“What do you think, Tanner?”
Tanner’s head jerked up. “Umm…I like graham crackers fine.”
“Sure. They’re fine. That’s what I mean. Who wants ‘fine’?” Byron snapped his fingers. “What if we used cookies instead of graham crackers?”
This perfunctory meeting that typically lasted only ten minutes had somehow turned into a protracted brainstorming session. Byron had to be doing this for Tanner’s benefit, because he didn’t want his boss’s brother to know he usually phoned in the content marketing meetings. But if this was the way Byron was going to be from now on? I was going to lose my effing mind.
“The problem with that is we’d have to include a recipe for the cookies,” I started to explain.
“What kind of cookies would go with s’mores?” Arwen asked.
“Chocolate chip?” Byron suggested. “Everyone likes chocolate chip, and they go with everything.” He looked at Tanner. “How do you feel about chocolate chip?”
“I like them,” Tanner said with a shrug.
“It’s better to keep the recipes simple,” I told Byron, making sure my This is Fine face didn’t slip. “Expecting people to bake homemade cookies might make the recipe too complicated.”
“Snickerdoodle?” Byron frowned and shook his head. “No, definitely not.”
“What about peanut butter cookies?” Tanner said, starting to show some interest.
I tried again to get my point across. “The thing is, we get much higher engagement when we keep the recipes super simple. Our newsletter subscribers have consistently shown they prefer treats they can throw together in five minutes. And also, I’ve already taken photos of the s’mores ice cream sandwiches I made with graham crackers. If we change the recipe, I’ll have to do the whole photo shoot over.”
“Does peanut butter and marshmallow go together?” Byron asked Tanner.
Had I died? Was it my ghost sitting here in this meeting and that was why no one was listening to me? I pinched my arm to make sure—and also to keep myself from shouting at everyone to shut up with all this cookie cross-talk.
“Peanut butter and marshmallows is totally a thing.” Arwen was getting into it now too. “What’s it called again when people put them together in a sandwich? My grandmother made me one once.”
“Fluffernutters,” Tanner said.
“Right!” Arwen beamed at him. “That’s it.”
Tanner beamed back at her. “I’ve never had one. Are they good?”
“I can’t remember,” Arwen said. “We should go out and get the ingredients at lunch so we can make them.”
My This is Fine face didn’t waver. I was This is Fine-ing like a champ.
“As much as I’d love to watch you eat that truly disgusting-sounding sandwich,” Linh cut in, “Lucy’s right. If the recipe requires people to bake homemade cookies, I can guarantee our click rate will be fifty percent lower.”
God bless Linh. I would have kissed her on the mouth if it wouldn’t get me in trouble with human resources.
“We learned that lesson from the great brownie sundae debacle last year,” I added before Byron could derail the conversation again. “It’s tempting to come up with the most delicious and ambitious recipes, but it’s important to remember that thirty percent of our subscribers are under eighteen. A significant number of those are under twelve. They’re not looking for America’s Test Kitchen.”
“Sounds like maybe we should stick with the graham crackers,” Tanner said without looking at me. It was impressive how he’d managed to go through this whole meeting without once letting his eyes turn in my direction.
“Yeah, okay,” Byron said. “Tanner’s probably right.”
My molars ground together hard enough to emit a supersonic whine. I was the one who was right. Me. It was my recipe and my opinion that had prevailed.
“What else?” Byron asked, looking around the table.
“That’s everything,” I said. Thank god.
“That’s it?” he repeated as if there should be more.
“Yes,” I told him. “We’ve covered the whole schedule.” Finally. It only took us forty-five minutes longer than usual.
Byron looked disappointed. “How’s it been going getting Tanner settled in?” Before I could answer, he turned to address Tanner. “What does Lucy have you working on?”
Tanner kept his eyes fixed on Byron, still pretending I wasn’t in the room. “I’ve been adapting the copy for the upcoming newsletter into tweets and Instagram captions.”
“Tweets?” Byron looked disappointed again. “Surely we can come up with something better than that.” He looked at me. “Did you know Tanner has an English degree?”
I fixed my This is Fine face back in place. “I am aware of that, yes.”
In fact, it was one of the first things I’d ever learned about Tanner. The night we first met, at one of my brother’s shows, we’d spent hours talking about our favorite books. I could guarantee I knew a lot more about Tanner’s interest in literature and writing than Byron did. For example, I knew Tanner had written his senior thesis on E.M. Forster and Virginia Woolf, that he’d reread The Lord of the Rings every year since he was twelve, and that his favorite author was Ursula K. Le Guin.
All of which was great, but it didn’t mean he could jump right into this job with no experience. Tanner was smart and an excellent writer, so I had no doubt he’d catch on quickly, but the fact remained that he knew nothing about marketing or writing copy for social media. When he’d sent me the tweets he’d written yesterday, I’d covered his draft in so much markup it had looked like one of Cy Twombly’s abstract expressionist paintings.
“I’ll bet we can come up with something a little more interesting for him to work on,” Byron continued before I could state my case. “Let’s put him to work on next month’s SJW stuff.”
I had to forcibly unclench my jaw before I cracked one of my molars. Byron’s habit of referring to the important issues facing our country as “all that SJW stuff” had always irritated me. The fact that he’d just undermined me in front of the whole team? Also not great. But I was downright incensed by Byron’s implication that the work I’d given Tanner was somehow beneath him. It was the same work I’d been doing for my entire tenure at this company. Why wasn’t it beneath me? Why did Tanner need something more interesting to do after all of five days on the job? Why was it fine for me to do the less interesting work but not him?
The answer was obvious, of course. Because Tanner’s last name was King.
My This is Fine face kicked into double-overdrive to hide all the fuming I was doing on the inside. “If that’s what you want,” I told Byron serenely.
Writing those issues features was one of my favorite parts of this job, not to mention one of the most challenging to navigate. Walking the delicate tightrope between the company’s progressive branding and our goal of building customer loyalty required a level of finesse it had taken me years to master.
But fine. Byron wanted Tanner to write it? I’d let Tanner write it.