The Herd

by Andrea Bartz

  “If I do what?” The throaty voice rang out and I whirled around, wearing a big openmouthed smile. “Katie!” she cried, and wrapped me in a hug. I closed my eyes and felt our necks against each other’s, our hair touching, a real hug.

  She stepped back, her palms still on my shoulders. “It’s so good to see you, my dear. You look fantastic.”

  “So do you,” I replied. And she did, like Entrepreneur Barbie: shiny brown hair in mermaid curls, skin dewy, eyes clear. I looked over Eleanor’s shoulder and saw that Hana had returned; both she and Mikki were beaming.

  I’d met Eleanor and Mikki when I’d visited Hana at Harvard, back when I was a gangly high schooler in awe of the smart, sassy women my big sister had befriended in the dorms. I flew to Boston every few months, feeling extremely adult as I navigated the airport alone, and they’d always treated me like their collective little sister—movie nights and Ben & Jerry’s at first, supervised frat parties when I was a little older. I’d moved to New York for college, right as Eleanor, gutsy Eleanor, sashayed into Manhattan, Mikki a few months behind her. (Hana, on the other hand, had inexplicably returned to L.A. after graduation, irritating me to no end—but about three years ago, Eleanor had convinced Hana to move to NYC. Now we were all where we were supposed to be.)

  Back in 2010, when I myself was a freshman at NYU and my sister and her friends were newly minted Harvard alums, Eleanor had begun luring in investors for her first venture: Gleam, an ethically sourced cosmetics line, back when the natural-beauty industry was still shedding its patchouli-scented skin. Because she’s brilliant, Eleanor had done everything right with her fledgling beauty company—founding a crisp, airy lifestyle blog that quickly amassed hundreds of thousands of devotees, investing in pop-ups instead of retail space, creating a public persona that felt personable and real but not oversharey or gauche.

  And I was there for all of it. I’d reached out to her, shyly and at Hana’s urging, to meet for dinner during my orientation week at NYU. I adored Eleanor but was intimidated, still, and at best I hoped for someone I could keep in my contacts list, a chic “adult” I could call if I got in a jam. Instead, Eleanor became my family—Mikki too. It awed me then, the thrill of getting invites and calls and wine-soaked heart-to-hearts with these magnificent women. We’d Skype Hana together from Eleanor’s sofa, gossiping and catching up and feeling as if the warm sunlight on Hana’s coast was seeping through the connection and into Eleanor’s battered apartment on the Lower East Side. While I studied for midterms and Mikki designed packaging for weird start-ups (a mail-order dog tiara company comes to mind), I’d watched as Eleanor built her beauty brand and grew vast in the public eye, but remained Eleanor, my Eleanor.

  “How’s your mom doing?” she asked, and Hana stiffened behind her.

  “Super well at the moment,” I replied. I felt my phone buzz again and willed myself to ignore it—I had an idea who was on the end of the line. “She’s getting her energy back and her scans keep coming back clean. Hana and I are going home to see her for Christmas.”

  “I’m so glad. I know I’ve said this already, but it’s incredible you were able to be there for her.”

  I cleared my throat. “I’m glad too. I’m lucky I had that flexibility. And I know it’s only been a few weeks, but this time around, New York feels…different. I’m different.”

  “Well, it’s good to have you back.” She smiled and held my gaze, those intense eyes, always able to make you feel like the only person in the room.

  Behind her, Hana shifted her weight, stuffing a hand into her pocket. We hadn’t talked about it head-on—Hana never was one for discussing our feelings—but I’d assured her multiple times before, during, and after the last year that she shouldn’t feel bad about staying in New York during Mom’s treatment. Business at her solo PR firm was booming, whereas I’d been unemployed after Rocket, the tech news site where I’d been a reporter, had folded. And anyway, Hana’s presence at home with Mom would’ve just stressed both of them out. And so I’d spent pretty much all of 2019 isolated in Michigan, freelancing, working on my book, and driving Mom to and from her treatments.

  It’d been a decent time to be a stringer in the Midwest: Politicians were announcing their 2020 runs, the culture wars were heating up, and national papers rooted in the coasts were clamoring for quotes from Middle America, from the “working class,” from the “anxiety-filled” white folks in so-called flyover states. Dutifully, I’d attended rallies and conducted interviews and scribbled down quotes and smiled blandly while the crowds railed against my profession. Then I’d tapped out my stories in a trance, only breaking down into sobs after I’d filed my copy. In a way, it felt right; no one expects you to be cheerful when your mother is battling stage-three breast cancer.

  “Well, I’m going to steal you away for a bit,” Eleanor announced, turning to her friends, “but we’ll keep it quick.”

  My pulse hastened as we headed toward the elevators. I’d had a stress dream the night before in which I’d shown up late and then realized, with mounting panic, that I was still in my childhood bedroom in Kalamazoo, unable to wrench the door open.

  “Oh, you should meet Stephanie,” Eleanor said. She stopped short and looked around, then led me over to a tall woman in red tuxedo pants and a silky blouse. I recognized her angular jaw and close-cropped hair from her photo on the Herd’s website. “Stephanie, this is Katie! Remember I told you Hana’s sister was moving back?”

  “Of course! So nice to meet you.”

  “You as well! You’re the director of…operations, right?” Thank God I’d done my research last night. Eleanor had poached her from WeWork as her first full-time hire.

  “That’s right, Eleanor’s second-in-command.” They smiled at each other.

  “And it’s lucky you caught Stephanie today—after this week she’ll be off the grid until the New Year!”

  She beamed. “I’m doing yoga teacher training in Goa. It’s always been a dream of mine.”

  “Amazing. Where will you teach?”

  “Hopefully here!” She gestured into the space and it clicked: the room marked MOVE was a fitness studio.

  “Definitely here,” Eleanor added. We traded nice-to-meet-yous as Eleanor turned down a small hallway behind the check-in desk, and I gasped at the sight of yet another perfect room: palm-frond wallpaper, spider plants in hanging gold pots, and a seating area with soft white chairs and gold shelving units.

  “I hope you have defibrillators all over the place,” I said, smacking my chest, “because I don’t think my heart can take much more of this. It’s gorgeous, Eleanor. Every single room. It’s even better in real life than it looks on Instagram. Which is almost never the case.”

  “Wow, thank you.” She plucked a framed photo off the shelf and handed it to me: Hana, Mikki, and Eleanor with sparkly eyes and skinny arms poking out of spangly going-out tops. It was taken in a dorm room, a crummy, overexposed shot; Mikki and Eleanor looked milk-white in the flash while Hana’s skin looked like copper.

  “Babies!” I cried.

  “I know. Freshman year. The only thing missing from the photo is you.”

  “Uh, my braces and acne would have ruined the shot.” I handed it back to her. “It’s incredible that you’ve all stayed so close. I have friends from college, but not like that.”

  “I know. We’re so lucky.” Eleanor placed the frame back on the shelf. Next to it was a stack of leather-bound notebooks and a small knife with a carved handle floating in a stand. The shelf above it held a cute photo of Eleanor and her boyfriend—no, husband now, I’d missed the wedding—on vacation somewhere warm. Mexico, judging by the ornate, embroidered tunic she was wearing, and what looked like a fat margarita in Daniel’s hand. Eleanor spoke fluent Spanish and had always loved the country.

  She pulled a notebook off her desk and settled across from me. “So when did you actually ge
t back in town?”

  “Two weeks ago yesterday.”

  “After a whole year in Michigan, right?”

  “Yeah, about a year.” I caught myself picking at a hangnail and folded my hands.

  She leaned back, smiled. “Katie Bradley, you’re here! You’re here and it’s all real.”

  “Yes! I’m sorry it took so long—I should have called when I landed. It’s been crazy with the move and getting back in touch with my editors, and—”

  “No, I get it.” Her fingers winged up into the stop gesture, blue-and-silver nails glinting. “I figured you’d need a little time to adjust. Taking care of your mom and writing a freaking book. Superwoman.”

  “Oh, please. Look who’s talking.”

  “Everyone thinks they can write a book, but you’re actually doing it. Tell me everything.”

  A pinch in my chest, like tongs squeezing. I rattled off my standard fake-news tech company line.

  “So cool. And you already have a publisher.”

  “Yeah, just—working things out with my agent,” I said, mumbling a bit.

  Eleanor leaned back in her chair. “We have a few members who work in publishing. People have such varied reasons for joining. Some are here to network, some obviously signed up for the coworking space. But also, we didn’t really anticipate this, but about a third of our members have full-time, in-office jobs already. What, why are you laughing?”

  I let the stifled giggle bloom into a grin. “You just morphed into Television Eleanor. Teleanor. It was awesome.”

  Her knuckles found her brow. “God, did I? I’m sorry—I’ve been doing so much press lately, with the Fort Greene location opening soon. I didn’t mean to go all time-share presentation on you.”

  “No, it’s not that! You’re just so on. Here, I’ll feel better if I interview you.” My hand gripped an imaginary microphone and her eyebrows shot up. “Now, Eleanor, I’m surprised to learn that women are signing up for a coworking space without any intention of coworking there. Is it really worth spending three hundred dollars a month for the privilege of attending the Herd’s after-work programming? I saw that you have panels on Afrofuturism, feminism’s global footprint, and how to run for local office.”

  She scoffed, mock-shocked: “The events calendar is members-only.”

  “I may have a mole. In my immediate family.” We both giggled.

  She arranged her face into that perfectly symmetrical smile, the one I knew from profiles of her in The New York Times, The New Yorker, et al. “It’s not just the programming. People call the Herd a club, but we like to call it a community. It’s a sacred space designed to make our members’ lives more balanced, beautiful, and connected.”

  “Hell of a line.” I nodded approvingly. “For real, though, I got that vibe the moment I walked in. I love how the setup sort of facilitates collaboration.” I brought my hands together, tapped the fingertips. “Like, it isn’t just a bunch of cubicles for rent. Women seem to come for the other women too.”

  She kept up the camera-ready facade: “That’s exactly right. Wonderful things happen when passionate women and marginalized genders come together.”

  “ ‘Women and marginalized genders.’ God, Michigan really makes you forget how ‘liberal elites’ talk.”

  “Only the woke are welcome here.” It was clearly a joke, but I felt a ribbon of unease. This past year, as I was falling apart in Kalamazoo, Eleanor, Hana, and Mikki had been here, together, being all progressive—they’d progressed. I wished I could go back to 2018 and have a do-over with me here, at the Herd, from the beginning.

  Eleanor folded her hands and leaned back. “So how do you see yourself using the Herd?”

  My fingers found my necklace. “I’ll be working on book stuff, of course,” I said. “But I’m also hoping to get back into freelancing—reconnect with old editors and meet some new ones.”

  “Yeah, you were placing some pretty high-profile pieces, right?”

  I was surprised she’d been keeping tabs. I felt my chest puff as I rattled off the publications I’d written for: Vogue, New York Mag, People, Vanity Fair, and Vice.

  “And you wrote that piece on Titan’s voice-activated thingy for The Atlantic, right?”

  “That’s right, the Zeus.” Wow, she really had been paying attention. My feature on the tech giant’s groundbreaking, AI-equipped virtual assistant—and the privacy issues it raised—had been one of my favorite bylines of the year, but it hadn’t garnered many page views. “It was a one-off.”

  “Got it. You still doing any satire? That Steve Jobs piece you wrote for the blog was one of the most-shared things we ran all year.”

  I grinned. “I loved writing for you. But no, not really. Maybe I’ll try again.” I shrugged. “Networking is a big part of the freelance hustle; it’s part of why I’d love to join. But I also…I love it here.”

  She smiled calmly. “We do have to follow the normal procedures for you. There’s a waitlist—we don’t want to look shady.”

  I worked hard to keep the hurt off my face. “Yes, I’ve read some very intense things about the Herd’s application process!” There were entire forums dedicated to getting in, picking apart one another’s materials in search of a pattern.

  “I feel bad about it. The Fort Greene location will let us expand membership—it’s huge. But of course the contractors are taking forever.” She closed her eyes. “I wish someone would start an all-female construction company. I’d hire the crap out of them. I was on-site in Brooklyn on Friday arguing with the head contractor about the floorboards, and the installer showed up and started talking to him literally right over my head. He’s lucky he was wearing a tool belt or I’d have kicked him in the balls.”

  There was a beat, and what the hell, I went all in.

  “Eleanor, I’ve missed you. I’ve been reading about you everywhere. I can’t believe you made all this happen. You’re my hero. Emphasis on the H-E-R.”

  “You know, it’s amazing we’ve put any marketing materials out without your wordsmithery.”

  “You need me!” I was pushing too hard, a tinge of desperation under my banter, but I couldn’t stop. “And though I didn’t know it an hour ago, I need this place too. I want to make it my second home until, like, I’m so decrepit they have to wheel me into a retirement community.”

  “So glad to hear it. It really has all come together, hasn’t it? I’m so—” It was the slightest of pauses, the tiniest key change. “I’m so happy.”

  My sensors went up. They were newly attuned after eleven months of interviewing smiling, close-lipped Midwesterners who viewed me as an uppity outsider. But then Eleanor stretched and grinned and I thought maybe I’d imagined it.

  “It will be so great to be able to see you every day,” I told her.

  “It will, Katie,” she said. “It will.”

  * * *

  —

  I left Eleanor in her office and skipped through the interconnecting rooms, on the lookout for Mikki and Hana. There was something fizzy in my chest, and I realized with a jolt that this place, this moment, was so annoyingly perfect it looped back into not-annoying. I hadn’t had to fight back tears all day. Chris hadn’t bubbled up in my mind in almost three hours, a new record. The sadness like a layer of black mold over my brain and ribs—I’d begun to think of it as permanent, the way I’d feel for the rest of my life. Mikki waved me over and I pulled my phone from my purse as I shimmied onto the sofa, then froze. There was a text from Mom: “Good luck today! xoxo”

  And four voicemails, all from a New York City number I recognized. I looked at the list: The earliest was forty-two seconds long, and the later ones grew shorter, the last just twelve seconds. I swallowed, feeling my pulse thumping in my neck. Then I reached out and slid my finger across them one by one: delete, delete, delete, delete.

  CHAPTER 2
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br />   Hana

  MONDAY, DECEMBER 9, 11:06 A.M.

  I watched Katie and Eleanor disappear into Eleanor’s office, chatting happily. Katie was wearing leather boots, stained with salt, even though I’d asked her to come in heels. I’d considered texting her a reminder last night, checking if she had any last-minute questions, assuaging the anxiety I thought she might be feeling. But I’d resisted, Mikki’s words echoing in my mind: She’s an adult. You’re not her mother. You’re not responsible for her. All true, and all things I repeated to myself whenever Katie released a tweetstorm of expletive-riddled jokes or a sudden rant about being a woman in the world. Your words hold power, I’d told her once, during a text conversation that quickly devolved into an argument. Your words shape how people see you. Things that should be obvious, one would think, to a journalist such as herself.

  But she’d shown up at the Herd on time this morning, looking cute if a bit underdressed, and for the first time since she moved back, she looked alert. For weeks she’d blamed exhaustion and seasonal affective disorder, her voice jagged with sleep when I called her at eleven, noon, sometimes one. It seemed clear something else was bothering her—I had my money on heartbreak—but hadn’t asked.

  Katie’s move—what an odd day. She’d found a roommate through friends, a fellow NYU alum with an open room in Bed-Stuy. For a year, while Katie was in Michigan, her furniture had sat in a moving pod somewhere in Queens. When she unpacked it last month, furniture sliding out like pieces of a 3-D puzzle, her eyes remained wide, her mouth a small o. As if U-Pack had bundled up and handed over someone else’s life.

  She hadn’t invited me back, so I didn’t know how unpacking had gone. But I’d had her over several times, ostensibly to catch up but in practice to eat dinner while watching a movie, my cat, Cosmo, curled in a furry ball between us. Katie hadn’t said much about Kalamazoo, about those last few weeks when she fell radio silent before announcing her return, but I was trying not to press her. I wanted things to be different, better, this time around, and Katie didn’t respond well to nagging.