‘I would love for someone to tell me who to date.’
‘I mean, that would be good so you don’t waste another eight months chasing after total self-obsessed wankers like Billy.’
‘Can we not talk about Billy?’
‘You can’t still be into him.’
‘I’m not. I just don’t need to talk about the man I wasted years thinking I was in love with when I was a teenager.’
‘He’s got a receding hairline now.’
‘Who?’
‘Billy. He posted a photo on Instagram the other day of himself on a beach in Costa Rica and I reckon he’ll be bald in a year or two. So that should make you feel a little better.’
Rose hated that it did make her feel a little better.
‘I haven’t spoken to him in a long time.’
‘Keep it that way. What about Dick Stick?’
Dick Stick was Luce’s less than socially acceptable nickname for Ed, Rose’s sort-of ex. They’d met at Luce’s twenty-fourth birthday party – he’d tagged along with one of her colleagues. With almond-shaped eyes and full kiss-me lips, he was beautiful to look at. A living, breathing work of art, as she often told him. And for whatever reason, that night he’d decided to ignore Luce and her tall lawyer friends and pursue Rose. Things between them moved fast, and after just two weeks Ed asked Rose to be his girlfriend, like the way eleven-year-olds ask each other to hold hands for a week. The following month, he told her he was falling in love. By month three, they were planning their Italian wedding together. Then he began to withdraw – and that’s when the arguments started. Soon, Ed, who called himself an actor despite the fact he’d never been cast in anything and didn’t actually have to work because he came from a family of retail tycoons, was putting her down all the time. He said she had no real ambition of her own and just absorbed those of other people, and called her superficial several times. Luce hated him. Still, Rose never stopped seeking his approval. Even when he ended things, she couldn’t help but ask if it was because he thought she was vapid. ‘No, of course not,’ he replied, lightly putting his hand on her arm as if she were a dying relative. ‘You’re fit and funny. I just don’t think we’re very compatible.’
‘I haven’t spoken to Ed in a long time, either,’ replied Rose.
‘Good. Proud of you. Do you have any other fun parties coming up this week? I feel like it would be good for me to get out. Find someone spicy to sink my teeth into.’
‘Already?’
‘God, not for a relationship. No, no. Love is obviously a lie. I just think some attention would be good for me.’
‘Intel has some whisky brand party happening on Wednesday. I wasn’t going to go but if you fancy it I could ask Minnie?’
‘Will there be hot people there?’
‘I don’t know but I can guarantee there’ll be several people who will want to sleep with you.’
‘Okay, but, like, on a scale of, say, George to Milo Jax.’
‘We don’t think George is attractive anymore?’
‘Absolutely not. He gives me the ick.’
‘Maybe we should send you on Love Island.’
‘I would like to come on Wednesday, please,’ said Luce, ignoring the Love Island pitch as she scooped her finger around her bowl, licking off the remaining tomato sauce. ‘Then I can go home on Thursday, happily hungover and suitably shagged.’
‘Okay, I’ll ask Minnie tomorrow.’
‘Thank you.’
Later, Rose was lying in bed drafting boilerplate pitches to influencers on her laptop for the launch of StandFirst. They followed a similar format, one structured by Minnie. Every pitch email had to do the following: detail the event and how many posts or photographs would be required, outline any freebies or gifted items on offer, and clearly state exactly how long they’d be needed for and if there was any available fee, which there never was. Hence the importance of the perks.
The most important thing, though, was to massage the person’s ego. Usually that person was not the person you wanted to come to the event. It was their publicist – and their ego was often larger than that of the talent they represented. But a surprising number of influencers didn’t have publicists per se. They had assistants, and because you never really knew who would be reading your email, it was best to pander to the influencers themselves.
Rose spent seven minutes drafting a pitch. Then, feeling tired, she closed her laptop, and went into the kitchen. It had been two hours since she put her phone in the cutlery drawer. She had turned off her notifications for Instagram several weeks ago in the hope of reducing the amount of time she spent on the app. The idea was that she would then have to open it in order to receive messages from it, making her usage more of a conscious choice as opposed to a passive one incited by a notification. That was the theory, anyway. But most of the time she found herself just opening the app even more frequently than before, looking for notifications.
There was a red circle next to the arrow in the top right-hand corner of the app. She had one new message. A swipe of her thumb to the left and there he was. @milojax. The top line of his message in bold: Oh, hello. How nice to he …
The message had been sent an hour ago. She tapped it.
Oh, hello. How nice to hear from you, Rose. How are you?
Her phone slipped out of her hands and made a loud thud as it smacked the floor.
She quickly picked it up, ignoring the white cracks that were now splintered across her screen, moving as quickly and quietly as she could to her bedroom.
Tucked underneath the warmth of her duvet, Rose opened her phone and stared at the screen. Okay, so he had replied. It must be someone on his team who had seen Rose worked for Firehouse and was therefore being friendly to maintain good relations. It was business.
Rose opened her Notes app and began drafting a reply she knew she would probably never send. Nonetheless, she wanted to have it ready before she went to sleep. Otherwise she’d just spend all night crafting it in her head anyway.
Oh hi. I’m good thanks. You?
Way too boring. Also, don’t copy him. He’ll clock that immediately.
Hey
Too American.
