Page 37 of No Kind of Hero
If Beth had been eighteen, she’d have huddled on her bed after an episode like that, weeping, writing in her journal, and playing angsty music. Now, her remedies were a little different. An hour after she’d left her parents’ house, she was mowing Dakota’s—well, her stepfather’s—somewhat weedy lawn, sweating in the late-afternoon sun and itching from the million tiny blades of cut grass sticking to her shorts and her legs. At this moment, she felt absolutely nothing like any possible fantasy of a serene, grounded woman in touch with nature. But she also didn’t feel eighteen.
When the buzz started in her pocket, it took her a minute. The mower’s electric motor wasnoisy,and there was a whole lot of vibration there, too. She finally recognized the buzz for what it was, pulled her phone out of her pocket as she was making a turn at the sidewalk, and just about cut the orange extension cord. She swore and jerked the mower before the realization clicked in.
Oh. Right. Stop pushing down the handle, and it stops.Electric mowers were supposed to be idiot-proof. She’d researched how to use this thing online—she’d never actually mowed a lawn before—and they’d said so.Make sure to hold the cord in one hand, out of the way of the blades, when making turns,the site had said. Her month away wouldn’t be much of a—whatever this was now. Recharging period? Reboot?—if she electrocuted herself.
The vibration and noise ended, but she still heard the echoes of them in her buzzing head. And of course, by the time she looked at the screen, the phone had gone to voicemail.
Evan,she thought with a leap of her heart that was also not serene at all. But it wasn’t Evan, and, no, shewasn’tdisappointed, because he was working late. He’d said so. Working late so he could take her out tomorrow.
Felicia Diaz,her phone said. She didn’t listen to the voicemail, just called back.
Somebody who was really focusing one hundred percent on that reboot might have ignored the call, but Felicia was a friend, or at least as much of a friend as a woman working eighty hours a week could afford. Felicia had started at the firm a couple years before Beth, had made partner the previous year, and had a way of discreetly rolling her eyes during meetings with the more self-important partners that had reduced Beth to hastily stifled giggles more than once.
“Hey,” she said when Felicia answered.
“Hey yourself,” Felicia said. “Whatcha doing right now? I hear rumors. Tell me they’re true. Make my day.”
“Mm,” Beth said, smiling already. “Some of them might be true.”
“Tell me it’s more chocolate cake and hot scuba instructor and less Zen retreat, because I know which one of those you need and which one you probably did. So come on. Right now.”
“Mowing a lawn. And it’s hot. Next I’m weed-whacking.”
Felicia sighed. “I knew it was too good to be true. But listen. Are you quitting?”
“What?” All Beth’s Nature Girl relaxation vanished. “No. I’m on vacation.”
“Because there’s a rumor that you’re turning down clients, and that’s not like you. You know what this takes. One more year and you’ve got it. I’ve seen the list, and your name’s at the top. And you didn’t hear that from me. You’rethisclose, girl. Don’t throw it away now. Or at least, if you do, make sure that’s what you want. I can’t believe it is.”
The partners voted on who made it and who didn’t. That was no secret. “The list is . . . already out there?” Beth asked, her voice faltering.
Felicia snorted. “You know this place. Document, document, document. While everything important, of course, happens down below where the sharks feed. Which is what’s going on. Carol-Anne, I’ll bet, spreading the word that you’re off having a nervous breakdown. Possibly institutionalized. Excuse me, ‘admitted to a treatment center.’ Ain’t nobody needs to havethatfloating around.”
“Uh . . . she is?”
“What, you’re surprised? You shouldn’t be. She’s never going to stop trying to knock you out of your spot, and you can’t afford to give her the ammunition. She’ll never be as good as you, but there’s no reason you can’t both make it. Unless she stops sucking up to the senior partners, andthat’snever going to happen. But try telling her it isn’t a zero-sum game. It’s the only way she knows how to play. So listen. Simon handed me a file today. Marjorie Sinclair. Ring a bell? He said I could ‘pull you in’ on it when you got back, and maybe you’d be back sooner than you’d said. I got the feeling he wanted to give it to you. Which means your vacation, or whatever it is, is good for me and bad for you. Even though I hate little dogs. Yappy, nasty ankle-biters. Why couldn’t she love cats? Or monkeys? Or better yet—gorillas, far away in the Congo. I could put my heart into gorilla welfare.”
“Wait.” Beth had long since stopped noticing the heat and the itchiness and the half-mowed lawn. “What’s Carol-Anne doing? Exactly?”
“What does she ever do? Taking that little bit of truth, whatever it is, and twisting it into a noose. Poisonous bitch. I hope she chokes on it.”
“Well, I’m coming back in less than two weeks, so Carol-Anne can go . . .”
“Fuck herself?” Felicia asked cheerfully.
Beth was the one snorting now. “Well, yes.”
“All right,” Felicia said. “But she’s not the only one who can play the rumor game, and I need the practice anyway. I’m going to ask her if she’s heard that you’re cuddled up with one of the guys from Accent Technology. Possibly on his boat, or maybe just in the love nest.”
“What?”
“The guys the firm just did the IPO for. Keep up. The beardie one. He was hot. Jason something.”
“He had a man bun.”
A heavy sigh. “He’s worth over a hundred million dollars.”
“I don’t care. Ick.”
