Once Bitten - Clare Willis Read online

  Chapter 5

  “Let’s go over Lucy’s accounts and get an update on when the next client contact is occurring.” Dick checked his notes. “Unicorn Pulp and Paper Products. Angie, I think you’ve been working with Lucy on Unicorn?”

  “Yes, Dick, and we’ve got a presentation coming up next Monday.”

  “Very well,” Dick answered, “who are you working with in Creative?”

  “Me.” Dave was our newest copywriter. Normally he had iPod earphones growing out of his ears, but in deference to Dick he’d removed one.

  “I’d rather have you work with someone a little more senior on that. Web, can you take over for Dave?”

  “Sure, no problem, Dick.” Web made a few marks on his notepad. Dave smiled at me, looking a little wistful, and I remembered that at our last brainstorming meeting he’d told me that my sweater was pretty.

  “Miss Minnie’s Muffins?” Dick said it like he was taking an elocution test. “That’s yours, Kimberley?” She nodded.

  “Deadlines coming up this week?” Dick asked.

  “No, not until next month. They’re working on new flavors.” Kimberley’s tone was subdued.

  “Plump n’ Tasty Chicken?”

  I raised my hand. “A week from Friday, I think.”

  “Okay, check in with Lakshmi on that by next Wednesday at the latest.”

  Dick looked around the room. “And last, but certainly not least, we have Tangento. I believe you were working with Lucy on that also, Kimberley?”

  Tangento was one of the company’s most high profile accounts. They spent millions a year on their advertising and everybody at HFB wanted a piece of them. Although few people were familiar with the parent company, as I’d said to Eric last night, their subsidiaries were some of the most common names in apparel. Adonis sportswear. Venus lingerie. Their Proteus line of basketball sneakers had the dubious distinction of being the ones over which ghetto youth shot each other.

  Kimberley was saying, “Yes, Dick, we just finished working with the Research department, doing focus groups on Venus and Adonis.”

  Dick paused and coughed into his hand. “Kimberley, I’d like to have Angie parley with Tangento for the time being. I’d like her to act as account manager, with your capable assistance, of course.”

  Dead silence took over the room. Kimberley looked down, her cheeks glowing red. Dick looked at his notes, either not knowing what he had just done or not caring. I felt a painful mixture of confusion, pleasure, and guilt.

  “Each of you should dispatch an email by the end of the day apprising me of the status of each account. Thank you all for your attendance.” Dick tried to make a decisive gesture with his pen, but it flew out of his hand and hit Dave in the chest.

  Kimberley walked over to Les and Web and started talking, her back to Dick. She walked out the door with them, and Lakshmi and Theresa soon followed.

  I made my way over to Dick, planning to jettison Tangento. Sure, I had wanted to manage some accounts, but because I deserved them, not because my boss was MIA. I also needed to be able to live with Kimberley. At least until I could afford my own place.

  “Dick, if I could just speak to you for a minute.”

  “Yes, certainly, Angie.”

  “I’m not sure I really have the time to give Tangento the superior service that they deserve. And also Kimberley is so much more familiar with the account than I am…”

  He held up his hand. “With Lucy gone we are in a staffing quandary. There are issues here that I am not at liberty to discuss, but rest assured that I have complete confidence in your ability, Angie. If you would like me to relieve you from some of your other duties in order to free up time for Tangento, we can delegate Macabre Factor to someone else.”

  And throw away my chance of running into Eric again?

  “No, no, that’s okay, Dick, you don’t have to do that. I can handle things for now.” Whether I was going to be able to handle them with Kimberley was another story.

  I saw the envelope immediately when I walked into my office, maybe because I had cleaned up my desk the day before or maybe because I was looking for something like it. It was cream-colored, made of thick, cottony paper, addressed in an ornate calligraphic hand, like a wedding invitation, but it had no stamp or return address. I grabbed it and ran down the hall to Theresa’s desk. She looked alarmed as I approached so I slowed to a walk.

  “When did this come?” I asked, waving the letter.

  “Early this morning. A courier brought it.”

  I took the letter back to my office and closed the door. My heart pounded painfully as I opened it.

  My dear Angela,

  I apologize if I frightened you last night. That was certainly not my intention. If you don’t want to see me again, then please accept my apology. But if you do, I hope you will do me the honor of meeting me tonight at 10 P.M. on the terrace behind the Ocean House.

  I knew I shouldn’t go. The guy lived far away, dressed like Oscar Wilde, and had sexual proclivities that were, well, strange would be putting it mildly. Why couldn’t I meet a nice guy who I wouldn’t be ashamed to take home to meet the folks? Maybe I should meet Eric one more time to get him out of my system, I thought. Away from the ambience of the club he’ll look like a run-of-the-mill weirdo and I can forget about him. Then all I’ll have to deal with is the disappearance of my boss, which Lord knows is enough.

  Nice rationalization, Steve would say if he could hear my thoughts. Now, what are you going to wear on your date tonight?

  In the hopes that the hangover I was still feeling could be cured by a little caffeine, I went out to get a latte. Leaving the climate-controlled environment of HFB was like opening an oven door. The day had turned San Francisco schizophrenic, foggy morning segueing into blazing midday. I took off my jacket and rolled up the sleeves of my blouse. The sunlight seemed inordinately bright, like the earth had moved closer to the sun while I wasn’t looking. I told myself it was because I’d been in the office all morning and ducked quickly into the café.

  Everyone in San Francisco professes to hate chain stores and love the independent guys, but whenever I went into Starbucks there was always a line. Lakshmi was standing near the cash register. From behind it looked like a ten-year-old was ordering a grande latte.

  “Excuse me, can I see your ID?” Steve and I had gotten into the habit of teasing Lakshmi because, unlike my own boss, she had a sense of humor.

  “What are you, the coffee police?” she asked with a mock scowl.

  “Did you know Coca-Cola actually used to have cocaine in it?” I asked. “Now all we’ve got is coffee. How are we supposed to maintain our productivity?”

  “Yes, don’t you hate it when your country won’t let you become a drug-addled drain on society?”

  “You immigrants, always sticking up for the government. You need to exercise your democratic right to bitch and moan!”

  Lakshmi reached the head of the line and beckoned me to order on her tab. We both ordered a grande latte and I followed her to one of the tiny tables.

  “So, that was quite a coup this morning,” said Lakshmi, looking at me expectantly. “Macabre Factor and Tangento. Are you taking steroids or something?”

  I took a sip and burned my tongue. The coffee had a metallic aftertaste, just like the orange juice. I wondered if one of my fillings was leaching metal.

  “I don’t know what Dick was thinking. I don’t know what the Macabre people were thinking, either. They hated the ideas we gave them.”

  Lakshmi shook her head. “But obviously they didn’t hate you. They want to give you another chance.”

  “Yeah, not sure why they want that, actually.”

  “Angie, you really don’t know how good you are, do you?” Lakshmi laughed. “Actually, that’s one of the charming things about you. You’re about the only person I’ve met in this business who isn’t always tooting their own horn. But you’re sharp. Those ideas you had on Spreckels Cereal and New Freedom tampons
, they were great. And the way you handle clients is terrific. But your light is shining in a barrel right now. I hope Lucy’s fine, but really, you’re lucky she’s gone. I’m sure she had you in her sights, right after Kimberley.”

  I wanted to bask in her compliments, but the last two sentences had me confused. “What do you mean, had me in her sights?”

  Lakshmi wiped a dab of foam from her upper lip. “Lucy had it in for Kimberley. She was trying to get her fired, quietly, of course.”

  “Why?”

  Lakshmi looked around, probably to make sure there were no other HFB employees lurking nearby. “Well, depending on which gossip you listen to, either Kimberley was trying to usurp Lucy and take credit for work she didn’t do, or Lucy was an impossible manager who wouldn’t let Kimberley sharpen a pencil without sending her a memo about it and was trying to fire Kimberley because she refused to knuckle under.”

  “Wow. Well, I could see both of those scenarios being true.” I started to tell Lakshmi about Kimberley deleting my Macabre Factor emails, but decided that I shouldn’t go spreading rumors unless I had proof.

  “Kimberley might deserve to be fired, and after all, Lucy is her supervisor, but you should still watch your back. I wouldn’t put it past Lucy to fire someone because she finds them threatening.”

  “Oh come on now, Lakshmi, who would find me threatening?”

  Lakshmi patted my hand. “I’m just telling you how I see it, Angie. I’m only going to be around for another couple of months, so I figure I’ve got nothing to lose by telling the truth. Dick is going to have to watch out for me. I might start correcting his vocabulary gaffes.”

  “What do you mean, are you leaving?”

  “I’m getting married.” Lakshmi said it in such a nonchalant tone I expected her to finish the sentence…and then I’m going to pick up my shirts at the dry cleaner.

  “I didn’t even know you had a boyfriend,” I said.

  “I didn’t, really. It’s an arranged thing, between our parents, mostly. He’s a postdoc at MIT, so I’ll be moving to Boston soon.”

  I didn’t know such things went on in the twenty-first century. I imagined a gift-wrapped Lakshmi being handed over to a bald man in his sixties. “Have you met the guy?” I asked.

  “Oh sure, we’ve met several times. I told my parents I had to approve of the man before I’d agree.”

  “I see,” I said. The man in my mind changed to a broad-shouldered hunk in bicycle shorts. “So you’re in love with him?”

  “Love comes later, Angie. It’s something that grows, from knowing a person, building a life together.” Lakshmi looked at her watch. “Oops, I’ve got to get back.” She swallowed the last of her latte and headed out.

  I sat for a while longer, pondering. I had dated guys before, one in college for over two years. My parents had loved Andy and hinted broadly about our getting married, but after graduation Andy wanted to be on Broadway, or at least Off-Broadway, and I wanted to see if I could make a go of it in San Francisco. We did the long distance thing for a while, but then Andy got a role in a play in which he and his costar appeared naked. By the second performance he was cheating on me. It felt silly to be angry when I hadn’t seen him in six months, so I just officially called it quits. Since then it had been one long dry spell, punctuated by brief showers, and now I had a hurricane on my hands.

  What should you trust, your heart or your head? Do you find a partner society considers appropriate and settle down to a life of TV reruns and potpies? Or chase down blatantly inappropriate, not to say sinister, men because they make you feel like a firecracker on the Fourth of July?

  At one o’clock I walked to the Azure Sea to meet Steve and the Toothpaste Kings. The foyer was subtly nautical, all dark wood and ship memorabilia in glass cases. The hostess, a young woman dressed in a decidedly non-nautical cashmere sweater set, led me back to our table. The building had once housed an exclusive men’s club and the dining room was the former swimming pool. The vaulted ceiling sported a gorgeous WPA-era mosaic of fishermen casting their nets into San Francisco Bay during the days when Fisherman’s Wharf was a working pier, not just a mecca for tourists and scammers.

  Steve had scored us an excellent table on a raised platform that ran along the side of the dining room, the “see and be seen” area. He was already sitting with the clients, Steve in the best seat, facing out into the crowd, with the two men on either side of him. I was sure Tweedledum and Tweedledee hadn’t noticed that Steve had taken the catbird seat. The Tweedle on my left, Stanford “Stan” Ruckheiser, stood up, catching his belly on the edge of the table, and pulled out my chair for me. My right hand was then enclosed in the clammy handshake of Jacob White, who I had secretly nicknamed “Jake the Snake” because he was long, sinewy, bald, and he talked like a rattlesnake, a breathy whisper with a sibilant “s.”

  “Sssso, Angie, Ssssteve tells us you have the best recommendations for what plays we might want to sssee tonight,” Jake hissed at me.

  “Yesss, that’sss right.” Steve looked right at Jake as he spoke. “Angie always knows what’s a go and what’s a missss.”

  I choked back a laugh. Steve had recently attended a conference called Neurolinguistic Programming for Salespeople, where they taught him to mirror the client’s mannerisms, accents, and speech patterns to create instant rapport. I wondered how long it was going to take Jake to catch on and ssstrike Steve across the face.

  “I hear Beach Blanket Babylon is fun,” Stan said.

  I groaned silently. Beach Blanket Babylon? I was about to take his question seriously and lay out an array of theater choices that was unrivaled on the West Coast, in my humble opinion. Molière at the American Conservatory Theater, Sam Shepard at Berkeley Rep, why, the Fringe Festival was going on right now! He could see twenty new plays a day for the next week! And instead he wanted a 30-year-old cabaret show whose big gimmick was a woman wearing a hat longer than a car with the entire skyline of San Francisco arrayed on it? Next he’d ask us to take him to Hooters on Fisherman’s Wharf.

  I must have betrayed my disgust, because Steve actually kicked me under the table. “Yes, Stan, Beach Blanket Babylon is fun!” he said cheerily. “We’d be happy to supply you with tickets. Just let me know how many you need.”

  Stan and Jake brightened at that news and we turned our attention to the menu. Our two guests from landlocked Fresno were suitably impressed by the variety of fish on offer, while I scoured the list for something vegetarian. I’m not a strict veggie, but I hate all fish. The smell and texture reminds me of something gone rotten. People are always telling me what I’m missing, so I periodically try a scallop or a bite of salmon, thinking that maybe I’ll change my mind, but it always tastes like flesh Jell-O to me. I decided on a Caesar salad. Steve, who is always watching his weight, ordered shrimp salad. Our two guests, mindful that lunch was on HFB’s tab, ordered appetizers and soft-shell crabs for Stan, lobster for Jake. I steeled myself for a long stinky lunch.

  Often our client lunches don’t involve any business talk at all. Although I’m sure HFB still takes a hefty tax write-off on them, their purpose is simply to oil the gears of commerce. This lunch appeared to be of that ilk, as the appetizers were consumed and Steve regaled our clients with hilarious stories of the zany citizens of San Francisco, such as the man who kept sixty-one dogs in his mansion in an upscale neighborhood.

  “People complained about the stench for eight years before the city did anything about it. Can you believe that?” Steve popped another shrimp into his mouth and smiled brightly.

  “Speaking of stench,” Stan replied, with a conspiratorial wink at Jake, “I hear you all have Tangento as clients. You don’t have any problem with that little brouhaha in Asia, huh?”

  Chapter 6

  Steve and I looked at each other, desperately trying to communicate via account executive telepathy. Which one of us knew what he was talking about, so we could act like we knew what we were doing? It seemed neither of us had heard anythi
ng, but we couldn’t let on to that.

  “Oh, yes,” I answered. “Last we checked it seemed like a flash in the pan. What have you been hearing?”

  “I figured you guys would know more than me,” Stan answered, looking smug. “This was a piece I saw in the Economist.”

  Steve and I exchanged surprised looks. Stan was reading the Economist?

  “There was an item a few weeks back,” Stan continued. “Slave labor, wasn’t it, Jake? Can’t really remember, but I thought you’d all be running like chickens with your heads cut off to make sure it didn’t come out here.”

  The waiter brought our entrées then and discussion ceased as shells were cracked and flesh sucked. I rearranged the lettuce and croutons on my plate while filing a mental note to myself to find out what Stan had been talking about. Public relations snafus, even in far away countries, were the nightmares that kept advertising agencies up at night.

  On the way out I stopped at the restroom and splashed my face with water. I was still feeling very nauseated, and the smell of fish at lunch hadn’t helped.

  After lunch I dug around in my office for some hand-drawn art that Creative had done for the Plump n’ Tasty Chicken account. I couldn’t find the pieces anywhere, and I thought it was my organizational system again, until I remembered I’d handed them to Lucy last week. I went over to her office to retrieve them.

  I stood in the doorway for a minute, feeling weird. Everything was just as she’d left it. There was even a sweater hanging over the back of her chair, as if she’d just gotten up to go to the bathroom.

  “Lucy, where are you?” I said under my breath.

  I opened her file drawer and looked under the Ps. Lucy’s workspace was arranged like the Library of Congress, but there was no file for Plump n’ Tasty Chicken. I finally found it in the Cs, but the illustrations I was looking for were not in the file.