Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
GRACE
When Grace left for the airport at dawn, she’d expected to have breakfast at her favorite airline’s loyalty lounge.
To spend two hours sitting directly in front of the departure board.
To have all the time in the world to pretend to read the New York Times bestseller she’d picked up.
She did not, however, prepare to spend six hours at MIA thanks to weather delays and canceled flights.
By the time Grace arrived at her gate, she was long past getting to Denver by lunch, and now she’d be lucky if she arrived before midnight.
Impatience was a massive, molten living thing pushing at the boundaries of her composure.
She was tired and drained and absolutely over it when her group was finally called to board.
Trying to ignore the loud breather with no sense of personal space trudging up the jetway behind her, Grace gripped the straps of the leather backpack with both hands. She remembered the mindfulness retreat the firm put on when they were pretending to give a shit about work-life balance.
Eyes focused on the suited man in front of her who had stopped walking thanks to some unseen obstruction closer to the plane door, Grace thought of snow. She imagined the adorable mountain-adjacent town Alix had described.
Grace’s desire to scream ebbed with every passing second. She thought of a real white Christmas. Alix said the chances of snow on the big day were fifty-fifty, but the forecast was promising.
She imagined Alix in a big fluffy hat and matching gloves while they walked the too-cute-to-be-real main street and popped into a little coffee shop.
She pictured sitting by the fire. It was easy to imagine being warm when her light cashmere sweater acted like a personal sauna while crammed in the small, un-air-conditioned jetway.
Her phone buzzed in the back pocket of her jeans. She reached for the welcome distraction.
Alix
Can it be true??? Is this flight tracker messing with my emotions, or are you actually getting on a plane right now?
The line into the plane moved and Grace chuckled to herself, irritation completely evaporated. Despite the mask making her face flush and hair that was no longer perfectly sleek, Grace took a selfie.
Alix’s chat bubbles appeared and reappeared. She hadn’t responded by the time Grace boarded. Delighted with her decision to book a first-class seat so she could plop down in a hurry, get her earbuds in, and relax, Grace slipped off her backpack.
She only had a few moments to revel in the fact that the lady in the window seat was quiet, until she produced a sandwich bag from her purse.
When she opened it, the nauseating aroma of hard-boiled eggs apparently coated in raw garlic slapped Grace in the face.
She was considering asking the lady if she’d ever shared an enclosed space plagued with recycled air with other people before when her phone buzzed again. A new text.
Shifting her body toward the aisle and away from chemical warfare, Grace grabbed her phone.
She couldn’t wait to see Alix’s response.
Her pulse jumped at the prospect of getting a selfie in return.
Since Thanksgiving, she’d wanted so many more photos of Alix but hadn’t figured out how to ask for them without sounding like a creep.
The text was not from Alix. If it were from Alix, it wouldn’t have triggered the intense and unstoppable urge to puke. An urge that was made infinitely more intense by her neighbor’s dinner.
Julie
You’re not attending my Daubert hearing on Tuesday.
Bile burned the back of Grace’s throat. She stared at the text, wondering whether to respond.
Julie hadn’t posed a question. She could ignore it, couldn’t she?
Grace had already gotten a disapproving grumble from the managing partner when she told him she’d be away — but available — most of the week.
She didn’t answer to Julie. But the more she stared at the text, the more annoyed she got.
Grace
Everything you need is in your folder in the shared drive. Marked depos, cases on point, and a memo for the argument. It’s a slam dunk. Judge Willis already allowed this expert on the same issue last year. I included his order in that case.
Julie
I’ve been practicing law since you were in high school, Grace. My concern is not for me.
Grace rolled her eyes. Even though Julie wasn’t the worst about it, Grace was getting sick of partners pawning off their work as if it were a favor to her. She understood how things went, but she could stand a little less patronizing.
Julie
You were out last month as well.
Grace
For Thanksgiving, Julie. When I hadn’t taken a day off in nearly two years. Not one.
Julie
And now you will be gone nearly a week.
It took all of her self-control not to scream into her phone in all caps and ten exclamation marks. Instead, she replied with a dry, “For Christmas.”
Julie
And how many Christmases do you think I spent with my family before I made partner, Grace?
The rhetorical nature of the question was obvious. Grace didn’t respond before Julie texted again.
Julie
These things are noticed, Grace. When it’s time to discuss equity partners, they won’t remember all the years of effort and sacrifice you put into this.
They’ll only see where you’ve failed to demonstrate dedication and commitment.
Becoming a partner has been so important to you.
I hope this isn’t a misguided attempt for my attention, but if it is, you have it.
And I don’t want you to throw away what you’ve worked for.
Grace stared at her screen while too many emotions warred for control of her thumbs.
Rage that Julie was accusing her of harming her own career for her attention.
Attention? Frustration that she could never tell Julie exactly what she was thinking.
That she couldn’t ask why Julie cared more about Grace’s fucking job than she ever had about her heart.
But there was an odd feeling brewing in her gut.
Bubbling and churning and making her lip curl.
Not a feeling. A question. A doubt springing from the crack in her iron-clad drive.
Did she want this? Want a life where her work took up all the room, and all she had were frayed margins to share with friends and family and… love?
She couldn’t blame a new wave of nausea on her neighbor’s chemical bomb. For the first time in her life, those ratios seemed wrong. Living for work rather than working to live felt perverse somehow.
Foundation crumbling under her feet, she reached blindly for her purpose.
Professional success wasn’t just about her ego.
It wasn’t even about her. Achievement was how she showed her mother that working two jobs as a single mom to send Grace to a private school she could hardly afford had been worth it.
She owed it to the grandparents she never met.
The ones who’d taken a desperate risk and sent their eleven-year-old daughter alone to be raised by American nuns in Miami to give her a chance at a bountiful life.
Her grandfather had died while a political prisoner, and her grandmother had suffered a fatal heart attack before Grace learned to walk.
Was she dishonoring all that sacrifice by jeopardizing her hard-won place at the firm?
The backs of her eyes burned, and she wished for a fast-forward button.
Some way to know whether she was making a huge mistake.
Whether it was selfish to chase someone who felt so good.
Whether letting generational hopes slip off her unworthy shoulders.
They were at cruising altitude, even if the constant turbulence meant no one was coming by with a little bottle of vodka to help Grace drown her anxiety, when her phone buzzed in her lap.
She was almost too tired to check it. She didn’t want to see Julie’s name.
Didn’t want to fear having thrown away years of work. But her hand moved reflexively.
Alix’s face popped up on her screen. A photo of her standing in a packed airplane aisle.
Freshly cut, wavy hair messy in that sexy, intentional way only Alix could manage.
It was so obvious she was smiling, even with half her face covered by a mask.
The unseen dimples burned into Grace’s chest and paused her existential crisis.
Alix
That message took so long to go through!
My Holiday Flight Bingo Card had: crying baby, woman doing lunges in the aisle mid-flight (bonus points because she also took her shoes off), drink cart slammed into my knee, and a man screaming over FaceTime the entire time we were boarding (he briefly mentioned a bone spur he’s having removed, which also feels like double points).
I know it’s early to declare victory, but I’m pretty sure I’ve got this in the bag.
She couldn’t stop herself from responding, just like she couldn’t wrestle her smile into submission. She glanced to her right before responding.
Grace
I might take the whole board with this one: Heavily seasoned hard-boiled eggs directly next to me. HEAVILY SEASONED.
Alix
Noooooo
Grace
Oh, yeah.
Alix
What the hell is wrong with people?
Alix
T-minus three hours, fourteen minutes, and six seconds until you land. I hope your sinuses aren’t blown out.
Grace
I’m not sure if I’ve gone nose-blind, or if the smell has just chemically bonded to my skin.
Tired, Grace didn’t have the energy to filter the truth. It escaped her heart and stared back at her on the screen. She hit send too fast for doubt.
Grace
I can’t wait to see you.
The response came before Grace could worry about being too much.
Alix
Me too.
Grace smiled despite herself. Despite her sour mood and the unsettled feeling in her gut. There was no joke. No qualifier. Just a little unvarnished fact.
Alix
I’ll be waiting right by your gate.