The Partner Track: A Novel (9 page)

Harold and Gavin exchanged a brief, pointed glance.

Andrea, Nate, and everyone else at the table pretended to concentrate on their dinners. For several moments the only sound was the delicate clinking of forks on china dinner plates.

My heart was breaking for Caleb Sweeney. I realized that I was actually holding my breath. I wanted to reach out, give him a hug, and march him out of that tent and back to the safety of the NYU Law dorm where he was living that summer.
I know,
I wanted to tell him.
It’s not fair, and it’s not easy. But you’ll learn. You just practice until it looks natural, that’s all. Fake it til you make it.

After a few minutes our waiter bustled back to our table clutching something in a neatly folded white cloth. He made a big show of setting the single bottle of A-1 sauce down on our table with a flourish. Then he hurried away without a word.

Caleb Sweeney looked shell-shocked. He sat staring at that bottle of A.1. sauce. I could see him actually turning over and over in his mind what he’d done, how he was going to recover from this later, how hard he’d have to work to make people forget. That is, if he ended up getting an offer from the firm at all.

Murph was engaged in a lively conversation with Harold and Gavin about the Yankees’ pitching so far this season. “Yeah, yeah, I know, they never should have traded DeSoto, but they’re making up for it with Sanchez. Seriously, look out for him later this season…” Still talking, without breaking stride, Murph reached out to the middle of the table, grabbed the A.1. sauce, uncapped it—still making his point about the Yankees’ latest trade—and, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, proceeded to pour a glob of the salty brown stuff onto his beautiful, perfect center-cut filet.

After a moment, Caleb Sweeney—the redness already beginning to recede, just a little, from his face—reached out for the bottle and poured a river of the stuff onto his own plate. He polished off his steak in three minutes flat. He even managed to look cheerful again by dessert.

I took another sip of my wine and looked at Murph. Really looked at him. He was still talking baseball with Harold and Gavin, but now they’d moved on to the Mets. My head felt a bit light, and I let myself sink back in my chair and enjoy the warm buzz of the room and the soft candlelight that made everyone look like they were glowing, like old-fashioned movie stars in a black-and-white movie. I was happy.

There was something else I was feeling, something I couldn’t quite name at that moment if you were to ask me. When I looked back at Murph, he was looking at me. I was so full of appreciation for him just then. I suddenly wanted him to know that I
loved
what he’d just done for that kid. I flashed him a big warm smile. Murph glanced away from me, replying to something Harold Rubinstein had just said, but underneath the table, I felt him reach over and lightly pat my knee. It was a reassuring, brotherly pat. Just an
I see you, too.

Then came a loud squawk at the opposite end of the tent. Dave Cavender, a tall, affable partner in Corporate Tax, was standing on a narrow raised platform, adjusting the mike stand. I’d heard that Dave Cavender was friends with Conan O’Brien from back when they’d been on the
Harvard Lampoon
together, and had never quite gotten over the fact that Conan hosted his own TV show while Dave had wound up a goddamn tax attorney.

Across from me, Pamela Karnow pushed back her chair and stood. “Excuse me, folks,” she said genially. “It’s showtime!” She threaded her way through the tables to join Dave Cavender up on the stage.

An expectant hush fell over the crowd. People angled their chairs toward the stage. Whistles and catcalls sprang from the tables down in front.

The annual Parsons Valentine Law Revue—a hallowed firm tradition—was a rare chance to laugh, let loose, and see your buttoned-up, straitlaced colleagues make fools of themselves in a way that was not only spectacularly public but also ordained by the firm.

Dave Cavender had been the official emcee of the Law Revue for the last three years, ever since the summer he’d unveiled a spectacularly hysterical short film he’d written, directed, and shot himself that spoofed
The Godfather.
He’d even managed to get Marty Adler to swivel slowly around toward the camera in his massive green leather chair, holding a cigar and a Scotch, and say in a low, gravelly voice:
Never go against the firm, Dave. The firm is family.

“We’ve got a great show for you this year, folks! Great show!” Dave was up at the mike, wearing a top hat at a jaunty angle, holding both palms up in the air. He seemed to be enjoying himself.

Pamela Karnow stood next to Dave, beaming. She had donned a matching top hat and was holding a set of index cards and a PowerPoint clicker.

Offstage, Ann Trask was sitting at a small table with a sound system and speakers. I liked Ann Trask—even before I’d found out that she’d once nixed the Management Committee’s idea of making the cafeteria staff dress in traditional ethnic costume for “International Food Day.”

The lights dimmed. Pamela looked over at Ann and nodded, and she cued the music at full blast. I laughed, recognizing the first few notes of a cheesy pop song I hadn’t heard in years, something about a guy on a catwalk and being too sexy for—what? His pants? His shirt? I looked over at Murph. Too sexy, indeed. He laughed, too, and nudged my arm.

A video began to play. Pamela Karnow shouted into the mike, “And now, ladies, for your viewing pleasure, may I present—the men of Parsons Valentine!”

We whooped and applauded.

It was a Chippendales-style video calendar. The first image announced
MR. JANUARY!
followed by a beefcake photo of Lincoln Forster, a popular, lanky, redheaded Tax associate in his sixth year, whom everybody called Link. In the shot, Link was standing outside by the bronze corporate sculpture in front of the Parsons Valentine building, turning to the camera with a shy smile, fully dressed in a crisp shirt and tie, with his gray suit jacket hooked over one shoulder. He was adorable. The pose sort of made him look like England’s Prince Harry, and this was not exactly a bad thing.

The room erupted in laughter, whistles, and applause. Everyone was in hysterics. I glanced around, looking for Link Forster. He was sitting a few tables away, at a table crowded with tax partners and summer associates. His male colleagues were convulsing with laughter and clapping him on the back as Link grinned and blushed profusely.

The images on screen shifted. Phil Calabrese, a new lateral partner in Private Equity, was Mr. February. Phil had been photographed in his corner office, standing by the windows in a kind of power stance, feet planted widely apart, arms crossed over his chest, eyes boring into the camera lens with a challenging,
I mean business
expression. Actually, it was distinctly sexy.

Mr. March was some third-year Litigation associate I didn’t know, but Mr. April turned out to be none other than Murph.

I fell over laughing.

Beside me, Murph pretended to be insulted. “Come on, Yung, it’s not
that
funny.” But he was nearly doubled over in hysterics himself.

In a classic Murph move, he’d decided to camp it up for his photo, actually allowing himself to be photographed shirtless, emerging from a glassed-in shower, with damp hair and a white towel wrapped loosely around his waist. You could tell he was trying for a steamy,
fuck me
expression in the eyes, an effect that was spoiled by the huge goofy grin on his face.

I recognized the setting. Murph’s shower photo had been taken in the firm’s infamous “R&R suite” up on the fortieth floor—a pair of cool, dark rooms with cots and pillows, like in a school nurse’s office, and an adjoining bathroom with real bathing facilities. These rooms were provided for the “convenience” of Parsons Valentine attorneys pulling all-nighters in the office, to catch a wink of sleep or freshen up before a morning closing. But the suite had all the ambience of a prison cell, so being there felt less like R&R and more like detention. Luckily, I’d never had to avail myself of the Parsons Valentine shower facilities—I lived close enough to cab home in those silent, wee hours of the morning, take a fast shower in my own bathroom, blow-dry my hair, and change into a fresh suit and clean underwear before turning around and cabbing straight back to the office.

To the crowd’s disappointment, the slides stopped abruptly after Mr. October. As the end credits rolled and the lights came back up, Pamela Karnow returned to the mike.

“Hey, what gives?” a male Litigation partner heckled from the front row. “What about Mr. November and December?”

Pamela deadpanned, “Well, the plan was to have a different photograph for all twelve months, but unfortunately we were not able to locate twelve hot guys who actually work at our firm.”

At this, every single woman in the audience burst out laughing, cheering, and clapping. I let out an appreciative whoop.

“Amen, Pam!” somebody else hollered.

Murph leaned over to me, grinning, and stage-whispered, “Um, isn’t this, like, sexual harassment or something? There’s no way we could talk about any
female
attorneys like that!”

I shouted happily above the din, “Come on, Murph, can’t you take a joke?”

Pamela Karnow bowed dramatically and exited the stage. Dave Cavender returned to the mike, clapping.

“Thanks, Pam! I’ll try not to take it personally that I wasn’t asked to pose. I must have been away that week.”

The audience tittered appreciatively.

“Next, ladies and gentlemen, for your entertainment, the musical stylings of Matt McCallum, Kyle Latham, and Hunter Russell!”

Murph and I hooted in delight.

“Oh, now
this
I’ve got to see!” he laughed.

“
Hunter?
Can
sing
?” I leaned over and elbowed Murph happily.

Harold Rubinstein glanced at us with a mock horrified expression. “Musical stylings of Hunter Russell?” he shouted over the noise of the crowd. “I think we should all be very, very afraid.”

Murph grinned, cupped both hands around his mouth, and chanted “Russ-
ell
!
”
at the stage.

The lights dimmed.

I was taking another sip of wine when I sort of
felt,
rather than heard, a low, excited murmuring, followed by a few barks of raucous laughter coming from a few tables behind ours. Beside me, Murph had a mildly shocked look on his face. “Oh, shit. Oh, no, they did not.”

I looked toward the stage.

I didn’t actually understand what I was seeing at first. Well, I mean I
knew
what I was seeing, but I didn’t really
believe
it. Hunter, along with Kyle and Matt, both fifth-year associates in the Securities Litigation group, were standing in a row onstage, next to a huge, old-school boombox stereo. Kyle and Hunter, arms crossed defiantly across their chests, their lips curled into insolent snarls, were both wearing dark, baggy tracksuits, ropes and ropes of gold chains around their necks, and dark glasses. Hunter wore a Lakers baseball cap turned to the side. Kyle had put on a do-rag and two ostentatiously fake gold-capped teeth, and he was holding something that looked suspiciously like—
No! They wouldn’t, would they?
—a crack pipe.

Matt McCallum was dressed in a black T-shirt and extremely baggy jeans, which he had pulled halfway down his ass, so that his abs and the top of his briefs were showing. He, too, wore tons of heavy gold jewelry and had given himself huge fake tattoos of Chinese characters up and down both arms. Like Hunter and Kyle, Matt was wearing dark sunglasses, but—unlike the other two—he had added a wig.

Matt McCallum had given himself fake cornrows.

“Yeeeeah, yeeeeah!” Matt screamed into the mike. “A’ight, fools! Me and my homies are
in the house
!”

Oh my God. This could only end badly.

I craned my neck and scanned the surrounding tables, looking for Tyler. It was too dark with the dimmed lights. I couldn’t see him. I turned back around and screwed my eyes shut tight for a second.
Please, please don’t.
I sent up a fierce, desperate prayer.

Onstage, Hunter knelt down and pressed a button on the boombox. In the next instant, a thick, pulsing beat shook the entire tent. We could feel the earth beneath us throb along with the deep, steady bass. Then a familiar swelling of orchestral strings began to sing up top, and I recognized the song immediately. It was a popular hip-hop song from years ago, the soundtrack to a Hollywood movie. It had been one of the earliest rap songs to cross genres and hit the top of the mainstream pop charts.

It was, in other words, a rap song that rich white people had heard of.

Hunter, Kyle, and Matt swayed their bodies to the beat of the low, steady bass, their palms open and swinging in front of them, swiping at the air in random arcs. Both Hunter and Kyle were comically awkward dancers, but then I realized that they were doing this deliberately, poking fun at themselves, purposely stepping on the offbeat, playing directly to the stereotype of clueless white guys attempting to rap.

But Matt McCallum seemed really into it. Matt was pumping his fists in the air and violently jerking his body in time to the music. He had a steely, pissed-off death glare in his blue eyes and a convincing sneer on his face. Matt McCallum was not going for comic effect. He was in character.

I strained to focus on the spoof lyrics they were belting out:

As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death

I take a look at my life and see there’s not much left

’Cuz I’ve been working at this firm for so damn long,

Even my mama thinks my mind is gone

But we keep billing and billing, we can’t ever stop

If one of these days we want to wind up on top

You better watch how you’re talking, and watch how you’re walking

Or you and your homies might never get made