Chapter 15 — Raj's Sister
The interview suite had gone very quiet.
Mike Ross sat across the desk from Harvey Specter with the careful stillness of someone who had assessed the room and concluded that stillness was currently his best available strategy. The plastic bags had been retrieved from the floor and were back in the briefcase, which was now closed, which was — everyone in the room silently agreed — an improvement.
Harvey looked at him with the expression of a man who had not been surprised in quite some time and was deciding how he felt about it.
"How did you know they were cops?" Harvey said.
Mike's eyes moved briefly to the corridor door, then back. "When I was about twelve, I read a book — crime thriller, pretty obscure — where the protagonist was a courier who got burned exactly this way. Plain-clothes detail in a hotel lobby, acting like they were waiting for someone." He paused. "The tell in the book was that real people waiting in a lobby check their phones, check the door, check the time — they look for the thing they're waiting for. These two were looking at the room."
"So you walked up and asked one of them what time it was," Harvey said.
"Cop instinct is to answer a direct question in cover. Drug dealer wouldn't walk up to a cop and ask for the time." He shrugged. "It bought me about forty seconds. The stairs were faster than waiting for an elevator."
The suite was quiet.
Harvey turned his head and looked at Martin, who was on the sofa with one leg crossed over the other and his chin resting lightly on two fingers, watching the exchange with the quality of attention he usually reserved for closing arguments.
Harvey raised an eyebrow: your call.
Martin gave a small shake of his head: your hire, your room.
Harvey turned back. "We only take Harvard Law graduates. You didn't go to Harvard. You didn't go to any law school."
"No," Mike said.
"Then give me a reason I shouldn't have security walk you out."
"Because the Barbri Legal Handbook is open on the desk in front of you," Mike said, "and you haven't closed it since I sat down. Which means you're either going to ask me something from it, or you've already decided to and you're waiting to see if I'll offer." He met Harvey's eyes. "I'll offer. Any page. Any question."
Harvey looked at him for a long moment. Then, without breaking eye contact, he turned the handbook to a random page and read a question.
Mike answered it.
Harvey turned to another page. Read another question.
Mike answered that one too.
And the one after it. And the one after that.
Martin watched. This was the part he'd been curious about — not whether Mike Ross was as sharp as the file suggested, because the file had been fairly persuasive on that point, but how he'd hold himself under Harvey's specific brand of pressure, which was less like an interview and more like being examined under good lighting by someone who was professionally paid to find flaws.
Mike held. More than held — he pushed back on one answer, corrected a premise in another question, and on the fourth exchange caught an ambiguity in Harvey's phrasing and asked for clarification before answering, which was exactly the right call.
Martin allowed himself a small private satisfaction.
Harvey closed the handbook.
"Twenty-five thousand signing bonus," Harvey said. "You'll be my associate. The hours are what you make of them, meaning they'll be significant. You report to me. You do not discuss your educational background with anyone. If anyone asks, you went to Harvard." He paused. "And the briefcase situation does not repeat itself."
Mike Ross blinked once. "I — yeah. Yes. Absolutely."
"Get out," Harvey said. "Come in Monday. Ask Donna for the paperwork."
Mike stood, picked up his briefcase with the excessive care of someone who'd learned a lesson, shook Harvey's hand, nodded to Martin — who gave him a small acknowledging nod back — and left.
The suite door closed.
Martin uncrossed his legs. "Jessica's going to have opinions."
"Jessica doesn't need to form opinions about things she doesn't know about."
"That's a very optimistic read of how this firm works."
"I need someone who can actually think," Harvey said, without any particular defensiveness. "This year's Harvard JDs are technically proficient and imaginatively inert. He's the opposite. I'll take the trade."
"The bar exam situation—"
"Is my problem to manage." Harvey picked up his water glass. "You've got enough of your own to manage."
Martin accepted this. It was true.
The remaining interviews took another two hours. Harvey and Martin passed four JDs from the day's cohort — competent, solid, the kind of work that would hold up under pressure — and declined eight, which was a higher rejection rate than usual and reflected Harvey's mood more than the candidates' actual performance, but Martin kept this observation to himself.
The last candidate of the day was called in at four forty-five.
Her name on the form was Priya Koothrappali.
She was mid-twenties, composed in the specific way of someone who'd prepared thoroughly and knew it, with the direct eye contact of a person who'd grown up in a household that expected you to make your case and make it clearly. She was also, as Martin had calculated before she walked through the door, almost certainly Raj's sister — same bone structure, same slight musicality in the name, and Raj had mentioned last week that his sister was finishing her JD and had been looking at New York firms.
He'd let Harvey run the first ten minutes.
She answered everything cleanly — not flashily, not performing confidence she didn't have, just accurate and clear and with the occasional small qualifier that showed she knew the difference between what she knew and what she'd need to look up.
Harvey looked at Martin.
Martin nodded once.
"Welcome to Pearson Hardman," Harvey said. "You'll be on Martin's team. Talk to Rachel about onboarding."
Priya Koothrappali thanked them both with the contained pleasure of someone who'd worked very hard for something and was choosing not to celebrate until she was alone.
After she left, Harvey looked at Martin with an expression that was weighing something.
"Koothrappali," he said.
"It's a common name," Martin said.
"Is it."
"In the sense that it exists and more than one person has it." Martin picked up his jacket. "She's the best candidate we saw today. Possibly the best we've seen this round."
Harvey held the look for another moment, then let it go. "Donna has the paperwork."
Martin took a cab back to Queens.
The apartment building was making its usual early-evening sounds — someone's TV through a wall, the pipes doing what the pipes did, the particular acoustics of a hallway that had heard a lot of conversations. He could smell food before he reached the fourth floor landing, which meant someone had ordered in volume.
He pushed open the apartment door and found the whole group in assembly — Leonard and Penny arranging an unreasonable quantity of takeout boxes across the dining table; Howard, who had apparently been here since mid-afternoon, sitting with his chair turned toward the kitchen in a way that suggested he'd been attempting conversation with whoever was in there; Raj standing beside Howard with the expression of a man managing a situation he'd anticipated and wasn't fully equipped for; Sheldon on his spot, laptop open, headphones on.
And at the kitchen counter, examining the apartment with the cautious curiosity of someone mapping new territory: Priya Koothrappali.
Raj saw Martin and covered the distance across the room in about four steps, pulling him into a hug that contained a significant amount of relief.
"Martin. You are genuinely my favorite person."
"I heard you the first three times you texted me," Martin said.
"The Koothrappali family has a long memory for kindness. My grandmother still talks about a neighbor who gave her a ride in 1987—"
"Raj."
"Right. Thank you. Deeply. That's what I'm saying."
Martin patted his back and separated. Across the room, Priya was watching this exchange with the slight smile of someone who'd grown up watching her brother do exactly this and found it equally endearing and exhausting.
She crossed over. "Thank you, Martin. I mean it."
"You don't need to thank me. You answered every question correctly and you corrected Harvey on the Chevron deference question, which almost nobody does." He extended his hand. "Starting Monday, call me boss. Until then, call me Martin."
"Pleasant collaboration," she said, shaking it.
"Ow," Howard said, from his chair, to no one in particular, watching this handshake with an expression that suggested he was processing a series of feelings in real time.
Penny had clearly decided this was a celebration and had organized accordingly — the takeout spread covered most of the table, there were drinks in actual glasses rather than the usual assorted mugs, and she'd found a string of lights somewhere and put them up along the window, which gave the apartment a warmth it didn't usually have.
Howard stood to make the first toast with the energy of someone who'd been saving it up.
"To the brilliant and beautiful Priya Koothrappali — congratulations on your graduation, your new job, and your excellent taste in law firms—"
"You can sit down anytime," Raj said.
"—and may this be the beginning of an extraordinary career in one of the world's great cities—"
"Howard."
Howard sat down. "To Priya."
"To Priya," the room said, and drank.
Priya stood, which surprised everyone slightly. "Then I get to make the second one." She looked at Martin. "To Martin Scott, who graduated Harvard Law a month ago and is already a Senior Lawyer at Pearson Hardman, having signed fourteen million-dollar contracts in a single evening—"
Penny made a sound that was not quite a word.
"—and who apparently did all of this while also living in Queens with four scientists and acting like it's completely normal."
"To Martin," the room said.
Martin drank his water and looked at the ceiling.
Penny appeared at his elbow. "Okay. I need you to explain that, because I understood approximately one in five words."
"It means he's doing very well at work," Leonard said helpfully.
"I got that part. The part I need explained is the fourteen million dollars."
"It's in contracts," Martin said. "Spread over time. It's not—"
"Martin." Penny put her hand on his arm. "I work for eleven dollars an hour. Can you let me have this?"
He looked at her. "Congratulations. It's a big deal."
"Thank you." She hugged him briefly, with the uncalculated warmth that was Penny's specific gift to every room she was in. "Genuinely. I'm proud of you even though I don't understand it."
"That might be the best review I've ever gotten," Martin said.
The food was good and there was too much of it, which was exactly right. The conversation moved the way group conversations do when everyone at the table actually likes each other — overlapping, jumping, occasionally three separate discussions happening simultaneously without any collision.
Sheldon gave a twenty-minute explanation of why the structural integrity of the takeout containers was superior to the food inside them, which nobody had asked for and everyone ignored, which Sheldon was comfortable with.
Howard played Priya four different songs on his theremin via YouTube because he'd mentioned owning one and she'd made the mistake of expressing polite curiosity.
Leonard told a story about a failed experiment that had filled the Columbia physics building's third floor with a smell that had still not been fully identified or resolved, which was apparently still under investigation.
Penny told a story about an audition that had gone wrong in a direction nobody in the casting room had anticipated, which was funny enough that even Sheldon looked up from his laptop.
Then Priya excused herself to the bathroom, and the table reconfigured with the specific energy of people who had been waiting to have a different conversation.
Raj pulled the male contingent into a cluster with the grave authority of someone calling an emergency session.
"I want to be absolutely clear," he said, in his lowest voice. "Nobody touches my sister."
"Raj—" Howard began.
"You," Raj said, pointing, "had the exact expression Gollum has when he sees the Ring when she walked in. I watched it happen."
Howard opened his mouth.
"I watched it happen, Howard."
Howard closed his mouth.
Raj turned to Martin. "And you — I'm grateful, I genuinely am, but you cannot use the fact that you're her boss as an opportunity—"
"I understand completely," Martin said.
"I'm serious."
"I know. And I agree." Martin held his gaze. "She's your sister and she's my employee. Both of those things are disqualifying, and I mean that without any reservation."
Raj studied him. Then exhaled. "Okay. Good." A pause. "The honest truth is I'm slightly more concerned she'll be the one causing trouble."
Leonard looked up from his drink. "Wait — is your sister—"
"She's been trying to get Martin into her orbit since approximately their third year of law school," Raj said. "Nothing has come of it. I am not sure whether to be relieved or confused."
"Relieved," Martin said.
"She's very persistent," Raj said. "She gets it from our mother."
"Is she—" Leonard stopped himself. Started again. "What does she look like? I mean. Just for context. In terms of—"
"You've been sitting across from her for an hour," Martin said.
"I know. I was asking—"
"Think," Martin said, "of the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show. Now remove the wings, because those are theatrical, and just focus on the—"
Every man at the table underwent a private recalibration.
Even Raj, who had set up this entire conversation as a warning, stared at the middle distance for a moment with an expression that suggested the visual was, in fact, extremely effective.
Sheldon looked up from his laptop. "I don't understand why that particular reference produces that particular physiological response. The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show is a commercial event. The models are paid professionals. The wings are structurally impressive but serve no aerodynamic—"
"Sheldon," everyone said, at various volumes.
Sheldon went back to his laptop.
Penny came back from the kitchen with a refilled glass, looked at the table full of men with varying expressions of private thought, and sat down next to Martin.
"What did I miss?" she said.
"Engineering discussion," Martin said.
Penny looked at Leonard, who was staring at his food. Looked at Howard, who was staring at the ceiling. Looked at Raj, who was looking at his phone with the focus of someone who was not actually reading anything on it.
"Sure," Penny said. "Engineering."
She clinked her glass against Martin's.
Outside the window, Queens did its evening thing — the particular urban lullaby of traffic and voices and the city running its endless background processes. Inside, the string lights Penny had put up caught the warm end of the room and held it.
Martin had his paralegal. Harvey had his associate. The firm had its next chapter.
Everything, more or less, was in motion.
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