—
KEVIN ASKED ME to come over, to meet him at his apartment after he got home from work, which should have been my first clue that something was amiss. In spite of what New Yorky television shows have misled non–New Yorkers to believe, city dwellers, especially those who reside in different boroughs, never just say come over. In truth, we usually don’t meet face-to-face without scheduling a week ahead of time and confirming the day of. Our LA counterparts who come to visit and want to hang out may be frustrated by this, but they just have to learn to deal. We’re busy here. Also, when we do meet, it will probably be at a bar, coffee shop, or restaurant located halfway between our starting points, because unless you’re very rich or lucky enough to have a dead grandmother who left you her rent-controlled mansion, you live in a cramped one-bedroom.
Yet I refused to question Kevin’s ominous text requesting that I take the forty-five-minute subway ride from my apartment in Williamsburg to his on the Upper East Side. Nope, nothing weird about that at all.
Like attracts like, I told myself on the way there, which was obviously something I’d read in The Oprah Magazine. It was a New Agey way of saying: Think positive, dear one, because if you think bad thoughts, really fucking awful things will happen to you and it’ll be your own goddamn fault. But in spite of this positive self-talk, my heart began to race while I rode the train to Kevin’s apartment and then waited on his doorstep to be buzzed in. The blue-black night sky took on an eerie prescient glow, the way the light changes in a movie flashback, or when you’ve had too much Red Bull and vodka.
Kevin opened his apartment door and I went right for him, wrapping my arms around his torso, burying my face into his neck. “I missed you today,” I said.
He held himself rigid, then carefully detached me and took a step back. He was wearing a Hanes T-shirt and loose jeans. I wasn’t used to seeing him dressed so casually, and the first thought to run through my mind was, This is what he’d look like around the house all the time if we got married. Clearly I was not feeling like myself.
“Can we sit down for a minute?” Kevin said. “I want to talk to you.”
I followed him across his minuscule apartment, to the couch, with an impending doom coagulating in my gut.
“I had a meeting today,” he said. “With Glen Wiles.”
I stared down at the area rug, which was still vaguely discolored with chocolate and strawberry stains.
“Tina, can you look at me?”
I did, though it took effort, and I noticed then that Kevin’s wholesome eyes were tinged with red. His mop of dark hair looked Beethoven wild, as though he’d been tugging on it nervously.
“There were some very important people at this meeting, Tina. Lawyers, and they were talking about your website. Specifically, how it’s funded.”
It’s interesting, how long I’d dreaded exactly this, the hours of night sweats I’d devoted to foreseeing my reaction, the first-thing-in-the-morning anxiety attacks I’d offered up to foretelling my response—but now that it had actually happened, now that the words had been spoken, all I could do was not hear them. I wasn’t pretending. I literally did not hear the words because how could I, when I wasn’t even there in that room? When I wasn’t even present in mind or body within the suffocating confines of that coffin-size apartment?
“Why is the Titan legal department looking into the funding of your website?” Kevin asked.
I swallowed hard, willing myself to pass out or succumb to an attack of angina, anything that would keep me from having to give him an explanation. I returned my attention to the area rug, wishing to collapse onto its hand-tufted surface, to roll myself up into a New Zealand–wool burrito.
“Tina.”
The funny thing was, technically all of the official website’s funding was legitimate. But if they started digging, they would probably uncover how Emily and I got it started.
“What exactly were the lawyers saying?” I asked.
“So it’s true,” Kevin said.
“What is?”
“Tina, is there a part of this nonprofit thing that you’re not telling me? I’m giving you a chance here, to come clean. To trust me. With the truth.”
“The truth,” I said, “is . . . complicated.”
“I don’t believe this.” Kevin brought his fingers up to his temples. “Why did Robert really fire you, Tina?”
“I don’t know. I swear.”
He ran his hands through his maniac hair. “I hope you realize that I’m associated with you now.”
“You’re associated with me?”
“I’m just saying I’m part of this whole thing, so if there’s something illegal going on, I need to know about it.”
I had no idea what to tell him, or what to leave out. I felt like I needed a lawyer present, but he was the only lawyer I knew.
“Tina, do you understand I don’t want to be—”