Vera had beenthrough hell before she came back to Durham a year ago. Whatever emotionalturmoil I was going through now couldn’t compare to what my best friend hadfaced. Honestly, the good outweighed the bad anyway. My joyful feelings for myfriend were so much larger than my own, selfish, pity-party ones. My pride inwho she’d become and how hard she’d worked to get where she was now wouldalways outshine my personal feelings of self-doubt and insecurity.
Because she wascloser to me than any other human. Because we’d been through good times and badtimes, and really good times, and really, really bad times, and that’s whatfriends did. We put each other first. We stepped outside of ourselves and ourissues to cheer each other on and root for each other’s happiness.
Vera had found hersoulmate and that gave me hope. Maybe I didn’t have an exact idea of what myperfect ending looked like, but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t find it.
****
Thanks to traffic Iprobably should have anticipated, I walked into the office twenty minutes laterthan I had planned. I was flustered and sore and unexplainably out of breathbecause I rationalized that I should be in ultra-shape now after my psychoticspin class this morning.
I had just enoughtime to say hi to Emily, drop my purse at my desk, and grab my notebook andlaptop for my morning briefing with Ethan and Henry.
“They’re alreadywaiting for you,” Emily murmured while I searched for my favorite pen.
“I’m not evenlate!” I protested.
“Yeah, well, goodluck convincing them of that.”
I growled somethingprofane at her, and then scurried to Henry’s office. Emily was right. They werethere and already talking about the account.
Scooting behind Ethan’schair, I took a seat and held my shoulders back, even though I felt likecurling into a ball and apologizing for who I was as a human.
“Molly,” Henrygreeted.“So nice of you to join us.”
“Sorry,” I blurted.“I thought the meeting started at nine-thirty.”
Neither manconfirmed my statement. Instead, Henry passed me a packet of papers about BlackSoul, including a marketing plan that he’d already devised. My heart sank to mystomach. I’d wanted to be a part of this process, not delegated tasks he didn’twant to deal with.
“As creativedirector, I want you to know my door is always open. I’m here to go over everyminute detail and help guide you in the right direction,” Henry explained. “Ethanalready has some great ideas for an updated logo. We’ve gone over his visionand I’m confident he’s off to a good start.” My heart sank further. I had somecool ideas for their new logo. There was so much to do with a name like BlackSoul. “Molly, I’m going to work side-by-side with you on the social mediapacket. I want my hands on every part of this project.”
Avoiding Henry’sawkward stare, I nodded and made notes in the margins of my planner as if thiswasn’t exactly what I’d expected. Sure, I had hoped for more. Or I’d at leastexpected to be part of a conversation that I could have petitioned for more.But the majority of my career so far had been in social media.
On one hand, Ialready knew I would excel because that was where I felt comfortable. On theother hand, it came with zero respect. The older designers in my office had noidea how valuable a strong social media presence could be. There was so much todo in the way of advertising on the numerous different platforms, and unlimitedpotential to be innovative and unique.
And yet, the peopleI worked with were still bidding on expensive print spots and TV commercials.They were single-handedly keeping magazine publishers in business. Because itobviously wasn’t the missing throngs of subscribers. And don’t even get mestarted on commercials.
Besides theelderly, who had the patience to watch anything on live TV?
“Are you good tomake some graphics that coincide with the logo Ethan develops?” The LittleTucker asked.
“Yep,” I answered,working hard to swallow bitter disappointment. To Ethan I said, “Send me all ofthe mockups you are going to take to them and I can develop a coinciding onlineplan. As long as you give me enough time to put something together, we can givethem the whole picture of what their campaign will look like.”
Ethan markedsomething in his notes. “That’s a great idea, Molly.”
I breathed a subtlesigh of relief. This wasn’t the first time I had pitched an approach like this.Usually I got polite nods and hums of resigned acceptance only to be totallyforgotten about until the morning of the pitch. I was good at my job, but evenI needed more than thirty minutes to put together an entire campaign.
I’d even confronteddesigners that I worked with often, trying in vain to explain why I would wantto pitch the advertising campaign along with the new logo, but I could neverget the good old boys to see the big picture.
And some of themweren’t even boys! In the beginning, I’d assumed I’d be able to count onfemales to fight battles with me. Because girl power!Andsolidarity.And a strong, mutual hatred of our periods.But it turned out women in the workplace could be just as vicious, if not moreso, than men.
Where men brushedme aside and ignored my requests, talents and opinions, women strapped on armorand waged war. Men barely acknowledged my efforts. Women assumed I was tryingto destroy their career by furthering mine.
Unfortunately,Henry wasn’t nearly as forward thinking as Ethan. “You’re going to create anentire ad campaign for each logo pitch? That seems like an excessive amount ofwork on your end. I think your efforts are better served on price points and potentialreach.”
“It won’t be anentire campaign for each logo. More like simple mockups featuring the logo inseveral different capacities. I’d like to have a graphic for desktop and mobile,website versus social platforms. It will give the client a bigger picture ofhow the logo will look during the campaign.”
Henry pinched hisnose with his thumb and forefinger, thinking over my idea.
“It will benefitthe logo,” Ethan added. “And help the client pick the best one. I think Mollyis on to something.”
