(No, I’m alright, Sam, had one upstairs.)

SAM takes the lid off the coffee, knocks it back in one go.

The circulation’s finally taken a leap, it’s early days, but the heart monitor is flickering, it’s definitely flickering. Print journalism lives to fight another day.

A half-hearted cheer from the others. He holds up the parcel.

Just arrived from the print shop.

He pulls off the wrapping to reveal a large framed print of a topless girl, kneeling on an unmade bed. It’s not a professional-standard image, it’s been taken by an amateur. The girl has very large breasts, and is in a pose that emphasises this, arching her back, presenting her arse. A sexy face, lips apart, a finger in her mouth. She is undoubtedly beautiful, but also very natural, her make-up is a little crudely applied, her hair is a little wild, she wears a white-cotton pair of everyday pants, chipped blue nail varnish, plastic bangles on her wrists. AIDAN takes down last year’s winner from where it hangs on the wall, and places the new print in its place.

Lady and gentlemen, meet Doghouse’s Local Lovely, 2012.

They all look at it.

CHARLOTTE (reading from the caption). ‘Carrie, eighteen, likes Twilight books and theme parks.’

RUPERT. Chestington World of Adventures!

CHARLOTTE. It’s retarded. At least last year’s had the reading age of a grown-up.

RUPERT. Charlotte was reading Proust when she was eighteen.

CHARLOTTE. Rupert was playing soggy biscuit when he was eighteen.

RUPERT. Still do. Lovely end to an evening, a good round of old SB.

CHARLOTTE. What were you doing when you were eighteen, Sam?

SAM. Revising.

CHARLOTTE. No but for fun.

SAM. Revising. Pretty much from when I was sixteen, to when I came here, I was revising.

AIDAN’s looking up at the print on the wall.

AIDAN. I really like this.

RUPERT. Carrie, meet Humbert Humbert.

AIDAN. No, I do, I mean. Aesthetically. I think this is what we should be going for. Much more natural than last year’s. Natural’s good. There was a sort of, plastic quality to last year’s, around her –

CHARLOTTE. Tits.

AIDAN. No, I meant more in her / energy –

CHARLOTTE. Tits.

AIDAN. I mean, there was a quality, an overall quality that I found a bit, intimidating. But this is good, it’s very real very next-door very normal. How many entries did we have this year?

SAM. Nine hundred and sixty-nine.

RUPERT laughs. CHARLOTTE gives him a look.

RUPERT. Sixty-nine.

AIDAN. Not bad. Up on last year.

CHARLOTTE. It was Sam’s choice.

AIDAN. Yes, I know. It’s an excellent choice, Sam.

SAM. I thought she looked friendly. Sort of, approachable.

They all look at the print.

CHARLOTTE. Yeah, that’s the word. Approachable.

,

AIDAN. Once more unto the breach.

AIDAN sits behind his desk. RUPERT and CHARLOTTE grab the two other chairs in the office, SAM has to make do with a beanbag.