Off the Record

Chapter 1

“You’re going to be late!” my mother yelled up the stairs as I finished buttoning up the jacket of my suit.

Technically, it was my sister’s suit from last year, but she was currently seven months pregnant, and therefore I had a few months before she demanded it back.

Then again, she didn’t know I had taken it either. But desperate times called for desperate measures, and I had landed an interview for my dream job. Kind of. It was a start anyway.

“Judy!” my mother called again more insistently. I slipped on my shoes, adding a solid three inches to take me to a respectable five foot three, grabbed my handbag, and went running down the stairs.

“I’m coming!” As if there were any scenario short of the president himself hiring me that would make me late for this interview.

Of course, my mother thought I was interviewing at my uncle’s law firm. Yawn.

“You’re going to have to take the bus,” she said crossly. “Your father left already.”

I pretended this was a hardship and not my plan all along. “I’m so sorry, Mom. I just wanted to look perfect.”

She picked an imaginary piece of lint off my sleeve and straightened the pillbox hat that I had also nicked from my sister’s closet. That, she would miss.

“Very professional,” she said. “Your uncle Gil will have to hire you.”

I was less certain of that than she was, especially considering that I wasn’t going to that interview unless I somehow botched this one. And I was not going to mess up my chance to work at The Washington Digest.

Even if my first foray into journalism had broken up Uncle Gil’s marriage.

That was the other reason he didn’t have to hire me.

But that was his own fault, quite honestly.

If he hadn’t been having an affair with his mistress at the same hotel where I had skipped school to try to get a picture of Truman Capote with my Brownie box camera, he wouldn’t have wound up in the background of the photograph that The Montgomery Gazette ran, and he would still be married to Aunt Dorothy.

Technically, she wasn’t my aunt anymore.

Just like how technically it wasn’t my fault his marriage ended. But I wasn’t his favorite niece, and I knew it. So working at his law firm didn’t exactly have the same appeal as working at a professional newspaper.

Of course, my mother didn’t care about any of those technicalities.

She wanted me working at the law firm to earn the MRS degree that I had failed to procure in four years at the University of Maryland.

My sister, along with most of my female classmates, had dropped out after earning hers, but I was determined to leave college with a degree in journalism.

And no finance major with a receding hairline was going to sway me.

So I smiled at my mother, kissed her cheek, and assured her that her little girl would be returning gainfully employed.

“Psh,” she said, waving a hand in the air. “Come home engaged. Then we’ll celebrate.”

I blinked. “Might be a tall order for an interview with my uncle, but I’ll do my best.”

She patted my arm, and I left the house, shaking off the weight of her expectations as I walked to the bus stop, my heels clacking on the sidewalk of our Rosemary Hills neighborhood in Silver Spring, Maryland.

A ride into DC with my father would have been quicker.

But then I would have to duck into my uncle’s building, hope no one who knew me saw, wait for my father to leave, then dash three blocks to The Digest’s office.

Fewer chances to mess this up on the bus—even if the old woman who sat down next to me did smell like onions, and—I glanced at her fur-covered sweater—yes, that odor was cat food.

I scooted as far over as I could, hoping the light spritz of Chanel No 5, which I had forgone a textbook to buy, would hold up against the stench.

I was sure even my mother would agree that it was a better investment than economics of the non-home kind.

I stepped off the bus on K Street and walked the remaining two blocks to The Digest’s office. One block down and three over from the building The Washington Post had moved into twelve years earlier in 1950.

The Digest wasn’t as grand as the empire Mr. Wainwright and his father-in-law had created, but it was a step in the right direction.

And they were hiring, which The Post wasn’t.

Well, The Post was hiring, but they explicitly told me they had no openings in the women’s section, which was the only place a woman could expect to write.

I grinned up at the building, which stood the full 130 feet that DC law allowed, so as not to block out the Washington Monument, the letters of the sign seeming to wink at me in return.

This was the start of my new life. I just knew it.

I would save up for a few months and make enough money to pay for a room in a boardinghouse for women—in cash, of course.

My father would never sign off on a lease—neither of my parents could fathom a girl wanting a life where the end goal wasn’t a husband and children.

I wasn’t opposed to the idea of a husband. Eventually. But whoever he was, he would have to understand that I wanted a career too.

And a husband like that wasn’t so easy to find.

Besides, if I was husband hunting, I would have worn a dress, not my sister’s suit, which was a decent knockoff of a number the first lady wore last year.

My brother-in-law having family in the garment industry up in New York had its benefits, which I was happy to pinch when my sister wasn’t looking.

No, this was about showing off that I could be a serious journalist.

So I stepped purposefully through the revolving door, told the older man in a security uniform that I had an interview, walked past a group of young men smoking in the lobby, and approached the desk.

“How can I help you?” a middle-aged woman asked, taking a puff of her own cigarette. I fought the urge to wave my hand in front of my face to clear the smoke.

“Judy Greenberg,” I said, attempting to lower the timbre of my voice and holding out my gloved hand. When she made no move to shake it, I lowered my arm. “I’m here for the interview.”

She looked me up and down, then turned back to her typewriter. “Third floor. Ask for Mrs. Kelly.”

Not the warmest welcome, but I would take it.

If The Diamondback, the University of Maryland’s student newspaper, had been any indication, women still weren’t popular in newsrooms. But I was determined to change that.

Alone if I had to. I marched to the elevator bank and pressed the up button, tapping my foot with nervous energy until the elevator arrived.

Once inside, I waited until the doors opened at three, depositing me into a large typing pool of women. Which I supposed made sense for interviews—they would need a secretary there to keep it all straight. I stopped at the first desk I saw. “I’m looking for a Mrs. Kelly?”

The woman at the desk glanced up sharply. She was maybe two or three years older than me. She took me in, then shook her head. “Best call her Miss,” she said. “If Dolores downstairs told you to call her Mrs., it means she doesn’t like you.”

“Doesn’t like me? She doesn’t know me.”

“Doesn’t matter,” this woman said, sliding a fresh sheet of paper into her typewriter and rolling it into place. “It’s that door at the other end of the room. And Miss if you want to get anywhere. The old battle-axe isn’t married. You’ll see why.”

“Thank you,” I said, meaning it. Having a friend in the typing pool would definitely be useful on deadlines. “I’m Judy.”

“Patricia,” she said, shaking my proffered hand. “Good luck.”

I refrained from saying I didn’t need luck. My journalism degree and clippings from college surely spoke for themselves. Instead, I thanked Patricia, walked to the door she had indicated, and rapped three times with my knuckles.

A raspy voice said to come in, and I pushed the door open. “Miss Kelly?”

“If you can’t read, I can’t help you,” a severe-looking older woman in horn-rimmed glasses said, pointing to her name on the door. She finally raised her eyes to look at me. “Who are you and what do you want?”

And that would be why she’s not married, I thought, mentally thanking Patricia. “I’m Judy Greenberg, and I’m here to interview for the—”

“Shh,” she hissed. “Close the door. She doesn’t know she’s getting the axe yet.”

Trying to keep my eyes from widening, I closed the door as instructed.

Miss Kelly indicated for me to take the seat across from her desk.

The job advertisement did not specify that it was for the newspaper’s women’s section, but it also didn’t prohibit women from applying, so I was a bit surprised when she held out her hand and demanded my résumé, but I assumed she was screening applicants for whoever would be doing the actual interview.

Or maybe The Digest was more progressive than I had even hoped.

She scanned the document I handed her, then lowered her glasses and fixed me with a hard look over them. “No, you won’t do at all.”

“Excuse me?”

“There’s no fraternizing here,” she said bluntly. “Which is exactly why we have an opening. I don’t know why you’d want to marry a journalist anyway. They’re never home and don’t make enough money. Go apply at a law firm or something like that.”

I blinked rapidly at her, taken aback by her assessment of my intentions at The Digest. Time to set the record straight.

“Actually, my mother thinks I’m applying at a law firm today for that very reason,” I confided, leaning forward.

“But I’m here because I’m not looking to—fraternize.

I want to be a reporter.” I reached into my bag and brought out a manila envelope.

“I think if you’ll look through my college clippings, you’ll see—”

“A reporter?” she repeated, barking out a short laugh. “You’re at the wrong newspaper.”

“But—the job listing—”

“Didn’t even take into account that a woman might think of applying,” she finished. “How’s your typing?”

“Excellent,” I said, confused. “Ninety words a minute.”

“And your accuracy?”

“Over 99 percent.”

“But you didn’t attend secretarial school?”

“Miss Kelly, I have a bachelor’s degree in journalism, with a minor in government and politics. I graduated with a perfect 4.0 GPA and was the first female section editor at my college newspaper, as well as—”

She held up a hand. “Like I said, The Digest isn’t looking for a female reporter.

I can offer you a job in the typing pool, but with the express caveat that it will not lead to a reporting job.

” She hesitated, and I leaned in closer.

“Here. I don’t want to get your hopes up, but we did have one girl leave us to go work for the women’s section at The Washington Post.”

The Post. This was a stepping stone to The Post. No, working in the typing pool wasn’t anything close to the job I wanted, but it was a foot in the door.

“Yes or no?” Miss Kelly asked. “I don’t have all day, and if you don’t take it, I need to list the job immediately.”

“I’ll take it,” I said quickly.

Miss Kelly’s face turned somehow even more stern. “I will warn you again: There is to be no fraternizing with the male staff. The girl you’ll be replacing is about to learn just how serious I am about that.”

“Miss Kelly,” I said, placing a hand over my heart. “Thank you so—”

“That’ll be all,” she said, balling my résumé up and dropping it into the nearly full wastepaper basket at the side of her desk. “You begin Monday at eight. And I do not tolerate tardiness.”

I nodded, fighting the urge to rescue the document I had worked so hard on from its fate. “Yes, Miss Kelly. Thank you, Miss Kelly.”

“Tell Louise Clark to come in here,” she said.

I had no idea who Louise Clark was, but I was sure my new friend, Patricia, would help me learn the ropes quickly.

It wasn’t exactly the outcome I had hoped for, but I was still one step closer to my goal than I would be at my uncle’s law firm, that was for sure.

Besides, my mother didn’t need to know about the no-fraternization policy.

And a pathway to The Washington Post! Though I was certain even The Digest would see the skills I had. It would be impossible not to.

When I got home, the house was empty. My mother had either gone shopping or to see a friend and my father was still at work, so I decided to change out of my sister’s suit and then walk over to her house—ostensibly to see how I could help prepare for the baby’s arrival.

Really to steal some more clothes for my new employment.

Everything’s coming up roses, I thought merrily.