Page 33 of Minted

I knew she had crappy internet, but that makes the joke way less funny. Actually, she kind of sounds mad.

“Is that work?” Lila’s not being irritating. I just kind of quit paying attention without any warning. It’s all my fault, but I’m still annoyed that she’s prying.

“Oh.” What do I say? “It is, yeah. It’s someone who works for me.” There. That’s true.

My fingers fly over the letters. YOU’RE THE ONE BEING SILLY. THIS IS THE PHOTO I SENT. LET IT LOAD THIS TIME, YOU BIG PRUDE.

“You must like your job, too,” Lila says.

“Huh?” I look up.

“You’re smiling so big while you reply to a work text.” She wipes her mouth with a napkin. “That’s how I feel when I’m recommending my favorite authors to people, especially kids.”

“Do you really like books that much?”

“People who read are just. . .they have more insight than other people. They’ve spent a lot of time looking through windows to other worlds and points of view, and it expands their minds.”

My phone buzzes again, and like a junkie, I pick it up. PLEASE TELL ME YOU’RE NOT TEXTING ME ON YOUR DATE RIGHT NOW.

Not even a laugh? C’mon. IT’S YOUR FAULT. YOU TEXTED ME FIRST, AND IGNORING FRIENDS IS RUDE.

BENTLEY, DO NOT BLOW THIS. LILA’S THE MOST PROMISING OF THE THREE.

RELAX. I’M NOT BLOWING ANYTHING. I CAN TEXT YOU A PHOTO, AND THEN MAYBE YOU’LL BELIEVE ME.

DO NOT DO THAT.

WHY NOT? SHE LOOKS JUST LIKE HER PROFILE. YOU DID GREAT.

But when I look up, Lila’s gone. She’s written a note on a napkin. It says, “When you find a girl who makes you smile like those texts on your phone, don’t let her slip away. -L”

Well, shoot.

But I did learn one important thing.

I had way more fun at that holiday party than I did getting tacos, even though Lila wasn’t a man who was catfishing me. Now I just need to figure out whether it was the party setting or the person I went with. I have a pretty good suspicion that I already know the answer.

And Lila the Librarian already told me what to do.

But the girl I like thinks I’m a player, and the only reason we’re hanging out and texting is so she can help me find someone else to date. So what do I do when the person I want to be with is only around to help me do something I no longer want to do?

I think about that all the way home, while I breathe in cinnamon and try to figure out what else to text. And if I scroll through the photos I took under the pretense of helping her see herself more clearly before I go to bed, well.

It’s not like she doesn’t know I took them.

9

Barbara

When every other marketing and public relations firm was focused on mega-influencers, I was one of the first to insist on a micro-influencer branch. Even taking into account the amount of time involved in reaching out to twenty or thirty times as many influencers, it’s more cost effective for our clients to pay a dozen small TikTokers with far better engagement and niched audiences than it is to land a few huge ones.

But that ignores the most important part of finding and focusing on micro-influencers.

When chosen properly, they will grow as the client grows, and that synergy can often springboard both of them at the same time, improving the reach and power of both. That’s how I found Twinning, and I also recently discovered a brand that I think will be a perfect fit for them.

The gum’s called Chump Change, and they offer a lot of the shreds packages, like old-school baseball packs used to have. It has a double letter in the first name, and they’ve been using a lot of old, classic ads, but changing them slightly, to push their old-school revival brand of gum.

It plays well to the kids who want the gum, as well as the parents who would be the ones buying it. Their target demographic is sports-playing kids at games and events. And the #Twinning girls play doubles tennis at school. I think a remake of something similar to the Double Double your enjoyment ad from DoubleMint would be a real #homerun.

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