Chapter Five
As soon as her Tuesday show was over, Vanessa Walker went straight to her dressing room and waited.
She sat in her chair at her mirror, reading a book, or rather, holding a book, because she wasn’t capable of concentrating on anything.
After a minute her position started to feel staged and unnatural, so she stood up and paced the room, and then that started to feel horribly dramatic, so she sat down again.
She was contemplating pouring herself a drink to take the edge off when the knock finally came.
Vanessa opened the door,
‘Craig, thanks for coming.’
‘It’s not a problem.’
‘Will you sit?’ She pointed him towards the small two-seater couch and armchair that sat in the corner of the room.
The furniture had seen better days, but she loved it, because she’d bought it herself when she’d been promoted to lead presenter and had been given her own dressing room.
The furniture must be what, nearly twelve years old now? The number made her shiver.
‘Sure.’
He took the armchair. She took the couch.
She regarded him. Craig was the show’s video editor.
He’d worked at the network for longer than she had, and he looked his age.
He had six years on her, she knew that, so he must be fifty eight.
Vanessa didn’t have to check the mirror to know that they looked like members of a different generation.
Acknowledging that fact had nothing to do with vanity.
She had poured serious resources into maintaining and improving her looks, because she had to, whereas Craig had treated his body like shit.
They’d all done it, in the early years. Hit the bar after every broadcast, hit the clubs after every bar.
The social scene was part of what made the job fun.
But most of them grew out of the partying by the time they hit their thirties, whereas Craig had just doubled down.
He was an alcoholic. Off the booze now for nearly five years, but he’d screwed up royally more than once before he’d finally got sober.
‘What’s up?’ he asked now.
‘I need your help.’
Those were not easy words for Vanessa to say.
She liked to be the one giving help. She liked to feel needed.
Asking for help made her feel vulnerable and exposed and she’d worked too damn hard for far too long to easily open up a chink in her armour.
But that was the benefit of age. You knew yourself.
Knew your own weaknesses and foibles and you could overcome them, if you had to.
Vanessa handed Craig the USB drive.
‘What’s this?’
‘Blackmail material, I think.’
It took him a beat. ‘Against you?’
‘No. Maybe. I’m not sure. It was sent to me. When you look at it you’ll see a video of my husband—of Robert—in his consulting rooms. In the video it looks like he’s having sex with a patient. The video is fake.’
Craig gave her a look. A look that Vanessa thought she was likely to see again and again.
‘I’m not delusional, Craig. The video is faked.
It’s very, very well done, but I’ve been married to Robert for twenty-six years.
If he was hung like a porn star, I think I’d have noticed.
’ She delivered the line with deliberate, dry humour, as if she’d always known the video was bullshit, as if she’d never vomited all over her bathroom floor, as if it hadn’t taken five whole minutes for Robert to force her to really look at the video.
Craig gave a surprised laugh, tried to swallow it, and turned it into a cough. ‘Okay, then. What do you want me to do with this?’
‘I want you to look at it with independent eyes. If and when someone goes public with the video, I want a professional lined up who can say, unequivocally, that it’s bullshit.
I want to be ready to go with evidence that proves that it’s a deepfake.
Preferably without having to refer to my husband’s penis. ’
‘Okay. Gotcha. I can do that.’
‘And Craig, I need you to keep this quiet. I really mean that. No rumours, no hints or suggestions that there’s something going around, okay?’
His eyes met hers. She wondered if he was thinking about the same thing she was, if he was remembering the morning when she’d found him drunk in the studio car park.
He’d been red-eyed, unshaven, slurring his words, and on his way to start the day’s work.
She’d forced him into her car, driven him to her place and installed him in her guest room, then refused to let him leave until he’d slept, showered, dressed in one of Robert’s shirts, and eaten food that she’d prepared for him.
She’d given him no lecture. Said nothing about the obvious need for rehab.
Vanessa had never seen the point of intervention.
In her experience, people only changed when they wanted to.
So after she’d bullied him into presentable condition, she’d just driven him back to the studio and dropped him off.
Vanessa didn’t claim any credit for Craig’s turnaround.
He’d bounced along the bottom for another couple of months before finally throwing in the towel on the drinking, presumably for reasons that had nothing to do with her.
And truthfully, she wasn’t sure what had driven her to look after him that particular afternoon.
In some ways, maybe, it was out of character.
She liked to help people but did not enjoy being dragged into other people’s dramas.
Maybe she’d known that he wouldn’t ask for more than she was willing to give.
She supposed it didn’t matter why she’d done it, only that she had.
Because now it was time for payback. She’d never told a soul what she’d done for him that day.
She wanted the same consideration from him.
That, and his expertise and his reputation.
Craig was an excellent video editor, and he was well known and well liked in the industry.
People saw him as a no-bullshit kind of guy.
If he said the video was a fake, people—in the industry at least—might believe him.
‘Who do you think is behind it?’ Craig asked.
‘I don’t know. I haven’t had time to think about it.’ A lie, such a lie. It was all she’d thought about.
‘Right.’
Craig stood. He tucked the USB into his pocket. ‘I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. By the morning, if possible. But I won’t be able to look at the video until I get home. If you want to keep this quiet, I can’t open it on a studio computer.’
‘Thank you.’ Vanessa stood too. She found that she was holding out her hand to him, like they’d just completed a business meeting. He took her hand and shook it, and if there was a slightly mocking expression on his face, she chose not to see it.
* * *
After he’d gone, Vanessa sat for a moment and thought everything through. Then she made two phone calls. The first was to Penelope Ford, the head producer on her show, and the second was to a runner. The runner arrived in five minutes with two coffees. Penelope arrived exactly one minute later.
‘Is that for me? You angel! I haven’t had coffee in at least thirty minutes.’
Penelope Ford, super-producer, was twenty-nine years old, aggressively fashionable, and screamingly competent.
Penelope was more striking than she was pretty.
She had a tight, muscled body, a long nose she liked to call Roman, and a strong jawline.
Pen was vocal about the fact that she’d never considered a nose job because Oh my god, faces should have character, darling. I want people to remember me.
‘So, what’s up?’ Penelope had taken the couch.
She sat with her legs crossed at the ankle, leaning forward, coffee cup in both hands.
She was wearing a pair of wide-leg cut-off leather culottes and a sleeveless shirt with a half-tuck.
An outfit that on Vanessa would have looked both try-hard and deeply eighties, but which on Penelope looked the height of retro cool.
Vanessa took a breath. ‘I have a problem, and I’d like to discuss it with you. I’m trying to figure the best way forward, and I think it would be useful to talk it through. That is, if you’re willing.’
‘Okaaay. What kind of problem?’
‘The career killing kind.’
Pen’s eyes narrowed. They weren’t friends and they both knew it. Penelope had to wonder why, if Vanessa saw trouble ahead, she was bringing that trouble to Pen’s door.
Vanessa’s show, Let’s Talk, Australia, had been a network staple for twenty years but ratings had been trending down for the last five.
Vanessa had the dubious comfort of knowing she wasn’t alone in facing a ratings cliff—every show on broadcast television was in the same situation.
The market was a mess. Streamers were competing with each other with expensive limited series after expensive limited series in a survivor-takes-all race for market dominance, while YouTube and gaming and social media were claiming more and more eyeballs.
Traditional channels had to scrabble for the remains.
The studio had to recognise that, and Let’s Talk was doing better than most. Vanessa had the affection of her audience.
She had a nationally recognised name and face in an industry where it was becoming harder and harder to build that kind of profile.