Tina strides back in with two bottles of Dom Perignon.
For me? You shouldn’t have!
Stuart pops the corks and divvies out the wine. We all raise our glasses expectantly.
‘To say that the incoming Creative Director is a visionary is something of an understatement. Their passionate dedication and cutting-edge savvy represent what we here at M&A should aspire to collectively.’
Cutting edge--HA! In your face, Kline!
‘Please help me in congratulating the new leader of our creative team…’ Without meaning to, I stop breathing. I picture my hand in a firm shake, Stuart nodding to me knowingly, the crowd crushing inward. ‘Roger Kline!’
Everyone, including Roger, lets out a little gasp of shock. I feel as if one of my lungs has collapsed.
‘Thank you, Stuart,’ Roger blubbers. Each of the board members pumps his hand in turn. Stuart pats him heartily on the back. I try to move, but I’m afraid that if I do I’ll keel flat over and face plant into the table. The clinking of glasses, the back clapping, Roger’s smug little laugh, careen through my head in a jarring circuit. What about ME?! I want to scream. I’m five times the marketeer Kline is! TEN! But I don’t (of course). I do the sensible, expected thing and walk, head high, up to my arch nemesis.
‘Congratulations,’ I hear myself say and move to clink glasses with him. My hand jerks out in a stiff salute and, at that exact moment, Roger turns a quarter of an inch to mouth ‘thank you’ to Gianni, and our glasses smack and explode! Crystal and champagne shower his pointed Italian brogues. He squeals and hops backward on one foot. Mortification isn’t the word. Should I make a run for it?! God, no. That’d make it worse.
A crushing silence fills the boardroom, but in my head that awful shatter replays over and over again. Everyone is staring. I fake a cough and thrust out an apologetic hand.
‘Oh my God! I am so sorry, Roger,’ I blurt, and I genuinely am.
He sneers at me over the top of his plastic rimmed specs. ‘Sure you are.’
Is there a paper towel somewhere? A dishtowel? Panicking, I do this awkward stop-start dance like I might go looking for a napkin or a mop or a hole to crawl into, or I might not. Tina swoops in with a rag and a dust pan and, while she’s mopping at Roger’s feet, I make a quick (but dignified) exit.
My first instinct is to rush the elevator and run headlong down the street, but I point myself in the opposite direction and march, with rigid, deliberate steps, back to my desk. One by one, the directors glide by, then the design team, all of them grazing me with pitying glances. Even the mail boy, Brian, gives me a sympathetic nod on his way to the store room.
‘Oh, for Christ’s sake,’ I grumble and try to make myself smaller behind the computer screen. Kate plunks herself down on the edge of my desk.
‘You were robbed.’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ I say flatly.
‘No, seriously. What is Stuart thinking?’ she snarls.
I freeze. She’s right! What was he thinking? A light bulb hisses to life in the back of my mind.
‘Oh my God, Kate!’ I jolt upright and grab her wrist. ‘It’s a test!’
‘Say what?’
‘A test! Stuart knows I’d blow Roger out of the water as Director! He wants to see how much I want it.’
‘Uh--’
‘I’m going to talk to him.’ I spring to my feet.
‘Julie, wait,’ Kate calls out, but I steam past to the elevator bay, shoot up a floor, and half run half walk to the outer door of Stuart’s office. His pert secretary, Norma, looks up at me with her standard, plasticine smile. I breeze straight past her.
‘Hey, you can’t go in there!’ she yelps after me.
Stuart is on the phone, swivelling ever so slightly in his angular Swedish chair, when I fling open the door. He looks up at me, then at the door, and says into the receiver, ‘I’ll call you back, Sid. Okay.’
‘I’m sorry to bother you, sir. It’s--’
‘Sit down, sit down,’ Stuart says and rises in the fashion of Bogart era gents. I smooth my dress and perch on the edge of a chair.
‘About the directorship,’ Stuart begins.
‘It’s alright. I totally get it,’ I smile at him. ‘It’s a test. You’re testing me.’ I lean back into the chair and recross my legs. ‘You’re good. I mean, getting Roger in on the whole thing. Really had me going there, boss.’
Stuart’s mouth droops open.
‘No. No, I’ve given the job to Roger,’ he says.
I can feel the blood, all of it, draining out of my face. I’m fairly sure I’m going to vomit.
‘You were the obvious choice, Julie. The safe choice,’ Stuart says, quiet and matter of fact, as if he were talking to himself.
A shudder of red hot bile careens up my spine and everything--the back wall, Stuart’s long face, the desktop--turns a sick shade of red. I check the fast rising impulse to scream at him, and instead swallow hard and clear my throat. But when I open my mouth to say something clever and proud, the only thing that comes out is a thin, strangled sound. I cough, sit up pin-straight, and train my eyes on Stuart’s.
‘The safe choice? Really?’ I ask and, before Stuart can answer, I feel myself sucking in a sharp I’m-going-to-regret-this breath. ‘Would that be because I have more experience than Roger? Or because I work longer hours than he does? Is that it? Or maybe it’s because I take my job--and this company--way more seriously than he does!’
Stuart pushes back from his desk. Oh dear God--he’s calling security! I jerk to my feet. However, instead of reaching for the red intercom button, Stuart reaches across the desk, his palm upturned in a gesture of pained apology.
‘You’re a brilliant adwoman, Julie. We’re very lucky to have you,’ he says and then seems to lose his train of thought.
‘Brilliant, but…’ I prod.
Stuart huffs slightly. ‘Sometimes you’re too careful. Most of the time, actually. What we need now is an innovator. Someone who isn’t afraid to take risks.’
‘Someone like Roger?!’ I hiss without meaning to.
‘Yes. Someone like Roger,’ Stuart sighs and takes a step toward me.
I raise a hand, and he freezes. ‘I hear what you’re really saying.’ I take a wobbling step backward toward the door. ‘If I was a man, I’d be able to compete! With half the experience!’
Stuart shakes his head. ‘That’s not it at all, Julie, and you know it,’ he says. ‘Maybe you should take a day or two off, sort out your emotions.’
‘My emotions?’
I slap my hand down on the door handle and graze the top of Stuart’s head with what I hope is a dignified, 100% self sure look. ‘I think I’d rather take a permanent vacation.’ I push the words out with forced determination and storm out of the office before I crumble against the door frame.
I half expect Stuart to dart out after me with a hangdog look and some retributive offer--a co-directorship maybe?--but he doesn’t. He’s calling my bluff, I tell myself and slow to a pottering stroll when I’m an arm’s length from the bend in the corridor. I look back over my shoulder, face composed in a look of pleasant surprise, but Stuart isn’t following after me in his loafers. The door to his office is closed. From the far end of the hall, it signals something horrendously final. The two rows of copywriters still their hands over their keyboards and gape.
That’s right. Get a good look!
I squint at them through a haze of swallowed tears, only now realizing what I’ve done. I’ve just blown the moment of my career! What am I going to do now?! Maybe I should throw myself at Stuart’s feet? Beg for my old job back? No. I couldn’t do that. I’ve made a stand, and it’s brash and a bit stupid, but behind all the spurting is belief, whole hearted, not-a-chance-I’m-backing-down belief. I have worked way too hard to give up on myself now. Stuart wants to see a risk-taker? Well, here’s me making the biggest leap of all! Here’s Julie Quinn calling her own bluff and risking everything on herself! The elevator door pings open. I step i
nside, and this time I don’t look back.
CHAPTER THREE
As soon as the elevator jolts downward, I push the glaring red hold button and slump back a step against the cool, steel wall. Two seconds. That’s all I need, and I’ll march back into the main office like the rock star that I am.
But first--
I suck in a deep breath. ‘Fuuuuuck!’
That’s better.
I push the button for the fortieth floor, and the elevator jolts back to life. The doors ping open, I step out, and Kate bolts to my side.
All eyes on me? Soak it up while you can, tossers. I’m OUT of here.
‘You okay?’ she whispers.
‘Mmmhmm.’
Just keep moving forward.
I stride over to my desk and swipe everything--picture frames, files, scraps of note paper--into the waste basket.
‘What?! No! What are you doing! Kate half whispers, half yowls at me across my desk.
‘Quitting.’ I say coolly.
You can’t quit!’
‘I can. And I’m taking this.’ I hoist the waste basket to my hip.
Tina snuffles at my shoulder.
‘This is so not like you. Jules!’
Kate latches onto my wrist and I try half-heartedly to wrench it free.
‘If I don’t go now--’ I choke on an upsurge of tears. ‘I’ve got to go. So just--let go.’
Kate loosens her grip, her eyes welling up with huge, grade school tears.
‘Call me later. Alright?’ I say, a tremor ringing through my voice.
‘Yeah, okay.’
She takes a step back to put an arm around Tina whose shoulders are heaving with silent, squint eyed sobs. I hug her neck, then Kate’s, and heft the box onto my hip.
‘If you need anything,’ Kate cries out as I turn for the elevator.
‘I’ll call you,’ I say and wave over my shoulder. The two of them watch, arms linked, as I go. I can feel their eyes on me, can feel Kate wishing for me to turn around. The box is suddenly cinder-block heavy; it’s all I can do to lift a hand and press the down button.
Please OPEN. For the love of God, PLEASE--
The door swings wide, and I haul myself and the top heavy bin inside. Good things, try to think of good things, I tell myself. At least I haven’t run into Roger. He would have stuck it to me again for sure, the little weasel. The numbers flash, thirty-five, thirty-four, and the doors open. A few bankish looking types push inside, but I only just sense them looking at me, the basket, sniggering. Right now, all I want to do is go home, take a long, hot shower, and have Brad make me hot chocolate, maybe cradle my head in his hands, and tell me everything is going to be alright.
I slip through the side entrance (the last thing I want to do is small talk with the doorman) and am met with a wall of sideways rain.
‘Perfect,’ I groan. I tuck the waste basket under my arm and make a run for it. It’s only eleven o’clock. The express won’t be running yet. An extra couple of blocks and I could catch the F train. I put my head down against the wind and splash through the intersection and up Broadway, the rumbling of the two passing trains reverberating upward through my feet. By the time I reach the station, my hair is streaming wet. My dress ekes an inky blue down one leg. A knot of hoodied teenagers crowds the stairwell.
Great. Feral children.
I try to twist around them. A tall, pock-faced boy jostles me on the steps, and I slip sideways, the bin toppling from my grasp. Files and photo frames and my mostly dead ficus crash, one after the other, down the stairwell.
This just gets better and better.
I sink to crouching, try to pick up the scattering papers and the photos of me and Kate before they’re stomped on.
When I finally make it home to #72 Montague I’m wet to the skin, and the bin is threatening to blow out at the bottom. I huff up the stairs and fumble about for my keys. When I slide it into the lock, the door pushes open.
‘Brad?’ I call out. There’s no answer.
I step inside and go dead rigid. A gauzy magenta bra half drapes my parents’ photograph on the hall table. My stomach clenches, and I set the bin aside and tip-toe my way into the living room. Clothes are strewn about in little heaps--Brad’s favorite pair of destroyed jeans, a leather shift dress, my Parisian shrug. A fit of laughter peels through the cracked bedroom door.
‘I said sit still!’ Brad says. The unmistakable shuttering sound of his camera fills the sticky air.
WTF.
I peer through the door frame, my breath stalled in my throat. A round faced model juts one shoulder out, then the other, atop the bed, her unnaturally red hair offsetting huge green eyes.
‘Make me,’ she teases, and Brad leaps on top of her and pins her down, snapping photos one handed. He wrenches up her skirt, and she lets out a giggly moan.
In the same instant I feel a renting sear in my heart and, just behind it, a cold, hand clenching anger. It’s this second feeling that pushes open the door and propels me into the room. Brad and his muse freeze.
‘Working from home?’ I snarl.
‘It’s not what--’ he bumbles.
‘What it looks like?!’ I size up the model, and she pouts back at me, apparently bored with the whole scene. This isn’t happening. ‘Is that my dress?’ I howl.
‘Braaad,’ the girl whines. ‘You said she was at work.’
‘Get out!’ I scream. The room blurs into a spinning red. I pitch pillows, a shoe, and Brad’s camera case blindly at the bed. The case beams him smack on the forehead.
‘Are you insane?’ he hollers. The girl scuttles to the door, kicking off my second hand Vera Wang as she goes.
‘Call me when your mom goes to bed,’ she purrs over her shoulder to Brad and disappears.
I stoop to pick up his telephoto lens and cock my arm. Brad squeals like a Japanese schoolgirl.
‘Calvin Klein, was it?’ I force a breath into my lungs.
‘Listen, Julie--’
‘Socks and jocks? I can guess what she helped you with.’
Is the room getting smaller, or is it just me?
‘It’s not like that,’ Brad answers.
‘Get out,’ I say, my voice unwavering, impersonal. Brad hops one-legged as he pulls on his jeans, one eye on the hovering lens.
‘Baby, listen. We were just prepping for a shoot. You know how it is,’ he starts, and I drop my arm back another inch. A deep, pulsing V creases his forehead as he wriggles into his shirt.
‘So, you weren’t about to give it to her?’
He purses his lips purple, then explodes. ‘You know, this is mostly your fault! If you weren’t so… so damned work-obsessed!’
‘ME?!’ The bastard!
I pitch the lens at Brad’s head, and he catches it mid air. For a few, head-swimming moments, neither of us moves. A siren shrieks up the back alley and underlines the collision of images firing behind my eyes--the girl’s devil-red hair, Brad straddling her super-tanned legs, Kate’s tears, Roger’s smirk.
‘Jules,’ Brad says, cool as ever, and my eyes focus on his. ‘I am sorry.’
He doesn’t look sorry. I want to say something, something smart and cutting, but I can’t. It’s all I can do to keep upright.
He runs a hand through his hair. ‘Listen, I’ll be at my place. I’ll call you tomorrow. We’ll sort this out,’ he says.
Is he for real?! He flat-out lies to me about where he’s been spending his afternoons! He brings some nineteen year old hussy back to MY house! And he wants to ‘work it out’? The black knot in my heart seethes up and into my mouth.
‘Get OUT.’ My voice is low, almost a whisper, but edged with a firmness that surprises us both. ‘Don’t come back.’
Brad nods in that infuriatingly cock sure way of his.
‘Yeah, alright,’ he says and heel toes it out of the apartment. The door clinks shut behind him, and the dark, bile burning fire licking upward from my belly snuffs out. In one solid motion I drop to the floor, the te
ars already coming in long, racking waves. How could he do this? In our bed?! And who is she? Does he love her? No. He couldn’t. Right? God, HOW did I not see this coming?
My mind rakes backward to all of the overtime shoots for the Abercrombie catalogue, all the texts from ‘the dark room’. There had been a niggling part of me, right at the back of my chest, that’d twigged at every one of his handy outs. ‘Sorry, babe, something just came up.’ Really?!
Truth be told, I’d wanted to believe him. I’d wanted him to be the poor little rich boy he played up to. Two pictures swam in my head: Brad as the svelte-talking Bogart--fiery, secretly honorable, and in unshakable love--and Brad as Ashton Kutcher--adolescent, ambivalent, and willing to get up on just about anything. I try to get the two pictures to lie side by side in my head but can’t and bury my face in my hands. I let the tears come in a gagging rush. How could I have been so stupid? A sudden, throbbing need to be held surges through me. In spite of myself I reach out, in my heart and in my head, for Brad to come home and make all of this--this entire rotten day--evaporate.
Made With Love: I Love You Forever Page 4
