Read Online The Case of the Missing Boyfriend by Nick Alexander - Free Book Online

that second, I see Darren press his nose against the glass partition.
    I force a smile, and beckon for him to come in.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ I say again, ‘but . . . I didn’t want to show you the visuals until I had explained about the specific market targeting we have planned. The first ad . . .’
    Without looking at Darren, I put a hand out to take the sheet from him. If he doesn’t have them, or if these are still the wrong ones, then this pitch will now crash, and I want to make sure that everyone realises that this is not my fault.
    To my great relief, like a marathon runner passing the baton, Darren places something, still rolled, into my hand.
    I unroll the poster-sized sheet, turn it right way up, clip it to the whiteboard, and then for an instant words fail me. Just for a few seconds, I am so stunned that I could burst into tears there and then.
    Because the photo before us – Darren’s reworking of the original concept Jude showed me on Friday, a man in a bar with a sketched-in dog collar, is so – and there’s really only one word for it –
beautiful
, it takes my breath away.
    The original pub location has been replaced by a glitzy London bar with multicoloured neon strip lights behind the bar, and everything about the photo is so lush, so rich, so gorgeously vibrant . . . every expression on every person in the shot, every suit, every drink . . . everything . . . everything about this shot is
perfect
.
    I suddenly remember that this is the moment which makes advertising worthwhile; this is the moment when, sometimes, just occasionally, what we produce is more than advertising. Sometimes advertising meets art. And I’m overwhelmed with pride to be the one presenting it.
    ‘We . . .’ I stammer, turning back to the group.
    I see Jude consciously close his own mouth.
    ‘We used an incredibly famous gay photographer for the location shots,’ Darren says, nervously filling in. ‘His name is Ricardo Escobar and he’s terribly well known in the gay community and I think it shows: you can really see that this is a photographer at the peak of his creativity.’
    ‘So . . .’ I say, catching my breath. ‘As you can see, the image shows a fashionable man wearing carpenter pants surrounded by work colleagues . . .’ An hour later, as we spill onto the pavement outside, Peter Stanton, says, ‘Brilliant show, guys. Spot On, as they say!’ He guffaws at this regularly repeated joke.

    I nod. ‘Erm, thanks.’
    ‘I thought the anticipation before revealing the visuals was particularly effective,’ he continues. ‘So well done for that. We should use that more often, I think.’
    ‘Yes . . .’ I say vaguely, raising an eyebrow at Darren who is beaming at me like a six-year-old who just got given a remote control fire engine.
    ‘Anyway, gotta go . . . busy day and all that,’ Stanton says.
    And then, he, Peter Stanton, our director, slaps my arse, and strides away.
    We all stand in silence for a moment, until Jude says, ‘Did I dream that, or did Stanton just slap your arse?’
    I shake my head slowly. ‘No,’ I say. ‘That really happened. That all really happened.’

    On Thursday morning, I am called into Stanton’s office.
    This makes me a little nervous because of the arse-slapping incident.
    Though I realise, of course, that this event could be useful in case of future redundancy negotiations (there were, after all, two witnesses to this particular act of sexual harassment), flirtation at Spot On is a tight-rope to be navigated with extreme care.
    Stanton, like all four male partners in fact, has always been an outrageous flirt, and fact is, most of the women who have done well at Spot On (as well as a few who have been fired) got where they are today by sleeping with one of them. Or in a few cases,
all
of them.
    That I have managed to climb the corporate ladder whilst avoiding this particular fate is, I think, what annoys Victoria Barclay the most. And if it
is
this that upsets her so much,