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meeting about a position that’s come up? Maybe this morning at ten? I know it’s
Sunday?”
    “Of course I can come in for a meeting! Ten is
great.”
    “Perfect. Come to the same place as last time?”
    We say goodbye, and I spring toward the bathroom to
start getting ready. The sudden movement makes my stomach turn over, but I shake
it off and leap into the shower singing, for some reason, “I am, I am Superman!”
over and over at the top of my lungs as I lather my hair.
    Whoever said there are no second chances in life
was a moron.
    I arrive at The Line ’s offices twenty minutes early
with my hair brushed, my makeup done, and my clothes pressed. (I pick the suit
this time, hoping some of its respectability will rub off on me.) My stomach
still feels jumpy, but I chalk that up to nerves. At least I know I don’t smell
like alcohol, having loofahed every square inch of myself just in case.
    At ten on the dot, Elizabeth appears in the
Sunday-quiet lobby wearing an extremely short gray skirt and a tight blue
sweater.
    “Hi, Kate. How are you?”
    “I’m great. Thank you so much for giving me another
chance.”
    “Sure. So, you’ll be meeting Bob? You remember him
from a few weeks ago?”
    I think back to the sea of faces sitting around the
boardroom table. Try as I might, I can’t remember Bob.
    “Right, of course. Looking forward to it.”
    “Good. His office is two floors down?”
    I take the elevator to a floor where the decor
hasn’t been updated in at least twenty years. It’s Miami
Vice chic, and there’s something kind of seedy about the
atmosphere.
    Seeing no one, I push the doorbell that’s recessed
into the wall next to a solid wood door. A few seconds later, the door buzzes
open, revealing a squat, blond man who resembles Philip Seymour Hoffman, which
is ironic when you think about it because PSH played a music magazine guy in Almost Famous and . . . Focus,
Katie, focus!
    “Hi, Bob. Thank you so much for asking me back
after . . . well, you know. Anyway, I’m really excited to be
here.”
    He gives me a tight smile. “Yes, well, when this
assignment came up we thought of you . . . for obvious reasons.
Why don’t we go to my office?”
    OK, so it’s an assignment, not a full-time gig, but
everyone has to start somewhere, right?
    I follow him along a dark hall to another
nondescript brown door. He swipes a key card. The room behind the door has a
long row of unoccupied fabric-divided cubicles full of abandoned coffee
cups.
    “Is this some kind of call center?”
    “You might say that. This way.”
    He cuts to the right along a narrow passage through
the cubicles. As I turn to follow him, I notice a paper banner hanging on the
far wall. It reads: GOSSIP CENTRAL: IF YOU CAN’T FIND
ANYTHING MEAN TO SAY, YOU CAN FIND THE DOOR .
    What the hell?
    I realize Bob’s striding away from me, and I hurry
to catch up with him. At the end of the passage is another brown door. Bob
swipes his key card once again and pushes it open.
    “Sorry about all the security. But given the nature
of the information we deal with, we have to take every precaution.”
    Since when did album reviews become top-secret
information?
    “Of course.”
    Bob points to the chair in front of his
cheap-looking desk. “Have a seat.”
    I sit down gingerly. When is this guy going to put
me out of my misery and tell me what my assignment is?
    “So . . . I assume Elizabeth filled
you in?”
    “Actually, not really.”
    “Well, you’ll have to leave immediately because
there’s no telling how long she’s going to be in there. Everything’s all
arranged, and the staff’s expecting you. It’ll be a minimum thirty-day
assignment if all goes well, but I’m warning you, it might be longer. We’ll be
covering your expenses and paying the usual per-word rate. We’d like five
thousand words, but we’ll discuss the final length once we know what you’ve
got.”
    He picks up a bulky envelope from his desk and
hands