Chapter Sixteen and a Half - Nora
She didn't make it to Elias first. Dana got there ahead of both of them, catching her by the kitchenette with a cup of coffee she clearly hadn't come for.
"Congratulations in advance," Dana said. No real warmth in it. "Word is you're getting associate creative director."
Nora set her mug down carefully. Some old instinct told her to keep her hands steady before she knew what she was steadying them for.
"I haven't heard anything official."
"You will. Priya's sorting the details." Dana's eyes did a slow sweep. Not unkind exactly. Not friendly either. The look of someone deciding how much to say and settling on all of it. "I asked Elias directly if you two were involved. He told me straight out."
The kitchenette got very small and very bright.
"That's not really—"
"I'm not trying to blindside you. I think you deserve to know what's being said about you before it gets said behind your back instead of to your face."
Dana leaned against the counter, arms crossed. For the first time since Nora had known her she didn't look like competition. She looked like a colleague trying, clumsily, to do right by her.
"People are going to say you got the title because you're sleeping with the guy who was up for it too."
Nora opened her mouth.
"I know. I know it's not — I'm not saying it's true.
" Dana was looking at the counter instead of at her.
"It follows you either way. That's the part I came over here about.
Whether he stepped back for good reasons or bad ones, it still follows you.
" She turned the coffee cup around once.
"I'd rather you heard it standing here than picked it up off somebody in three weeks. "
The old tightening came up under Nora's sternum. The one that had lived there since her first week at this job. Since every meeting where she'd had to work twice as hard to be taken half as seriously.
Three years building a reputation that couldn't be waved away by a number on an HR form. And now it could be waved away by a rumor about who she went home with.
"I earned this." Quiet. Steady. More to herself than to Dana. "Every deck. Every late night. Every line in that pitch that actually worked. That was me. Not him stepping back. Me."
"I believe you." Dana said it flat. "I told Priya the same thing. You did the work. I just don't think the work is going to be the whole story people tell about it, and I think you should be ready for that before it happens instead of after."
Nora didn't have a comeback. There wasn't one. Dana wasn't wrong, and being right about something ugly didn't make her the villain of it.
"Why are you telling me this."
"Because I spent five years here watching men get given things and women get accused of trading for them, and I'm tired of it happening to people I respect.
" Dana pushed off the counter, already halfway back to her usual professional remove.
"You're good at your job. I've thought so since your first pitch here.
I just don't want you walking into a room unprepared for what people are going to whisper about why you're in it. "
She left before Nora could work out what to say back.
Nora stood there a long moment with the coffee going cold, sorting it. Which parts were fair. Which weren't.
Most of it was fair. None of it changed anything.