Tucked away from Wall Street, in the valley of shadow cast by the big banks and executive corner offices encased in glass, the brick exterior of the Riot Street building is unmarked but for simple white lettering on the front door. It’s Tuesday morning, my first day as a member of the magazine’s staff, and I’m caffeinated to the point of intoxication when I walk in thirty minutes early.

Last night I stayed up until after midnight preparing essay pitches for Cara. It was my mission to start my first day looking like I have my shit together. Then this morning I spent the subway ride over crossing out and revising every idea I’d come up with. Whether from nerves or insecurity, this tends to be a recurring symptom. I get all doped up on a shiny new project, spend days or weeks obsessing, scrutinizing, planning, and prepping, only to dissolve into chaos when the moment arrives. A case of performance anxiety, I suppose. But I try to remind myself, as I sign in at the reception desk and almost misspell my own name, that I don’t have to conquer the world on my first day.

Everyone’s just making it up as they go along, right?

“This is for you.” Andrew, the Banana Republic model in a plaid dress shirt and contrasting bow tie behind the reception desk, hands me a coffee mug with the magazine’s logo on it and several fun-size candies nestled inside. “Consider it purely decorative. The coffee here sucks.”

“Thanks for the warning.” I tuck the mug into my messenger bag.

“You need to go see HR.” He gestures toward the hallway behind him. “First door on the left.”

Three hours later I emerge from the holding cell of human resources. What I thought would be a quick series of forms and signatures to begin my employment turns into an unending trudge through a dozen major life decisions, like HMO versus PPO and how to allocate my 401(k) contributions.

I walk out of the room—my bag a couple pounds heavier with forms and folders and an employee handbook—to find Ethan leaning against the opposite wall of the corridor. He’s glaring at his phone, jabbing his thumbs at the screen while typing what I can only assume from his demeanor is a sincere death threat. I shut the door behind me just loud enough to announce my presence. He looks up, the creases in his brow disappearing, and shoves his phone in his back pocket.

“Ready?”

“Officially official.” I hold up the badge hanging from the lanyard around my neck.

“Don’t wear that in here.” Ethan turns toward the elevator and I follow beside him. “The other kids will blow spitballs in your hair.”

“I’m just absorbing the moment,” I say, taking a last adoring look at the big bold letters of PRESS PASS above my picture before sticking the badge in my bag. “Let me have my fun.”

“You’re right.” Ethan hits the button for the elevator. He slides me a sideways glance. “I’ll resist the urge to smother your excitement with jaded pessimism.”

The elevator dings and the doors open.

“That’s all I ask.”

“At least until after lunch.”

We exit the elevator on the fifth floor, where the bull pen of blue-gray cubicles hides activity under rows of white recessed lighting. Keyboards clicking in two-dozen swift staccato rhythms. Conversations rising over the fabric-padded cube walls. The air smells of burnt coffee and fresh runs of paper and ink through the copy machine.

“I’ve got a meeting,” Ethan says, pulling out his phone to give it another dirty look.

“Oh, okay.” Not that I expected cake and flowers, but…

“Addison will give you the tour and show you to your desk.”

Before I can respond, he’s walking away. I stand caught in an awkward moment of indecision, follow or wait here, until I see Addison Lee’s tall, lanky image materialize in the center mass of cubicles to wave me over. Like an orphaned puppy, I scurry to the familiar face.

“Welcome, welcome,” Addison says, setting his headphones on the desk. “I guess you’re mine today.”

“Sorry you drew the short straw.” Babysitting the new girl can’t be anyone’s idea of a choice gig.

“Nah, no worries. Today’s pitch—”

“Addison, got that sidebar?” a voice shouts from somewhere across the room.

“I got you.” Addison bends down to his laptop and drops a file into a chat box. “Sorry. It’s pitch day, so Cara and Ed are in the Slaughterhouse.”

On the back wall, four five-by-eight whiteboards stretch the full length of the bull pen. They’re lined in a grid pattern and represent every writer, their stories, and the current stage of production. On the next wall, running parallel to the windows that look out on the street, cork boards are decorated with reams of paper displaying the proposed layout for each page of the upcoming issue. Visualized this way, the operation appears a massive undertaking.

“Follow me.” Addison leads me back toward the elevator then down the hallway to where Ethan disappeared. “Online edition meets with Cara for Weekly Wednesday Whippings, so you have that to look forward to.”

“Can’t wait.”

During Addison’s rendition of the orientation process, I am introduced to the Riot Street offices as a sort of vast landscape of factions and fiefdoms. The cubicle community, where most of the staff writers, associate editors, and the like live, is known as the Farm.

“Pretty self-explanatory,” Addison says.

Writers are animals. We subsist on junk food, caffeine, and pats on the head.

The first floor belongs to all things administrative: HR, payroll, that sort of thing. It’s a different culture down there, where they all have kids and spouses and are obsessed with their Fitbits. Except Banana Republic Andrew. He is the rare downworlder who transcends the divide between floors.

The fifth floor is shared by Editorial and Advertising, between which is a shaky truce mediated on the neutral and sacred territory of the snack room.

“After three meetings between designated negotiators for both sides,” Addison says, pulling two bottles of water from the top shelf of the refrigerator and handing one to me, “it was decided that Editorial may occupy the second shelf, Advertising gets the bottom shelf. Door and drawers are open territory. Anything on the first shelf is fair game, so help yourself to soda, water, whatever.”

“You’re kidding.”

He nudges the fridge door shut and twists open his water. “I shit you not. Wars were fought. Interns were poisoned. It got messy.”

“What about the freezer?” I shove the bottle of water into my bag, now almost overflowing with souvenirs from my journey thus far.

“Do not go in there.”

Down the hallway that separates the Editorial and Ad sections of the floor is the main conference room.

“The Slaughterhouse,” Addison tells me. We stop to spy on the pitch meeting through the glass walls. “Beware, all ye who enter.”

Because the Slaughterhouse is where the animals are butchered. Fitting. In my experience, pitch sessions are a brutal event in which writers let the happy, hopeful balloons of their precious dreams and ideas float into the air, only to have an editor shoot them out of the sky with a sniper rifle and take a piss all over the exploded, shriveled remains.

Ed and Cara sit at opposite ends of the rectangular table, flanked by half a dozen of the writing staff with iPads and open laptops. In the center, facing us, Ethan stabs at his phone. That deep, vexed crease between his eyebrows slices down the center of his face. Whatever has him so upset, I fear for the person on the receiving end of his angry texting.

“Ethan wanted to show you around, but Ed pulled him in,” Addison says.

“It’s fine. I think I’m getting the more informative version of the tour.” Somehow I doubt Ethan’s would be as colorful.

“Stick with me, kid.” Addison nudges my shoulder. “Speaking of which, where’d you and Ethan sneak off to after the bar?”

As if he’s heard us, Ethan looks up. His crinkled face relaxes. He draws across the screen of his iPad with his index finger then holds it up for us to see, which catches the attention of Ed, Cara, and everyone else in the room. Great.

“Meet for lunch—15,” the screen reads.

Addison nods and gives Ethan a thumbs-up, leading me down the hallway to continue the tour. It concludes in the Cave—a dark, stuffy room furnished with dilapidated desks that look like they were salvaged from a fire sale. The air is clogged with a vague smell of dirty carpet mixed with subtle hints of hot garbage, the latter stench emanating from the restaurant Dumpster in the alley below and creeping in through the window’s cracked weather seal.

“Yeah,” Addison says, his face warped by sympathy, “this is you.”

The size of the room suggests it was designed as a conference room or storage space, but is now congested with shadow-dwelling writers all but sitting on top of each other in the glow of computer screens. Where overhead fluorescent tubes should be, only empty tracks.

Addison brings me over to a bearded guy in a tight pair of jorts. The kind of bony, leathery man whose social calendar revolves around Critical Mass meetups. He smells of WD-40 and wilted kale. Two desks arranged in an L shape in the center of the room create a small fort from which he oversees his modest territory.

“This is Cyle with a C, the associate web editor and keeper of the Cave.” Addison’s introduction carries a chipper-yet-sarcastic tinge to his voice. “Cyle, this is Avery.”

I hold out my hand. “Nice to meet you.”

He gives me a limp reciprocation and jerks his head toward a chipped, laminate desktop supported by two waist-high filing cabinets. A brown molded-plastic chair, like the ones in a school cafeteria, sits beside the makeshift desk.

“That’s yours. You’ll need to talk to IT about getting a laptop assigned.”

“Yeah,” I say, a polite smile slapped on my lips as I take in the sad little workspace shoved up against the wall. “Great. Thank you.”

Any notions I had about the glamorous world of internet journalism? Cured.

“Better be worth it.” Cyle wraps his headphones around his ears and slouches over his laptop. “We’re losing three paid interns this summer for you.”

So it isn’t just apathy but outright hostility. Grand. Cyle and I are off to a great start.

Addison tosses me a pitying glance as I set my bag down on the warped, uneven surface of the desk top. A dip in the center leaves one corner raised off its cabinet. Which corner depends on where the weight is distributed. So that’ll be fun.

No one else in the room even lifts their eyes from the hypnotic radiance of their computers. They all wear earbuds or headphones, jacked into the Matrix and unconcerned by my appearance. Until Ethan enters the room and takes a hard look at my desk.

“The fuck is this shit?” He darkens the doorway for a moment, snapping every pair of startled eyes in his direction, before stalking up to Cyle. “She needs a proper desk.”

Cyle leans back in his adjustable, ergonomic throne, crossing his ankle over his knee. “New chick can deal until we get some money in the budget.” Prick. “We’re out of spares.”

“I don’t mind,” I say. “I’m not picky.” The last thing I need is to inspire a turf war over a stupid desk. Hell, I’ll bring mine in from home if I have to.

“No,” Ethan barks at me. “Fuck that.” He glares down at Cyle, violent shadows across his face. “You’ve got two desks for what? Stop being an asshat and give her one.”

“She’s your pet.” Cyle sends a snide glance at me over his shoulder. Super prick. “Feel free to find her better accommodations.”

“I think that’s lunch.” Addison jerks his head toward the door.

I grab my bag, swallowing down the burning acid rising up the back of my throat, and slip along the wall toward the exit. I had hoped to blend in at first, slide into a comfortable rhythm, and allow my work to get me noticed. Instead, I’ve become a disturbance.

“How about you try not being such a miserable bastard, yeah?” Ethan’s voice is coarse with restrained rage. Though he releases some of the tension from his jaw, his eyes still sting with hatred. “Little less time up your own ass.”

“Goodbye, Cave people.” Addison waves at the spectators caught in the darkness and pushes me into the hallway. “Let us know when you’re ready to overthrow the fascist regime.”

At the elevator, Ethan catches up to us. He punches the button with his fist and stares at his rigid reflection in the metallic doors. The obvious ire has evaporated from his expression, replaced by an eerie, implacable veneer.

“Let’s get a drink.”

Out on the sidewalk, severe noon sun splits through the leafy branches of trees dotting the curb. The lunch rush clogs the street with passing cars. Addison and I appraise Ethan, both waiting for an eruption that doesn’t come.

“So…” Addison says, swinging his arms in an uncertain gesture. “Taco stand?”

Ethan squints at the sun, glancing down the block. “It’s too hot to sit outside.” He looks to me. “It’s your first day. Let me buy you a real lunch.”

“Dude.” Addison scoffs, almost offended at the thought. “Taco Tuesday.”

“So I’ll take her to El Centro.” Ethan steps beside me, putting Addison on the other side of the invisible line drawn on the sidewalk. “We can get a drink and relax instead of standing in line for twenty minutes.”

They become tangled in an exchange of unreadable stares. Silent messages pass between their unmoving lips. There’s a story there, twisting in the air between them.

“Whatever you two want to do,” I say. Because I’m not about to pick sides. “I’m just along for the ride.”

The front doors open, releasing the hungry horde of the magazine staff onto the sidewalk. They hardly pause to shuffle around us, on their way down the block. Navid and C.J. wave, mid-conversation with each other, then move on.

“Yeah, have fun,” Addison says to Ethan and me, his eyes skeptical. “Catch up with you later.” And he turns to follow the stampede.

“Right then.” Ethan holds his hand out to point the way in the opposite direction. “Let’s go.”

Seated at a two-person booth in the noisy Mexican restaurant, smears of cheese sauce and sprinkles of rice are all that’s left of my meal.

“You sure you don’t want a drink?” Ethan finishes his first tequila, neat, and waves down the waiter for a second. “It’s on me.”

I sip water and look past him toward the windows and line of patrons at the hostess stand waiting to be seated.

“What?” he asks, dipping a chip into his salsa.

“Nothing.”

I’m plenty irritated with him, Cyle, the whole stupid tirade, but I don’t have room for petty bullshit. I learned a long time ago to let go of the little stuff. Emptied a damn suitcase-load of little stuff and set it on fire. Felt much better ever since.

“That means something.” His bland expression and patient eyes say he’ll wait all day for an answer.

“It means I don’t want to open a discussion on the something. I’m capable of keeping my thoughts to myself.”

“You’re mad at me.” Ethan smirks and pushes his hair off his forehead. “I should let that little snot push you around?”

I stab my straw through the ice blockade inside my cup.

“Go on, then. Let it out.”

Fine. Fuck it. “You embarrassed me back there with Cyle. You caused a whole confrontation that will probably have little or no effect on your daily life, but which creates a whole mess of uncomfortable problems for me.”

“He’s a jackass.”

“I don’t get the luxury of calling Cyle names to his face.”

“Why not?” He slouches back in the booth, amused. “He’s calling you a cunt behind your back.”

Charming.

“Because I’m new. I’m new and have been plucked from obscurity for the unfortunate and inequitable reason that the story of my upbringing was popular for a day. And then only because it ended in mass murder.”

“That all?”

The waiter arrives with Ethan’s drink, which he takes and holds to his smiling lips.

“And because I’m a woman in a newsroom dominated by men. I don’t get to pitch a princess fit over the crappy desk they stick me with. Because then I’m needy and difficult. But you waltz in, defending my honor, and still all the negative repercussions will land on my shoulders. Because you’re Ethan Ash, and Ethan Ash is just a hot temper who always has a ‘fuck this’ or ‘fuck that’ every time he enters a room.”

“On occasion I’ve been known to enter a room without saying anything at all.” He winks. Snarky shit.

“And you know what they’re thinking.” I slide my finished plate of food to the edge of the table to alert the waiter that we’re ready for the check. “Everyone in the Cave and everyone they’ve told so far.”

“That we’re sleeping together,” Ethan says, dry and without inflection. “Maybe you’re sleeping with half the senior staff and that’s why you have a job when there are more experienced and qualified candidates begging for scraps.”

“Pretty much.”

“Do you want to?”

“What?”

“Sleep together.”

“Ethan…” Glad he’s taking this seriously.

“Look.” He sets down his glass and leans forward. “Nobody’s handing out Brownie points for nobility in that place. If you want something, take it. If you don’t like something, fix it. Cyle doesn’t have his job because he’s nice to people. Five years ago he was an intern who chased away everyone else who wanted his gig until he got to sit in that dark little hole and lord over his minions. If you want people to respect you, don’t take any shit.”

“That’s you,” I say, folding my straw wrapper into an accordion. “That’s not me.”

“It could be. This is your shot to define your identity. Don’t waste it on being a shadow.” Ethan sips his tequila like the world could explode around him and it’d barely ruffle a hair out of place. “Because whatever you were doing before, Avery, it wasn’t working.”

He’s not wrong, and that bugs me more than it should. Ethan can’t understand what it’s like to have already shed one whole person from my psyche. To look back just ten years and barely recognize myself. As if the memories were of a past life, of a stranger. Echo was a failed attempt at being. Not viable once removed from the controlled environment in which she was created. She wasn’t equipped for the outside world. Delicate, unable to withstand the stimulation and disorder, pain and loneliness. Echo was shriveling, breaking down. She became destructive. So I killed her. A very late term abortion.

But it’s like fragments of her survived, implanted so deep I can’t claw them out. I see afterimages that flash and flicker behind my eyes. Hear her inflection in my voice. Sometimes I still taste her cravings on my tongue.

Becoming who you want to be requires conviction and stamina.

Ethan will never get that.

When we get back to the office, Ethan tows me around the Farm from desk to desk like it’s the first day of school all over again and I’m today’s show-and-tell. Arts and Culture girls with thick black glasses, and cardigans over striped shirts like they live in a perpetual French film festival. Econ boys in pressed button-downs and skinny ties, laptop screens an ordered frenzy of charts and decimals. The crime-and-punishment crew, all haggard and going to or coming from their smoke breaks on the roof. There’s a permanent stench of tobacco in the air around them. Traversing the landscape, doing the grip-and-grin, I’m regarded by the staff with about as much enthusiasm as a flyer handed out on a street corner.

“Every one of them assumes you’re out to take their job,” Ethan says. “The better you are, the more they’ll hate you.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

“No.”

Seems the group I met Friday night were selected as the more-welcoming face of Riot Street and Ethan was saving the less-savory personalities for after I signed the contract.

Once we’ve made the rounds, he takes me to IT on the third floor to pick up my laptop, after which we sit at his desk while he escorts me through the process of setting up log-in credentials for the magazine’s intranet, email, publishing platform, and a few other sites and services I’ll need access to.

“Getting settled in?” Ed leans over the side wall of Ethan’s cubicle. His eyes are a bit droopy from a Taco Tuesday food coma and his faux hawk is a smidge off-center.

“All good,” I say, sitting up straight. “Got a tour, I’m all plugged in…”

“Uh-huh.”

“I just want to thank you, again, for giving me a chance. I know my interview wasn’t—”

Ethan shoots me a chastising glance as Ed swats at the air in a dismissive gesture. Not much of a talker, Ed. Seems his visit is more a formality than genuine interest.

“I’m not sending her back to the Cave.” Ethan reclines in his chair and folds his arms behind his head, like he’s issuing a decree and his word is final. Now I send him a glare, because I thought we’d come to an understanding on the matter.

Ed looks away. At the wall or at dust moats floating through the air. “I heard.”

Undeterred by my silent thought waves begging him to back off, Ethan grabs my bag from the floor and drops it over the front wall of his cube to the adjacent empty desk. “Take that one.”

Ed’s lips stretch to a thin line, brow furrowed. “Vee’s desk?”

“She’s not coming back,” Ethan says, harsh and clipped.

“Who’s Vee?”

Ethan stares past me like he’s pretending really hard not to hear her name. Ed just taps the top of the wall and nods before walking away. The man has no fucks left to give about shit like this.

“Seriously?” I say, once Ed is out of earshot. “Will you stop?”

“Quit apologizing. If you walk around like a charity case, that’s how people will treat you.”

“Then stop acting like my chaperone.”

“I’m not going to let you get absorbed and disappear. So you might try a little gratitude.”

“And a touch of humility wouldn’t kill you.”

“I tried it once. Didn’t suit me.”

No kidding.