Lindsey Kelk - I Heart London

‘Did I miss anything?’

‘Just the coffee run.’ Mr Spencer was sitting in my leather chair, a small smile on his face. It had been so long since I’d seen that smile that I actually shrieked in surprise. Bollocks. Yes, I was late into the office, but I wasn’t late for the meeting. Why was he early? Who was ever early? Arses. ‘I hear you’re off to London, Ms Clark?’

‘I am,’ I nodded, attempting to regain my composure. And failing. ‘It’s my mum’s sixtieth.’

He stood up and gestured for me to sit down. Which was nice of him, given that he was in my seat in the first place.

‘I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to get back to you, ladies,’ he said, striding across our tiny office in two steps and settling himself on the edge of Delia’s desk. For an older gent, Bob Spencer was still well put together, like he’d reached a certain age and decided he was just going to stick with that. He always reminded me a little bit of Ken Barlow, but less evil. ‘Things are very busy right now, as I’m sure you can appreciate. The industry is going through a very difficult time.’

I settled into my chair, suddenly aware that I shouldn’t get too comfortable. Where was Delia? Why was he talking to me when she wasn’t here? There was only one possible reason – he was here to shut us down and she was crying in the toilets.

‘I’m sure you remember I was a big fan of your work, Angela.’ He smiled at me and I waited for the blow. Why had she gone to cry in the toilets without me? Selfish mare. ‘You did some wonderful writing for The Look , and what you did with James Jacobs was really very good.’

Through the mediums of eyebrow raising and telepathy I tried to communicate to the boy dropping off our mail that Bob was talking about an article I had written about the actor James Jacobs coming out of the closet and Nothing Else. He replied with widened eyes with a very loud and clear ‘Whatever, lady’.

‘Thank you?’ I brushed the floor with my toes and turned the chair very slightly from side to side.

‘And Delia assures me my first impressions about you were correct,’ he went on, continuing to stare me down. I took it all back − Ken Barlow would never be so rude. ‘And that, possibly, Cecelia didn’t exactly cover herself in glory when working with you.’

I took that as his very, very diplomatic way of saying that Cici was a batshit, cray-cray mental who should be locked up, but instead of correcting him, I made a small scoffing noise and concentrated on pressing the hem of my striped American Apparel T-shirt between my thumb and forefinger.

‘So I have to be honest with you − I thought the presentation the two of you gave me last week was a little lacking.’

Finally we were getting to it. I felt tears prickle in the backs of my eyes and fought to keep them down. I have always tried so hard to keep tears out of the workplace. It was a very smart woman who said, ‘If you have to cry, go outside.’ Or a very intolerant one. Either way. But this was too awful. We’d worked so long and so hard on Gloss , and the feeling that it was just going to go away was almost as disappointing as thinking you had a packet of chocolate Hobnobs in the cupboard only to find nothing but two Rich Teas.

‘There was a distinct lack of vision.’ Mr Spencer raised his voice a little, presumably to ensure every word of his carefully put together ‘fuck off and die’ speech hit home. ‘You weren’t looking at the bigger picture. But that’s what I’m here for. I am the bigger picture.’

Bigger knob , I thought to myself with a sniffle, but managed to keep the words to myself. Just.

‘If we’re going to launch a new print magazine in this climate, we need to make some noise,’ he said. ‘And you make noise by going global. Or at least transatlantic. Simultaneous US and UK launch. So what do you think, Angela? Up to the challenge?’

Huh. So I’d got it a bit wrong. As I desperately fought both disbelief and the urge to reply with the words ‘fuck’ and ‘off’, Delia pushed the door open with her tiny bottom and beamed at me, hands full of giant Starbucks cups.

‘You’re here.’ She turned her back to her grandfather and gave me the biggest smile I’d ever seen on her face. ‘Has Grandpa filled you in?’

‘He has,’ Mr Spencer answered for me. ‘But Angela hasn’t actually reacted in any way other than to gape at me like a goldfish.’

‘I, um, I’m sorry.’ Second attempt to gain composure in one day. Second failure. Delia set a large cup down in front of me and passed the second to her grandfather, gulping down the third as if someone was going to take it off her. ‘I’m just sort of surprised. What exactly are you saying?’

‘I’m saying I need you to sell this idea to the London office,’ he said. ‘And if you can get them on board, and you can get the exec team on board, you’ve got yourself a magazine. And not just a magazine but a franchise.’

‘Oh. Right then.’

‘You don’t think you can do it?’ Bob mistook my shock for terror. It was reasonable.

‘Of course we can do it,’ Delia replied. Life really was so much easier when people answered all of your questions for you. ‘Angela means it’s a pleasant surprise.’

‘I do,’ I said, remembering myself and nodding eagerly at Delia and then at Bob. ‘That’s exactly what I meant. We can absolutely pull off a transatlantic launch.’ I felt like we were back in a Bob place now. Probably.

‘Perfect.’ Bob stood up, took one sip of his coffee, made a face and set it back on Delia’s desk. ‘I’ll make an appointment for Angela to meet with the publishing team in London, and Delia, I’ll send you the information about Paris. Ladies.’

And with a nod, he was gone.

Delia waited a slow three seconds before running round to my side of the office, knocking my coffee across the room and wrapping me up in a very tight, very excited hug. I squeezed back, even though I was still in a complete state of shock. The magazine was happening! There were Hobnobs in the cupboard after all! I needed to clean up that coffee.

‘Holy shit, Angela,’ Delia shouted as loud as her WASP-y lungs would allow, which wasn’t really all that loud, and let go of my shoulders to do a little dance in the middle of the office. ‘We have a magazine. We have two magazines. We’re global, Angie!’

‘I know.’ I breathed out hard. ‘I can’t believe it. I mean, we’ve been planning it for so long, I can’t believe it’s actually going to come to life. We’re going to print a magazine and people are going to be reading it. Fingers crossed.’

It was all a bit much. It had taken me six days to recover from the shock that I wasn’t just walking around wearing a very pretty ring but was actually going to have to have a wedding and get married, and now I had to adjust to the idea that we really were going to have to write and publish a magazine, not just talk about it and put together pretty PowerPoint presentations.

‘So I talked to Grandpa before you came in and the plan is that you’ll meet with the London Spencer Media publishing team next week while you’re over there, and I’ll take the advertisers’ conference in Paris.’ She paused, took in the look of abject horror on my face, and recovered herself. ‘Unless you want to do Paris and I’ll do London?’

‘Paris?’ Not bloody likely, I thought to myself. ‘You can take Paris. But, um, wouldn’t you like to come to London too?’

‘Love to,’ Delia laughed, calming down slightly and settling into her desk chair. ‘But the advertisers’ conference is next Friday and I need to get everything together for that. Grandpa is going to schedule your meeting for Wednesday, maybe Tuesday? Keep it clear of your mom’s party on Saturday.’