Chapter Nine
Elizabeth
“What’s done can’t be undone.”
MacBeth
Despite the chill in the air, I decided to walk to my new job, which left me cranky because these streets now held a ghost of a memory of that night Evan had walked me home before he revealed himself to be delusional, before he’d called and let me know I’d lost any chance of resuscitating the corpse of our prematurely deceased romance.
Since I had to cross the Downtown Mall, I popped in to see Chelsea at the coffee shop. She looked me over and gave me the thumbs up.
“Have you seen your boyfriend?” I asked, as she sealed the lid on my complimentary latte.
“Not since Friday.” She kept her eyes on her work, not giving away a single expression that might show too much interest in this topic. “And he’s not my boyfriend.”
“Hmmph,” I said, side-eying her. While I’d been on the phone with Evan on Friday, Chelsea had been facing her own consequences. She’d run into Basil after work at the wine shop, and somehow he’d tricked her into a dinner date. To everyone’s surprise, she’d agreed.
“What?” She wiped down the steamer. “He’s not.”
“Ten bucks he makes a coffee run sometime today.”
“If that’s how he wants to spend his money, I can’t stop him.” She called out the name inked on the cup, then looked at me. “And have you heard from your boy toy?”
I still couldn’t believe Evan had thought I was someone else—for two weeks.
I’d tried to reframe our entire conversation from his perspective, and I understood why it might be weird, but I’d confessed it all.
Everything I’d said after we left the bar had been honest. Our attraction had felt genuine.
Was he carrying out some high school fantasy?
Did he even like me? “I think I’m the villain in his story. ”
“Fuck him if he can’t take a joke.”
I winced. To Evan, it hadn’t been a joke, had it? “I’m a little nervous he might’ve taken a job at the station where I’m working. I don’t know if I can handle that.”
“Oof. That’s what? A fifty-fifty chance?” She leaned against the counter. “You didn’t ask?”
My head fell back with an exasperated sigh. That phone call had been seven kinds of fucked without chatting about our jobs. “It doesn’t matter. Even if he’s at the other station, he’ll be wandering around town. What am I going to do once he moves here?”
She chortled. “I’d tell you to just avoid him, but look how that’s working out for me.”
“Salt in the wound, C.” I sighed. “Anyway, I don’t want to avoid him. I want a chance to clear my name. I want my day in court.”
It was a physical ache that someone in the world thought I was a bad person. I wasn’t. I’d just done one foolish dare.
And hurt someone in the process.
I frowned. “I should at least get the chance to apologize in person.”
“Don’t start feeling bad about yourself. It was just a stupid prank. You didn’t mean any harm, and if he thought about it for two seconds, he’d realize it had been you he liked and not some person he clearly didn’t know well enough to tell the difference.”
“Yeah.” I tried to process all that. Her therapist had clearly been giving her the right words to say, even if she didn’t apply any of them to herself. “Despite everything, whatever he seems to think of me, we’d had a connection.”
Hadn’t we?
Whatever. I was done pissing away brain cells on a guy who couldn’t even consider forgiving and forgetting.
“You’re not the villain, E.”
Convenient for her to say since she’d gotten to play the virtuous one in our challenge. And that brought up a more pertinent question.
“So are you going out with Bas again?” I tried to keep the bitterness out of my voice. I already knew her answer. She’d never let a guy get that close. It rankled that she had the option and she was throwing it away.
Her nose wrinkled, like she’d been sitting on a terrible secret. “I sort of gave him my phone number.”
“You what?”
Suddenly my gloominess lifted. “That’s huge.”
Maybe that stupid list of hers hadn’t been the worst idea after all if it let someone past those fireproof walls she lived behind.
A customer reached around me for his coffee, shooting me a glare. That was my cue to hit the road. “See you around, Chels.”
I grabbed my latte and the one I’d ordered for Shelby. I knew my Ferengi rules of acquisition. It never hurts to suck up to the boss.
* * *
When I arrived, I was sent directly to the newsroom, without stopping in to see Shelby.
I wound through the building, narrow halls giving way to a larger room littered with desks.
For a newsroom, the hustle and bustle seemed rather low key.
One auburn-haired woman crawled on her knees laying cable. She stopped and waved.
“You must be Elizabeth,” a voice to my left said, and I turned to find a sporty blond hunched over a keyboard, scrolling through a color-coded spreadsheet.
I made note of her less professional slacks and Converse, wondering if I could get away with that level of casual.
Maybe if I lasted the trial period, I’d test it.
She stood. “I’m Lauren.” When she reached out as if she wanted to shake hands, I found myself hampered by a pair of coffee cups.
“Uh.” I looked around for somewhere to set them. She probably thought I had a caffeine addiction. “Would you like a latte? This is an extra.”
“Oh, thanks, but I’m cutting back.”
The woman on the floor clambered to her feet. “I would kill for some coffee. Hi, I’m Gabriella. But you can call me Gigi.”
“Gigi, this is Elizabeth. She’s taking over my old job.”
Gigi made a very distinct “yikes” face, pulling her lips into a tight frown. But then she winked so I took it as a friendly joke. After all, I wouldn’t like to work on my hands and knees connecting a computer network. When I handed her the drink, she said, “You are a godsend.”
Lauren said, “Gigi handles our IT issues, and she also helps with our web news. If you know anyone who works in application support, please have them send in their résumé.”
I could see the actual news studio through a thick window. Lauren followed my gaze and said, “Come on. Gigi can set up your credentials while I show you around.”
We passed into a control room where mind-boggling electronics covered every conceivable surface.
One fortyish man was hooking up a monitor.
“Tom, this is Elizabeth, our new associate producer.” He acknowledged me with a nod.
“Tom’s our technical director.” She pointed out a console centrally located near the back wall.
“This is where we’ll work during the newscast.”
I gaped at the equipment, overwhelmed, but still mostly optimistic. “It looks complex.”
“Tom handles all of that. As the senior producer, I’ll be right here, keeping things running on time. You can sit in with me until you get the hang of it.”
“Why do I need to get the hang of it? I was hired to write.”
She shot me an “are you an idiot” grimace. “You’re my backup.” I must have turned green because she waved a hand. “It’s not terribly difficult. I started doing this in high school. Anyone can learn.”
I didn’t believe her at all. She’d had years of experience.
Lauren appraised me with a raised eyebrow. “Can you work a computer?”
Barely. “I have a laptop.”
She shook her head. “You’ll get the hang of it.”
I couldn’t understand why she had so much faith in my potential. Surely there were other people qualified for the job.
But Lauren kept on going. She introduced me to “the personality” in the studio.
I immediately recognized Sandra, the matronly Black woman, and Kent, the overly tanned middle-aged ex-football-player.
He’d probably been extremely attractive in his youth.
Kent winked at me, and I fought off a grimace.
I traded smirks with Sandra. Her sardonic expression told me their professional on-air rapport must involve a fair amount of acting.
As we passed a green screen, Lauren said, “This is where our weatherman gives the forecast.” She walked on, pushing through another door. “He’s probably back with the meteorology equipment.”
My whole body tensed at the prospect of running into Evan again. I couldn’t tell if it was anticipation or stark terror.
Lauren led me down another corridor to a room filled with a hell of a lot of computers where the only weatherman awaiting us was an older guy I vaguely recognized. I felt simultaneously relieved and disappointed.
Evan had said he was starting this week, so I guessed that was that.
I might run into him in the wild, but more likely, unless Chelsea started dating Basil for real, there was no reason to think I’d ever see Evan again.
It was time to come to grips with the fact Evan had been a one-time thing and get over him.
Bob stood and crossed the room, looking at me with curiosity.
“Hello,” that voice resonated in my memory banks in an uncanny way.
“Bob, this is Elizabeth Wright, new associate producer. Elizabeth, Bob Laslow, meteorologist.”
“Believe it or not, you’re the second TV meteorologist I’ve met in the past month.” I blushed just remembering how I’d met Evan, how well I’d gotten to know him in a short time.
“Me, too,” said Bob, laughing. Obviously, he’d have a whole weatherman friend group. “It’s very nice to meet you.” He raised a brushy brow at Lauren. “And don’t take advantage of her just because you can.”
I didn’t like the sound of that at all, but then I remembered wiping down a bar with a spray bottle of bleach and water at two a.m. and suddenly, I wouldn’t care if Lauren made me fetch her dry cleaning.
Back in the newsroom, she led me to a bank of desks. “This will be your computer.”
A note had been left with my temporary username and password.
I glanced back at the open room wondering how I was supposed to work in the middle of the traffic and noise. Lauren must have read my mind and said, “You need to be out here with the rest of the staff. You’re going to be busy getting their input and writing, writing, writing.”