Household Gods

Nicole knew what she meant. Nicole would have felt the same way. But they were her kids. She was left in the lurch, on a bare day’s notice. “Oh, yes,” she said. She hoped she didn’t sound as disappointed as she felt. “Yes. Of course. I just thought… well. If my family were here, and not back in Indiana… Oh well. It was worth a try.” She did her best to make her shrug nonchalant, to change the subject without giving them both whiplash. “Ten-thirty, you said? I’ll see what I can catch up on till then. Lord, you wouldn’t believe how long it took me to get here this morning.”

“Traffic.” Cyndi managed to make it both a four-letter word and a sigh of relief. Off the hook, she had to be thinking.

Lucky Cyndi, with her sister in town and not in Bloomington, and no chance of her disappearing into the wilds of Ciudad Obregon. Nicole mumbled something she hoped was suitably casual, and retreated to her desk. She was still riding the high of Ogarkov’s news, though the bright edge had worn off it.

The first thing she did when she got there was check her voice mail. Sure enough, one of the messages was from Sheldon Rosenthal, dry and precise as usual: “Please arrange to meet with me at your earliest convenience.” She’d taken care of that. Another one was from Mort Albers, with whom she had the eleven-thirty appointment. “Can we move it up to half-past ten?” he asked.

“No, Mort,” Nicole said with a measure of satisfaction, “you can’t, not today.” It was just as satisfying to have Cyndi make the call and change the schedule – the pleasure of power. Nicole could get used to that, oh yes she could. Even the little things felt good today. Tomorrow, she thought. Tomorrow she’d be doing them as a partner. Today – her last day as a plain associate – had a bittersweet clarity, a kind of farewell brightness. She answered a couple of voice-mail messages from other lawyers at the firm. She wrote a memo, fired it off by e-mail, and printed out a hard copy for her files. Frank would have gone on for an hour about how primitive that was, but the law ran on paper and ink, not electrons and phosphors – and to hell with Frank anyhow, she thought.

It was going to feel wonderful to tell him she was a partner now. Even if -

She quelled the little stab of anxiety. He had to keep paying child support, as much as he ever did. That was in the divorce decree. She was a lawyer – a partner in a moderately major firm. She could make it stick.

The clock on the wall ticked the minutes away. At ten twenty-five she started a letter, hesitated, counted up the minutes remaining, saved the letter on the hard drive and stood up, smoothing wrinkles out of her skirt. She checked her pantyhose. On straight, no runs – thanks to whichever god oversaw the art of dressing for success. She took a deep breath and squared her shoulders, and forayed out past Cyndi’s desk. “I’m going to see Mr. Rosenthal,” she said – nice and steady, she was pleased to note. Cyndi grinned and gave her a thumbs-up.

Nicole took the stairs to the seventh floor. Some people walked all the way up every day; others exercised on the stairs during breaks and at lunch.

Nicole never had understood that, not in a climate that made you happy to go outside the whole year round – even on days when the smog was thick enough to asphyxiate a non-smog-adapted organism. People who’d been born in L.A. didn’t know when they were well off.

She stood in the hallway for a minute and a half, so she could walk into Sheldon Rosenthal’s office at ten-thirty on the dot. It was an exercise in discipline, and a chance to pull herself together. She thought about ducking into a restroom, but that would have meant heading back down to the sixth floor: she didn’t – yet – have the key to the partners’ washroom. Her makeup would have to look after itself. Her bladder would hold on till the meeting was over.

Then, after what felt like a week and a half, it was time. She licked her dry lips, stiffened her spine, and walked through the mock-oak-paneled door with its discreet brass plaque: Sheldon Rosenthal, Esq., it said. That was all. No title. No ostentation. Noble self-restraint.

That restraint was, in its peculiar way, as much in evidence inside as out. Of course the office was a lot more lavishly appointed than anything down on her floor: acres of deep expensive carpet, gleaming glass, dark wood, law books bound in red and gold. But it was all in perfect taste, not overdone. It was a perk, that was all, a symbol. Here, it said, was the founding partner of the firm. Naturally he’d surround himself with order and comfort, quiet and expense, rather than the cheap carpet and tacky veneer of the salaried peon.