Julia's Child (9781101559741) (22 page)

It was a couple of hours later when Marta's voice sang out purposefully. “Oh, Julia!” I turned to her. “Meet Kai from Whole Foods!”

Aha! Hours ago, I had thought to wonder whether he'd turn up. I looked him up and down. Kai was tall, dark, and handsome, perhaps half Asian, half skater dude. He had coffee-colored skin, straight brown hair, and big brown eyes. “Ladies, it's a pleasure,” he said warmly. “I thought you weren't going to make the trade show.”

“I decided that wasn't wise,” I said evenly.

“So how's it going?”

“Good! It's good,” I insisted. “I can't believe how much product we've moved today. And I'm going hoarse, and it's only . . .” I looked at my watch. Oh. It was five thirty already. I had an hour left to meet the buyer of my dreams.

“Hang in there,” he said kindly. “These things can kill a person. Look at me! I'll need a chiropractor if I don't get out of here soon.”

In each hand he had a heavy shopping bag full of product samples—every one of them, I was sure, made by one of my competitors.

I stared at those bags with the feeling of doom, wondering if Melissa's Munchers had made it inside. I tried for a joke. “Well, Kai, you don't really need all that stuff. With muffets selling out at three of your stores already . . .”

He laughed. “I hear you, Julia. We'll talk soon. When all this madness is over.” As he walked away, I said a silent prayer that those bags were full of twenty-five brands of yogurt smoothies.

Marta read my thoughts. “You know, Julia, possession is nine tenths of the law. You're already on his shelves. Why would he take the trouble to replace our product with another one just like it?”

“From your lips to God's ears, Marta.” I could only pray that she was right.

“Anyway, it looks like we brought enough.” Marta showed me what was left—a few cartons of muffets. “With only an hour to go.”

One more hour. I spun around to squint at the stream of people trickling past our booth. Maybe this would be the moment when one of them would appear. Yes! That must be how it would happen. Someone who tasted muffets earlier in the day would come back now to talk to us about a deal. There was no reason it shouldn't play out that way. A serious buyer would sample everything before circling back to make up his mind.

Wouldn't he?

I was like the survivor of a shipwreck, treading water in the ocean: I knew I couldn't go on like this forever, but I wasn't quite ready to slip beneath the waves yet.

I brushed a few crumbs off Yona's table and then stepped over to the chalkboard to smooth down the flapping corner of a poster. It was a blow-up of Wylie, his arms stretched wide, looking upwards. We'd superimposed the various flavors of muffets in an arc above him, creating the illusion that Wylie was juggling them like a circus performer. The flavors were labeled over each picture: “Apple and Cheddar!” “Focaccia Fiesta!” They sailed above his rounded toddler head like a rainbow.

I'd studied my dog-eared entrepreneur magazines while designing those signs. They'd cautioned me that it usually took a few rounds on the trade-show circuit to find your audience. But I'd really believed that this one day would do it for me. I
needed
ANKST to work for me, and so I'd believed that it would.

Wallowing in my disappointment, I almost didn't notice the suits stroll into our booth. The two unfamiliar men wore pinstripes. I glanced over at Marta to see if she'd noticed them. But she was busy with a gray-haired lady, probably a health-food-store owner.

“Hello there,” I greeted our visitors.

One of them held a map of the trade-show booth assignments, marked up in ink pen. The other one checked his ANKST catalog and addressed me. “Are you Julia Bailey? I'm J. P. Smith.”

“Yes, sir.” I shook his hand. “How can I help you, Mr. Smith?”

He definitely wasn't a health-food-store owner. He looked more like a corporate lawyer. His starched white shirt collar stood up just so. “I'm from GPG. We were wondering if you'd take a meeting. Say, next week? You're based in New York, correct? Our offices are just in midtown.”

I blinked at him for a minute, trying to decide whether or not to admit that the name GPG didn't ring any bells. Some of the big grocery chains were part of large corporations.

“A meeting?”

The two men nodded in unison.

I'd prefer an order, but sure I'll take a meeting. The subway fare would be the cheapest business expense in Julia's Child's history. “Certainly,” I said. “Next week in midtown.”

“Super. My team and I look forward to hearing more about Julia's Child.” He handed me his business card.

I promised to phone his assistant on Monday. Then they were gone.

I turned to Marta. “GPG?”

She shook her head. “
Chica
, I never heard of it. But that don't matter, as long as their checks don't bounce.”

Chapter 18

“GPG? I think it stands for Gulf Pacific Group,” Luke said. “It's a big conglomerate. Why?”

I'd arrived home from the trade show in the midst of bath-time and bedtime madness, so I'd been waiting an hour to talk to Luke about my whirlwind day. “Well, I hope it's a conglomerate that owns a chain of grocery stores. They turned up at the end of the day. They want to meet with me, but I don't know why.”

I handed the business card to Luke. He looked at it, shrugged, and handed it back. It was only marginally more forthcoming than what you'd expect to receive from a CIA operative. It contained just a name and phone number under the gray letters
GPG.

“Interesting,” Luke said. “So let's Google.”

“Oh, baby!” I teased. But I trotted after him toward his computer. He sat down in the desk chair and I sat down on his lap, and together we stared at GPG's corporate Web facade. There was a long list of food brands, brands they owned. We recognized a Napa winery and a luxury ice cream.

There weren't any grocers on the list.

“What do you suppose these guys are after?”

“I don't know, honey.” Luke scratched his chin. “Maybe they want to buy your business, not your products.”

I sat up straighter on Luke's lap. It was an idea I'd never considered.

Luke skimmed the list. “You'd be in good company with these brands.” We clicked through the meager information on their site. After reading every word, I still wasn't even sure what gulf the first
G
in GPG referred to. The corporation had offices on every continent except Antarctica. I chewed on my lip. “They didn't tell me a thing, Luke. But it says here that they acquire a brand every two weeks.”

“This is really wild, Julia. I'd better get some champagne out of the fridge.”

I shook my head. “Don't pop the cork yet. Why on earth would they want my unprofitable company? These other brands are all big-time. Maybe they've mistaken me for someone else.”

Luke laughed. “Don't you think
they
started small? Whatever they're after, you'll have an interesting meeting. Shall we have a cocktail now?”

I followed him into the kitchen.

Luke sliced a lime, while I stared out the window, lost in thought.

“Did any of the chain grocery stores you were looking for turn up?”

I shook my head miserably. “Not unless they were incognito. There were dozens of independent stores that showed interest. But without a big distributor behind me, that will never work.”

“It's not nothing. Maybe health-food stores are your brand's niche?”

“If I could sell to every single one in the country, then maybe it would work. Otherwise . . .” I didn't finish the sentence. Unless GPG had big ideas for my company, it might be curtains for Julia's Child.

Chapter 19

C
lutching a visitor's pass, I walked through the crowded lobby of an enormous office tower on Sixth Avenue. The place gave off a familiar smell: corporate culture. It buzzed with the self-important energy of a big-city firm. It was early afternoon, and many of the corporate drones were returning to the building with their lunches in tidy white bags. They moved in twos and threes toward the elevators, their ID tags hanging around their necks or clipped to their belts.

I watched two women ahead of me march toward adjacent automated turnstiles. Without breaking stride, they swiped their IDs in front of the machines' laser readers. The Plexiglas gates parted neatly, allowing them to pass. Once upon a time, I was one of them. I too wielded that bit of laminated power—a card marking me as a member of the inner circle.

Now, as I stepped toward the monolithic granite security desk separating the insiders from the outsiders, I had never felt more like a frumpy mom. Sure, I was wearing the right clothes. My nicest suit still fit me, and my blouse was fresh from the dry cleaner's plastic. But the clothes felt stiff and unfamiliar, and I was certain that anyone who bothered to glance at me would peg me as an imposter.

Corporate land was like a foreign country that I had once inhabited comfortably, but which had turned on me and become unfamiliar.

“Photo ID, please!” barked a voice from the other side of the marble desk. I slipped my ID and a visitor's pass through the slot. “Nineteenth floor, thank you!” My papers were returned to me, and the door swung open.

The guard, in his blue uniform, pointed toward one of the elevators. I pressed the “up” button and a set of doors parted instantly. I stepped in alone.

The GPG building had the sort of polished brass elevator doors that were reflective enough for finger-combing one's hair. I used the last few moments before my mystery meeting to neaten up.

“Welcome to GPG,” chirped a receptionist as the elevator doors parted. She wore a gray GPG blazer, the exact shade of the granite wall behind her. The granite, I noticed, had an enormous “GPG” carved into its face.

“Hi. I'm Julia Bailey,” I told her. “I'm here for a meeting with J. P. Smith.”

“One moment, Miss Bailey. I'll let him know you're here. May I take your coat?”

She rose from behind the desk and opened a closet, which was perfectly camouflaged by the maple paneling on one wall of the reception area. I handed over my coat and tried to look around. But the place was built to conceal. The granite and maple swooped around me, offering only an oblique glimpse of the passageways that led to where the real work was done.

“Ms. Bailey,” said a voice. “Thanks for coming by.”

I spun around to find the speaker. At the trade show I'd been too overwhelmed to get a good look at J. P. Smith. Now I saw a thin, bookish face and a very expensive suit. His dark hair was perfect and neat. He might have been sent by central casting to play the role of corporate titan.

“It's my pleasure.” I offered my hand.

He had a titan's handshake. “Would you step this way?” He slid open another neatly camouflaged door, revealing a tiny, windowless conference room. Apparently, I wouldn't be getting the nickel tour. This must be the room where they held meetings of little consequence. The visitor could be coughed back off the premises in mere seconds if the fit wasn't just right.

“One moment while I grab my colleague,” Smith said, disappearing.

I chose one of the matching gray mesh chairs. There were only four of them, pulled close to the slab of maple that served as a table. The room was lit by large translucent panels on the wall, providing the illusion of windows. GPG, whatever it was, did not give up its secrets easily.

Smith reentered the room, followed by his tidy sidekick.

He too offered his hand. “I'm Paul Smythe,” he said. “It is a pleasure to see you again, Ms. Bailey.”

Smythe looked a lot like Smith—the slightly younger model. As we shook hands, I smiled. “Ah, the team of Smith and Smythe! But you must get that all the time.”