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By Root 401 0

and always call him by his first name, and then launches into some story about the movie he watched on the plane coming out here. I notice that Tim is observing my interaction with John approvingly, and suddenly I feel grateful for John’s presence. Something I learned back in high school was that it’s easier to make a guy like you if you can reel in his friends, or if you can perform your humor-and-flirt routine for a crowd. I’m calmer with two people than I am with one—being alone with somebody tends to make me terrified that I’m going to run out of things to say. As I listen to John talk about the movie he watched in his room here last night—this guy sure likes movies, and boy, can he ramble—I think about how much more comfortable I am being around Tim this time than I was when I first met him. I’m still wearing the attention I was getting from Kane like a protective coat, and am feeling like the very epitome of a Sexy Woman Who Has to Fend Off Advances from Her Interview Subjects on a Regular Basis.

As if on cue, Tim asks, “And what brings you to the L’Ermitage this afternoon?” I swear, he can make even dull questions sound charming.

“I was actually interviewing a musician,” I say, and then, after glancing around the bar area, determining that neither Kane nor his sour manager are in the vicinity, and lowering my voice anyway, I proceed to regale them with the story of my recent interview—complete with the bits about being invited into the bed and his suggestion for a follow-up interview tomorrow at his house.

“You are too much!” Tim exclaims, looking absolutely delighted. “You do realize that these things don’t happen to normal people?”

Since there’s almost nothing I’d rather be less than normal, I feel utterly thrilled.

“I hope you don’t think I’m horribly unprofessional,” I say.

“Absolutely not!” Tim says.

“You should use what you’ve got,” John adds.

I continue to revel in my impressive story and their reaction to it for the next half hour as I finish my screwdriver. Just as I’m thinking about how much I want a cigarette and am wondering if I can tell Tim Bromley I smoke because surely the British don’t have the same closed-minded attitude about cigarettes that overly health-conscious Americans do, he glances at his watch and tells me that, regretfully, he and John have to meet some advertisers for a drink across town in twenty minutes and that they should probably be on their way. I love the way he says “regretfully”—it almost makes up for the fact that he’s leaving.

“Do you have a card on you?” he asks, and as I literally feel my heart alight with delight, I realize that I ran out of cards a few weeks ago and still haven’t gotten around to ordering more.

“I don’t,” I say. “But why don’t I write my information down?”

He smiles and slides me a napkin and a ballpoint pen, and I write down my work number and e-mail address. Then I add my cell phone and put a little “x” next to it. Subliminal message that will make him think of kissing when he looks at it, I think.

The next day at work, I rush over to Brian’s office to gloat about my follow-up interview with Kane, and he asks me when I’m going over there.

“Three o’clock.” Even though I’m meeting Kane at 7 P.M., this answer just comes out of me, probably because I know that if I tell Brian the truth, he’ll get the wrong idea. I make a mental note to leave the office at two thirty to perpetuate this lie.

Rather than saying anything, Brian just hands me a sheet of paper: an assignment to interview singer-songwriter Linda Lewis.

Now I’m a little too cynical to get my panties all in a twist over interviewing any celebrity but from the moment I heard Linda Lewis’s song, “Sinner,” on the radio—on my way to work after a coke-fueled night—I felt inspired. It literally made me go from feeling somewhat suicidal to powerful, and right then I decided that Linda Lewis was going to be the Next Big Thing. Of course, I’ve been convinced of that many times during my Absolutely Fabulous tenure, only to be ignored by the New York editors, and then watch the person become