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“I need a plan,” I said to Jonathan later that evening.
He had poked his head into the new office while I was making a list of furniture and equipment we needed. He’d invited me for a drink on his gorgeous terrace, which I’d accepted at once. I needed a friend to talk to. I hadn’t known him more than a few days, but I had felt a strange affection for him at first glance. I knew immediately he’d be someone I could trust. Gay men make the best friends. There’s an extra dimension to them that straight men don’t have. Perhaps it’s that feminine side, but they know the meaning of true friendship. That’s exactly how I felt about Jonathan. And he was nice-looking too.
I relaxed against the cushions in a deckchair on his terrace, sipping wine and looking at the streetlights all over town and the deep pink clouds floating above the tops of the mountains beyond. There was a whiff of barbecued meat in the air, mingling with the scent of honeysuckle brought in by the light breeze. Summer smells.
Jonathan turned on the electric lanterns at the edge of the terrace and lit the candles on the small table between us. “Do you want to stay for something to eat? I was going to toss a few prawns on the grill, and I’ve more than enough for two. With salad and bread and my homemade garlic mayonnaise. What do you say?”
I laughed. “I’m drooling already. Yes, please.” I stretched and sighed. “Thank you for inviting me. I need a little TLC before all the work tomorrow. Moving into two places at once isn’t going to be easy.”
“When’s your dad coming with your furniture?”
“About eleven tomorrow morning. The furniture store in Cashel has promised to deliver the desks and chairs for the office by nine. I’ll be able to have a staff meeting and get everyone working on the Wednesday paper before I get stuck into my own flat. Then we’ll have to manage with whatever laptops we have until we can replace the PCs and the big screen for the layout.”
Jonathan topped up his glass from the bottle of Pinot Grigio. “So, what kind of plan do you need?”
“Something that will increase circulation really fast. We were doing well before the fire, but the publisher has now given me an ultimatum. Make him some mega bucks, or we’ll all get the chop.”
“Sounds like a real shit.”
I drained my glass. “That’s for sure. I just had a less than pleasant meeting with him at Killybeg. The problem is—I fancy him. I think the feelings are mutual. I’m a sucker for alpha males. He seemed to guess how I felt too, which is embarrassing to say the least. Shit.” I sighed and reached for the bottle.
Jonathan glanced at my legs. “Maybe a more demure outfit might have been better?”
I tugged at my skirt. “I didn’t have a chance to change. Been rushing around all day, and then I had a staff meeting at the pub.”
Jonathan leaned back in his chair and smiled. “But your amazing looks are probably your best...ahem, asset, right? Your weapons of mass seduction?”
I had to laugh. “Spot on, my friend. God, this will sound so precious, but okay, I use my looks to get ahead in business. Does that sound really tarty to you?”
He smiled. “No. I think women have a tough time out there in career-land. It’s hard to compete in a man’s world. Why not use whatever you have? I call that power. You have what intimidates men most—a sharp brain inside a beautiful body they can’t have. I bet you’ve been laughing behind the poor suckers’ backs while getting the best stories and the best deals.”
I chuckled. “Of course I have. In business anyway. In my personal life it doesn’t work very well. My love life is less than exciting.”
“I find that hard to believe. What the hell is wrong with those guys?”
I let out a bitter laugh. “What’s wrong with me, you mean? There must be something missing. Only last year—” I couldn’t go on. Remembering what had happened with Marcus made my eyes sting. “Never mind. It’s still hard to talk about it.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thanks. I’m trying my best to get over it, but it still hurts. Deep down I know it was my fault. I’m too bossy, too opinionated. Men don’t like that. Especially those alpha males I have the irritating habit of falling for.” I stopped, surprised at myself. I would never have admitted my weakness for domineering bastards to anyone else, but I had this strange feeling about Jonathan. As if we’d met before, or were meant to meet, and that he had been waiting for me all my life so I could share my secrets with him. I shook my head. Crazy thoughts. Must be the wine.
As if reading my mind, he got up. “We need food. We must be getting light-headed from the wine.”
I nodded. “Yes. Food would be good. Do you need a hand?”
“No. Just relax. I’ll be back in a minute.”
While Jonathan put the meal together in the kitchen, I put my hands behind my head and looked up at the stars glinting in the darkening sky. What a haven this was, away from stress and misery. And Jonathan. Like a long-lost brother.
“I was an only child,” I said when Jonathan came back with a platter of grilled prawns. “My mother died when I was seven.”
“Must have been hard.” He put the platter on the table. “Let me just get the salad and bread, and you can tell me about it.”
I hesitated when he came back. Why ruin his evening with the story of my life? But as we ate, Jonathan prompted me to talk. “Must have been hard to lose your mother at such an early age. But you had your dad.”
“More like he had me,” I replied. “He leaned on me for support those first years. I was glad to help. But it made me grow up very fast.”
“I can imagine. Not fair really, to steal your childhood like that.”
“I never thought of it like that, but it’s true in a way,” I said, remembering the dolls and toys forgotten in my room while I helped Dad to cook dinner and did other little chores to make his life easier. “I turned to books for comfort. It turned me into a bookworm.”
“I know what you mean.” Jonathan topped up my glass and divided the last of the prawns between us. “I was one too. I was an only child like you. My parents were both in their forties when I was born. They had no more children. I was shy and a bit of a nerd and had few friends. So I disappeared into the world of books.”
“Pity we didn’t meet then. I wasn’t shy, but I was very prickly. A real teacher’s pet too, which didn’t make me very popular.” I chewed on a piece of bread, remembering. “My dad was very ambitious for me. Pushed me to do my best at all times.”
“And you did, I bet.”
“Yes. I enjoyed it too. Loved university. More books, you know?”
He laughed. “Yeah. Sounds like you were a cool kid, like me.”
“Ha ha, yes. I was this tall, geeky girl with glasses who couldn’t stop lecturing people. Not your dream date.”
His gaze scanned my body. “Then what happened?”
“I was thrown into the world of journalism. I realised very quickly that good looks will get you the entrée to a lot of well-known people. And that they—especially men—are more inclined to spill the beans to a good-looking woman than a plain one. At that same time, I got a job at Image magazine, which gave me a taste for fashion. Started using contact lenses and learned how to dress to impress. Fun times.”
“And it gave you the confidence you have now,” Jonathan added.
I leaned back against the cushions. “Yes, I suppose. Superficially. It’s an armour I can hide behind. Deep down I’m still that nerdy little girl.”
We talked late into the night, sharing stories of our childhoods, our parents, summer holidays, interests—and books. Many of Jonathan’s favourites were the same as mine—Thomas Hardy, Jane Austen, Thackeray, and the Russian classics. We were deep into an argument about whether Anna Karenina and Madame Bovary were spoilt bitches or simply women stuck in loveless marriages when my eyes started to close. I yawned.
“I’d better go back to Miranda’s to get some sleep.”
Jonathan pulled himself from the depths of his chair. “I’ll walk you there.”
“That would be lovely, but you don’t have to. You must be tired.”
“I’m fine. I’ve been writing all day. A bit of exercise will do me good before bed.”
We walked slowly through the silent streets, with Jonathan’s arm resting lightly on my shoulders. It felt comforting to be with a man who just wanted to be friends. Someone who was cuddly and warm and supportive.
I stopped at Miranda’s gate. “Here we are. Thanks for taking me home.” I gave him a warm hug and sighed. “Oh, it’s so nice to do this, just hugging and feeling close. You’re like a big warm teddy bear, Jonathan.” I looked up at his face, dimly illuminated by the streetlight. “Thank you for taking me home and for the yummy dinner.”
He laughed and ruffled my hair. “You’re an article, Audrey, as my mother used to say. I’ve never met a girl like you. But I’m glad I did. Good night. Sweet dreams.”
He kissed my cheek and walked away into the darkness, whistling a tune I vaguely recognised. I sighed and floated in through the door, up the stairs, and into bed. A day that started so badly had ended so well. A new home and a new friend—a forever friend.
***
Moving day started with the delivery of the office furniture, which, with the help of the rest of the staff, was soon in place. We set up our laptops and got to work on the Wednesday paper. Dan had uploaded the photos he took of the fire to our website with a brief post. There wasn’t much else we could do, as the national newspapers and TV and radio news had been full of it all evening the day of the fire.
“Brilliant work, Dan,” I said. “I saw what you put up on the Facebook page too. I think we can move on now, if we’re all happy that we’ve covered every angle of this disaster, including our move here.”
I decided not to share what Pat O’Dea had told me, as I had no idea what the forensic team had come up with. I looked at my staff as they sat at their new desks, coping with the lack of equipment as best they could. What a great bunch they were. We had been working together for over three years, ever since Finola appointed me to the position of editor-in-chief with Jerry’s approval. Mary, Fidelma, and Sinead, all local girls who knew everyone in town and what people wanted from a country newspaper. And dear old Dan, excellent photographer and layout man. The best team any editor could wish for. How sad it would be if they all lost their jobs. But I was determined to make sure that wouldn’t happen. Not on my watch anyway.
I cleared my throat, standing in the middle of what had become the communal office. “Listen, gang, we have to think hard about getting this paper to sell even more copies than before. The darling publisher has told me that we have three months to increase circulation or—” I ran my finger across my throat.
There was a stunned silence. “Shit,” Fidelma said. “The gobshite.”
I nodded. “I agree. But there you are. He’s the boss, we’re the minions. Our jobs are on the line.” I waved my hands in the air. “Come on, think!”
“I have a kind of idea,” Fidelma piped up. “You might think it’s stupid but—”
“Spit it out,” I urged. “We need to throw everything out there. Good ideas, bad ideas, whatever ideas. Then we’ll sort them out and see if there are any nuggets of gold in there.”
Fidelma nodded. “Okay, so, don’t laugh, but I thought we could do a digital paper. We could have our own app and—”
“Our own app,” Mary jeered. “Where are you going to get that, then? That could cost a lot of money.”
“My cousin knows how to do it,” Fidelma said. “He developed his own app for a game he invented. He might do one for us.”
I looked at Fidelma. “Okay. So where are we going with this?”
Fidelma took a deep breath. “Don’t get annoyed when I say this, Audrey, but even before the fire, I noticed the Wednesday paper didn’t sell half the copies of the Saturday edition.”
I nodded. “I know. Go on.”
“Well,” Fidelma started and held up her hand in a defensive gesture. “This is just an idea, okay? I thought we might drop the Wednesday paper and just do a digital one that day, for people to check the main news and deaths and births and stuff like that and then, on Saturdays, do a big thing, with a weekend supplement with loads of stuff.” She drew breath.
I leaned against Dan’s desk. “Stuff? What kind of stuff?”
“Everything,” Fidelma replied. “Cooking, gardening, fashion, sports events, interviews with interesting people, a column with country life, outdoorsy activities like hiking and riding and fishing—”
“We could have human interest stories,” Mary cut in.
“And interview newcomers, especially those from foreign countries,” Sinead added. “There are quite a lot of people from exotic places like Africa and the Far East around this area. Wouldn’t it be great to have their stories?”
“Fantastic idea,” I agreed. “There are so many immigrants here from all over the world. Their experiences of living in an Irish country town must be worth telling.”
Sinead nodded, making her ponytail bob. “Yeah, they are. There’s a Japanese girl next door to us. Lives with a guy from Donegal. I’d love to write her story.”
I added “ethnic minorities and their stories” to the list on my tablet. “Any more ideas?”
“Photo competitions,” Dan suggested.
“A health section,” Mary said. “With tips from that guy at the gym. He makes these healthy smoothies, and he knows so much about diets and exercise. We could call it ‘Joe’s Hot Tips,’ because he’s...hot,” she ended, her face pink.
“Holy Mother.” I laughed. “You’re all hopping with ideas. Keep them coming. And yes, Fidelma, I’ve been thinking along those lines myself. Only an online edition midweek. Could save us money, which would be funnelled into the Saturday paper and that supplement. Could be a glossy magazine that’d be on sale all week. Brilliant! But for now, let’s do a nice little Wednesday paper, and then we’ll announce the launch of the new weekend magazine in—how long?”
“Two weeks,” Fidelma said. “If we only have three months to up the circulation, we’d better put our skates on. But I suppose you have to clear this with the publisher first?”
I sighed. “Yes. Of course. I’ll send him a detailed e-mail, stressing the money-saving aspect of all of this and the potential of that weekend supplement. Fingers crossed he’ll be too busy playing golf to object.”
Sinead sighed. “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I don’t envy you that task. That guy sure is hot, but I bet he’s not easy to handle.”
“Not for Audrey, ”Dan muttered. “She has the bitchy edge.”
I blinked and stared at him. “What?”
He met my stare defiantly. “Yeah, you do. You’ve got the power, Audrey. And it’s a good thing.”
“The power?” I mumbled. “You think?”
“I know it,” he said with more fire in his voice than I’d ever heard before. He raised his fist in the air. “Go, Audrey!”
I laughed. “I’ll probably end up backing off, but I’ll put all my heart and soul into this. The Knockmealdown News must never die.”