Four Days of Fall

by Beck Jones

  In the Q&A, the students were satisfyingly brash, confronting him on network policies and various news media stances. He liked their cockiness, even as it aroused in him some uneasiness, a memory of why he had considered skipping The Talk for Helen’s class this year. But he had prepared for the question, and when the girl stood up to ask—a short, heavy girl with a pale moon face and small close-set eyes like raisins in rising dough—he knew before she ever opened her mouth what she would ask.

  He was your producer. How could you not know?

  “That’s a question I’ll ask myself until I die,” he replied. “I have no excuses.” And then he said, in what he thought was a fairly masterful stroke, “Galileo once said all truths are easily understood once they are discovered. The point is to discover them. And I wasn’t looking to discover anything about Paul McGann. I knew him as a consummate professional. I thought I knew him as a dedicated family man. People wear masks. We should all be eternally grateful, I know I am, for those women with the courage and integrity to speak up on this issue.”

  But he couldn’t help but think, even as he cringed inwardly at the indecency of it, that Paul wouldn’t have touched this girl with a ten-foot pole. And the image of Paul, the crude Paul that they all knew and looked away from, materialized so vividly that heat steeped into Russ’s face.

  “I’m ashamed of my negligence,” he said quietly, sincerely. “But I hope that no student in this class will ever be subjected to demeaning or dehumanizing treatment, at least not in your workplace.” He paused. “I can’t make any promises about the treatment you will endure from some of the people you will investigate.”

  A hand shot up. A young male asked, “Did you think about quitting when Lenny the Lisp planted the bomb under your car?”

  Russ took in a breath, trying to seem reflective, although he was happy the kid had asked. If the students didn’t know about the car bomb, they should.

  “No,” he said. “I just accepted that sort of thing comes with the territory.”

  A young female asked, frowning, “Why was Lenny Romano called Lenny the Lisp?”

  Another male student piped up with what seemed like almost relish. Looking toward Russ for approval, he said, “It’s because he used to slit people’s throats, isn’t it? One of his victims tried to say something as he died, and Romano said, ‘I can’t understand you. You’re lisping.’”

  Russ nodded. Truly, it wasn’t easy profession. Sometimes the evildoers like Lenny the Lisp wanted to kill you. And sometimes they just wanted to destroy your career. Like Andrew Shrekel. That lawsuit was almost scarier than being bombed.

  But then Lenny the Lisp was serving 25-to-life for conspiracy to murder two FBI informants, and Andrew Shrekel was finishing a dime in a country club prison for securities fraud. Why was Russ up here feeling sheepish about this girl’s question? Goddam it, those two miscreants would still be out on the street if not for the work that he and Paul—yes, Paul, dammit—had done.

  And then another female student rose to her feet. Willowy frame, a graceful flow of dark hair, almond eyes set above chiseled cheekbones. All packaged in tastefully expensive clothes. And Russ felt shame again, because she was exactly the sort that Paul would have wanted to hit on.

  Exactly the sort he himself would have been delighted by. SYT—Sweet Young Thing. He would have chosen her over the short fat girl for an internship. And if he had chosen girls like the short fat one all those years, none of this mess would have happened. He had laughed at Paul’s joke about the interns: Russell’s Rangers. An echo of Sloane’s Rangers, those tony chicks they’d lusted after in the eighties. And now they’re all ours for the picking, Paul had said.

  The SYT asked, “What made you give up newspaper work for television?”

  “The newspaper I worked for folded.” He gave her a rueful smile. “Even back in the Stone Age, newspapers didn’t always survive. Even award-winning newspapers. I had some pretty good clips” (and a Pulitzer, he could have added) “and I thought I’d try for a bigger paper. But then I met a producer who said he thought he could do something with me even though he said I had a face for radio.”

  It took a moment for the joke to sink in. A few scattered smiles.

  Why don’t you tell them that the producer was me? Paul’s voice whispered his ear. The knot reformed in Russ’s gut and squeezed.

  But then blessedly, his time was up, and Helen thanked him, and the class applauded him again. But maybe not so enthusiastically, he thought. Thanks to the fat girl they would all think of him as an enabler. Or worse. He begged off talking with Helen, and he was bathed in sweat by the time he found a bathroom and careened into a stall to heave out coffee and bile. He washed his hands, splashed water in his face. He reached for his phone, an automatic gesture, but dropped his hand. There might be a text from Larson, but there might also be another one of those emails.

  Just leave the phone alone until his stomach was calmer. He couldn’t face one of those emails. Not right now.

  Outside he gulped the cool fall air the way he used to be able to swallow food. Motioning for a cab made him feel better. Uber was fine, but he liked using cabs. He liked supporting taxi drivers, and besides, hailing a cab made him feel like the quintessential New Yorker, the quintessential man on a mission. Which he was. He just needed to get a grip. Get a grip.

  But then he saw the burnished red golden hair. Thirty yards away. Lustrous. Glinting in the sun, cascading down a long, slender back.

  Larson.

  No. Surely not. This time he didn’t hesitate to grab his phone. He waved away the cab and texted her.

  Are you here?

  The woman with the hair didn’t look at her phone, but it didn’t matter. The memory of her flooded him. Larson draping that hair across his chest. Silk between his fingers. And her shimmering copper bush, with a texture even more finely spun. He had told her that her sex smelled like ocean. That she was a sea goddess that delivered by intracoastal tides.

  He decided to follow the hair. He texted her again.

  I know you are here in Manhattan. I’m following you right now.

  His heart thudded in time with his feet. Larson had texted him out of the blue a few weeks ago, and they had been engaged in a back and forth since then. Mostly silly stuff, and one magnificent nude selfie of her. God, she looked even more beautiful than he remembered. He hadn’t even remembered giving her his phone number, but now he was glad. She was his balm during this nightmare.

  He hadn’t told her about the Argofel story down in North Carolina, but he promised her that he would see her soon. So would she really surprise him and show up here in Manhattan? It could make things pretty complicated. But to to see her right now, to touch her right now. The thought of it was not helping his pulse retreat, and his gut, already wrung out, could only flop fish-like between cold dread and hot anticipation.

  Ahead of him, the hair swayed gently with each step, swathing the woman’s shoulders with languid grace. If he picked up his pace he could easily reach her, know right away whether it was Larson. He willed the woman to turn around, but she wouldn’t be willed.

  And then the text came back from Larson. Why would I be in Manhattan? Stop stalking whoever you’re stalking.

  He was relieved. He was disappointed. And he couldn’t release his fixation on that incandescent mass of hair. His heart continued to pound. As he followed her toward Washington Square Park, the dull pain in his chest grew sharper. He realized his hands were numb just as the arch of the entrance disappeared in blinding light, the fountain fading, too. If I’m going to die, I should sit down, he thought. I’m going to die. And then his brain closed up shop.

  He came to beneath a huddle of faces frowning down at him. His head ached.

  “An ambulance is on its way,” an ancient woman in a fox-trimmed coat said to him.

  He sat up quickly. “I’m fine.”

  “You may have a concussion,” someone else said.

  Another voice chimed in. “Ar
en’t you Russell Stockton?”

  He got to his feet, unsteady but upright. He pulled out his phone and dialed 911 trying to cancel the ambulance. He also tried to make a pleasant expression at the people crowded around him. “I appreciate your help. But I’m fine.”

  “You should have a doctor check you out,” someone said. “You got a cut on the back of your head.”

  “I’ll get it checked out,” Russ said cheerfully, easing into his on-air persona. “No need to take up E.R. resources. You guys have been great. Thanks! I better get going.” He made a show of frowning at his watch. “Don’t want to miss my meeting.”

  He made his escape into a cab, started to sink against the seat before he remembered the cut. His head still pounded.

  “You don’t have a Kleenex or something do you?” he asked the cabbie.

  “Russell Stockton, right?” the cabbie asked, eyeing him in the rear view mirror.

  Russ nodded. He held up his bloody palm. “Sorry. I don’t want to make a mess.”

  In the mirror he could see the cab driver’s forehead wrinkle as he moved sideways to reach for something. Then the driver handed back a wad of tissues. “You okay? What happened?”

  Russ tried to grin. Or at least he could feel himself baring his teeth. “Well, when you’re in the news business you don’t always get good reviews.”

  The cabbie scowled. “Listen, man, I want to thank you for what you did to Andrew Shrekel. The Feds would have never put away that bastard. He stole ten grand from my father-in-law.”

  “That’s a tough break,” Russ said and meant it. He forced himself to make small talk with the driver. He offered advice about a lawyer, even wrote down a name and number.

  “Good somebody’s still out fighting the good fight,” the driver said as Russ got out.

  And then Russ was finally inside the building, his building, and he was swallowed into the soothing maelstrom of the network. The security guard regarded him questioningly, and he realized there was blood on his shirtfront. But he could almost believe the lie he told the cab driver. When you fought the good fight, you did get bloodied from time to time. He could have died in that car bomb.

  He got off the elevator, head still aching, but with a feeling that could have been a reasonable facsimile of normal. All the sweating, puking, and passing out like a damned school girl, that was over. He’d lost his grip, but he was better now.

  And then he walked by Jeff Fairholt’s door.

  Only it was clearly now the door that used to be Jeff’s.

  It was open. Inside the office all that had been Jeff was gone.

  Russ gawped.

  No. Not Jeff. Not Jeff with the pert young wife and the two kids like something out of a Ralph Lauren advertisement.

  Russ flinched at the voice next to him. “Like someone tiptoeing over your grave isn’t it?”

  Larry Symington. His squat body fogged in cologne, his fake-tanned face wrapped with a smirk. “My forecast? Partly cloudy with a sixty percent chance of more pink slips. Poor Jeff.”

  Russ said nothing. He tried to breathe deeply without making a display of himself.

  And then Larry elbowed Russ. “Nah. Just kidding. I mean about Jeff. He thinks he’ll get more airtime at CNN. Hey, your face is pretty funny. But don’t worry. You’re not the only guy who did it.”

  Russ recoiled. “What the hell do you mean?”

  “I mean you’re not the only guy who walked by this door today and practically crapped his pants. Oh, come on, admit it. There are a hundred other shoes ready to drop in this building.” Larry grinned. “My forecast for real? More shit storms with a hundred percent chance of estrogen overload around here. Men are about to become an endangered species.” He nodded at Russ’s shirt. “Rough morning, huh?”

  Russ bolted for safety, away from Larry, down the hallways, into the Take Stock show’s suite of offices, past the production assistant’s desk, Madison AWOL for some reason, and finally into his own sanctum where he collapsed in his chair. He leaned his head back. Who gave a shit about a little blood? He looked around the room, and the photos that looked back reassured him. Russell Stockton getting awards—the Pulitzer, the Peabody, the Emmy. Standing with U.S. presidents he’d interviewed. With Nelson Mandela, for Christ’s sake.

  But none of it would matter.

  Not if just one girl.

  But there wouldn’t be. Not any. He wasn’t like Paul. God, no. Paul was awful. He was crude and horrible. Swaggering around like the whole building was his private game preserve, all the attractive females free for the poaching. Russ had told him more than once to knock it off. But he didn’t make Paul clean up his act. He didn’t threaten to have him fired. Dammit, if he’d gotten Paul fired before all this Me Too stuff started he’d be safe right now. Maybe.

  Not maybe. Certainly. They were all consensual. No, he shouldn’t have screwed around on Liz, no, he shouldn’t have bedded the interns, but they were consensual.

  And none of them had come forward.

  “What the hell happened to you?”

  Eleanor was leaning against the doorframe, her thumbs hooked into her jeans, looking every inch the cowgirl that she had once been. She was short and densely muscled, with high cheekbones vacuum sealed in olive skin like tanned leather, even though it had been decades since her days on her father’s ranch riding horses as fast and expertly as any Apache. At least that’s what she’d said to him. He remembered that.

  “You shouldn’t talk about riding a horse like an Apache,” Russ said. “It’s politically incorrect for a white woman.”

  Eleanor raised an eyebrow. “What crawled up your caboose and left the non sequitor?” She squinted. “And apparently whacked you on your head. Good grief, Russ, you’re not making any sense, and you’re bleeding all over your chair. We need to get you to the E.R.”

  “No you don’t. I just need to change my shirt, and you can clean up the back of my head. Surely somebody around this building must have a band-aid. I’m fine. I just fell, that’s all. You know I’ve got a meeting with the top floor, and with Sabine at noon.”

  “That’s cutting it close.”

  “Just get me a bandage. And something that will kick my headache’s ass.”

  After Eleanor disappeared, he sat immobile, listening to the tick tock of the small clock on his desk. Cheap gold plate, with roman numerals on the dial. The only actual award he kept in his office. The Young Journalist Award from the Collier City Chamber of Commerce. He was still in high school when he won it. He had been so proud of it. But Jennifer Belson still refused to go to prom with him. When he was playing spin the bottle in seventh grade Beth Matson said she’d rather cut off her tongue than go into the closet with the Word Nerd. It was all over seventh grade that he read the dictionary. For fun.

  Why did he still remember that? His heart was starting to thump again. Get a grip. Get a grip.

  He couldn’t put it off anymore. He held his breath as he opened his email, but when he saw the subject line the air rushed from his lungs in synchrony with the blood draining from his face. The same subject line as before: From a Woman Scorned.

  He opened the email. The message was the same: Don’t think you’re getting off that easy. I know what you did. Just wait. Everybody is going to know that when it comes to #MeToo, it’s #YouToo.

  The phone wobbled a little in his hand as he placed it face down on his desk. As he looked to his photo wall for comfort, his own distorted reflection stared back at him, and he didn’t think the face-made-for-radio joke was much of a joke. A television critic had once written of his face that it was “work of art like Michelangelo’s David—if Michelangelo took a hatchet to hack away those parts that weren’t David.” But he’d had more than one woman say she liked his face because it was strong and “strong” wasn’t code for ugly. The code word for ugly was “interesting.” Besides, he knew how to please a woman.

  He pulled a clean shirt from his stash in the desk drawer, and yanked off his bloodied one, ev
idence of his weakness.

  There was a knock at the door.

  “Come in,” he said.

  Madison stood saucer-eyed in the doorway. After a beat she said, “Eleanor wanted you to have these,” as she set a bottle of pills and the water glass on his desk.

  Damn. He quickly raked his arms inside the clean shirt and fumbled with the top buttons. Now she could say he had lured her into his office while he was in a state of undress. The world had gone insane.

  Eleanor sailed in behind Madison with first aid supplies in hand. “Florence Nightingale to the rescue. Thanks Madison, I’ve got it from here.” Eleanor motioned Russ toward the low-backed chair in front of his desk. “Park it there, mister.”

  Mercifully, Madison disappeared, and Russ settled in the chair.

  “I hate to be clichéd,” Eleanor said, “but this really will sting.”

  But in fact Russ hardly felt anything except gratitude to the small dynamo standing behind him. Always standing behind him, always standing by him, ministering to his head wound the way she took care of everything else. Eleanor’s very presence told him that things were still normal. His life could never be upended as long as Eleanor was there. She had been with him for almost as long as Paul. They used to joke that she was his better half, back when it was permissible to make those kinds of jokes. They had agreed that she couldn’t be his actual wife because it might ruin their working relationship, although they had slept together off and on during those early years. She was brisk and efficient in bed, anticipating his wants there just as she did in the office, but wanting and taking her own pleasure, too. He suddenly remembered with a pang that he used to call her his little Apache because of the abandon she showed when she was on top.

  “Sorry about the Apache comment,” he said.

  “Not a problem. I was just surprised you remembered. You’ve got a lump back here.”

  It occurred to him he should say something nice, something gracious about their time together—their affair, he supposed he should call it—that he should thank her for being wonderful not just in bed but about it all. She had treated him like a horse she knew she could ride but not tame.