7. Victoria
VICTORIA
Ishould have known.
Looking back, I should have somehow seen this coming.
Realistically, there was no way for me to predict this terrible turn of events. There were no warning signs. No hints or whispers.
But still, something in the back of my mind blamed myself for not knowing.
It started with an email.
Chris was not known for being an early riser, but there it was. A message from him in my inbox at four a.m. Pacific time.
Instructions to meet Joe in the lobby of my hotel at eight a.m. Nothing else.
I’d heard of Joe in passing. He generally covered football. I figured he was in town for the festivities and was dropping something off for me.
It wasn’t all that unusual to have the network treat us journalists like their personal delivery team since red-eye flights generally got to the other side of the country faster than even overnighting a package.
But I didn’t need anything.
Unless Miles requested a piece of equipment and didn’t let me know, there wasn’t any other reason for this meetup that I could think of.
What a fool.
Joe stood there, looking far too polished for the early hour and his late flight.
His perfectly uniform teeth, which were an unnatural shade of white, the tan I knew he hadn’t earned from stepping foot outside, combined with his knit polo and pressed slacks, gave off the vibe of forced charm.
Like he tried really, really hard to look like he wasn’t trying at all.
I shouldn’t be so hard on him, or the other men in my field. We were all fighting against unrealistic standards in our own ways.
“Hi, Joe,” I gave him a small wave as I approached.
He looked me over, not quite smiling back. “Hello.”
I fought to keep my smile in place. “I’m Victoria.”
Something in his eyes clicked. “Ah, yes.”
Did he not recognize me? We weren’t close friends, but we’d worked together for four years on the same floor. Yes, we were often away on assignments, but there was no way he simply had no idea who I was.
“Chris didn’t mention what you were bringing.” I lifted my hand to accept whatever it was he was here to drop off.
He smiled in the most demeaning way. “I’m not here to––”
“Victoria, there you are!” Miles was running up to us, a look of panic in his eyes. “I’ve been trying to call you.”
I checked my phone screen and saw it was still on Do Not Disturb from last night. “Sorry.”
“You’re Miles?” Joe eyed him for a brief moment before extending his hand. “Joe Banks.”
“We’ve worked together before.” Miles didn’t bother to hide his bitterness like I had.
“Have we?” Joe looked off into the distance as if trying to recall. “Well, that’s probably why they paired us together again.”
“What?” The word was out faster than I could process. He was paired with Miles? Oh, what? Was he picking Miles up for their next assignment? Was that why Miles had been trying to call? Why didn’t Chris tell me that?
I didn’t want to start over with a new cameraman, but better now than in a week.
Joe glanced at me like he’d forgotten I was there, “Victoria, is it? Chris said you had notes. You can go ahead and send them my way.” He winked, then began speaking to Miles. “Now, I have some locations I’d like to check––”
“What?” It was the only word my brain seemed able to speak.
Joe sighed and turned his whole body to face me. “Perhaps you could be more specific in your question?” He shot me a practiced smile. “You are a journalist, are you not?”
The urge to punch him in his perfectly sculpted nose was almost too much to ignore, but Miles stepped in before I could resort to violence.
“Joe is here to provide additional coverage of the event.” Miles shot him a side glance before looking back at me. “With the additional focus on the women’s teams, the network decided to send out Joe and Cambrie, but she must not have arrived yet.”
Joe shrugged. “She was on my flight, can’t imagine where she got lost to.”
“She was on your flight, but you didn’t wait for her? Didn’t share a car?” Miles asked.
“My driver was already here. She had several bags she had to wait for at baggage claim.”
“So you didn’t wait to help her with the bags?” he asked, looking disgusted.
“It’s not my fault she over-packed.” Joe looked around the lobby.
“It’s camera equipment." Miles pointed out.
“Yes, but she’s not my cameraman. You are.”
I stared between the two of them, watching as Miles seemed to come to the same conclusion that he did need a punch to that face.
“So, Cambrie is coming to work with me?” I clarified.
Miles nodded, but Joe began to speak. “Yes, and we should really get going. Practice is starting soon.”
“Oh no, you have until this afternoon.” Women had the ice for practice first today.
“No,” Joe tapped on his phone. “East starts at nine.”
“Right, the women’s East. Men are after lunch.”
“And I’m here to cover the rise in popularity of the women's teams.”
Miles dropped his eyes to the floor as I felt all my blood pool that way. “What?”
“Again, Vicky, I hope you’re better at interviews.”
“The women’s teams are my––”
“Were your responsibility.” He sighed. “We know this is a money grab to capitalize on their short stint in the public eye. No one is going to care about them in a month, but for right now, they are the headline makers and the big bosses want the best coverage.” He winked again.
“So Miles and I will take it off your plate, so you can focus on the men’s teams, since anyone can cover them.
The higher-ups are loving the silly content, so keep that up. ”
I shook my head. “No.”
“Victoria,” Miles sounded nearly as distraught as I felt. “My boss sent the explanation last night.”
“Why didn’t Chris tell me? Why wasn’t I on that email?”
Joe shrugged like he couldn’t care less. “Now you know, so send me your notes. Mike and I have to get going.”
“It’s Miles,” I snapped, but Joe was already walking away.
“I’m sorry,” Miles whispered while he gave me a side hug, his camera bag bumping between us before he hurried to follow Joe to the waiting sedan.
I stared as they pulled away. This wasn’t happening. How could this be happening?
They sent one of the most famous names we have to cover the women’s teams? What bizarre alternative universe did I wake up in?
Sure, the exclusive contract would give them the exposure and publicity the women deserved, but why kick me off covering them? Chris knew how much this meant to me. My personal connections to the players.
Why send in some random football dude when I’m right here?
Now I had to cover only the men? Since anyone can cover them.
This was terrible.
I was in a nightmare.
I squeezed my eyes shut, then opened them. Nope, still in the lobby gathering more attention the longer I stood unmoving.
“Victoria?” a woman called, and I glanced toward the doors to see several black cases slide against the marble floor.
I hurried over to find a petite, pink-haired punk rock woman pushing them. Relief washed over me. Cambrie and I had worked together on assignments before, though rarely, and out of the dozens of people they could have sent, she was someone I was excited to work with again.
“You okay?” I pulled the camera equipment to the side and stood to take in her ragged appearance. Her usually straight, sharp bob was a wavy mess, and the purple bags under her eyes almost looked like bruises.
“Oh, thank heaven that was you. I’ve been looking for a luggage cart, but––”
“Hold on.” I hurried away from here to where I’d spotted several waiting by the elevators and came back, pulling one behind me.
“You’re a saint.” She and I loaded up, and I showed her to the desk to check in before taking her up to her room. Once we unloaded her luggage, she kicked off her black boots and plopped onto the bed, and I dropped onto the chair in the corner.
“Can you fill me in on what’s going on?”
She turned her head to face me. “What do you mean?”
“All Chris told me was to be in the lobby at eight.”
She pushed up onto her elbows. “Excuse me?”
I nodded while she pulled her phone from her back pocket.
“You weren’t added to the email.” She frowned.
“That was quite the oversight.” She tossed it to the side.
“Basically, the big bosses heard about the women’s teams getting more attention and wanted to capitalize on that.
Chris did actually refer you, told them about your expertise and experience, but they wanted someone with their own notoriety, as if women watching care about Joe Banks. ”
“Chris recommended me?” That made me feel slightly less full of rage. Toward him.
“Yeah, said you were the best person for the job, but obviously they ignored him because that’s what they do.” She let out a sigh, “Anyway, they called me and told me to get on the next plane here since they were taking Miles from you.”
“Where were you?”
“Atlanta for the World Cup.”
I cringed. “Sorry, that’s pretty cool.”
She waved me off. “It’s okay. The humidity was killing me—at least I can be mostly indoors here.”
“Who’s replacing you?”
“No one. There were plenty of camera people already there.”
“It’s a busy summer.”
“Insane,” she agreed. “So, where are you at?”
I caught her up on what Miles and I had been doing for the past few days and our plan for content. “But Joe said they’re loving the silly content.”
She made a face. “Ew, so we’re not doing that anymore.”
“Agreed. If they want clickbait, they can send out someone from the social media team.” That wasn’t actually a decision I could make, but it felt good to try to take back some semblance of control.
“Exactly,” she leaned back, “but until then we have to do the silly stuff, huh?”
“Yeah,” I slouched in the chair. “Unless I come up with something else to make people care about the athletes.”
“It’s not even that. It’s finding a way to get people to sit and watch a video for longer than half a second. The journalism and photography don’t matter as long as the editing is good.”
I loathed that this was what our industry had come to.
She rolled over to face me, propping her head up with her hand. “What do you remember most from the past few Olympics?"
“Being in Italy?” I wasn’t sure where she was going with this.
“Okay, bad example because you were there, but I mean from people talking about it, specifically online. What moments stand out?”
“The men’s and women's teams winning.”
She nodded. “That was big. What else?”
“The dog that joined the race,” I smiled. “That was pretty funny.”
She laughed, “Right.”
“And that one guy that admitted to cheating on his girlfriend," I cringed. “That was terrible.”
“But viral.”
“You want me to get one of the guys to admit to cheating on camera?”
She wrinkled her nose. “No, they better not be! But you never know what someone might say.”
“So always be filming,” I guessed.
“That,” she agreed. “Remember the muffin man from the Summer Olympics?”
I laughed. “Yes! The swimmer. That was amazing.”
“Might have been my favorite part of that whole Olympics; all the athletes trying to get a chocolate muffin,” she chuckled. “Maybe we could get the guys to try local food places?”
“I have seen quite a diverse selection of restaurants.” I didn’t hate the idea, but I didn’t love it either. “We’re planning on them playing mini stick games while answering questions.”
“Mini hockey sticks?” she asked.
“Yeah, they’re about this big,” I held my hands up about two feet apart. “Kind of takes you back to your youth travel days. We’d have mini stick games in the halls of our hotels.” I smirked, “Until our coaches or parents found us.”
She smiled along. “Cute.”
“It is,” I defended. “It’s a hockey thing.”
“It’ll probably be better than the quick questions you’ve been doing. I checked your views on the cab ride over, and it might gain some attention for a bit, but you can’t do it for the next two weeks.”
“Well, once the games start––”
“In a week.” She gave me a stern look. “We’ll lose interest long before then if we don’t diversify.”
I dropped my head back and stared at the ceiling. “I don’t want to talk to them.”
“The men?”
“Yes,” I groaned.
“I know. It sucks. You have connections with the women and have been doing so much to raise awareness of their league. It’s not fair, but it is what it is.”
“I know,” I leaned forward. “Plus, now we have to beat Joe.”
“Of course we do,” she grinned.
“Men covering the women and women covering the men,” I cringed. “How progressive.”
“That’s how they’ll spin it, but it’s still sexist at the root.”
This was not how I expected my day to start, nor for this event to go.
Changing things last-minute wasn’t completely unheard of, but it was the first time it had so directly affected me.
We were trained to adapt and pivot on the spot, and I would.
I’d make it work just like I always did, but I was beyond frustrated.
“Anything about the players I should know?” Cambrie sat up and picked up her phone again. “I went through the rosters and tried to memorize at least the captains, but I’m not super familiar with most of them.”
“Most of them are really nice. Only a few divas. Some of them are pretty shy. Hockey generally doesn’t get the attention it deserves, so they’re not always the most media-trained.”
She grinned. “Love that.”
“It can be pretty adorable sometimes.” And other times they storm off mid-interview.
“Most of them are pretty private, so I focus on the game until I know them well.”
She nodded. “Not the limelight type.”
“There are a few, like Erik Schultz on the Stars. He’s a ham.”
“I remember one of his videos,” she grinned. “He’s charming.”
“I rely on guys like him if I don’t get content anywhere else. There are a few players I know will always be on board with getting in front of the camera.”
“That is really good to know. Too bad Joe doesn’t have that same trick up his sleeve.”
I rolled my eyes. “They’re going to hate him.”
She laughed. “I wonder if they’ll ignore him just out of spite or loyalty to you.”
“A girl can dream.” Then the network would have no choice but to fix this mess and put me back where I belonged.