Even though I was head down on the latest portfolio proposal that needed my review, I knew it was on or about 5:30 p.m. as soon as I heard the all-too-familiar hustle and bustle from the cubicles near my office. Over the past couple months, in fact, I’d learned all the telltale signs of various hours in the day at my job, never even needing to look at the gold, sunburst-style wall clock that hung near the canvas image of me symbolically waving goodbye to London.
Around 8:30 a.m., I’d normally hear the rush of people walking onto the floor, telling stories about their evenings and sighing about all the work they still needed to accomplish. At about 10:00 a.m., the floor would seem eerily quiet, but only because most of the staff had inevitably either started congregating in the kitchen area for their morning coffee breaks or were in various meetings throughout the building. No later than about 1:00 p.m., I usually heard puttering footsteps as groups of people decided if they were going to eat lunch somewhere in the neighborhood or simply heat up whatever they’d brought from home. And somewhere around 5:30 p.m. usually signaled the time for the mass exodus, leaving only the few masochists like me and Walter to close down the floor each day.
Every once in a while, I stepped out of my office during these daily interactions to partake in the activities with the rest of the teams—feel like I was actually part of the portfolio crew. But more often than I’d like to admit, I spent my time like a working Sleeping Beauty, enclosed in my glass office until someone (usually Wendy or Julie) burst in and forced me to take a sanity break.
The last of the telltale signs was the sound of Walter’s feet as he stomped down the hallway toward my office anytime between 6:00 and 6:30 p.m.—something that had become a sort of regular routine for him, especially in the last couple weeks. The first time I’d heard him clobbering around, I’d thought it to be an indication of his anger, but no. He just seemed to have a heavy walk, which was quite interesting considering he was maybe one hundred sixty-five pounds wet and probably no taller than five foot nine. But Walter did almost everything big—commanded the room when he walked in, paced up and down in his office during calls and stomped throughout the floor when he was simply walking from one office to the next. It was a far cry from the meek and mild man I’d met on day one, but then again, I’d also learned by now that our first interaction had been more of an anomaly than the norm. Walter was the man in this office, and he knew it.
Since that first day, he and I had actually formed a pretty great thought partnership. Not to say we were the best of friends—he was still my boss, obviously—but he’d meant it when he’d said that he wanted my hands on and ideas represented in most of the proposals and strategy briefs by the time I left New York. And because Walter expected mountains to move when he said so, he’d really only given everyone about two or three weeks after my start date before he’d begun consistently asking anyone who’d sent him something to approve if I’d seen it first.
“Did Olivia see this?” he’d ask, straight-faced with serious eyes and hands tucked into his pockets until he received a yes.
If he got a no, his answer was simple: “She sees it before I do.”
Within a week, he never had to say those six words again.
It was a great testament to his trust in me. It also meant I had a lot of work on my plate all the time.
Just like clockwork, I heard Walter’s feet coming toward me. Must be about 6:00 p.m., I theorized, looking up just in time to see him standing at my door with a big grin on his face. That usually amounted to one thing—at least a few more hours of work for us both. Instinctually, I grabbed my phone to get ready to text Thomas that I might have to cancel our date.
“Olivia, my favorite,” Walter said, sauntering in and plopping down into one of the chairs facing my desk.
“No, Walter, you can’t butter me up today,” I replied. “I have plans. I know it’s hard to believe, but I really can’t be here with you until nine o’clock tonight.”
“Oh, perfect—this is exactly what I came in here to talk about.”
“My plans?”
“No, Olivia, do I look like Wendy to you?” he asked, clearly taken aback by my suggestion.
I laughed at his confusion, but he wasn’t alone. I was equally curious about where this conversation was going.
“Of course not,” I replied, trying to hold back my chuckles while a quick vision of Walter with bright red hair flashed before my eyes. “Please continue.”
“Thank you,” he said, leaning back into the chair so that he could sit in a wide stance comfortably.
It was something I noticed a lot of American men did—white, Black and otherwise. I could only guess that it made them feel powerful somehow.
“You know, I’ve been loving the work coming across my desk lately, and I attribute that all to you. I think you’ve been challenging our teams to listen to their clients and not just deliver proposals and updates that seem tried and true, but ones that are tailored to their unique needs and have proven results in other spaces.”
“Thanks, Walter. I really appreciate that—”
“But that’s not what I came in here to talk to you about,” he said, interrupting my interruption of him. “I wanted to talk to you today about work-life balance.”
“Excuse me?” I asked, now even more confused about what he was blubbering on about.
Still seated in the chair across from me, Walter leaned toward me so that his elbows were almost to his knees. I wasn’t sure if this was his way of trying to indicate closeness without being too close, but it was an odd thing to look at, mostly because he didn’t exactly seem like the kind of person one would want to have this conversation with. Data. Numbers. Winning. That was Walter’s MO. But work-life balance?
It felt far-fetched, and even he seemed uncomfortable bringing it up. I also suddenly noticed that he’d rolled up his sleeves to about halfway up his forearms before coming to my office in some sort of odd attempt at trying to portray an “everyday man.”
What is going on?
“Work-life balance,” he repeated.
“What about it?”
“Well, my fiancée reminded me this morning that I needed to be doing a better job at it, and I realized when I didn’t see you leaving with the rest of the office, you probably do, too.”
“To be fair, Walter—”
“I know, I’m usually the reason for your late-night stays, but not tonight. Tonight, I want you to go home, or I guess to whatever plans you have on a Wednesday night.”
“It’s a date,” I replied, laughing at how uncomfortable even the littlest bit of gossip made him.
I could tell he was holding back another quip about not being Wendy, and it made me laugh that much more.
“Well, good for you,” he said awkwardly. “So, this is me...telling you to go, you know, do that.”
I eyed him as he squirmed in his seat, clearly ready for this conversation to end now that I’d taken it from just big, bold Walter giving me permission to take some time for myself. I also knew he was waiting for my silent head nod before he would inevitably jump out of the chair and go plodding back to his office, but I had one last question before I gave him what he wanted.
“Okay, Walter,” I said. “I’m curious, though. Fiancée? How do you have time for that kind of commitment?”
I half expected him to fall out of the chair when he processed my question. Instead, I saw a fire in Walter’s eyes that I usually only caught when he received confirmation that someone had exceeded their fundraising goal.
“Oh, that’s easy,” he said, perking up in his seat. “I got lucky and found someone who has no desire to change me or lessen my ambitions. She gets that some nights I’m going to be working late, and she doesn’t judge me for it or question whether I love her because of it. And to make sure she knows I appreciate her, every once in a while, I actually leave the office before 6:30 p.m. and surprise her with something special. Tonight, it’s tickets to her favorite Broadway play. She’s watched it probably eight times now, with multiple different people. And yet she cries like it’s her first time any time she sees it.”
“Wow,” I said, listening to Walter in awe. “That’s special. And rare.”
“Maybe. But I think people like me—and you—need someone like a Sarah in our lives. She keeps me balanced and challenges me in all the best ways.”
Walter paused and nodded his head toward me.
“Do you think the person you’re going on a date with tonight has the same potential?”
“Hard to know, really,” I replied with a deep sigh. “It’s only our second date, or really first—I don’t know. But if precedent has anything to do with it, my chances aren’t good.”
“Well, if you’d told me a year ago that I would be talking to my senior consultant about work-life balance, I would have laughed in your face. Things change sometimes. Unexpectedly.”
“That they do. You’re very right.”
“I’m always right, Olivia,” Walter said with a wink, finally rising out of his chair. “Now, close that computer down and get to your date. I insist.”
“Aye, Captain,” I joked as he walked out of my door, stomping his way back down the hallway.
I turned my phone onto its back and unlocked the screen, noting to myself that it was now 6:10 p.m. If I hurried, I could make a quick outfit change in the bathroom and still make it to Thomas before our 7:00 p.m. class began. All I really had to do was freshen up and change into the dark blue jeans I’d brought with me, along with my classic Tommy Hilfiger shirt. I’d purposely chosen my double-breasted plaid oversize women’s blazer to wear to work, figuring that it would make for a great work-to-date transition—same with my green velvet Taro Ishida slingback heels that were adorned with gold metal studs plus a gold ring and gold leaf embellishment on the pointed toes.
Hi! See you at 7, still? I typed as quickly as I could while walking to the restroom.
Thomas instantly replied.
Thomas: Yep. You’ll know it’s me because I’ll be the guy with the smile that won’t go away when you walk up.
Me: Please! I’ll know it’s you because of the way I can’t stop smiling when I see you.
That, too, he replied.
I’ll see you soon, I texted back, unsure of what else to say and in a desperate crunch for time anyway.
Thomas must not have known what to say, either, as he simply liked my reply with the thumbs-up reaction, letting me know he received it in the most millennial way possible.
As soon as I walked into the ladies’ restroom, I practically threw my phone onto the counter, rushing to make my switchover happen in less than ten to fifteen minutes.
You got this, I said to myself while looking in the mirror. Or something like that.
Exactly forty minutes later, my Uber pulled up to the Great Jones Distilling Co. at 6:53 p.m. The first thing I noticed was how regal the exterior of the building looked with its three and a half stories of all-black paint and gold fixtures. Flanked by two grayish-tan skyscraper buildings, the facade stood out immediately, making for the kind of grand appearance that Manhattan’s first whiskey distillery since Prohibition would necessarily demand. The second thing that caught my attention was Thomas, already standing outside, waiting on me with his matching all-black outfit and a fifty-thousand-watt smile.
“You look amazing,” he said as he gently took my hand and helped me step out of the car.
I was instantly struck by the fact that I could somehow still see the muscles in his forearms underneath the thick black wool coat he was wearing. These were the kind of forearms that were made for scooping a ready-and-willing woman up and carrying her to his bed. That, of course, sent flashbacks running through my head of how crazy good it had felt when he’d gripped me tightly while we kissed under the moonlight just days before, and I instantly felt myself grow wet.
In truth, I hadn’t stopped thinking about how Thomas’s lips had felt as they’d enveloped mine since then. So I knew I was going to have to work hard to keep my composure on this date. Focusing on things like his perfectly sculpted forearms and how my hand seemed to fit in his, like they were made to seamlessly cup each other, wasn’t going to make that easy.
“You look pretty dapper yourself, eh,” I replied as I stepped fully out of the car.
“Well, it is our first date, so...”
Thomas’s one lone but incredibly intoxicating dimple peeked out as he looked back at me and waited for my reply.
“Is it?” I asked. “So, the Christmas tour through the city didn’t count?”
“No, definitely not.”
“I feel like if it ends with the kind of kiss that you left me to ponder over all night, that automatically qualifies as a date, no?”
“Ha ha, well, you might be onto something there,” he replied, chuckling off to the side. “But to be fair, we had specifically called that a non-date. I want you to be very clear that this is a real one.”
Thomas stared at me intensely, holding my attention until I found myself squirming under his gaze. I could barely breathe sometimes when he looked at me because everything in my body felt like it was being tethered to him, and so my lungs were waiting on his to even say go before they moved on their own. This was one of those occasions. It just so happened that the last time, I was almost ready to give myself to him in the middle of the street in front of my flat.
“Okay,” I said softly, releasing the tension in my body with short, slow and steady breaths. “I am crystal clear.”
“Good,” he replied. “Now, let’s go inside so we don’t miss the start of the class. I’ve been wanting to check this out for a while now.”
“Oh, I see! So, I just gave you a good excuse, then?” I joked as we walked through the gold revolving-door entrance.
“Yep, sure did. The best excuse.”
We quickly joined the rest of the evening’s mixology class as we all oohed and ahhed our way through a guided tour of the distillery, followed by a four-part tasting of their signature bourbon. By the time that was done, we were treated to a few bites from a premade charcuterie board, which included smoked almonds, marinated olives, dark-chocolate pieces and some of the best cheese and prosciutto I’d ever tasted. If that wasn’t enough, they also gave us a smoked old-fashioned to sip on while our mixologist for the night led us in a hands-on course on how to make two of Great Jones’s house-made cocktails—the Saratoga Julep and the Great Jones Rye Manhattan.
As the kick from the old-fashioned began warming up my insides, I realized I’d worked through my lunch hour earlier, so I was officially surviving off two cups of coffee, a granola bar and the few bites to eat from the charcuterie board. Maybe that’s why the cheese tastes so good? I wondered. Either way, I knew I was going to eventually need more than that to coat my stomach if I wanted to show up to work at 7:30 a.m. like normal—and without a massive headache.
I finished my first drink and looked toward Thomas so we could toast with the juleps we’d made, giving my best attempt at making flirty eyes at him. To my surprise, however, the next sound I heard was him bursting into laughter and curling over with tears threatening to fall from his eyes.
“What?” I asked. “Did I miss something?”
“Your eyes are so glassy right now,” he said. “You never told me you were a lightweight.”
“I’m not.” I laughed, suddenly understanding what he found so funny.
“The eyes don’t lie, love.”
“No, really. It’s not that. I actually just realized that I didn’t eat much today, so, you know, the liquor doesn’t have anything to soak it up.”
“Mmmm, okay, see now that’s good information to know. We’ll have to make sure we get you a chopped cheese before you go home tonight. In the meantime, let’s try to make sure your eyes focus on one thing at a time so they don’t get stuck crossing over.”
“OMG, it’s not that bad!” I said, playfully slapping him on his broad shoulders.
“I don’t know. I wish you could see what I see.”
“Oh, really?” I asked. “Well, tell me, what do you see?”
“The most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on...”
“Thomas,” I interrupted.
“Barely keeping her eyes open while she desperately tries to stay awake to make her next cocktail,” he continued, laughing even harder.
“I’m so glad you’re enjoying this,” I replied. “It feels great to be the entertainment tonight.”
“Nah, I just enjoy spending time with you, so the laughs come easy, that’s all.”
Damn it, there goes those swoony, spine-chilling feelings again. What is it that’s holding me back from giving in to them again? I asked myself.
Oh right, I remembered as I took another sip of my drink. I didn’t see how he fit into all my plans. That pesky little fact. But I really did enjoy our time together.
“Same actually,” I admitted. “Which is why I’m so mad at myself for not eating earlier. I do kinda wish things were a little less hazy right now, to be honest.”
“See? I’m glad you’re finally telling the truth. I told you the eyes don’t lie.”
We both laughed as I bumped the side of his hip and licked my bottom lip to keep from biting it—something I was all too aware I did whenever I wanted mine to be on his. Then, just as quickly, we fell back into the rhythm of the class, following along as our mixologist walked us step-by-step through our final cocktail.
“Tell me more about this butchered-cheese thing you mentioned earlier?” I asked as we neared the end of the class.
“A chopped cheese,” he said chuckling.
“Right, that.”
“Wait, this isn’t your first time hearing of a chopped cheese, is it?”
“Is it, like, an American delicacy or something?”
“I mean, kinda!” he said, stepping back shocked with a smirk on his face. “I would argue it’s at least a New York delicacy and the best, classic late-night food option in the city. I’m surprised no one’s brought you to get one yet.”
“Well, that makes sense because I don’t often find myself out late at night. You know my bed starts calling my name around 11:00 p.m.”
“No, I know. I just figured that you and your girls would have partaken in it by now, especially with Reagan living uptown.”
“Nope. We have had a late-night slice of pizza!” I replied, probably a little too enthusiastically.
“Okay, I mean, that’s New Yorker 101. But once you’ve had a chopped cheese, I think you’ll find it to be even better.”
“All right. Well, I trust you, so I’m down.”
The growing smile on Thomas’s face after my reply could have lit up the night sky if we were outside, and I made a note to myself just how much I enjoyed being the cause of it.
“It’s a good thing I’m here to help you dig in a little deeper,” he said.
I smiled back, probably just as glassy-eyed as before, while I watched him down his last drink and call us a car for our next location.
A few minutes later, we were all bundled up again to brave the cold, December air and waving goodbye to all the temporary friends we’d made during the class as we rushed to catch our Uber before the car pulled off. Together, we climbed in, with Thomas right behind me, once again shooting chills up my spine as he lightly grazed the small of my back to guide me in. Once we were both settled into our seats, I leaned my head back and attempted to calm down the anticipation building within my body—of both Thomas’s continued touch and this food he’d been bragging about for the past twenty minutes.
“I know this is very out of the way, and you can get a chopped cheese from almost any bodega now,” he said, turning toward me as our car curved onto First Avenue and then FDR to make our way to East Harlem. “But if you’re going to have your first one with me, it’s gotta be from the OG.”
Thomas was already right about one thing. We were taking a major detour for this thing, so I hoped it was worth it for us to travel twenty minutes away when we probably could have taken a long walk from the distillery back to my apartment.
“It’s okay,” I replied, facing him in the back seat of the car, my head still relying on the mounting anticipation to keep me awake. “At this point, you’ve talked it up so much, I wouldn’t want it from anywhere else. I do have to know, though, what makes it so special?”
“To me? Or to New York?”
“I guess both.”
“Well, for me, I equate my first chopped cheese with the day I knew I’d make it here,” Thomas said, sitting up straight and turning his entire body toward mine. “You know, I came here so fresh and green and got a very quick awakening that life wasn’t going to be a straight shot to the top. After about a few months, I’d started questioning whether I had what it took to be a ‘New York lawyer,’ whatever that meant. The job was stressing me out, I was struggling to make any kind of headway with the few clients the firm had entrusted me with, and I just was feeling really down. But thankfully, a few of my boys noticed, said, ‘Bruh, let’s go out for some drinks,’ and by the end of the night, they had reminded me I wasn’t alone trying to navigate this new world on my own. We were also very drunk, though, so they took me to Hajji’s. We got some chopped cheese sandwiches—with grilled onions, lettuce, tomato, ketchup and mayonnaise, like you’re supposed to—and I swear, every bite felt like it was changing my life.”
“Wow,” I replied, in awe of everything he’d just divulged—the connection with his friends, the vulnerability he’d shown in telling me this story, the way he made the food sound...
“I’m kind of at a loss for words.”
“That’s because you’re drunk.” He laughed.
“Maybe a little tipsy, but you know that’s not why.”
“No, I know.”
We looked at each other with that unsaid understanding we’d had since our first conversation in the airport. That had been the moment I’d realized Thomas got me in a fundamental way that was both scary and refreshing. Now it was my turn. I’d had almost every single emotion he’d expressed (and the ones he hadn’t) since moving here, too, so I knew how important that night must have been for him. After all, he was still in the city years later, thriving beyond, what I was sure, was even his wildest imagination. I also knew he probably still secretly had those moments where he questioned if he deserved it all.
“Do you still have moments like that at your firm?” I asked, bracing myself for an inevitable shutdown in his vulnerability tank. That was what every other man did whenever they dared to try to be open with me before.
“Yeah—of course,” he said, drawing me toward him. “I psych myself out all the time, thinking today’s going to be the day I don’t do everything perfectly and it’ll give them a reason to elevate the next guy before me. Or sometimes, I’ll deal with those kinda gray situations where I wonder if they only put me on a specific file because they needed a Black man on it, or if a client requests a different attorney, there’s that small voice in my head that makes me question if it’s because they aren’t the Black man from Philly, you know. But at the end of the day, it all just makes me go harder. I get to prove all of those doubts in my head wrong every time I show up and excel.”
“Yeah, I know.”
I leaned into him, snuggling myself into the nook under Thomas’s arm and next to his torso. As he wrapped his left arm around me, I took in the deepest, most calming breath, preparing myself to enjoy the security of his embrace as we rode the next fifteen minutes up the motorway. In a perfect world, this could be my existence every night—just basking in the comfort of his presence without any worry for the future. Openly talking about the good and bad parts of our jobs; pushing each other to be the best and to find balance, just like Walter and Sarah. If only, I thought, momentarily stopping myself from even thinking the rest of that idea...but eventually, it came to me anyway. If only women like me got to have that kind of joy, maybe I’d trust this more.
“I wish you could see yourself through my eyes, too, you know,” I whispered as they slowly drifted shut.
“The glassy ones that can barely stay open?”
“Yeah.” I chuckled. “And the ones who see just how amazing you are.”