“Goose bumps, Finn, I have goose bumps.” Priya thrusts her arm in front of his face when he makes it back to our table. “You were amazing. I had no idea you could do that.”
“I told you I sing. We had a whole conversation about auditions last week when we went to the launch party for that energy drink.”
“Well, yeah,” Priya says, “but I didn’t think you were actually good.” Her hands shoot to her mouth, the lubrication of the four previous stops on our bar crawl having loosened her tongue. She rushes to cover: “I mean . . . why aren’t you getting cast if you can sing like that?”
Finn doesn’t take offense at her gaffe. “Everyone at these auditions is good. Talent is table stakes. But I don’t have any connections or credits. I’ve had directors tell me I don’t have the right look for the part, which is sometimes code for I’m too Black, but other times code for I’m not Black enough. Or sometimes the reason is totally minuscule. Like one time, I almost got cast for a role, but I was too tall for the costumes, and they didn’t have the time or resources, or maybe just the desire, to refit them.”
“That’s bullshit, Finn. That’s so unfair,” Priya rails.
“Life isn’t fair.” He shrugs his shoulders. “Does anyone want another?” He holds up his empty vodka soda.
“I’m good,” I say. “I have to be up at the ass crack of dawn for work tomorrow.” As the most junior full-time employee at Z100, I had no illusions about getting the whole week off. The station is closed for Christmas, playing a preprogrammed loop of music and ads, but tomorrow we’re back at it bright and early.
“Hannah Gallagher, rising star of radio, destined to outshine her starving artist best friend as she rockets towards success,” he says in a fake newscaster voice.
“I don’t know that I’d call my minimum wage job ‘success.’ I don’t think that’s what they were talking about at BC when they said to ‘set the world aflame,’？” I say, quoting the oft-invoked Jesuit motto they lobbed at us during various platitude-heavy speeches throughout college. But secretly, I was overjoyed to be converted to a full-time employee last month after paying my dues for more than a year as an unpaid intern.
No one was more surprised by my post-college career glow-up than me. I figured I’d wait tables or work at the box office of whatever theater’s production Finn was starring in. I only applied to the internship on a lark after a particularly frustrating conversation with a counselor at the campus career center. “What do you love?” she implored. The only things I could think of were music and my Christmas tradition with Finn, and only one of those was monetizable. Finn, on the other hand, is having a harder time finding his footing.
“Is anyone else starving?” Priya asks.
“Let’s get out of here,” Finn suggests. “We can still make the Waverly Diner.”
“Now that I’m on board with,” I say. It’s one of the few spots that has hash browns instead of home fries, making it our favorite. “Breakfast for dinner is kind of a Christmas thing for us.” I tell Priya.
“Okay, highs and lows of your first Christmas,” Finn prompts as he leads the way down Bleecker toward the West Village.
“My high was definitely your song, Finn. I’m still not over it. You had the whole bar on their feet.” Finn’s face lights up at her gushing praise. “Seriously,” Priya continues, “I don’t have any real basis for comparison, but this Christmas easily takes my top slot.”
I beam back at her, glad she gets it. “Want to do it again next year?” I ask.
“I would be honored.”
five
Hannah
This year, November 16
Wait for me on the boyfriend couch. Finishing up one thing! 5 mins! Priya texts.
I’m not sure what a boyfriend couch is, but it’s self-explanatory when I get to Glossier’s Lafayette Street office and spot three men scrolling through their phones on a pink tufted sofa in the reception area while their girlfriends shop for makeup in the attached showroom, sampling the brand’s minimalist shades and taking selfies in the perfectly lit mirrors.
Since Priya started her new job in April, it’s all she can talk about. She mentions the brand every other sentence like she has a crush. Glossier is going to be the next unicorn. Glossier gave me stock options. I read on Into the Gloss that Priyanka Chopra uses yogurt to exfoliate her skin. Priya didn’t just drink the Kool-Aid, she did a twenty-second keg stand and is wasted on it.
And it’s nice to see her excited about work after three years of career misery. Before this, she was cobbling together an income from an increasingly bleak slate of freelance writing assignments. Toward the end, all she was getting were SEO articles designed to bait readers into clicking affiliate links. But now she has her dream job as an editor for the brand’s blog.
When she started, I placed a massive online order for products with names like “cloud paint” and “haloscope” despite not knowing how to use them. I was just happy to see Priya so happy and wanted to support her.
After a quick wait, Priya rounds the corner into the reception area shrugging on a furry blue coat that looks like it’s made from a Muppet pelt, her eyes rimmed with matching glittery blue eyeliner. “Ready?” she asks.
* * *
? ? ?
?“Tell me what this class is again?” I ask as we cross Canal Street, making our way toward Tribeca. I’ve seen a lot less of Priya since she started her new job and we moved out of Orchard Street. The last three times we had plans just the two of us, she bailed with an 8:00 p.m. text that she was stuck at the office. I figured she was less likely to flake if the plan was her idea, but now I’m wary about what I’ve gotten myself into.
It turns out, I was right to be scared. Ostensibly, it’s a dance cardio class, but by the end of the fifty-five-minute session I feel like I showed up to an advanced Navy SEALs training in a pair of water wings and a string bikini. My T-shirt is soaked through with sweat, and I tripped over my own feet no less than five times. At the end of class, Priya finds me lying prostrate on the mats we rolled out for cooldown. I’m not sure I can get up, never mind wipe down my mat and walk home.
“So fun, right?” she asks once we’re on the street outside the studio. “Imagine how ripped you’d be if you did that three times a week.” Priya’s blue eyeliner is still intact while I have mascara tracks dripping down my cheeks.
“I will never know because I’m never coming back here. I think this fulfilled my workout quota for the next year at least.” I hope I haven’t accidentally opted into a new tradition. I much prefer the old hits, like Sunday nights eating pad thai and spring rolls from our favorite takeout place while we binge episodes of 30 Rock. But I guess we’ve only managed to do that once in the five months since moving out.
“We could have done something else,” she offers.
“I wanted to spend time with you, and this is what you wanted to do,” I tell her.
“You really are a secret softie.” She nudges my shoulder with her own.
“Don’t tell anyone,” I urge. “It’s not good for my street cred. Now, can we please go get a huge plate of fries, and maybe a yellow Gatorade if we pass a bodega on the way?”