She cleared her throat. “I understand the inclination, but first off, this place won’t change. This industry won’t change. And second, you need to be careful not to undo the hard work that women in my generation did to get things to where they are now.”
I pushed my spine up against the back of my chair, lifting my chin. “I appreciate the advice,” I managed.
Vivienne’s eyes narrowed. She uncrossed her legs and recrossed them, then enmeshed her fingers together in her lap. We stared at one another, anger boiling underneath our perfect posture and designer blouses.
She broke first, to my delight. Her tone was low and angry. “I gave everything I have so this place would invest in female associates. I swallowed my pride and fetched coffee so you’d get invited to board meetings and charity balls. I let clients sweat on me and drool over me so you could be here now and walk into Mike Baccard’s office and ask for firm funds to be allocated to the betterment of women in the workplace and he wouldn’t laugh you the fuck out of there.” She leaned back and smoothed her beige silk blouse into her navy pleated skirt, then readjusted her diamond drop necklace so it lay back in the center of her chest.
She has no idea why Mike didn’t laugh me out of his office, I thought. Not because she made great strides for women. It was because I almost got raped by a client. I tried to view her reaction more rationally. She was right, of course. I owed her and her generation a debt of gratitude for making the firm care about its diversity statistics and its ratio of female to male partners. But BigLaw, big business, had gotten off course somewhere, missing the mark entirely.
“I appreciate what you’ve done. But you must know things aren’t right around here. They’re better—in large part due to you. But they’re not good.” I watched her carefully and added, “And women like you and I would never settle for good enough.”
Her lip curled as she shrugged and plastered a small smile on her face, then grabbed her Moreau and rose from her seat. “Good luck to you, Alexandra. I mean it.”
“Oh, by the way, I always meant to tell you—I love your bag,” I said, standing to show her out. I hope everything you did to be able to afford it was worth it.
I arched my back, folded my arms, and turned to stare down at all the people scurrying about on the street below my window like ants. I heard a faint knock on my door.
“Come in!”
Anna poked her head in and stepped over the threshold. “If you need anything today, let me know,” she stammered. “I don’t mean to pry, but are you okay?”
“I am,” I told her with a small smile, appreciating her concern.
Anna pushed the door against the frame without shutting it all the way. “I’ve seen thousands of associates start here. Everybody gets tired. Everybody starts dressing better. Some get fat. Some get skinny. But you . . . you have a lunch with Mike Baccard on your calendar today.” She paused. “I’ve never seen somebody with so many important partners in her office in her first year.” I didn’t know what to say. It didn’t exactly feel like a compliment. Or a question. “You’re doing something right.”
“Or very wrong!” I looked at the ceiling and laughed.
Anna nodded, apparently having said what she came to say, and slipped back out to the hallway.
I turned back to my window, trying to work out what my view would be like from the fifty-sixth floor. I mentally placed myself in the office and oriented my mental image. It would be totally different. I’d be looking uptown.
Epilogue
Q.Do you currently represent Stag River or Gary Kaplan in any capacity?
A.My firm did until recently. I have not personally worked on a Stag River matter or for Gary Kaplan since my first year as an associate.
Q.Thank you, Ms. Vogel. That concludes our questions regarding your experience at Klasko & Fitch. Thank you for your candor. One last question, for the record: Do you know or have any relationship with the plaintiff, Sheila Platt?
A.No. Well, I understand she is Gary Kaplan’s longtime assistant, so it’s possible that at some point I spoke with her when I was working for Stag River. But no, no relationship I am aware of.
Q.Thank you, Ms. Vogel. That concludes our deposition. The questions and answers today will be typed up by the court reporter into a deposition transcript. You have the right to read the deposition and review the answers prior to signing a statement as to their accuracy.
A.Thank you.
Q.Trial is slated to begin on October 1st. We will be in touch about the day of your witness testimony. It is at the judge’s discretion whether you will be permitted to attend the entire trial. Do you have any further questions at this time?
A.No. Thank you.
I heard nothing except a tinny ringing in my ears as the judge banged her gavel. Her lips moved resolutely above the collar of her robe, but when they stopped, I thought I could detect disappointment in their slope. I inhaled sharply and looked at Gary, wishing I could hear anything at all. He hugged his attorney close before falling into a tearful embrace with his wife. His wife looked grave, as if she’d aged twenty years in the past few since I’d seen her at the Met. His daughter, now a young woman with long dark hair and an elegant long neck, hung back slightly, seeming to wrestle with something in her head, before leaning in and hugging her father. I wished desperately that they were saying goodbye to one another. But their tears were decidedly happy ones. They were celebrating.
Suddenly the courtroom cacophony rushed in on me—uproarious joy from some pockets and the silent endurance of agony from others. I was now painfully aware of the wooden bench digging into my backside, which was less padded than usual after a week of a stomach in knots and intermittent vomiting.
“Excuse me,” the couple to my right said, making their way into the aisle. They looked pleased. The woman was the female version of Gary. Must be his sister and her husband. Her calf-length mink coat brushed my legs, and her perfume pervaded the air around me, perverting it further, choking me.
I forced myself to stand and make my way out of the large, dark wooden doors and into the marble-floored hallway, staring straight ahead as people filed past me. I pushed my feet forward and into step with the crowd.
It had been futile. All of it. There’d been no purpose to my public recounting of that night, and the nights that led up to it, and the aftermath. No sweet end to reliving the bitter nightmare aloud to a room full of stoic strangers and unfeeling recording devices. Gary Kaplan’s poor secretary, who had accused him of rape, who had relied on me to provide convincing witness testimony, would have to live with the fact that he’d simply gotten away with it. He was innocent under the law. And in my world, the law was the only thing that mattered. I felt that the system had somehow failed me, and attempted to mollify my racing thoughts with the soothing idea of the women’s initiative, now successfully celebrating its third anniversary, but it did little to help.
I continued down the marble steps, avoiding the sideways glances and whispers from the people who’d seen me testify, and filed out of the double doors with the crowd, allowing the hibernal air to rouse me out of my trance. I moved off to the side of the courthouse steps, the sun forcing me to squint, and I suddenly felt, saw, and heard everything, as I began to process what had just happened in the courtroom. I had the sense of a bottomless black hole appearing below me, of being in free fall. I doubled over and pressed my palms into my bent knees to steady myself. I could hear my heart thudding.