Work Text:
Bug extermination was not part of Jess’ job description as Kendall’s administrative-slash-personal-slash-everything-and-anything assistant, but nonetheless, she finds herself watching ant carcasses circle the drain of the laundry room sink in Kendall’s Hamptons house one Saturday morning. Upon their arrival, Iverson and Sophie had both found their rooms infested with ants and immediately started shrieking and pointing at them with put-upon disgust. (Jess happened to know that both of them went to an expensive sleepaway camp in Maine every summer and were more than familiar with the phenomenon of indoor bug cohabitation, but she doesn't begrudge their instinctual outrage. Much.)
“They’re just everywhere, aren’t they.” Jess turns around and spots a blissed-out, sun-speckled Rava in the doorway. She and Kendall had just returned from a marriage therapy boot camp in the Catskills, and both of their visages were gleaming with the afterglow of great makeup sex and idyll-inspired insights. Insights that will be immediately put to the test upon tomorrow’s return to the Tribeca penthouse, Jess thinks privately.
Jess nods in response and pivots back towards the sink; she’s never sure what Rava wants, or how to handle the woman’s infrequent attempts at interacting with her. Sometimes, when Kendall asks her to meet him during family breakfast or come over after work, she detects Rava’s searching gaze prickling over her skin––something that she always pretends not to notice. If caught, however, Rava’s expression always morphs into a vacant smile that Jess has never been able to interpret. But for the most part, Rava’s wifely and motherly dominion exists outside of Jess’ purview. When Kendall takes off––earlier than usual as of late so he can try to make it home before the kids’ bedtime––Jess is off too, which is something she really appreciates about him as a boss. But despite all of Kendall’s efforts, Rava’s tractor-beam gaze has yet to vanish from Jess’ periphery.
“The ants, I mean.” Rava looks at Jess expectantly. She suddenly realizes that a longer response is now expected––but what?
“Yes, Kendall said we should have an exterminator come to look at it on Monday.”
Rava frowns at this; Jess remembers Kendall bemoaning Rava’s vegetarian Tuesday dinners as he cut into one of the forbidden filets they would consume together in the conference room before heading out for the night. “Classic Kendall,” Rava mutters, “always wanting the easy way out.” (Jess thinks privately that Kendall has never wanted or gotten the ‘easy way’ out of anything.) “Could you please cancel that appointment and have the contractor get someone out who can refinish the grout? Sealing up all the little gaps in the tiles and floors will keep em’ out better than pesticides.”
Jess nods stoically again; she will covertly run this by Kendall first but knows that he will concede, as he always does, to Rava’s vision for their domestic sphere. “Thanks, Jess.” Rava smiles again before slinking back out into the hallway. Jess hears her call for Sophie and Iverson, convincing them to leave their ant-ridden rooms and electronic devices and head out to the beach instead.
“Jesus, you shouldn’t be doing that.” Jess jumps at the sound of Kendall’s voice, startling her out of her rhythmic rinsing.
“It’s fine,” she replies, quickly averting her gaze from his sweat-soaked Nike-clad torso––clearly just returning from one of his marathon gym sessions.
“No, it’s not.” Kendall says firmly, walking over to her and forcibly removing the rags out of her hands. “That’s not what I pay you to do. Why isn’t the nanny––”
“Rava gave her the day off. Really, it’s fine,” she placates, attempting to head off another petty spousal squabble she knows this will create.
Kendall shrugs uncomfortably. “Look, I need to talk to you about something.” Jess’ heart begins to race.
“I just got off the phone with my dad, and he…he needs me to go to Shanghai.” He self-consciously rubs the back of his head; Jess dully notes that his hair has grown too long and that she should schedule a trim for him with Armand next week.
Kendall goes on: “...there’s some legacy business there, some expansions he wants me to look into. Ones that will apparently require my full-time presence and focus.” He says this last sentence with the cadence of a direct quote from Logan Roy, while he rolls his eyes and looks at her exhaustedly.
“Oh, wow.” Jess doesn’t know what else to say.
“Yeah, I…haven’t told Rava or the kids yet, so just, obviously, you know.” At this point, after so many coke-soaked morning afters and backroom dealings, they both know Jess’ discretion is a forgone conclusion. “I mean, I haven’t totally made up my mind yet either,” he quickly amends, as if trying to convince her of something. “We just…got better and now…this.”
“And there’s no way she would…?” Jess doesn’t even need to finish the sentence before Kendall is shaking his head firmly.
“No, she’d––she’d never uproot her life like that. Or the kids. Iverson just got settled at that new school, and Sophie has her horseback riding…” A shadow of ever present guilt overtakes his face. “I get it, really. And honestly…” Kendall looks behind him, as if readying himself for someone listening. “I think they’d just be a distraction. I need…I need to do this on my own.”
A new resolve enters his tone. “If I do this, hopefully for only two years, if I can talk him down, I think he’ll finally do it. Hand the keys over to me. Once and for all.” Kendall continues to peer at her with pleading eyes, as if it’s her he really needs to convince and not himself. “And then after I prove myself, I won’t have to do anything like this for him, or, or anyone else, ever again.” Jess has her reservations about that last bit, but tries to muster up the enthusiasm she knows he needs to hear from her.
“Kendall, that all sounds great, and I––”
He interrupts her again: “If I do end up going…would you be interested in, in…moving with––as well?” Kendall seems chagrined at his inability to offer and persuade her to move across the world with him in an HR-approved fashion. But his face depicts just how much he wants her to come––so much so that he would say it in whatever clumsy fashion he can.
She opens her mouth to speak, but he seems unable to stop himself mid-pitch: “It would be a substantial pay increase, and we would set you up with a visa and a company-leased apartment and anything else you need.” He shifts from foot to foot uncertainty. “It––It won’t be much fun. The work. The hours are…a lot. But I’d make it worth your while.” He ends this with a sly smirk, the old Ken making a reappearance momentarily, before the shutters of propriety descend down again. “Just––just think about it. You don’t have to give me an answer now.”
Jess knows she has to cut him off before he talks himself into a manic episode: “Kendall, I was going to…I was going to say yes.” Jess can’t hide the truth, or her resulting blush upon revealing it, from him or herself.
“Well, still,” Kendall wears an expression of equal parts shock and flattery at her immediate acceptance. “Just…think on it a bit. I’ll email you the paperwork and the increased benefits package, give it a look over.”
Ken greets the immediate protestations written all over her face with a soft smile. “Don’t make it too easy on me, Jess. I expect to see a proposed list of revisions to the contract in my inbox by the morning.” His expression darkened. “Make sure you fight for what you want, okay? Don’t just take what people give you. If they’re giving it to you without a fight, it’s because they know you’re owed more. And you should get it. Anything, whatever you’re…” He cuts himself off. Somehow, Jess knows they weren’t just talking about the benefits package anymore.
She nods dumbly in response, her brain already racing through all the plans she needs to make for the both of them now. What did I just do, she screams at herself. And what else would I do for him, if he asked it of me?
“Okay,” Kendall’s conversational awkwardness returns; he claps his hands in finality. “Glad that’s settled. I’ll tell you more on Monday, of course. I just…have to tell them first, you know.” His expression looks lost and forlorn. Jess tactfully doesn’t comment on how this ‘hypothetical’ move suddenly seems all but one hundred percent decided on now. After a brief pause, he zeroes in on her again: “But you should get going. I’ll call Fikret and get you a car back to the city.” He immediately begins composing a text.
Jess tries to say something: “I can just take the ferry again––”
“Is that how you got here? Fucking Rava.” Kendall mutters under his breath. He attempts to play off this animosity in an ironic way, but it clearly grates on him.
“No it was…”
“Fine, yes. It always is.” Kendall looks up at her with an intense expression, and suddenly she feels like he’s looking right into her soul, seeing through the lies she’s gotten so good at telling she almost forgets they’re not the truth anymore. “But please take the company cars, Jess. That’s what they’re there for, and you’ll have one at your disposal the entire time we’re in Shanghai. Get used to it, baby.” This last word, baby, said in jest the way he would to Shiv, Roman, even Frank or Karl, gives them both pause; it rings in the silent halls as loud as the children’s shrieks that sound off a minute later, signaling the early end of the family beach day.
“Okay, he says he’s on his way.” Kendall shoves his phone back into his basketball shorts pocket before making his way downstairs. He pauses halfway down the first step to look back at her: “Thanks for coming down here. And I’ll see you on Monday. Wish me luck,” he adds––another comment meant in jest, but he can’t quite disguise the melancholy grimace just underneath. She nods conspiratorially, trying to bolster him with a jokey grin of her own.
As she ducks into the waiting town car, wordlessly greeting Vikret and politely returning Rava’s distracted wave goodbye, she thinks about Shanghai. She thinks about her swift submission, and how much it scares her that she doesn’t regret it, is in fact looking forward to leaving her worn-out Brooklyn studio apartment for a glossy, chilly, high ceilinged Asiatic abode tucked away in the luxurious corner of a foreign city with only Kendall for company. She thinks about this the whole ride home and the whole night afterwards, while she forces herself to burrow into the minutiae of Kendall’s contract until the wee hours of the morning.