Chapter 20
Deepti Batra is far more thrilled to be made temporary assistant to the Anniversary Architect than Olivia was to be given the role.
‘Gosh, it’s a real privilege to be working with you …’ Deepti attempts to look furtively at the notebook that sits hidden on her lap under the canteen table ‘… Olivia. Yes, thank you, Olivia.’ She nods her head vigorously. ‘I’m really very grateful for this opportunity.’
‘Oh my god, Deepti, your politeness is adorable but you don’t have to pretend to me.’
‘Pretend?’ Deepti begins to look panicked. ‘I’m not pretending. I’m genuinely thankful for every opportunity afforded to me on this internsh—’
‘It’s OK, Deepti. I don’t need your gratitude, I just need your help.’ Olivia peels the wrapper off a KitKat. ‘Now why don’t you tell me a bit about yourself?’
‘Well, I, um, I went to Rushey Mead Academy in Leicester,’ says Deepti, looking coyly at her hands. ‘Then on to read History at Manchester University.’
Olivia remembers the time when her entire personality was her A-level grades and university choice. She realizes that, give or take two kids, a husband and a semi-detached house, it still is. ‘Sounds pretty impressive to me,’ says Olivia, clearing her throat.
‘I thought so too, until I pitched up for the internship here and clocked that I was the token hire to tick a few diversity and inclusion boxes. I’ve spent most of my time being a general dogsbody, making cups of tea, while the other people on the internship, people with names like Lucas and Edward and Little Lord Fauntleroy, get to gallivant around the country doing actual reporting.
Sorry, I don’t mean to sound rude. It’s just … ’ Her face flushes.
‘No need to apologize,’ smiles Olivia, taking a big bite out of her KitKat.
‘It all sounds very familiar to me. Listen, this isn’t news, and it isn’t going to make Little Lord Fauntleroy jealous.
But that’s a good thing, believe me, because you don’t want to be on the same wavelength as Little Lord Fauntleroy.
I’ve had two decades of journalistic experience and I promise to impart some of it to you while you work on this project with me.
And the good news is that this project is an editor’s special.
If we can pull off the party and impress him, it will help your connections no end.
It may not result in a byline, but believe me, those can come later.
You’ve got all the time in the world for bylines.
Now you can focus on showing how keen and competent you are.
Keen and competent, keen and competent!’ Olivia waves her KitKat in the air then takes another bite out of it.
‘This is way more important than being on the news desk.’
‘Really?’ Deepti perks up.
‘Yes, really. So you’ve heard of Stop the Press, right?’
‘Of course!’ Deepti lets out a gasp. ‘STP. The people who keep throwing bright pink paint over journalists and editors?’
‘The very ones,’ says Olivia, mouth full of chocolate.
‘I did think about joining them,’ sighs Deepti, ‘but, you know, need to pay off student debt and all that.’
‘Right,’ nods Olivia. ‘Sure. Anyway, STP. Well, the thing is, Stephen has heard that they’re planning to threaten this centenary celebration we’re putting on, and we need to make sure that doesn’t happen.’
‘How can we do that?’
‘By using our investigative journalism skills to find out about them, of course, so that we can STP-proof the party.’
‘Oh, right.’ Deepti pulls out her phone. ‘I mean, we could start by looking at their Instagram?’
‘Surely that’s too obvious?’
Deepti shrugs and hands her phone to Olivia, who begins scrolling through a selection of black and white pictures of STP members at protests.
Shots where the only colour in the frame is the pink paint poured over some shame-faced journalist standing outside their office.
Candid shots of group members, huddled round kitchen tables as they work late into the night, plotting the downfall of the ‘corrupt MSM’.
And multiple shots of a young woman, on a march, her hands holding crudely created cardboard banners, bearing the wisdom STOP THE PRESS.
A woman with short, white-blonde hair and furious grey eyes.
Rose.
Olivia sits in Gail’s, alone, having slipped out of the office for a moment to herself. The barista has started giving her the cappuccinos for free, a sure-fire sign that she is spending far too much time here, not to mention money.
But it’s the only place that she can get her thoughts together, without Deepti or Stephen bothering her, or the grunts that echo from Nina’s glass box every time HaalandIsLife drops another comment under her column.
And Olivia needs the quiet right now to work out what she is going to do about the fact that she went on a wild night out and revealed her soul to one of the founding members of a group whose sole aim is to destroy the industry that pays her salary, and in doing so, most of her monthly mortgage.
The Post-it note containing the contact email for Rose sits on the granite table in front of her, fluttering in the gentle breeze of the air conditioning which the manager could really do with switching off, given the weather is that especially cruel late-April brand of icy cold.
Rose’s email had been easy enough to find, hardly requiring the skills of a trained investigative reporter – there on the website, under the ‘About Us’ section, lay the pictures and contact details for every member of the ‘Executive Activism Team’, which sounded to Olivia about as nonsensical as the title of Anniversary Architect.
Olivia may not want the antidote to the gummy any more, she might even be glad about everything that’s happened since. But she needs to know what, exactly, she told Rose and what, exactly, Rose is planning to do with that information.
But she needs to do it in a nice way. A way that doesn’t provoke any ire from this woman she so recently shared many intimate details of her life with.
She begins composing emails.
Dear Rose, I hope this finds you well. I just wanted to see if we could arrange a time to meet again and perhaps discuss our night out in a grown-up and sober way. Yours, Olivia.
Too formal.
Hi Rose! I hope you are well, and don’t mind me reaching out to you – I tracked down your details and I thought I would just check in as I had so much fun the other night. Fancy doing it all again?! xx
Too perky. Too fake.
Rose – I wanted to get in touch as it has come to my attention that you are not who you say you are.
Don’t worry, I’m not cross, I just wanted to figure out what it is you want from me, and if there is a more honest way that we could communicate.
I’m pretty sure I told you things that night that I’ve never even told my own husband, and given that level of candour on my part, I feel it would be such a shame to ruin it by us not at least trying to have a conversation on a more equal footing, one based on trust and integrity.
Way too understanding. Not to mention worthy.
With a start, she realizes that she doesn’t need to be nice to Rose.
She doesn’t owe her anything, because Rose is the one in the wrong – the one who lied and tricked her into revealing things that were better off left in the past. Why is this her natural setting?
Rushing to apologize even when she hasn’t done anything?
It’s Rose who should be sitting somewhere composing messages to her – it’s Rose who should be feeling cornered and on the spot.
By trying to be polite and nice, she is thinking like the old Olivia.
The Olivia who Rose had so effectively deconstructed that night in the pub.
If she sends a pleadingly pathetic message to her, Rose will know that she holds all the cards, that the ball is firmly in Stop the Press’s court.
Olivia’s not going to behave in the very way that got her into this mess in the first place.
She writes quickly, and without bothering to reread.
Rose (at least I think that’s your name). If you know what’s good for you, you’ll call me, ASAP. OR ELSE. My number is at the bottom. PS. This is Olivia. No more Mrs Nice Girl.
She hits ‘send’, gulps down her free coffee, and strides back to the office with a sense of majestic purpose.