Something about you (Norminah)

Chapter Two

I spent three days interviewing candidates to take over my position and I finally settled on Avery Hall. He already had experiencing working at a magazine and more importantly, his one "accidental" interaction with Normani sealed the deal. They had complemented each other's taste in shoes and hit it off immediately. It took me six months to get to a stage where I could call Normani by her first name and there he was getting the privilege after a two minute conversation. And worse still, she had no clue that I was holding an interview at that moment, because I had been showing Avery around the office, so she was pleasantly surprised when I finally introduced him as her assistant.

I had to admit though that he was a quick learner, it took two weeks for him to start getting the hang of things. By then, I had signed my contract and I was finishing out my last two weeks as Normani's assistant before I officially began as a writer for La Sienne Daily.

On the morning of my first day, I stood downstairs in the lobby, watching as the few people that arrived early walked into the building, completely oblivious to how momentous the occasion was for me. Finally, I walked up to badge reader and swiped my brand new badge across it, smiling when Paul gestured for me to walk through. This was it, my first official day as a writer.

"Are you going to get into the elevator or not?"

"Oh sorry," I mumbled as I walked into the elevator and stood as far away from the angry green eyed woman. I had seen her sometimes around the office, her name was Lauren. "It's my first day."

"Aren't you Normani's assistant?" Lauren asked without bothering to look up from her phone.

"As a writer, it's my first day as a writer. But yes, I was Normani's assistant until yesterday."

Lauren smiled at me for the first time since I had walked into the elevator. "Well congratulations. I look forward to working with you."

She walked out of the elevator first and I followed, heading to my new desk instead of the desk that Avery now occupied. The office had an open plan with all the editors having their own offices while everyone else had individual desks out in the open. There was a conference room for briefings and pitch meetings and the staff room or area was set up like a bar with stools and a few tables around it. My desk wasn't too far from Normani's office, which I suspected was on purpose so I could still help Avery out if he needed it.

I had barely sat down when Avery sent me an email to let me know that Normani wanted to see me. I suspected it had something to do with my first article since I had missed yesterday's pitch meeting. I took out a notepad and a pen put the rest of my stuff away before heading over to Normani's office. I was so used to not having to wait for her to tell me to come in that I knocked twice and opened the door straight away.

"Wait I'm sorry, I shouldn't be doing that anymore. We can just start―"

"It's okay Dinah. How are you? You're here extremely early."

"Well it's my first day as a writer and I wanted to get here early and get started as soon as possible. I assume you wanted to see me with regards to my first story?"

"Yes I did," she pulled out a notepad and handed it to me. "Pick one from those topics and give me something by Friday latest?"

I looked at the list and the topic that stood out most at me was the one about getting along with family during holidays. I had a complicated relationship with most of my family and maybe it was because the holidays were coming up soon that this title seemed to jump out of the page at me, so I decided to go with that one. I crossed it off the list and handed it back to Normani.

She took a look at it and nodded. "Amazing. Starting next week you can pitch stories to me if there's something you really want to write about, but there will be times when I give people specific stories. If you have any issues or if you're struggling to write, please don't hesitate to come and see me okay?"