‘Firstly honey, I’m absolutely not going to Brooklyn on my one night off in for ever,’ she said, striking off her points on her fingers. ‘Secondly, my skinny indie boy days are as far behind me as my skinny jeans days, and thirdly, I’m not going to play chaperone to you two. It’s not healthy.’
I smiled sweetly, waiting a moment.
‘Brooklyn? Really?’
‘I’ll even take the subway and I’ll buy all your drinks,’ I promised. ‘I really want you to meet Alex.’
‘Jesus, I’d better dig out my Chucks,’ she sighed. ‘You’re totally buying the candy tonight as well.’
‘Never a problem,’ I said staring at the Milk Duds, Raisanettes, Sour Worms, and wondering which of the bags and bags of new sweets to try. America the Brave.
Before I could get excited about introducing Alex to Jenny, I had my Friday morning meeting with Mary to get worked up about. I took it as a good sign when her assistant greeted me with a smile and, I nearly fainted, a coffee.
‘Angela,’ Mary was sort of smiling, her wire-rimmed glasses propped up on the top of her insanely shiny grey bob. I had to remember to ask what shampoo she used. ‘Tell me why you want to write for me.’
‘Because I love to write,’ I said, a little thrown by her idea of a hello.
‘And?’ Mary turned her back to me and looked out of the window.
‘Because, I,’ I wasn’t sure what she wanted me to say. ‘I have something to say?’
‘And what is that exactly?’ Mary asked, turning to face me. Literally, she leaned right into my chair.
‘I’m not sure yet.’ Honest, if not my best answer ever.
‘Neither am I. The thing is, everyone in the team meeting loved your writing. I like your writing,’ Mary said, sitting down behind her desk. ‘It’s funny, it makes me like you and want to read about you, but I don’t know where it’s going.’
‘Oh,’ I deflated in front of her. ‘Where do you want it to go?’
‘I need it to go somewhere,’ Mary said, picking up a pencil and flicking it on the table. ‘Let’s look at what we like.’
She pulled all the columns I had sent over out of a drawer. My witty little, self-effacing dating diaries were covered in scratchy red pen, questions marks and illegible notes, which I was sure more or less amounted to ‘pile of steaming poo’.
‘I like seeing New York through your eyes,’ she started, pulling a piece from the bottom of the pile. ‘I like how you talk about what you’re doing, where you’re going in the city, but I need more. Look readers love to read about New York, and it’s great to get it from a fresh pair of eyes, but the whole blog can’t depend on it. Lots of readers already live here, and they need more than travel writing.’
‘OK.’ I nodded, taking out a pad and pencil and scribbling notes. They were scribbles too, it had been so long since I’d had to put pen to paper. ‘I can definitely work on that.’
‘And the dates, I’m kind of confused,’ Mary stopped tapping and stared at me intently. ‘On paper, there isn’t that much of a contest, is there?’
‘There isn’t?’ I asked. I had hoped that my blogs hadn’t made it entirely obvious who I was most interested in. I’d even elaborated a little bit to try and stir up some contention amongst my potential ‘readers’.
‘Let me think.’ Mary began to read from one of my entries. ‘Wall Street really made me feel like a princess last night. From the way he always opens the door and pulls out my chair to the way he holds my hand and acts as though I’m the entire only person in the world when we’re together, I just can’t get enough of this treatment. It’s a whole new world.’
‘Really?’ I said. I was so surprised.
‘You know how many of my readers are looking for a Wall Street banker to make them feel like a princess? This is gold to us.’ Mary slapped the piece of paper down on the desk. ‘Downtown guy, he’s a plot twist at the moment honey, a distraction, but everyone knows his kind is never going to get you anywhere.’
‘I guess,’ I smiled. At least I’d managed not to make it obvious how much I really liked Alex.
‘Word of advice, and this is as a woman, not an editor,’ Mary leaned back and shook her head. ‘You just got out of a long relationship that ended badly. You need to be spoiled, wooed and screwed six ways from Sunday. If you want the blog to work, you have to keep dating. From what you’ve told me so far, this Alex guy is going to screw you, but not in the right way. Date around for a while, keep the blog fun, but Angela, they don’t call them investment bankers for nothing.’
‘I suppose it does all make sense on paper,’ I acknowledged. Tyler really did have everything going for him, great in bed, generous, hot, and most importantly, he might have told me he had dated around a lot, but he hadn’t slept with every girl that had ever made eye contact with him for the last year.
‘Life is rarely as simple as it looks on paper,’ Mary smiled again. Two in one meeting, yes! ‘So here’s the deal. The Adventures of Angela are go. I’m going to put the intro piece online when we refresh the site tonight, and then we’ll start publishing the blog every day from Monday. You keep sending in entries every day by four and I keep a few days back in the bank. We meet again in a fortnight to sense check everything.’
‘Really?’
‘Really.’
I wanted to jump up and down and hug her, but despite her dating advice, Mary didn’t strike me as the hugging kind. She struck me as the ‘What the hell are you doing?’ kind, so I figured I’d save that for Jenny.
‘Any plans for the weekend?’ Mary asked as I stood up to leave after we’d discussed the wonderful issue of my expenses. Basically, she was going to pay for everything and give me $75 for each piece. She was paying me actual money to write. Ha! ‘Apart from clicking on your own link a thousand times?’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t do that,’ I blushed. I’d have repetitive strain in my index finger by Monday if it would help me keep this job. ‘But yep, I’m going to Alex’s gig tonight with my friend, and tomorrow I’m going to Central Park with Tyler, for a picnic.’
‘Picnic in the park?’ Mary raised an eyebrow. ‘Keep this up and we’re going to have to change this to a bridal blog.’
‘Oh no,’ I half laughed. ‘It’s not like that, really, it’s not.’
‘It’s dinner, theatre and Tiffany’s,’ Mary said bluntly. ‘Is he good in bed?’
‘You said not to put that in the blog,’ I blanched.
‘I did. Now I’m asking you a question.’ She stared me down. Definitely not a hugger.
‘Erm, yes?’ I said.
‘Have fun at the gig tonight, but work that picnic like it’s paying your rent.’ She
