Polly Courtney - It’s A Man’s World

Alexa admired his tact. She knew how much work Jamie had on his plate upstairs; he was always the last to leave the office at night. He certainly wouldn’t want to take all afternoon.

With a shaky hand, Kayleigh returned the empty glass to the pictures editor and flashed him an apologetic look.

‘Tell you what,’ said Jamie. ‘Just do a dry-run. No pressure; we’ll leave the camera off and you can just practise what you’re going to say.’

‘Okay.’ She nodded. ‘Right.’ Kayleigh looked darkly into the camera and in a slow, sexy voice, growled: ‘Hi, I’m Kayleigh and you’re watching Banter TV.’

The videographer smiled. ‘Got it.’

Kayleigh frowned. ‘What d’you mean? That was a practice.’

‘Oh, I must have left the camera running by mistake.’ The videographer glanced at Jamie. ‘That’s lucky, isn’t it?’

Alexa had to stop herself from laughing. Kayleigh was an ideal candidate for ‘Brainy Banter’.

She looked at her watch. Strictly speaking, they were ten minutes into Kayleigh’s ‘exam’, but the junior editor who was supposed to be asking the questions had wandered off in search of a pen and hadn’t been seen since. She was about to suggest popping upstairs to find the young man when the door flew open to reveal a windswept-looking Paddy, towering in the doorway, panting.

‘Hey!’ He made a half-hearted attempt at taming his wild, curly hair as he looked around the room, his eyes settling on the lingerie-clad student. ‘Sorry I’m late. I’m stepping in as exam master. Had to track down some questions.’

Kayleigh smiled timidly. Alexa breathed a sigh of relief. Paddy, she was beginning to realise, was one of the gems shining out from a mixed team at Banter . She raised a hand to the lad in a gesture of appreciation.

‘I’m Paddy,’ he said, bounding over. ‘Pleasure to meet you.’

‘Kayleigh,’ she replied, shaking his hand.

‘You can put your clothes on if you like,’ suggested Jamie, quietly.

Quickly, Kayleigh slipped on a translucent white blouse and a leather skirt, perching nervously at the desk, opposite Paddy.

Alexa wondered whether it was fair for her to stick around while the questions were asked. The photographer and videographer were already packing away. She doubted that exam conditions were necessary, but it didn’t seem fair for her to listen in. Her phone buzzed.

I knew it. I will have

to remind U tonight of

what U would miss if

you turned . . . Mmm,

looking forward to it.

Alexa hid her smile as she tucked away her phone. Paddy had already started the exam.

‘You’re at Leeds Uni, right?’ he asked. ‘Studying Sociology and hoping to get . . . a third?’

Kayleigh nodded.

‘And most importantly . . . you’re a 32DD, right?’

Alexa watched as the junior editor glanced approvingly at the girl’s flimsy top. There it was again: the blatant reference to parts of Kayleigh’s body as though they were joints of ham.

‘Okay . . . let’s begin. What is the main ingredient of the German dish, sauerkraut?’

‘Um . . .’ Kayleigh’s face crumpled. ‘Sausage?’

Paddy smiled. ‘That’ll go down well with the readers.’

Alexa followed Jamie out, trying not to cringe as Kayleigh struggled to decide whether a baby fox was called a cub or a puppy.

‘Jamie?’ she said, as the lift started to propel them up to the fifth floor. ‘D’you think, generally, we’d do better to get some higher-calibre models in for our features?’

He looked at her, raising an eyebrow. ‘You mean models with a higher IQ?’

Alexa shook her head. She knew that intelligence, sadly, was not a desirable trait for the girls. ‘No, I mean . . . more professional models. Ones that know how to love the camera.’

Jamie started to smile. ‘You don’t have any brothers, do you?’

She frowned. ‘No.’

‘I only ask because if you did, then you’d know that the thing about Banter and all the other lads’ mags – the thing that makes them sell – is not using chic glamour models who love the camera.’

‘What?’

‘They want photos of the girl-next-door. Or rather, they want photos of their fantasy of the girl-next-door. Chicks like Kayleigh . . . perfect.’

‘But . . .’ Alexa was struggling to understand what he meant. ‘All the airbrushing and touching up that you do . . . surely that’s because the readers want pictures of the perfect woman?’

Jamie motioned for Alexa to exit the lift before him. He was shaking his head and smiling.

‘Nope. They want her to look sexy, but approachable. They want to believe that they can get their hands on tits like Kayleigh’s – that girls like Kayleigh will let them into their pants.’ He leaned forward and yanked open the door. ‘Sexy, but rough. That’s what we do best.’

Alexa headed back into the office, lost in thought.

‘And the best bit?’ he said, eyes twinkling.

She looked at him.

Jamie smiled. ‘We don’t have to pay them a penny.’

Chapter 8

Alexa laid out the cuttings on the desk in front of her, re-reading the headlines that were splashed strategically across backdrops of nipples and flesh.

The ‘Win Your Girlfriend a Boob Job’ competition had been the most popular one of the year. That was closely followed by the search for the nation’s horniest girlfriend, and at number three was Chick Strip, an appeal for readers to send in videos of their other halves undressing – a contest that probably could have performed even better, had it not been curtailed by some women’s rights group declaring it ‘insulting to women’.

Alexa pushed the cuttings aside, thinking about the campaigners’ argument for a moment. Was it insulting? She was a woman and she didn’t feel insulted. But then, she wasn’t one of the subjects of the video footage. She tried to imagine how she would feel to be one of the girls in the winning clips, having her body subjected to scrutiny by hundreds of thousands of hormonal young men. It was difficult. She wasn’t likely to find herself in such a position. Alexa turned back to the blank document on her screen. ‘Competitions’, she typed. Carriage-return. She drummed her fingers against the keyboard.

It wasn’t that she didn’t know what to say. She knew, conceptually, what she needed to recommend to Peterson in the way of features and competitions. She knew that they needed greater reader engagement: more blogging, more uploads, more general banter. They needed to run more contests with compelling incentives – although Alexa was not convinced that cosmetic surgery for girlfriends was necessarily the right way to go on this. No, the problem was not a lack of inspiration. The problem was that she was completely demoralised.

More than a month had passed since Alexa had first set foot in the Banter offices. For weeks, she had read, watched, assessed and observed, pulling together recommendations and starting to make small changes where possible. She had no doubt that she could make an impact, perhaps even meet the ambitious April targets, given the chance – but that was the problem. She wasn’t being given the chance. The weight of resentment felt by certain members of the team was such that she couldn’t make an impact, however hard she tried. Changes couldn’t be made by Alexa alone; they had to be instigated by the senior editors. Of the five senior editors at Banter – Derek, Marcus, Neil, Jamie and Riz – the most critical two were ardently opposed to Alexa’s very existence. It simply wasn’t possible to turn things around with only half of the team on board.

Alexa sighed. It was a quarter to seven. Her brain had given up for the night. She closed the document, emailed it to herself, realising that yet again, she would be opening up her laptop after dinner. Matt would be disappointed. Already, Alexa had downgraded his suggested ‘drinks and dinner’ to a takeaway at her place and now she was effectively writing off any chance of a relaxing evening by committing herself to more work. Her thoughts flitted back to the advice her mother had given her: Make time for him . Where was this time supposed to come from?