No Two Are Alike

03 | taking the infamous article

Logan Winters leaned back in his chair and considered jumping from the seventh floor of his office building.

Christ, this meeting was boring.

A trip to the A&E could only spice things up. Who knew what he'd find? A man with crushed ribs from a Christmas tree accident. A woman with burnt fingers after reaching for the mince pie tray without oven mitts. It really was the best time of year for it.

Across the table, Kate's eyes narrowed.

Don't you dare, she mouthed, her eyes flicking to the door.

Logan grinned. Kate would be well mad if he just glided out the door, leaving her to the mercies of their editor, Jim Banks. Hell, maybe that was incentive enough. He always fancied Kate more when she was angry with him.

Logan mimed choking himself to death. Kate's lips twitched.

His phone buzzed.

Idiot, she wrote.

Logan studiously ignored this.

Up at the front, Jim was droning on and on about various statistics and their editorial strategy for December. Logan tried very hard not to look at Kate. "Editorial strategy" was one of Jim's favourite sayings; if their editor didn't like Logan's pitch about a celebrity's shoes, then it wasn't part of the editorial strategy. If he fired a writer, it was because that writer didn't fit with the editorial strategy.

Logan heavily suspected Jim's wife could get him a tie he didn't like for Christmas and Jim's excuse for returning it would be that it "didn't fit with the editorial strategy."

"Logan."

His eyes snapped up. Jim was looking at him expectantly.

"Your pitches?" he prompted.

"Oh." Logan cleared his throat. "Right."

He consulted his notebook, reading through a list of four. The first two were features on football teams in the area doing Christmas toy drives, and the third was a review of a pantomime that Benedict Cumberbatch had miraculously agreed to do. Poor sod. Logan hoped they were paying him well.

The fourth pitch was slightly more vague.

"I want to do some sort of holiday prank," Logan explained. "A Borat-style personal essay. Something the public can really sink their teeth into."

This was a risk. Jim rarely approved personal essays, and especially not from writers that had been at Shout! for less than two years. But to Logan's surprise, Jim leaned forward, steepling his fingers.

"What sort of prank did you have in mind?"

"There's a pair of football players," Logan said quickly. "Identical twins. I could reach out and see if they'd be willing to trade places for a week during Christmas events."

"How is that personal?"

"I'd go with them," Logan said. "I'd document their experiences: what it's like to switch places, people's reactions to finding out..." He paused. "A fly on the wall, if you will."

Jim tapped his pen on his notepad. He didn't look unconvinced, Logan realized with relief. Merely contemplative. Which was good. Logan could work with that.

"No," Jim said, and Logan deflated.

"No?"

"We won't be able to afford the twins," Jim clarified. "They're too big. And even if we could, it's not personal enough. I want something that you're emotionally invested it. Something that you're experiencing yourself."