After she rejected his offer to cohabitate, rather than cooling things off, his demands for her time and desire to go public as a couple only became more urgent. No one needs to know that we got together before I left Sheila, he would say, I can just tell people I couldn’t get you out of my mind. If you think people would buy that, she’d reply, I’ve got a bridge to sell you. He was relentless. To provide them cover for getting reacquainted he went so far as to have the Historical Society, his pet charity, hire her to plan their annual gala honoring his generous support of their recent exhibit, “Free Markets and Freedom: Commerce in New York City.” Dick had made good use of the time, luring her to his office under the guise of gala planning. And while Olga resented this move, she was not so resentful as to turn away the business. Instead, she began to sleep with other people, in a passive attempt to assert her independence and a reminder to herself that Dick Eikenborn did not own her. She had only the faintest qualms about her behavior, feeling justified that she had never made a commitment to Dick, but uneasy about why, then, she didn’t just cut things off.
As she walked through the sleek lobby, past the security guard who waved her in, it occurred to her that this “thing” Dick had for her might be another of his juvenile euphemisms for sex. Dick had a millennial-like obsession with dirty texting. It was, after his oblivious sense of his own privilege, the thing she found the most annoying about him. There was seemingly no rhyme or reason to when he might send his missives, meaning Olga could be in the midst of a meeting, a wedding, or visiting her twelve-year-old niece, when suddenly a giant pic of Dick would pop up on her screen. This notion that his sex needs, thoughts, or desires were so pressing that they should be allowed to rupture her day was galling to her. She rode the elevator to the upper floors of the building where his suite of offices was, all the while becoming more convinced that this was a ploy for a midday tryst. She was not amused.
“Richard,” she said, as she entered his office, “if this ‘thing that I need’ has anything to do with your penis, I’m walking out and I think we just might need to take a break from each other for a while.”
He looked up from his computer and meal supplement shake.
“What’s happening, Richard?” came a male voice from his speakerphone. It was only then that Olga realized that this was not a sex ploy.
“Background noise, Nick,” Richard said into the phone, shooting her a biting look. “I’ve got to go, but listen, our San Juan stores are doing well, so if you say there’s more opportunity down there, I’m all ears. Charmaine will set some time with your office.”
He hung up the phone, his face sour. “You were saying?”
“Oh.” She grimaced. “Sorry? I guess I couldn’t imagine what was so urgent that I needed to rush over here and thought maybe this was some kind of a ruse.”
“Do I need a ruse?” Dick said, pouting.
Although life had rarely wounded Richard, Olga discovered that he bruised easily. In dramatic fashion. Like a baby’s wail, it elicited a knee-jerk rush to comfort him. She stepped towards him, took his face between her hands, and pressed herself up against him.
“No, of course not. It’s just been a hectic day.”
He put his arms around her waist.
“I know, I know, busy woman! And I wouldn’t have bothered you if it weren’t for something I know will tickle you.” With that he reached over to his desk and presented her with a neatly calligraphed envelope.
Mr. Richard Eikenborn III & Ms. Olga Acevedo
She knew what it was before she opened it. An invitation to the Blumenthal annual end-of-summer party in Easthampton. An event she had been angling to get invited to for years, and which, for several critical reasons, had taken on new urgency this season. Recently, Carl Blumenthal, the long-divorced host, had married Laurel, an actress of some acclaim who had reached an age too old to actually be cast in films, but just right for being the second or third wife of an aging billionaire. With her came a fresh, more glamorous guest list than this event—long a high point of the summer for the finance set—had known in previous years. Additionally, Laurel brought to the table her twenty-seven-year-old adopted daughter, herself an aspiring actress, and, more important to Olga, recently engaged. To a YouTube cooking celebrity, whatever that meant. Olga knew that if she had the chance to work that room, she would walk out with two or three new clients, and possibly the big fish themselves. Looming over all of this, though, was her knowledge that Meegan, her assistant, would be there. Meegan’s boyfriend had been newly hired at Blumenthal’s hedge fund and each year the top earners and first years were invited. A world where Meegan, by simply swiping right on an app, could be at a party Olga had unsuccessfully climbed her whole adult life to be invited to was an unjust one. Olga had been texting, calling, and setting up drink dates with anyone and everyone who might be able to correct the situation for weeks, but to no avail.