“I haveto hand it to you, Ava,” Lindy is saying, staring in the direction of her camera that indicates she’s notlooking at the camera, rather like she’s scrolling through something else on the screen. “You’re a superhero right now. I didn’t know what we were going to do when Event Tech decided to shut down.”
I smile pleasantly even though she’s still obviously not looking at me while she scrolls. “I think a lot of people felt that way. And I get why they decided to do it. But…you know. We have to try to do something right now. You know?”
“Yeah,” Lindy says absently.
I cut a glance towards Zoey’s smirking face in her little video square on my screen. My phone vibrates, and I pick it up.
Zoey Campos: Slay all day, bitch!!!!
Ava Herald: LOL.
Ava Herald: Maybe wait til she actually signs the contracts.
Zoey Campos: She’s TOTALLY going to sign the contracts. Look how freaking into it she is.
“Yeah, this is perfect,” Lindy says, and I look up from my phone. She’s still staring at something on her screen. “And we can have the registration site go live this week?”
“Yes ma’am.” I click over to the proposed implementation schedule for the virtual conference. “It would go live on Friday. That would give us a lead time of about five weeks for people to register, which, you know…is pretty standard.”
I subtly cringe at my awkwardness, becauseyes, Ava. Lindy knows that’s pretty standard. But nobody other than me notices apparently.
“Perfect,” she coos, sounding just like Roger for a second. I really don’tmiss Roger at all. “This is fantastic, ladies. I’m so relieved, honestly. And I’m so glad you reached out to me. Pandemic aside, I think virtual events really are the future of our industry.”
I have to laugh recalling when I said that to Roger on a number of occasions way before the lockdown. He said I was wrong. Now he has no company at all. And I’m about to have his most important client as myfirst client. “Yeah, I’d been telling the guys at Event Tech for a while.”
“It’s really too bad they didn’t listen to you,” Lindy adds with a content sigh. “Okay, well, let’s get the ball rolling on the contracts. If you can send them this afternoon, I’m pretty sure we can have them back by C.O.B. today. Tomorrow morning at the latest.” She chortles. “I think everyone’s still in the day-drinking stage of quarantine, so it’s kinda touch-and-go with email.”
I match her laugh. “Awesome, will do. Thanks again for your time, Lindy. I’m looking forward to working with you guys on this.”
“Us too.” She finally looks straight at her camera and waves. “You ladies have a great rest of your day, okay?”
“You, too.” I click to end the meeting, closing the lid to my laptop and gathering my things for my nextmeeting—this one with Meyer in the dining room downstairs. My phone starts buzzing, and I swipe to answer as I clutch all my stuff against my chest and head into the hall. “Hey, Zoe.”
“Giiiirl!”
I laugh loudly, stepping around two of Lucky’s dancers, who are stretching on the floor, wearing skimpy leotards and black leg warmers. “Giiiirl…I know.”
“This is honestly ideal,” Zoey goes on. “I mean, who in their right mind would ever actually want to go back into an office?” She pauses and raises the pitch of her voice to mimic Lindy. “Pandemic aside.”
I laugh again as I step down the stairs. “I can’t disagree. Even though I’m honestly ready to get back to some kind of normalcy.”
“You mean you can’t wait to get out of the speakeasy ofsin,” she prompts coyly. She knows all about Shawna’s little show from last week,andthe little passive aggressive show I did for Lucky immediately afterward. “Have you fucked him yet?”
My eyes widen as I glance around. Gratefully, nobody’s downstairs in the hall that leads to the dining room. “No, and I have no intention to. But I am about to meet with Meyer, so can you be available for the next hour or so if I need to call you?”
“Yep. But fair warning, I’m about to start day-drinking so I can be nice and liquored up before I start that Tiger King show.”
I groan. “Okay then. If I don’t call you while I’m meeting with him, I’ll text you when I’m done.”
“Sounds good.”
I end the call just before stepping into the dining room. Meyer’s seated at the head of the table with his laptop and a stack of documents. Per usual, he’s wearing a dress shirt, tie, and vest like this is a 1920s mafia headquarters—just like all the other men in this house.
Upon seeing me, he raises his hands, palms up, in a grand gesture at me. “Ava! Welcome, welcome, welcome.” He flattens one hand on the table and gestures at a seat to his right with the other. “Make yourself cozy.”
“Thanks.” I step all the way into the room, heading toward the chair, and then catch sight of Lucky at a mahogany sidebar that has a silver coffee setup as well as a bunch of liquor bottles. Today he’s wearing a gunmetal gray, three-piece suit with subtle, horizontal light gray stripes and a solid black tie. He doesn’t acknowledge me and continues to swirl a spoon in an espresso cup. I set down my things at the table and take a seat.
“Ooo-kay,” I say, opening my laptop and pulling up the mock-up of the site that would host Lucky’s first virtual concert. I inch my chair slightly closer to Meyer’s side of the table and turn the laptop toward him. “So this is just a dummy site for now, but it gives you an idea of what the layout will look like. We’ll obviously have it fully branded, but as you can see, it’ll have the video player featured and all your links below.” I point at a few items with the tiny arrow. “Social media here, website, merchandise, and this will be a live chat. We don’t have to include that, but it would be a fun option to allow the fans to interact with each other, kind of like they might at an actual show.”
