Homebodies

by Tembe Denton-Hurst

Genres: African American Women's Fiction; LGBT Lesbian

Synopsis

’THIS BOOK IS SO FUN AND HOT AND EXCEPTIONALLY WRITTEN!!’

Reader review,⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

‘I melted into this book and loved every minute of it – if you're looking for a contemporary story of a queer black girl finding herself, you'll love this’ Reader review, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

‘Tembe’s characters are captivating. Her writing is sexy, honest, and powerful. I laughed, I cried, I NEED more’ Reader review, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

‘It's really powerful to show a raw, relatable character trying to decide if the career she's worked toward for her entire life is worth the pain it causes her’ Reader review, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

‘Mickey and her friends drew me in right away and it was so easy to see myself in her’ Reader review, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

* * *

She’s stayed quiet for too long.
Now it’s time to speak her truth.

Until twenty-four hours ago, Mickey Hayward was living the life she’d always dreamed of:

- Working as a full-time writer for a trendy media company (tick)
- In a committed, loving relationship (tick)

Now she’s fired, tossed aside for a younger, more ‘agreeable’ Black writer. Sick of being overlooked, she responds with an online letter detailing the racism she’s faced within the industry. And when a media scandal turns Mickey’s post into a viral sensation, suddenly everyone wants to hear what she has to say.

That’s what Mickey has always wanted – isn’t it?

* * *

Tropes:

· Coming of age
· Old flame
· Love triangle
· City girl/small hometown

Release date: May 2, 2023

Publisher: HarperCollins

Print pages: 352

Sample

One

The day that everything changes tends to feel like any other, at least at first—which is why Mickey hadn’t suspected anything when Chelsea Cooke asked her if she was going to that beauty event after work. The event was being thrown by a fancy fragrance brand known for peddling genderless perfumes that, to Mickey, smelled mostly like musky men’s deodorant with occasional hints of gardenia or jasmine or rose. She expected to slog through it like all the other events she attended, trading niceties with the other writers and editors until it was time for her to go home. She didn’t expect to find out that her job, the one she’d been doing for just shy of a year, was in jeopardy. This she would learn, over mixed drinks in a glass-walled penthouse overlooking the West Side Highway, from the very same Chelsea who had spoken to her all day as if she wasn’t harboring this kind of life-altering news.

Mickey should’ve known something was up when, an hour into the event, Chelsea pulled her to the side and said, “So I want to tell you something, but you can literally never tell anyone that it came from me.” But still, Mickey hadn’t suspected anything. Chelsea and Mickey had never been friends, never leaned into the Black girl camaraderie that she’d hoped for. Outside of the occasional knowing look during an All Hands meeting, which sometimes resulted in Mickey gawking at Chelsea and her impressively sleek silk press, they rarely spoke. Chelsea was closer with the girls on her team, fashion-types who, in a past life, were Midwest Christian-types born-again in fuzzy pink cardigans and Dries boots. But that didn’t stop people from thinking they were closer than they were or (admittedly, rarely) mistaking one for another. Mickey had hoped the tides were turning, that perception had somehow morphed its way into the truth. She thought the next words out of Chelsea’s mouth would be office tea: that someone was pregnant, or that their parent company, Bevy, was acquiring another digital property they had no business owning. Mickey nodded enthusiastically about keeping things secret and smiled conspiratorially, ignorant of her own demise. She’d even leaned in closer, so Chelsea wouldn’t have to speak so loudly.

“A friend, and I can’t tell you who,” Chelsea began, taking a sip of her freshly mixed drink and plucking a convenient-to-eat cone of ceviche from a cater-waiter with shimmering bronze skin, “told me that Nina reached out and mentioned that there would be an opening on your team in a few months.” She brought the cone to her mouth, and bit down. “For your role.”

Mickey’s chest seized violently at the news, but she held her face still, allowed a small “Oh” to escape from her lips. Chelsea continued to chew, staring at Mickey with an unreadable expression. It dawned on her that this wasn’t an act of friendship, but one of duty. She was looking out, and Mickey was grateful. It’s what she would do if the roles were reversed.

Now that Chelsea had gotten the big part out, the rest came easier. “My friend ignored her at first, but then Nina reached out again and asked for a meeting.”

Mickey’s mouth hung slightly open, and she felt the tears pressing at the back of her throat. They were tears of embarrassment, of incredulity, but she knew how they would read: as tears of despair. But she couldn’t cry here, in an apartment she could never afford with people she saw no less than three times a week. It would be the talk of post-event wrap-ups between PR girls dressed in tasteful black: that Mickey had cried into a lobster ceviche and they all had to turn the other cheek. The other writers and editors would talk, too, waiting until the next beauty event to place a gentle hand on her forearm and ask if everything was okay. Mickey refused to give them the satisfaction. This isn’t what she would be remembered for.

“Wow” was all she said. Twice, and then twice more, her voice thicker each time. She was surprised, given that just a few hours earlier, Nina had asked her to present a vision for the site’s beauty and culture vertical. It was due in a few days, and Mickey had believed there was a small chance she was getting a promotion. That maybe everything she’d been through thus far was a sort of test to see if Mickey could handle more.

“I know. It’s crazy. And my friend doesn’t want it because she’s happy where she is, but I just wanted to let you know so, you know,” Chelsea sprinkled the debris from her hands into a napkin and stuffed it in her drained drink, the garnish stuck to the bottom with the leftover ice.

“Yeah, I know.”

“I know this sucks.”

“It does, but are we surprised? Nina’s fucking incompetent and she never liked me anyway. You know she made me write a story twice, only to bury it with the help of her senior editor? And she didn’t even tell me. The senior editor felt bad and let me know.”

“They don’t like us, period,” Chelsea said with a nod of the head. Mickey hesitated to agree with that, because they very much liked Chelsea, who was a senior beauty editor at one of their sister sites. Although the two seemed worlds away online (Chelsea’s publication catered to white, middle-aged women with bank accounts that didn’t need checking and Mickey’s was aimed squarely at the daughters with whom they had strained relationships), they only sat three rows apart. But she nodded anyway, because us was the shorthand for Black women in general, which Mickey would say was accurate. At least most of the time. They took synchronized sips of their endlessly refillable mixed drinks and traded gossip before calling Ubers home, but the air remained heavy, the unease encasing every word.

“How far away is yours?” Chelsea asked, her face illuminated by the blue light of her phone. The sun had plunged into the Hudson River hours ago, and now they were all burdened by their glassed reflections, the shimmering lights of New Jersey blinking back at them.

Mickey stopped her frantic texting to check. She’d fired off an SOS text to her industry group chat, composed of interns turned editors, friendships forged by fire. “Two minutes, you?” She checked her messages and frowned at the thick blue block of text staring back at her. No reply.

“Same, let’s walk out.”

Mickey gathered her things—a branded tote bag she carried all her work stuff in and even more totes filled with all the random products she’d received over the past few days—single-word brands that stood out with curved, pointed fonts and bright, punchy hues. Mickey’s arm was a kaleidoscope of color. She headed for the door, and the bags sagged as she walked, weighing down her shoulder and cutting into her skin—a physical reminder that this was what she had asked for: the excess, the access, the burden.

“Hi ladies, did you enjoy the event?” a voice asked as they approached the exit. Mickey looked up from her phone to give the woman a once-over. She had a face she vaguely recognized and a name she was sure popped into her inbox at least once a day. Rows of identical, small black bags lined the floor behind her, continuing for what seemed like miles.

“Of course!” Chelsea gushed, and Mickey was reminded why Chelsea was beloved. She put in the effort to learn every PR person’s name and the brands they represented, took every deskside meeting and went to all the events, bringing in business for the company and flitting from one thing to the next with the kind of unflappable enthusiasm Mickey reserved for weekends spent in bed. Mickey was a writer, full stop, something she reminded people of when they asked why they rarely saw her at events like these, rubbing shoulders with other writers and editors rather than trying to get ahead on her work. Between her overflowing inbox (five hundred new messages since the morning), brainstorming her next big idea (the fumes from her last viral article had died down over a year ago and another would prove she wasn’t a fluke), and managing an untenable workload of three to four stories a day, she simply didn’t have the time. Had Chelsea only asked her to come because she wanted to tell Mickey she was being pushed out? Mickey felt a prickle at the back of her neck. Something didn’t feel quite right.

The voice produced two identical black bags, held outstretched and pinched between her well-manicured fingers. Mickey wondered briefly at the shade of pink dotting her hands, knowing they didn’t make such a pink for her skin tone. She stared down at her own hands, critical of the bare half-moons jutting out from the base of her nail beds. She was due for a fill.

“It was so good to see you, Malinda!” Chelsea said as she pulled Mickey toward the elevator, which only had two stops: this apartment, and the bottom floor.

“Yes, we should do lunch!” Malinda called back, with Chelsea nodding enthusiastically until they were hidden by steel and plummeting gently but swiftly toward the ground, Mickey slightly nauseous by the time they stepped out.

“It’s going to be okay girl,” Chelsea said before squeezing a handful of Mickey’s shoulder. Mickey tried not to cringe. The only thing she hated more than the implied pity of a shoulder squeeze was the pat pat of a sympathetic hug. “We’ve all been through some bullshit. And you’re still so early in your career and so talented. You’re going to be fine.”

“I just don’t get it,” Mickey said, dividing her attention between Chelsea and her driver, Vijay, who was supposedly parked at the end of the street. Or was it the other corner? She couldn’t be sure. All she knew was that the finality of Chelsea’s statement was unnerving. “She asked me to present a whole creative vision board for her like two days ago. I thought she was going to give me more to do. Not like I’m not drowning already but I just thought . . .”

Chelsea cut in. “Have you never seen Succession? That’s what the fuck they do. Bleed you dry and then cut you loose.”

Mickey nodded, rocking back onto her heels before pressing her feet firmly into the ground. She turned to face Chelsea. “Can you tell me who?”

Chelsea smiled a strange smile and adjusted the small black bag hanging delicately from her fingertips. “Sorry, I can’t. My friend made me promise not to say.”

Mickey resisted the urge to roll her eyes. She didn’t understand what difference it would make. “Okay,” she allowed. “Is she?” Mickey ran her finger over the back of her hand.

“She is,” Chelsea confirmed.

“Of course,” Mickey said. “Thanks for looking out, girl.”

“You know I got you, sis,” Chelsea replied in a tone that surprised Mickey. She’d never pegged Chelsea as a code-switcher, that her voice could drop half an octave at will and get syrupy with a shared knowing. Sis? Mickey thought. Interesting.

Mickey couldn’t tell if this was the beginning of something or the end. She thought of her potential replacement and cringed at the fact that she’d been so out of the loop, that she’d been caught so unaware. Then, that this new girl, Black like her, would likely meet a similar fate. She almost felt sorry for her, knowing what she was walking into: a once-cool and edgy publication now wholly dependent on clicks, chasing virality and relevancy rather than figuring out what they had to say. But the name still held weight. It had been weighty enough to keep Mickey transfixed, wanting, badly, for things to work out. The tears pressed at the back of her throat, more insistent this time, and Mickey swallowed them, hard.

She looked at Chelsea with new eyes, took in her sleek hair (today wound up into a perfectly messy bun), and the fluff of her sweater. Examined the height of her heel, and the curve of her jaw. Before this very moment, Mickey had admired her, been jealous even. Now, she wanted to kick her back to the white women she prayed to.

She checked her phone again. Still nothing from the group chat.

A black Toyota Camry pulled up in front of the building.

“Smart,” Mickey commented. “I should’ve had him pull around.”

Chelsea pulled open the door and ducked her head inside. “Roberto? Okay great.” She looked back at Mickey as she eased into the car and waved. “Bye! Love you!”

Mickey forced herself to wave but she couldn’t force herself to say love you, too. She did not love Chelsea, not even a little bit, and hated that the word had become a platitude.

As soon as Mickey shut the door of the Uber, the tears came. She cried all the way back to Astoria, grateful Vijay hadn’t looked into the rearview mirror to ask if she was okay or turned up the music louder to drown out her sobbing. She knew she looked pathetic, but didn’t even bother to wipe her face clean, tears marking her cheeks.

It wasn’t long before they pulled up to her apartment building, a boxy taupe-colored structure with a brick façade and very little curb appeal. It was populated with a mix of families who had lived there for over a decade and people like Mickey, who had snapped up the newly renovated units at a premium price. She tried to gather herself before getting out of the Uber, and then remembered she had arrived at the one place she didn’t have to perform.

She thanked her driver and took a moment to let the last bite of spring chill cool her skin. She would be okay either way.This is what she told herself as she stepped into the elevator, trying to talk herself down as she inched closer to her apartment. She reached the fifth floor, took a deep breath, and was nearly composed by the time she turned the key in apartment 504.

Mickey opened the door and found her partner, Lex, on the other side. She didn’t turn her head toward Mickey—she was in her own world, her headphones plugged into her ears, the music so loud that Mickey could hear the tinny bassline from across the room. She was dancing while she cooked dinner, moving her smooth, thin limbs in time to the beat. Mickey wanted to keep crying and wallowing, but she was distracted by her woman and the ease with which she moved. It was clear that Lex was not having a terrible day. She was having the kind of day that allowed her to shake her hips and glide across their hardwood floor.

Mickey took her in: Lex was in her house clothes—a T-shirt and a pair of bright red mesh shorts—which were covered by an apron cinched at the waist, stained from her many colorful concoctions, yellow-green curries and sauces that refused to come out in the wash. It was evidence of her alchemy, her ability to turn raw materials into something more. Her curly brown hair, kinks smoothed by smears of gel and a mixed Jamaican heritage, was tied back into a bun, showing off her features. Her high cheekbones pointed toward her slanted, almond eyes, which were framed by dark lashes longer than they had any business being, even without mascara, which she never wore. Her hands, delicate but strong, gripped a pair of metal tongs, the small veins pulsing with effort. She twisted her wrist, twirling something unseen in the pot. From the smell of it, Mickey guessed pasta—something buttery and garlicky and fresh.

When she noticed Mickey, her shoulders hopped up to her ears in surprise. Then a smile, which reached her eyes. Lex paused her cooking and wiped her hands on a nearby dish towel, then she crossed the room to greet Mickey at the door, their cat, Mango, at her heels.

Her girls.

Mickey inhaled deep. The sight of her family was enough to make her come undone. Tears gathered at the side of her eyes now, and she couldn’t tell if she wanted to cry because of the day’s happenings or the fact that Lex had cleaned up while Mickey was gone, disappearing the random pile of clean, unfolded laundry from the morning into the closet and hiding Mickey’s overflowing piles of product samples from view. Lex had even vacuumed the massive rug that covered most of their living room, a checkered brown and cream Moroccan rug that Mickey had seen on Chelsea’s Instagram story. It had cost too much money, but Mickey liked the feel of it in between her toes. Her credit card liked how much interest it accrued.

The bookshelf, crammed with books by Black women and theoretical texts she hadn’t cracked open since college, had been dusted and tidied, the plants misted, and the vinyl collection rejiggered, the previous display of Earth, Wind & Fire; Peter Tosh; and Rihanna’s Anti swapped out for Cleo Sol, SZA, and EarthGang.

The overhead lights were off in favor of the orb lamps that Mickey had dotted throughout the house, their apartment awash in a warm, low-wattage glow. It was hard to see at times, but it was a vibe. Jill Scott crooned through the speakers, serenading them about how good loving had the power to transform even the most basic routine. Jill was moaning the word griiiits when Mickey let the tears spill.

She almost forgot why she was crying but the heavy tote bags cutting into her shoulder reminded her: her life as she knew it was coming to an end and she was powerless to stop it. Mickey’s shoulders drooped dramatically, the tote bags sliding from her body and onto the floor with a jumbled thump. Mickey winced at the sound, sure that at least one of the items in her many bags was glass.

“Aw baby,” Lex said to what Mickey was sure was a pitiful sight, her face twisted in anguish, body slumped. This wasn’t the first time Mickey had met Lex at the door like this, defeated by her day, worried she’d be fired. A few weeks ago, Mickey had only posted two stories instead of three, and Nina made sure to check in on her progress multiple times a day, avoiding Mickey in person and only communicating with her via Slack. Then she’d been left off an important meeting invite, and she became certain that it was the end for her. She had sounded every alarm bell: calling her best friend Scottie, texting the group chat, putting out soft feelers to other publications. But that had been an accident—a new assistant who was typing too quickly. Or maybe it wasn’t an accident but a warning sign. Unless this was just another false alarm?

Lex pulled her close, standing on her tiptoes to kiss her on the forehead and cheeks, her mouth slick with olive oil and lemon.

“Why do they have my baby crying on a school night?” she asked, running the pads of her thumbs over Mickey’s full, soft cheeks, attempting to remove the streaks. She ran a hand over Mickey’s braids and brought her face close before sticking out her little pink tongue and licking Mickey’s cheek. “Salty.” This is what Lex always did, fixed Mickey’s messes without making her feel bad for fucking things up in the first place. She spoiled her rotten, so rotten that after half a decade together it had become their dynamic—Mickey announcing her pain or her needs or her struggles and Lex doing everything in her power to make it all all right.

Mickey pushed Lex’s face away and laughed. “Stop licking me.”

“Oh please, you like it,” Lex countered, giving the other cheek a lick for good measure and kissing her there, too. “But what’s up? Did Nina pull some bullshit in the pitch meeting again?” Lex fished her phone from her apron. “You didn’t text me, right? I was cooking dinner.”

Mickey was tempted to fall into the routine of their evening—the kisses upon greeting followed by dinner and a show (they were on season four of Downton Abbey), which they half-watched while scrolling and futilely attempting to catch up on the following day’s emails—but something else was pressing. She could feel the weight of Chelsea’s admission on the tip of her tongue, fighting its way from her lips.

“I didn’t,” Mickey confirmed. “They’re going to fire me.” She announced it with a heaving sigh, disappointed to find Lex’s mouth twisting into a sort of wry smile.

“You say that every week.”

“Well, this week’s different.”

“How?” Lex asked, turning her back to Mickey and migrating to the kitchen, as if some internal timer cued her to the pasta.

Mickey toed off her sneakers before continuing inside, peeling off her coat and hanging her keys on the small hook in the entry. She slumped onto the couch and Mango immediately hopped into her lap, stretching her small body backward before settling into the shape of a burrito, all four paws tucked underneath her fluffy orange body.

“I brought you perfume from the event, it smells really good,” Mickey called out, even though there was no need. Thanks to the construction of their boxy, awkwardly configured apartment, the kitchen was still the living room. There was an island separating the space, a wood structure they’d purchased at IKEA almost immediately after moving in two years ago. It was clear there used to be a wall where the island sat now, the scents once so fragrant the walls were necessary to soak some of that up. The new developers did away with all that, the open concept floor plan assuming that anyone willing to spend upward of two thousand dollars a month for a mail room, white subway tile, and stainless-steel appliances must not be cooking anything that couldn’t be eliminated with the flicker of a scented candle. Lex sometimes cooked like that, Jamaican curry or fried dumplings or saltfish scenting the room and slipping under the door and into the hallway. Mickey’s concoctions, on the other hand, rarely involved fire.

Mickey picked up her phone to check the group chat. She reread her message, a frantic missive asking if anyone had heard about Bevy hiring new writers, tossing in that there’d been murmurings about another round of layoffs. She was intentionally vague, obscuring her real fears with emojis, exclamation points, and lowercase letters. It dawned on her that Chelsea was in this chat, too. That she had seen Mickey’s text while she took her own Uber home. Had possibly shook her head at the message, realizing that Mickey was both spooked and distrustful of the information Chelsea had slipped to her. That Mickey had failed to act cool. It was an unspoken breach of their tenuous sisterhood, and Mickey was unsurprised that whatever they’d built just a few hours ago was already falling apart. Their relationship was fraught, tinged with an undercurrent of fear and envy. They were as jealous as they were admiring. As dismissive as they were close. It was a balancing act, and Mickey found herself complaining about Chelsea and wanting to be her in equal measure.

She should’ve just texted her best friends. Mickey pressed her lips into a thin line and though she knew it to be impossible, googled how to unsend a text.

“Hello?” Lex asked between stirs of a wooden ladle, frowning her disapproval at Mickey’s head buried deep in her phone. “Are you going to tell me or am I going to have to text you to get a response?” she asked before turning back to the cooking.

Mickey looked up, the beginnings of frustration blooming in her hands. She hated when Lex used that half-joking tone to communicate her needs, sarcastic and verging on scolding. It made Mickey feel like a kid who did a bad thing.

“Sorry,” she said offhandedly, deciding now was not a good time to pick a fight. Not when her dinner was in Lex’s hands and what she wanted more than anything else was to feel her girlfriend’s fingers raking across her scalp. “I got distracted. Nina sent me an email.” This was a lie, but a plausible one.

Lex made a show of checking the time and shook her head, exposing a flash of her neck. Mickey loved that neck, which was sturdy and sure. Her mane of brown curly whirly hair was often tied back into a quick ponytail, hiding the shaved underside and a tiny tattoo they’d both agreed was a bad decision: her full name, Lennox, in delicate, typewriter script. People often spoke of having a good head on one’s shoulders, but Lex had a good neck. A sniffable neck that always smelled of vanilla almond body wash, a whisper of cologne, and a skin scent she couldn’t name but wished could be bottled up. She wanted to be buried in that neck right now, but there was the matter of what Chelsea had said.

“Chelsea basically told me so at the event,” Mickey began, pressing her head into the back of the couch. “She said Nina is going around saying the role will be open in a few months.”

Lex stopped stirring and Mickey knew the shock had registered. “Wait, what?” She turned to face Mickey. “That’s OD.”

“Now you see why I cried all the way home.” Mickey rubbed Mango harder now, waiting for the temperamental cat to spring from her lap and onto the floor. It didn’t take long for the cat to take her leave, digging her claws into Mickey’s thighs on the way down.

“The fact that she’s making you do that dumbass presentation makes it worse.”

“Exactly,” Mickey said. She picked up her phone before putting it down. Still nothing.

“So, what exactly did Chelsea say?”

Mickey did her best to relay things in clearheaded detail, but the conversation felt foggy and just beyond her reach even though she’d been with Chelsea an hour ago. She painted their conversation in broad strokes, emphasizing that Chelsea had refused to say who was being courted, which Lex pointed out was strange.

“Aren’t y’all supposed to look out for each other? What’s the point of all the Black girl magic kumbaya shit if she won’t give you the details?”

Mickey nodded in agreement. “I’m saying! Like why be all weird and just tell me half the story. I guess it doesn’t matter who the girl is, but now it makes me suspicious of everybody.” Mickey remembered the group chat and her empty stomach lurched.

“But then I kind of fucked up.”

“What you do?” Lex asked. She turned off the stove’s flame and drained some of the water into a separate pot, leaving the pasta noodles quivering while she whipped up a sauce to drown them in. A basic alfredo became something more refined, as Lex sautéed some minced garlic and butter before adding in a few sun-dried tomatoes, a handful of fresh Parmigiano-Reggiano, a dash of oregano, and a few shakes of salt and pepper. Lex always had a way of making the ordinary a little more interesting, taking what she had and fine-tuning it to suit her needs.

“I asked the group chat if they knew anything.”

“The big one with all the Black girls?” Lex asked. “Isn’t Chelsea in that one?”

Mickey nodded before burying her head in her hands, her elbows digging into her doughy thighs.

“Damn, babe. I mean that’s not that serious though,” Lex replied. “Everybody mutes their group chats anyway.”

“It is that serious!” Mickey insisted. “Now it looks like I’m trying to figure out who the girl is or like I’m pressed.”

“Okay, I could see that.”

“You think they’re talking shit about me?” Mickey asked.

“Definitely not,” Lex replied, and she sounded sure. So sure that Mickey nearly believed her, or maybe it was the aroma of the pasta and her gurgling stomach distracting her from the dilemma at hand. But even a signature Lex home-cooked meal couldn’t make her forget that unemployment was hurtling toward her at full speed.

“I should’ve known when she fired Jordan three months ago,” Mickey said, pulling herself from the couch and relocating to their kitchen. She leaned up against the island. “It was only a matter of time before they got me, too.” Mickey thought back to when they’d packed up Jordan’s desk. She was the social manager for Wave, making sure their Instagram had a distinctive voice and energy. She reposted celebrities looking attractive or being relatable or acting out with captions that made the reader nod or laugh at its absurdity. She was in charge of making their readers feel seen.

They fired Jordan the day after a pitch meeting, but Mickey had been too rattled to notice. Nina had responded to her three pitches (two of which were profiles of white ingénues Mickey knew Nina was obsessed with) with a grimace and a single word—“Interesting”—uttered in the kind of dismissive tone that Mickey had come to recognize as a no. It was subtle, but Mickey had picked up on it quickly. Her own high school had been populated with primitive Ninas—white girls who wielded their indifference like a superpower, breaking down their subjects with flat tones and bemused sighs.

That day, Mickey had been faced with her failure to—yet again—pitch something that would elicit Nina’s approval, the disappointment so severe that she barely noticed when Jordan’s stuff was carefully packed into a box. She didn’t even register Jordan’s absence until many days later, when she turned to ask her a question (“What was your braider’s name again?”) and was met with dead space. She was ashamed, but she’d gone right back to work. It hadn’t occurred to her to reach out or check in, which she still felt guilty about. Mickey wondered how long it would take for people to notice she was gone.

“You’d think they’d keep at least one Black person on the team, if only for the optics,” Mickey said with a laugh, reflexively looking at the brown of her skin, wondering if this time it would save her.

Lex wordlessly responded by pouring a glass of white wine and handing it to her by the stem. “I got this one at work,” she said. Mickey reached for a metallic gold coaster and placed the glass atop its corrugated surface.

“Ooh,” Mickey said after taking a languid sip, the wine sweet on her tongue. “It’s good.”

“I know, some brand sent a case to Davis and she started handing it out to everyone,” Lex explained without turning around. “Something about her making Forbes 30 under 30. She almost poured it down the drain because she didn’t want to be seen sipping anything other than Something Else.” She looked to Mickey for dramatic effect. “I started passing it out before she could get rid of it and then she started acting like it was her idea. Acting like we was supposed to be grateful when she owes us real money. She’s acting like that last fundraising round didn’t happen, but I’ve seen the receipts. She’s taking a Suburban everywhere and we can’t even expense an Uber home.”

Mickey grinned, grateful for the predictable change of pace. “You’re the one who turned down that cushy corporate job for the start-up. ...