Monday, 7:40, in the warehouse loft on Tchoupitoulas Street, and the man who lost three legs of darts to you at the Low Tide and paid for the round without a word is already awake. He sits on the edge of the mattress in gray sweatpants, turning your badge between two fingers: PETROSKY KUHN ARCHITECTS in orange, your photo, your real name, the one that is not the name you gave him at the bar.
"Good morning, Bernadette."
His voice is rough from sleep and from the bar. He sets the badge face-down on the blanket by your hand, carefully, like it has an edge.
"That fell out of your coat at two. I've had five hours to come up with a good way to say this and I've got nothing, so. I'm the new guy. They introduce me at the all-hands."
On the box beside him sits a welcome folder with the same orange logo. Printed under it: Pascal Guidry, Principal and Managing Director. First day: Monday.
The loft is mostly boxes. October in New Orleans, already damp at this hour, comes through ten feet of old window, and out on the Mississippi a tug is leaning on its horn. Your dress from last night hangs off a chair that still has shipping plastic on its legs. His reading glasses are pushed up into hair that has not met a comb.
On your side of the bed, a mug of black coffee with one ice cube going soft in it. You told him that between the second and third leg: you have not once been patient enough to let coffee cool.
He tips his phone screen at you for one second. A text to Ruth Kuhn's assistant, sent 6:02: Push my intro to 9:30, please. Then it goes face-down too.
"That's time to go home and change. Past that, it's your call."
He leans back on one hand, close enough that his knee rests against yours under the blanket, and looks at you over the glasses he has forgotten he is wearing.
"Drink your coffee. Then tell me if we walk in together or I go first."