A Christmas Caroline by Camilla Isley
Twenty-one
A New Way
The offices of Wilkins and Marley are closed today. But our building, which we share with a couple of law firms, an investment fund, and a headhunting company, is used to dealing with workaholics and their on-holiday emergencies, so it’s open and staffed with basic security even during the holidays or at night in true New York fashion.
When I step inside, the security guard, Edward his plaque reads, doesn’t appear at all surprised to see me. I’m a notorious holiday avoider and late nighter.
“Afternoon, Miss Wilkins,” he greets me.
“Afternoon, Edward.”
The guard’s eyes widen at my response. I’m not sure if Manhattan Caroline ever even replied to his greetings. “How was Christmas, did you have a good time with your family?”
“Y-yes,” he replies, astonished.
A few more basic questions on my part are all it takes for him to grab his wallet and show me pictures of his five grandkids.
“And what about you, Miss Wilkins?” he asks after I’ve admired and praised the beauty of each of his grandchildren. “Was your Christmas good?”
“Yes.” I smile, feeling bittersweet. “These have been the best holidays of my life, and please call me Caroline, Ed, won’t you?”
On the way to the elevator, I feel the guard’s stunned stare on me even after I’ve gotten in and pushed the button to the top floor. I imagine Ed staring at the moving elevator for as long as the spacious lobby allows and shaking his head in wonder before he remembers he’s supposed to be calling my secretaries to alert them I’ve arrived and promptly do so.
When the elevator doors ding open, Annabelle and Debra are waiting for me outside, looking a little out of breath. As if Edward’s five-second delay forced them to run down the long office hall, which it probably did.
“Good afternoon, Miss Wilkins,” Annabelle greets me.
“Good afternoon, ladies,” I interrupt before she can recite all the work-related info I’ve trained her to give me the moment I step out of the elevator.
Once again, I ask both of them how Christmas went, make a little conversation, and request for them to call me Caroline from now on. They’re even more stunned than Edward or Nelson. As my closest collaborators, they aren’t used to any mollycoddling on my part.
Both assistants are still staring at me with that deer-caught-in-the-headlights expression when I prompt Annabelle to go on with the list of info I need.
By the time she replies, we’re already standing in my office.
“Nothing much happened yesterday, the numbers for the last-minute holiday sales reports on How to Décor Your House like a Celebrity are extraordinary.” She hands me a printout, and I try not to wince at the book title.
I don’t even look at the numbers I would’ve pored over with greed once, and merely ask, “Anything else?”
Annabelle is too shocked by my attitude to reply, so Debra takes over. “Miss Marley has already arrived and is waiting for you in conference room Ophelia.”
“What about Yashika?” I ask. “Is she coming?”
“I’m here.” A panting Yashika appears on the threshold, leaning on it.
I raise an eyebrow. “Did you run all the way from home?”
“No, but I was visiting my parents in Maine and I only got your notification this morning so I had to rush back on two different trains and—”
“Oh my gosh, Yashika, I’m so sorry,” I interrupt her and all three women gape at me. No one in this office has probably heard me apologize, like, ever. “I didn’t know you were visiting your family or I wouldn’t have called. Please, take next week off, and I’ll pay for your ticket to go back north. Now, shall we? I’d like you all to be present for the meeting.”
The women exchange side glances that range from wary to shocked to incredulous and follow me down the hall.
The Ophelia meeting room is our grandest with a long, rectangular table that can easily accommodate thirty people, glass walls at the front and back—windows technically—and a grand crystal chandelier dangling from the ceiling.
Ophelia is the room we use for all-staff meetings where the editors make their pitches for books they want to publish and anyone, from interns to secretaries, can bring forward an idea. At least it used to be like that in the early days. I don’t remember the last meeting where a book wasn’t pitched by a senior editor.
Ophelia is an odd choice, considering I’ve asked Jackie for a tête-à-tête.
My partner is waiting for me seated at the closest corner of the table—not the head—on the windows side with her back to the view.
Jackie is wearing a cream wool suit with a pencil skirt and a cape jacket that makes a stark contrast with her long bob of straight licorice-black hair. The company’s lawyer, a thirty-something Persian Adonis, is sitting on her right. I more than suspect their relationship of not being strictly professional, but he has an uncanny eye to comb through overlong, tiny-written contracts and spot any potential traps, so I’ve never objected to Farhan’s position.
Without hesitation, I pull the glass door open, and with a brisk, “Good afternoon,” I position myself on Jackie’s opposite side, facing the windows. The sun is already setting and its low glare above the horizon forces me to squint my eyes before they get adjusted. Did Jackie choose the positioning on purpose? Like an opponent army choosing its vantage point on the battlefield to blind the enemy. I also wonder when Jackie and I stopped being friends. I guess the more the company made money, the more we progressed from friends to business associates and finally partners who don’t particularly dote on each other.
I consider making the effort of a few minutes of polite conversation before getting to the point, but Jackie Marley is the one person I can skip pleasantries with. She has always been a cut-to-the-chase kind of gal.
“Afternoon, Caroline,” Jackie replies, taking in my casual clothes with predatory interest. And true to character, she promptly asks, “Do you mind telling us why you had to drag us to the office on one of the few days of the year we’re closed? What was so important that couldn’t wait until tomorrow?”
“I’m sorry, did I pry you from the arms of your loving family…?”
Jackie scoffs. “More saved me from their claws. I swear, if I have to listen to another Christmas carol I might start to wear ear wax plugs even during the day.”
The old Manhattan Caroline would’ve agreed with her soundly. The new me, not so much.
“Good,” I say. “And to answer your question, I’ve asked you here today because I thought we’d better be alone to discuss what I’m about to propose.” I gesture at Farhan. “There was no need to bring the legal department into this, by the way.”
“I don’t know, Caroline, you call me out of the blue asking for an urgent meeting. I wasn’t sure what to expect.”
“Nothing sleazy, I assure you. On the contrary, you’ll be pleased with what I’m about to propose. And, Farhan, sorry if we’ve interrupted your holiday.”
Farhan mumbles a “not at all” before throwing a side glance at Jackie that makes me wonder if they were already together when I called.
I nod at him and continue, “Actually, it might be a good thing that you’re here.”
“Please, Caroline,” Jackie interrupts, “the suspense is killing me.”
“All right,” I say. “I’ve decided to accept your offer.”
“What offer?”
“The one to buy me out.”
A collective gasp spreads across the room, and not even the usually impassible Jackie can hide her surprise.
Jackie recovers faster and narrows her eyes at me. “What’s the catch?”
“No catch.”
She leans back in her chair, pensive.
“I thought you’d be happy. You’ve been asking me to sell you my majority stake for ages.”
“Yes, and you’ve always refused. What’s changed?”
I tell her the truth. “I had a near-death experience which made me reassess my priorities.”
Jackie chuckles. “Oh, Caroline, please don’t tell me you’re going soft on me.” Then her gaze turns shrewd. “And I know you too well, you’re not planning to strip yourself of all your possessions and become a Good Samaritan. You have something in mind.”
“Yes.” No point in denying it. I want to make Rumpelstiltskin a reality, beginning with one store and then expanding. But I want my cake and to eat it too, as I plan to also be a publisher, but not for the rubbish we’ve been printing lately at Wilkins and Marley. “I’ll branch out on my own. We can both agree our partnership has gone as far as it could.”
Jackie leans her elbows on the table. “You won’t be able to take any of our authors with you like we did when we left Bucknam.”
I keep myself in check not to scoff. “Don’t worry, I don’t want them. But,” I turn to the three women sitting on my left. “I’d like to take Yashika, Annabelle, and Debra with me.”
Their already slacked jaws dangle a little lower.
Jackie regards them as if she was appraising a nasty bin of trash. “Oh, you can have them.”
“Good,” I say, standing up. “Make me an offer. Give me your best number and Farhan can draft an exit contract. Our personal lawyers can review it, and the whole business can be over before the end of the year.”
Jackie stands up as well. “You’ll have my offer by end of day tomorrow.”
“Great,” I say. “I won’t take up any more of your precious time.”
I exit the room, and my three minions scramble to their feet to keep up with me.
In my office, I ask Debra, the last one in, to close the door and invite all three women to sit before my desk. “Don’t just stand there like fish dangling from the hook, take a seat.”
They do.
“Today might’ve come as a shock to you, but, trust me, this will be a great opportunity for you all.” I turn my gaze on my senior editor. “Yashika, you were right about the direction we’d been taking. Things will change at my new company. You’ll have complete creative independence and the budget to sustain your choices… except for your first novel…” Yashika’s face, which has been growing brighter the more I speak, crumbles. “I want you to track down Kendall Hick’s agent and make sure that The Yellow Window is the first book we publish.” Her smile brightens again. “I heard they had an option with an incredibly obtuse publishing house that let them walk, but we’re not going to be that stupid, are we?” I give Yashika a little wink. “Offer them whatever you feel is right. With the sale of my shares of Wilkins and Marley, I’ll have enough to cover it.”
Yashika nods, and I turn to the other two. “As for you, I assume you both got a degree in English Literature and came to work for a publishing house to become editors eventually, am I correct?”
They both nod sheepishly.
“And the reason you’re still stuck as my assistants is that you feared that if you quit and I took it the wrong way, I would’ve zeroed your opportunities to work at any other publishing house in the city.”
This time, they don’t nod, but they don’t deny it either.
“Well, you’re both promoted starting today. Annabelle, you’re going to be an editor, and Debra, you’ll be her junior. I only need you to help me set up our new gig, you’ll have to hire and train your replacements and a few admins before you start with the actual editorial work. The startup period shouldn’t take more than a month or two. And, Annabelle, you’ve been with me long enough to know how it works, so spread the word with literary agencies that you’re open for submission and the manuscripts should flow in naturally.”
“Are we going to focus on any genre in particular?” Annabelle asks.
“No, do whatever you want, as long as the story is good. I only have one veto.”
All three look at me expectantly.
“No celebrity biographies, or celebrity tell-all, or celebrity accounts of their first twenty-five very meaningful first years on the planet.”
That declaration earns me three bright, eager smiles.
“Oh,” I add. “I also need you to track down a Pamela Sutton and an Elsie Garner and ask both of them to come in for an interview, and girls… don’t take no for an answer.”
***
My professional life took less than a day to sort. Tomorrow, I’ll meet with my real estate agent to look at some locations for the new offices. I shocked her when I specifically asked to steer clear of Manhattan. We’re going to spend the day trudging around Brooklyn, the city’s pulsing heart of startups and innovation.
But now that I’m sitting alone on my creamy white couch in my too empty apartment, I can’t escape the question that has been terrorizing me all day and I’ve avoided asking myself at all costs: is Sam single in this universe?
I place my laptop on a pillow on my legs and with a beating heart, I open Facebook and tap Sam Crawley into the search box.
Facebook is considered a social network for old people now, and I’m glad we’re both old enough to have a profile and that we’re still friends. In fact, my Sam pops up at the top of the results page. His profile picture is one of him in a tux at some event, probably an inauguration for one of his mosaics. Sam is so devastatingly handsome and I love him so much my fingers tremble on the mouse wheel as I scroll down the “about” section to find his relationship status.
He doesn’t have one.
No news is good news,I chant to myself. But the discovery doesn’t ease my accelerated heartbeat, and my stomach ties itself into knots.
Since he isn’t spelling it out for me, I scroll his profile backward for any hint that he’s seeing someone.
Sam’s posts are mainly of artistic pictures of his creations, from the sketches to the final mosaics with all the phases in between detailed in “behind the scenes” reportages.
Desperate to find any clues on his private life, I rifle through the recurring posts of happy birthday wishes, but nothing stands out. And Sam himself barely ever appears on his profile. I find a photo of him on a biking trip. One of his ten-year high school reunion. A selfie of himself at Madison Square Garden at a Knicks game. And a picture of him kissing a woman on a tropical beach at sunset.