Honey on Your Mind (14 page)

“So does everyone have a date?” Scotty looked around the room. “I know several eligible bachelors and bachelorettes if anyone wants to get set up.”

I looked up from my notebook. “You know people who are willing to be set up for a complete stranger’s
company
holiday party
? Who does that?”

“Waverly, have you ever been to the penthouse of the New York Athletic Club?” Scotty asked.

“The penthouse? No.” I’d met Kristina there once for coffee before I moved to New York, but had never gotten past the lobby.

“Well, believe me, it’s
worth
pimping yourself out for the night for the view alone.”

Wendy patted her hair and nodded. “I know I rarely agree with Scott’s taste, but he’s right. The view of Central Park is absolutely incredible.” Since her sudden softening in the kitchen several weeks ago, she had settled into a haphazard routine of teetering between “sort of mean” on some days and “sort of nice” on others, never quite fully tipping one way or the other. I’d come to the conclusion that she wasn’t a
complete
bitch and had given up taking her jabs personally. Plus, by now I was comfortable with the crew and the routine of producing my segment, so she didn’t scare me as much.

“Sounds gorgeous,” I said, excited at the prospect of having Jake on my arm. Jake looked great in a suit. Actually, he looked good in anything. Or nothing.

Wendy lowered her voice and leaned toward me. “I can give you the names of a few people if you want some help.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Help?”

She looked me up and down and smiled. “Hair, makeup, you know what I mean. We both know your appearance isn’t your strong point, right?”

I sighed and fake smiled back at her, and then turned my head back toward Scotty at the front of the room.

Blech.

“So, Waverly, do you have anything to share with us today?” Scotty asked.

I looked up at him. “Excuse me?”

“E-mails. Got any good ones lately?”

As the ratings for
Love, Wendy
grew, so did the collective fan mail. People often wrote me to say they enjoyed
Honey on Your Mind
, but they also loved sharing what was on
their
minds. And some shared a bit too much. Reading the wackiest e-mails aloud to the staff had become a highlight of our weekly meetings.

I smiled. “Actually, I do have some good ones. Want to hear?”

Everyone in the room nodded.

I pulled out a sheet of paper from my notebook. “OK, here goes:

“Hi, Waverly, being alone forever is what’s on my mind. I’ve been single for a while now, so last night I decided to try the online dating thing. Get this: shortly after I posted my profile, I got messages from three men. One of them was holding a cat in his photo. A
cat
. Another was sitting on a donkey. I’m not joking, a donkey. The third guy looked normal. His message, however, said he’d love to meet me but asked if I’d be willing to strip on a webcam first. There’s really not much more I can say.”

“Dear Waverly: You know what’s on my mind? Idiots who misuse basic words. I have a coworker who every single Monday sends around an e-mail raving about the movies she watched over the weekend on her paper view.
P-A-P-E-R V-I-E-W
. Yes, you read that right. Or is it you
R-E-D
that
W-R-I-T-E
…?”

Laughter from the room.

“Waverly, why do people insist on sharing every boring and/or gruesome detail of their lives in their mass holiday letters? Your daughter had a baby? Wonderful! Your son graduated from college? Good for him! But do I want to hear about Aunt Louise’s gastric bypass surgery? Not so much. And is it really necessary to explain how you waffled for months between getting a Kindle or a Nook? Definitely not. And
do I really care about your bacterial infection?”

More laughter.

“Hi, Waverly, you know what I’ve been thinking about lately? Massages. Why do people pay for them? I mean, why give money to a complete stranger to rub his hands all over me for an hour when I can put on a slutty outfit, walk into any bar in America and have ten guys volunteer to do it for free? I’m just sayin’…”

More laughter.

“What up, Waverly, this is all I have to say: Tiny nylon running shorts + any man who isn’t in the Olympics = GROSS. Bye.”

More laughter.

I looked around the room and held up the sheet. “And the last one on my list just came in this morning. Perfect timing, given that we’re talking about escorts for the holiday party:

“Dear Waverly: I have a good dating story for you. This guy from my volleyball league recently asked me to brunch, so I figured why not? He’s cute and seemed nice enough. We’re both in our late twenties and work in downtown Philadelphia. So anyhow, we’re at the restaurant about to order, and he looks around the place, then leans across the table to me and says with a proud grin, ‘My friends and I used to run out on the bill here all the time.’ Uh, what?”

Everyone cracked up, even Wendy.

I took a seated bow.

• • •

The day before the holiday party, Paige and I met for an afternoon catch-up meeting at Connecticut Muffin on picturesque Montague Street, the “Main Street” of Brooklyn Heights. Jake was flying in a few hours later.

“So you’re off to Vermont next weekend?”

She nodded. “I haven’t gone away for the weekend with a guy in six years.”

“Six years? Really?”

She held up six fingers. “Six years. I plan to spend the entire weekend naked.”

I laughed. “So you’re meeting him there?”

She nodded. “Late Friday night. His son has a basketball game that afternoon, so he can’t get here in time to drive up with me, which would have been so nice. But it will be great anyway.”

“How old are they?”

“The kids?”

I nodded.

“Seventeen, nineteen, and twenty. Two girls and a boy.”

“Wow, three kids. That doesn’t freak you out at all?”

“A little, but like I said, it’s worth it. So hey, are you ready?”

“Ready for what?” I picked at my sticky bun.

She spread her hands on the table. “We need an office.”

I looked up at her. “An office?”

“Yes. Once those big accounts kick in, it’s time for us to up the ante.”

“But wouldn’t that be crazy expensive?” So far, we’d managed to run Waverly’s Honey Shop out of our apartments, plus a variety of bars and coffee shops. I’d lost track of how many sticky buns I’d eaten at the Connecticut Muffin.

She shook her head. “I found a great space in Dumbo that would be perfect for us, and it’s available at the beginning of
January.” Dumbo, an acronym for “Down under the Manhattan Bridge overpass,” was a trendy neighborhood within walking distance of my apartment and just one subway stop from Paige’s place in lower Manhattan.

I didn’t respond immediately, and Paige followed up with, “It’s right across the street from a super cute coffee house/bakery place,
and
next door to a chocolate shop.”

My ears perked up. “Chocolate shop?”

She laughed. “I knew that would get your attention.”

I smiled. “OK, I’m listening…”

“We also need employees.”

“We need employees?”

She nodded. “Nothing major, but we definitely need a couple of minions to manage the orders and deal with production and inventory so that I can focus on running the accounts, not to mention opening new ones, and so you can focus on client relations and promotion, not to mention expanding the product line.”

My head was spinning. “OK…”

“We also need an accountant.”

“An accountant?”

“Yes, just part-time for basic bookkeeping, but yes.”

“You think we’re ready for all that?”

She didn’t hesitate. “Yes, and eventually we’re going to have to hire a marketing manager too.”

“Can I afford all that?” I’d already incurred a ton of expenses flying us around the country to meet with potential buyers, not to mention the cost of manufacturing and new product designs, and the small revenue stream from the online orders hardly covered what I was putting out. I’d been able to pay for everything so far from my TV salary, but if the whole Honey operation blew
up in my face, I’d soon be dipping into my nest egg, which was really more of an egg
let
and wouldn’t go very far if I had to pay a whole staff New York salaries.

She nodded. “I’ve run some numbers, and with the large orders we have lined up for January, we can lower our manufacturing costs through production volume discounts, and switch to a distribution center that handles bigger clients. That will bring our cost of goods sold way down, streamline shipping, and more than cover the cost of our additional overhead. We’ll also be able to accommodate future growth without disrupting our existing accounts.”

I blinked. “That was a lot of business-school speak you just rattled off. I don’t speak that language.”

She smiled and tapped a finger against her temple. “Trust me.”

A vision of me in bankruptcy court flashed before my eyes. Boxes of T-shirts and tote bags in my apartment and a sales rep who worked entirely on commission was one thing. An office and hourly employees was another. Was I getting in over my head? I began to shred my napkin into little bits.

Sensing my anxiety, Paige reached across the table and gently squeezed my arm. “It’s taking off, Waverly. You should be excited. This is
exciting
.”

“It is? I should? It is?”

She nodded and smiled. “
Yes
. It’s really happening.”

I looked down at the remainder of my sticky bun sitting among the napkin pieces. “Then why do I feel sort of sick?”

“You mean aside from the fact that you just ate an enormous ball of sugar?”

I nodded. “Good point. But seriously, Paige, just last year Waverly’s Honey Shop existed only in my imagination, and now I’m going to have an
office
? And
employees
? I can’t believe it.”

“Why not? You came up with a fantastic idea, and you’ve worked extremely hard to turn it into a real product. That’s a lot easier said than done.”

I didn’t reply.

“You should be
proud
of yourself, Waverly.
I
am.”

I stared at the table.
She’s right, Waverly. You
should
be proud of yourself.

I still didn’t reply.

“Waverly?”

Finally, I looked up at her, still in a daze. “Thanks, Paige. I…I’m so grateful for all your help. None of this would have happened without you.”

She smiled. “It’s been a pleasure. So you want to walk over and check out the space?” She gestured toward the exit.

I tossed the remaining chunk of sticky bun into my mouth and nodded. “Let’s do it.”

• • •

“Want me to call a cab? Or should we take the subway?” I yelled from my bedroom. It was nearly seven the following evening, and I was digging through my jewelry box to find a necklace to wear with my new dress.
Why didn’t I think about accessories before?

“Your call, I’m easy,” Jake called from the living room, where he was watching the Hawks game on TV. He’d been granted a quick hall pass to take me to the NBC holiday party and was flying to meet the team in Salt Lake City the next day.

I pulled out a small diamond pendant and clasped it behind my neck. “You
do
realize that when you say ‘I’m easy’ on the way out to a party, it makes you sound like a paid escort,” I said at a normal decibel as I walked into the living room.

“Does it? Then I guess we’ll have to figure out a payment plan after the party.” He looked up at me and smiled. “Wow, you look gorgeous.”

I curtsied. “Why, thank you.” I’d spent half a day shopping for the “perfect” holiday party dress, something red, sparkly, and amazing…but I hadn’t found it. The red dress I
did
find, however—pretty, strapless, and just above the knee—wasn’t bad. And I didn’t really mind. I’d learned that I was never going to stand out as a fashionista in New York City, and it felt good not to wrap my self-esteem up in something as superficial as a dress. It made me feel…grown up.

Jake stood up and gestured toward me. “Come here.”

I stepped toward him, and he put his arms around my lower back. “You’re stunning,” he whispered into my hair.

I closed my eyes and smiled.

• • •

We splurged for a cab and were soon standing at the entrance to the New York Athletic Club, a majestic building located on Central Park South, directly across from the park itself. We made our way through the lobby, and as the elevator doors closed behind us, I clenched my hands into fists against my chest.

“You OK?” Jake asked.

I nodded. “Just a little nervous. I’ll be fine.”

The doors opened onto a room full of people I didn’t recognize. The women were all wearing floor-length gowns, some with fur coats draped over one arm. And I was sure they were
real
fur coats. I tried not to stare, but I was not used to hanging around with people who wore real fur. Or floor-length gowns.

“I didn’t expect to be so nervous,” I whispered to Jake, not sure what to do with the nervous energy I felt pulsing through my veins.

“Let’s get a drink,” he whispered back.

Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked Central Park on one side and Seventh Avenue on the other. Guests were milling about and socializing, the music not yet loud enough to drown out the cocktail chatter. After checking our coats, Jake took my hand and led me toward the bar.

“Hey, there’s Scotty and Tad.” I gestured to the opposite end of the room.

“Meet you there in a second with drinks?” Jake said.

I smiled at him. “Have I told you lately how wonderful you are?”

“Perhaps, but a man can never hear that enough. What’s your poison going to be tonight?”

I thought for a moment. Given my history, beer or wine was the best choice. I tended to get “emotional” if I drank hard alcohol, “emotional” being a euphemism for “plastered.” And plastered was the last thing I wanted to be at a work party. I’d done that once before and ended up getting super sick—in a public restroom, no less. It was not one of my finer moments.