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Miranda knows that installing listening devices in her outer office is not the epitome of ethical conduct. She also knows that such behaviour is exactly in keeping with the martial discipline she runs her office - and, by extension, her magazine - with. Therefore, she feels no particular contrition, remorse or conflict over this decision. Such emotions are generally foreign concepts to her, anyway.
What she does feel, however, is aghast. How her two assistants manage to execute the litany of tasks she throws at them every day while carrying on such an incessant stream of inane chatter, she has no idea. She chooses not to mention it. This has nothing to do with having grown uncharacteristically fond of Emily and Andrea (especially not Andrea). Not at all. It is entirely to do with the Board finally putting their foot down and limiting the number of firings she is permitted to conduct per month. Entirely. A ruinous decision. God, she hates Irv.
I.
“How’s it going with that model of yours?”
Her ears prick up at Emily’s not quite dulcet tones.
“Hardly a model of mine, Em. He only asked me out last week and we’re getting coffee on Sunday. All perfectly friendly.”
Emily snorts. “I’m sure.”
“You never know,” Andrea murmurs, “he might just want more exposure to Runway. Sure, he’s the lead in the Valentino spread, but are you telling me no one’s ever shown interest in you because of your job?”
“Fair point. If he was genuinely interested though, would you give him a chance?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. That’s kind of what coffee dates are for, aren’t they? Giving people a chance?”
“If you say so.”
“Well, I guess that you wouldn’t really know. Didn’t Serena rent out the entire Westwood showroom for your birthday?”
“Some of us happen to like grand romantic gestures. Don’t you?”
Silence.
“I guess?”
“I forgot. You dated that amateur grilled cheese fanatic for years. Silly me.”
Miranda has heard enough. She stands up and closes the door, then returns to her desk and picks up the phone.
“Nigel? Yes. I want a mockup of the Valentino spread with annotations showing all the models’ names. In an hour.”
It takes less than a day to run a background check on the main male model, and less than two to successfully bribe Nigel with an elevated budget for his upcoming shoot to discreetly inform Andrea that said model is quite obviously engaged in a relationship with some no-name hairstylist. Her own name, naturally, is not to be mentioned at all in relation to such a discovery.
Why she has decided upon this course of action, she doesn’t quite know. Actually, she does. As she gravely informed Nigel, she simply cannot have her employees inadvertently partaking in infidelity. Being the other woman went out of fashion in 1998, and her assistants represent the magazine. It would be optically embarrassing to be so behind the times.
Even if she has never felt quite so satisfied by optical engineering before. Particularly given that the relationship between the model and the hairstylist was actually ambiguous at best. Not that she would ever admit that to a court of law, let alone her Art Director.
II.
Miranda does not generally enjoy the Met Ball. She does not like making the mandatory niceties with endless sycophants, and she does not appreciate the fact she cannot indulge in anything beyond one (one!) drink. But what she really, really does not enjoy is watching Andrea stand almost shoulder to shoulder with that fluffy-haired mongrel of a journalist who is far too close with Irv to be worth anything save conversion into liquid fuel for her car. She does not enjoy the look on his face, the position of his hand, and she does not enjoy Andrea’s failure to remove herself from his presence. Does Andrea not know he is a known womaniser? Does she not know he is no doubt involved in the borderline fraudulent schemes cooked up by Irv? She's seen the latest audit reports. Christian Thompson is the sort of man who ought not to be trusted to tie his own tie (evidently, if the subpar attempt at a Windsor knot is anything to go by), let alone with her assistant.
The Editor edges closer. He seems to experience a flicker of something resembling self-awareness (must be a novel experience for him, how quaint) and picks up on her approach.
…”Call me, Andy!”
The mongrel leaves, but not before running his hand down her assistant’s bicep in a way which makes her toes curl in her heels. Andrea turns to face her with her ever-present serenity.
“I wasn't aware I was employing you at this event to entertain romantic overtures from improperly-attired men, Andréa.”
“You said you didn't need me for a few minutes, Miranda. I owed him a conversation for something he helped me with. Sorry.”
If any other employee had spoken to her in such a manner so totally void of deference they would no longer be an employee. Quite frankly, if Page Six was to be believed, some might no longer be alive. But for reasons she is unwilling to investigate at any meaningful - or, indeed conscious - level, she simply sighs.
“Well, I require you to do your job now. Come along.”
Later that week, Miranda strides into her office with the air of a woman who has just achieved a particularly pressing task. Which, of course, she has. She settles back into her chair. The floor is still reeling from the disaster zone she left in her wake after arriving two hours early and not telling anyone about it. But there had been a day where she had found herself unable to hear anything at all from Emily and Andrea, and rousing herself at an even more obscene hour than usual had been the only way she could feasibly check the bugs without discovery. To her irritation, one had completely disappeared and the back of the other had come loose. She screws the latter back together and places it carefully under the plant pot situated between the desks.
It was shortly before four when Emily’s voice unknowingly rings out from the outer office with information she is actually interested in.
“Surprised you’re not in more of a rush. Didn’t you have that date with Christian Thompson tonight?”
Miranda approvingly notes the scathing tone of her first assistant.
“Nope.” Andrea does not sound especially moved. “Can’t. He's managed to mess up his visa paperwork. Having to head back to Canada this weekend. Not exactly fitting the mood…”
“You don’t sound especially upset,” Emily replies, clearly amused. Miranda feels a flash of rare affection for her first assistant.
“Not really, no,” Andrea says. “That level of incompetence is an absolute buzzkill. I mean, talk about basic due diligence!”
Miranda smiles to herself. Her own visa paperwork is in excellent order. She personally checked yesterday. It hardly makes sense to waste an audience with the Secretary of Homeland Security, after all.
III.
“...Do you really want to get back with him? I thought he’d cleared off to Boston.”
“No…not really. But I don’t like how we left things, and if he’s got this new job at a burger joint literally five minutes away from my apartment, I might as well try to clear the air.”
“Is that what he thinks this is, though?”
“No,” Andrea sighs. “He almost certainly thinks it’s a quasi-date. Probably not quasi, if I’m being honest.”
“After the way he treated you? The names he called you? He practically called you a whore! He threatened you! I think not.”
“He doesn’t think, Em. That’s the problem.”
“His problem. Not yours. Shouldn’t be, anyway.”
Miranda hates not being able to delegate administrative tasks to her assistants. But that night, she narrows down the restaurants around Andrea’s address (somewhat illegally acquired on her part, but that is simply a matter of semantics) with an intensity usually impossible to achieve sans Starbucks.
Now for Facebook. She scrolls through Andrea’s timeline. Notes frequent reactions to status updates. One in particular leaps out as also appearing on a no doubt grease-infested establishment not far from Andrea’s home.
Nathaniel. Bingo. She picks up her phone.
Two days later, Miranda keeps a close ear to the conversations emitting from the desks. The excerpt she is awaiting occurs just after her steak delivery, when Emily sharply inhales.
“Fucking hell. Have you seen this?”
“What? Wait - Em, are you reading a local paper?”
“Yes, because your bloody ex - oh, just look.”
Silence.
Miranda smirks as she clicks on the open tab of her own laptop, where a small ninth-page box headline details the comprehensive shutdown of a Midtown burger joint and associated criminal charges directed at the new sous-chef on account of serious health and safety violations. Take that for grand…gestures.
“Andréa?” She calls. “Take this” - she waves at her semi-eaten lunch - “away.”
She swears she hears Andrea mutter something that sounds suspiciously like ‘hook, line and sinker’ under her breath as she settles back down at her desk. But that makes no sense at all.
IV.
“Hey Doug!”
Another one? Really?
“Yeah…yeah, tonight works great. Let's say the Oak Room at quarter to nine? Okay, sure! See you then. Bye!”
The pen between her fingers snaps in two. Red ink leeches onto the desk.
Miranda thinks Andrea seems entirely too familiar with this ‘Doug’. Simply preventing them from meeting tonight is unlikely to work or deter him in the long run. There is also insufficient information available to her at present to arrange another reputational defenestration, emergency arrest or deportation. A change of tack may be in order. Call it a reconnaissance mission.
“Andréa?”
“Yes, Miranda?”
“Schedule the run-through tomorrow for two. The twins need new stationery from the place that does the engraved leather journals. And book a table at the Oak Room for eight-thirty tonight. Bring the Book beforehand.”
Her assistant smiles beatifically at her. How odd.
“Yes, Miranda!”
What curious inflection.
“Oh, and Andréa? Look into the preliminaries of suing the manufacturers of Biro writing implements. Disgraceful craftsmanship. My desk requires cleaning.”
She is not in the habit of drinking prior to dinner, let alone drinking prior to dinner and delivery of the Book. Yet here she is, standing ominously in the foyer of her townhouse, glass of scotch in hand. It is eight-fifteen, and there ought to be the tell-tale turn of the key in the lock at any moment.
Eight-fifteen.
Eight-sixteen.
Eight-seventeen.
The lock turns. Miranda wonders if her sadistic streak has somehow inverted itself, because she now finds herself standing opposite Andrea, thoroughly attired in date-suitable couture, humming gently to herself. She pointedly clears her throat.
“Oh! Miranda. I thought you would have left already.”
“Evidently not. Although I thought you would have delivered the Book a little earlier, given I recall you are yourself engaged this evening.”
Why did she say that? When had Andrea told her that? Damn.
“It wasn’t ready until now,” Andrea replies. “I’ll probably be late at this rate.”
Miranda purses her lips. And then silently confirms that she is indeed developing a masochistic streak - or at the very least, a borderline voyeuristic one - because before she knows it, she’s opened her mouth and:
“Well. We can’t have that. Roy will have to drive both of us.”
Wonderful. Just wonderful. Not that she had any particular plan to avoid the eventual realisation, but she’s just made explicitly clear to Andrea that she knows they will be dining at the same location. Thank goodness for the abject moratorium on her staff asking her to explain herself. She contents herself with an explanation to her own brain, that being she is merely doing this so that she can assess the suitability of the man who may end up competing with her publication for Andrea’s time (and if he is unsuitable, she is confident she will have little problem winning that particular war by virtue of her capacity to induce sheer terror). Unfortunately, her own brain has had rather enough of it as of late, and instead keeps on diverting her attention to just how lovely Andrea looks in her Prada dress.
The car journey to this Oak Room establishment is quiet, and she cannot decide whether it is a comfortable or an awkward silence. Upon arrival, to her surprise, Andrea steps in front of her. She smiles at the maître d (a smile not quite wide enough that Miranda would have considered attempting to unilaterally fire him, despite having no connection to the place whatsoever) and chirps.
“Hello! Andy Sachs and Miranda Priestly.”
Honestly. If Andrea is to subject her to this inadvertent (albeit entirely self-inflicted) humiliation ritual, must she put her own name first? How utterly unprofessional.
(Nothing about this is professional, that nasty little voice in the back of her head helpfully pipes up. It's definitely not professional to stalk your second assistant while she's on a date in order to scare off said date like the proverbial father with a shotgun. No. Not father. Definitely not father. This is New York, not Alabama, and even if it were Alabama, she's English, however well-curated her accent is. Damn it.)
The flushed young man bows slightly and gestures for them to follow him. Miranda plasters her best impression of a crocodile - and that's saying something, she's got at least ten of them perfected - across her face and makes her way to the secluded booths at the back of the restaurant. High backs separate each booth, and her mood sours further. If she's going to spend her evening nursing a glass of what is a yet to be determined quality of wine, she'd better at least be able to see the duo causing her misery.
And then the maître d stops in front of a booth at the very back.
“Your table, ladies.”
Ladies? Table singular?
Miranda blinks and swivels her head to catch the eye of their host, only to find him nowhere to be seen. When she turns back to face Andrea, she is greeted with a smile which seemingly cannot decide which side of the line between dazzling and nervous it falls upon, and an outstretched arm to the seats.
“Ladies first.”
Miranda rarely finds herself as uniquely confused as she is in the current moment. Annoyed, yes. Irritated, certainly. Confused? No.
“Andréa. Ought you not to be waiting for your - friend? Doug?”
(Surely that is not his full name. And she refuses to call this mystery man anything but a ‘friend’).
“Oh, Doug? You've just met him. He showed us to our seats.”
She has a date with the glorified waiter? Dear Lord. Miranda swallows and decides that this cloak and dagger approach really isn't working for her. She should have known it was a mistake to deviate from her customary directness.
“I was under the impression you had a date.”
Andrea shifts almost imperceptibly from foot to foot. She has no right to find it faintly adorable. She finds it so nonetheless.
“Well, uh. That's kind of up to you.”
Excuse her? Has Andrea figured out what Miranda has been up to? Has she adopted an equally unorthodox approach to her contract as she does the execution of her job, and has decided that Miranda’s jurisdiction over her comings and goings extends to her personal life?
“I beg your pardon?”
The girl bites her lip, then offers a crooked, lopsided grin. Steps just a bit closer and places a warm hand over Miranda's left wrist.
“Dates tend to require the consent of both parties to happen. So tell me, Miranda. Do we have a date?”
FIN