by Kay Williams
In the office she introduced me to another Blood Dependant, Anthony Carson, he had a smooth and sophisticated air and confidently assured me he had been a lawyer for over three hundred years and though the situation was manic and out of the ordinary for me it was something he had dealt with before, he had then confiscated my phone and gone to find a seat and play back the voicemails.
We all watched Jonathan give his statement before the crowd of journalists outside of their building. Surprisingly once they had some information and were assured I would be giving my own release later on several of them left and the general mania to their activities died down.
They were like sharks that had scented blood in the water and now they had been thrown something to chew on they were happy to circle patiently waiting for the next meal to be thrown their way. I had no doubt that if I had stepped on to the pavement outside of house alone, or approached the office from the street on foot, my arrival would have stirred them up again and I was happy to hide in the safety of the office. Thankfully there was plenty to do in the way of email and message board complaints and with plenty of customer service experience in my working life Rosemary happily took advantage of my offer to help and I started answering messages anonymously.
Anthony relayed the voicemails once he was done, the phone hadn't been hacked; every message from the numerous journalists who had called first started the conversation by saying where they had legally acquired the number from. Apparently at some point in my online life I had forgotten to tick the box that said my address and telephone number details could not be sold to third party interests. He had made a list of the journalists' names, their publications and the kind of messages that had been left, and once copies were made of them for Rosemary he had deleted them leaving several personal ones for me.
Simon arrived once the bulk of the journalists had moved on and he brought food and a new phone for me. While he, Anthony and Jonathan put their heads together to write my speech I listened to the personal voicemails. I programmed my new phone with the numbers of family and friends who had called with a warning and ignored the rest. There was too many for my peace of mind who rang and begged me to call them back because the press had offered them money for a joint interview.
I called my parents and spent half an hour telling them I was fine, that there was plenty of support for me, that Simon was in the thick of it and they didn't have to worry; I just hoped I wasn't lying to them. My agency had left messages and I called my contact there. They were being pestered by the press and releasing a short statement of their own designed to move the sharks on. Thankfully the privacy policy had left the name of my new employers out of reach and they were still interested in having me start as planned the following week. I texted Lucy and her brothers and received almost instantaneous responses wishing me good luck with the speech.
After lunch came a gruelling crash course in public speaking, even though I had been written a very gentle speech I had trouble remembering the words and Jonathan had to write up prompt cards. I was shaking and seeing the number of people slowly gathering wasn't making me feel any better. All the journalists from this morning and then some had taken up places right by the little podium and microphone, but it looked like plenty of regular people had turned out as well. There was no police presence and they were staying calm and semi-organised but it was still frightening.
“Don't be nervous,” Rosemary smiled.
“But I am nervous!” I protested. “I've never even done a presentation at work before.”
“It is going to be fine,” Jonathan handed me the prompt cards. “We have practised, this is meant to be informal.”
“Just be yourself,” Simon added with a reassuring smile.
I looked down at the cards and noticed that my hands were shaking. The last twelve hours had been too surreal for words, but the sharks were gathered for my speech and if I didn't step out and give it they were never going to clear off my doorstep.
I took a deep, steadying breath and walked to the office door and out into the cool afternoon.
The sharks immediately swept on the small podium that waited for me, they were yelling my name and snapping my photo, I had the feeling that the very unflattering and uncertain expression I wore would be all over the papers and the glossy magazines in the morning.
I put my cards on the podium and braced my still shaking hands against it. I looked up at the sea of expectant faces, all of these strangers waving recorders for my attention simply because Heronsgate had been seen with my book.
It would have been so much more satisfying if this had been happening because of my own hard work, and not because of one random picture. I wanted to ignore the cards and call myself the fraud I knew that I was, I did as Anthony had told me to and waited for the calling to calm down.
It was as I was taking my first nervous breath to begin that I caught sight of a familiar face in the crowd. Lucy grinned at me mischievously, and I instantly wanted to smack her for not telling me she was going to be here. In the next moment I loved her for it, and for knowing me well enough that I would need her here as a friendly face in the crowd and as someone I could talk to. I was still nervous, but my smile felt less forced, the tension in my shoulders faded and I found myself stupidly straying off the cards.
“Show of hands. Who expected to be here today?”
A general easy laugh rippled from the crowd and having that small victory made delivering the rest of my speech surprisingly easy. Jonathan had made sure that each prompt card had only one point printed on it and we had practised my breathing so I didn't rush through the words. I remembered to meet the eyes of several of the journalists and their cameramen, but I found myself flicking back to Lucy and her grin for moral support when I felt I needed it.
The few minutes I spoke for felt like the longest of my life and I was incredibly grateful when it came to an end. I backed away from the podium and ignored the way that they called for my attention and to answer their questions. Rosemary had told me that personal interviews would follow under less stressful circumstances and not to be drawn into any debates just yet, but I couldn't help but turn as someone yelled a question I couldn't pretend I hadn't heard.
“What would you say to Heronsgate if he were here?”
I smiled as I remembered what I had said to Lucy this morning and from her wide-eyed look and the amusement she was struggling not to express it was clear she fully expected me to say those words again, instead I decided to be a little more diplomatic.
“I would say to him the same thing as I would say to anyone who had purchased my novel. I'd say thank you, and ask if he is enjoying it.”
I escaped back into the building and Jonathan patted me on the shoulder.
“See, that wasn't so hard.”
# # #
Henry Heronsgate
It was getting to the point where I felt I couldn't breathe without some reporter noticing the fact, and I was beginning to understand why my grandfather and my father had bailed out of running the company as soon as they had.
One book.
One moment of self-indulgence.
One moment when I hadn't been completely attuned both physically and psychically to my surrounds and this happened.
Some random person who couldn’t manage to live their lives without taking out of focus pictures of which-ever celebrity they happened to cross paths with had taken aim and snapped a shot. I had been devouring South’s book while waiting for my car to arrive at my New York hotel to take me to the airport.
Only to arrive to a swarm of reporters lying in wait at the terminal for my return flight to Britain vying and catcalling for my attention and demanding a book review, I had ignored all of them to climb into my waiting car and was now thankfully secured in my office.
My first duty had been what I was forced to return London for so quickly; I had the unenviable task of firing the advertising director. The woman had not only accepted media bribes to attend events like the one
I had had to cover for only two days before, but had rather stupidly kept a note of the emails and a spreadsheet of her earnings on company owned computer drives. Given the time zones and the flights I wasn't in the best of moods and I still needed to handle the frenzy that had erupted over South's book.
Harriet South; I had thought about her more than I was comfortable with in the last couple of days. After reviewing the free downloads I had discovered that her offering wasn't amongst them. A search of her on the internet had yielded the surprising result that her novel wasn't being self-published as I had assumed it would be giving its genre, but that it had been picked up by a small publishing house. I had taken the free download of the first couple of chapters if only to prove to myself, her impassioned argument to one side, that she was no better than any of the others.
I had been buying the book before I had even finished the sample, and paying the extra to have it delivered to my hotel on release day so I would have it before my flight back to the States.
The photo and live interview on her author page on the publisher's website didn't do her any justice but hadn't stopped me appreciating the beauty of her naturally wavy hair, gentle brown and gold eyes, full mouth and a figure that curved in all the right places. It was a relief to see someone kissed by the sun instead of the sun bed and someone not hidden underneath four inches of make-up. I had replayed our brief conversation over and over in my head remembering and lingering on the long line of her neck, and the dexterous way her fingers played with the pen in her hands.
Adams was currently reclined into the sofa next to me while I sat poised on its edge as we watched the events unfold on the television. The tiny house South called home was mobbed and her neighbours were either giving up what they considered juicy comments to the reporters, or were ordering the press off the street and threatening to call the police. A second set of press were swarming the small publisher's office.
South and her team were nowhere in sight.
The last time this had happened was when a photo had been captured of me wearing a pair of headphones made by a new company, they had instantly launched an advertising campaign saying that I had endorsed the use of their product. As I had done no such thing I had sued them for libel and misrepresentation almost bankrupting them in one lawsuit, but I had no regrets; no one made a profit off of me or my company without my permission. If your product couldn't make it on its own two feet then it I wasn't going to let you use my face to help it make money it was unworthy of.
I was waiting for South's small company to issue its statement; if they or she made any attempt to profit from this twist of fate than I was going to come down on them hard.
Instead I was left pleasantly surprised when a tall man looking to be in his mid-twenties stepped outside of the offices and gave a clear statement centring on apologising for the crash on their site from the volume of traffic it had experience in such a short space of time and a plea of them to offer South some privacy. He spoke of her obvious distress by the number of aggressive reporters on her doorstep and harassing her neighbours and promised that she would be giving a speech herself later in the afternoon.
“Morals,” Adams commented. “Who would have thought it?”
“I think it goes to say something about the kind of people we are becoming when we automatically assume the worst is going to happen.”
“Yeah, when did we become this jaded?”
I chuckled. Adams had been with me since I had taken over the company from my father six years ago. I had hired him partly because he had been male and hadn’t once made eyes at me during the interview, and partly because I couldn’t read his thoughts, I knew he wasn’t Wildling, but I had never asked what his magical skills entailed and I had never seen him Cast anything.
Adams was of a lean fit build and I often wondered how he kept the figure on his diet of soda and junk food without regular trips to the gym, he knew me far too well from our close six year relationship and I considered him more of a friend than an employee.
“Are we hanging about for her statement?”
“Yeah,” I smiled, remembering how she had spoken her mind with me.
“I need to reschedule your New York flight.”
“Give me a couple of days,” I replied, it would nice if I could shake off my current jetlag before travelling again.
“I'll fly back tonight and make sure your hotel is all set.” Adams left my office to go back to his desk.
I didn't know if it was my youth or my Abstract ability to fly but I didn't suffer as much from jetlag as I should have done but Adams was in a league of his own. There were times when I felt he never actually slept.
I managed to reply to a few emails and conduct the initial interviews with those I was keen to move up my corporate ladder while waiting for South's speech. The one her publisher had issued had left me satisfied that they weren't going to be riding my coat-tails but I was curious to know what South was going to say.
When she eventually made her way out of her publisher's building she looked like a rabbit caught in the headlights, with none of the confidence that she had impressed me with when talking about her book. Then something in the crowd caught her eye and she smiled beautifully.
“Show of hands. Who expected to be here today?” She asked.
I smiled as a ripple of amusement stirred the reporters.
My smile was swiftly replaced with a wince when she started with her prepared statement, she had obviously never given any kind of public address before, and though her nerves had abated she spoke too carefully for it to be natural and timed when she made eye contact with her audience leaving the whole speech feeling awkward. I would forgive her for it, first time nerves and no experience got the better of everyone. As she stepped back the calling started and she made a rookie mistake that I was fairly certain that she would have been cautioned against, a reporter called out a question and she turned to answer it.
“What would you say to Heronsgate if he were here?”
“I would say to him the same thing as I would say to anyone who had purchased my novel,” she smiled. “I'd say thank you, and ask if he is enjoying it.”
Very much was the answer I wouldn't be able to give her.
South backed up into the door of her publisher's building and the odd camera angle gave me a gift. Just in sight was someone in her company who I knew very well, maybe there was a way to tell her I was enjoying her book.
# # #
Harriet South
I checked my sales.
Two hundred and seventy-three thousand, three hundred and four.
The press might not be camping out on my doorstep any more but my flash in the pan popularity wasn't burning out as fast as I would have liked, I had managed to sell another hundred thousand copies since my speech yesterday afternoon. Fast readers had managed to finish the book and Rosemary had texted me to say that most reviews were coming through at four or five stars with plenty of compliments. I was well aware that no one product was ever going to please everyone and I refused to spend my time scouring the book stores looking at the reviews and fretting over the one star ones. There had been refunds but I had expected that too, strangely though the sales were easily cancelling those returns out, and I was still on course to earning more money at the end of the week then I had ever had at one time in my whole life.
Today I was due to attend another library for a second session of handing out sample download flyers. A part of me had known that Rosemary and Jonathan wouldn't cancel the event while my sales were doing well; as more exposure would contribute to further sales; that was the nature of any business, but I had hoped that I would get up this morning to text messages saying it had been put off for my safety.
I only had a few more days before I was due to start my new job and I wonder that if I hid for that time the sales might ease off and I would be able to turn up for my first day without this experience over-shadowing me.
'What should I wear?'
&nb
sp; Words I never thought I would be texting Rosemary with.
'The press will probably be there, so we do need to be more professional then last time. You are always smart but try to be polished as well.'
Right.
I looked through my wardrobe again.
I settled for a pair of plain black leggings, coupled with a cream shirt that had a high collar topped with lace that would cup my chin, the sleeves were three-quarter length and were again embellished with lace. It was long, and left untucked it fell to brush mid-thigh, I found an old pair of flat knee-high leather boots that shone once I had attacked them with soap and water. I didn't own any polish so it was the best I could do at short notice.
I snapped a shot in front of the mirror and sent the image to Rosemary, I was ready to defer responsibility of dressing myself to her and if she said no I would try again.
'Perfect. Love that shirt.'
Even if she was lying I appreciated her compliment, and unconvinced I sent the image to Cory. Born sixth out of the seven Sharp septuplets Cory was everything a big bother should be. He was patient and kind, but always honest and genuine. Cory had always possessed a strange knack for knowing what was going on inside a person’s heart. Trying to hide only seemed to make it easier for him to know what was bothering you, if anyone was going to tell me the truth about how I looked in the outfit it would be Cory.
'Bit early for a date isn't it?'
'Book promo.'
I corrected but I smiled and relaxed a fraction, he had answered my question in his own way.
'Take care today, don't let anyone corner you. Always keep someone friendly at your back.'
Trust a predator to approach a book promotion like a hunt, but he had a point and I agreed that it was sound advice. I had the feeling today was going to be more of a mob than a promotion.