Chapter 16
Sometime around eleven thirty we got the final approval for the statement, and then I quickly sent it to Silverline’s communications team for them to release, since that was part of the requirement per Victoria.
When I woke up this morning, it was already picking up momentum after being shared by both People (for fans) and Deadline (for the industry).
“What happens next?” Sam asks once I catch her up on the situation with the statement.
We’re standing in the kitchen while we wait for the coffee Sam is brewing, we’re both in PJs, hair in messy high ponytails, and I’m sure I look like I’ve been run over by something, because that’s what I feel like.
Yesterday seemed like an entire week.
“Now, we wait,” I say. “And maybe pray it works.” Sam presses her hands together and whispers a quick one.
Tessa has already flagged a few unhappy posts, but that’s expected. The first people to respond are always the ones posting their feelings, not their well-articulated thoughts.
Sam grabs two mugs from the cabinet and places them on the counter.
“So, you and Luke looked pretty cozy on the couch last night,” she says, tilting her head, a smile pulling at the corners of her mouth.
I knew when she saw us sitting there after she made it home from work that she would say something. Thank goodness she waited until this morning.
I pull my lips taut. “We were working on my laptop,” I tell her.
“So close, though?”
“It’s a small screen.”
She lifts one shoulder. “I’m just saying it looked pretty cozy to me.”
“There’s nothing to read into.”
“Too late.” She gives me a full grin now. “It’s quite the one-eighty, though. Aren’t you supposed to hate Luke?”
“I do,” I say, even though after last night, I feel . . . different.
It was hard to fall asleep after he left. I was worried about the statement, of course. But also, his words kept replaying in my head. I’m having a hard time believing his version of the story after holding on to mine for so long.
I nibble on a thumbnail, debating telling Sam what he said, but then I give in.
“I had things wrong about him,” I tell her.
She scrunches her nose. “About what?”
“About why he left,” I say. “He took the job with Pulse because he was sure I was going to get the promotion.”
“Really?” she asks.
“Apparently he told me all about it in the voicemail.”
“Why did you delete that?” she asks, looking appalled.
I shrug. “It felt right at the time.”
“But you totally misconstrued that entire situation,” she says. “What else did he tell you?”
I bite my thumbnail again, not sure I want to tell her the next part. “And Ella Abbott apparently went with him because she wanted to. He didn’t poach her.”
Her eyes widen. The coffee maker beeps, and she ignores it.
“You can’t hate him now,” she says.
“I feel . . . confused.”
She nods, slowly, an understanding look on her face. “Classic schema rigidity,” she says. “It’s when your brain has built a story and now it doesn’t want to update it.”
I tilt my head. “You learned that from two semesters of therapist school?”
“No,” she says, shaking her head. “I saw it on a TikTok last week.”
I glare at her.
She ignores it. “Regardless, that’s probably what’s happening. Give it some time. You’ll get used to the idea.”
“It’s hard, though,” I say. “It changes everything.”
“It does,” she says. “But maybe when you let that go, he could be a contender for kiss number fifty.”
Thank goodness I don’t have my coffee yet, or I’d have done a spit take.
“Are you kidding?”
“Not even a little. He’s fine.” She fans herself. “You should definitely kiss him.”
“There are rules, Sam,” I remind her.
She scrunches her face, like she’s trying to recall them. “The work one?”
“Yes, no kissing coworkers.”
“But he’s not a coworker.”
“He’s a colleague that I’m now working with,” I say. “And even more importantly, I’m not interested in kissing Luke. I’ve got . . . that brain thingy going on.”
“Schema rigidity,” she says. “Get over it. Or at least let me kiss him. One of us needs to.”
“Neither of us is kissing Luke,” I say.
My phone rings, and I grab it from the counter, but not before Sam catches the name on the screen, her eyebrows shooting up.
“Jerkwad?” she asks.
“Shhhhh,” I say before answering.
“Hi, Luke,” I say into the phone.
Sam’s eyebrows travel up her forehead again before she drops them and starts making kissy faces. I turn away from her.
“Hey, Arch,” he says. “Did you see the post from You Oughta Know that just went out?”
My stomach drops. “No. What did she say?”
“It’s not good. She’s done a full breakdown about how it was clearly written by PR and not River and Bailey.”
I grumble. “I hate that woman.” For this and for the fact that her assessment was right: PR did write that statement. She’s so annoying.
Luke chuckles. “Do we need to come up with a plan of attack or give it more time?”
I think about that. If we do something now, it will feel performative. But if we wait, the narrative sets. And once it sets, it’s even harder to shift. Maybe even impossible.
There’s really no good move here.
“I have no idea,” I tell him honestly.
“I think we should wait a bit longer,” he says. “See if sentiment shifts.”
“Okay, let’s wait,” I say. It might be the only move we have right now.
Waiting looks like me watching Brandwatch like a hawk, getting texts from Tessa with links to other posts saying basically the same thing as You Oughta Know’s, talking down Bailey when she sees what’s happening online, and going back and forth with Luke about what we could do next.
By the end of the day, when the narrative has only shifted more to You Oughta Know’s perspective and Victoria sends an email with just one line—“What’s the plan?”—we wave the white flag.
Me: Time for plan B. Any ideas?
Jerkwad: Nope. You?
Me: I’ve got nothing. Meet tomorrow?
Jerkwad: I’ll come to your office in the morning.
The next morning, after I get Luke clearance into the building, we sit in the conference room, known as the war room at Harrow it’s the ones who actually matter,” Tessa says, giving me a report of what she’s been seeing online.
Translation: Things are getting worse, not better.
We can’t get these pictures up soon enough.
By six thirty in the evening, Luke and I are back in the war room, staring at the pictures of our clients looking pleasant as they leave a coffee shop. Bailey is wearing a flowy sundress and a crossbody bag, and River is in a striped T-shirt and jeans and dark sunglasses.
“I think we should go with this one,” I say, clicking on a picture with my mouse to enlarge it. “See how she’s looking at him?”
Luke nods. “But River looks like he has some constipation issues. Look at his jaw.”
I snort laugh when I see what he means. His jaw looks rigid. It’s a stretch, but as we’ve seen time and time again, these influencers can make mountains out of molehills.
“Okay, then this one,” I say, clicking on the next picture. It’s the same pose, essentially, but River’s jaw looks a little less clenched.
“That works,” says Luke.
We select the three best photos, and they are exactly what we wanted: casual and friendly.
I send them off to the studio. Once we get approval, we’ll let People magazine have them.
“Do you think it will work?” Luke asks while we wait.
“I really hope so,” I say.
But it doesn’t work. Not at all.