I pause, my fingers hovering over my keyboard. If Thea was right about that, what else might she be right about?
I squeeze my eyes closed and try to picture Sasha the cat. Her cool, silvery beauty. Her absolute confidence that everyone loves her. Her “you know you want to touch me, but don’t you dare try it” attitude.
If Sasha can convey all that with a single glare from her ice-blue eyes, then surely I—with my college education and years of writing experience—can manage a simple sentence or two that will put Tad in his place.
I cross one leg over the other, prop my elbows far back on the arms of my chair, and spin around to face Tad. I’m acutely aware that my skirt rides up higher on my thigh than I’m used to. And equally aware that my posture displays my breasts to their best advantage.
I’ve never used my body to get what I wanted, but Sasha would.
“Tad, be a doll and double-check the graphics? We can’t afford to slip up on this. And we need to be in the conference room in ten minutes.”
Be a doll?Did I actually just say that? I hold my breath, waiting for him to laugh at me.
Instead, Tad nods—the smile he sends me is a little dopey. “I’ll get right on it.”
I watch him leave, feeling baffled. Should I be thrilled or horrified? Is it really that easy? Could men really be won over with faux confidence and a low-cut blouse?
That’s when it hits me. Just now, I hadn’t stuttered when talking to Tad. My throat hadn’t closed. My words hadn’t log-jammed. Score one for Sasha the cat.
Now I just have to fake Sasha’s confidence and allure for the meeting with Butler.
And trust that I can pull it off again.
Thirty minutes later, when Matt walks into the conference room with the representatives from Butler, I don’t give myself even a moment to consider that I might fail at this. That I might stutter or flounder.
Butler sent over a trio of people for the pitch meeting, two women and a man. Often, meetings like this are done over video conference, but Butler’s corporate headquarters are right outside of Houston, only a couple of hours away.
Matt handles the introductions and the small talk. I let him, because it’s what he’s great at and because I have my own “lines” memorized. I’ve refined and reworked my pitch to avoid words and sound combinations that tend to trip me up. I may be playing a role, but it’s a role of my own creation, and there’s no need to make this harder on myself than it has to be.
When Matt hands the presentation over to me, Tad cues up the graphics, and I stroll to the front of the room, already talking. “We’ve all seen countless ads that sell cleaning products to moms. Nearly every vacuum ad out there shows some variation of spilled juice, tracked dirt, or clinging pet hair. Our ad targets a different woman.”
I pause and glance at the screen behind me, letting the images do the selling for me.
I’ve been drawing since I was eleven. Okay, yeah, I know all kids draw. But, I’ve been working my ass off at this since I was a tween. I know I’m good. And I’ve been working in advertising for nearly a decade. After that much time, you get a feeling for when the idea is right. You just know.
This is my creativity—my mojo—at its absolute best. Another fantasy turned into a brilliant ad copy.
Tad and I have refined the images, but the basic concept is the same.
A pair of champagne flutes discarded on the fireplace mantel. A faceless couple slow-dancing, their bare feet shuffling across the plush carpet. Pan back to a shot of them lying on the floor, her hair mussed, his hands braced on either side of her face as he leans down to kiss her. Her knees are bent, her thighs cradling him. Her toes curl into the carpet as her hips rock up to meet him. Pan away from the couple, past the forgotten champagne flutes, to the Butler Steam Vac peeking out of a linen closet’s slightly ajar door. Then the tagline appears.
“Because sometimes you want your carpet to bereallyclean.”
With that final line frozen on the screen, I turn back to the people from Butler. “Given the current shift in demographic trends, we want to target not just mothers relentlessly cleaning up everyone else’s mess. We don’t want cleanliness to be associated with monotonous, endless chores. Everyone wants a clean house, sure. But we want Butler to be associated with somethingelsewe all want. Something relatable and a skosh cheeky. We believe our ad does just that.”
Based on the smiles of the two women, they agree. The man from Butler isn’t sold on the idea as easily. I continue the presentation while Tad flips through the additional slides, showing off the statistics that prove our point. By the time we reach the last slide, I know we’ve got them.
Matt leads them off to talk contracts, leaving Tad and me to pack up. The second the conference room door closes behind Matt and the folks from Butler, Tad jumps to his feet and gives me a high five so strong it nearly knocks me over.
Maybe it’s the heels, but honestly, I think it’s his excitement.
“Damn!” he exclaims. “You knocked that out of the park!”
“Weknocked it out of the park. I couldn’t have done it without you.”
Tad blinks, clearly surprised by my praise. Then a smile spreads over his face. “Thanks.”
The guy is practically beaming as he gets back to work. It’s crazy how such a tiny drop of praise made such a huge difference in his attitude. Teresa doles out praise like the company is going to deduct it from her paycheck. Teresa loved basking in praise, but rarely wanted to share the spotlight. That was just her style. And it might even be Sasha’s style, but it’s not mine.
