by Adam Mitzner
The dessert was all store-bought. The chocolate cake was from my favorite bakery and particularly decadent—and vegan to boot. I also put out vanilla Häagen-Dazs and Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey vegan ice cream. To my surprise, Stuart broke out the one bottle of cognac we owned. Richard was more than happy to accept his offer of an after-dinner drink. Ed gave in to the peer pressure and joined them.
“Ladies?” my husband asked, waving the bottle.
“No thank you,” Kate said. “I’ve had enough.”
“I’m game if you are,” Lauren said to me.
“Sure, why not?” I said, even though I was already tipsy.
I couldn’t remember the last time I had cognac, except to recall that on that prior occasion, I didn’t like it. It tasted too strong, too alcoholic. It was likely because of my inebriation, but this time I found it to be utterly delicious. Like a warm bath completely enveloping my body. Although I knew I should resist the feeling of being swept away, I couldn’t help but welcome the relief my buzz was delivering.
From the looks on the faces of my guests, it was clear that I was not the only one feeling no pain. Lauren’s cheeks were flushed, and there was a calmness in her eyes that I’m not sure I’d ever seen before. She was no longer looking over at her husband every thirty seconds, as she had been earlier in the evening.
She and I had fallen into a discussion about work, excluding the rest of the table as they talked about a recent national political scandal. The others were loud, but Lauren and I spoke in a stage whisper, as if we were involved in a secret conspiracy.
Without any segue, Lauren broke from talking about the Humphries case, a particularly disturbing child-abuse situation in which the mother had been burning her daughter’s backside, and said, “This was wonderful. I’m so glad that you thought to invite us.”
I leaned in closer to her; I could feel the warmth radiating off her skin. “I was nervous about it. You know . . . worlds colliding and all.”
“Don’t be silly,” Lauren said. “Tonight only proved to me what I’ve suspected since we first met.”
“Oh, and what’s that?”
“That you’re a woman not only of extraordinary ability, but also of secret talents.”
30.
For some reason, the DA’s office does performance reviews in the middle of the calendar year. Lauren referred to the exercise as “the black hole of being a supervisor.”
“If I had my way, we would never do written reviews,” Lauren said. “The good ADAs know they’re good, and the bad ones are even more self-aware of their shortcomings. All reviews do is upset the good ones because they obsess about the one area of constructive criticism you provide and disregard all the positive things that are said. The bad ones inevitably respond by giving up altogether. I have never, and I mean never, seen anyone turn around a bad review.”
We had twenty-seven to do.
I suggested that the process would be aided by some alcohol. Lauren agreed quickly, and fifteen minutes later we were off campus at some hole-in-the-wall Mexican place around the corner from our office with a pitcher of margaritas in front of us and a stack of performance reviews in a Redweld folder.
“Is this what you dreamed it would be like when you decided to be a lawyer?” I said in jest after we’d gotten through the first five.
“I actually wanted to be a nun,” Lauren said in a much more serious tone. “Really. And not just when I was eight. I thought about it in college, even. Do you know what Richard says about it?”
“No, what?”
“He says it’s because I was searching for the perfect man even then, and nothing less than God would do for me.” She smiled, but not without effort. “Did I ever fall short of that,” she added with a chuckle. Then she downed the rest of her margarita—her second.
I followed suit, throwing back my own drink. Then I reached for the pitcher and refilled both of our glasses.
“I sometimes wonder what the world would be like if marriages weren’t forever,” I said. “If your marriage license was kind of like a driver’s license. You have to renew it every few years. If you don’t, no big deal. You take the bus for a while.”
“That’s brilliant,” she said. She raised her glass in a toast. “To taking the bus for a while.”
We clicked together our margaritas and then both took healthy slugs. This time she refilled the glasses, even though they were only half-empty.
“I think we’d better do some more work while we’re both still semisober,” she said.
We plowed through the rest of the reviews, checking boxes, making jokes, and drinking our margaritas. Ninety minutes later, we were left with an empty pitcher and one sheet of paper still to complete.
“This one is yours,” Lauren said. “I suppose I should fill it out in private—and when I’m not drunk.”
“What fun would that be?” I replied. “I’m a big girl, I can take it. How am I doing?”
If I’d been any less inebriated, I wouldn’t have said that. Not only because I was putting her on the spot, but because I wasn’t sure I could take it.
Lauren’s drunken smile quickly vanished. It was as if she could will the alcohol out of her system and seamlessly reenter boss mode.
“You know, Dana, I never thought I would have another deputy after Ella. I figured that she’d stay with me until I passed the mantle of leadership to her. And I liked the idea, to tell you the truth. But the dynamic between us was a mother-daughter-type thing. I brought her in when she was very junior, and there was so much she had to learn. Not just about the Bureau either, but about navigating her way around . . . life, really. I talked to her about her boyfriends, her relationship with her father, and how she felt about losing her mother so young, which gave her responsibility for her younger sister. And . . . well, you know how that story ended, with the tragedy concerning her sister’s murder. Don’t get me wrong, I liked being a role model for her. I see now that, with you, exactly what you told me you wanted when you interviewed is what I’ve been missing too—being part of a true team. Not a chief and deputy, but equals running this group. And I swear to you, Dana, the bad guys better watch out, because we’re going to be unstoppable.”
She made quick eye contact with me, but when I smiled back at her, she turned away, clicking her pen and looking down at the paper in front of her. “But now we have to put it down on paper.”
She began to read from the form. “Rate subject one to ten on the following . . . first . . . intelligence.” She looked up at me. “That’s a ten.”
“You’re not really going to do this in front of me, are you?”
Lauren smiled and then looked back down at the evaluation form. “Number two . . . dedication to her job. Gotta go again with . . . ten.”
“Are you sure you want to do this?” I said although I knew I wasn’t going to stop her.
“Number three. Relationships with coworkers.”
Lauren looked at me as if she wanted me to grade myself.
“Well, considering I’m drunk with my boss filling out my evaluation . . .”
“Right . . . maybe I need to give you an eight there.”
“Hey!” I shouted.
“Just kidding. I already put down ten. Okay, last one. Overall, how do you rate this person?”
I waited, feeling my heart race even though I wasn’t the least bit nervous about her evaluation. She teased me by withholding her rating for a minute. Then, when her mock deliberations had gone on so long that I was about to beg her to tell me, she said, “I’m going to keep that to myself for a little while longer, I think. Can’t give everything away on the first date, right?”
She paid the check by snapping down her American Express card and dismissed my offer to pay my half with “Don’t be silly.” Then she ordered an Uber, telling me that she didn’t want me on the subway drunk.
“I’ll be fine,” I protested.
“Nope. The car will drop me off and then take you home. And, before you
say another word, all that stuff I said about our being partners and equals, that was the tequila talking. I’m still your boss, and this is an order.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said.
The Uber pulled up less than a minute after we exited the restaurant. Once we were in the back seat, the driver turned around to us. “Good evening, ladies. First stop is Seventy-Fourth and Park, correct?”
“Yes,” Lauren said. “Then you’re going to take this lovely woman to Queens.”
The driver smiled, which I took to mean that he could see that we were both drunk. He turned around, and we began making our way through Lower Manhattan.
“Shall I take the FDR?” he asked, now looking straight ahead. “It’s probably fastest.”
“No,” Lauren said. “I like watching the city go by at night.”
For the rest of the ride, Lauren looked out the window. I sat quietly, alternating my gaze between my view of the cityscape passing before me and my boss, captivated by the same view. The neighborhoods changed every ten blocks or so—the Lower East Side to the East Village to Gramercy Park to Murray Hill to Beekman Place.
The traffic on Third Avenue approaching the Fifty-Ninth Street Bridge was heavy, so the driver crossed over to Madison. A few minutes later, the car came to a stop at the near corner of Park and Seventh-Fourth Street, a good twenty feet from the building’s entrance.
“This is me,” Lauren announced.
“Come out my side so you don’t get killed,” I said.
I opened my door and stepped out. It had begun to rain, a light mist.
We would joke about it after, each of us taking credit. But I know the truth. It wasn’t her. It could have never been Lauren. This was all me.
I kissed her. On the lips. When she didn’t break the seal immediately, I parted my lips slightly and allowed my tongue to make contact with hers.
It was an out-of-body experience, with conflicting sensations—the cold rain juxtaposed with the warmth of her mouth, the softness of her hair against my cheek. It made my entire being tingle.
I broke the embrace. When I did, I knew Lauren wanted more.
The next morning, Lauren appeared at the threshold to my office. She looked perfectly put together, as if last night’s alcohol had had no effect on her. Her cheeks had a rosy glow and her eyes glistened. She was even having a good hair day. I, on the other hand, felt like I’d been hit by a truck.
I knew that there were really only three ways she could play this: pretend the kiss never happened, claim it was a big mistake, or set up a situation for us to finish what we’d begun.
“I . . . I can’t remember the last time I drank like that,” she said.
“I couldn’t tell by looking at you. I’m feeling it today, though.”
“I feel . . . great, if you want to know the truth,” she said with a broad smile. “Was your husband upset?”
I wondered if Lauren had intended for her simple query to have so many meanings. Was Stuart upset I came home late? Drunk? With my boss’s lipstick on my mouth?
“He was fast asleep. It’s not uncommon that I come home really late from work. My boss is a real hard-ass—he knows that.”
“Yesterday we were ‘partners,’ and now I’m back to being your boss, huh?”
Even though Lauren said it with a laugh, I knew that I’d upset her. That hadn’t been my intent, at least not consciously. But once my words were out there, I couldn’t deny that I might have intended them as a warning for both of us to consider the price we’d have to pay to go down this path.
We agreed to meet after work—to “talk.” She selected a poorly lit bar around the corner from the office. We sat at a table at the back, and I ordered a Heineken because you have to order something, even though the last thing I had on my mind was consuming more alcohol. Lauren seemingly needed the liquid courage, however. She asked for a vodka cranberry right off the bat.
As soon as the waitress brought us our drinks, Lauren said in a low voice, “To . . . one of the great kisses of my life.”
I could feel my eyes moisten in response to her compliment. I clinked my beer bottle to her vodka cranberry, and then we both drank.
“It was a first for me,” Lauren said as if she were in a confessional. “I mean, not even in college.”
“It’s been a while for me,” I said, and left it at that.
She scanned the room. Apparently it was empty enough for her liking, because she put her hand on top of mine.
“Tell me about it,” she whispered.
“It’s not important, Lauren. Past is past. What matters is what you want to do now.”
She lifted her hand but didn’t break eye contact. “It’s my choice?”
“Only because I’ve already chosen. This is the kind of thing that needs to be unanimous.”
This time she didn’t even look around the pub. She immediately leaned across the table and placed her lips on mine. It was that kiss, not the drunken one from the previous night, that ranks at the very top of my list.
Lauren wasted no time in calling for the check, then paid it in cash. She led me by the hand out of the bar and across the street to a Best Western hotel. She’d obviously planned ahead, because the room was already booked.
The room was no-frills, but more than adequate for our intended purpose. Clean, with a king bed and a flat-screen TV.
As soon as the door closed, I took matters into my own hands. Literally. Before she could say anything, my lips were on hers, my tongue in her mouth, my hand on her breast.
When we were finally satiated, neither of us said anything. The first quiet of the last hour fell in the room. All I could hear was Lauren’s breathing and my own beating heart, as if they were engaging in a two-part harmony.
Stuart liked to talk after sex. To recap what went on. I always hated when he did. I was there. I knew what happened. I much preferred to be alone with my thoughts. Lauren appeared to be like me in this regard. She wordlessly curled up beside me and placed her head on my shoulder. I lost myself in her sweet scent. Mixed with the rawness of the sex we’d just enjoyed, it was nothing short of heavenly.
31.
Every Tuesday that summer, Lauren and I met at the same Best Western. It became the center of not just my week, but my life. A few hours when I no longer existed as the woman I’d come to despise. I recognized, of course, the circularity of my reasoning. I hated myself precisely for what I was doing with Lauren—for the betrayal of Stuart, and Jacob too. And yet I couldn’t pull myself away. It was as if the only antidote to that feeling was more time with Lauren. I suspect that anyone with an addiction knows the cycle all too well: self-loathing, the desperate need for relief that brings on even greater self-loathing, inextricably leading yourself back to that relief.
In August, Lauren invited Stuart, Jacob, and me to visit Richard and her at their East Hampton home for Labor Day weekend. Summer homes in the Hamptons were virtually unknown to ADAs, save for those, like Lauren, who had spouses with seven-figure incomes.
“Are you kidding?” I replied.
“No. I find the weekends intolerable.”
I understood the sentiment all too well. It was as if time stood still on Saturday and Sunday. Before Lauren, like most people, my working life had been dedicated to a countdown to Friday afternoon. Now, however, I couldn’t wait until Monday mornings, when I could see her again.
“This seems like a colossally bad idea.”
“No worse than any of our others recently,” she said.
And so, Stuart, Jacob, and I headed to East Hampton. Stuart was excited about seeing how the one-percenters lived, and Jacob couldn’t stop talking about the fact that our hosts actually had their own swimming pool.
Throughout the drive east, I considered feigning some type of illness as justification to ask Stuart to turn around. But I didn’t say a word.
After more than three hours on the road—the last hour in bumper-to-bumper traffic along a single-lane highway—our beat-up, ten-year-ol
d Hyundai rolled onto Lauren and Richard’s circular white-pebble driveway. Their perfect house, complete with large picture windows, a long sloping roof, and a wraparound porch, stood before us.
“They live here all alone?” Jacob asked as we got out of the car.
“It’s different outside the city,” I said.
“It’s different, all right,” Stuart said.
Lauren greeted us at the door. She was wearing flowing white linen from head to toe and looked positively angelic. I was in jeans, as was Stuart, and Jacob was wearing his Aquaman T-shirt and shorts.
We embraced. She kissed me on the cheek, holding me tighter than an introductory hello of a coworker warranted. When the hug ended, I nervously looked at Stuart, but he was oblivious, staring up at the double-height ceiling and the enormous crystal chandelier that hung from it.
“Quite a place,” he said in a way that sounded more envious than complimentary.
“We like it here. An oasis from the city,” Lauren replied. “Come in. Let me get you situated in your rooms, and then you can change into swimsuits. We can all sit out back. Richard went to the market for provisions for tonight. We thought we’d grill, if that’s okay with you both. And you too, of course, Jacob. Do you like burgers?”
“Mmm hmm,” my son said.
“Excellent,” Lauren said. “Come, follow me. I’ll show you to your rooms.”
She led us straight to the sweeping staircase that dominated the entry. When we began up the stairs, I caught a glimpse of the living room, which looked like it was right out of Architectural Digest—virtually the entire space was white, right down to the rug. I shuddered thinking about Jacob even passing through it.
