Page 98 of Smoke and Glitter

"You do."

It isn't really a question, but I answer it anyway. "I want it." Saying it out loud feels stranger than it should. "I built this campaign. I know where it works and where it still doesn't. I know which reporters Nix trusts now and which ones are waiting for an excuse to drag the old story back out. This got bigger because we were good at our jobs, and I want to see what we can do with it."

Anna is silent long enough that I wonder whether I've surprised her or myself more. Then she laughs. "That might be the most selfish thing you've ever said to me."

"Probably."

"I've been waiting a few years."

I lean against the wall. "You could've mentioned that."

"I did. You kept interpreting every conversation as a request to become more efficient."

"That does sound like me."

"It really does."

I'm smiling when we hang up. When I go back, Nix has surrendered the laptop but not the coffee. I tell them I'm staying through the extension, Nix grins, and Gemma shifts the routing toward the empty space in front of me. Five minutes later we're arguing about Manchester again, and it already feels normal.

After a few days of pulling the new dates into something resembling a schedule, Priti starts telling us about a BBC producer she dealt with years ago. The story gets worse every thirty seconds, and by the time she reaches whatever he said after the interview, Tom has folded forward over the table while Gemma keeps asking Priti to stop and demanding she finish at the same time.

I'm still laughing when I pick up my phone. I unlock it, open a message thread and start typing.

you are not going to believe this

Then I see the name at the top.

Sam.

My thumb stops over the screen. Nothing dramatic happens around me. Priti is still talking, Tom is still trying to recover and Gemma has started accusing her of making half the story up, but I'm staring at an empty message box because for months this is where stupid things went.

Something happened that made me laugh, annoyed me, pissed me off or confused me, and eventually Sam heard about it. Half the time texting lasted three messages before one of us called because it was easier. I hadn't decided to tell him this story. I'd just started.

"Autumn."

I lift my head and find Priti waiting for me. "What?"

"You missed the best part."

I lock my phone and put it facedown beside me. "Then go back."

Tom groans. "Please don't."

Priti ignores him and starts again, and by the time she gets to the end, I'm laughing just as hard as I was before. My phone stays where I put it.

The new routing keeps growing until I reach the week I already have blocked off for Chicago.

SUMMER'S BABY SHOWER.

I stop with my hand on the trackpad. I put it on the calendar before I knew there would be a second leg, back when getting home for it looked simple enough that I didn't think much past buying a ticket. Now Amsterdam is sitting three days before I'm supposed to leave.

I pull up the rest of the schedule and start moving pieces around. Manchester can shift. Two interviews can move with it. A press dinner is annoying but fixable. Amsterdam isn't. I try anyway, then build another version, then a third. Twenty minutes later I'm still staring at three different routes that all lead to the same answer.

Somebody else has to do Amsterdam.

My first instinct is to keep looking. There has to be another flight, another handoff, some ugly overnight connection that gets me through the press day and onto a plane without giving anything up. Then I look at SUMMER'S BABY SHOWER sitting on the calendar again and realize I'm solving the wrong problem.

I'm going home. That was never the question. I pick up my phone and open my messages with Summer.