Within a year Andrea was pregnant with our child (so left the agency in her seventh month) and we were married – in that order. Time went by and, bar a few downsides not worth mentioning at this point, life was pretty good. Or so I thought.
Seven years later I was still enjoying my career, was happily married, and had a wonderful daughter called Primrose. (Yeah, I know. Advertising people, eh? In fact, it took only three months to call her Prim – Primrose seemed such a heavy handle for such a squirt, pretty as she was.) I still had OBEs, which I was learning to control more as well as initiate. They remained my secret and continued to fascinate me.
Little did I know it was those OBEs that would lead to my premature demise.
Hopefully, you’ve stayed with me so far. It’s just that I thought it important that you knew some of my history – it’s pertinent to all I’m about to tell you. Believe me, I’ve left out heaps of personal stuff because I didn’t want you to lose interest along the way.
But now I’m ready and – hopefully again – you’re primed to hear my tale. Everything I’ve told you leads to the horrendous event that was to change my life – or I should say, my existence – forever . . .
10
‘It’s too big for us,’ I said, keeping my voice steady, avoiding Oliver’s glare. The debate – all right, the argument – between Sydney, Ollie and myself had been going on for over an hour at least. ‘We’re just not ready.’ I leaned back in my chair, arms folded across my chest, staring at my outstretched feet, ankles also crossed.
‘Not if we expand.’ Oliver was leaning forward in his seat, wagging a finger at me.
‘The time isn’t right for us to take on more staff. We just don’t have the capacity here.’
Oliver slapped his thigh hard and I winced; the slap must have made his leg smart.
‘Then we move!’ was his reply.
‘Are you kidding? It was difficult enough taking over these premises. We’re too busy for the disruption anyway.’
‘There is another way.’ Sydney Presswell was sitting behind his broad but minimalist desk, and his voice, as usual, was quietly soothing. Sydney had always been a good advocate between myself and Ollie, whose interaction these days was becoming more and more volatile; we barely agreed on anything lately, particularly when creative work was involved.
We both turned our heads towards our finance director/manager.
Sydney had piled on the weight over the years – too many drawn-out client lunches – but still managed to look dapper with his grey receding hair and grey suits, the latter always worn with deep blue or red ties. The flesh of his neck puffed out over his shirt collar a little, but his aquiline nose and soft grey eyes beneath finely arched eyebrows gave him the appearance of a benevolent patriarch. He wore those understated glasses, no frames, just plain lenses supported by hinges and plastic nose pads. Although now going through his third divorce, no lines furrowed his smooth brow and only slight bags hung beneath those pale-grey eyes.
We waited for him to speak again, perhaps both of us relieved that our increasingly angry confrontation had been interrupted.
‘We could merge,’ he said simply, leaning forward and interlacing his fingers on the desktop before him.
Neither Oliver nor I reacted. I just stared.
Sydney’s pale face was impassive. ‘Blake & Turnbrow have been chasing us for some time, as you know. They’re much larger than us and have offices world-wide. Together we could easily manage our respective clients and any more we might care to pitch for. Blake & Turnbrow are keen to amalgamate with us.’
‘To take us over, you mean, don’t you?’ I said, my annoyance now focused on him. That in itself was unusual, because Sydney was the easiest person in the world to get along with.
‘No, I don’t mean that,’ he said, his retort mild, not at all offended. ‘If getting into bed with a prestigious global agency will help us expand and find bigger clients, why should we balk at the idea?’
‘Because, Sydney,’ I said with disguised impatience, ‘it means giving up control of our own business.’
‘Wait a minute, Jim,’ Ollie put in. ‘It doesn’t have to mean that at all. Let’s take the helicopter view.’
It irritated me further when my copywriter used ad-speak: ‘overview’ wasn’t good, but ‘helicopter view’? And a ‘takeover’ was a ‘takeover’, not the sharing of a bed. A suspicion struck me: was Oliver really surprised at the suggestion, or had he and Sydney already discussed the prospect in my absence (I was often away from the office on photographic shoots or making TV commercials, allowing plenty of opportunities for cosy get-togethers for my partners)? Or was I just being paranoid?
‘Obviously Blake & Turnbrow like our client list, as well as the creative talent in this agency,’ Oliver went on. ‘But then don’t we envy their client list and some of their creative teams?’
‘If we get taken over—’ I began to say.
‘Merge,’ Sydney insisted.
I didn’t drop a beat. ‘—there’s no guarantee that some of our accounts won’t leave us. They signed up with Guinane, True, Presswell, not with Blake, Turnbrow, Guinane, True, Presswell . . .’
‘BTGTP has a nice ring to it.’ Oliver smiled and I wasn’t sure if he was deliberately winding me up.
Before I could respond, Sydney cut in once more. ‘Companies rarely switch agencies unless they’ve been let down by bad marketing strategies, mediocre creative work, or poor servicing: we’re guilty of none of those. However, we might fall down on the first and last points if we pitch for and win this new account.’
‘I’m still not sure why such a large corporate bank should approach us,’ I muttered, a little sourly I think. ‘The agency they have now is one of the biggest and best.’
‘Yes, and it’s become complacent. The bank has been with them for twenty years or more and I think they’ve both become tired of each other. It happens to every account eventually, no matter how solid the relationship has been.’
Sydney unlocked his fingers and rested back in his chair. ‘Fortunately, the bank’s marketing director is a very old acquaintance of mine and for the past year I’ve been rekindling our friendship. We belong to the same club and more than once I’ve let him thrash me at golf.’
‘This is the first time you’ve mentioned it to us,’ I said grudgingly.
‘Because I’ve had nothing to report until now. Geoff tipped me the wink only a few months ago and I’ve been working on him since. He’s well aware of my interest, of course, and I think he’s enjoyed the little game between us. I want the carrot and he loves to dangle it before me. Naturally, I’ve allowed him to enjoy himself at our expense – and I mean that literally.’ He looked meaningfully at me, and then at Oliver.
‘British Allied Bank is beginning to lose out in the market place,’ Sydney went on. ‘Its competitors, the other big banks, are regarded as more friendly towards small businesses and more trendy as far as the younger market is concerned. Certainly British Allied is banker to many vast corporations, but never underestimate how important the smaller businesses are. What they lack fiscally as individuals, they more than make up in quantity. Not quite as important, but certainly worth considering are the young non-account holders, the upwardly mobile C2s, who have to be encouraged – or enticed – to open a bank account. Like the small businesses their numbers are incredibly high and well worth bringing in. Catch ’em while they’re young is the motto of all the banks, because they rarely change banks during their lifetimes.’
‘So we’re seen as more cutting edge than British Allied’s present agency? Is that why they want us to pitch?’ Oliver was jigging a foot on the carpet, a habit of his when his energy was running high.
‘Precisely,’ Sydney replied. ‘But naturally, there will be other agencies pitching, including their present one, which has to be given a chance. I’ve learned from Geoff, though, that we’re the only hot shop; all the others are good and well established, but don’t have our reputatio
n for high-concept campaigns. I think, provided we come up with the right pitch, if we hinted that we could possibly be associated with another much larger agency in the near future, it might be to our advantage. Of course, if we did win it, it would be the biggest single account we’d held financially. The advertising budget would be phenomenal.’
‘Are you saying both deals go hand-in-hand?’ I asked, frowning.
‘Not at all. But a merger would help in regard to back-up. It’s all very well having wonderfully innovative ideas, but if we can’t service the account fully, then what’s the point? The bank will be all too aware of our limitations as much as I know they’ll like our ideas.’
I turned to Oliver. ‘What do you think?’
He grinned, and his foot was still tapping. ‘I say let’s take it to the max. Let’s burn the blacktop, go for both.’
He spoke in precise, clipped tones, an ‘elitist’ accent he’d never even tried to modify for street-cred purposes; estuary-speak had become the norm in our game, but he was having none of it. I liked him for that, even though he had an irritating penchant for jargoneze. He never tried to hide his wealthy, upper-class background and, with his shortish brown-almost-auburn hair, loose strands of which hung over his forehead, and military-straight back, intelligent brown eyes, home-counties accent, he would never have succeeded in doing so anyway. Even though his clothes were casual, they had a sharp neatness to them, a kind of preciseness that matched his clipped voice.
‘I think we’ve a good chance of winning the account,’ he went on, ‘particularly if they’re tired of the old staid bank advertising they’ve become used to and are looking for something fresher and more original.’
‘And the takeover?’
‘Merger,’ Sydney persisted.
Oliver shrugged. ‘Whatever. It might be an extremely beneficial move.’
‘You’d give up everything we’ve worked for?’ I was beginning to simmer.
‘It wouldn’t necessarily mean that, chum. Try seeing it from the north.’
I hated it when he called me chum, especially when it was coupled with the jargon.
‘Sydney and I already more or less agreed it would be a smart way for us to expand.’
Ah, so Sydney and Oliver had already discussed the matter without me.
‘Beside which,’ Oliver put in, resting his elbows on the cushioned arms of his leather swivel chair and making a steeple under his chin with his fingers, ‘we three would each receive quite a large sum for the company.’
‘That sounds like a buyout to me,’ I said.
‘Not at all. Financial remuneration for the partners would be merely part of the deal . . .’
There was a light tap on the door and it opened a little. Lynda, our receptionist/switchboard girl, poked her head through the gap. She looked directly at me.
‘Phone call for you, Jim. Your wife.’
‘Did you tell her I was in a meeting?’
‘She said you’re always in a meeting.’
I couldn’t argue with that: over the last couple of years, my whole life seemed to revolve around meetings, which was frustrating for someone who wanted to work only on the drawing board. I knew Oliver felt the same as far as copywriting was concerned, but somehow he was better than me on such occasions, especially where clients were concerned. Ollie was also terrific at presentations and his social skills were excellent, whereas I tended to be too stiff and was hopeless at cosying up to the clients, particularly those I didn’t like.
‘Ah, tell her I’ll ring back in a couple of minutes, will you?’
Lynda smiled and retreated, quietly drawing the door closed after her.
Ollie was looking at his wristwatch. ‘Look, Jim, I’ve got something on tonight so I have to get away,’ he said, his foot stopping its tattoo on the carpet.
I breathed a loud sigh. ‘Okay with me,’ I said. ‘But I still think we should take things one step at a time.’
‘You think we should pitch though?’ Sydney leaned forward over his desk again.
‘You two would outvote me anyway, wouldn’t you?’
‘Oh no, Jim,’ said Oliver, standing up and brushing an imaginary crease from the knee of his trousers. ‘Also, I want to think on bedding down with Blake & Turnbrow myself. Let’s touch base again tomorrow morning when we’re fresher. I have to admit, though, right now I’m inclined to push the envelope. We could all benefit from a paradigm shift.’
I assumed Sydney understood the lingo; I did, just about.
‘If we’re going for the new account we have to start work right away.’ Despite the warning, there was no impatience in Sydney’s manner, nor in his grey eyes. There was only his usual impassiveness.
‘We wouldn’t start on it tonight anyway,’ said Oliver to Sydney. ‘Let’s sleep on it, okay?’
Sydney nodded and I got to my feet, still wondering if I’d been left out of the loop somewhere along the way. Ollie hadn’t seemed very surprised by either of the two propositions, nor by the possible linking between them. I followed my copywriter out of Sydney’s office back to the one we shared as the agency’s creative directors, Oliver switching on the light as we entered.
Moving behind my desk and picking up a long steel cutting rule that rested there, slapping the flat side against my open palm, a habit of mine when I was tense, I began to say, ‘We oughta talk . . .’
‘Ring Andrea first, Jim,’ he interrupted. ‘It might be something urgent.’
Reluctantly, I placed the heavy rule back on the desk and picked up my phone, pressing 9 for an outside line. We needed to discuss things, Ollie and I. I dialled my home number.
‘Hello, please?’
It was Prim’s breathy little voice.
‘Hey, squirt, it’s Daddy.’
‘Daddy! Are you coming home now?’
I smiled as I thought of her standing in the sitting room, phone clutched in both hands, her curly hair kept away from her face with an Alice-band. Lush brown hair like her mother’s, a few shades lighter though, with a reddish hue when the sun lightened it; tawny brown eyes full of innocence and fun.
‘Soon, Prim,’ I told her.
‘You got to, Daddy. You’re looking after me tonight. Don’t you ’member?’
Uh-oh. Sure I remembered. Andrea was meeting two of her girlfriends this evening for a quietish girlie night out and I was the appointed childminder.
‘Did you think I’d forgotten? Anything special you want to do?’
‘Lots and lots. And cards.’
Seven years old and I’d already taught her how to gamble. Taught her to cheat a little too.
‘No DVDs you want to watch?’ I needed some thinking time tonight.
‘Just games, please.’
I laughed. ‘Okay.’ Plenty of time to think once I’d put her to bed. ‘Now run and get Mummy for me, will you?’
‘Love you!’
She was gone and I pictured her running to the kitchen – she was of an age when kids are always in a hurry, rushing from one interest to the next. A snapshot view of her came to mind, a holiday photo, the sun directly behind her so that the curls around her face were orangey red, a halo of fire, her features softened even more because they were in light shadow, her brown eyes deepened so that they were like Andrea’s. I wanted to eat her.
‘Jim?’
Andrea’s voice, low-pitched, even now seductive to me.
‘Hi. You rang me,’ I told her.
‘You haven’t forgotten I’m out tonight.’
‘No, I’ll be home in plenty of time.’
‘No last-minute meetings. You know what you’re like.’
In truth, I did want to discuss Sydney’s proposal some more with him and Oliver, but maybe a breather would be useful at this point: I was getting just a bit rankled with this talk of a merger – it still sounded like a sell-out to me – and needed time to think on it to calm myself.
‘I’ll be home within the hour,’ I assured Andrea. ‘Where are you meeting the gir
ls?’ The dinner with two girlfriends of old was a bi-monthly get-together to yak and catch up on the latest gossip.
‘San Lorenzo’s.’
I was impressed. ‘Hope you’re not paying.’
‘We always go Dutch. You don’t mind, do you?’
Of course I didn’t; we both needed own-time every so often. ‘No, you have a good dinner, order the best on the menu.’ She deserved it; I was always ringing home at the last moment to tell her I was going to be stuck in yet another meeting, or that I’d be working till late. ‘Tell you what, I’ll cover the whole bill. You can treat your friends.’
‘No, Jim, that’s not necessary. I don’t want to start a precedent.’
‘Up to you, but really, I don’t mind.’
‘Thanks anyway. Prim’s already eaten, but can you fix something for yourself. There’s plenty of easy stuff in the fridge.’
‘No prob. I’ll see you soon. Oh, and Andrea . . .?’
‘Yes.’
‘I need to talk to you later.’
I caught the faint rush of anxiety in her voice. ‘Is something wrong?’ she asked.
‘No, no. Just things going on here that I’d like your opinion on. Nothing that can’t wait till later.’
‘Okay, Jim. I’ll see you soon, then?’
‘Almost on my way. Bye for now.’
I replaced the receiver and sat at my desk for a while. Oliver had left the office during my telephone conversation and I was alone. People leaving for home were passing by the open door, some of them calling in a brief ‘G’night’ on their way. Preoccupied, I waved a casual hand.
Something was making me uneasy and at the time I thought it was due to both the suggested merger and the pitch for the new account (which I didn’t think the agency was quite ready for).
Only much, much later did I realize I was intuitively troubled over something that had nothing to do with business.
But then, I’d understand a lot of things once I was dead.