Saving Max

Georgia sits on Danielle’s lumpy couch. “I can’t believe it, either. Just when you think it’s over, there’s that drive from Des Moines to scenic Plano.”

“Coffee?” She gives Georgia a broad smile.

Georgia peers into the paper cup Danielle offers. “I’ll pass.”

They sit, and Georgia squeezes her hand. Danielle is thrilled to see her dear friend. “Why are you here, by the way?”

“Because I’m worried about you and Max.” She takes a deep breath. “And I have some things to tell you that I felt needed to be said face-to-face.”

Danielle feels a fresh uneasiness. “What things?”

“Later.” Georgia settles back into the couch.

Danielle waits. Their specialty is shorthand speech. Georgia begins the beguine.

“How are you?”

“Okay.”

“Max?”

“Not great.”

“He hasn’t tried to—”

“No!” She pulls back. “Of course not!”

Georgia places a cool palm on her arm. “I’m sorry. It’s just that you don’t always tell me the worst.”

Danielle gives her a miserable smile. “It’s because I can’t even bear to think about it.”

“Do you have a diagnosis?”

“No.” Before she lets Georgia continue her cross-examination, Danielle changes the subject. “Tell me something about the outside world.”

Georgia doesn’t let her down. There is the latest office gossip—who’s sleeping with whom; who made a fool of himself at the summer recruiting party; which associate is brown-nosing which partner; which partners are trying to screw around other partners.

“So,” says Danielle, “how did you manage to get away from the office? From Jonathan and Melissa?”

Georgia’s lovely face bleeds from blushed pearl to arsenic white. “Oh. That.”

“Oh, what?”

Her deep indigo eyes fall to the floor. “Well, like I said, there are a few things I have to tell you.”

“A lot, I’d guess.” Danielle’s voice is dry. “And don’t try to put a good spin on it, Georgia. You look like shit, and I want to know why.”

Georgia meets Danielle’s eyes. Brilliant tears, unshed, skate on her lower eyelids. “It’s Jonathan,” she whispers. “He’s been … fired.”

Danielle thinks of the cutting-edge plastic surgery group in which Jonathan has been the boy genius. “What are you talking about? He became a full partner last year, didn’t he?”

“Yes.” Her voice trembles.

“So what happened?”

Wet diamonds course down her cheeks. “They found out.”

“About the drinking? Well, that’s not exactly—”

“He’s been doing cocaine—a lot of cocaine.” Her voice is flat, dead.

Danielle is stunned. “But how did anyone find out?”

Georgia gives her a look of shame and fear. “He operated on a woman while he was high. Everyone in the operating room could tell.” She closes her eyes. The rest comes out in a whispered staccato. “Her face is horribly disfigured. There’s going to be one hell of a lawsuit. It could ruin their practice.”

“When did this happen?”

“A month ago,” she says miserably, her face deathly pale. “He never said a word.”

“Did his partners turn him in to the police?”

“At first they were in damage-control mode, but then they searched his desk and found a huge stash.” Her words are hollow reeds in a blistered wind. “They say he was dealing, Danielle. Can you believe that? Jonathan—a coke dealer!”

“God, Georgia, what now?”

“They reported him to the medical board and fired him immediately. The board suspended him pending a complete investigation.” She shakes her head. “There’s no question that they’ll jerk his license. He’s finished.”

“Where is he now?”

“The last time I saw him, he was in the apartment, locked in the bedroom—drunk. He told me to get out.” The thin thread that held her snaps. Georgia’s head falls into her hands as brutal sobs pound her small frame. Danielle holds her dear friend until they subside. Georgia looks up with frantic eyes. “What am I going to do? What about Melissa?”

“Where is she now?”

“I grabbed her; took her to my mother’s house in the Bronx; and came here.” Georgia’s face is titanium white. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

Danielle pats her hand. “You did the right thing. Can you stay for a few days?”

Georgia shakes her head. “I have to leave at noon. I start trial in the Simmons case on Friday.”

“What timing.”

“No kidding.”

Danielle retrieves her keys from the desk and takes one off of the ring. “Stay at my place for as long as you want. When I get back, you two can have the guest bedroom. We’ll figure something out. Right now you need to concentrate on Melissa and that trial.”

Georgia takes the key with a grateful look and wipes away her tears. “I may just use your place as a getaway from the office. I’m desperate for some peace and quiet.” She sighs. “Melissa and I will stay with my mother until I can figure out what to do. Thank God Mom is retired, and Melissa isn’t in school yet.” She takes a deep breath. “Okay, enough about me. What’s going on with Max? How are you holding up?”

“Oh, Christ, Georgia, let’s not.” She hears the tension in her voice.

“Okay.” Her voice is as patient as Danielle’s is not. “I won’t demand ugly details. Just tell me one thing. When are you coming home?”

Danielle shoves an ashtray full of cigarette butts across the coffee table. “In a week, maybe two.”

“You’re coming back for the partners’ meeting, aren’t you?”

“Absolutely. I don’t want to leave Max, but I’m sure as hell not going to risk my partnership.”

“That’s my girl. You’ll be our first female partner. How can they not anoint someone who won a fifteen-million-dollar case in front of the Supreme Court? Still, you’d better put in some face time very soon.”

Danielle shakes her head. “Not now. They’re having trouble titrating Max’s medication, and he needs me here. He looks terrified every time I even suggest that I have to go back to New York.”

“How often do you see him?”

“Mornings and afternoons.”

Georgia glances around the room. “What do you do the rest of the time?”

A migraine blooms somewhere behind Danielle’s left eye, enveloping her forehead in a deep, twisting pain. She thinks briefly about Tony but doesn’t mention him to Georgia. It already seems as if it were a dream. “I work. That’s not entirely true. I try to work.”

Georgia leans back. “Well, that’s good, because things are heating up at the office.”

“What do you mean?”

Her blue eyes cloud. “It’s another reason I came out here. You need to know what’s going on. That worm, Gerald Matthews, is sucking up to every partner in his usual unctuous manner, letting them all know he’s the natural choice for your spot.”

“I’m not worried about him,” says Danielle.

“Well, worry about this.” Georgia gives her a pointed look. “E. Bartlett is up to something, and it isn’t good.”

Danielle is silent. E. Bartlett again. His unpleasant countenance appears in her mind’s eye. The last few years have been tough on Danielle, now officially designated as his personal lackey. She knows that some of the powers-that-be at the firm hope she’ll give up and go elsewhere—once they’ve made enough money off of her. But they don’t know her. She never gives up. Slowly, grudgingly, E. Bartlett has been forced to acknowledge her talents. Although he will never admit it, she is the associate he turns to when a crisis erupts; when a complex case presents an esoteric legal issue; when an important client from overseas must be wined and dined. He even leaves matchbooks on her chair from the all-male club where he takes the prep boys for lunch. It’s as close as E. Bartlett comes to having a sense of humor. Despite his currently favorable assessment of her, she knows he will use any excuse to keep her from joining the fraternity of the testicularly anointed. E. Bartlett also has a W. C. Fields view of children. If she hadn’t already billed thirty-two hundred hours this year and wasn’t due two years’ worth of vacation, he would have already dropped her in the dirt. She lights a cigarette, ignoring Georgia’s disapproving glance. “Okay, let’s hear it.”

“It’s the Sterns case.”

“What about it?” Sterns involves Danielle’s biggest client. It is a juicy class-action suit that has all the earmarks to make the firm millions. That, coupled with her big win in the Baines case, is her ace in the hole for partnership. Michael Sterns, the young CEO of the company, loves Danielle’s aggressive litigation style and has, thus far, refused to be represented by any of her partners.

Georgia glances away. “The bastard turned over the next slew of depositions to Matthews.”

“But that’s my client—” Danielle cries. “I spent two years wooing that company.”

Georgia shrugs. “Too true, my dear, but you are a mere associate.”

Danielle slaps her hand to her forehead. “Goddammit.”

Only partners are allowed to put their names on the case-generation form. Her initials appear in small type as the assigned minion. E. Bartlett has been getting credit for Sterns for over a year now. That, coupled with the fact that her billable hours have dropped precipitously since Maitland, puts her into the average category. And average won’t make her a partner. Panic rises in her throat. She can’t let this partnership slip through her hands. She’s earned it—not to mention the fact that she needs the extra income to help pay Maitland’s phenomenal bill. As usual, insurance only covers the bare minimum, and there is no way she can cover the uninsured portion on her salary and savings. She also has Max’s future expenses to consider—whatever they might be.

“That’s not all,” says Georgia. “Last night I stayed late to work and ran down to Harry’s for a drink and a sandwich. You know the scene—the whole firm crawls over there before the partnership meeting—boozing it up while they bullshit each other about how great their candidates are.” Harry’s is a terrific place for lawyers to gather. Danielle almost feels the cool dark of the room; the huge oak bar with brass bar stools; the rows of dusky liquor bottles; the deep, red leather booths; the blurred light from the candles on the tables.

Danielle puts her bare feet on top of the cheap coffee table. She wishes she were half as relaxed as she appears. “So this year is exactly like any other.”

Georgia frowns. “You’re wrong there, I’m afraid. Guess who I saw—all closed off and cozy?”

“Who?”

“E. Bartlett and Lyman—two snakes in a pit.”

Danielle sits up straight, her eyes wide. “But that’s impossible.”

Lyman and E. Bartlett started with the firm in the same class and have been bitter rivals ever since. E. Bartlett made partner a year before Lyman, and he’s never forgotten it. The lengths to which the two go to stab each other in the back are legend.

Georgia takes the cigarette out of Danielle’s hand and stubs it out. “Well, the impossible has occurred. They were knocking back a bottle of single malt and grinning from ear to ear.”

It doesn’t take a clairvoyant to know what’s happening. Her absence has so pissed off E. Bartlett that he’s agreed to let Lyman’s boy leapfrog her. She wraps her sweater tighter around her. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

“No kidding,” says Georgia. “I also overheard one of Lyman’s lackeys saying that Lyman didn’t trust E. Bartlett farther than he could kick him. It would be just like E. Bartlett to put on a great friendship act with Lyman and then totally screw him over at the partners’ meeting.”

Danielle feels a flicker of hope and grabs Georgia’s hand. “It would be just like him, wouldn’t it?”

“True.” Georgia gives Danielle’s hand a firm squeeze, but something is very wrong with her voice. “Look, E. Bartlett isn’t all you have to worry about. The scuttlebutt is that the partners met last week and decided that, due to financial concerns and low billable hours, they’re considering firing some associates.”

“What?”

“The goal is to get rid of four of us by January,” she says softly.

Danielle’s heart lurches until she runs the numbers through her head. “Well, at least you and I are in the clear. We’re the top producers of the whole damned section.”

“Exactly—and the most expensive.” Georgia sighs and hands her a piece of paper. “There’s more. I got a copy of the latest musings of the partnership committee yesterday—from the trash can of E. Bartlett’s secretary.”

Danielle doesn’t comment on Georgia’s methods. “And?”

“And …” Georgia draws a deep breath. “You’re up—or you’re out.”

CHAPTER NINE

Danielle sits in a battered vinyl chair, jacked up with a hydraulic thing so the flashy hairdresser with the flaming red lipstick can get a good look at her. Country music blares as the woman pops her gum and delivers her verdict.

“Cut.” She wheels Danielle around. “Perm.”

Danielle sees her eyes in the mirror, as large and wild as a religious zealot who shows up on your doorstep to pray for your soul. Oh, well, she thinks. Drastic times require drastic measures. She nods her assent.

After Georgia left, Danielle worked like a madwoman, making client calls; following up on court and deposition dates; catching up on her billing records. Georgia’s visit struck terror into her heart. She has to make partner. If she doesn’t, there will be no way to fund Maitland’s expenses, much less the special schools and future treatment Max may need.

She is bleary-eyed by the time Marianne shows up at her door and asks if she would like to escape for a while. Danielle grabs her bag and hops into Marianne’s car. They laugh and chat their way across town to a small beauty shop with the name Pearl’s above the door in faded red letters. Danielle so thoroughly enjoys herself that when the pedicures are over, she lets Marianne whirl her in front of a mirror and convince her that it is definitely time to take a serious stab at personal grooming. Besides, Danielle wants to look her best when she has dinner with Tony tonight. She has a brief consultation with Pearl, drops into a chair and surrenders herself to the process.

The scissors are sweet as they slice through her hair. So true, so simple. The acrid solution on her head is shockingly cold. Under the dryer, she falls into a trance. Pregnant with Max, she sees him through the translucent onionskin that is her stomach. He is a tiny fetus, perfectly formed, eyes closed. Red and blue veins interlineate his little body. He curls around them, waiting to come out. Wine-colored blood and magenta amniotic fluid flow seamlessly from mother to son in primal grace. She rubs her stomach under the warm air.

Relaxed, she lets her mind wander to Tony and their dinner tonight. Will they make love again? A warm blush suffuses her body as she considers the possibility. She lets herself fantasize about a holiday with Tony—on a sandy beach somewhere in the Caribbean, the glistering azure of the waves lapping before them as they lie with their arms entwined like teenagers exploring a first love. After that, Tony will make regular trips to New York, where they will see plays, cook extravagant dinners and eat them in bed while watching old movies on television. Max will adore him, and Tony will happily be the father he has never had. She can almost see the glittering diamond on her finger and the look on Tony’s face as he lifts her veil to kiss her …

“Done!” The redhead raps on her plastic helmet, takes her to the sink and rinses her hair. Plastic rollers plop into the bowl like hard rocks that clack against one another at the base of a waterfall. After a fierce blow-drying, she twirls Danielle around. “Terrific. You’ll love it.”

Danielle looks at the woman in the mirror. Her mouth forms a horrified O. She ignores the fact that her face is the color of powdered sugar and that exhaustion has worn deep ruts under her eyes. She squints at the new, close-cropped curls that have turned her head into a battleground. After a long moment, she decides they look like the crazy cockscomb of an electrocuted rooster.

“Don’t you worry none, sugar,” says Pearl. “Everybody thinks they’re a little different-lookin’ after a perm.” She pulls an odd tool from her cart. It is some type of flat, metal comb with long spikes. She stabs and picks at the tight curls, her gum snapping nonstop until she reaches the desired effect. She hands the comb to Danielle. “A girl’s best friend! Almost—if you know what I mean, honey!”

CHAPTER TEN

Danielle takes a deep breath. She barely caught the early flight out of Des Moines. E. Bartlett’s secretary called her yesterday afternoon to inform her that the partners’ meeting had been moved up a day. She saw Max before she left. He seemed a bit odd and flat, but stable. She also cancelled dinner with Tony by leaving a message at the front desk. She has to focus completely on her real life and, unfortunately, he doesn’t fit into that category—yet.

Danielle hears the ping of her heels as they march across the marble floor. Her firm is in one of the oldest buildings on Wall Street, and its cool silence calms her. She takes the elevator upstairs. The receptionist smiles in greeting, her eyebrows rising suddenly as she stares at Danielle’s hair. Nodding curtly, Danielle walks down the hallway and stops to collect herself. She takes a deep breath and opens the door. She takes in the large room on the forty-second floor and the thirty male partners of Blackwood & Price, an old-line bastion of the post–Second World War law firms. She studies the high gloss of the conference table, made of burled wood harvested from a special grove in South America. On top of the table is an impressive floral arrangement, an antique china and silver service for fifty, and a gourmet lunch catered by one of Manhattan’s trendiest restaurants. At this point in the deliberations, stout coffee is being poured—a prerequisite for clear thinking after the wine that was served with the meal. There is a shuffling of papers and a few blurred coughs, the inevitable flotsam of decision making.

The partners around the table are not so different from those of any major law firm. There are the rainmakers, who expect routine ass-kissing and stupefying bonuses; the worker drones, who grind out hours on cases they are given; the young partners, who do the real work the senior partner has promised the client would be done only by him; the branch-office partners, bastard stepchildren; and the lazy remainder, a minority contingent with no major clients of their own who play resident sycophant to the powerful and, of course, who prostitute their votes on close decisions—like partnership.

A voice rumbles across the room. “Good afternoon, Danielle.”

Danielle looks up and smiles despite her nervousness. It is Lowell Stratton Price III, the head of the executive committee. It is he who was mentored by the great admiralty and international lawyers—the ones who marched off to Europe and Scandinavia after the Second World War and cornered the shipping business. With silver hair and intelligent eyes, he commandeers the firm by virtue of the respect all accord him. Lowell Price will be fair.

“Hello, Mr. Price.”

“Lowell, please.” He gestures to the hot seat at the end of the massive table.

“Thank you, Lowell.” In old-line New York firms, it is an unspoken rule that an associate may refer to a partner by his first name only when he or she has become a partner among the anointed. Maybe it’s a good sign, she thinks. She crosses the room and sits, hands folded, as if she were in court, ready to jump and object. She glances at the partners around the room. They look neither pleased nor displeased. No one notices her strange hair. They’re far too self-absorbed.

“Danielle, we have spent the morning discussing the fine associates who are up for partner this year,” he says. “We have interviewed the other candidates and are now opening the floor to partners who have questions they would like to pose to you. I understand you’ve been somewhere in … Idaho, is it? On personal business?”

Danielle stifles a groan. “Iowa. And yes, I have taken a few weeks off to attend to a personal matter, but I plan to be back in the office shortly.”

“Of course, of course,” says Price. She knows he is trying to cushion the glare of white paper—the blank time entries of the past few weeks. She’s had all she can handle just putting out fires on her cases. Even though she has worked as hard as she can, she knows that her concerns about Max have impacted her focus. Because of this, she did not feel justified in charging her clients for much of her time. She can almost read the other partners’ minds. No time, no money. No money, no partnership. This is where E. Bartlett, if he had a shred of honesty secreted away in that monumental ego of his, should step in and sing her praises. She looks at him, but he doesn’t meet her eye. In fact, he is flipping through a magazine. The message is clear: she’s on her own. “I don’t have your numbers in front of me, Danielle, but perhaps you could tell us what they are and some particulars about your practice.”

God bless him, thinks Danielle. He’s giving her an open door to toot her own horn. She sits up straight and puts on her game face. “Thank you, Lowell. I have billed thirty-two-hundred hours this year and believe I have shown sufficient drive and commitment to become a partner in this firm. In addition to my billable hours, my success in the Baines case resulted in a multimillion-dollar windfall to the firm. I have also generated new, significant clients whose collective billings represent an additional million dollars of the firm’s gross revenue.”

There is a rustling of paper. Danielle knows the partners are checking her figures.

“You are a very bright, young attorney, and your work ethic is extremely impressive,” says Lowell. A murmur of what Danielle hopes is assent drones around the table. “Well, I am getting impatient looks from some of the other partners, so I’ll let Ted Knox have the floor.”

Danielle stiffens. Knox is a short man—with all of the attendant complexes—and a Lyman toady. Knox relies on Lyman to throw him the bulk of his cases. Without him, Knox couldn’t get a job as a paralegal. What really worries her is that he’s also a drinking buddy of E. Bartlett’s. If Lyman and E. Bartlett are truly in cahoots, Knox is the perfect pit bull. E. Bartlett flips to another page in his magazine. Danielle feels a sharp pressure behind her eyes.

Knox clears his throat and squints at her with his pale, gray eyes. “Thank you for taking time to talk to us, Danielle. We regret that your personal problems—whatever they are—have kept you from the office for so long. Actually, some of us, many in fact, have reservations about your bid for partnership.” He gives Lyman a sly grin. “Now, as Lowell mentioned, no one is knocking your hours. You’re a good producer—a good associate. But I’m sure you agree that it takes more than long hours to be a partner at Blackwood & Price.”

Danielle wants to ask him if the primary criteria include the presence of a penis. She holds her tongue.

“I’ll just lay it out on the table.” His voice is pedantic. “First, we don’t typically consider associates who have been with us less than ten years. You’re only in your sixth year. Second, most of us are not familiar with your work, a problem not of your own making, of course, but a problem nevertheless. Third, although you have demonstrated some marketing ability, the marketing in this firm is done by partners, and partners alone.”

Danielle grips the side of her chair until her knuckles are white. She wants badly to respond, but has to make sure the little weasel is finished first.

Knox’s voice is now syrup, as sticky as the outdated pomade he smears onto the three remaining hairs on his pate. “Let me move on to one of the most troubling aspects of your proposed partnership.”

“And that would be?” she asks.

“Michael Sterns.”

Danielle’s mouth goes dry, but she manages to speak. “Michael Sterns is my client, as you know. I brought him into the firm three years ago, and the multi-jurisdictional class action I’m working on for him is, and will continue to be, extremely lucrative for the firm. In fact, that case alone has generated almost $350,000 in the past nine months.”