“And that’s why working with me would help boost your viewership and lead to more international recognition — as you specifically said you were hoping for.” Zoe Devine clicked to the last slide of her presentation and smiled at her potential client. “Thank you again for meeting with me. If you have any questions, just let me know.”
The potential client, a social-media-based singer with the handle Gapcha, raked his hand through his spiky purple hair and shook his head. He was lounging on a chaise longue eating Cheetos and drinking a red wine that was probably older than both of them combined. Zoe’s heart raced as she waited for his answer, but she got the feeling that she already knew what he was about to say.
“Yeah, I’m just not really interested.”
Zoe swallowed a sigh of frustration. “I understand that working with a PR professional like myself would be a change from your previous business model, but as I said, a few small changes to your branding could really help you. You’re great at what you do — singing. I can help you become just as great at every part ofbeing an influencer. For instance, a more targeted social media presence and increased focus on the kinds of videos that already get you a lot of engagement, like singing in public and meetings with your fans?—"
“Let me stop you right there.” Gapcha held up a hand. His large gold rings reflected light directly into Zoe’s eyes. “I’m not against PR professionals. I just don’t want to work withyou.”
“Right.” Zoe bit her lip and took a deep breath, but her chest already felt tight. “If you could give me a little insight into why that is, I’m sure I could ease your mind.”
“I don’t think you can.” Gapcha shrugged. “Sorry. But I don’t have unlimited time, and you’re wasting it.”
“I’mthe one who’s sorry,” Zoe snapped. “When we agreed to this meeting, you seemed interested in hearing what I had to say, but now you just want me to leave. I thought I was working with a professional.”
“Iama professional,” Gapcha protested. He rolled his eyes. “You’renot. Your former boss reached out to me to let me know that you aren’t what you pretend to be. Apparently, you’re unreliable, unfocused, un... I don’t remember anymore. But yeah, I’m going to work with her, not you.”
Zoe’s annoyance flared. Frustratingly, tears pricked at her eyes, but there was no way she would show Gapcha that. “Listen, Carla Vassallo is a wonderful PR professional, but she isn’t right about everything. Rather than go with a big company like hers, you’re better off working with someone who has a smaller clientele and can give you the personalized assistance you need.” Zoe drew breath to continue, but Gapcha shook his head.
“Just go. You can see yourself out.”
Zoe got to her feet. Her cheeks were flushed, her chest was tight, and she was still close to tears. She was just so frustrated. This wasn’t her first meeting like this — and it probably wouldn’t be her last. Arguing more wasn’t going to help, though.
“Thank you for your time.” Her tone was curt. She grabbed her laptop and walked out of the singer’s penthouse. It took all her self-control not to tip one of the many statues of Gapcha’s face onto the marble floor just to watch it shatter. His rejection hadn’t been about her pitch. No. He was uninterested in her work because of something else. Or, rather, someone else.
She pressed the button to call the elevator. Behind her, she heard Gapcha rapping something about asparagus and rolled her eyes. He wouldn’t have been a good client anyway. That was even more frustrating. Her career had sunk to the point that she would have been ready to work with a third-rate rapper who was currently trying to make “asparagus” rhyme with “tacos.”
When the elevator finally arrived, Zoe slumped against the handrail inside, forcing herself to take deep breaths. She caught sight of her face in the mirrored back wall and groaned.
The woman in the mirror looked so… defeated. Her blond hair was beginning to escape its bun in wispy curls. The circles beneath her large brown eyes were more pronounced than ever, though she’d worked hard to conceal them with makeup. And her usual bright, charismatic smile had faded.
Zoe certainly felt defeated. Two months ago, she’d quit an unreasonable PR job with an unreasonable boss, Carla Vassallo, and struck out on her own. At thirty-two, with ten years of PR experience, she’d felt ready, and she’d had an existing client base who she’d been ready to reach out to. But, on the day she’d quit, Carla Vassallo had called her into her office to say thatZoe would never find a PR job in New York City again. It had seemed like the last jab of a mean and manipulative boss, but it was proving so far to be true. No one would work with Zoe, and her old boss was responsible. Zoe had to wonder how much time Carla, or one of her flunkies, was spending finding out what clients Zoe was trying to land and sabotaging her.
As she stepped out onto the street, the warm June air enveloped her. Cabs whizzed by and pedestrians streamed around her, all eager to get where they were going. Zoe stopped on the sidewalk, frozen. She felt like she’d been standing still for two months, unable to move forward no matter how much she tried, while the rest of the world moved on without her.
How was she ever going to find a job in this city, if one of the biggest names in PR was set on keeping her down?
That familiar tightness blossomed in her chest, and she absentmindedly pressed a hand to her heart. Gapcha had been a stretch. But Zoe was desperate, and she’d hoped that he would have been small-time enough that Carla wouldn’t have gotten her claws into him yet. She’d been wrong. Again.
An older woman pulling a grocery bag on wheels almost knocked into Zoe, who quickly stepped out of the way. If she kept standing here on the sidewalk, she was going to get trampled sooner or later. She fell into the flow of pedestrian traffic and headed towards the subway that would take her back to her modest studio apartment.
“What am I going to do now?” Zoe muttered. A passing businessman gave her a strange look. She was turning into one of those muttering weirdos who roamed the streets of New York. Maybe this was how those weirdos became who they were — they chased a dream, fell short, and never recovered.
Zoe had no idea what she was supposed to do. She’d been so excited to start her own career out from under Carla’s thumb, and it had been a total flop so far. She could keep chasing after small-time clients like Gapcha, but that wasn’t sustainable, especially since Carla had gotten to him anyway.
Maybe it was time to move. In a new city, she could step out from the shadow of one of the biggest PR names in the city and start something for herself. But Zoe dismissed the idea as soon as she thought of it. She had lived in New York City her whole life — she’d been born in a Manhattan hospital and had grown up just a few subway stops from where she now lived. New York was as much a part of her as her soft brown eyes or the upturned nose she’d inherited from her mother. She couldn’t leave this city behind.
As Zoe stepped into a crosswalk, a bike messenger almost mowed her down, and she glared after him. New York City may be a part of her, but it still annoyed her at times. She hurried across the street to avoid another row of bike messengers, who didn’t seem to believe that the stoplights applied to them.
If she didn’t want to move — and no matter how annoying the bike messengers were, she didn’t — maybe it was time to give up on her business. She could try to find a job again — but no PR company would hire her now that she was on Carla’s bad side, and she didn’t want to do anything else. Zoe loved PR. Helping people decide how they wanted to present themselves to the world and bringing them closer to their dreams in the process was a great feeling. And she was good at it. She couldn’t let herself give up on her career just because things were difficult.
Zoe reached the subway station and descended the stairs with a wave of other travelers. She tapped her MetroCard and went through the turnstile. Finally, she had a little good luck as hertrain arrived at almost the same time she did, with a whoosh of air and an unintelligible conductor announcement.
Onboard, she found a place to stand near the doors and leaned against a metal pole. She was just sotired.For the last two months, she’d barely slept, seen her friends, or taken a moment to herself. She’d been completely focused on looking for new clients, preparing pitches, and going to meetings and networking events. Every spare moment had been spent trying to forward her career. And yet, here she was, no further along than she’d been when she’d started. In fact, she was probably worse off after being turned away by dozens of big names.
But she couldn’t give up. She never had before, not even when things looked far darker than this. She had to keep trying.
Tomorrow, she would try again. She would look for new clients. She’d cast a wider net. She’d do whatever it took to make her dream a success.
