We’re both talking at once then—the first day of filming footage, the cast reactions, the party. We’re fully in our element, going back and forth, ideas coming together with ease.
We quickly lay out the plan, making a list of everything we’ll need before we can present this ideato Victoria.
“This will work,” I say, sitting back in my chair an hour later when we’ve put all the pieces together.
Luke nudges me with his arm from the chair right next to mine, where he moved so we could share my laptop.
“If I haven’t said it in a while, you’re really good at this job,” he says.
“This was a group effort,” I say.
He nods. “We make a great team.”
I turn my head, giving him a smile, but drop it when I see his serious expression. No smile, no brightness in his eyes. He’s just staring at me intently.
Then his eyes travel down to my lips.
I clear my throat. “Should we . . . go talk Victoria?” I ask, rolling back my chair and standing up.
“Yeah,” he says. But he doesn’t get up. Not immediately. He just looks at me for a second longer, something unreadable on his face. Then he closes his laptop and stands.
“Yes,” Victoria says.
We went up to her office ten minutes ago, the midday sun cutting through her wall of windows, and laid out the plan. I’d half hoped she would jump out of her seat and give us both ahug, commending us for our genius. It was a silly thought. I doubt Victoria’s ever hugged a person in her life.
But her “yes” was enough. Still, would aGood jobor even just aGoodhave killed her?
Back in the conference room, we get to work putting the plan in place.
There are a lot of moving parts with this one, and we have to get it right. We spend time pulling clips—the unguarded, imperfect, real ones—and coordinating with other cast members to post on social media. Things they witnessed on set. No script, no approval process, just the truth.
The posts have to go up at different times, in different formats, on different platforms, from different people. It can’t look like a campaign, even though it is one.
The raw footage we pull—clips of Bailey and River when they didn’t think cameras were rolling—is set to be posted by a crew member. Specifically someone who works with the cameras. Its job is to look like a leak, even though it isn’t one.
Tessa will also send a different-but-similar clip to the fan account we used for the Wooster video. Just some more raw footage and a note that saysThought you might want to see this.
The irony of it is that we’re trying to prove this wasn’t staged, and we still have to stage it.
Luke slumps back in his chair when we send out the final piece.
“That was intense,” he says, running his fingers through his hair, messing it up.
“It really was,” I say, yawning.
“Thank goodness they aren’t filming for the next couple of days. I need a break from this place,” he says.
I nod, but what I’m actually thinking is that a break from this place means a break from this—from working side by side every day, from the easy rhythm we’ve fallen into. At some point the crisis will be over, and we’ll go back to our separate offices and our separate firms and our separate lives. I’ve been so focused on getting through each day that I haven’t let myself think about what happens when there’s nothing left to get through.
I push the thought away. “I can’t believe we pulled that off,” I say.
“Hopefully, we pulled it off,” he clarifies.
“Yes, let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” I say, not wanting to jinx it.
He turns toward me, a smile on his face. “But we should pat ourselves on the back.”
“For sure,” I agree, smiling back.
