Set It Off where a shirtless Blair Underwood came out of his house to say good-bye to Jada Pinkett popped into Dior’s head. She started salivating.
So what do you look like? was the next message Mr. Good Black Man 2008 wrote.
Dior smiled to herself as she wrote I would tell you, but I like your original philosophy.
Touché, was his reply. So what do you do for a living? Or would that be too personal?
Actually, I start my new job on Monday, she wrote him.
She told him her job title and a brief description of her upcoming duties. He wrote back that her job seemed interesting and that he might have to hire her agency one day to advertise his business. Dior lit up like a Christmas tree and in her next message she asked him what kind of business he owned. He told her that his primary business was an investment firm, but that he also owned lots of real estate around Manhattan. Dior didn’t know how to act. Dollar signs were floating all through her head and she started seeing doubles of her Gucci bag.
They went back and forth for another hour before Dior said she had to go, but asked if they could stay in touch.
We certainly can, came back the reply. I’d love to be your Harlem tour guide. Just message me when you’re ready to see the sights.
Dior was tempted to message him back to say she was ready at that moment but decided against it. She turned off the computer, stretched, and went back to bed.
Dior was excited about starting her new job. She stepped out her door with pride. Being senior copywriter, she had to dress the part and she did, in a black Nicole Miller skirt suit and some black and white Chanel pumps. Her thigh-length mink shielded her from the January cold and with her black crocodile briefcase in tote, she looked like she meant business. She walked over to 116th Street and Malcolm X Boulevard to take her first rush-hour subway ride, feeling like a true New Yorker. Luckily, she was able to find a seat and immediately realized most of the people who had seats also had reading material. Duly noted, she thought, she’d bring a book or magazine along to pass the time on her next ride. She nonchalantly glanced over at the newspaper the woman next to her was reading. Her eyes widened as she saw pictures of Al Pacino in front of his new restaurant signing autographs.
“Do you mind if I look at your paper?” Dior asked eagerly.
The woman looked at her like she was crazy, but said, “You can have it. I get off at the next stop.”
Dior quickly scanned through the photos on Page Six of the New York Post. No, she wasn’t in any of the pictures. Damn the luck.
When she arrived at her office in the heart of Times Square, Dior was in awe. This is what I’m talking about, she thought. She went in the revolving doors and was greeted by a security guard. She told the guard where she needed to go and he pointed her in the right direction. She took the elevator up to the fifteenth floor and immediately after getting off she walked to the glass door that read KACEY AND PATNICK and introduced herself to the receptionist.
A few minutes later a short redheaded girl came into the lobby to meet her.
“Hi, I’m Larissa, Barbara’s assistant,” the girl said. “Follow me.”
“Dior Emerson, hello,” Barbara said with a warm smile. She shook Dior’s hand and waved her to a seat. “So, we finally meet.”
“Yes, and it’s my pleasure,” Dior said.
“Well, here’s the thing.” Barbara took a sip of her coffee. “Normally your first day would be pretty laid-back, but something’s come up. If you don’t mind, we’d like to put your orientation off for a while. We’re trying to land a new major account, and we want all of our best people on it. And although you’re new, we’re all familiar with your work and we’re confident we want you to be in on this.”
Dior eagerly leaned forward in her chair.
“Al Pacino opened a restaurant here in the city a couple of days ago. We heard word that he’s about to fire the advertising company he hired because he was dissatisfied with the coverage he got for the grand opening. He wants a major campaign in place immediately, and we’ve already reached out to him and told him we have one ready for him to look at. Of course we don’t. The meeting with him is scheduled for this time next week, so by then we have to have a presentation that will blow him away and land us the account. So we want you to get to work immediately trying to come up with some ideas. We don’t have much time, so we’ll screen the ideas that the copywriters come up with, pick one, and have them ready to present it to Mr. Pacino personally when he comes into the office.”
Dior’s head was spinning. What is the likelihood of this? she thought. What do I look like presenting business to this man after I lifted up my shirt and asked him to sign my chest in public? He’s going to laugh at me, then tell my boss how I acted a fool. Then he’s going to tell her no thanks and go over to the competition for a campaign proposal that was actually done by a professional. Then my boss is going to fire me on the spot because she can’t have such poor representation of her agency roaming the streets of New York. How do I get out of this?
“Like I said, normally we wouldn’t immediately throw you into the fire so quickly, but this is major, and we’re familiar with your work and we think you can handle it. And between you and me, in the next couple of years we’ll be looking for a new partner. Landing a major account like this in your first week at work will look very impressive.” Barbara folded her hands on her desk. “No pressure, of course.”
As she walked out of her new boss’s office, Dior quickly thought of things she could say to Al Pacino to excuse her raunchy behavior; then she figured the best thing to do would be simply to deny it. It wasn’t her. He must be mistaken. There were so many people there that day he couldn’t possibly remember just one face. That was it. That would be her defense. It wasn’t me, she thought.
“Uhhh!” Dior moaned as she pulled off her knee boots. She had just gotten in from work and her feet were killing her. She couldn’t figure out why, though. She had worn those boots a hundred times in Montreal and this was the third time she had worn them in New York. And the two times before that, she did lots of walking in them—her first day at the airport and her second day walking up and down Fifth Avenue. She wondered if her feet were growing from all the walking she had been doing lately. That was all New Yorkers did, walk.
She sat down on her pile-it and leaned her back against the wall. Suddenly she felt a sharp pain in her behind. It came and went so fast that she dismissed it and just repositioned herself. She started to pick through the mail, coming across her electric bill. As she opened it, the pain in her behind returned. It felt like something had stuck her, and she thought maybe she had gotten a splinter from the floor. She stood up and scanned the bill, directing her eyes straight to the balance and due date. She couldn’t figure out if the amount of the bill said $341 or if the pain in her butt was causing her to hallucinate. She figured she would take care of one problem at a time, and her ass came before the bill.
She put the mail up on the mantel and came out of her mink. Then she began to rub her butt as it was so sore. She started to feel around on her back pockets to see if there was something in them poking her. She felt nothing. Wanting to find out what was sticking her, she sat back down and sure enough the pain returned, this time causing her to jump to her feet as if she had gotten the Holy Ghost. She immediately unbuttoned her jeans and pulled them off. She went into the bathroom and tried looking at her butt in the mirror, but it was too high, and even sitting on the sink she couldn’t turn herself around enough to see her backside. She started to feel around on her bare butt, trying to locate a splinter or a cut or something. But there was nothing but a pimple. And that had been there for days and hadn’t given her any problems before, so she was sure it wasn’t the culprit.
Confused, Dior went back into the living room and picked up her jeans off the floor. She examined them. Then she decided to turn them upside own and shake them, thinking that if it was a splinter or a pin sticking her it had to be in her back pocket. After a few shakes, a tiny gold key fell out of her jeans and onto her hardwood floor.