Little Pink Slips Read Free Page A

the grace of a gorilla, but
    grabbed the last one without a try-on. She dragged her purchases to
    the cash register. It took another fifteen minutes to check out.
    "Thirty-nine hundred," said the Chanel girl, without looking up.
    Magnolia took another look at the handbag. If you added a chain, it
    could double for her lunch box from fourth grade. Was she really going
    to spend almost four thousand dollars on purchases she wasn't even
    sure she liked? If she'd ever wear these clothes, she wished she could
    accessorize with a disclaimer that read, "Do not judge the wearer, who
    may look deeply shallow, but is truly a person you'd want to know."
    "Are you paying or not?" a woman behind her shouted. Magnolia
    whipped out her credit card. She lugged her bags to the street, hoping the hotel doorman could flag a taxi. It was 8:45. Magnolia was
    famished, thirsty, and needed to get to the office for a nine o'clock
    meeting.
    Finally, she slid into a cab. As it turned right past the old Plaza
    Hotel, Darlene, Charlotte, and the other Scary publishers—each on
    her cell phone—passed her in a company limo. The light changed.
    Magnolia looked at her watch, a Cartier tank she'd indulged herself
    with in honor of getting her job. She realized now she'd certainly be
    late for her meeting.
       She might have the title. She might be the youngest woman to ever edit a magazine as huge as Lady. But Magnolia Gold felt, not for the first time, as if she were a big, fat fake. Any minute now, she'd be
    exposed as the cubic zirconia she truly believed she was.

C h a p t e r 2

    The Grunt Work and the Glory

    "Ah, the couture shopper," Sasha Dobbs greeted Magnolia as she entered her office on lower Fifth Avenue. "The sale—all
    it's cracked up to be?"
    "Bought a lot, sweat a lot," Magnolia replied to her assistant. She

    glanced at her watch. Five after nine.
    "Not to worry. The meeting's pushed to four because Little Jock
    broke his arm in an equestrian event yesterday. Or so they say."
    Jock didn't strike Magnolia as a Mr. Mom who'd hang out at a
    child's bedside, even if it was his first son after five tries in three mar
    riages. More likely than not, he was enjoying the happy ending of a
    very late night, probably with someone cute and young and not his
    wife. But it was a gift to Magnolia just the same. She'd have the better
    part of the day to rehearse for the meeting.
    Sasha handed her the morning's messages. Three were from publi
    cists, one from her friend Abbey, and another from Natalie Simon, the town's current alpha dog editor, who headed up Dazzle. She'd hired Magnolia for her first job, as her secretary, a title you were still allowed to use twelve years ago at Glamour.
    "Okay if Cam pops in?" Sasha asked.
    "Two secs, Sash." As Magnolia scanned her e-mail, Sasha arranged
    a fresh bouquet of peonies. Twice a week, Sasha stopped at the corner
    grocer and managed to discover flowers that looked as if they came from
    Takashimaya. Nonetheless, Magnolia made a mental note, when salary
    renegotiations came up, to ask for a weekly stipend to order fresh flow
    ers every week from a real florist—ideally, that guru of design known
    for supersimple, superexpensive monochromatic bouquets.
    She'd be useless without Sasha. When Magnolia's previous assis
    tant, the plummy-voiced Fiona, had failed to return from a vacation,
    Magnolia seriously considered hiring the Oberlin grad who was
    temping for her. Then she got a peek at her pierced tongue. The next
    day Sasha showed up, dressed in a slim black suit by Theory. Sasha
    had limited experience beyond Teach for America, but she clinched
    the deal with her thank-you.
    Magnolia never hired anyone who didn't send a follow-up note; to
    not thank a potential boss for her time, and make a case for how per
    fect you were for the job, was just plain dumb. Sasha's note was liter
    ate and hand-delivered on creamy, engraved Smythson of Bond Street
    stationery.
    Sasha had begun six months ago at $41,000 and