Page 88 of Friend of the Family

‘No,’ said Amy, laughing. ‘You know me and social media.’

‘You should,’ said Tracey seriously. ‘The Miranda Pilley interview is trending.’

‘That’s great. I was just about to come out and congratulate everyone on a terrific issue.’

‘I think you’d better take a look.’

It was the top headline on Growler, one of the most popular internet gossip sites: ‘Miranda Hates Gays? Gay pride group slams model for “anti-gay propaganda”, while top feminists criticise her “prehistoric” views on marriage.’

‘What the hell? When did this happen?’

‘About an hour ago, as far as I can tell. It looks like some gay pressure group has got hold of an early copy of the interview and has chosen to take it out of context.’

‘Which bit?’

Tracey read out the passage: ‘“I’m kind of a romantic when it comes to marriage. I love all that boy-meets-girl, love-at-first-sight stuff, one man and one woman together for the rest of their lives. It’s a nice idea.”’

Amy frowned, confusion fighting with her rising panic. ‘I don’t understand, what’s anti-gay about that?’

‘This pressure group, the Pink Panthers, are taking the “one man and one woman” quote entirely out of context and saying that Miranda’s against gay relationships. They’re seizing on it to make a point about gay marriage still not being recognised in dozens of countries.’

‘But she wasn’t saying anything even close to that!’

‘I know that, you know that, but that’s not how the internet works. All anyone is going to see is the headline “Miranda Hates Gays”.’

Amy felt her head begin to pound. ‘Can’t we do something? Put out a statement or something? Isn’t this what the lawyers are for?’

‘It’s already too late for that. Hundreds of other sites – even some of the newspapers – have jumped on it, so now it’s going viral. And the way it’s spinning, it looks like we’re complicit.’

‘What? What’s it got to do with us?’

?

??Well, we’re running the story, not questioning the gay line, going on about how great marriage is.’

‘Her marriage, we’re happy for Miranda!’ cried Amy. ‘That’s all!’

Tracey nodded. ‘I totally agree. But you know how social media can twist everything out of context.’

Once Tracey had left, Amy picked up her phone and called Miranda’s manager, Karrie. Within the hour, Miranda had made a statement on Twitter clarifying her position, saying that she had championed same-sex marriage from the start, and apologising for any confusion. Verve.com posted a feature about the magazine’s favourite same-sex couples, whilst Amy took to her own barely used Twitter account to write a heartfelt and passionate post: ‘Let’s celebrate love, not use it to divide humanity. Let’s celebrate freedom of speech, not abuse it in the name of clickbait.’

Never had 140 characters created such a storm in one afternoon.

Radio 4, LBC, even CNN all got in touch to ask her views on whether journalism was in crisis, sacrificing the truthfulness of news to bolster web traffic and ad revenues.

Amy gave one short interview warning media companies not to jettison trust and truth because of digital panic, and within fifteen minutes, her opinions were trending even higher than the original controversy.

Whether it would be enough to stop Douglas Proctor coming on the war-path only time would tell.

Chapter 28

The Twitter storm died down as quickly as it had started. So much so that by mid-afternoon, the story had been relegated to a minor corner of the Daily Mail homepage and the anti-Miranda tweets had slowed to just a trickle. At the same time, WHSmith, McColl’s and supermarkets around the country were reporting that they had sold out of Verve’s October issue in less than a day.

Tracey suggested nipping out to Tesco Express to get some champagne to celebrate, but the jet lag was setting in and Amy felt exhausted. She took a long swig of lukewarm coffee and reached for the Pret salad that had been waiting for her since lunchtime. She ripped open the box and picked at some avocado and crayfish, hoping it would revive her.

The events of the day had distracted her from thinking about David. She had tried not to dwell on Josie going round to their house whilst she was in New York, consoling herself with the fact that surely they were not so brazen as to have sex in the house with Tilly there. But you never knew.

‘Amy, have you got a minute to come and look at some clothes?’ Renee was a junior fashion editor being allowed to do her first shoot, thanks to the rest of the fashion team being at the shows.