Whisper Network

The first-person plural narrator declares that when one woman in any industry fails, it brings all the women in that industry down. Women’s mistakes are seen as gender-defining, as they often are for any marginalized group.

Ardie is eating takeout and watching TV, enjoying buying food while she can still afford it. The next day, she will likely owe Truviv over 1.6 million dollars. She will have to get a job at a law firm that she hates and sell her house, making Michael not want to spend as much time with her. Her phone rings, which always makes her nervous that something is wrong with Michael. It’s Rosalita, who is panicking about filling out her financial aid forms—they are late because she got the deadline wrong. Ardie asks for her address.

Ardie arrives at Rosalita’s apartment complex and puts her key between her fingers, an instinctive self-defense mechanism; all women have these ingrained fears. Rosalita’s apartment is small. Salomon tells Ardie that he got into the school and they share a sweet moment. Rosalita is too flustered to find the government papers that Ardie tells her needs. Ardie fills out the paperwork while Rosalita makes tea. One form asks for Salomon’s father’s name. Rosalita tells Ardie that he’s dead, but when Ardie says they should still put his name down, Rosalita evades the question. Ardie notices that Rosalita’s most recent pay stub is for half the normal amount and asks why, saying it’s not enough to live off. Rosalita tells Ardie that she has no sense of what is enough to live off because she is rich.

Using some Spanish, Ardie explains the lawsuit against Truviv and Ames to Rosalita. In turn, Rosalita reveals that she saw Ames and Katherine together in the office one night.

Ardie drives to the Truviv office late at night. She thinks about calling Sloane or Grace, but does not. There is an anticipatory feeling in the air. Back in law school, Ardie had dreamed of investigating white-collar crime, but got sidetracked by a different job that paid more.

She goes into the room with the personnel files and starts reading. She realizes she had not called Sloane or Grace because the story she is reading is not her story to share. Ardie thinks of her own story starting out at Truviv. One night many years earlier, she and Ames got drunk at a hotel bar together after closing a huge deal that they’d spent months on. While Ardie called her boyfriend, Ames bought another drink and then offered to walk her to her room.

The first-person plural narrator explains that women know that the problem has always been their womanhood, no matter how much they alter their mannerisms and interests, or stay silent on matters like harassment.

On May 3, as Sloane waits for Ardie to get to the meeting, she tries to imagine Cosette’s life. Cosette tells the room they can do housekeeping. She passes three settlement papers across the table. Truviv could have just let Sloane and her friends drop the lawsuit, but Truviv wanted to make an example of the women.

Ardie enters with Rosalita and Salomon. Cosette tells Rosalita that this is a private meeting and that she can clean later. Rosalita introduces herself to Cosette and says that Salomon will wait in the hallway; as Salomon leaves, he removes his hat, and everyone sees that he has the same silver streak as Ames. Rosalita explains that Ames assaulted her in this office eight years ago. Cosette argues that it could have been consensual, but Grace informs Cosette that Truviv paid Rosalita twice as much as the rest of the cleaning staff to keep it all under wraps. Rosalita decided to come forward now because her friends should not lose their jobs for simply telling the truth. Sloane gives the settlement papers back to Cosette. Cosette’s team reminds them that they are under confidentiality agreements and cannot speak about the company, but Rosalita counters that she is not.

When Rosalita found out she was pregnant after Ames raped her, she decided to keep the child to haunt him. Before he assaulted her, she felt like an invisible cleaning machine to all the men in the office; after, she wished to feel invisible once again. Before the rape, Ames often worked late and Rosalita enjoyed his quiet companionship. The night of the assault, Rosalita heard Ames’s boss yelling at Ames and felt bad for him. She suspects that Ames saw her pity and decided to exploit it, making “his humiliation hers instead” (431). While pregnant, she contacted a free lawyer and met with the CEO of Truviv, but the lawyer assured her that Ames’s word would be taken over hers. Now, Rosalita still needs money. She tried going to Bobbi, but Bobbi told her to leave and shut up. Rosalita refuses to.