Chapter 2 #2
The stylish woman Lauren now knew to be Joy looked up from her laptop just long enough to give an acknowledging nod to the room before going back to her typing.
“Honored to finally be a czar,” she said.
“Rasputin says hello. And yes, as James said, we’ve already put several steps in place to help mitigate the effects of the Countess of Lancaster’s latest actions.
” She glanced up again. “Credit, I must add, should also go to Lauren for mapping out this plan a few days ago, or so I’ve been told. ”
Lauren sat up a little bit straighter in her chair. Solving problems and bringing doughnuts. (Which, she noticed with some satisfaction, were quickly disappearing.) “That’s the job,” she said.
“Indeed it is,” Joy said. “So we have the countess reflecting on her actions and taking time to ‘listen and learn.’ In the
meantime, the Princess of Strathearn has graciously agreed to liaise with the British History Museum and the Royal Collection
teams as they pull out more offending items from occupied royal residences. There will also be an educational document for
other family members and household staff on why those items are offensive in the first place, in case they’ve somehow missed
the cumulative effects of one thousand years of British colonialism.”
“Well, thank you, Joy—” Eugene started to say, clearly a little uncomfortable with the subject.
“You’re very welcome. In addition,” she continued, “there are several reporters and photographers accompanying the princess
during her museum visit this morning, which will help stem the tide of negative coverage in the press. But again, credit goes
to Lauren.” Joy smiled at her, and it seemed sincere. “Although I have zero doubt that there will be future opportunities to put out more of these fires. Hopefully we can even start preventing them.”
Eugene also had a sincere look on his face—sincerely annoyed at the doughnut that had been placed on a napkin in front of him. He poked
at it with his pen, and Lauren fought the urge to snatch it away. Those orange and yellow sprinkles were completely wasted
on him.
“Thank you, Joy,” James said, this time standing up. “Your presence at the Palace will be most valuable. I’d also like to
introduce the rest of our team here to our new faces. Harriet Parker is our communications secretary, which of course means
she will be working with you on the majority of media efforts, Lauren. Harriet has been with the royal household for coming
up to twelve years and has worked closely alongside a number of our late members of the royal family.”
Lauren and Joy both gave her a little nod. Harriet nodded back, aiming for an expression of over-the-moon pleased yet deeply
serious. But instead, she just looked like she was having a muscle spasm.
“And this is— Violet, please, if I could have your attention— Violet Broughton, our head of digital engagement. From the official website to the social
feeds, it’s all in her hands.”
Violet, who appeared to be barely twenty-two years old and made Lauren feel like it was time to take retinol seriously, glanced
up just long enough to say hello, the way one would say hello to their old aunt Clara at Thanksgiving, before going back to
her phone. “Sorry, I’m tracking real-time engagement on our latest post,” she said by way of explanation, which was exactly
what Lauren would have said if she was head of social media and wanted to avoid being part of the meeting.
“Now, Lauren,” James continued, “I appreciate you have only just joined us, but I think we’d all like to hear your initial thoughts on the next few months and what efforts you might be thinking of to improve public image, trust, and the royal family’s connection with the public.
We can’t afford more negative press, especially with the US state visit less than five months away. ”
Violet and Harriet looked especially weary at that last sentence.
“A US state visit?” Lauren repeated.
“I’m sure Amelia put the details in her handover notes,” James said with a wave of his hand. “Anyway, please continue.”
“Yes, of course,” she said, adding US state visit?!?!?!? to her mental list of Things to Deal With—Amelia most definitely had not left handover notes. “As these, um, unfortunate
situations continue to pile up, the image of the monarchy continues to suffer as a result. What I propose is something that
I learned the power of during my six years at the White House.” She glanced at Eugene as if to say, You’re not the only one who’s worked in an esteemed institution, pal. “I suggest we begin hosting weekly in-person media briefings.”
James choked on the sip of tea he took from his travel infuser tumbler.
“Let me get this straight,” Eugene said, not even trying to hide his smirk this time. “You want to bring the press—the same
organizations that work around the clock to cause absolute mayhem for the monarchy, that we so carefully try to keep at arm’s
length while still providing necessary access—into the Palace? Every week?”
“I do,” Lauren said cheerfully, then stood up so she could start pacing around the room. She always thought better when she
was moving.
“The latest polling numbers don’t lie,” she began, “‘Never complain, never explain’ doesn’t cut it anymore in this age of transparency, especially among the younger generations.
Being secretive and mysterious just leaves the press to fill in the gaps, the public becomes confused, and we’re no longer in charge of the narrative.
Waiting for them to approach us for a comment in the final hour of a story puts you—well, us—at a disadvantage every time.
We’re living in a twenty-four seven news cycle, and social media, along with an entire circus of talking heads, shapes the conversation around everything.
I looked through several years’ worth of coverage and it’s pretty obvious that attempting to cover things up, create distractions, or hide behind anonymous source quotes in newspapers isn’t working so well. ”
“We are absolutely not—” Eugene started to say, but Joy held up a hand.
“It would be nice to hear her out,” she said. “This could be good for everyone.”
Lauren fought the urge to take Eugene’s doughnut away from him and put it in front of Joy instead. “Thank you, Joy,” she said.
“By doing a weekly press briefing, we can help shape any stories, show we are accountable for our words and actions, and also
give a timely heads-up about any upcoming events and points of interest, so they’re not filling the gaps with gossip.
“Plus,” Lauren continued before taking a deep breath, “I also downloaded some recent polls from a few different agencies on
how the British public feels about the monarchy.”
Both James and Eugene sat up like a current of electricity had run through them.
“They’re not great,” Lauren said, “and I suspect I’m not the only person in this room who knows that. So I’ve mapped out a
tentative five-month plan that can help us improve those numbers ahead of the state visit.” Her “plan” was really some arrows
on a legal pad pointing to the words BAD POLLS, but she’d come up with something more substantial in the next few days.
There was a snicker at the table, but Lauren couldn’t tell where it came from. “So American,” someone muttered.
“So what if it’s American?” Lauren retorted. “I can tell you that it works. It’ll let us curry favor while also keeping them at bay. Think of it this way: We’re giving the press a steady stream of glances into the royal institution, but we decide which windows they get to look in and when.”
Violet grinned. “Sounds a bit lecherous.”
“Okay, that wasn’t my best metaphor,” Lauren said. “But you understand where I’m going with this, right? And I think our first
media briefing should be this Friday, introducing Joy as the Palace’s first diversity chief, which is a huge moment for us,
along with talking points and the chance to ask a few questions. We couldn’t come out of this looking bad.”
Eugene just shook his head. “They are going to eat you alive,” he said. “This lot are a different breed to the US press; some
of them are absolute animals.”
“Maybe so,” Lauren said. “But my job isn’t to protect myself, it’s to protect all of this,” she said, dramatically gesturing to the entire room. “And this is an excellent way to do just that.”
There were a few beats of silence.
“I like it!” Joy said. “What’s the harm, Eugene? Are you afraid they’ll storm the building?”
Eugene paled slightly. “N-no,” he said, making clear that was exactly what he worried about on a daily basis. “I just feel
that Her Majesty has managed to steer this ship for the past thirty—”
“With all due respect to you and Her Majesty, Eugene,” Lauren interrupted, “we also need to move with the times.”
She half expected a sniper to burst into the room and take her out for even suggesting such a thing, but instead the room
was quiet.
“One month,” James finally said. “That’s four briefings. If all goes well, we’ll continue with them. And if it all goes wrong, and I do fear it will, it’ll be your head and not ours.”
“Ah, love a good guillotine reference,” Joy said. “Probably best not to reference the French Revolution while sitting in a
palace, though, yeah? Didn’t end too well for them.”
James cleared his throat. “I ask that you send me an outline of the first conference by Wednesday morning,” he said. “We’ll
need to approve the topics and list of outlets, and we also need time to get the room ready by Friday.”
Lauren suspected that “get the room ready” meant “find an actual room that we can use,” but that was fine. “Great, absolutely,”
she said.
Eugene laughed dryly and shook his head. “Next order of business, please,” he said. “I have a stroke scheduled for ten thirty,
don’t want to be late.”
“So needlessly dramatic,” James muttered as Lauren sat back down. She caught Joy’s eye and gave her a “thanks for backing
me up” smile, which Joy returned.