Page 28 of Home Grown Talent
Mac grunted and shuffled over to the tiny kitchen area to make herself a cuppa.
Owen finished pulling together the week’s timesheets, then emailed them over to the guy who did their payroll. Next, he pulled up the rotas for the next two weeks, and he and Mac discussed the alterations they’d need to make for the new job they’d taken on.
“It’s kinda tight,” Mac said at last, “but it should be fine. They’ll all be up for some weekend overtime, I reckon.”
By then the crew had begun arriving. Owen helped Steve and Ally load up the vans for the day ahead while Mac got everyone organised. She headed off with two of the guys for a day of maintenance contract work in the north and west of the city, while Owen took the others with him to the Chelsea job for what he knew would be a tough day, clearing out a mature hornbeam hedge and digging up a bunch of concrete paths to prepare the ground.
He didn’t get a chance to check his phone for a couple of hours, and when he did, he found a string of texts from Mason waiting for him, the last sent just a few minutes earlier.
OMG that’s awesome!
Thanks, BTW. I thought you might have changed your mind after last night.
Also, sorry about that. Hope I didn’t make you feel uncomfortable.
I mean, obviously I did. Sorry again.
If it makes you feel any better, I have a bloody awful hangover today.
Owen stared at the messages, reading them over and over. Then he typed a quick reply.
Honestly, no need to apologise. It was no big deal. Consider it forgotten.
He followed that up with,
Sorry you’ve got a hangover :-(
A minute later he got back,
Thanks <3 <3 <3
He stared at the last message—at the stupid little row of hearts—for too long before he put his phone away and got back to work.
Mason had been absolutely right about the time involved in working on Weekend Wellness. Over the next few weeks, it took up way more than the couple of hours Misty had predicted. RPP ended up suggesting eight ten-minute slots for the show to be filmed in three sessions. It didn't seem like that big of a commitment, and Owen agreed without thinking too much about it. However, within a few days of confirming, his inbox was brimming with invitations to production calls and meetings.
It turned out there would be a four-week lead-in to the airing of their first segment. During that time, they needed to secure a piece of ground to work on and get ready for filming—Misty apparently had somewhere in mind that had ‘allotment energy’—while Owen planned what plants to put in, and the basic gardening content for each slot. Misty wanted details in advance so that her team could work on a ‘loose script’ and get hold of the plants and equipment they needed.
“I thought you said you wanted us to talk naturally,” Mason said when she mentioned the script again. It was a chilly spring morning. Misty had asked them to come and see the plot, which turned out to be an area of semi-abandoned land next to the RPP studio.
“And you will,” Misty reassured Mason. “We definitely want to make the most of your spontaneous style. This is just about giving you guys some structure to help shape the conversation and make sure we’re hitting our key messages each week.”
Owen wondered what their ‘key messages’ might be, but decided not to ask. The presenting stuff was Mason’s department. He wanted to concentrate on checking out the space that was to be their garden.
Clearly, at some point in the past, this had actually been a garden. According to Misty, it was currently used by some staff for smoking breaks. There were a couple of disreputable-looking plastic chairs and a pile of cigarette butts on the concrete slab patio area to prove it. A few scraggly bulbs were poking up through the weeds, most of them coming up blind. An overgrown buddleia, probably self-seeded, dominated one corner of the rectangular plot. It was, at least, south-facing, and the brick side of the studio would be sheltered and warm. He could imagine a jasmine or honeysuckle climbing up the brickwork, perhaps trained over a small wooden arbour with a bench where you could sit and soak up the beautiful fragrance with the evening sunshine…
“...is that okay with you, Owen?”
He blinked and found Mason’s eyes on him, head slightly cocked as he waited for an answer. Over the last couple of weeks, they’d got to know each other a little better, and Mason had definitely softened towards Owen, dialling back the sarcasm and joking around in a more friendly way. By silent agreement, they’d put that night in Mason’s flat, when Mason had made a pass at Owen, firmly behind them. Which didn’t stop Owen noticing how gorgeous Mason looked every time they met. Today, he wore jeans and Converse, an oversized baby blue sweatshirt, and a slouchy beanie hat. The early sunshine gleamed in the wisps of pale blonde hair that framed his face, and his cheeks and nose were pinked by the chilly air.
Mason’s sculpted eyebrows arched questioningly, and Owen realised that he still hadn’t replied.
“Uh, sorry,” he said, scrubbing a hand through his hair. “I was just thinking about planting options. What did you say?”
Mason nodded towards Misty, who was, amusingly, dressed in green wellies and a Barbour jacket. “Misty was just saying that we’ll have a rough script to work from, with talking points and so on, to keep us on track rather than us trying to ad lib the whole thing.”
“Sounds good to me.” Owen was honestly relieved that they’d be getting some guidance on the presenting side. He had no idea what to say in front of a camera and had visions of freezing as soon as a lens was pointed in his direction.
Maybe Misty recognised his unease because she grabbed his arm and added, “Don’t worry, Mason will take the lead on the conversation. He’ll keep the discussion moving along while you”—was she squeezing his bicep?—“concentrate on covering the gardening content.”