Charitable Getting: Chapter One
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originalsam_backupETA 10/1/10: This is a FIRST DRAFT of Charitable Getting. Please see this post for the index to the second and most current draft.
Chapter One
The event was going quite well, Roxy thought, until her boss said one word to her:
"Webinars."
"What?" she asked, brushing hair out of her face and cursing her hairdresser's advice against bangs.
"Webinars. I hear they're the wave of the future," Bo Sparks told her. "I checked one out on the Tech4Free CEO's phone -- do you know him?"
"Uh..."
"Anyway, I emailed you some ideas."
Roxy's fingers instinctively clenched her phone. She heard the ding of an incoming-email alert.
"Can you get them up on the website by tomorrow?" Sparks asked. "Can we do the first one on Friday?"
She took out her phone and checked the email. Erin, their Client Joy Manager, was scheduled for the first one. On Friday. Two days away.
"Let me look them over and get back to you," she said, and went to find Ian. Ian would know where Erin was, and she had fifteen minutes to make a crisis plan before she had to set up the PowerPoint for the dinner lecture.
Ian was, predictably, in the kitchen, a fidgeting blur weaving in and out among the caterers.
"The pasta station's broken," he said, by way of greeting. "Dinner's going to be seven minutes late. Every single pot bigger than a soup bowl is on the boil. Can you fix heavy industrial catering machinery?"
"I...just need to know where Erin is," Roxy said. "Nice tie, by the way."
"Thanks. This time of night, I'd think she'd still be overjoying clients," Ian replied, straightening the tie's knot slightly. "Try the Free Stuff table."
"I passed it on my way in. She's not there."
Ian picked up a glass of wine from a passing tray and handed it to her. "Drink. What's going on? HEY, SOMEONE'S CREAM SAUCE IS SCALDING," he shouted, and then turned back to her as one of the catering chefs crashed through to stir it.
"How did you know that?" Roxy asked.
"What, I can't be a receptionist and a good cook?" Ian inquired. He looked young when he grinned that way -- well, he was young, but younger, all cherubic blue eyes and mischief around the mouth. "You were going to tell me why we're panicking?"
"Sparks just told me he's scheduling a webinar for Friday," she said.
"Oh, so the Tech4Free guy talked to him about it?" Ian asked, smoothing his already-tidy dark hair with just a hint of guilt.
"You knew?" Roxy blinked at him.
"Yeah, well, I thought I'd network them a little. He was talking about webinars and I said, you should go show that to Mr. Sparks, he's always looking to be on the cutting edge."
"I am going to stab you later," Roxy said. "Any idea where else Erin might be?"
"Look for the knot of joyful clients?" Ian offered. Roxy scowled. "She's probably trying to get cell reception, it sucks in here. Check the northwest corner next to the podium," Ian continued.
Roxy leaned out of the kitchen and looked at the podium. Erin was standing there, waving her phone around energetically, red hair beginning to come undone from its neat up-do.
"How do you do that?" she asked.
"Magic," Ian replied, already distracted by something. "I'll put a note in my calendar to remind you to stab me tomorrow. And send you some free graphics websites!" he called, as Roxy ran out of the kitchen.
She hurried through a few crowded knots of men and women in formalwear, making a note to ask Creative about doing a piece on Appropriate Fashion In Fundraising. Were bow-ties In?
"Roxy!" Erin called as she approached. If ever there was a poster-girl for Appropriate Fashion, Erin and her little black dress were it. She patted the flyaways from her hair back into place. "Are you getting cell reception? It sucks in here."
"Yeah, but I need to talk to you first," Roxy said urgently. "Sparks just -- "
She was interrupted by the sound of a muffled scream from behind the stage curtain.
"What was that?"
"Anna and Sarah," Erin replied. "I just need to make one call."
"I didn't know they were together," Roxy said, as Erin flailed her phone over her head, looking up hopefully.
"They aren't. Sarah just brought over the final legal papers from the Nations In Need people. She's making Anna rewrite the speech to include it. Apparently we have to sound smug, but not too smug."
"Is Anna okay?"
"She'll get it done. Screaming is how she works."
"Okay, just -- put the phone down," Roxy said, pulling Erin's wrist to her side. "Sparks wants webinars."
"He wants what?" Erin asked.
"Webinars," Roxy said, and thrust her own phone under Erin's nose.
A slow look of horror dawned on Erin's face.
"What fresh hell is this?"
"It's webinars! He wants this text up on the website tomorrow. Day after tomorrow, you're giving an internet-based call-in seminar on social media. Congratulations, you're a guru."
"I hate social media gurus!"
"Thanks," Roxy said drily.
"You don't count," Erin said. "I have two days to write a PowerPoint presentation on social media?"
"You could do it in sentences of 140 characters or less," Roxy managed, stuffing down insane laughter. "I think I can put him off until Monday. Can you do it this weekend?"
"Do I get a choice?"
There was another muffled scream from behind the curtain, where apparently Anna was really getting into her creative process. Erin sighed.
"Okay. Tell him you can have everything set up by Monday, I'll take one for the team. Who told him about this?"
"It's Ian's fault."
"Is it really his fault or are we blaming him because it's fun again?"
"Really his fault. He's made a note to remind me to stab him tomorrow."
"Don't do it until after he makes the coffee."
Erin's phone rang. They both looked at it.
"Success!" Erin said, answering it. "Hi, I need to make a call. Talk to you later!"
Roxy watched as she hung up and redialed. The screaming behind the stage seemed to have subsided, and there was still a glass of wine in her hand. She sipped it while she backed away from the stage slowly and went to find Sparks.
Bo Sparks wasn't ever hard to find, even in a crowded room. Among the glitterati of the charitable sector's leading faces, he glittered brightest -- a handsome fortysomething with the barest beginnings of salt-and-pepper in his brown hair, a booming voice, and an infectious laugh. He was the despair of his PA and the envy of most of his colleagues. She found him cracking jokes with a man whose nametag simply read UNION ARMS.
"Roxy! Over here!" he called. "Trent, this is Roxy, she's our technology wizard. She has some very enterprising ideas about webinars."
"We're rolling out several educational webinars for our clients tomorrow," Roxy said, immediately smiling the Everything Is Under Control smile. "The first one will be going up on Monday. Social media. We're all very excited."
"Monday?" Sparks asked, looking a little crestfallen.
"The route servers need time to compile," Roxy improvised.
"Well, you can't rush route servers, I guess," he agreed. "Almost ready for my big speech?"
"I just need to get your laptop set up," Roxy replied.
"Duty calls," Sparks said, clapping UNION ARMS on the shoulder. "Have a seat. I'll see you after the speech."
As if on some mysterious, subconscious signal, people began to drift towards the tables clustered around the stage, looking for their place cards and greeting their dinner companions. Cellphones were silenced; a few industrious go-getters were unfolding small paper pads on which to take notes. Roxy saw Anna and Sarah emerging from behind the curtain, both looking a little frayed around the edges but with smiles -- or the best substitute they could manage -- stamped firmly in place. They were met immediately by Ian and an entire bottle of wine.
On the edges of the gathering, the rest of SparkVISION's service team was slowly forming a little, nervous-looking crowd. They were also passing around John's flask, the one with the tiger etched on the front. Vodka, probably. She wondered if she was safe to leave Sparks alone with the laptop and join them.
As everyone settled in their seats, the lights dimmed as if on cue, and a projection appeared behind Sparks:
SparkVISION: Providing For The Providers.
Sparks cleared his throat and smiled. You could practically hear the ting as his teeth caught the light from the podium.
"Good evening," he said, and there was a murmur of polite applause. "Welcome to SparkVISION's eighth annual Status and Forecast dinner. This morning, I was thinking about our first annual Status and Forecast dinner. Back then we were a little less formal..."
There was a small groan from Ian, who apparently knew what was coming. And sure enough, there was the slide: a giant image of Sparks, in a TOOL t-shirt, sitting with their only two clients at the time and eating pizza out of a box on the table in front of them. Cue: audience laughter.
"...but we've grown since then," Sparks concluded. "Now we can afford plates. Naomi!"
Naomi, at the back, hastily handed the flask to John. Like Erin, she was properly fashionable for the clients: tall and poised like a blonde Hitchcock heroine, dressed in something just slightly over the top, she was somehow still convincingly professional with the aid of sensible shoes.
And really, around Sparks, you couldn't have too many sequins anyway.
"Yes, boss?" she called.
"What's our operating budget for the rest of the year after this party?"
"Do you want that in negative dollars, or negative Euros?"
"Whichever makes us look better," Sparks said. Ting went the smile. The audience snickered.
Roxy breathed a sigh of relief and saw the tension in Ian's shoulders relax as the waiters emerged from the kitchen carrying trays of food and pitchers of water. Cee, Ian's immediate supervisor and Sparks's PA, patted his shoulder reassuringly.
"We are gathered here tonight -- friends, clients, colleagues, and a few competitors -- to reflect on what we've achieved on the past year," Sparks continued, "and to make resolutions for the year to come. Some people have called SparkVISION's goals ambitious, but we feel it's better to aim high and fall short than to set our sights on mediocrity, and I'm sure our clients will agree. Now, if you'll forgive a discussion of money at dinner..."
Sparks changed the slide again, and a series of numbers and terms like gross income and equity began to wash over the crowd. Roxy edged her way towards the rest of the team, keeping one ear cocked for phrases like "Uh oh" or "Computer frozen".
"I should have offered it in Yen," Naomi whispered to her as John handed her the flask (yep, definitely vodka) and Ian hooked a chair around for her with one leg. "Yen always looks impressive. Love that dress on you, by the way."
"Thanks," Roxy said, fanning the soft, comfortable fabric out over her lap. "Hey, bow ties. Hot or not?"
"Not," Naomi decided, after a few seconds' thought. "Except formally and for a few very specific men. And those men should only wear bow ties."
On Naomi's other side, Anna refilled her wine glass and brushed her slowly collapsing hairdo out of her eyes.
"We're never closing a client contract in December again," she said, giving up on the style entirely and starting to pull pins out of her hair, shaking it down into long curls. "My nerves can't stand it."
"You had four minutes to spare," Sarah told her. "Besides, Legal just emailed me back. Our ass is covered. Good job."
"What would I have to do if Legal didn't approve it?" Anna asked. She looked around for somewhere to dispose of her hairpins, then shoved them in the pocket of John's polo shirt.
"Do you really want to know?" Sarah countered, slyly adjusting the chopsticks holding her own hair back.
"She doesn't," Ian and Roxy said in unison.
"Can I diss MySpace in a webinar on social media?" Erin asked. Onstage, Sparks began reviewing the not inconsiderable accomplishments SparkVISION had achieved that year. Given that the economy had tanked and charitable giving was always the first to go, they really hadn't done badly at all.
"I heard you're the new webinar queen," Sarah said. "As long as everything you say is a fact, you'll be fine. Try not to get catty about anyone."
"I'm the clusterfuck queen at the moment," Erin muttered. "Clusterfuckinars. I was going out this weekend. I was going shopping. Now I'm stuck studying statistics on Internetworking."
"Is that a word?" Naomi asked, aghast.
"It is now," Anna sighed.
"Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn...what am I missing?" Erin asked. Ian coughed gently.
"Blogs," he said, as if he were sorry to bring up such an impolite topic. "I can send you some posts about, uh. Effective blogging and advertising and that kind of thing."
"Shit! Blogs! This is all your fault!"
John, who was only getting away with wearing jeans to this because he'd finally cut his hair, handed Erin the flask. "Go ahead. Finish it."
Out in the lights, Sparks was extolling the simplicity of their new donation web app. Roxy preened a little. That had been her and Zoe's baby for six months, and she was justifiably proud of it. Zoe poked her gently from behind and waved -- she hadn't been sure she'd be able to get away for the evening.
"He would pick the one pixelated screencap I sent him," she whispered, wrinkling her button nose at the screen.
"Have some wine," Roxy whispered back. Ian took another already-opened bottle from under his chair and passed it down.
"I brought cookies!" Zoe replied, offering her a paper bag with a few grease spots on the bottom. "I thought everyone might get hungry."
"It's a dinner, Zoe," Roxy pointed out.
"Yeah, but...cookies!" Zoe protested.
"I'll eat them if you don't want them," Erin offered. Roxy sighed and passed the cookies down the row to Erin.
"Who's the woman taking notes?" Zoe asked, indicating a young woman with short curly hair, in the standard Evening Event black dress but with a brilliant red-ribbon choker around her neck.
"I think she's a reporter," Roxy replied. "Sparks said he put out a call to some media pals."
"Speaking of," Cee said, consulting her phone, "Guess who's liveblogging us?"
"Liveblogging," Erin moaned.
"Are people tweeting?" Roxy asked. "I don't see many phones out."
"Yeah, but that's not the big deal," Cee replied. "Non's posting about us."
All other chatter ceased. Even Sparks's voice seemed to fade into the background as heads craned over Cee's cellphone.
"What's he saying?" John asked, trying in vain to see around Sarah's head and nearly losing an eye to her hair-chopsticks. "Is he slamming us?"
"Why would he slam us? We're awesome," Ian replied, leaning over Naomi's shoulder.
"He says it's a great party," Cee replied. "He says he'll post later with all the details. You know what this means, right?"
"Non's here somewhere," Erin said, looking up at the men and women who were, in turn, watching Sparks. "In this room."
"Maybe he's a client," Roxy suggested.
"Or a competitor. I bet he's that guy, the young guy who's here from PanArts," Erin exclaimed.
"It's not like he's going to be glowing or something," Ian grumbled, sitting back in his chair. "He's just a person, you know. Not even. He's a blogger."
"I hear he gets fifty thousand hits a day and had to take a restraining order out on a stalker," Naomi said.
"I hear he's secretly a woman," Cee replied.
"Erin keeps linking to his posts with LOL in the subject line," Anna said.
"Well, they're funny," Erin protested.
"I'd hit that," John said. Everyone looked at him. "What? He's probably hot. He writes hot."
"It's more the sudden bisexuality," Zoe observed. "Not that we wouldn't still love you," she added, with a sharp look around to make sure there were no dissenters.
"Whatever," John said. "I like girls, but I don't like labels."
"Everyone look attentive," Ian announced in a hushed tone. "Faces forward, he's about to thank us for our efforts."
John took the flask back and hid it, Cee and Erin tucked their phones away, and Naomi folded her hands primly in her lap. Sarah and Anna moved back so as to be almost invisible, and Ian scooted gently to one side with Zoe. A second later a bright spotlight hit them as Sparks extolled the virtues of his hardworking team, and congratulated them on a job well done.
"We're getting overtime for this, right?" Sarah whispered.
***
Date: Wednesday, 12/2/09
Subject: Make A Difference, One Cater Waiter At A Time
Well, I promised a report on the SparkVISION hootenanny tonight, and now that I have a proper keyboard in front of me I can do a little more than the sketchy notes from earlier.
As I did say earlier, SparkVISION is a lot of fun, and they put on excellent parties. It's très uncouth to compliment the catering at a dinner party, but I don't think Bo Sparks will mind if I tell him he has excellent taste in food prep, a subject very dear to my heart. I wish more companies would do a year-in-review party like SV, because then I'd get a good meal once in a while instead of scavenging the staffroom for box-lunch leftovers, stuffing bits of sandwich into my cheeks for later like a hamster.
Also, nobody stinted on the wine. Whether that's generosity or aimed at getting the clients tanked before you talk to them, I leave to my readers.
SV has done well this year, and I think will continue to do well, especially with the new programs they've unveiled. You can check the list of new programs at the website -- the slots for the webinars are going fast, and those are sure to be educational, so I'd sign up soon -- but my favorite is the Price List.
Those of you in charitable giving have probably seen this before, especially with educational institutions. For a set amount of money you can "buy" something with your donation. Say, ten grand gets you a park bench, fifty grand some kind of birdbath or garden or something. A couple of million might earn a building named after you. SV is introducing this in conjunction (kinky!) with the Parks Association of Chicago, but with a twist: a set donation amount will buy your name on a sculpture donated to the Parks Association by a local artist, with the money going to one of SparkVISION's local urban youth organizations. I'm guessing it'll be another Cows of Chicago kind of campaign. I'm holding out for kangaroos, myself.
Come on, don't tell me you don't want to see Kangaroos Of Chicago.
In the spirit of SparkVISION, I've decided to publish my own price list. Donate to the Feed Non More Sushi fund and you too can have your name affixed to something on my desk. Just picture it: The Your Name Here Memorial Stapler. The Fill In This Blank Desk Directory. This Pen In Memory Of Your Deceased Loved One's Name.
Bidding starts at seven dollars or one shrimp tempura maki roll.
SV also announced that they've just been hired by Nations In Need to organize their events and manage their investments, so keep an eye on Nations In Need's gala dinners as the foodie pinnacles of the coming year!
***
Mornings after charitable-sector events were always the best mornings, Ian had long ago decided.
For one, they were quiet. The only people in the office at eight were the admins, because Administration Must Go On. Unless something was broken or the toilets weren't flushing, they mainly left him alone at the reception desk.
For another, everyone double-appreciated the coffee, and often people brought in breakfast pastries or bagels as an apology for being late.
He left his bag on the chair and shrugged out of his coat, waved to Cee as she emerged from Sparks's office, and hollered "COFFEE IN TEN" down the hall to where Sarah was sorting through paperwork in the Legal pod. She held up a disposable coffee cup.
"Fine, MORE COFFEE IN TEN," he yelled. From the opposite direction, he heard Jess laughing.
"Missed you last night," he said, as their Youth Coordinator emerged from the cubicles and drifted over to the pair of coffee machines in the staff kitchen. He liked Jess; she was a little younger than he was, still idealistic, and had hip, punky, multi-colored hair. She was almost uncontrollably cool.
"I was glad-handing at the Youth Center," she said. "Recruiting interns for the holidays."
"New grist for the mill," Ian replied. He carefully began the daily morning ritual of pouring water, measuring grounds from the bags in the freezer, separating filters and flipping switches.
"Something like that," Jess said. "Were we a hit?"
"We were a hit," he confirmed. "Sparks wooed them. Anna had a nervous breakdown. Most of the staff went out drinking after. Erin hates me and Roxy wants to stab me."
"Not really, though."
"Well, hate might be a strong word. Stab probably isn't," he said.
"Was it the webinars?"
"How do you know about the webinars?" Ian asked.
"Roxy texted me."
"Maybe I should break out the candy dish today," Ian said thoughtfully.
"Everyone loves a candy dish," Jess agreed.
Ian hunched over slightly to check the level of the coffee in the first pot, pulled it out quickly, and poured a cup before replacing the carafe. He held up a hand.
"Three...two...one..."
The door slammed in the reception lobby. Ian grinned and put his head around the corner.
"Coffee, boss?" he asked.
"Yeah!" Sparks answered, giving Cee a customary morning high-five-low-five as he walked into his office. "Hey, last night was great!"
"I agree," Ian said, as Cee winked and held the door for him to carry the coffee into the office. She followed, laying a stack of printouts on his desk.
"Did you see we got blogged?" he asked, twitching the papers into piles as he skimmed them. "NonProphetBlog said we were a lot of fun and put on great parties."
"And that you have excellent taste in catering," Cee said.
"Which means Cee should always get to pick the caterers," Ian added loyally.
"It's because we're fun," Sparks confided. "Hey, what do you think of Kangaroos Of Chicago? I like that idea."
"I think they already settled on abstract artists," Cee said. "Legal wants you to sign the copies of the Nations In Need paperwork, and I have John and Anna's first draft of the press release for you to review."
"And that's my cue to go look cute and answer phones," Ian announced, closing the door as he left.
People began to drift in around eight-thirty, many of them in dark glasses, a few looking as if they might not have slept. Anna's normally sleek brown hair was frizzed, a sure sign she hadn't had time to do her morning routine; Zoe, who as an artist could take certain liberties, was wearing her favorite hoodie, the one with FSCK WINTER emblazoned on the front. He heard her doing the rounds a minute later, offering aspirin to the hung-over.
Most of the calls to the front desk were requests for information about the new Nations In Need outsourcing; Ian apologetically sent them to Sarah, who at least had read the contracts, since Anna and John weren't quite up to improvising. He saved her an onion bagel in gratitude before sending out the mass email that there was breakfast in the staff kitchen, thank-you-Roxy.
And, because Ian was a little bit of a sadist, he waited until everyone was settling in to work before he reminded Cee to remind Sparks that they needed to make an announcement about the webinars.
Which, of course, brought the gong into play.
The gong was a point of contention in the office. Sparks had picked up the idea somewhere, probably from the Zen Management seminar he and Erin had been to earlier in the year. He'd spent hours with Cee, looking at gongs online, debating gong size, reading about gong philosophy. Apparently it created a sense of community within the office; none of the gong websites mentioned that the sense of community came from a unified sense of loathing.
Nobody had thought Sparks would actually buy one, but someone had slipped him a Craigslist ad selling a gong made from the radiator of a classic car. That was clearly too much for him to resist.
Normally it hung, ornamental and mysterious, behind Ian's reception desk. Sparks kept the hammer for it on a stand on his own desk (the stand had been thrown in for free with the gong). The company blog had film footage, somewhere in its archives, of the first time the gong had been rung. It didn't include the horrified expressions of the staff.
Ian was very fond of the gong, actually, but then he always had warning when a gonging was imminent.
"Shall we?" Sparks asked, handing the gong to Cee to hold.
"I'm ready," Cee said, pre-emptively flinching.
For such a small thing, it put out a lot of sound.
As it reverberated around the office, heads raised above cubicles and more than a few angry groans were heard. Sparks bashed it again, for good measure, and then waited for everyone to gather like sulky schoolchildren in the lobby.
"Good morning!" he beamed. "I have a very important announcement to make about webinars."
Erin was already glaring daggers at Ian. Roxy probably was; short and pugnacious, she had a fierce hazel glare and a sharp tongue to back it up, but fortunately the dark Hepburn-style sunglasses made it hard to tell if she was angry or just hung over.
"Here's the schedule of the webinars we'll be doing, starting on Monday when the router...things get compiled," Sparks said, passing out printouts. "If anyone who isn't doing a webinar has one they'd like to submit for the new year, we'll be budgeting for weekly or bi-weekly, depending on the figures Naomi gives me."
Those who hadn't been signed up to do webinars looked sympathetically at those who had. Ian was suddenly grateful to Roxy, who had replaced Anna's name with John's on the "Writing To Impress" webinar.
"Wait, I'm on here," Jess said, looking suddenly annoyed.
"You're good with kids! That's a very marketable skill. Most people aren't," Sparks told her. "And it's a PowerPoint so you don't have to worry about your hair."
"What's wrong with my hair?" Jess asked.
"Nothing," Sparks said, a little too hastily in Ian's opinion. "Oh! Hey! Also! Holiday party is in planning," he added, while Jess cross her arms and muttered "Nothing wrong with a little color, normally he likes my hair."
"Venue yet to be announced, but I have confirmed karaoke," Ian said, right on cue. Expressions ranged from fear to jubilation. "Cee's ordering the food and Erin..."
He wilted for a moment under her glare, then steadied himself.
"If you could make...those bar cookies you make...everyone likes them," he finished uncertainly. "Secret Definitely Not Santas Because They're Not PC gifts to be handed out -- "
"Oh! We're going on a shopping trip for that!" Sparks put in. "Next Friday."
"...so make sure you wear warm clothes for the walk up Michigan Avenue," Ian finished. "I will have spare hats and scarves from lost and found if anyone forgets."
"Great! Meeting adjourned!" Sparks said, and rang the gong again. A chorus of ear-weary groans accompanied the slow dissolution of the assembly.
Ian leaned against his desk and watched as John and Anna grabbed Zoe for a Creative Team smoke break. Naomi and Cee went with Sparks to his office to go over the new webinar budget. Roxy wandered back to the tech pod, and Jess seemed to be comparing notes with the company's sole intern, a young, dark-haired woman named Hanna who wore a constantly terrified expression on her face.
Sarah lingered near the desk until everyone was gone, then leaned over and whispered, "Guess who got lucky with Union Arms?"
"Union Arms?" Ian asked. "Wasn't he about a hundred years old?"
Sarah tipped her head at Anna as she disappeared into the elevator. She raised one well-groomed eyebrow.
"No," Ian said, relishing the moment. "Oh, of course, that's why her hair isn't done."
"He's not that old," Sarah said. "Besides, she had stress to work off."
"Anna had sex with Union Arms." Ian whistled low.
"His name's Trent. He likes it rough."
"How do you know these things? Did she tell you?"
"Administrative telepathy," she said lightly, and walked back to her desk with an air of invincible self-confidence. Ian chuckled, reached into a desk drawer for a chamois cloth, gave the gong a loving swipe before hanging it back on the wall, and settled in to the day's work.
***
Chapter Two
Chapter One
The event was going quite well, Roxy thought, until her boss said one word to her:
"Webinars."
"What?" she asked, brushing hair out of her face and cursing her hairdresser's advice against bangs.
"Webinars. I hear they're the wave of the future," Bo Sparks told her. "I checked one out on the Tech4Free CEO's phone -- do you know him?"
"Uh..."
"Anyway, I emailed you some ideas."
Roxy's fingers instinctively clenched her phone. She heard the ding of an incoming-email alert.
"Can you get them up on the website by tomorrow?" Sparks asked. "Can we do the first one on Friday?"
She took out her phone and checked the email. Erin, their Client Joy Manager, was scheduled for the first one. On Friday. Two days away.
"Let me look them over and get back to you," she said, and went to find Ian. Ian would know where Erin was, and she had fifteen minutes to make a crisis plan before she had to set up the PowerPoint for the dinner lecture.
Ian was, predictably, in the kitchen, a fidgeting blur weaving in and out among the caterers.
"The pasta station's broken," he said, by way of greeting. "Dinner's going to be seven minutes late. Every single pot bigger than a soup bowl is on the boil. Can you fix heavy industrial catering machinery?"
"I...just need to know where Erin is," Roxy said. "Nice tie, by the way."
"Thanks. This time of night, I'd think she'd still be overjoying clients," Ian replied, straightening the tie's knot slightly. "Try the Free Stuff table."
"I passed it on my way in. She's not there."
Ian picked up a glass of wine from a passing tray and handed it to her. "Drink. What's going on? HEY, SOMEONE'S CREAM SAUCE IS SCALDING," he shouted, and then turned back to her as one of the catering chefs crashed through to stir it.
"How did you know that?" Roxy asked.
"What, I can't be a receptionist and a good cook?" Ian inquired. He looked young when he grinned that way -- well, he was young, but younger, all cherubic blue eyes and mischief around the mouth. "You were going to tell me why we're panicking?"
"Sparks just told me he's scheduling a webinar for Friday," she said.
"Oh, so the Tech4Free guy talked to him about it?" Ian asked, smoothing his already-tidy dark hair with just a hint of guilt.
"You knew?" Roxy blinked at him.
"Yeah, well, I thought I'd network them a little. He was talking about webinars and I said, you should go show that to Mr. Sparks, he's always looking to be on the cutting edge."
"I am going to stab you later," Roxy said. "Any idea where else Erin might be?"
"Look for the knot of joyful clients?" Ian offered. Roxy scowled. "She's probably trying to get cell reception, it sucks in here. Check the northwest corner next to the podium," Ian continued.
Roxy leaned out of the kitchen and looked at the podium. Erin was standing there, waving her phone around energetically, red hair beginning to come undone from its neat up-do.
"How do you do that?" she asked.
"Magic," Ian replied, already distracted by something. "I'll put a note in my calendar to remind you to stab me tomorrow. And send you some free graphics websites!" he called, as Roxy ran out of the kitchen.
She hurried through a few crowded knots of men and women in formalwear, making a note to ask Creative about doing a piece on Appropriate Fashion In Fundraising. Were bow-ties In?
"Roxy!" Erin called as she approached. If ever there was a poster-girl for Appropriate Fashion, Erin and her little black dress were it. She patted the flyaways from her hair back into place. "Are you getting cell reception? It sucks in here."
"Yeah, but I need to talk to you first," Roxy said urgently. "Sparks just -- "
She was interrupted by the sound of a muffled scream from behind the stage curtain.
"What was that?"
"Anna and Sarah," Erin replied. "I just need to make one call."
"I didn't know they were together," Roxy said, as Erin flailed her phone over her head, looking up hopefully.
"They aren't. Sarah just brought over the final legal papers from the Nations In Need people. She's making Anna rewrite the speech to include it. Apparently we have to sound smug, but not too smug."
"Is Anna okay?"
"She'll get it done. Screaming is how she works."
"Okay, just -- put the phone down," Roxy said, pulling Erin's wrist to her side. "Sparks wants webinars."
"He wants what?" Erin asked.
"Webinars," Roxy said, and thrust her own phone under Erin's nose.
A slow look of horror dawned on Erin's face.
"What fresh hell is this?"
"It's webinars! He wants this text up on the website tomorrow. Day after tomorrow, you're giving an internet-based call-in seminar on social media. Congratulations, you're a guru."
"I hate social media gurus!"
"Thanks," Roxy said drily.
"You don't count," Erin said. "I have two days to write a PowerPoint presentation on social media?"
"You could do it in sentences of 140 characters or less," Roxy managed, stuffing down insane laughter. "I think I can put him off until Monday. Can you do it this weekend?"
"Do I get a choice?"
There was another muffled scream from behind the curtain, where apparently Anna was really getting into her creative process. Erin sighed.
"Okay. Tell him you can have everything set up by Monday, I'll take one for the team. Who told him about this?"
"It's Ian's fault."
"Is it really his fault or are we blaming him because it's fun again?"
"Really his fault. He's made a note to remind me to stab him tomorrow."
"Don't do it until after he makes the coffee."
Erin's phone rang. They both looked at it.
"Success!" Erin said, answering it. "Hi, I need to make a call. Talk to you later!"
Roxy watched as she hung up and redialed. The screaming behind the stage seemed to have subsided, and there was still a glass of wine in her hand. She sipped it while she backed away from the stage slowly and went to find Sparks.
Bo Sparks wasn't ever hard to find, even in a crowded room. Among the glitterati of the charitable sector's leading faces, he glittered brightest -- a handsome fortysomething with the barest beginnings of salt-and-pepper in his brown hair, a booming voice, and an infectious laugh. He was the despair of his PA and the envy of most of his colleagues. She found him cracking jokes with a man whose nametag simply read UNION ARMS.
"Roxy! Over here!" he called. "Trent, this is Roxy, she's our technology wizard. She has some very enterprising ideas about webinars."
"We're rolling out several educational webinars for our clients tomorrow," Roxy said, immediately smiling the Everything Is Under Control smile. "The first one will be going up on Monday. Social media. We're all very excited."
"Monday?" Sparks asked, looking a little crestfallen.
"The route servers need time to compile," Roxy improvised.
"Well, you can't rush route servers, I guess," he agreed. "Almost ready for my big speech?"
"I just need to get your laptop set up," Roxy replied.
"Duty calls," Sparks said, clapping UNION ARMS on the shoulder. "Have a seat. I'll see you after the speech."
As if on some mysterious, subconscious signal, people began to drift towards the tables clustered around the stage, looking for their place cards and greeting their dinner companions. Cellphones were silenced; a few industrious go-getters were unfolding small paper pads on which to take notes. Roxy saw Anna and Sarah emerging from behind the curtain, both looking a little frayed around the edges but with smiles -- or the best substitute they could manage -- stamped firmly in place. They were met immediately by Ian and an entire bottle of wine.
On the edges of the gathering, the rest of SparkVISION's service team was slowly forming a little, nervous-looking crowd. They were also passing around John's flask, the one with the tiger etched on the front. Vodka, probably. She wondered if she was safe to leave Sparks alone with the laptop and join them.
As everyone settled in their seats, the lights dimmed as if on cue, and a projection appeared behind Sparks:
SparkVISION: Providing For The Providers.
Sparks cleared his throat and smiled. You could practically hear the ting as his teeth caught the light from the podium.
"Good evening," he said, and there was a murmur of polite applause. "Welcome to SparkVISION's eighth annual Status and Forecast dinner. This morning, I was thinking about our first annual Status and Forecast dinner. Back then we were a little less formal..."
There was a small groan from Ian, who apparently knew what was coming. And sure enough, there was the slide: a giant image of Sparks, in a TOOL t-shirt, sitting with their only two clients at the time and eating pizza out of a box on the table in front of them. Cue: audience laughter.
"...but we've grown since then," Sparks concluded. "Now we can afford plates. Naomi!"
Naomi, at the back, hastily handed the flask to John. Like Erin, she was properly fashionable for the clients: tall and poised like a blonde Hitchcock heroine, dressed in something just slightly over the top, she was somehow still convincingly professional with the aid of sensible shoes.
And really, around Sparks, you couldn't have too many sequins anyway.
"Yes, boss?" she called.
"What's our operating budget for the rest of the year after this party?"
"Do you want that in negative dollars, or negative Euros?"
"Whichever makes us look better," Sparks said. Ting went the smile. The audience snickered.
Roxy breathed a sigh of relief and saw the tension in Ian's shoulders relax as the waiters emerged from the kitchen carrying trays of food and pitchers of water. Cee, Ian's immediate supervisor and Sparks's PA, patted his shoulder reassuringly.
"We are gathered here tonight -- friends, clients, colleagues, and a few competitors -- to reflect on what we've achieved on the past year," Sparks continued, "and to make resolutions for the year to come. Some people have called SparkVISION's goals ambitious, but we feel it's better to aim high and fall short than to set our sights on mediocrity, and I'm sure our clients will agree. Now, if you'll forgive a discussion of money at dinner..."
Sparks changed the slide again, and a series of numbers and terms like gross income and equity began to wash over the crowd. Roxy edged her way towards the rest of the team, keeping one ear cocked for phrases like "Uh oh" or "Computer frozen".
"I should have offered it in Yen," Naomi whispered to her as John handed her the flask (yep, definitely vodka) and Ian hooked a chair around for her with one leg. "Yen always looks impressive. Love that dress on you, by the way."
"Thanks," Roxy said, fanning the soft, comfortable fabric out over her lap. "Hey, bow ties. Hot or not?"
"Not," Naomi decided, after a few seconds' thought. "Except formally and for a few very specific men. And those men should only wear bow ties."
On Naomi's other side, Anna refilled her wine glass and brushed her slowly collapsing hairdo out of her eyes.
"We're never closing a client contract in December again," she said, giving up on the style entirely and starting to pull pins out of her hair, shaking it down into long curls. "My nerves can't stand it."
"You had four minutes to spare," Sarah told her. "Besides, Legal just emailed me back. Our ass is covered. Good job."
"What would I have to do if Legal didn't approve it?" Anna asked. She looked around for somewhere to dispose of her hairpins, then shoved them in the pocket of John's polo shirt.
"Do you really want to know?" Sarah countered, slyly adjusting the chopsticks holding her own hair back.
"She doesn't," Ian and Roxy said in unison.
"Can I diss MySpace in a webinar on social media?" Erin asked. Onstage, Sparks began reviewing the not inconsiderable accomplishments SparkVISION had achieved that year. Given that the economy had tanked and charitable giving was always the first to go, they really hadn't done badly at all.
"I heard you're the new webinar queen," Sarah said. "As long as everything you say is a fact, you'll be fine. Try not to get catty about anyone."
"I'm the clusterfuck queen at the moment," Erin muttered. "Clusterfuckinars. I was going out this weekend. I was going shopping. Now I'm stuck studying statistics on Internetworking."
"Is that a word?" Naomi asked, aghast.
"It is now," Anna sighed.
"Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn...what am I missing?" Erin asked. Ian coughed gently.
"Blogs," he said, as if he were sorry to bring up such an impolite topic. "I can send you some posts about, uh. Effective blogging and advertising and that kind of thing."
"Shit! Blogs! This is all your fault!"
John, who was only getting away with wearing jeans to this because he'd finally cut his hair, handed Erin the flask. "Go ahead. Finish it."
Out in the lights, Sparks was extolling the simplicity of their new donation web app. Roxy preened a little. That had been her and Zoe's baby for six months, and she was justifiably proud of it. Zoe poked her gently from behind and waved -- she hadn't been sure she'd be able to get away for the evening.
"He would pick the one pixelated screencap I sent him," she whispered, wrinkling her button nose at the screen.
"Have some wine," Roxy whispered back. Ian took another already-opened bottle from under his chair and passed it down.
"I brought cookies!" Zoe replied, offering her a paper bag with a few grease spots on the bottom. "I thought everyone might get hungry."
"It's a dinner, Zoe," Roxy pointed out.
"Yeah, but...cookies!" Zoe protested.
"I'll eat them if you don't want them," Erin offered. Roxy sighed and passed the cookies down the row to Erin.
"Who's the woman taking notes?" Zoe asked, indicating a young woman with short curly hair, in the standard Evening Event black dress but with a brilliant red-ribbon choker around her neck.
"I think she's a reporter," Roxy replied. "Sparks said he put out a call to some media pals."
"Speaking of," Cee said, consulting her phone, "Guess who's liveblogging us?"
"Liveblogging," Erin moaned.
"Are people tweeting?" Roxy asked. "I don't see many phones out."
"Yeah, but that's not the big deal," Cee replied. "Non's posting about us."
All other chatter ceased. Even Sparks's voice seemed to fade into the background as heads craned over Cee's cellphone.
"What's he saying?" John asked, trying in vain to see around Sarah's head and nearly losing an eye to her hair-chopsticks. "Is he slamming us?"
"Why would he slam us? We're awesome," Ian replied, leaning over Naomi's shoulder.
"He says it's a great party," Cee replied. "He says he'll post later with all the details. You know what this means, right?"
"Non's here somewhere," Erin said, looking up at the men and women who were, in turn, watching Sparks. "In this room."
"Maybe he's a client," Roxy suggested.
"Or a competitor. I bet he's that guy, the young guy who's here from PanArts," Erin exclaimed.
"It's not like he's going to be glowing or something," Ian grumbled, sitting back in his chair. "He's just a person, you know. Not even. He's a blogger."
"I hear he gets fifty thousand hits a day and had to take a restraining order out on a stalker," Naomi said.
"I hear he's secretly a woman," Cee replied.
"Erin keeps linking to his posts with LOL in the subject line," Anna said.
"Well, they're funny," Erin protested.
"I'd hit that," John said. Everyone looked at him. "What? He's probably hot. He writes hot."
"It's more the sudden bisexuality," Zoe observed. "Not that we wouldn't still love you," she added, with a sharp look around to make sure there were no dissenters.
"Whatever," John said. "I like girls, but I don't like labels."
"Everyone look attentive," Ian announced in a hushed tone. "Faces forward, he's about to thank us for our efforts."
John took the flask back and hid it, Cee and Erin tucked their phones away, and Naomi folded her hands primly in her lap. Sarah and Anna moved back so as to be almost invisible, and Ian scooted gently to one side with Zoe. A second later a bright spotlight hit them as Sparks extolled the virtues of his hardworking team, and congratulated them on a job well done.
"We're getting overtime for this, right?" Sarah whispered.
***
Date: Wednesday, 12/2/09
Subject: Make A Difference, One Cater Waiter At A Time
Well, I promised a report on the SparkVISION hootenanny tonight, and now that I have a proper keyboard in front of me I can do a little more than the sketchy notes from earlier.
As I did say earlier, SparkVISION is a lot of fun, and they put on excellent parties. It's très uncouth to compliment the catering at a dinner party, but I don't think Bo Sparks will mind if I tell him he has excellent taste in food prep, a subject very dear to my heart. I wish more companies would do a year-in-review party like SV, because then I'd get a good meal once in a while instead of scavenging the staffroom for box-lunch leftovers, stuffing bits of sandwich into my cheeks for later like a hamster.
Also, nobody stinted on the wine. Whether that's generosity or aimed at getting the clients tanked before you talk to them, I leave to my readers.
SV has done well this year, and I think will continue to do well, especially with the new programs they've unveiled. You can check the list of new programs at the website -- the slots for the webinars are going fast, and those are sure to be educational, so I'd sign up soon -- but my favorite is the Price List.
Those of you in charitable giving have probably seen this before, especially with educational institutions. For a set amount of money you can "buy" something with your donation. Say, ten grand gets you a park bench, fifty grand some kind of birdbath or garden or something. A couple of million might earn a building named after you. SV is introducing this in conjunction (kinky!) with the Parks Association of Chicago, but with a twist: a set donation amount will buy your name on a sculpture donated to the Parks Association by a local artist, with the money going to one of SparkVISION's local urban youth organizations. I'm guessing it'll be another Cows of Chicago kind of campaign. I'm holding out for kangaroos, myself.
Come on, don't tell me you don't want to see Kangaroos Of Chicago.
In the spirit of SparkVISION, I've decided to publish my own price list. Donate to the Feed Non More Sushi fund and you too can have your name affixed to something on my desk. Just picture it: The Your Name Here Memorial Stapler. The Fill In This Blank Desk Directory. This Pen In Memory Of Your Deceased Loved One's Name.
Bidding starts at seven dollars or one shrimp tempura maki roll.
SV also announced that they've just been hired by Nations In Need to organize their events and manage their investments, so keep an eye on Nations In Need's gala dinners as the foodie pinnacles of the coming year!
***
Mornings after charitable-sector events were always the best mornings, Ian had long ago decided.
For one, they were quiet. The only people in the office at eight were the admins, because Administration Must Go On. Unless something was broken or the toilets weren't flushing, they mainly left him alone at the reception desk.
For another, everyone double-appreciated the coffee, and often people brought in breakfast pastries or bagels as an apology for being late.
He left his bag on the chair and shrugged out of his coat, waved to Cee as she emerged from Sparks's office, and hollered "COFFEE IN TEN" down the hall to where Sarah was sorting through paperwork in the Legal pod. She held up a disposable coffee cup.
"Fine, MORE COFFEE IN TEN," he yelled. From the opposite direction, he heard Jess laughing.
"Missed you last night," he said, as their Youth Coordinator emerged from the cubicles and drifted over to the pair of coffee machines in the staff kitchen. He liked Jess; she was a little younger than he was, still idealistic, and had hip, punky, multi-colored hair. She was almost uncontrollably cool.
"I was glad-handing at the Youth Center," she said. "Recruiting interns for the holidays."
"New grist for the mill," Ian replied. He carefully began the daily morning ritual of pouring water, measuring grounds from the bags in the freezer, separating filters and flipping switches.
"Something like that," Jess said. "Were we a hit?"
"We were a hit," he confirmed. "Sparks wooed them. Anna had a nervous breakdown. Most of the staff went out drinking after. Erin hates me and Roxy wants to stab me."
"Not really, though."
"Well, hate might be a strong word. Stab probably isn't," he said.
"Was it the webinars?"
"How do you know about the webinars?" Ian asked.
"Roxy texted me."
"Maybe I should break out the candy dish today," Ian said thoughtfully.
"Everyone loves a candy dish," Jess agreed.
Ian hunched over slightly to check the level of the coffee in the first pot, pulled it out quickly, and poured a cup before replacing the carafe. He held up a hand.
"Three...two...one..."
The door slammed in the reception lobby. Ian grinned and put his head around the corner.
"Coffee, boss?" he asked.
"Yeah!" Sparks answered, giving Cee a customary morning high-five-low-five as he walked into his office. "Hey, last night was great!"
"I agree," Ian said, as Cee winked and held the door for him to carry the coffee into the office. She followed, laying a stack of printouts on his desk.
"Did you see we got blogged?" he asked, twitching the papers into piles as he skimmed them. "NonProphetBlog said we were a lot of fun and put on great parties."
"And that you have excellent taste in catering," Cee said.
"Which means Cee should always get to pick the caterers," Ian added loyally.
"It's because we're fun," Sparks confided. "Hey, what do you think of Kangaroos Of Chicago? I like that idea."
"I think they already settled on abstract artists," Cee said. "Legal wants you to sign the copies of the Nations In Need paperwork, and I have John and Anna's first draft of the press release for you to review."
"And that's my cue to go look cute and answer phones," Ian announced, closing the door as he left.
People began to drift in around eight-thirty, many of them in dark glasses, a few looking as if they might not have slept. Anna's normally sleek brown hair was frizzed, a sure sign she hadn't had time to do her morning routine; Zoe, who as an artist could take certain liberties, was wearing her favorite hoodie, the one with FSCK WINTER emblazoned on the front. He heard her doing the rounds a minute later, offering aspirin to the hung-over.
Most of the calls to the front desk were requests for information about the new Nations In Need outsourcing; Ian apologetically sent them to Sarah, who at least had read the contracts, since Anna and John weren't quite up to improvising. He saved her an onion bagel in gratitude before sending out the mass email that there was breakfast in the staff kitchen, thank-you-Roxy.
And, because Ian was a little bit of a sadist, he waited until everyone was settling in to work before he reminded Cee to remind Sparks that they needed to make an announcement about the webinars.
Which, of course, brought the gong into play.
The gong was a point of contention in the office. Sparks had picked up the idea somewhere, probably from the Zen Management seminar he and Erin had been to earlier in the year. He'd spent hours with Cee, looking at gongs online, debating gong size, reading about gong philosophy. Apparently it created a sense of community within the office; none of the gong websites mentioned that the sense of community came from a unified sense of loathing.
Nobody had thought Sparks would actually buy one, but someone had slipped him a Craigslist ad selling a gong made from the radiator of a classic car. That was clearly too much for him to resist.
Normally it hung, ornamental and mysterious, behind Ian's reception desk. Sparks kept the hammer for it on a stand on his own desk (the stand had been thrown in for free with the gong). The company blog had film footage, somewhere in its archives, of the first time the gong had been rung. It didn't include the horrified expressions of the staff.
Ian was very fond of the gong, actually, but then he always had warning when a gonging was imminent.
"Shall we?" Sparks asked, handing the gong to Cee to hold.
"I'm ready," Cee said, pre-emptively flinching.
For such a small thing, it put out a lot of sound.
As it reverberated around the office, heads raised above cubicles and more than a few angry groans were heard. Sparks bashed it again, for good measure, and then waited for everyone to gather like sulky schoolchildren in the lobby.
"Good morning!" he beamed. "I have a very important announcement to make about webinars."
Erin was already glaring daggers at Ian. Roxy probably was; short and pugnacious, she had a fierce hazel glare and a sharp tongue to back it up, but fortunately the dark Hepburn-style sunglasses made it hard to tell if she was angry or just hung over.
"Here's the schedule of the webinars we'll be doing, starting on Monday when the router...things get compiled," Sparks said, passing out printouts. "If anyone who isn't doing a webinar has one they'd like to submit for the new year, we'll be budgeting for weekly or bi-weekly, depending on the figures Naomi gives me."
Those who hadn't been signed up to do webinars looked sympathetically at those who had. Ian was suddenly grateful to Roxy, who had replaced Anna's name with John's on the "Writing To Impress" webinar.
"Wait, I'm on here," Jess said, looking suddenly annoyed.
"You're good with kids! That's a very marketable skill. Most people aren't," Sparks told her. "And it's a PowerPoint so you don't have to worry about your hair."
"What's wrong with my hair?" Jess asked.
"Nothing," Sparks said, a little too hastily in Ian's opinion. "Oh! Hey! Also! Holiday party is in planning," he added, while Jess cross her arms and muttered "Nothing wrong with a little color, normally he likes my hair."
"Venue yet to be announced, but I have confirmed karaoke," Ian said, right on cue. Expressions ranged from fear to jubilation. "Cee's ordering the food and Erin..."
He wilted for a moment under her glare, then steadied himself.
"If you could make...those bar cookies you make...everyone likes them," he finished uncertainly. "Secret Definitely Not Santas Because They're Not PC gifts to be handed out -- "
"Oh! We're going on a shopping trip for that!" Sparks put in. "Next Friday."
"...so make sure you wear warm clothes for the walk up Michigan Avenue," Ian finished. "I will have spare hats and scarves from lost and found if anyone forgets."
"Great! Meeting adjourned!" Sparks said, and rang the gong again. A chorus of ear-weary groans accompanied the slow dissolution of the assembly.
Ian leaned against his desk and watched as John and Anna grabbed Zoe for a Creative Team smoke break. Naomi and Cee went with Sparks to his office to go over the new webinar budget. Roxy wandered back to the tech pod, and Jess seemed to be comparing notes with the company's sole intern, a young, dark-haired woman named Hanna who wore a constantly terrified expression on her face.
Sarah lingered near the desk until everyone was gone, then leaned over and whispered, "Guess who got lucky with Union Arms?"
"Union Arms?" Ian asked. "Wasn't he about a hundred years old?"
Sarah tipped her head at Anna as she disappeared into the elevator. She raised one well-groomed eyebrow.
"No," Ian said, relishing the moment. "Oh, of course, that's why her hair isn't done."
"He's not that old," Sarah said. "Besides, she had stress to work off."
"Anna had sex with Union Arms." Ian whistled low.
"His name's Trent. He likes it rough."
"How do you know these things? Did she tell you?"
"Administrative telepathy," she said lightly, and walked back to her desk with an air of invincible self-confidence. Ian chuckled, reached into a desk drawer for a chamois cloth, gave the gong a loving swipe before hanging it back on the wall, and settled in to the day's work.
***
Chapter Two
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