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Morgan’s voice.
    â€œNo problem,” I said cheerily, stabbing the intercom button and sticking out my tongue. Titles and back cover copy by noon. Great. I had only a hundred other things to do, not to mention going over my notes for the lunch meeting with the Gnat.
    I checked my e-mail. Sixteen new messages. Nine were from Morgan: Remke’s dictates for Posh employees. The use of blue pen was now against company policy, since it didn’t mimeograph as well as black. Editors were never to use red pencil to edit, as copyeditors traditionally used red. Lunch was limited to one hour, except for author and literary agent lunches, which had to be approved in advance. The use of letterhead for scrap paper was absolutely forbidden. On and on and on. My favorite was: The frivolous use of e-mail is strictly forbidden.
    I clicked open a message from Eloise. Tell me how it went with Remke on our cig break!—E.
    What would I do without Eloise? I ignored all messages related to work and opened one from Amanda Frank, which had also been sent to Eloise. The three of us met without fail every Friday night for the Flirt Night Roundtable, which included gossip, venting about work, nine-dollar drinks, guy hunting and, of course, flirting. Amanda and her boyfriend had moved in together a year ago, so she was out of the running for the flirting part. But shenever missed a Friday. Well, actually, we never did much flirting at all (we mostly eyed cute guys and occasionally tried to meet them). It had been Eloise who’d dubbed our early get-togethers “Flirt Night,” and it had been me, the editor, who’d added the “Roundtable,” since we discussed flirting more than we did it. The name had stuck. Each week for six years now, we’d traded turns at choosing the place to meet and arranging with everyone.
    Hey guys! How about Tapas Tapas, the new place on 16th off Union Square, for tonight’s FNRT? Time Out mag says it’s the latest Beautiful People hot spot and has great tapas. It’s super-expensive, but oh well! Same time as usual. See ya’ll later!—Amanda
    Amanda was a transplanted cowgirl from Louisiana. Honest—she was from a ranch and everything. She had long blond hair, something rare in New York City, and attracted a lot of guys our way every time we went out, which Eloise and I sincerely appreciated. I typed back a Can’t wait, then clicked onto Word to start drafting titles and back cover copy for the Gnat’s memoir.
    Title Suggestion: The Gnat Sucks. Back Cover Copy Headline: The true story of Natasha Nutley, a blood-sucker squashed in her prime. Read it and weep tears of joy that you’re not her!
    I smiled. If only.
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    Natasha Nutley kissed the air close to my cheek. I couldn’t even lampoon it as the Hollywood kiss; everyone I knew kissed like that. Well, except my own friends. Acquaintances and business associates air-kissed, sometimes going so far as to air-kiss both cheeks, as though they were European. If someone was willing to muss up her Bobbi Brown lipstick by actually kissing your flesh, she was your real friend.
    Natasha settled her super-thin self into the chair across from me at a back table in the Blue Water Grill. I hadn’t seen her in ten years, since graduation day at Forest Hills High School. She looked exactly the same…well, sort of. At least she didn’t look twenty-eight. Maybe she’d already had work done on her eyes?
    â€œOmigod!” she trilled one second later. “I see my agent. I have to go say hello! Excuse me, Janey?”
    I nodded and forced a smile. Janey. Hardly an appropriate name for a big deal senior editor like me. (I wasn’t going to tell the Gnat my real title.) I watched Natasha glide to a table full of tanned men. More air-cheek kissing.
    I was grateful for the reprieve. When the hostess had led Natasha to my table, my heart started booming in my chest. Suddenly I wasn’t even