CHAPTER TWO
Mason’s a small man with a large presence. Rachel told me about him ahead of time, but he’s different than I imagined. Rachel said he was from Texas, and like the motto, everything about him was big. But I’m 5’10” and he’s shorter than I am. He does seem to be bursting through his suit, though. And as Rachel warned me, he does have too much crotch for too little pants—you can literally see the outline. Grateful for Rachel’s warning, I try not to stare.
“Mr. Mason,” Rachel says.
He walks past me and over to Rachel, anxious to give her a hearty Texas handshake. “Excellent work on the new hire,” he tells her.
“Thank you,” she says graciously.
“I’m not here long,” he says, “heading back to the cattle. I just had to meet the future of this company in person and congratulate you on getting the hiring deal done. If everyone could close even half as well we wouldn’t be in our current state of affairs. But that’s not something you have to worry about.”
They share a smile.
His smile melts when he looks in my direction. “And him,” he says, pointing to me, “part of the problem or solution?”
“Solution,” says Rachel. “Definitely.”
I extend my hand. “Daniel,” I say.
He looks at me like he’s expecting something else.
“Daniel Rivera,” I say.
“Rivera,” he says, “yes. You must be new.”
“I transferred in from the Berlin office,” I say.
He looks at me as if that’s offensive.
“You’ll find that we do things differently here. Big 10,” he says.
“Excuse me?” My eyes look at his crotch for some reason. I stare at the floor for a moment, hoping it wasn’t obvious.
“Won’t find them there,” he says.
I’m sweating from heat and embarrassment. “Excuse me?” I say again.
“Your leads,” he demands. “Who are you closing?”
“Oh,” I say. The old me would have spat out not just 10, but 20 leads, but this version of me is having trouble. “It’s my first day,” I say.
I can’t quite read his expression, but it’s somewhere between disdain and disgust.
“Excuses are like assholes,” he says. “This city’s full of them. Get your shit together or you’ll be getting out.”
Rachel shows up as the beer I’ve been nursing sweats.
“Since when do you drink beer?” She asks.
“You can’t live in Germany and not drink beer,” I say.
“What am I going to do with these two martinis then?”
We down the first two and are already ordering the next round.
“I’m so happy you’re back,” she says. “Mason’s crazy. Batshit crazy. I talked to San Antonio HR, and she told me stories about a secretary in the Atlanta branch that became everybody’s boss. They told me to write the hiring contracts in pencil and not to bother ordering business cards. Someone once got fired for bad breath.”
I’m suddenly regretting my decision to come back.
“Anyway, are you better? You never tell me anything anymore, are you okay?”
I play back the events of the day. Unable to meet with my new Texas manager until tomorrow, the day was spent doing some research, but mostly pretending to look busy; Rachel, on the other hand, had real work to do, which she’s only now finished at almost 7 pm. The meeting with Mason was the highlight, and that went disastrous. “I have terrible luck.”
“There’s no such thing as luck.”
“Well, whatever I have sucks.”
“You need to go back to what you used to have,” she says. “Especially now. You just need time. And to close deals. All they care about are deals closed. You can even show up drunk. But you really need to start closing. And turnover is so fast you’ll be back to your old job in no time. You have to be careful though,” she continues, “he’s doing this efficiency study. They’re going to be tracking every move and every bit of work you do. It’s crazy, but so is he.”
“Great, they would do this when I show up. I really just need some normal in my life.”
“And you came back to New York for it? You know there’s never any normal around here.”
I let out a sigh, realizing she’s right.
“Look,” Rachel says, slightly intoxicated, “you just lost your mojo. Living in a foreign country, working a stressful new job, and dating an older jerk who’s your boss has a way of stressing you out. Don’t let it fuck you. That’s not an approved form of fucking.”
I’ve missed the way the way she looks at problems.
“You’re right,” I tell her. “It’s just hard.”
“Hard is a good thing,” she says. “A very good thing.”
I watch her stare for a moment at a hot guy out her league—him being gay and all. That doesn’t stop her from staring.
“Anyway,” she says, “what really happened? I know you need space, and I’ve been giving it to you. But you also need to connect with the people that love you.”
“It’s not a long list,” I say. “We’re both here.”
“Don’t change the subject,” she says
“What happened?”
Once upon a time, after my stint as an intern, I was hired and taken into the talent development program. I was to make my way through a one year rotation, then decide which department the company and I saw as a best fit for me. Having fallen for the European Sales Director, a position working under him was obviously the best fit. My real interest was in marketing, but sales was a cousin, and the director was a beast. Rachel stayed here while I moved to Europe for a few years.
I’m about to bare my soul and tell her about my overnight decision to leave Berlin and come back to NYC, but another hot specimen steals her attention. This one we both know. Biblically.
“Hey sexy,” he says.
“Hey,” Rachel and I say simultaneously.
The voice belongs to Devante Moore. Devante’s sexual orientation changes every time I see him. Last I’d heard he was pansexual, which I think means liking whomever he’s into at that given moment in time. He’s originally from Tennessee, where his sexuality was far too complicated, hence his move several years ago to NYC. We all met during undergrad. For the longest time, he was both Rachel and my best fuck. Not that we’d been with him at the same time.
“You’ve been working out,” he says to me. He’s gym obsessed and even though we’re about the same height, he’s got about 20 or so pounds of muscle on me. As I hug his solid body and he squeezes mine I can tell that he’s gone up in both size and strength.
“And look at you, sexy girl,” he says to Rachel. “I see the baby weight is gone. And the Baby Maker?
“He’s fine. And still in the picture.”
“Congratulations,” Devante says, though we all know he doesn’t mean it.
Rachel has been with Martin, aka the Baby Maker, since our senior year in college. I’m not sure what he means by Rachel losing baby weight.
Martin had a baby during grad school—with another woman—while he and Rachel were still together. She did put on a few pounds because of that drama, but she’d lost it a long time ago. We’ve been waiting for Rachel to come to her senses and end things with Martin, but alas, she’s still living with him and raising the offspring of his indiscretion, who just turned three.
“That reminds me,” Rachel says, “I have to go.” She gathers her belongings and composure and suddenly looks all grown up. “Okay,” she says, no longer slurring. “Dinner. Everyone. When we’re all back,” she says.
Who knows where Martin is.
“I know stress when I see it,” Devante says as Rachel walks off. “I think Martin’s gone.”
“What?” I ask. “She would have said something,” I say.
“You’ve been gone for awhile,” Devante says.
“Not that long,” I say and down the half martini Rachel left.
“You sure you want to handle it like that?”
“Stress relief,” I say. “We’re both stressed.”
Hours and rounds of drinks go by, though it feels like minutes and sips. At some point I think I end up trying to climb on the bar. Actually, I know I do, because I remember Devante’s eyes from above. The light caught them, and I was lost for a moment, trying to figure out if they were more brown or green.
“They’re beautiful,” I tell him. “And so are you.” I feel compelled to tell him this repeatedly because it’s true and he should know it.
I jump/stumble down from the bar and am ready for another drink.
“Is that a good idea?” Devante asks. “Don’t you have to work in the morning?”
“I’m stressed,” I tell him. “What am I supposed to do?”
“I don’t know. Maybe not this,” he says. “I have to work too,” he says.
“We’re all such grown ups now,” I say. I decide to share this with people close by, as I’m sure they can appreciate what I’m saying.
Devante shushes me with a glass of water that has suddenly appeared.
“I have to use the bathroom,” I tell him as the room starts spinning.
Heading to the bathroom is the last thing I remember. And something about it being Wednesday—Humpday!