Tide Together (Paradise Bay #7)

1. Spray Tan Mistakes and Erectile Dysfunction Disasters

1

Spray Tan Mistakes and Erectile Dysfunction Disasters

Paige Chadwick

There are three things that are not tolerated in my family. Ironically, the first is failing to be number one at whatever you’re doing at the moment, whether you’re playing a ‘friendly’ game of tennis with one of the Rockwell children, or you’re learning to walk at the same time as your nimble cousin Anya (who later goes on to make the USA Gymnastics team). You’ve probably heard of the ABC rule of sales, Always Be Closing. The Chadwicks follow an ABW variation—Always Be Winning. To my father, Phillip Chadwick III, CEO of Chadwick Mutual Funds, and my mother, Daniela Chadwick, model-turned-fashion-mogul, everything is a competition, and it’s better to be dead than to come in second. They’re the winningest winners in America, as are two of their three offspring.

I’m the third.

The second deadly sin in the Chadwick household is being overweight. My parents don’t believe in ‘slow metabolisms,’ only lazy people. But slow metabolisms are a thing. I know because I inherited our Grandma Jean’s sloth-like one (and curly ginger hair that resembles a clown wig when there’s even a hint of moisture in the air—thanks, Grandma Jean). My big brother, Phillip IV, as well as my younger sister, the perfect princess Tiffany, are tall and lean like both my parents. They have striking blue eyes (with 20-20 vision, of course) and blond hair with just a slight curl to it that resembles perfect beach waves, whereas I’m short with green eyes (one near-sighted, and one far), and if I even think about eating a carb, I swell up like a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade balloon. So, I’ve pretty much spent the first twenty-eight years of my life either feeling extremely hangry or binge eating Doritos, followed by months at the gym to work off the devilish orange triangles. I’m working on body positivity—I swear I am—but it’s just so freaking hard to erase decades of programming.

And now, for the third and final transgression, for which you will swiftly be ostracized from the family—being late for anything, ever. Chadwicks show up fifteen minutes early—not because we value other people’s time (that would be stupid). It’s so we can suss out the situation, find the most powerful place in the room to sit or stand (standing is infinitely better, by the way), and make any adjustments that give you even the slightest advantage. I’ve actually seen my mother take over the lighting controls at swanky restaurants until she achieves a soft, youthful glow.

So, let’s go over that again so the people at the back of the room don’t miss anything. Don’t be a loser. Don’t be fat. Don’t be late.

My thin little sister Tiffany is about to win, win, win! because in two days’ time, she’s going to marry the heir to the Tyson Oil fortune in a disgustingly lavish ceremony on the most ultra-exclusive island in the entire Caribbean—Azure Island. And I’m in the process of committing the third deadly sin because the festivities started two days ago, and I’m still in New York, which makes me unforgivably late.

And here’s where two of the three rules come into conflict because if I were to have been on time, that would have made me a failure at work, and since I’m not allowed to fail, because that would make me a loser, and I’m not allowed to be late, I’ve got myself in a real Sophie’s Choice situation here.

Well, okay, so I’m exaggerating a little bit. I’m not choosing which of my children lives and which one dies. But let’s just say I think I get what poor Meryl Streep was going through because this is one freaking impossible decision. In fact, I’m about to commit the fourth (and slightly less deadly) sin in the Chadwick family—crying in public. I can feel the prick of tears welling up behind my eyes. I fight with everything in me to hold it together because I’m currently sitting at my desk in the sleek, ultra-modern office of Prescott Marketing and Ad Solutions.

I won’t cry. I refuse to. It’s simply not done. Not by Chadwicks and certainly not by the executive assistant to Guy Prescott, ‘the real Don Draper’ (well, according to Guy after a couple of whiskeys anyway). He may be a bit of a blowhard, but the truth is Guy is known around the globe as the king of advertising. He’s a creative genius who could sell hair ties to Patrick Stewart. He’s my boss, my mentor, and a giant twatwaffle who has made me two days late for my little sister’s destination wedding trip.

I should’ve left for the airport an hour ago, but Guy is currently in crisis mode for our biggest client—the pharmaceutical company that makes Vialis, the little green pill that assists men with erectile dysfunction. You’ve no doubt seen our ads of smug, satisfied middle-aged couples, and more recently, the one starring aging rapper Li’l Rhythm, who’s mounting his comeback via a song about how he’s ‘aging like fine wine, still rockin’ that hype, he’s got Vialis in his pocket and he’s got his groove on tonight.’ (Yeah, I wrote that line when the team was coming up blank.) I also wrote this little gem:

Grey in my beard, wisdom in my eyes,

It’s the motion in the ocean, baby, not the size.

Got my swagger back, and I’m on the rise,

With Vialis in the mix, I’m reaching new highs.

Get it? He’s ‘on the rise’ and he’s ‘reaching new highs?’ Wink wink.

It’s crap, I know. But it gets even worse because I also wrote this even crappier verse:

I still got the rhythm that I always had,

But now I got Vialis so my girl ain’t sad,

You should get it too, you’ll really be glad

You don’t got to worry cuz this stuff ain’t bad.

So, as it turns out, that last line simply isn’t true. But I’ll get back to that in a minute. First, I’m sure you’re wondering what an executive assistant is doing writing lyrics. So allow me to explain. I’m not just an EA. I’m a future ad executive, which means right now I have to be a fixer, a problem solver, a Jill of all trades. I swoop in and do what needs to be done, no matter what needs doing. Six months ago, the team was writing that jingle, it was two a.m., they were stumped, and I was forced to stay to make sure they finished the song before Li’l Rhythm got to the studio to record later that morning. I’m no rapper, believe me. I just really wanted to go the hell home so I finished the damn song so we could all leave .

Anyway, the song was a huge hit among young boomers and older Gen X men (our target audience), sales of Vialis skyrocketed, Li’l Rhythm’s career bounced back from oblivion, and he started selling out stadiums again. Only, four nights ago, he took one of the little green pills on stage during a concert to show how ‘effective’ it is (gross, right?), only to suffer a massive heart attack twenty minutes later.

Sales flatlined along with Li’l Rhythm (who, luckily, only flatlined for six minutes). The stocks, however, are dropping by the hour, and with each dollar, a portion of their ad budget disappears with it. We’ve been working around the clock to spin this, but let’s face it, you can dip a shit sandwich in chocolate and deep fry it, but it’s still a shit sandwich.

As Guy’s go-to woman who can fix anything, there’s no way I could just mosey on out of the office with a wave and a ‘See you in a week! Good luck with that.’ Besides, Guy is also in the middle of a nasty divorce, so his life is a ‘total shitstorm’ which means my sister’s wedding ‘couldn’t have come at a worse time.’ In the six years I’ve been working for him, he has never needed me more than he does right now. And I know he’ll pay me back for staying. He’s the kind of person who rewards loyalty. And since he’s my very best shot at my dream career, I’m forcing myself to stay put in my seat while he’s in Chicago in a meeting with the makers of Vialis, going over the three strategies we’ve come up with. He needs me here to get the team started on whichever strategy they choose the second that they choose it. And so, I’m waiting, even though I know that, in a few minutes, I’m going to have to rebook my flights, yet again, which is a panic-inducing thought that is bringing on these damn tears.

I glance out the wall of windows on the opposite side of the office that looks out over the city. Yup, it’s still a cold, grey January morning, unlike the Benavente Islands in the Caribbean, where the rest of my family is probably lounging poolside, sipping fruity boozy drinks right about now. They’re also likely shit-talking yours truly from dawn till dusk.

“Do you think she’ll even bother to show up?”

“Not a chance.”

“Do you think she even bought a ticket or has she just been pretending the whole time?”

Yes, dammit, I bought a ticket. Two of them, actually, because three days ago, when Guy ‘gave me the choice’ to either postpone or find a new job, I wasn’t able to get a refund or make changes to the first ticket on account of buying it on a Black Friday sale. And yes, Tiffany, my sweet little sister, I’ll bother to show up. A thousand times, yes. I promise. I’ve been buffed, waxed, and detailed, just like the biweekly treatment Guy’s Bentley gets. I also had an early morning spray tan, which, now that I look at my hand, I see is getting darker by the minute. I should not have listened to the girl at the counter who said I could totally pull off ‘deep bronze goddess.’ Shit. Maybe it’s not that bad and I’m the only one who’s going to notice on account of it being my skin.

But I digress. The point is, I’m fully committed to this trip. In my mind, I’m already there, sucking back pi?a coladas to numb the sting of all the biting comments coming from my mom and her sisters. But I will bloody well be there. I hope. My flight leaves LaGuardia in exactly two hours and twenty-two minutes. So long as I get that call in the next ten minutes, and everything runs smoothly en route to the Caribbean, I’ll arrive just in time for the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner, where I will make the most heartfelt, memorable speech a big sister/bridesmaid has ever made. I’ll toast the hell out of the happy couple, and there won’t be a dry eye in the house. And everyone will have to shut the hell up about me being unreliable or out of touch with the family because it’ll be that good. And then, on the big day, I’m going to be the one she asks to help her hold her dress while she pees, because that is the sort of thing you need your sister to do. We’ll giggle away, tipsy on Champagne, while I gather all that tulle and silk up over her head, and she’ll know I’m going to be there for her, even for the yucky stuff. It’ll be one of those perfect, simple bonding moments we’ll remember forever.

“You are never going to make that flight,” Lyle, the junior ad executive whose desk is across from mine, says. Junior twatwaffle is more like it—a complete know-it-all who thinks his knowledge is far superior to my own because he has a marketing degree and I dropped out of college a year early when a summer internship here at Prescott turned into an offer of full-time employment.

“I am absolutely going to make it,” I answer. “He’s going to call. Right … now.”

We both stare at my phone but nothing happens.

Dammit. Why couldn’t that have worked? It would have been a total baller move. “Say, can you try calling me to make sure my phone is working?”

He smirks, then dials my number with one lazy, slow finger.

Immediately, my phone lights up and starts to ring. Damn. “Okay, good. Thank you.”

He doesn’t hang up, but instead smiles at me while the phone continues to ring.

He’s going to leave a message, isn’t he? “You can hang up now, we clearly know it’s working.”

He waits until my voicemail kicks in, then says, “Yeah, Paige, it’s me Lyle. Apparently your phone is working. Listen, you should know you are never going to make that flight. A meeting like the one Guy is in will take six hours, minimum. Also, you may have gone a little heavy on the spray tan because you’re starting to look like the orange stripes on a clown fish.”

Clown fish? Asshat. Also, how dare he make me check my messages? Ignoring the clown fish remark, I say, “You don’t know any better than I do what’s happening in that meeting.”

“I do, because I’ve been in lots of meetings just like it.” He clicks his teeth. “Yup, you are screwed. You’re not going anywhere.”

I set my jaw so hard my teeth grind. “He’s going to call. Any second now.”

“You should get a hold of your mom and tell her you’re not going to make the wedding. It’s better for them to know now.”

“I don’t need to because I’m going to make it.”

Lyle shakes his head. “You won’t. When Guy calls, he’ll have a laundry list of things you’ll have to do, and he’s going to tell you he’s counting on you and that he can’t trust anyone else. Guy doesn’t give a shit about your sister’s wedding. Guy would skip his own wedding for this account.”

He’s right. Guy would skip his own wedding, which is probably why he’s getting a divorce. And he’s definitely going to tell me I have to stay. I rub the bridge of my nose, feeling a tension headache coming on. “I’m just going to have to say no.”

Lyle shrugs. “Then be prepared to kiss your career goodbye.”

I stare out the nearest window for a second, my stomach in knots as I watch the people in the building across from us. It’s the office of 2M Marketing, our biggest competitor, and the reason Guy leased the 32nd floor of the tower we’re in even though it has a funky, musty smell. They don’t even do half of our annual business, and yet somehow he feels threatened enough by them to want to look across at them any time he likes and flip them the double bird. The two M’s, Monica and Marcel, actually seem very cool. Like right now, they’re in a staff meeting, and someone just said something funny because they’re all laughing. That’s something that never happens here. I sigh, then say, “I bet they’d have let me go to my sister’s wedding on time.”

Lyle opens his mouth to say something I assume will be shitty, like, “If you think it would be so much better there, why don’t you quit?” but my phone trills and I pounce, answering it before the first ring finishes. “Guy Prescott’s office, Paige speaking.”

“Yeah, we’re making progress but this is going to take most of the day,” Guy says. “I need you to cancel my two-thirty with the lawyer and be on standby.”

“Umm, I can rebook with Hal, but I do have to leave for the airport in the next ten minutes.”

“Come on, Paige. You’re on Guy Time. You knew it when you took the job.”

“Yes, I know, but this time I really do have to leave.”

“For what?”

“For my sister’s wedding.” My gaze lands on my suitcase and my gut tightens. I’m going to miss the rehearsal dinner, aren’t I? Yes, yes I am. And I’ll be permanently on my family’s shit list. Forever, like those chemicals in non-stick pans. Unredeemable. A black sheep from now until eternity. I can’t stay. I just can’t.

“Oh, right. I forgot about that. Listen, that’s not going to work today. Get her to push it back. ”

Push it back? What the actual fuck? “I don’t think that’ll be possible.”

“Of course it is. It’s a destination wedding. They’ve got everyone trapped for the entire week anyway,” he says. “Gotta go. Be waiting for my call.”

I hang up and take a deep breath in lieu of throwing my phone across the office. It’ll be fine. It’s a problem, sure, but every problem has a solution. I’ve been in much worse situations and there’s always a way out.

Lyle gives me a nasty grin. “How cute. Are you giving yourself a little mental pep talk?”

“No. Just doing some … mental calculations.”

“Like weighing out how screwed you’ll be career-wise if you leave versus how screwed you’ll be with your family?”

“Something like that,” I say, feeling suddenly very hot and queasy.

“So, what are you going to do?”

I don’t have the first fucking clue…