Chapter 21 The Gritty Sandwiches of New York City
MY FIRST WEEK AT EFG is both easier and more difficult than I expect.
It’s easy because Jane and I share matching, rigid schedules. She likes working in a twenty-minute yoga routine before her morning coffee. Because what Jane does, I must do also, I join her every morning at five thirty, to the protest of my recalcitrant spine.
Generally speaking, the true difficulties of my days kick in when Jane and I part ways at the elevator lobby.
She heads for the fifth floor, and I go to the sixth, where I meet up with the tech auditing group.
For accountants, being able to work with companies like Oracle and MicroOrange in the AI space is the pinnacle of slick and sexy.
In that sense, being reassigned has no downsides. None.
Any discomfort I’m having can be attributed to how bad I am at brewing caffeinated drinks, even compared to Hanry, whose company I can’t help missing.
Working quietly beside me, he was always ready to meet my eyes with a smile, with confidence in my abilities.
Whereas, as a new staff hire—the newest one on the floor—I can’t yet be trusted with reconciling accounts or working directly with clients.
I get kicked out of a ten o’clock meeting by a senior accountant who clearly hasn’t kept up with the Slack channel and is convinced I’m some random street urchin who stole a pass card.
He doesn’t say that, but I can tell. I’ve thrown that look at numerous nameless members of the Community.
It’s… unpleasant being on the other side of it.
Jane says this is normal. That all new hires have to surmount such indignities before they can jump rank and confront new indignities, like listening to the client explain how AI is going to render bookkeepers irrelevant.
Although we’ve yet to see an AI understand it isn’t fraud if MicroOrange increases the price of its subscriptions.
As the days pass, I find myself sleeping poorly.
Part of this is because I’m working late, and on Saturdays.
Most of my insomnia I attribute to the apartment’s hyperactive radiator.
I struggle to keep my eyes open at my desk.
Occasionally, when I stop typing and let my hands rest too long on my keyboard, Bulan will bang into my leg from inside the duffel bag.
“I’m waiting for you to get bored and leave,” I tell him one day at lunch hour.
“I’m waiting for you to get bored and leave,” he says.
“Stop imitating me.”
“Stop imitating—oof!” We’re in my new hire class’s favored deli on Park Avenue. It’s highly visible, and crowded, meaning I can’t have extended conversations with my duffel bag and escape with my reputation intact. Especially not when Jane approaches, a workmate in tow.
Jane’s friend is the pinnacle of color matching.
She wears a blazer and flared pants in exactly the same ash brown shade as her eyes and hair.
Her manicured nails and her milky coffee appear to be in sync.
Altogether, she seems like great friendship material.
She could be a true source of solidarity. Like hardwood flooring.
“Hi,” I say, tossing my bag on the floor, making space at Bulan’s expense.
“Are you Sammy?” Jane’s friend sits. “I heard that you snore.”
Damn it, Bulan.
“I’ve ordered special nasal strips, but the shipping company lost them,” I lie. “Last I heard, they were in Toronto.”
“Oh.” The girl unwraps her sandwich. Turkey. Cheese. Multigrain bread. A banana, because she’s trying to be healthy, but not trying too hard. This is what I’ll order tomorrow. “That’s far.”
“It is,” I say.
“I think Kansas City is farther,” says Jane. That’s where her family lives, and I can see her doing the mental math. “By a thousand miles?”
“I can google it,” says Jane’s friend. She doesn’t go for her phone, though. I guess none of us care enough to. “Didn’t Desmond say we have an account in KC?”
“Huh, maybe,” says Jane.
Hoping to smooth over the ensuing awkward silence, I say, “I’ve always wanted to visit the Plains. They sound nice. Or at least, nice enough.”
“They’re all right,” Jane agrees. “Really open. Wide and stuff.”
“The jet stream makes it perfect for tornadoes.” Jane’s friend shudders. “I hate that. It sounds so dangerous.”
“Yes!” I exclaim, finally finding my footing in this conversation. “Tornadoes are the worst of all natural disasters, right? They come out of absolutely nowhere and ruin everything!”
Jane laughs noncommittally.
“Most storm systems aren’t strong enough to yield tornadoes. The ones that do touch down are usually no more than F-1 or F-2. Plus, they hit in cornfields more than cities. And we have tornado shelters, so. It’s not a big deal.”
“Oh, I guess it isn’t bad, then,” says Jane’s nameless friend, who still hasn’t introduced herself, and probably at this point never will. She looks down at her phone and wipes her chin with a napkin.
“Did you see this meme? Oh my god,” she says.
I wait for her to flip her phone and show me what she’s watching, but she doesn’t.
Shifting on her seat, Jane silently joins in watching the screen.
At one point, she sends a vague frown at her dip-powdered nails.
Nothing’s wrong with them. They’re fine.
When I finish my own gritty sandwich, I pack up and return to my work desk. But instead of logging back in, I stare up at the ceiling, counting the cracks in it until Bulan rolls out of my bag and bites my ankle.
I let out a sharp yip, but no one on the sixth floor pays me any attention. Behold, the power of noise-canceling headphones.
“What are you doing?” Bulan asks.
“Thinking,” I whisper back.
“Well, that seems boring.”
“No more boring than our lunch conversation.”
“Yeah, what was that?” barks Bulan. “Didn’t you tell me it was fun to be a young twentysomething in New York?”
“Be quiet. And yes,” I hiss. I was promised, repeatedly, that EFG was fun by a half-dozen recruiters and coworkers during interview season.
They said work would be spectacular. That we’d have pizza parties in-office, complete with Kool-Aid, and make meaningful impacts for our clients.
But, like most of the other non-nepo-baby newly hired staff, I’ve only been trusted with reconciling A/R.
Though satisfying, it’s certainly not spectacular.
The better word I’d use for it is “repetitive.” And “lots.” Because it’s usually late when I finish work.
The best part of my day is coming home to Jane.
And it’s almost like… Jane isn’t enough.
She’s just… when we hang out, there are a lot of screens involved.
On the weekends, my study sessions for the CPA exam don’t fill as much time as I’m used to having filled. I wonder if I should get on a dating app to stop daydreaming about Hanry. To keep busy. To feel less itchy, less unsettled all the time.
During meetings, I keep catching myself sketching table settings without meaning to.
Sometimes I even imagine coworkers falling in love, and I wonder if I can guess what type of wedding they might have.
Bohemian? Beach? Bridgerton-inspired? No.
It’s always something traditional. I bet they’d search no farther for venues than directly across the street.
Not that I should judge: I’m struggling to daydream anything romantic for myself.
There aren’t cute boys to stare at here at work.
Sure, a few of them might be slender enough to compete with Jungkook, but I haven’t met any single men of the handsome, lumberjack-esque variety.
They all seem… crisp and square. They remind me of stale white bread.
Tasteless and forgettable. They barely hold substance in my mind.
Hanry and I only dated for a few weeks. I should be able to shake off the way I’m missing him, but I can’t do it. I can’t.
Why did he have to be part of Salem’s paranormal community?
If only he could’ve been a guy with regular ambitions who would’ve considered moving with me to New York.
I know it was just a handful of weeks, but…
maybe we could’ve compromised, with him keeping dogs instead of squirrels.
Would he have ever considered replacing his love of salsa dancing with an interest in Broadway shows?
I wonder what he’s doing right now. I imagine him curled up on the sofa, cozy under his wool blanket, a mug of once-hot cider tipped over on the floor. The top buttons of denim shirt undone, exposing his collarbone, a sliver of his chest…
It’s a nice image. It would be nicer if I could see it up close, if he were dozing here with me. If I were wrapped in his arms, sated and warm.
I wonder why he hasn’t texted me yet. Has he met someone else at his salsa class? I hope not. I want him to miss me. To be wistfully knitting his brows as he works on yet another wreath, eating cold pizza by himself.
And Mandy. Is all the wedding prep going okay? Is she struggling to do the work by herself in the shop? Does she ever feel like the space is cavernous without me and Bulan?
If it weren’t for Bulan and the endless client returns I’m stuck reviewing, I wonder if I’d be lonely too.
I don’t get the chance to wonder for long.
About two weeks after I’ve started at EFG, I wake up and find a very strangely worded note on an empty takeout bag near my bed:
MY nemezis has track t me
Im of f wi th the b I r dz
Hab f u n!
It can’t be from Jane. Her handwritten script is blocky, neat, and lacks Bulan’s undercurrent of hasty enthusiasm. Also, as far as I know, Jane doesn’t have birds in her friend group. Or a nemesis. Since when did Bulan? I think maybe he’s lying to soften the blow.
I stare out the window and the brick wall it faces, wistful. I hear no telltale crow squawks, just traffic and distant sirens. If I strain, I can hear the idea of pigeons.