Not Quite Perfect

by Annie Lyons

  Emma feels as if she might regurgitate her breakfast. It’s not that she’s afraid of Digby: He’s a pussy cat compared with the bottom-line obsessed powers that now run the company. But he is one of Miranda’s oldest friends and was a traditional, independent, gentlemen publisher, who launched a whole host of seminal works, as well as being the founding member of the day-long publishing lunch. Emma takes a deep breath and knocks on Miranda’s closed door with what she hopes is an air of quiet authority. There is no answer, so Emma inclines her ear towards the door, just as it is flung open by the literary powerhouse that is Miranda Winter.

  ‘Ah, Emma. I thought I heard something. Morning. Morning. And how is my brightest and best on this exquisite day? Come, my child, don’t be shy. Digby won’t eat you. He’s had his breakfast.’

  Miranda’s office is a shrine to the great and good of publishing, books and reading. Her walls are adorned with photographs, sketches and mementos from her forty-odd years as the matriarchal founding editor of Chandler and now Allen Chandler. The world of books and publishing may have changed, but Miranda Winter is not a woman to be trifled with and the newer suits at Allen Chandler simply wouldn’t dare. They’re terrified of her and she makes them far too much money. The photographs of Miranda with everyone from John Gielgud to John Updike read like a history of cultural movers and shakers from the post-war years. Emma is particularly impressed by the rumours that Miranda has slept with most of the men photographed here, even the gay ones. They are like the photographic equivalent of notches on her bedpost.

  As Emma enters the room, Digby is perched on the edge of Miranda’s dark oak monster of a desk, a pudgy hand pawing at one of his many chins. Although publishing today is a very different world to that of fifty or even twenty years ago, when lunch neatly segued into afternoon tea, cocktails and dinner, no one seems to have told Digby and he remains the very picture of old-school corpulence. He is suited by a little man in Saville Row and his Oxford brogues are always shiny. He prefers a dickey bow to maintain the air of an eccentric publisher and today his pink shirt looks fit to burst as his belly extends over his blue pinstriped trousers.

  ‘Ah Ella,’ he begins, raising his fat hands in a sort of waving gesture.

  ‘It’s Emma.’ She corrects him. ‘Ella’s the other one.’

  Digby snorts with amusement as if having two people with vaguely similar names is the funniest thing he’s ever heard.

  ‘Sorry, so sorry. Now, Emma, I know I don’t need to tell you how much our hopes are resting on you today. And I just wanted to say good luck. I know you can do it.’

  Emma tries to speak but only manages a squeak of agreement.

  Miranda leaps to her rescue. ‘Well, Emma and I will do our darndest to bring home the bacon, eh Emma?’

  Emma nods vigorously, deciding that it is probably best to remain mute for now.

  ‘Quite so, quite so,’ says Digby with customary vagueness. ‘Well, the very best to you both. I look forward to hearing good news!’ And away he shuffles.

  ‘So tell me how you’re really feeling’ says Miranda when he is gone.

  ‘Honestly? I’m bloody terrified. I mean, this is this most exciting book I’ve read since Marquez. Do you really think we can get it?’

  ‘The agent is touting it hither and thither after the publisher with the most money, but I know we have more to offer.’

  She looks at Emma with glassy eyes. It’s the look Ella and Emma call her ‘mirror to the past’. Ella always jokes that Emma is her protégé and it is clear that Miranda does see something of herself in Emma. At last year’s Christmas party, Miranda threw her arms around her and told her that she was like Boudicca, but they were all very drunk.

  ‘Ten o’clock then. We pitch our ideas, gush, enthuse and generally plump up their egos like sumptuous cushions. OK?’

  ‘Ok. Do you think Richard will go for it?’

  ‘Oh, it’s not Richard we have to worry about, darling. It’s the agent.’

  The light is flashing on Emma’s phone when she gets back to her desk. It’s a text from Martin: ‘Good luck Mrs Almost-Wifey. Hope you get the book. I’m proud of you. Love M.’ She smiles but is starting to feel a bit sick and desperate to get on with it. She checks her watch: 9:34. twenty-six minutes to go. She leafs through her notes again and realises that her hands are shaking. The book is beautifully written and Emma desperately wants to be the one to publish it. She gives herself an internal pep talk: ‘You can do this. You are good at your job. You love this book and you want the world to love it too.’

  The phone rings shattering the peace. Emma leaps up, knocking coffee all over her notes. ‘Fuck!’ she says involuntarily into the mouthpiece.

  ‘Emma?’ asks Miranda with no notable surprise at the outburst.

  ‘Yes? Sorry. I’m here.’

  ‘And so are they. Are you ready?’

  Emma looks at the coffee-steeped notes and realises that she’s going to have to wing it. ‘I’ll come straight over.’

  ‘Fine. I’ll go and welcome them, roll out the red carpet as it were. And remember, you should be bloody nervous but it’s just another book. OK?’

  ‘OK,’ says Emma feeling anything but.

  Miranda’s office is filled with the heavy perfume of pink lilies, mingled with the welcome aroma of freshly brewed coffee. Emma realises that she needs to pee, but daren’t leave the room now. The table is covered with a selection of Danish pastries. Her stomach groans appreciatively, but she decides against the risk of icing down her top and flaky crumbs on her upper lip. She can hear Miranda coming, jollying their guests along in a warm but business-like way. She decides that standing is the best option as sitting might seem somehow presumptuous or complacent or both.

  The woman who enters first is known to Emma by fearsome reputation only: Joanna Uppington is ball-breaker number one of the publishing world. Emma is pretty sure she’s never smiled in her life. She is immaculate and tiny in her fitted, designer trouser suit. The only aspect to her that gives her any height (and which Emma suspects is the actual source of her power) is her hair with its impressive four-inch power-bouffant held in place with enough hair spray to finish off the ozone layer.

  ‘Joanna, this is Emma Darcy, our most talented editor.’

  Joanna looks Emma up and down as if seeking to identify a new life form and thrusts out a bony hand like a poison dart. ‘And this is my most talented author, Richard Bennett,’ she retorts.

  And there he is. Of course. As if God, Beelzebub and his wizards, and the spirit of Joel Riches were all conspiring as one against Emma. The man from the train.

  Chapter 3

  Rachel looks at the kitchen and tries to ignore the Weetabix-encrusted carnage. She presses the button on the washing machine, waiting with impatience for it to release the laundry. She can hear Alfie and Lily shouting their usual morning chorus of ‘I hate you’s’ and decides to let them resolve it for themselves, like the books tell you to. She unlocks the back door and picks her way across the dewy grass. She is just prising apart a mass of trousers and socks, when she hears the phone ring.

  ‘I’ll get it!’ calls Lily. Rachel curses. Moments later, her daughter pads into the garden.

  ‘My socks are wet and it’s Grandpa,’ she announces. Rachel accepts the phone and waves her daughter away with the international semaphore sign for ‘Go and find some dry socks.’

  ‘Hi, Dad,’ she says at last.

  ‘Morning, daughter number one. Your mother was fretting so she made me phone you,’ he says with a chuckle.

  Rachel laughs. ‘I’m fine thanks, Dad. It was lovely to see you all yesterday, despite the apple tree incident.’

  ‘Yes and how is the little man this morning?’

  Rachel can hear her mother talking in the background, directing operations. ‘He’s absolutely fine. No lasting damage. What’s Mum saying?’

  Edward doesn’t speak for a moment, as he tries to listen to two separate conversations. ‘Sorry, Rachel. Your m
other wants to know if you and Steve are all right?’ says Edward. Rachel hears her mother exclaim at his lack of subtlety.

  She laughs again. ‘We’re fine. Why?’

  ‘She wants to know why,’ Edward reports back to his increasingly exasperated wife.

  ‘Oh for heaven’s sake, Edward. Give me the phone will you? Honestly, if you want something done in this family. Rachel?’ says Diana as she takes the phone.

  ‘Yes, Mum?’

  ‘Now don’t you “yes, Mum” me. I know what you and Daddy are like when you get together. I simply wanted to check that everything is all right between you and Steve.’

  ‘I’ve just told Dad we’re fine. Why do you ask?’

  ‘Steve has asked us to have the children on Saturday night.’

  ‘Oh right, yes, well we just want to have a little time on our own as a married couple.’

  ‘Yes all right, Rachel. There’s no need to be coarse. So I don’t need to worry then?’

  Rachel contemplates this question and then immediately rejects the idea of telling her Mother about Edinburgh. ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘Well good, because I’ve got enough to worry about with this wedding of your sister’s. I’ll hand you back to your father.’

  ‘Rachel? Sorry about that. You know what your mother gets like when she’s been listening to the Today programme. Two hours of John Humphries and she just won’t let things go,’ says Edward.

  ‘It’s all right, Dad. I know.’

  ‘You know you can always talk to your old dad, if there is anything, don’t you?’

  ‘I know, Dad. Thanks. Look, I’ve got to go.’ Rachel replaces the phone and glances at her watch.

  ‘Kids! We’re –’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, we know. Late again!’ says Lily. ‘It’s OK, we’ve done our shoes and coats. We’re a bit more organised than grown-ups, you know.’

  ‘Well thank you, Lily,’ says Rachel through gritted teeth, grabbing her bag and ushering them out of the door.

  It’s fortunate that Emma is not the sort of girl who blushes. She does her best to shake hands with Richard without betraying what can only be described as her almighty cock-up. Looking at him properly for the first time, she notices his dark brown eyes and the dimple that appears when the subject is amused. The subject is now extremely amused.

  ‘Hello, Emma. So good to see you. I feel as it we’ve met somewhere before? Or maybe not?’ He plonks himself down into the nearest chair, grabs a pastry and grins at her. Happily, no one else seems to notice this display.

  ‘Coffee anyone?’ asks Miranda.

  ‘Tea thanks. Lapsang souchong if you have it – with lemon,’ says Joanna.

  ‘Yeah. Coffee’s fine. Milk, no sugar thanks,’ says Richard folding his arms behind his head in a ‘so what can you offer me?’ type way.

  ‘Of course. I’ll get Andrea to do the honours,’ says Miranda disappearing.

  Emma is panicking inwardly like a child whose mother has left the room, but she fights the urge to throw herself on the floor and beat the carpet with her fists, offering Joanna a seat instead. Joanna looks horrified and turns to inspect the chair, dusting it with a manicured hand and perching awkwardly, as if this is the first time she’s sat down in her life. All the while Richard is eyeing Emma with vast amusement.

  ‘So,’ booms Miranda on her return, ‘thank you for coming today. We’re tremendously excited about this book and hope you decide that Allen Chandler is the best home for it. Emma has prepared some data on the current market, our comparable titles and what we can offer Richard.’

  ‘Oh come on, Miranda, never mind that. This is a brilliant and original book. We all know that. Every other publisher is telling us that. Great. Fantastic. We’re thrilled. But what are you prepared to pay?’ Joanna’s voice is direct, fierce and as terrifying as her reputation. Emma gulps. No one speaks to Miranda like that. Her eyes betray thunder, but her smile remains fixed.

  ‘No Joanna, it’s OK, I think we should hear what Emma has to say.’ Richard’s voice is amused and almost mocking.

  ‘Do you?’ Joanna says in surprise. ‘Oh all right then. Let’s hear it.’

  Emma’s heart is in her mouth. ‘Right, well I’ve prepared some data.’

  ‘Yes, yes. Miranda said that. Let’s see it.’

  She passes round the pages.

  ‘Ooh, PowerPoint®. How modern!’ says Richard, and Joanna sniggers.

  ‘The first slide shows what we view as the benchmarks for this title and sales data to support,’ says Emma ignoring them.

  ‘Life of Pi? The Book Thief? Surely The Red Orchid is better than these?’ says Joanna looking unimpressed.

  ‘Well, I think so, yes. If you look at Allen Chandler’s own, comparable titles from the past five years we have exceeded sales of these industry benchmarks, and I see no reason why we can’t go even further with The Red Orchid.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Well, it will obviously be picked up by the key retailers and reviewers.’

  ‘Ha! A Waterstone’s 3 for 2 and four inches in the Guardian does not a bestseller make.’

  ‘Well, then there’s the awards.’

  ‘Yes, but there’s no guarantee, is there?’

  ‘Of course not, but –’

  ‘What I want to know is, how are you going to make the UK’s most talented and original author since McEwan into an out and out bestseller?’

  ‘As I’ve said –’

  ‘But you haven’t said. It’s all hot air and promises you can’t keep, isn’t it?’

  Richard is grinning, enjoying the spectacle, but for Emma it is turning into another fight with her mother. She is waiting for Joanna to tell her to go and tidy her room.

  ‘No, it’s not all hot air and promises,’ says Emma surprising everyone in the room including herself. Joanna looks at her sharply. ‘In the past ten years the fiction market has changed beyond recognition.’

  ‘Tell me something I don’t know,’ yawns Joanna.

  ‘Publishers are under incredible pressure to deliver profit, but are being squeezed by the demands of agents and authors for ever higher advances.’

  ‘And I suppose that’s my fault, is it?’ Joanna wants to spar. Emma won’t bite.

  ‘There are a whole host of publishers who will offer you more money than they can ever earn just to win your book.’

  ‘And?’

  Emma address her directly now, refusing to be cowed. ‘And, those with the fattest cheque books don’t necessarily have what you need to turn a book from an emerging talent to a bestseller to a classic.’

  ‘Oh please impart your wisdom. What would that be?’

  ‘One word: Passion.’

  Joanna snorts with derision. Miranda is watching Emma with what she detects is a glimmer of pride. Emma takes courage from this and addresses Richard directly. ‘Your characters, particularly Alexander and Newton, are the lifeblood of this book. They leap out and grab you by the throat, and Alexander’s unrequited love for Stella is one of the greatest love stories ever told. It’s a story that will stay with readers for ever.’

  Richard’s eyes are fixed on Emma now, calm and steady. He has lost his earlier cockiness. He opens his mouth to speak but Joanna butts in. ‘Listen, I’m sure you’re a great editor and it’s lovely to hear that you’ve read and loved this book. Ya di ya big deal, but what are ya gonna pay?’ She spits out the last six words with venom.

  Miranda clears her throat. ‘Joanna, I think it’s time we drew this meeting to a close.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Yes, so am I. I think we have been upfront, honest and seeringly enthusiastic for Richard’s book. If it’s all about the money, it’s not for us. Shall I see you to the lift?’ Miranda appears calm but the area of neck just below her ears has reddened.

  ‘But I thought –’ Joanna blurts.

  ‘Then you thought wrong. If other publishers are prepared to let you throw your weight around and patronise their editors, then more foo
l them. I, for one, am not.’

  Joanna opens her mouth to speak but stops when she sees Miranda’s face. She raises herself up on her bony twig legs and pats her immobile hair. ‘Come on, Richard, let’s go to another, less short-sighted publisher.’ Joanna Uppington breezes out of the room on a waft of Chanel No. 5.

  Richard is still staring at Emma.

  ‘Richard!’ shouts Joanna from the corridor.

  Richard jumps up ready to follow, but stops at the door and turns to address Emma and Miranda. ‘I’m sorry, I have to erm, it was lovely to meet you –’

  ‘Richard!’ screeches Joanna again.

  Richard holds up his hands and smiles like a defeated man. ‘Bye,’ he says and darts out of the door.

  ‘Tell me his written word is better than his spoken,’ says Miranda after a moment.

  ‘It is. Unfortunately,’ says Emma with a sigh. ‘Why does Joanna behave like that?’

  ‘Because, my dear, she is a bully and frankly we’re better off without them both.’ Her phone chirps and she glances at it, looking weary. Emma feels guilty. ‘It’s Digby. I better update him.’

  Emma takes this as a signal to leave and tries to creep back to her desk unnoticed. She realises that the god of shit days has got it in for her as she turns the corner and Joel appears out of nowhere. Emma jumps. ‘Jesus, Joel!’

  ‘Ahh, thanks for the accolade, you can just call me Joel though. Sooo, how’d it go? Ooh. Not so good eh?’

  ‘I don’t know. We’ll just have to see.’

  ‘Ouch. That bad eh? You should have asked me to come along, Em. I would have been happy to help.’

  Emma bristles at his familiar use of her name. Realising that homicide is probably not the best course of action, she tries to muster some dignity and shambles back to her desk. Almost immediately, Ella is by her side confirming that the Joel bush telegraph is fully operational.