“What about you, Maddie?” Jo asks. “Cam is a traditionalist from the fifties and I’m very much not. Where do you fit when it comes to dating?”
I think. “Maybe somewhere in between? I don’t date much—it was a hard thing to do when living at home.” And the thought alone is anxiety-inducing.
“But you’ll start dating soon?”
“I am talking to someone, Ben, who I met at the theater.”
“That’s how you meet someone new,” Cam says.
“We’re just texting, though. He hasn’t asked me out or anything.”
“Why not ask him out?” Jo says.
“Or,” Cam offers, “she could drag her vagina across a bed of nails.”
“Such a Leo,” Jo says. “Drama queen. It’s the twenty-first century! It’s all about equality between the sexes.”
“Then why aren’t tampons free yet?” Cam turns to me. “No, wait for him to ask you.”
Chapter Eleven
I was offered the job at OTP the next day, and started the following Monday.
My first few days are nothing but admin. Now I know why they needed someone so soon. My predecessor left months ago and the work’s been piling up since. Meetings need organizing rather than the grab-and-go system they’ve been temporarily operating under. Minutes need taking, Penny’s emails need sorting, titles set up, and royalties need inputting （if you thought you could escape maths by pursuing a career in books, think a-fucking-gain）。 I did wonder when I’d be able to attend meetings, discuss submissions, and work on photographic interiors, but I can’t expect too much so soon. Maybe it’s something I’ve got to earn.
I’m only Penny’s PA, but my line manager and mentor is Kristina Dorval （shoulder-length hair, flipped at the ends nineties style, reminiscent of Avi; midthirties with dark green eyes）。 It’s her food and drinks list I’m assisting on and her method of mentoring is very admin-focused, but I like her. She insists I call her Kris and our first catch-up lasted much longer than the allotted thirty minutes because it doesn’t take much for her to turn away from her computer and talk to me about life.
She has a partner called Bruce and a cat called Alfred. No children, and I get the impression that it’s a choice. She attends salsa classes every Thursday evening and goes to the theater at least twice a month. She loves to eat but hates to cook.
“On Thursdays we have Creative,” Kris says, “and you’ll need to prioritize that in Penny’s diary because that’s where we discuss submissions we want to share with the wider team and our upcoming titles.”
“Do I go to that?” I ask hopefully.
“No, that’s just for assistant and commissioning editors,” she says, “but every Tuesday, the entire department meets for NFPM—Nonfiction Publishing Meeting—where we discuss proposals/new projects, perspective authors and illustrators/photographers, our back and front list, the like. You’ll take the minutes.”
A catch-up with Penny follows straight after. I was naive enough to assume the PA aspect of this job would be minimal, given that at the theater it was a full-time job in and of itself, and it paid me a grand more than this one.
“I need to add three new meetings to my calendar this week,” Penny says. “One with Thom, Gabby, and Sabrina and then a follow-up meeting later on in the week—though not Friday afternoon—with just Thom and Gabby, and then I need a separate meeting with Marie, Levi, and Chrissy from the US office—watch out for the time difference.” Penny doesn’t pause for breath or look up from her computer screen as I scrawl notes at her office table. “The follow-up meeting can be half an hour, but the other two are a full hour. If no conference rooms are available, we can have the UK meetings in my office, coffee, tea, biscuits, et cetera.”
I look down at the printout of her calendar. It’s alarmingly full. I wonder if she genuinely has time to pee or whether she runs on chronic dehydration.
“I know,” she says, catching me. “I’m very full at the moment, but I do need these meetings scheduled in.”
“Right.” I nod emphatically. “Sure.”
* * *
Something I learned my third day in? To suggest a lunchtime meeting is the equivalent of spitting in the eye of the king’s firstborn son.
For the next ninety minutes, I go through Penny’s diary to see if any one of her catch-ups are out of office this week. Great, Laura’s on holiday, so I can cancel her thirty minutes. I ask Gabby’s assistant if she can be free for that time and she agrees to move things around to accommodate. I thank her as profusely as one can over email without exhausting the exclamation mark key, however I know there’ll come a time where I must reciprocate similar generosity or risk losing any future favor.
I notice Thom and Penny have two meetings scheduled in this week and request the hour be reduced to thirty, leaving thirty minutes free at 11:00 A.M., but Sabrina is busy. 11:30 A.M.? Yes, Sabrina can make that, but Penny’s meant to be in a cafe in Leicester Square at 12:30 P.M., so I’ll need to reschedule Bridgette’s catch-up. I reach out to her PA, who responds with “Maybe … can you check if that’s all right with Susanna?” Thankfully it is, and by the end, all three meetings are in.
I push out from under my desk to use the bathroom when— “Maddie?” Penny steps out of her office. “Can you run me the total sales figures for Morgan Taylor’s titles with us and then a separate report with his figures for other publishers? I also need our pub schedule for the next two years printed out on A-three and please categorize by month to include author, illustrator, ISBN, price, product type, and editor. I’ve also just sent you an email with a letter, can you put that letter on headed paper—it should be somewhere on the server, have a look—and print me nine copies ahead of tomorrow’s ten A.M. meeting. I’ll also need its standing agenda and previous minutes.” She smiles knowingly. “Do I need to repeat anything?”
I look down at my notepad and it’s like I’ve drawn spider’s legs across the page. “No, I’ve got it.”
“Thank you.” She walks out.
I look around and the girl in front of me smiles, lopsidedly, and widens her eyes. I know her name is Eliza. She chuckles and it could be disingenuous, but her face suggests otherwise. It’s round with permanently pink cheeks and she has brown Raphaelite hair that reaches the tail of her back. I smile and she mirrors it before dropping behind her computer again.
MT’s sales figures at OTP
Letter on OTP headed paper x9
Pub schedules on A3
* * *
I have jollof rice and salad for lunch. I’m glad to eat at two because the dining room’s emptying after the one o’clock rush. Back at CGT, I once made the mistake of sitting with my colleagues for lunch.
“Oh, what do you have there, Maddie?” Claire asked. “Is that African rice?”
I explained jollof rice as best I could whilst looking at their lunches. Jacket potato. Soup. Jacket potato. Sandwich. Sandwich.
“I bet it’s good.” She smiled. “Smells spicy.”
I tried to laugh （because what other response was available?）， but it came out as just an exhale of air through my nose.