desk clicking his stapler so that staples flew randomly all over the carpet.
“Sure, Girlie. Don’t worry,” Reese said as he wrapped his arm protectively around my shoulders. “Stick with me and you’ll be just fine. Buckle your seat belt, baby. Today I’ll teach you how to work the phones.”
ON WEDNESDAY THE FOLLOWING WEEK Chick pointed at me early in the morning and said, “Girlie, you need to update these models for us. We need the new currents on the sheet, and remove any bonds that rolled out of the basket this cycle. I want them to be cleaner. Also, work in the forward drops for the swap curve. I want to see the three-month, six-month, and one-year forward rates as well as the spot rates. Why don’t we have that?”
“I don’t know, Chick,” I replied honestly. If only because I had no idea what he was talking about. “I’ll get to work on them. When do you want them by?”
“Tomorrow. I’m leaving for a golf tourney. Reese taught you how to use the phones, right?”
“Yeah. I know how to work them,” I said. Which was true. I originally thought Reese’s offer to give me a phone tutorial was a complete waste of time. I was a girl, for God’s sake. I was well versed in phones and all their functions. Until I realized that the phone system at Cromwell was slightly more advanced than the cordless phone I’d had in my room in high school. The Cromwell phone system was more complicated than anything I had ever seen. It had various types of lines: inside-only; outside-only; direct-to-client; desk-to-desk (New York office and our desks in other cities in the United States and overseas). A few phone lines were labeled with abbreviations I didn’t understand and that Reese told me not to “worry” about; I never touched those. They scared me. I had stayed late after my coaching session with Reese, calling my mom and Liv and seeing if I could, in fact, mute them, disconnect them, place them on hold, conference them, or transfer them to each other without accidentally hanging up on one of them. It took me two hours to get it right. Don’t tell anyone that.
“Good. Sit at my desk while I’m gone. I left the models up on my screen so you can work on them from my desk. Touch my e-mail and I’ll kill you, but the team will need help with the phones. There are a lot of people out today for some reason and without me they’ll need an extra set of hands. Pick up the outside lights only. No client directs. Capiche?”
“Sure, Chick. No problem.”
“Good. See you in the morning.”
I slid into Chick’s chair, closed down his e-mail, and looked at the models on his monitor. He wanted them fixed by tomorrow. Wonderful. I prayed that the day would be quiet and I’d be able to spend all twelve hours working on the models. I still didn’t understand all the market jargon and my Excel skills sucked, so figuring out how to fix these formulas was going to be painful.
The morning was fairly quiet, and the rest of the team had no problem fielding occasional phone calls while I worked on Chick’s models. I spent hours working on the sheet, dissecting each formula symbol by symbol, and I was beginning to make progress. Then, somewhere around 3:00 P.M., things went crazy.
Hit ringing line, I mentally instructed myself. The night I had stayed late at work calling my friends and family suddenly seemed worthwhile. I wish they had taught a class on it at UVA. I’d have felt a lot more confident.
“Cromwell, this is Alex.”
“Alex, my car isn’t here. I’m waiting outside the clubhouse with my clubs and my car isn’t here. I look like a goddamn caddy. You ordered me a car, right?”
Oh shit. “Hey, Chick, yeah, I did. I’ll call the car company right now and find out where it is. Give me one second, okay?”
“Grrrr,” he grunted. I think that was a yes. Press hold, press left headset, dial number on the Post-it stuck to the side of Chick’s keyboard.
“Hi, yes, I’m calling to check on a town car I ordered for a pickup at Baltusrol Country Club, confirmation number 8625 … Uh-huh, okay, ten minutes? How bad is the traffic though, because this is my boss and he has a very low tolerance for employees who lie to him. So if ten minutes is really twenty minutes, I need you to tell me. Okay, fine, ten minutes. Yes. Thanks.” Clear line, hit right headset, hit line. “Hi, boss, I just spoke to them. They said there’s some traffic, but the car will be there in ten minutes.”
“Fine.”
Click. Chick hung up. Another light flashed. Hit ringing line. “Cromwell, this is Alex.”
“Oh Christ, it’s you,” an all-too-familiar voice said, agonized that she had the misfortune of speaking to me.
“Hi, Kate, can I help you with something?”
“You can try, although your being successful is a low probability event.”
I energetically gave the receiver the finger. “I need a reservation at Le Bernardin tonight for four people at 6:30. I’m going into a customer meeting in Midtown. Get me the reservation and e-mail my BlackBerry.”
Le Bernardin? That’s one of the most popular restaurants in the city. The freaking mayor can’t get in there with three hours’ notice. “Kate, I’ll call, but I don’t know if …” Click. Kate hung up.
I grabbed the Zagat’s restaurant guide out of Chick’s top drawer and looked up the number for the most popular restaurant in town.
Hit light, dial number. “Hi, I’m calling from Cromwell. I was wondering if it would be possible to get a reservation for tonight for four people at 6:30?”
The hostess laughed rudely. “I’m sorry, we are fully booked for the next four months. If you like, I can get you in at five thirty or ten o’clock on December twenty-ninth.”
“I know, but this is for Kate Katz, who I doubt you know, but I assure you she is a very important person at Cromwell Pierce.” (Read: psycho hose bitch.) “Is there anything you can do?”
“I’m sorry, no. Please hold.”
Click. The hostess hung up. Le Bernardin must have the same phone system as Cromwell.
The phone rang again. Hit flashing light. “Alex, this is Cromwell.” Wait no, that’s not right. “I mean, Cromwell this …”
“My car still isn’t here, Alex!” Chick yelled before I could finish clarifying that my name wasn’t Cromwell and I didn’t work at a firm named Alex. I checked my watch. It had only been five minutes, not ten.
“Okay, boss, umm, sorry. Hold, I’ll call them back right now.” Clear line, hit left headset … oh shit. I was supposed to hit hold in there somewhere.
I accidentally hung up on Chick. I’m dead. Another line rang.
“HELP ON THE LIGHTS!” I screamed in panic the way ER doctors yell for crash carts. Drew threw on his headset and picked up the phone.
I called back the car company. “Hi, I just called looking for a car. Confirmation number 8625? I really need to know where this car is. Okay, it’s pulling in now? Great, thanks.”
I dialed Chick’s cell phone. “Yeah. It’s here, see you back at the office.” Click. He hung up.
“Alex,”
