In a New York Minute(13)

“Thanks, Luis,” she said. “I’ll have Tyler send it over by Friday.”

She tapped her earbud to end the call. “Opening this Seattle office is going to be a nightmare,” she said, and I nodded, already resigned to the stress of what expanding our company would mean. “We’re going to need these investors to come through stat if we want any chance of expanding.”

I gestured to a stack of photographs leaning against the wall behind her. “You already took those down?” Eleanor called herself an amateur photographer, but her work was stunning. The photos she took on her solo surfing excursion to Costa Rica a couple years ago had added a chill vibe to a space that could often get tense when deals were on the verge of being made—or broken.

“We move offices in, like, three months,” she said matter-of-factly. “Might as well get a jump start on the packing.”

In addition to trying to open an entirely new branch on the West Coast, Eleanor and I were shifting our whole New York City operation to a bigger, brighter space downtown, to accommodate our ever-expanding team. It was exciting and terrifying all at once, a bold declaration of the growth we were experiencing.

The thought of all the success we’d had the last few years made my stomach churn. It was one thing to be successful on my own, or just alongside Eleanor. But we now had an entire company to answer to, people with mortgages and families and car payments. I rarely doubted myself, but when I did, it was because I was worried about letting our team down.

“I have something for you,” she said, her eyes revealing nothing. She reached into her leather tote bag and pulled out a bent copy of the New York Post. She pressed at it with her hands, flattening it on her desk and flipping a few pages until she found what she was looking for. “Saved on the Subway!” She read the headline out loud. “Fashion disaster leads to romance with mystery man on the Q.”

She looked at me again, like she was seeing a wild animal in the flesh for the first time. “You weren’t going to mention you went all Hayes in Shining Armor on the train yesterday?”

I grabbed the paper out of her hand, reaching up to scratch the back of my neck.

“You really think that’s me? That could be anyone.” It was a terrible attempt at a cover-up.

“Don’t play dumb with me.” Eleanor leaned back in her chair with an exaggerated sigh, kicking her feet up onto her desk and crossing them. She slowly, purposely locked her fingers and cracked her knuckles. She knew I hated that sound. As her hands undulated back and forth, the sunshine pouring in from Fifty-Seventh Street connected with the massive diamond engagement ring on her finger, creating a spiral of light on her desk.

“What I think,” she said, enunciating her words as she bent her fingers, “is that you were headed downtown to the new space yesterday morning. But what I know is that while you generally present as a curmudgeon—”

“Come on,” I protested.

“You are at your core a nice person who wants to help when someone’s in trouble.”

“Well, thanks for the compliment,” I said sharply, crossing my arms.

“Honestly, I’m impressed.” She golf-clapped in my direction. “Your Boy Scout side rarely comes out in public.”

“Excuse you.” I rolled my shoulders, tried to relax. “Did I or did I not rescue a baby bird in college and let it live in my dorm room for two weeks?”

“You did.” She laughed. She’d witnessed it firsthand all those years ago. “See, I know the real you that not everyone gets to see,” she said with an affectionate smile, and it was true. I’d let Eleanor sleep on the couch in my dorm room for a week after her girlfriend dumped her and she was too depressed to sleep in her own room, and I drove her five hours up to Boston a few years ago, when her sister was hit by a car. And even though she and her fiancé, Henry, could easily afford a cat sitter, she still asked me to feed Luna when they were away, and I always said yes. She knew this side of me, the one that was often hidden behind the more obvious and shiny things that I presented to the world. It felt good, having a friend know me this well. Except right now.

“Also,” she said with a wicked grin, “Tyler said you came in yesterday morning with no jacket on.” Tyler was our assistant, fresh out of college and whip-smart. They’d mastered the job in one day, and knew every move made in this place. Of course they’d spotted me without my jacket and made a note of it on their mental checklist.

“Look, it wasn’t a big deal,” I conceded. “It was definitely not romantic.”

Eleanor’s brow tightened, and she squinted at me. “I didn’t ask you if it was romantic.”

I waved her off. “All that happened was a woman’s dress got stuck in the door and ripped straight down the back—can you believe that? So I let her have my coat to wear.” I crossed my arms defensively again. “I didn’t know it would make the New York Post.”

“So you’re okay with people knowing it’s you in this picture, then?” she asked.

“Yes, of course. It’s not a big deal, but for the love of god, please stop badgering me about it. I have work to do.”

“Okay, good, because New York News called to book you on their morning show, and I said yes.”

She said the words at twice her normal speed.