by Kiki Archer
This chat had then escalated into the option of a street party with screens outside relaying the live show as it seemed clear that Camila’s idea was going to win and yes while it would take Camila an hour to get back from the studio, people would party on until she came home to a hero’s welcome. She was a star, they kept saying, and she was going to win, they insisted. Michael and Ethan had spent a huge amount of the evening showing her things on their phones trying to explain how she and Harriet were trending on Twitter and how the early polls were showing H.I.Pvention had already won, but it all seemed a little premature for Camila who, standing now in front of the judges, knew nothing was decided until it was decided. They were the last business to make their spiel and the three other entrepreneurs had all done a wonderful job. It was obvious that each of their businesses would be a success regardless of whether they won the show or not. Yes, Jill Masters had received a huge grilling about the ethics of her cosmetics spa, with the suggestion that it may encourage low self-esteem amongst young women who were made to feel lacking in their own skin, but Jill’s response that young women should treat themselves because they were good enough elicited a cheer from the audience which seemed to encourage further her theme of: if a woman feels empowered by surgery let them feel empowered.
Camila had been sitting in the green room with the other entrepreneurs during Jill’s live spiel and was unsure what she thought about it. It was all too easy to cheer along with a live audience, but in reality how many mothers and daughters would be sitting at home watching the show wishing that lip plumps and cheek fillers weren’t even a thing, let alone an easy-access product that young women were encouraged to get together and just do. Likewise, the nods of approval about the paleo food samples handed out to the panel of judges, the audience and the green room by Oliver James seemed encouragingly positive, but how many people sitting at home watching the show with their fast-food takeaways would actually vote for a café that sold cold-pressed, date-and-prune-heavy health bars?
The presentation that Camila had liked the most was Barry Maddison’s. His clothes shopping app was simple, useable and low-cost, but the judges seemed to have a huge issue with the fifteen copy-cat apps developed already since Friday night’s show. Camila didn’t seem to think this was a concern and completely accepted Barry’s claims that these impersonators didn’t matter as he’d be the market leader. Camila remembered nodding at this point. She trusted the brands, as did most people, and if Barry’s brand was the brand she remembered then that’s the brand she would use. Whether she’d actually bother to download a clothes shopping app was another matter entirely, but she liked Barry and if she were voting he’d be the entrepreneur she’d choose, second to Harriet of course.
Standing that little bit straighter as their commercial came to an end, Camila understood that the game was wide open. Yes, after last night’s show she and Harriet seemed to be leading the audience vote, but these things could fluctuate and there were four judges to contend with. The programme makers had pitched the audience as the fifth judge, so at least two of the real life judges sitting in front of them right now would have to vote for their business to guarantee a win. She eyed them all carefully, wondering which one to smile at. No one looked her way, they were all too busy eyeballing Harriet. Maybe they were wondering why Harriet had a helper as none of the other entrepreneurs had presented with someone by their side. Obviously they’d used people in the same way she and Harriet had used Brett and Geoff to explain the intricacies of the business, but this final grilling session had been completed by each entrepreneur alone. Camila glanced at her boss. Was Harriet still playing the fauxmance card? If that was the reason for the huge audience vote, then it made sense to remind the judges of their love interest: a vote for the business means a vote for true love. Camila stopped herself, she was past all this now, she’d put it to bed. Harriet wanted her here because she knew the Technology Box better than anyone else.
“Right,” said Claude Grifton, the judge who seemed to appear on every single reality competition going, best known for his bald head and bulldog attitude. “That advert’s all well and good. It’s just a shame you can’t deliver on your promises.”
Harriet didn’t falter. “We’ve shown with the production of the Technology Box that we can. H.I.Pvention will see your idea though from concept development to product creation.”
“No, you won’t.”
Harriet nodded. “We will. You have children, don’t you, Joanne?”
Camila smiled. Very clever. Harriet had redirected the focus onto the softest judge, Joanne Thomas, the tall blonde who’d built her success on interior design.
“I’m sure your children would benefit from the Technology Box. All children would. All families would. We created this.” Harriet stepped forward and lifted the box from the judges’ desk. “We designed this. We developed this. We produced this. We’ve shown that H.I.Pvention can be trusted with your ideas.”
Claude slammed his fist onto the table. “No, you cannot! You haven’t even got the patent!”
“The patent claim has been filed,” continued Harriet. “Full patent approval takes years.”
“One query to the patent office,” shouted Claude, “that’s all it took!”
“You’ve lost me,” said Harriet, lowering the box but still managing to keep her cool even through the nervous gasps from the audience.
Camila looked at Harriet. Harriet had explained there would be dramatics and that the judges would try and needle out all of the business’s weak points, but the other entrepreneurs hadn’t received anything even remotely close to this onslaught. It reminded her of an episode of The Apprentice where a candidate was simply told to “Get out,” because they’d lied on their CV; no opportunity to explain, just thrown out in disgrace.
“GET OUT!” shouted Claude.
“Excuse me?” Camila hadn’t realised she’d spoken until she noticed the two cameras closing in on either side. She froze as the bald bulldog’s eyes narrowed her way.
“Your idea, wasn’t it?”
Camila nodded. “Yes, it—”
“NO, IT WASN’T!” The angry bald man lifted a piece of paper from the desk. “One call to the patent office and I discover that your lauded Technology Box will never come to fruition.”
Harriet took over. “It will. It has. It’s here.” She held the invention towards the camera. “The Technology Box is just an example of what we can do for you at H.I.Pvention.”
Claude roared. “If you can’t even perform a patent search then your business is dead in the water. No inventor should trust you. Now get out of my sight. There’s nothing else to discuss.”
Harriet continued. “We do know how to perform a patent search and we have performed a patent search.” She nodded. “The patent’s filed.”
“FILED TOO LATE!” Claude’s bald head was sweating. “One phone call and I discover a replica patent was filed two days earlier.”
“That can’t be right,” continued Harriet. “There’s absolutely nothing like this on the market and there are no patents pending for any similar technology.”
“See for yourself,” said the judge, thrusting the piece of paper their way. “My colleagues on the panel have their own copies.”
Judge Joanne shook her head. “I must say it’s very disappointing, Harriet, and very out of character.”
Claude sneered. “Maybe if you’d spent more time focusing on the business instead of your little romance then this would never have happened.”
Camila moved to Harriet’s shoulder, reading the print as quickly as she could.
“Oh, Camila,” said Harriet, slowly shaking her head.
Camila continued to scan the words, not quite sure of what she was reading but very aware of the gasps coming from the audience.
“Oh, Camila,” said Harriet once more, “how could you?”
“Tell her you love her!” shouted someone from the crowd. “Whatever’s happened love will pull you through!”
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Claude addressed the camera. “For the benefit of the people at home, a little romance is all well and good but this is a business programme. H.I.Pvention failed to spot an identical patent that had been filed just days before theirs. They ploughed on with prototype production, even daring to present this idea as their own. Imagine if you were an inventor using the services of H.I.Pvention. Either there’s a leak in their system or they’ll knowingly have you paying to produce a prototype that will never legally be yours due to their inability to perform a proper patent search. Whichever the case, this whole thing’s a shambles.”
“You need to tell her you love her!” came another shout from the audience.
Harriet handed the paper to Camila before nodding at each of the judges in turn. “I’m sorry for wasting your time. Good luck to the other entrepreneurs; I’m bowing out of the race.”
“Harriet, wait.” Camila had no clue what the paper actually meant.
The audience continued to shout: “Tell her you love her! Just tell her you love her, Camila!”
“You can’t bow out of the race,” announced Claude. “But I can safely say your business won’t be getting my vote.”
“Nor mine,” added Joanne.
The two other judges were silent, probably well aware that this tension was television gold.
“Harriet, wait!” Camila tried to ignore the growing audience chants as she ducked in front of the camera that had followed Harriet’s walk away from the judges’ table. “What have I done wrong?”
“Not in front of the cameras.”
“You told me you loved me in front of the cameras!”
Harriet planted her feet at the side of the stage. “I’ll happily make a fool of myself personally, but not professionally. You’ve made a fool of me professionally, Camila.”
“What?” Camila squinted at the bright light that suddenly shone out from the third camera that had chased them to their current position.
“How could you do this to me?” whispered Harriet, trapped in by the wide lenses.
“Do what?”
“She’s your friend.”
“Who?” Clutching onto the piece of paper, Camila felt her fingers suddenly balling around the line she’d read at the bottom of the page: Patent filed by Mrs Julie Biggs. “Oh, Harriet! No! I didn’t know!”
“I think we should call this a day.”
Camila watched open-mouthed as Harriet headed backstage taking two of the three cameras with her. Standing still, Camila turned at the tap on her shoulder. The host of the live show who’d been interviewing the entrepreneurs once they came off stage was suddenly by her side.
“Do you think Harriet means your personal relationship or your professional relationship?”
“What?”
The microphone was thrust into Camila’s face. “Harriet. She just said she wanted to call it a day.”
Camila shook her head. “She can’t! I love her! I don’t want to lose her!”
The whoops from the audience were deafening.
Camila continued, talking fast and frantically. “My friend’s an idiot, she’s stolen our idea, but we can file a patent dispute. I know all about patent disputes. I’ve learnt everything we might ever need to know about patents in case something like this ever happened. We can file an interference claim and there’ll be an oral hearing. The Technology Box is H.I.Pvention’s idea and even if for whatever reason we lose the patent the business is still a wonderful business. Harriet’s a wonderful entrepreneur and I’m just sorry for any disrepute I’ve brought her way.”
The “aaaaaaahs” from the audience were heartfelt.
“Vote for her. Vote for H.I.Pvention. Vote for the business model, which is good.” Camila took hold of the microphone and turned to the camera, staring straight into the lens. “I know I’ve lost Harriet’s vote, but that doesn’t mean she should lose yours.” She sighed. “I’m sorry, everyone, I need to go home.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Pulling into her driveway, Camila realised she’d just driven the longest journey she’d ever driven in total silence. Yes, the television studio was only an hour away but she always had the radio playing in the car. She wasn’t even one of those people who needed to turn down the volume to park. She loved the music and the chat, but this evening she’d chosen to drive in total silence, just in case Harriet called, which she hadn’t. Everyone else who’d ever received her phone number had though, with some names flashing up on the screen that she didn’t even recognise, the strangest call coming from the gutter man who’d over-charged her two years ago to clean out the gutters. There was no way he was calling at ten p.m. on a Sunday evening to offer his services. He was probably, like all the others, calling to have his five minutes of fame in front of his mates at the pub no doubt: I cleaned that woman from the telly’s gutters once; let me call her up and tell her what a fool she’s made of herself on national TV, or something like that. Camila realised she’d never know as she hadn’t answered the call, or any of the other calls, her excitement at the burst of ringing instantly dissipating every time she saw it wasn’t Harriet’s name flashing up on the screen.
Harriet had disappeared. Camila had tried her best to find her, but Deana and the team were freezing her out, the only person seemingly willing to talk to her was the live host who kept thrusting the microphone her way but she didn’t want to play any more of this out in front of the audience. She’d said her piece, she’d made her plea, there was nothing else she could do now apart from drive home to where she belonged. She was meant to wait around and do backstage chats and analysis during the half hour break before the results were announced, but there was no way she could go out on stage for the final segment of the show only to be told that they’d lost because of her.
Turning off the ignition, Camila felt her anger flare once again. Julie bloody Biggs. Throwing open the car door, she jumped at the thundering cheers of whoops and applause, her lounge window dancing with the brightly lit silhouettes of people hurling themselves up and down. She gasped as her phone rang in her hand. Was it Harriet? Had they won? Why was everyone cheering? Had Harriet re-declared her love live on TV? Had she forgiven her? She looked at the screen, ready to swipe right. Great Uncle Mac. Camila frowned at the flashing name on the display; she’d thought he was dead, as he certainly hadn’t called her in over five years.
“Camila!!!” screamed Julie, dashing out of the house and onto the driveway with her arms flailing, flanked by Debbie, Roy, Michael, Cassie, Ethan and Harry not to mention half the estate who seemed to be piling out of her house. “That was me! I won that for you!”
Michael enveloped his mother in a huge hug. “You did it, Mum, you won! Me and Cassie are so proud of you.”
“You’re so cool,” squealed Ethan. “Harry says you’re cool too!”
“You bloody owe me,” shouted Julie. “Terry! Pop another champers! Let’s have a bloody street party! Roy, go turn the stereo on in my van, let’s get this celebration started!”
“What’s going on?” shouted Camila over the noise, shocked to see Julie’s old man Terry for the first time in however many weeks.
“You won!” Julie grabbed Camila by the arms, jumping her up and down. “H.I.Pvention won! You got the audience vote and two of the judges’ votes! You won! Your plea won it and you only made that plea because of the cock-up with the patents and that was me! Without me you’d never have won! I make money with the Technology Box, you make money because you won! I’ve already phoned the papers; they’ll be round in the morning! We’re all winners! Bloody chars!”
Terry thrust a flute of Champagne Camila’s way. “We call this the Lamborghini champers, don’t we, Jules. You’re a bloody sort, Camila. Things have been on the up for us all since you went and turned gay!”
Camila tried to focus but was too distracted by the loud music that suddenly started blaring out from the bacon butty van and the crowd of people dancing around on her driveway. “Lamborghini Champagne? Her car? Ha
rriet’s Lamborghini?”
“Chill bloody out!” shouted Julie over the din. “It’s all come together. You won! I bloody won! It was my bloody idea after all.”
“To steal her car?”
“No, not the car! I only tipped off Terry and he tipped off Jack the Trader and he tipped off his men from Leyton and we all won. You won, Camila! Why aren’t you smiling?”
“You think the Technology Box was your idea?”
“It bloody well was and that firm Patent Reg are fab. I’m not sure if H.I.Pvention could go up against them actually, but the whole thing’s all smoke and mirrors anyway isn’t it, you said so yourself. It’s like The Apprentice, you’re only bloody pretending to start these businesses.”
“This is Harriet’s life!” shouted Camila. “This is my life! You’ve ruined my life, Julie, and it wasn’t your idea anyway.”
Terry reached out and grabbed the glass of Champagne back from Camila. “It was her bloody idea and the people at Patent Reg filed the patent for us. We got all dressed up and everything didn’t we, Jules.”
“It was so easy.” Julie lifted her glass in a cheers motion. “I don’t know what you’ve been moaning about. I only had to talk them through the idea and they did the rest.”
“It wasn’t your idea!”
Julie gasped. “It bloody well was! I said: How about you invent something that allows kids a certain number of hours on technology a day.”
“And then I invented it! Harriet invented it! H.I.Pvention invented it!”
“You mean H.I.Pvention that was that Deana woman’s idea? You’ve got form with this, Camila.”
Terry threw his arm around his missus. “End of the day, we’ve got the bloody patent!”
Julie shook him off and continued. “Camila, if that curveball had never come your way you’d never have done your plea and it was your plea that won those two judges over. It’s not about the Technology Box after all, you said that yourself, it’s about the business and the business has won.”