I talked for twenty-five minutes.

I drew the posters on the whiteboard. A close-up of Mavis's hands, packing biscuits. Hands that have made 40 million Digestives. A photo of Liam, next to a black-and-white photo of his great-grandad at the same machine. Same factory. Same recipe. Four generations.

I described the TV advert, scene by scene. The six o'clock shift arriving in the dark. The ovens warming up. The first biscuits coming off the line. Then a cut to a teenage girl in London, dunking one in her tea.

I didn't need the slides. I'd lived every one of them.

Halfway through, Olivia tried to interrupt.

“Of course,” she said brightly, “we also have a more modern option, if you'd like to see something a bit more glamorous. We've got an influencer concept set in Ibiza—”

“No, thank you,” said Catherine Hartley, without taking her eyes off me. “Carry on, Becca.” Olivia sat back down.

When I finished, the room was completely silent.

One of Catherine's directors, an older man, was quietly wiping his eyes.

Catherine Hartley reached out and took a biscuit from the open packet. She dunked it in her coffee.

“My great-grandfather started that factory with eleven people,” she said quietly. “We've spent the last ten years trying to make Hartley's look like everyone else. You're the first person who's told us to look at what we already are.”