“Comeon,guys,” Sasha whines. “I want to gosobad, and I need you locals to show me how to ride the mechanical bulls on Broadway.”
“The key,” I say, propping my foot on the fourth chair, “is to flirt with the guy working the bull so he takes it easy on you for ten whole seconds.”
Miriam nods sagely. “Spilling your drink all over your legs acouple of minutes beforehand helps, too. It makes your thighs stick to the leather.”
Sasha blinks. “Neither of you have done it, have you.”
“Of course not.” Miriam sounds genuinely offended.
“Well then.” Sasha crosses her arms. “All three of us are riding the mechanical bull in December, and whoever falls off the fastest has to solo-perform ‘Rocky Top’ at a karaoke bar on wine night.”
I laugh deep in my chest. “Hand to God, Sasha, you have never met an experience you couldn’t turn into a challenge.”
“I probably get that from my dad,” she says.
Miriam launches into a retelling of her day at the hospital—“The cutest baby in the PICU, I almost triggered an Amber Alert”—and Sasha and I listen to her describe burping methods in excruciating detail as the city quiets down outside.
I can hear the drip of our leaky faucet, soft and repetitive, into our pint-size enamel kitchen sink, beside a stove that couldn’t cook a hard-boiled egg if it tried. This apartment is a disaster—too small, too messy, too run-down, and way,waytoo expensive for all its quirks—but it’s perfect to me. Because it represents everything I traded when Lance and I broke up, when Miriam and I decided to move to New York City together.
A life I knew like the back of my hand for a life I never could have predicted.
CHAPTER SIX
Alex Harrison:How much money is left in the budget for September?
Casey Maitland:None.
Alex Harrison:None?
Casey Maitland:You have already eaten into half of October’s budget.
Alex Harrison:Why can’t we just take the L and reset for Oct?
Casey Maitland:Please explain how you convinced your high school algebra teacher to let you pass.
We never talked about it.
Never sought each other out, never lingered after a meeting to clear the air. Alex’s singular focus isn’t on me anymore; he’s preoccupied with one thing only.
Well. Two things:
Getting the subsidiary primed to launch.
Cementing his status as Little Cooper’s most flagrant spender.
It’s kind of funny, if I stop to think about it. The way his goals are in exact opposition to mine. If I want a recommendation for the London office, I need to spend the next eight months doing my job exceptionally well. Doing my job well means controlling the finances. Problem is, Alex encourages every idea without bothering to consider the cost.
Podcast? Do it. Digital creator conference in LA? Put the airfare on the corporate card! A new Web designer? Hire him.
Whenever we’re in the same room, our disharmony comes off both of us in frustrated heat waves. Like right now, for example, as we argue our way through another weekly BTH meeting. It almost feels like the two of us are alone in this conference room. Which is why it startles me when Saanvi interrupts us to say, “You guys should appear together on our YouTube channel.”
Alex and I stop bickering long enough to look at Saanvi, one of Little Cooper’s on-staff video directors. Her arms are loosely crossed. She’s staring at us across the conference table, a flicker of amusement in her eyes.
I think Saanvi views everything in life through the lens of a camera. She’s one of those people that have found their capital-P Purpose. Before Saanvi came to Little Cooper, she worked for one of our competitors, where she made a huge name for herself directing all those videos of celebrities walking around their homes showing off the interior design or answering a bunch of rapid-fire questions we shouldn’t care about but do.
She has this policy—if you appear on the channel, you get paid. Brijesh explained it to me after the “Healthed-Up Hot Chicken”video, and then I saw it for myself on my next paycheck: there was a line item in the HR portal where they break down your earnings that saidvideo appearance.The amount of money I’d earned was minuscule, but I appreciated it all the same.
In response to Saanvi’s suggestion, I dumbly mutter, “What?”
