Chapter 16: The First Real Thing
Lattanzi was exactly what I'd hoped—small Italian place, white tablecloths but casual atmosphere, quiet enough for conversation without being oppressively formal.
Donna arrived at exactly 12:30, wearing a blue dress I'd never seen her wear at the office.
She dressed up. For this. For me.
We sat across from each other, and suddenly I realized I had no idea how to do this without treating it like a deposition.
"You look nervous," Donna said, amusement in her voice.
"I am. I'm very good at depositions and very bad at this."
"What's 'this'?"
I gestured vaguely at the table between us.
"Spending time with someone I actually want to impress without a strategic reason."
Donna's expression softened, and something in her eyes changed—warmth replacing the professional armor.
"That's sweet. Also very you."
The waiter appeared. We ordered—she got pasta carbonara, I got chicken parmesan because my brain had stopped working well enough to make sophisticated food choices.
Once we were alone again, Donna leaned forward slightly.
"Tell me something real. Not work stuff. Something about you that the office doesn't know."
Careful. Can't tell her about transmigration, the System, any of the truth that actually defines me.
But I could tell her something true.
"I grew up in Connecticut. My dad was an accountant, my mom taught middle school English. They wanted me to be a doctor—stable career, respectable, something they could explain to their friends."
"But you chose law."
"Because medicine is about managing chaos—emergencies, diagnoses, things you can't always control. Law is about building systems. Creating frameworks that make the chaos predictable."
Donna tilted her head, studying me.
"You like control."
"I like predictability. The world is chaotic and messy and full of variables I can't account for. Law creates structure."
"What about things that can't be structured?"
I looked at her directly.
"Like this?"
"Like this."
[WIN RATE CALCULATOR: ACTIVATING]
[QUERY: SUCCESSFUL DATE PROBABILITY]
[ERROR: INSUFFICIENT PARAMETERS FOR EMOTIONAL OUTCOME PREDICTION]
[ERROR: UNDEFINED SUCCESS CRITERIA]
[RECOMMENDATION: MANUAL NAVIGATION REQUIRED]
I almost laughed.
Even the System has no idea what to do here.
"I don't know how to predict this," I admitted. "That's... actually exciting?"
Donna smiled, genuine and warm.
"Good. You shouldn't be able to predict everything. That's what makes it interesting."
Our food arrived. We ate, and the conversation flowed easier now—Donna telling me about growing up in Connecticut (we'd lived thirty minutes apart as kids), leaving for New York at nineteen with two thousand dollars and no backup plan, building her career through sheer competence.
"You could have gone to law school," I said. "You understand the work better than half the associates."
"I could have. But I'm better at making lawyers effective than being one myself. Harvey wins because I make sure he's prepared, organized, and pointed at the right targets."
No defensiveness. No insecurity. Just self-knowledge.
She chose this path deliberately. She's not defaulting or settling.
"That's rare," I said. "Most people stumble into their careers and pretend it was the plan."
"And you?"
Careful.
"I always wanted to be a lawyer. The specifics—corporate law, financial structuring, Pearson Hardman—those evolved as I learned what I was actually good at."
Donna set down her fork, expression shifting to something more serious.
"Harvey's going to be weird about this."
Here it is.
"Louis already warned me."
"Did he? Good. Then you know Harvey's possessive of my loyalty. Not romantically—we're not together, never have been—but he likes having me as his secret weapon. You dating me, he'll see it as you trying to take something that's his."
I kept my voice level.
"Do you care what Harvey thinks?"
Donna considered the question carefully.
"I care about Harvey. We've worked together for years, and he's... important to me. But I don't obey Harvey. There's a difference."
I nodded.
"For the record, I'm not dating you to get at Harvey. That would be terrible for multiple reasons, starting with 'you're a person, not a strategy.'"
Donna's smile was small and knowing.
"I know. If I thought you were using me, we wouldn't be here. But you calculate everything else—your cases, your relationships with Louis and Jessica, your career trajectory. What happens when you can't calculate this?"
Honesty. She deserves honesty.
"I have no idea. Want to find out together?"
Donna's expression changed—something vulnerable and hopeful breaking through.
"That's the most romantic thing you could have said, and you didn't even mean it to be."
"I meant it. I just didn't realize it was romantic until you pointed it out."
She laughed, and the tension dissolved.
We finished lunch, split the check despite my attempt to pay (she insisted), and walked back to Pearson Hardman together.
In the elevator, we stood closer than necessary but maintained professional distance—no touching, no obvious intimacy, just proximity that suggested something more.
The doors opened on our floor.
Donna touched my arm briefly as we stepped out.
"This was good. Let's do it again."
"Is that a prediction or a request?"
"Both."
She walked to her desk. I walked to mine.
Kyle Durant had noticed us arriving together—his eyebrow raised in that universal gesture of interesting development.
Louis saw from his office and looked concerned.
Harvey was in court. Hadn't seen yet.
But he will. Eventually.
I sat at my desk, opened my laptop, and tried to focus on the securities filing that was due tomorrow.
The System ran quiet calculations in the background, but for once, it had nothing useful to offer.
[RELATIONSHIP STATUS: UNDEFINED BUT POSITIVE]
[EMOTIONAL STATE: SATISFIED WITH UNCERTAINTY]
[ASSESSMENT: MANUAL NAVIGATION SUCCESSFUL]
I dismissed the notification and smiled at my screen.
Maybe some things don't need calculating.
Maybe that's the entire point.
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