“She’s no longer on my payroll. I’ve refunded everyone whose deposits I didn’t need to give to Baldy, and I made plans to refund the rest. That’s what it means when you close a business.”
“So you say.”
“Yes. It is what I say.”
And that should be the end of it, but there’s something to his expression I don’t like. I fold my arms. “What don’t I know, Bulan?”
“She’s still planning to put on all your weddings.”
I balk.
Mandy can’t do that. She is—was—a talented assistant, sure. But she needs someone to give her directions. To keep her from eating the cake ahead of the bride. These commonsense things, they don’t come to her naturally, desire for seriousness notwithstanding.
“Why?” I ask. “Just—why?”
“She wants to prove she’s a serious sort of pixie,” Bulan explains proudly. “That she’s much more than just a seductress and a charmer! And I couldn’t be happier for her, Sabby. This is a big step. Surely you can see that. Can’t you?”
It’s a fair question.
I mean, the first thing that pops into my head is that this probably won’t work out well for Mandy. Or me, whose brand name she’s presumably doing this under. But if she ruins my reputation, what does it matter? I’m not going back to Salem. If anything, maybe this is good: no one can accuse me of failing to follow through in providing the services they placed deposits for. They can blame Mandy instead. Unless, more happily, Mandy proves me wrong and turns out to be a success.
“Fine,” I say at last. I throw up my hands because that seems like what people do in these situations. “Mandy can do what she wants.”
“And so can I,” says Bulan, face rotating back into the pillow. “Which is why I’m staying here with you.”
No. Absolutely not. The last thing I need is to be haunted a second longer than necessary by Grandma Rose’s paranormal world.
But I can’t quite bring myself to turn him out, despite all this. I’m a little bit—just the tiniest bit—happy to see him. And I’m sure Bulan will get bored of staying here eventually. Once he runs off with his crow friends again, everything will be fine.
And normal.
So very, very normal.
Please.
21THE GRITTY SANDWICHES OF NEW YORK CITY
MY FIRST WEEK AT EFGis both easier and more difficult than I expect.
It’s easy because Jane and I share matching, rigid schedules. She likes working in a twenty-minute yoga routine before her morning coffee. Because what Jane does, I must do also, I join her every morning at five thirty, to the protest of my recalcitrant spine.
Generally speaking, the true difficulties of my days kick in when Jane and I part ways at the elevator lobby. She heads for the fifth floor, and I go to the sixth, where I meet up with the tech auditing group. For accountants, being able to work with companies like Oracle and MicroOrange in the AI space is the pinnacle of slick and sexy. In that sense, being reassigned has no downsides. None.
Any discomfort I’m having can be attributed to how bad I am at brewing caffeinated drinks, even compared to Hanry, whose company I can’t help missing. Working quietly beside me, he was always ready to meet my eyes with a smile, with confidence in my abilities. Whereas, as a new staff hire—the newest one on the floor—I can’t yet be trusted with reconciling accounts or working directly with clients. I get kicked out of a ten o’clock meeting by a senior accountant who clearly hasn’t kept up with the Slack channel and is convinced I’m some random street urchin who stole a pass card. He doesn’t say that, but I can tell. I’ve thrown that look at numerous nameless members of the Community.
It’s… unpleasant being on the other side of it.
Jane says this is normal. That all new hires have to surmount such indignities before they can jump rank and confront new indignities, like listening to the client explain how AI is going to render bookkeepers irrelevant. Although we’ve yet to see an AI understand it isn’t fraud if MicroOrange increases the price of its subscriptions.
As the days pass, I find myself sleeping poorly. Part of this is because I’m working late, and on Saturdays. Most of my insomnia I attribute to the apartment’s hyperactive radiator. I struggle to keep my eyes open at my desk. Occasionally, when I stop typing and let my hands rest too long on my keyboard, Bulan will bang into my leg from inside the duffel bag.
“I’m waiting for you to get bored and leave,” I tell him one day at lunch hour.
“I’m waiting foryouto get bored and leave,” he says.
“Stop imitating me.”
“Stop imitating—oof!” We’re in my new hire class’s favored deli on Park Avenue. It’s highly visible, and crowded, meaning I can’t have extended conversations with my duffel bag and escape with my reputation intact. Especially not when Jane approaches, a workmate in tow.
