The Circle

of sentimental slop they were always doing—at least
     recently. When she was younger, the only child of a couple who long considered thepossibility of having none at all, their home was more complicated. During the week,
     her father had been scarce. He’d been the building manager at a Fresno office park,
     working fourteen-hour days and leaving everything at home to her mother, who worked
     three shifts a week at a hotel restaurant and who responded to the pressure of it
     all with a hair-trigger temper, primarily directed at Mae. But when Mae was ten, her
     parents announced they’d bought a parking lot, two stories near downtown Fresno, and
     for a few years, they took turns manning it. It was humiliating to Mae to have her
     friends’ parents say, “Hey, saw your mom at the lot,” or “Tell your dad thanks again
     for comping me the other day,” but soon their finances stabilized, and they could
     hire a couple guys to trade shifts. And when her parents could take a day off, and
     could plan more than a few months ahead, they mellowed, becoming a very calm, exasperatingly
     sweet older couple. It was as if they went, in the course of a year, from being young
     parents in over their heads, to grandparents, slow-moving and warm and clueless about
     what exactly their daughter wanted. When she graduated from middle school, they’d
     driven her to Disneyland, not quite understanding that she was too old, and that her
     going there alone—with two adults, which was effectively alone—was at cross-purposes
     with any notion of fun. But they were so well-meaning that she couldn’t refuse, and
     in the end they had a mindless kind of fun that she didn’t know was possible with
     one’s parents. Any lingering resentment she might direct at them for the emotional
     uncertainties of her early life was doused by the constant cool water of their late
     middle age.
    And now they’d driven to the bay, to spend the weekend at the cheapest bed and breakfast
     they could find—which was fifteen miles from the Circle and looked haunted. Now they
     were out, at somefake-fancy restaurant the two of them had heard about, and if anyone was aglow, it
     was them. They were beaming.
    “So? It’s been great?” her mother asked.
    “It has.”
    “I knew it.” Her mother sat back, crossing her arms.
    “I don’t ever want to work anywhere else,” Mae said.
    “What a relief,” her father said. “We don’t want you working anywhere else, either.”
    Her mother lunged forward, and took Mae’s arm. “I told Karolina’s mom. You know her.”
     She scrunched her nose—the closest she could come to an insult. “She looked like someone
     had stuck a sharp stick up her behind. Boiling with envy.”
    “Mom.”
    “I let your salary slip.”
    “Mom.”
    “I just said, ‘I hope she can get by with a salary of sixty thousand dollars.’ ”
    “I can’t believe you told her that.”
    “It’s true, isn’t it?”
    “It’s actually sixty-two.”
    “Oh jeez. Now I’ll have to call her up.”
    “No you won’t.”
    “Okay, I won’t. But it’s been very fun,” she said, “I just casually slip it into conversation.
     My daughter’s at the hottest company on the planet and has full dental.”
    “Please don’t. I just got lucky. And Annie—”
    Her father leaned forward. “How
is
Annie?”
    “Good.”
    “Tell Annie we love her.”
    “I will.”
    “She couldn’t come tonight?”
    “No. She’s busy.”
    “But you asked her?”
    “I did. She says hi. But she works a lot.”
    “What does she do exactly?” her mother asked.
    “Everything, really,” Mae said. “She’s in the Gang of 40. She’s part of all the big
     decisions. I think she specializes in dealing with regulatory issues in other countries.”
    “I’m sure she’s got a lot of responsibility.”
    “And stock options!” her father said. “I can’t imagine what she’s worth.”
    “Dad. Don’t imagine that.”
    “Why is she working with all those stock options? I’d be on a beach. I’d have a harem.”
    Mae’s mother put her hand on his. “Vinnie, stop.” Then to Mae she said, “I hope she
     has time to enjoy it all.”
    “She does,” Mae said. “She’s probably at a campus party as we speak.”
    Her father smiled. “I love that you call it a campus. That’s very cool. We used to
     call those places
offices
.”
    Mae’s mother seemed troubled. “A party, Mae? You didn’t want to go?”
    “I did, but I wanted to