From Brooklyn Baby
The first thing Diana heard was the bang.
Something struck the wooden floor beside her bed hard enough to drag her out of sleep.
Her eyes snapped open.
For several seconds, she didn’t move.
She didn’t know what time it was. She wasn’t entirely sure what day it was.
Then—
Bzzzzzt.
Bzzzzzt.
Bzzzzzt.
And judging by the slow, nauseating roll of her stomach, she wasn’t entirely convinced she was sober.
Bzzzzzt.
Bzzzzzt.
Her phone vibrated angrily against the floorboards.
Diana groaned and buried her face back into the pillow.
“No.”
The buzzing stopped.
Silence.
She exhaled.
Then it buzzed again.
“Oh, for God’s sake.”
She rolled toward the edge of the mattress and reached blindly toward the floor, fingertips sweeping uselessly over the wood.
Nothing.
Until she felt herself hit the floor.
“Damn!”
The phone continued buzzing beneath her.
Diana opened one eye.
That was immediately a mistake.
Her bedroom was still dark, except for the faint blue-grey light beginning to creep through the curtains. Her head throbbed behind her eyes. Her tongue felt approximately three sizes too large for her mouth.
She slid her hand under her tummy and finally found the phone.
The screen illuminated her face.
Miranda.
Diana stopped breathing.
That name sobered her faster than water ever could.
She answered.
“Hello?”
Her voice came out like she’d been smoking cigarettes for forty years.
“Diaana?”
Miranda sounded terrible.
Somehow, worse than she did.
Diana pushed herself upright.
The room shifted gently to the left.
She closed one eye.
“Miranda?”
“I need you to listen carefully.”
Diana glanced toward the clock.
4:47 a.m.
She stared at it.
“What happened?”
“I’ve been sick all night.”
Miranda paused, and Diana heard the unmistakable sound of someone swallowing nausea.
“I thought it would pass. It hasn’t.”
Diana rubbed her forehead.
“Do you need me to call a doctor?”
“No.”
Another pause.
“I need you to go to Saudi Arabia.”
Diana’s hand stopped moving.
“What?”
“With Mr. De Laurier.”
Silence.
The room no longer seemed to be spinning.
Diana stared straight ahead.
“What?”
“You heard me.”
“I thought I didn’t.”
“You did.”
Diana picked up herself.
“Ouch, ouch!”
Her foot landed on something cold and sharp.
She looked down.
A fork.
She stared at it.
Why was there a fork in her bedroom?
“Diana?”
“I’m here.”
“The aircraft leaves from JFK at six.”
She looked at the clock again.
4:48.
“Miranda, I—”
“I can’t get on that plane.”
“I know, but—”
“You prepared the Saudi briefing.”
“Yes.”
“You’re updated on the schedule.”
“Yes.”
“You’ve read the client files?”
“Yes.”
“The financial projections?”
Diana hesitated.
“Most of them.”
“Good enough.”
Good enough?
Miranda had never used those words in the entire time Diana had known her.
Diana walked a few steps.
Then immediately grabbed the edge of her dresser.
Definitely still a little drunk.
Perhaps.
Hopefully not.
“I’ve never travelled with him.”
“I know.”
“I’ve never been in a meeting with him.”
“I know.”
“I’ve barely spoken to the man.”
“I know, Diana.”
Miranda sounded distinctly unhappy about this too.
That wasn’t comforting.
Diana stared at herself in the mirror.
She looked horrifying.
Yesterday’s mascara had migrated beneath both eyes. She regretted, not for the first time, buying waterproof mascara. It took forever to get off sober.
Half of her hair had escaped the bun on top of her head. One little gold hoop still hung from her left ear.
The other was gone.
Argh, not again…
She lost them like she lost bobby pins.
She leaned in front of the mirror and felt she looked like someone had abandoned her behind a nightclub.
In an alleyway.
Behind a garbage bin.
“What the fuck happened last night?” she whispered to herself.
“Excuse me?”
Diana froze.
“Um—no, sorry, Miranda.” She cleared her throat. “I’m not sure I’m the right person.”
“You’re the only person.”
That quietened her.
Her chance had come sooner than she’d expected.
Much sooner.
Diana Brooks had been at De Laurier Beauty Group for only a few months. Officially, she was a junior executive assistant.
Unofficially, she was Miranda’s assistant.
Which made her the assistant to the personal assistant of Alexander De Laurier.
There was an important distinction.
Miranda travelled with Alexander.
Diana printed the itineraries.
Miranda sat inside the meetings.
Diana booked the rooms.
Miranda coordinated international negotiations.
Diana ran downstairs when someone needed three Calvin Klein sweatshirts immediately and discovered, after crossing half of Manhattan, that they were the wrong shade of grey.
When they asked her which Heather Grey at Calvin Klein, she panicked. She, of course, took the wrong one.
They were for a minimalist De Laurier skincare campaign.
Apparently, nothing said effortless beauty quite like a carefully selected designer sweatshirt.
Yesterday, she’d slipped on ice on the way back.
Straight onto her backside.
By the time she’d limped into De Laurier headquarters, her trousers were soaked through at the back.
One security guard had politely looked away.
The other hadn’t been fast enough.
“You okay, Miss Brooks?”
She had tightened her grip on the shopping bag.
“Never better.”
Her job was a hazardous zone.
A war zone.
And she wasn’t paid half as much as she deserved.
“When do I need to leave?” Diana asked.
“Now.”
Diana blinked.
“Now?”
“Be at JFK in thirty minutes.”
“Thirty minutes?”
“The aircraft departs in an hour.”
“I live in Brooklyn.”
“I’m aware.”
“I haven’t packed.”
“Three nights.”
“I haven’t showered.”
“Then I’d suggest moving very quickly.”
Diana looked at herself again.
“Miranda—”
“And Diana?”
“Yes?”
Miranda’s voice changed.
Not dramatically.
Just enough.
“Don’t keep Mr. De Laurier waiting.”
The call ended.
Diana stared at the screen.
Then the clock.
Then herself.
“Oh, shit.”
She moved.
Or tried to.
Her foot caught inside a pair of trousers lying beside the bed.
Diana pitched forward.
“Jesus—”
She landed hard on the carpet.
For one second she remained there, cheek pressed against the floor, hair across her face.
Exactly where she’d been several hours earlier.
Except then—
she’d been laughing.
Several hours earlier…
“I CAN’T GET UP!”
“Then stay there!”
Diana was sprawled across the carpet, laughing so hard her stomach hurt.
Layla was folded over the armchair.
Lara was sitting on the sofa with both hands over her face, mascara running at the corners of her eyes.
BANG.
All three froze.
Then—
BANG! BANG! BANG!
From the apartment next door.
A muffled male voice travelled through the wall.
“WOULD YOU KEEP IT DOWN?”
Layla covered her mouth.
Lara whispered, “He’s soooo angry.”
Diana whispered back, “I gathered that.”
“Some of us have WORK TOMORROW!”
Lara blinked.
“We have work tomorrow.”
The three of them broke down again.
The apartment looked like a crime scene.
Empty wine glasses. Shoes. Open cartons of Chinese food. A bottle of red wine balanced precariously near a stack of Vogue magazines. Someone’s jacket hanging from a lamp.
It had been months since the three of them had been together properly.
Layla was preparing for her bar exams.
Lara had recently passed her EPPP and had been insufferably pleased with herself ever since.
And Diana had been swallowed alive by De Laurier.
So when she’d finally had an evening free, they’d decided to behave like responsible professional women approaching thirty.
They’d ordered Chinese.
Then wine.
Then more wine.
Then music.
Then they’d decided Diana’s seven-year relationship deserved a formal psychological autopsy.
Lara had called it “closure.”
Layla called it “being nosy with credentials.”
Diana called it Tuesday.
Layla was now holding Diana’s phone.
“Oh my God.”
Diana, still on the floor, groaned.
“What?”
“She’s in Japan again.”
Lara leaned over.
“The matcha woman?”
“The matcha woman.”
Diana covered her face.
“Please don’t.”
Layla ignored her.
“She’s visiting a tea farm.”
“Of course she is,” Diana muttered.
Lara took the phone.
The photograph showed an impossibly healthy-looking woman standing in a field of green tea leaves, dressed in cream activewear with her dark hair swept into a glossy ponytail.
She was smiling beside an elderly farmer.
The caption beneath it went on for six paragraphs.
Lara scrolled.
“Apparently she flew to Japan to understand the spiritual relationship between matcha and mindfulness.”
Layla stared at her.
“What does that even mean?”
“I have a psychology licence and I don’t even know what that means.”
Diana reached for her wine.
“She’s committed. I’ll give her that.”
Layla looked at her.
“Don’t defend her.”
“I’m not.”
“You just complimented your ex-boyfriend’s mistress.”
“She’s not his mistress anymore. She’s officially his girlfriend now.”
Layla grimaced.
“Worse.”
Diana drank.
The cheating had ended things.
But it hadn’t destroyed them.
That was the embarrassing truth.
Phillip and Diana had been together for almost seven years.
Seven.
They’d met when Diana was barely an adult and simply... continued.
There hadn’t been some great sweeping love story holding them together.
There hadn’t been some enormous hatred either.
They’d become comfortable.
Routine.
Christmases.
Birthdays.
Shared passwords.
Sunday phone calls.
Automatic plans.
Eventually, Diana suspected they’d remained together because ending seven years sounded more exhausting than staying for an eighth.
Then Phil slept with someone else.
That was the final straw.
A fitness obsessive, naturally.
Phillip was a triathlete.
Run.
Swim.
Cycle.
Repeat.
Five in the morning training sessions. Protein powders. Recovery gels. Watches that knew more about his cardiovascular health than Diana did.
And apparently his perfect match wasn’t the woman who occasionally forgot lunch because she’d spent four hours comparing handbags online.
It was a woman who travelled internationally in search of superior matcha.
Layla continued scrolling.
“Oh—Phillip’s there.”
Diana groaned.
“Oh yea?”
“Oh yes.”
Lara leaned over.
Phillip appeared in the next photograph wearing cycling gear, one arm around Matcha Girl’s waist.
They looked disgustingly healthy.
Diana was eating a spring roll while lying horizontally on the floor.
She stared at the photograph.
“At least she has something going.”
The laughter faded.
Layla lowered the phone.
“Diana.”
“No, seriously.”
She sat up.
“Look at her. She’s ridiculous, but she’s doing something.”
“She drinks tea for money.”
“Exactly. She figured it out.”
Lara watched her.
Diana gestured around the apartment.
“I have an accounting degree from Penn and yesterday I spent forty-five minutes arguing about whether three sweatshirts were the right shade of Heather Grey.”
Layla frowned.
“How many shades of grey can there possibly be?”
“Apparently enough to ruin my afternoon.”
Lara snorted.
Diana pointed at her.
“Don’t.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I fell on ice for those sweatshirts.”
Layla laughed. Tried to contain it.
“My entire ass was wet.”
Diana began laughing too despite herself.
“I walked into the office looking like I’d pissed myself.”
Lara was crying again.
Diana grabbed a cushion and threw it.
“I hate you both.”
“No, you don’t.”
“I do.”
Layla wiped beneath her eyes.
“You have options, though.”
Diana’s smile faded.
She knew exactly what Layla meant.
Her father’s firm.
Brooks Accounting.
Small.
Respectable.
Safe.
He’d take her tomorrow.
He had always wanted her there.
In fact, that was the life Diana had been supposed to have.
Accounting degree.
Professional examinations.
Eventually taking over the firm.
Good husband.
Stable home.
Stable life.
Her father loved stability.
Diana loved clothes.
The conflict had started before she was old enough to understand why it mattered.
Her mother had encouraged it.
Little Diana could spend an hour dressing to go into town.
She coordinated ribbons.
Shoes.
Hair clips.
She checked everything twice.
Her father found it ridiculous.
Her mother called her their little princess.
By university, Diana wasn’t playing anymore.
She started a fashion blog at Penn.
She wrote between accounting lectures.
Runway reviews.
Fashion-house histories.
Designer profiles.
What made one luxury brand endure while another disappeared.
Eventually, she realised she didn’t simply enjoy fashion.
She understood it.
And she wanted in.
So when graduation came, she told her father she’d accepted a position in New York.
He’d been delighted.
“Alexander Forbes?”
Diana had swallowed.
“Yes.”
It was not Alexander Forbes.
More like Alexander De Laurier.
It wasn’t accounting.
It was a fashion and beauty house.
By the time her father discovered the truth, she was already in New York.
Their relationship had never quite recovered.
Seven years later, she was still there.
Still trying to prove she hadn’t run away for nothing.
Lara leaned forward.
“You could go back.”
Diana stared into her wine.
“I know.”
“Would you?”
She thought about her father’s office.
The quiet.
The predictable hours.
The respectable salary.
Numbers.
Tax.
Accounts.
A life where nobody called at four in the morning.
“No.”
The answer came too quickly.
Layla smiled.
“There.”
“There what?”
“You still want this.”
Diana sighed.
“I want fashion.”
“Then stop acting like you’re wasting your life because you’re not CEO yet.”
“I’m not asking to be CEO.”
“Good, because I think De Laurier already has one.”
Diana rolled her eyes.
Lara picked up the phone again.
“Back to the important issue.”
Diana groaned.
“No more matcha.”
“I have one question.”
“What?”
Lara studied the influencer’s photograph.
“Do you think she travels with her own whisk?”
Diana stared at her.
Layla whispered, “Absolutely.”
And that was it.
They collapsed all over again.
Music went a little bit louder – Best friend anthems.
Wine disappeared.
At some point Layla stood on the sofa.
At some point Lara tried to teach them a dance.
Something from TikTok – and she immediately regretted it.
At some point the neighbour hit the wall again.
At some point Diana sang loud enough to qualify as a public nuisance.
And at some point she fell.
Again.
They laughed until their stomachs hurt.
Until Diana couldn’t breathe.
Until Phillip, Matcha Girl, her father, her career and every stupid thing she’d worried about disappeared beneath noise and wine and friendship.
For one night, she didn’t have to know where her life was going.
She could simply enjoy it.
Now she was lying on the same carpet.
Alone.
Diana opened her eyes.
No laughter.
No music.
Layla on the couch.
Lara on the bed.
Just the pale beginning of morning and the faint smell of wine, takeaway food, old books and Chloé perfume.
“Thirty minutes.”
She scrambled up.
Her apartment looked slightly less disastrous than she remembered.
Someone had stacked the cartons.
The wine glasses had been moved near the sink.
A blanket had been folded over Layla.
She smiled.
Then remembered Saudi Arabia.
“Oh, shit.”
Five-minute shower.
No hair washing.
Absolutely not.
She scraped her hair into the neatest bun she could manage.
More like into the saddest bun.
Concealer.
Mascara.
Intense moisturiser.
She ran from her bathroom to her closet.
Black trousers.
White blouse.
Navy blazer.
Safe.
Professional.
Her suitcase was wedged beneath the bed.
She dragged it out.
It caught.
She pulled harder.
It released suddenly and nearly sent her backwards.
“No.”
She pointed at it.
I’m done falling.
Two nights.
Saudi Arabia.
She knew the itinerary.
Thank God.
Formal business meetings.
Dinner.
Presentations.
She started throwing things inside.
Cream blouse.
Black dress.
Another pair of trousers.
Closed shoes.
Flats.
Underwear.
Mini toiletries.
She stopped.
“Passport.”
Nothing was ever more terrifying than needing a passport immediately and having absolutely no idea where you’d last put it.
Then she remembered Mexico.
Two years earlier.
Green handbag.
She pulled it from the back of the wardrobe.
Passport.
“Oh, thank God.”
She kissed it.
Her phone vibrated.
Diana almost screamed.
A message appeared.
VEHICLE ARRIVING IN 3 MINUTES.
She stared.
“Vehicle?”
Of course Miranda had sent a car.
Diana zipped the suitcase.
Or tried.
She had to sit on it.
Victory.
She dragged the suitcase toward the front door.
Stopped.
Coffee.
No time.
Water.
She grabbed a bottle from the kitchen counter, took two large gulps.
She gripped the sink.
“Oh no.”
Nothing happened.
Good.
She might genuinely still be drunk.
That was information she chose not to process.
Her phone rang again.
Unknown number.
“Hello?”
“Ms Brooks?”
A man’s voice.
“Yes?”
“De Laurier security. Your car is downstairs.”
“I’m coming.”
“Mr De Laurier’s aircraft is scheduled for departure at six.”
“I know.”
A pause.
“We cannot delay departure.”
Diana looked at the clock.
5:18.
“Understood.”
She hung up.
Then stopped.
Looked around.
The tiny apartment.
Her magazines stacked beside the sofa.
Books overflowing from the shelves.
The wine glasses.
One abandoned heel.
The remains of what had been her first genuinely carefree evening in months.
Twelve hours earlier, she’d been lying on the floor laughing about the woman her boyfriend had cheated with.
Now she was flying to Saudi Arabia with Alexander De Laurier.
A man she’d barely spoken to.
A man whose decisions moved thousands of employees across continents.
A man Miranda had once described with the highest praise she ever seemed capable of giving:
He’s not difficult. He’s exact.
Diana grabbed her suitcase.
Opened the door.
Stopped.
Something wasn’t right.
She looked down at herself.
Blouse.
Trousers.
Shoes.
Bag.
Passport.
She sniffed.
Slowly closed her eyes.
“Deodorant.”
She ran back inside.
The elevator took forever.
Diana pressed the button repeatedly despite knowing that elevators didn’t respond to desperation.
Finally, the doors opened.
She dragged the suitcase inside.
The mirrored walls revealed a woman who looked considerably more respectable than she’d felt twenty minutes earlier.
Pale.
Tired.
Hair questionable.
But respectable.
She stared at herself.
“This is good.”
The elevator descended.
“This is an opportunity.”
Floor eight.
“You wanted more responsibility.”
Floor six.
“This is more responsibility.”
Floor four.
“You graduated from an Ivy League.”
Floor two.
“You can handle one business trip.”
The doors opened.
Diana stepped out.
Then stopped.
Turned around.
Caught the closing doors with one hand.
“And you are possibly still drunk.”
The doors tried to close again.
“Fantastic.”
Outside, Brooklyn was beginning to wake.
The sky had turned pale silver, Manhattan visible in the distance beneath the blue-grey morning.
A black coupe waited at the curb.
A man in a dark coat stepped forward.
“Ms Brooks?”
She tightened her hand around the suitcase.
“Yes.”
He opened the rear door.
“JFK.”
Diana climbed in.
The city began slipping past the window.
She watched her building disappear behind them.
A few hours earlier, she’d been celebrating the end of seven years.
Now she was hurtling toward an airport to spend several days with a man she’d never had a real conversation with.
Diana leaned her head back against the seat.
Closed her eyes.
And had one final thought before the car merged into early-morning traffic.
Please, God.
Do not let me be sick in front of Alexander De Laurier.
