In Five Years

by Rebecca Serle

  “Bells—”

  “Please,” she says. “I promise I will call you later.”

  I feel her words bite through me. It’s bad enough as it is, but now why would we face it alone? We need to stop down. We need to get coffee. We need to talk about this.

  She starts walking and, instinctively, I follow her, but she knows I’m behind her and she turns around, her hand signaling—Be gone.

  My phone buzzes again. This time I pull it out and answer.

  “It’s Dannie,” I say.

  “Where the hell are you?” I hear my case partner Sanji’s voice through the phone. She’s twenty-nine and graduated from MIT at sixteen. She’s been working professionally for ten years. I’ve never heard her use a word that wasn’t absolutely necessary. The fact that she added “hell” speaks volumes.

  “I’m sorry, I got caught up. I’m on my way.”

  “Don’t hang up,” she says. “We have a problem with CIT and corporate. There are gaps in their financials.”

  We were supposed to complete our due diligence on CIT, a company our client, Epson, a giant tech corporation, is acquiring. If we don’t have a complete financial report, the partner is going to lose it.

  “I’m going down to their offices,” I say. “Hang tight.”

  Sanji hangs up without saying goodbye, and I book it down to the Financial District where CIT has their headquarters. It’s a company specializing in website coding. I’ve been there a little too often for my liking lately.

  We’ve been in constant contact with their in-house counsel for over six months, and I know how they work extremely well now. Hopefully, this is an oversight. There are tax reports and statements for a full eight months that are missing.

  When I arrive, I’m let up immediately, and Darlene, the receptionist, shows me to the associate general counsel’s office.

  Beth is at her desk and looks up, blinking once at me. She’s a woman in her mid-to-late fifties and has been at the company since its inception twelve years ago. Her office resembles her in its stoicism, not a single photo on her desk, and she doesn’t wear a ring. We’re cordial, even friendly, but we never speak about anything personal, and it’s impossible to tell what greets her at home when she leaves these office walls.

  “Dannie,” she says. “To what do I owe this displeasure?”

  I was in her office yesterday.

  “We’re still missing financials,” I say.

  She does not stand up, or gesture for me to sit. “I’ll have my team review,” she says.

  Her team consists of one other lawyer, Davis Brewster, with whom I went to Columbia. He is smart. I have no idea how he ended up as a midsize company’s legal counsel.

  “This afternoon,” I tell her.

  She shakes her head. “You must really love your job,” she says.

  “No more or less than any of us,” I say.

  She laughs. She looks back at her computer. “Not quite.”

  * * *

  At 5 p.m., more documents come through from CIT. I’m going to be here until at least nine parsing through them. Sanji paces the conference room like she’s figuring out an attack strategy. I text Bella: Check in with me. No response.

  It’s 10 p.m. before I leave. Still nothing from Bella. Everything in my body feels crunched, like I’ve been ground down to an inch over the course of today. As I walk, I feel myself stretching back up. I don’t have sneakers with me, and after about five blocks my pump-clad feet begin to hurt, but I keep walking. As the blocks go on—down Fifth, rolling through the forties like the subway—I begin to pick up the pace. By the time I get to East Thirty-Eighth Street, I’m running.

  I arrive at our Gramercy apartment gasping and sweating. My top is nearly soaked through and my feet throb with numb disconnection. I’m afraid to look down at them. I think if I do, I’ll see pools of blood seeping out from the soles.

  I open the door. David is at the table, a glass of wine next to him, his computer open. He jumps up when he sees me.

  “Hey,” he says. He takes me in, his eyes narrow as he scans my face. “What happened to you?”

  I bend down to take off my shoes. But the first won’t come off. It seems stitched to my foot. I scream out in pain.

  “Hey,” David days. “Woah. Okay. Sit down.” I collapse onto the little bench we have in the hallway and he crouches down. “Jesus, Dannie, what did you do? Run home?”

  He looks up at me and, in that moment, I feel myself falling. I’m not sure if I’m going to faint or combust. The fire in my feet rises, threatening to engulf me whole.

  “She’s really sick,” I say. “She needs surgery next week. Stage three. Four rounds of chemo.”

  David hugs me. I want to feel the comfort of his arms. I want to fold into him. But I can’t. It’s too big. Nothing will help, nothing will obscure it.

  “Did they give you some data?” David asks, grasping. “The new doctor? What did he say?” He releases me and puts a hand gently on my knee.

  I shake my head. “She’ll never be able to have kids. They’re taking out her entire uterus, both ovaries…”

  David winces. “Damn,” he says. “Damn, Dannie, I’m so sorry.”

  I close my eyes against the rising tide of pain from my feet, the knives that are now burying themselves into my heels.

  “Take them off,” I tell him. I’m practically panting.

  “Okay,” he says. “Hang on.”

  He goes to the bathroom and comes back with baby powder. He shakes the bottle and a cloud of white dust descends on my foot. He wiggles the heel of my shoe. I feel nauseous with pain.

  Then it’s off. I look down at my foot—it’s raw and bleeding but looks better than I thought it would. He dumps some more powder on it.

  “Let me see the other one,” he says.

  I give him my other foot. He shakes the bottle, wiggles the heel, performs the same ritual.

  “You need to soak them,” David says. “Come on.”

  He puts an arm around me and leads me, wincing and groaning, into the bathroom. We have a tub, although it’s not a claw-foot. It’s always been a dream of mine to have one, but our bathroom was already built. It’s so stupid, impossible even, that my brain still relays this information to me now, still notes it—the missing feet of a porcelain tub. As if it matters.

  David begins to run the water for me. “I’m going to put some Epsom salt in it,” he says. “You’ll feel better.”

  I grab his arm as he turns to go. I cling to it—hold it against my chest like a child with their stuffed animal.

  “It’s going to be okay,” he tells me. But, of course, the words mean nothing. No one knows that. Not him. Not Dr. Shaw. Not even me.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Bella will not return my calls or texts, so finally, on Saturday night, I dial Aaron.

  He picks up on the second ring. “Dannie,” he says. He’s whispering. “Hey.”

  “Yeah. Hi.”

  I’m in the bedroom of our apartment, my bandaged feet kneading the soft carpet. “Is Bella there?”

  There’s a pause on the other end of the line.

  “Come on, Aaron. She won’t return my phone calls.”

  “She’s actually sleeping,” he says.

  “Oh.” It’s barely 8 p.m.

  “What are you doing?”

  I look down at my sweatpants. “Nothing,” I say. “I should probably get back to work. Will you tell her I called?”

  “Yeah, of course,” he says.

  All at once I feel irrationally angry. Aaron, this stranger. This man, who she has known for less than four months, is the one in her apartment. He’s the one she’s turning to. He doesn’t even know her. And me, her best friend, her family—

  “She needs to call me,” I say. My tone has changed. It bears the fire of my thumping thoughts.

  “I know,” Aaron says. His voice is low. “It’s just been—”

  “I don’t care what it has been. With all due respect, I don
’t know you. My best friend needs surgery on Tuesday. She needs to call me.”

  Aaron clears his throat. “Do you want to take a walk?” he asks me.

  “What?”

  “A walk,” he says. “I could use some air. It kind of sounds like you could, too.”

  I’m not sure what to say. I want to tell him I have too much work, and it’s true—I’ve been distracted all week trying to prepare the documents we need for signature. We still don’t have everything from CIT, and Epson is getting anxious; they want to announce next week. But I don’t say no. I need to talk to Aaron. To explain to him that I have this, that he can go back to whatever life he was living last spring.

  “Fine,” I say. “The corner of Perry and Washington. Twenty minutes.”

  * * *

  He’s waiting on the curb when my taxi pulls up. It’s still light out, although it will fade soon. October hangs a whisper away—the promise of only more darkness. Aaron is wearing jeans and a green sweater, and so am I, and for a minute, the visual as I pay the driver and get out of the cab—two matching people meeting each other—almost makes me laugh.

  “And to think I almost brought my orange bag,” he says. He gestures to the leather Tod’s crossbody Bella gave me for my twenty-fifth birthday.

  We start to walk. Slowly. My feet are still sore and raw. Down Perry toward the West Side Highway. “I used to live down here,” he says, filling the silence. “Before I moved to Midtown. Just for six months; it was my first apartment. My building was a block over, on Hudson. I liked the West Village, but it was kind of impossible to get anywhere on public transport.”

  “There’s West Fourth,” I say.

  He moves his face in a sign of recognition. “We were above this pizza place that closed,” he says. “I remember everything I owned smelled like Italian food. My clothes, sheets, everything.”

  I surprise myself by laughing. “When I first moved to the city, I lived in Hell’s Kitchen. My entire apartment smelled like curry. I can’t even look at the stuff now.”

  “Oh, see,” he says, “I just always crave pizza.”

  “How long have you been an architect?” I ask him.

  “Since the beginning,” he says. “I think I was born one. I went to school for it. For a little while I thought maybe I’d be an engineer, but I wasn’t smart enough.”

  “I doubt that.”

  “You shouldn’t. It’s the truth.”

  We walk in silence for a moment.

  “Did you ever think about being a litigator?” he asks me, so suddenly I’m caught off guard.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I mean, I know you practice deal law. I’m wondering if you ever thought about being one of those lawyers who goes to court. I bet you’d crush at it.” He gives me a one-eyed smile. “You seem like you’d be good at winning an argument.”

  “No,” I say. “Litigating isn’t for me.”

  “How come?”

  I sidestep around a puddle of liquid on the sidewalk. In New York you never know what is water and what is urine.

  “Litigating is bending the law to your will, it’s deception, it’s all about perception. Can you convince a jury? Can you make people feel? In deal making, nothing is above the law. The written words are what matters. Everything is there in black and white.”

  “Fascinating,” he says.

  “I think so.”

  Aaron lifts his hands from his sides and rubs them together. “So listen,” he says. “How are you?”

  The question makes me stop walking.

  So does he.

  I turn slightly inward, and he mirrors me. “Not good,” I say, honestly.

  “Yeah,” he says. “I figured. I can’t imagine how hard this must be for you.”

  I look at him. His eyes meet mine.

  “She’s—” I start, but I can’t finish it. The wind picks up, dancing the leaves and trash into a veritable ballet. I start to cry.

  “It’s okay,” he says. He makes a move forward, but I take one back and we stand on the street like that, not quite meeting, until the river quiets.

  “It’s not,” I say.

  “Yeah,” he says. “I know.”

  I swallow what remains of my tears. I look across at him. I feel anger hit my bloodstream like alcohol. “You don’t,” I say. “You have no idea.”

  “Dan—”

  “You don’t have to do this, you know. No one would blame you.”

  He peers at me. “What do you mean?” He seems to genuinely not understand.

  “I mean, this isn’t what you signed up for. You met a pretty girl, she was healthy, she’s not anymore.”

  “Dannie,” Aaron says, like he’s choosing his words very carefully. “It’s important that you know that I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Why?” I ask him.

  A jogger passes by and, sensing the tension of the moment, crosses the street. A car horn honks. A siren whirls somewhere down Hudson.

  “Because I love her,” he says.

  I ignore the confession. I’ve heard it before. “You don’t even know her.”

  I start walking again. A kid zooms past us with a basketball, his mother sprinting after him. The city. Full and buzzy and unaware that somewhere, fifteen blocks south, tiny cells are multiplying in a plot to destroy the whole world.

  “Dannie. Stop.”

  I don’t. And then I feel Aaron’s hand on my arm. He yanks and turns me around.

  “Ow!” I say. “What the hell.” I rub my upper arm. I am, all at once, overcome with the urge to slap him, to punch him in the eye and leave him, crumpled and bleeding, on the corner of Perry Street.

  “Sorry,” he says. His eyebrows are knit together. He has a dimple in the space above his nose. “But you need to listen to me. I love her. That’s the long and short of it. I don’t think I could live with myself if I bailed now, but that’s not even relevant because, like I said, I love her. This isn’t like anything I’ve ever had before. This is real. I’m here.”

  His chest rises and falls like it’s taking physical effort to be upright. That I understand.

  “It’s going to be more painful if you leave later,” I say. I feel my lip quiver again. I demand it to stop.

  Aaron reaches out to me. He takes both my elbows in his palms. His chest is so close I can smell him.

  “I promise,” he says.

  We must walk back. I must call a car. We must say goodnight. I must come home and tell David. I must, at some point, fall asleep. But later I don’t remember. All I remember is his promise. I take it. I hold it in my heart like proof.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  On Tuesday, October 4, I arrive at Mount Sinai on East One Hundred First Street an hour before the scheduled surgery. I still haven’t spoken to Bella, but I come to her pre-op room to find both her father and mother there. I don’t think they’ve been in the same room in over a decade.

  The room is loud, even boisterous. Jill, impeccably dressed in a Saint Laurent suit and with her hair blown out, chats with the nurses as if she’s preparing to host a luncheon, not for her daughter’s reproductive organs to be removed.

  Frederick chats with Dr. Shaw. They both stand at the foot of Bella’s bed, arms crossed, gesturing amicably.

  This isn’t happening.

  “Hi,” I say. I knock on the side door that is obviously already open.

  “Hey,” Bella says. “Look who made it.” She gestures to her father, who turns around and gives me a sideways wave.

  “I see that,” I say. I put my bag down on a chair and go to Bella’s bedside. “How are you?”

  “Fine,” she says, and I see it right there—the indignant stubbornness that has been avoiding me for the past week. Her hair is already in a cap, and she’s wearing a hospital gown. How long has she been here?

  “What did Dr. Shaw say?”

  Bella shrugs. “Ask him yourself.”

  I take a few steps down. “Dr. Shaw,” I say. “Dannie.”

 
; “Of course,” he says. “Notepad woman.”

  “Right. So how is everything looking?”

  Dr. Shaw gives me a small smile. “Okay,” he says. “I was just explaining to Bella and her folks here that surgery will take about five or six hours.”

  “I thought it was three,” I say. I’ve done extensive research. I’ve barely left Google. Filing statistics. Researching these procedures, recovery times, added benefits of taking out both ovaries instead of one.

  “It could be,” he says. “It depends on what we find when we get in there. A full hysterectomy is usually three, but because we’re also removing the fallopian tubes we may need more time.”

  “Are you performing an omentectomy today?” I ask.

  Dr. Shaw looks at me with a mixture of respect and surprise. “We’re going to do a biopsy of the omentum for staging. But we will not be removing it today.”

  “I read that a complete removal increases survival odds.”

  To his credit, Dr. Shaw does not look away. He does not clear his throat and look to Jill or Bella. Instead, he says, “It’s really a case by case.”

  My stomach turns. I look to Jill, who is up by Bella’s head, smoothing her cap-covered hair.

  A memory. Bella. Age eleven. Crawling up into my bed from the trundle because she’d had a nightmare. It was snowing and I couldn’t find you.

  “Where were you?”

  “Alaska, maybe.”

  “Why Alaska?”

  “I don’t know.”

  But I did. Her mother had been there for a month. Some kind of two-and-a-half-week cruise followed by a specialized spa.

  “Well, I’m right here,” I said. “You’ll always be able to find me, even in snow.”

  How dare Jill show up. How dare she claim ownership and offer comfort now. It’s too late. It has been too late for over twenty years. I know I’d hate Bella’s parents even more if they didn’t show today, but I still want them gone. They don’t get the place by her side, especially not now.