The Circle

 
    M Y GOD , M AE thought. It’s heaven.
    The campus was vast and rambling, wild with Pacific color, and yet the smallest detail
     had been carefully considered, shaped by the most eloquent hands. On land that had
     once been a shipyard, then a drive-in movie theater, then a flea market, then blight,
     there were now soft green hills and a Calatrava fountain. And a picnic area, with
     tables arranged in concentric circles. And tennis courts, clay and grass. And a volleyball
     court, where tiny children from the company’s daycare center were running, squealing,
     weaving like water. Amid all this was a workplace, too, four hundred acres of brushed
     steel and glass on the headquarters of the most influential company in the world.
     The sky above was spotless and blue.
    Mae was making her way through all of this, walking from the parking lot to the main
     hall, trying to look as if she belonged. The walkway wound around lemon and orange
     trees and its quiet red cobblestones were replaced, occasionally, by tiles with imploring
     messages of inspiration. “Dream,” one said, the word laser-cut into the red stone.
     “Participate,” said another. There were dozens: “Find Community.”“Innovate.” “Imagine.” She just missed stepping on the hand of a young man in a grey
     jumpsuit; he was installing a new stone that said “Breathe.”
    On a sunny Monday in June, Mae stopped in front of the main door, standing below the
     logo etched into the glass above. Though the company was less than six years old,
     its name and logo—a circle surrounding a knitted grid, with a small ‘c’ in the center—were
     already among the best-known in the world. There were over ten thousand employees
     on this, the main campus, but the Circle had offices all over the globe, and was hiring
     hundreds of gifted young minds every week. It had been voted the world’s most admired
     company four years running.
    Mae wouldn’t have thought she had a chance to work at such a place, but for Annie.
     Annie was two years older and they’d roomed together for three semesters in college,
     in an ugly building made habitable through their extraordinary bond, something like
     friends, something like sisters or cousins who wished they were siblings and would
     have reason never to be apart. Their first month living together, Mae had broken her
     jaw one twilight, after fainting, flu-ridden and underfed, during finals. Annie had
     told her to stay in bed, but Mae had gone to the 7-Eleven for caffeine and woke up
     on the sidewalk, under a tree. Annie took her to the hospital, and waited as they
     wired her jaw, and then stayed with Mae, sleeping next to her, in a wooden chair,
     all night, and then at home, for days, had fed Mae through a straw. It was a fierce
     level of commitment and competence that Mae had never seen from someone her age or
     near her age, and Mae was thereafter loyal in a way she’d never known she could be.
    While Mae was still at Carleton, meandering between majors,from art history to marketing to psychology—getting her degree in psych with no plans
     to go further in the field—Annie had graduated, gotten her MBA from Stanford and was
     recruited everywhere, but particularly at the Circle, and had landed here days after
     graduation. Now she had some lofty title—Director of Ensuring the Future, Annie joked—and
     had urged Mae to apply for a job. Mae did so, and though Annie insisted she pulled
     no strings, Mae was sure that Annie had, and she felt indebted beyond all measure.
     A million people, a billion, wanted to be where Mae was at this moment, entering this
     atrium, thirty feet high and shot through with California light, on her first day
     working for the only company that really mattered at all.
    She pushed open the heavy door. The front hall was as long as a parade, as tall as
     a cathedral. There were offices everywhere above, four floors high on either side,
     every wall made of glass. Briefly dizzy, she looked downward, and in the immaculate
     glossy floor, she saw her own face reflected, looking worried. She shaped her mouth
     into a smile, feeling a presence behind her.
    “You must be Mae.”
    Mae turned to find a beautiful young head floating atop a scarlet scarf and white
     silk blouse.
    “I’m Renata,” she said.
    “Hi Renata. I’m looking for—”
    “Annie. I know. She’s on her way.” A sound, a digital droplet, came from Renata’s
     ear. “She’s actually …” Renata