If You, Then Me

by Yvonne Woon

  By the time he was finished, I was pressed against the back of my chair, feeling smaller and more irrelevant than I’d felt before. I turned to Arthur.

  To my surprise, he only shrugged. “You know, I think it’s a really cool idea. I don’t know. I’d buy it. Who doesn’t want someone to tell them what to do? Isn’t that the entire point of the internet?”

  I wasn’t sure if he was saying it to be nice or if he really believed it, but either way I felt relieved. When class was over, Arthur caught up with me in the hallway.

  “Hey,” he said. “I really liked your pitch.”

  “Thanks. I liked yours, too.”

  “I think Micah was being too harsh. I wouldn’t let him get under your skin. He’s just jealous that his app isn’t as good as yours.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “You know, my mom’s an immigrant, too, so I know what you meant when you were talking about your parents.”

  “Oh, yeah. I mean, it’s true—that’s how they are—but it wasn’t how I came up with Dare Me. I just use it because it’s a good story. You know?”

  “Oh,” I said, mildly disappointed. He’d sold it so well that I’d thought maybe he was like me, making an app to fill a void in his life. “Right. Yeah, me too.”

  Arthur gave me a knowing nod. “Cool, well, see you around.”

  “See you around,” I said.

  Nineteen

  The sun was setting on Sunday night when the Foundry car dropped me off in front of a stone wall overgrown with a blushing bougainvillea, just a few streets away from downtown Palo Alto. Behind it stood a gray shingled mansion shaded by willows. Had I not known where I was, I might have assumed it was a historic hotel or the main building of a country club.

  Despite the time we’d spent together, I’d never been to Mitzy’s home. It almost felt like she didn’t have a home and instead sprung from a golden-rimmed cloud every morning, fully showered and dressed, so to be there in person was surreal. I buzzed the gate and waited until it opened to a velvety lawn manicured with rose bushes and fruit trees. A stone walkway led to the front door, where a cascade of blushing vines flowed over a trellis.

  “Come in,” Mitzy called through a window. “It’s unlocked.”

  It was surprisingly messy inside. Though the house was beautiful—airy and bright, with lovingly maintained historical detail—it was strangely lacking furniture, save for a few random pieces here and there, which were covered in papers and dirty dishes and clothes.

  Mitzy breezed in from the hallway holding a cup of green juice. “Sorry for the mess. The cleaners were supposed to come a few days ago, but they bailed. It’s so hard to find good people these days.”

  She looked me up and down. “Good,” she said, clearly pleased with my outfit choice, then handed me the cup, which I stared at suspiciously.

  “I had my blood processed by that new wellness test company and it turns out I’m deficient in folate, so I’m trying to eat more greens,” Mitzy said, nodding to the drink. “It’s good for your skin. Try it.”

  I took a sip and eyed a sculpture in the corner of the room. It looked like a naked woman eating the throat of a wild boar. I lingered on it, mildly disturbed, then forced myself to turn back to Mitzy.

  “So where exactly are we going tonight?” I asked, glancing at a few stray papers on her counter, all printed on the same fancy legal letterhead. They looked official and important.

  To my surprise, when Mitzy saw me looking at them, her face darkened and she grabbed them. “Those are trash,” she said and balled them up and threw them in the bin.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to look at your mail.”

  “Then don’t,” she said, in a tone that I’d never heard her use before.

  I must have looked surprised, because her face softened. “Sorry,” she said. “I’m just so used to people stealing my ideas. It’s a knee-jerk reaction. I need to work on it.”

  I swallowed. It made sense, though I was still startled by how quickly her mood had changed. “That’s okay.”

  “So you asked where we’re going,” she said, a conspiratorial glint in her eye. “To a dinner party hosted by Einar Karlsson, co-founder of Karlsson Barrow, one of the most powerful venture capital firms on Sand Hill.”

  Sand Hill was a road in Menlo Park, gilded with parched, golden grass on either side. All of the venture capital companies were there, their sleek signs perched on the side of the road, reflecting the sun. Amina and I had driven down it once, imagining what the offices inside looked like.

  “What’s that?” Mitzy said, nodding to a leather folder I was holding in one arm.

  “It’s my business plan. I did it for class. I thought it would be helpful.”

  Mitzy laughed. “No one cares about that.”

  She slipped the papers out of the folder, crumped them up, and tossed them at the waste bin. She missed by an inch, and they sat on the floor amid the discarded mail. I wondered what they were.

  “Business plans are for people with mediocre ideas who need to use paper to trick people into thinking that their idea is good. You, on the other hand, have a good idea. All you need,” she said, pointing to my phone, “is this.”

  She led me upstairs where she finished getting ready. Her bedroom was messy, too, with clothes strewn about the floor—the room of someone who clearly didn’t have to clean up after herself.

  “Why don’t you have any furniture?” I murmured, gazing at the vast empty room, which was adorned with just a bed and chandelier.

  “I had some, but I sold most of it,” Mitzy said, powdering her face. “It was feeling a little stale. I want to redecorate but I haven’t decided on the style yet.”

  Mitzy put the final touches on her makeup and turned to me. “Before we go, I wanted to talk to about our relationship.”

  The thing about Mitzy was that she had the uncanny ability to slip business into seemingly casual conversation so that you barely realized you were agreeing to invite her to give a keynote address or nominate her for a board position until after it was done. I’d watched her do it when she ran into acquaintances at lunches and dinners, and it both impressed and unnerved me to see how she managed to lure them in and extract what she wanted before they realized what was happening.

  Now I wondered if she was doing the same to me, only with bad news.

  I swallowed. This was it. We’d had a good run, but she was growing tired of me and was going to cut me loose. I braced myself.

  She searched through the things on the table until she found a stack of papers, which she handed to me.

  I’d expected her to break the news gently in her typical Mitzy way, but I wasn’t expecting there to be paperwork. “What is this?”

  “I let it slip to my lawyers that I was taking you to funding meetings, and they told me I needed to protect myself. They suggested I draw up a contract to make sure I’m a founding associate if you happen to get funding through a deal I broker. I know that founding associate sounds like a shift in power, but it really just means that I’m serving as your mentor and that I’ll be using my connections to help give you an initial boost. I wouldn’t get a salary unless we agreed upon it at a later date, and it would still be your company. You can terminate our relationship at any time, and if you later decide that I should get a percentage, we can update the contract.”

  I must have looked stunned, because Mitzy studied me with a concerned look. “My lawyers didn’t love that last part—they really wanted to negotiate a percentage from the get-go, but I don’t need the money and it felt a little weird talking about my cut before we went out to see anyone.”

  I knew I should be attempting to read the papers she’d handed me, but I was too overwhelmed to focus on them. The words kept blurring together.

  “So what do you think?” Mitzy ventured.

  “Are you asking if you can be a part of my company?”

  “Well, yeah, I guess. I mean, it’s not really a company yet, it’s just a partnership—”

&n
bsp; “Yes!” I said, cutting her off. “It’s only been my dream since I was ten years old.”

  She beamed. “Great. Take it home, read through it, see what you think. Just don’t tell my lawyers I took you to this meeting before you signed it. They’ll think I’m a pushover.”

  I grinned. “Okay.”

  Mitzy cleared the remaining papers off her coffee table and replaced them with a few fancy candles from her mantel, her laptop, and a pile of random papers, which she arranged, then rearranged in a stylish stack.

  “I have to stay on-brand,” she said, and held her phone out to take a photo of us on the couch, staged so that it looked like we were having a much more serious business meeting. “Give me your best game face.”

  I dug through my bag to find my phone and took one, too.

  “Okay,” she said, packing up. “Let’s go show them who you are.”

  This is what I remember about the party. I remember riding in Mitzy’s red sports car up Sand Hill Road and parking in front of a modern glass building. It had a bubbling water wall out front despite the drought, signaling that the rules of nature and weather did not apply. I remember taking pictures for Amina as I followed Mitzy inside, knowing that she would demand photos when I told her where I’d been. I remember walking into the room, which was full of men, and feeling so nervous that sweat beaded on my lip. I remember how Mitzy lit up, her presence drawing everyone to her. I remember her handing me a drink, something bubbly and bitter, which I drank quickly because I wanted to occupy myself while she left to go work the room. I remember Einar Karlsson, our charming, silver-haired host, who looked like an aging movie star and was delighted to discover that I was at the Foundry. I remember showing him Wiser, and him marveling at how well she worked, and bringing other guests over so I could demonstrate it for them, too. I remember him handing me another glass of something bubbly, which I drank while staring at the photographs of atomic bombs exploding into mushroom clouds lining the walls.

  I remember Mitzy nodding to the different guests and whispering in my ear, “That one with the big jaw is Art Shifrinson of Fairbow Ventures. That young one, kind of hippieish, is Mickey Lerner from MediVC, really powerful, hard to win over. Those two by the punch work for Garlin Security. They contract for the military.”

  Another drink. Then another, until they stopped tasting bitter and started tasting neutral, like water. Until I was laughing and talking freely about the Foundry and Wiser with three men named Dennis and Fred and Tom, or were they Mitch and Ted and Tim? I couldn’t remember. The only mention of my age was them marveling at how much of a prodigy I was, at how mature I seemed.

  I remember seeing one of the older VCs grab Mitzy’s ass through her dress, and her casually slide his arm off. I remember the smell of the men as they leaned toward me, laughing, grinning, baring their teeth, staring down at my chest, staring down at my legs, their cologne sweet and pungent like the smoke from a cigar. I remember a younger VC, a guy who might have looked cute had the room not been spinning, had his face not been blurred into a mush, put his hand on my thigh and ask me what Wiser would say if I asked her if I should go outside and get some air with an older guy. I remember stammering, saying I had to use the bathroom, and trying to remain calm as I slipped through the crowd. I remember thinking about Mast and wondering what he was doing that night. I remember opening the bathroom door only to find Lars Lang and a bunch of other men inside, snorting white powder off a manila folder on the sink. It must have been the wrong bathroom, and I backed away, wishing I was at the movie with Mast, feeling his leg against mine as we sat together in a dark room.

  I remember looking for Mitzy only to find her in a conference room with a few guys, cutting what looked like emoji stickers from a piece of paper. I remember her giving me one, telling me it would make me smile if I put it under my tongue.

  I remember her mocking me for hesitating. I remember their laughter, how it seemed to fill the room, pushing me out into the shadows where it was cold and lonely. I remember taking the emoji and slipping it under my tongue, and how pleased Mitzy looked, how good it felt to make her happy.

  I remember talking to the guys next to me, and laughing because they were all named Josh. The longer I sat there, the more they seemed to refract upon each other, a series of mirrors, Josh upon Josh upon Josh. I remember the table beneath me getting soft like taffy, the chairs slumping over like wilted flowers. Someone turned off the lights and projected a PowerPoint presentation onto the wall: something with graphs and pivot tables. It was dark in the room, and Mitzy was laughing and touching one of the Josh’s arms. A Josh leaned toward me, touched my leg, asked me if I wanted to see his office.

  I remember trying to focus on Josh’s face, but it refused to materialize and remained a fleshy, featureless mass. I thought of ObjectPermanence and the photographs of the atomic bombs hanging in the lobby and felt suddenly like they were a portrait of my internal life, a snapshot of destruction, frozen in time. ObjectPermanence. Mast.

  I didn’t remember leaving the party or going home, only that I found myself in bed with a Vilbo-branded water bottle of unknown ownership, and a light feeling that everything would be okay as long as I spoke my truth.

  The next morning I woke up to a throbbing headache. The sun was too bright. My face felt fuzzy, like it was filled with cotton, and my mouth was so parched I could barely speak. I winced and patted my nightstand until I felt a glass of water of unknown vintage. It tasted dusty, and I tried to remember the last time I’d filled a cup and left it there. Two days ago? Maybe three?

  I drank it all and reached for my phone when I noticed the box of pizza on my desk. When had I ordered pizza? I stumbled out of bed only to find a stranger’s coat strewn on the floor by my computer. It was a wool coat, navy, far too big to be mine or Mitzy’s. It looked like it belonged to a man.

  Had someone come home with me the night before? No, impossible. I would have remembered. Had I worn the coat home? Possibly, though I had no idea who it belonged to. I thought of the Joshes, faceless, all wearing the same tech uniform of twill pants, a gray T-shirt, and white tennis sneakers. Were their names even Josh?

  I searched the remaining pockets of the coat but only found a few peppermint candies and a crumpled receipt from a coffee shop with no identifying information. I thought back to the night before, trying to piece together what had happened, but it was hard to decipher what was a dream and what was reality. I knew I had taken something from Mitzy in the conference room, some kind of smiling sticker, and after that the night had turned into a bizarre dreamscape. Had I gone to one of the Josh’s offices? The thought made me shudder. I vaguely recalled throwing up in an office trash can. Then somehow I had gotten home with this strange coat. I must have ordered pizza, though I couldn’t remember.

  I took out my phone to ask Mitzy when I noticed the time—1:45 p.m.—which meant I had slept through half of my classes. Inside the box of pizza were three congealed slices of pepper and olive. I took a bite, hoping it would make me feel better, followed it with an Advil, then dressed and got ready to face the day.

  “Where have you been?” Amina whispered when I sat down next to her. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. I was just sleeping.”

  Amina snorted as if she knew as much. “That’s good at least, after the night you had.”

  I felt all the blood drain from my face. How did she know about my night?

  “Did you drop acid?”

  I blinked, feeling suddenly dizzy. Mitzy in the conference room. The smiling stickers. The way the table and chairs had gone mushy. The faceless Joshes and their extra-dimensional PowerPoint presentation. So that was what had happened. “I—um—I’m not sure. How did you know?”

  “You didn’t see them yet?”

  I could feel myself flattening into a two-dimensional being. “See what?”

  “Check Façade.”

  I wanted to fold myself up, making myself smaller and smaller, until I was just a speck on
the floor. Then I’d fold myself again, get even smaller. Infinite divisibility. There was no end to how tiny I could get.

  I must have looked like I was going to throw up, because she added, “Don’t worry, at least your stock went up.”

  My heart was racing. What did she mean by at least?

  Mast was sitting by the window, his face glued to the board as though he was purposely not looking at me. His refusal to look, even though he must have noticed me enter the classroom, was more of an indictment than anything Amina had told me.

  I didn’t bother to ask Kowalski if I could leave. Trying not to make a scene, I slipped into the hallway and hurried to the bathroom where I sat in a stall and checked my phone.

  The pictures had originally been posted by a guy from Stanford who’d been at the party. They’d been reposted by his friends, and then by ValleyBrag, the anonymous account that posted gossip from the Foundry.

  I scrolled through them quickly, scouring them for details about my night and hoping I wouldn’t discover, alongside everyone else, that I had gone to “see Josh’s office.”

  Most of the photos weren’t of me. There were a bunch of Mitzy, of Einar Karlsson, of the other VCs drinking together. There was one of Lars Lang mixing drinks on the patio—a much more flattering context than the one I’d seen when I’d walked in on him in the bathroom. There were start-up guys throwing ice cubes, playing wiffle ball with empty bottles of Veuve Cliquot. And then there were the ones of me. Me and Mitzy screaming and smiling after being sprayed with an overflowing bottle of champagne. Me and Einar Karlsson, laughing, his hand inching dangerously down the small of my back. Me, leaning through a crowd of start-up guys to be fed an hors d’oeuvre off a platter by a balding VC who looked old enough to be my grandfather.

  I winced, remembering flashes of the night before. The way the champagne had sprayed all over my shirt, making it translucent, the start-up guys cheering. The way Einar Karlsson had brushed the back of my neck with his hand, his wedding band cold against my skin. The final photo was of me, lying on a conference table, staring at the fan undulating above me. The caption read: Macrodosing.