"Ms. Anthony, so glad you could join us." Mr. Waverly stood as I entered.
I hated it when meetings started like that. Was like putting a neon 'sucker' sign on my back.
"Please, sit down. We've got a proposal. Still in the rough stages, of course, but we want your input before we consider."
Groan . Couldn't I just say no now and head back to the darkroom?
I sat like a girl scout, considering this may be my good deed for the day. "I'm duly intrigued," I said. But I didn't mean it.
I really hate it when people laugh at me. So far the only positive I could name was the ergo dynamics of the chair. Why didn't I have one of these at my desk?
"Remember, this is simply a proposal," Mr. Waverly said. "And you've been chosen, well, based on some recent rumors."
Double groan . I shook my head. This chair wasn't that comfortable.
"This might also be a photo opportunity for you."
I'd had my butt a foot off the seat, but his statement magnetically pulled me back down.
"We've heard word of an underground club. A dating club. Singles bar. High tech and very popular. We've sent a couple of reporters already, but this place makes one jump through hoops just to get in the door. Seems like they have some kind of security that tracks all sorts of personal information."
Mr. Sammys, one of the editorial staff frowned in my direction. Probably because my jaw had hit the table about three sentences earlier.
"Miss Anthony, any questions so far?"
Thank goodness they addressed me or I'd never have responded. A secret club? Underground dating services? I pictured loud music, darkness lit by multi colored neon lights and lots of people. But the personal stuff worried me. Needless to say, I had a lot of questions. "Why not a reporter? You want a story, not a photographer."
"As I mentioned, we tried with two different reporters. The first one as himself. He got immediately booted due to occupation. They don't want the press. Go figure. The second time we sent a female, gave her fake ID and the works. Turns out they slammed the door in her face because nothing was verifiable on their system."
I looked around the table to a chorus of nods. Mr. Waverly seemed to like seeing everyone agreed with him, so he continued. "We got enough from her to know you have to fill in your likes, dislikes, all these details into a database and sign a release that gives them information about you. I can't imagine what data provider they're using. Maybe that's it. Maybe that's the illegal thing. I don't think we're here to be a whistle blower on that, so we're not asking you to really get much on that end. What we need is someone who can get in there and feed details to our reporter so she can write the article."
I didn't understand why this prompted this big meeting but in all honestly it scared the pants off me. "Me?" my voice squeaked. Somewhere in the midst of the mental chaos was a glimmer of hope. I'd probably never make it past the background scan. Wasn't working for the newspaper bad enough? I leaned back in my chair and tried to keep rational. "Why not someone else, I don't understand, why me?"
"Well." Two of the tie wearing pencil-pushers exchanged a glance. One spoke, "With that ad out there, we figured it would just make it easier for you to get in. You will take the ad, tell them you got word of the place and the personals weren't bringing you the type of man you were looking for."
"But I'm not looking for a man!"
Oh jeez. Now they were looking at me like that . Backpeddle, Jill, fast—you're headed for the falls. "I'm perfectly capable of getting my own dates. I've got one for Saturday already. Yes. A man." I flashed my teeth.
"So do it for work." And then Mr. Waverly named a dollar figure that had my Visa snoopy-dancing on the table.
"How?" I stuttered out. "How can you toss that number out for me to go to this dating place, get enough for a story and then leave?"
"Because we're hoping to run a weekly column for a month. You'll be anonymous, of course, but we'll have you pair up with one guy a week, get with the gal we'll have writing this. She'll portray it as if it were her."
They were turning this newspaper into the tabloids. And I was their bait. Lovely.
"So I have to go back and go out with men?" I wanted to stand up and ask where my mother was hiding. She had to be in on this.
The stars could never line up to make this happen to anyone else ever again. Some people win the lottery, I get top billing on the dating game.
Life sucks.
"Let me think about this."
"We need to know by three."
"Great." I didn't try to hide my sarcasm. Was this kind of prostitution even legal?
