of highly polished mahogany. She waved to Jen and Kim, then continued to address the phone. The wall successfully obscured all sound, making Alexia’s performance, complete with expansive hand gestures, a pantomime of “woman having an urgent conversation”.

  “I have to get to my next meeting”, Kim announced. “One of the talent acquisition admins will meet you here in thirty minutes to take you to your interview. Good luck!”

  She rushed off, leaving Jen to reflect that although she had often been accused of overformality in the tech industry, in the Aspire Brands headquarters her fashion ethic appeared conspicuously plain.

  Alexia’s phone conversation lasted long enough to allow Jen to contemplate the question of whether to attempt to look composed by standing with her hands at her side or to assume an appearance of busyness by checking her phone for e-mail, but not long enough to reach any resolution. Then the vice president stabbed her phone off with decision, rose, and pulled open the door.