Rebecca Serle - In Five Years

We go to dinner at Ivy at the Shore, a restaurant practically across the street from Casa del Mar, but Aldridge still calls a car. Kelly is in town to see another client, so it’s just Aldridge and me. I’m wearing a navy shift dress with lilac flowers and navy espadrilles, the most casual I’ve ever been in a work environment. But it’s California, these women are young, and we’re by the ocean. I want to wear flowers.

We get to the restaurant first. Rattan chairs with floral backs and pillows pepper the restaurant as diners in jeans and dinner jackets clink glasses, laughing.

We sit. “I’m going to insist on the calamari,” Aldridge says. “It’s delectable.”

He’s wearing a light asuit with a purple paisley shirt. If you photographed us together, you might think it had been planned.

“Is there anything we should go over?” I ask him. “I have the company stats memorized, but—”

“This is just a get-to-know-you meeting, so they feel comfortable. You know the ropes.”

“No meeting is just anything,” I say.

“That is true. But if you try for an agenda, you often get an undesired outcome.”

Jordi and Anya arrive in tandem. Jordi is tall, in high-waisted pants and a cowl-neck sweater. Her hair is down and wet at the ends. She looks like a bohemian dream, and I am reminded, for not the first time, of Bella. Anya wears jeans, a T-shirt and a blazer. Her hair is short and slicked back. She talks with her eyes.

“Are we late?” she says. She’s skittish. I can tell. No matter. We’ll win them over.

“Not at all,” Aldridge says. “You know us New Yorkers. We don’t know anything about your traffic patterns.”

Jordi sits next to me. Her perfume is heady and dense.

“Ladies, I’d like you to meet Danielle Kohan. She’s our best and brightest senior associate. And she’s been a huge boon to your IPO evaluation already.”

“You can call me Dannie,” I say, shaking each of their hands.

“We love Aldridge,” Jordi tell me. “But does he have a first name?”

“It’s never to be used,” I tell her, before mouthing: Miles.

Aldridge smiles. “What are we drinking tonight?” he asks the group.

A waiter materializes, and Aldridge orders a bottle of champagne and a bottle of red, for dinner. “Cocktails, anyone?” he inquires.

Anya gets an iced tea. “How long do you think this will take?” she asks.

“Dinner, or taking your company public?” Aldridge does not look up from his menu.

“I’ve been a big fan of yours for a while now,” I say. “I think what you’ve done with the space is brilliant.”

“Thank—” Jordi starts, but Anya cuts her off.

“We didn’t do anything with existing space. We created a new one,” she says. She eyes Jordi as if to say— lock it up .

“I’m curious, though,” I say. I aim my question at the both of them, equally. “Why now?”

At this, Aldridge looks up from his menu and grabs a passing waiter. “We’d like the calamari immediately please.” Aldridge winks at me.

Jordi looks to Anya, as if unsure how to answer, and I feel a question answered before it has been raised. I swallow it back down. Not now.

“We’re at the point where we don’t want to work as hard as we have been on the same thing,” Jordi says. “We’d like the revenue to be able to turn our attentions to new ventures.”

I feel the familiarity in her speak. The measured, calculated words. Maybe it’s all true, but none of it feels authentic. So I push.

“Why give away control of something you own when you don’t have to?”

At this, Jordi busies herself with her water glass. Anya’s eyes narrow. I can feel Aldridge shift next to me. I have no idea why I’m doing this. I know exactly why I’m doing this.

“Are you trying to talk us out of this?” Anya asks. She directs her question to Aldridge. “Because I was under the impression this was a kick-off dinner.”

I look at Aldridge, who stays silent. He is, I realize, not going to answer for me.

“No,” I say. “I just like to understand motivation. It helps me do my job.”

Anya likes this answer, I can tell. Her shoulders drop perceptively. “The truth is, I’m not sure. We’ve spoken a lot about this. Jordi knows I’m on the fence.”

“We’ve been at Yahtzee for almost ten years,” Jordi says, repeating what is no doubt a familiar line. “It’s time for something else.”

“I don’t know why we have to give up control in order to have that,” Anya says.

The champagne arrives in a flourish of glasses and bubbles. Aldridge pours.

“To Yahtzee,” he says. “A smooth IPO process and a lot of money.”

Jordi clinks his glass, but Anya and I keep our eyes on each other. I see her searching me, asking the question that will never be spoken at this table: What would you do?

Chapter Thirty

An hour later, I’m at the bar upstairs at the hotel. I should sleep, but I can’t. Every time I try I think about Bella, about what a terrible friend I am to be this far away, and my eyes shoot back open. I’m leaning over my second dirty martini when Aldridge comes in. I squint. I’m too drunk for this.

“Dannie,” he says. “May I?” He doesn’t wait for my response but takes the seat next to me.

“Tonight was good,” I say, trying for steady. I think I’m slurring my words.

“You were very engaged,” he says. “Must have felt good.”

“Sure,” I deadpan. “Wonderful.”

Aldridge’s eyes flit down to my martini glass and back to me. “Danielle,” he says. “Are you alright?”

I’m suddenly aware that if I speak I will cry, and I have never cried in front of a boss, not once, not even at the DA’s office where morale was so bad that we had a designated room for hysterical outbursts. I pick up my water glass. I sip. I set it back down.

“No,” I say.

He gestures to the waiter. “I’ll have a Ketel on the rocks, two lemons,” he says. The waiter turns, but Aldridge calls him back. “No, actually, I’ll have a scotch. Neat.”

He takes off his suit jacket, drapes it over the empty stool next to him, and then goes about rolling back his sleeves. Neither of us speaks during this interval, and by the time the ritual is complete, his drink is in front of him and I no longer feel as if I’m going to cry.

“So,” he says. “You can begin or I can do my ankle cuffs next.”

I laugh. The alcohol has made everything loose. I feel the emotions there, right on the surface, not tucked and tidy where I normally keep them.

“I’m not sure I’m a good person,” I say. I didn’t know that’s what was inside my head, but once I say it, I know it’s true.

“Interesting,” he says. “A good person.”

“My best friend is very sick.”

“Yes,” Aldridge says. “I know that.”

“And we’re in a fight.”

He takes a sip of scotch. “What happened?”

“She thinks I’m controlling,” I say, repeating the truth.

At this, Aldridge laughs, just like Dr. Shaw. It’s a hearty belly laugh.

“Why does everyone think that’s so funny?” I ask.

“Because you are,” he says. “You were quite controlling tonight, for example.”

“Was that bad?”

Aldridge shrugs. “I guess we’ll see. How did it feel?”

“That’s the problem,” I say. “It felt great. I loved it. My best friend is—she’s sick, and tonight I’m in California, happy about some clients at dinner. What kind of a person does that make me?”

Aldridge nods, like he understands it, now. Gets what this is about. “You are upset because you think you need to quit your life and be by her side.”

“No, she won’t let me. I just shouldn’t be happy doing this.”