Sacha arrived at the address Si had given her over the 'phone the previous day, and double-checked the number. The door she was standing outside didn't look like a magazine office. She wasn't quite sure what a magazine office might look like but she was pretty sure it shouldn't look like this: she was looking at a scuffed, unmarked door that was wedged tightly between two shops.

It was only when a young woman walked past her and through the door that Sacha realised that maybe this really was the right address: the woman was carrying a sheaf of papers and a box of C.D.s under her arm, which Sacha saw was labelled "Not for general release". The woman also had seemingly more piercings than pieces of her body to pierce, and Sacha suddenly felt a little awkward in her blouse and jacket - even with the jeans she'd decided upon. Nonetheless, Sacha breathed in to calm herself (she couldn't believe that she had to calm herself - anyone would think she was going on a first date or something) and pushed the door open.

There was a steep flight of stairs in front of her, lit only by a 60-watt bulb hanging from a cobwebbed cable overhead. Sacha climbed the stairs and came to a bare landing at the top which showed signs of having recently had a carpet removed. There was, fortunately, more light up here than at the foot of the stairs: Sacha pushed her glasses up her nose and looked left and then right. To her right was a shut door; to her left the sound of people talking loudly and a printer slowly churning out leafs of paper. To the left it was, then.

Sacha immediately noticed the woman she'd seen enter the building earlier. "Excuse me, could you tell me where I could find Si?" she asked the woman.

The woman turned towards a tall, dark-haired man making a cup of tea in the corner of the room. "Si! Someone to see you."

The man looked up eagerly and then smiled at Sacha like she was an old friend. "You must be Sarah" he said.

"Sacha" replied Sacha.

"Oh, of course. My mistake." He walked over to her and shook her hand. "Hi, I'm Si." He laughed precisely three times, and then stopped abruptly. "Come over to my desk."

Sacha followed him to a cluttered desk next to a dusty window. "Here, have the chair" he said, offering her an old office chair while he sat on a stack of telephone books.

"So" he said loudly, "Rona says you want to write for us."

Sacha looked at him, slightly perplexed. "Well . . . Yeah, I guess so."

"Great! That's the spirit. I've got just the job for you. Tea?" He held a tin of biscuits out towards her while sipping at the mug of tea he'd made himself earlier.

"Uh, no, no thankyou" replied Sacha.

"That's all right" said Si. "You don't have to have a biscuit. Or tea. We're all about individuality here at 'The Word'. Now -" he put away the tin of biscuits - "let's talk about how we can make you one of the team."