by Lynn Ames
“Right, kiddo, sounds like just the ticket. We don’t need too much of the personal stuff here; probably won’t have room for it. Focus on the career and the professional approach she takes to her work, her philosophy, you know.”
“Yep. In fact, you’re right, there’s no time to waste. I’ll try to get up there this evening if I can, start following her right away. Let me guess, you want it on your desk at 10:00 a.m. next Monday, right?”
The editor just smiled as she walked away and winked at Jay over her shoulder.
As soon as she was out of sight, the writer looked around to make sure that she was alone. Assured that she was, she let out a little whoop and did a happy dance in her chair; this was too good to be true.
Looking at her watch, she noted that it was 1:00. Kate wouldn’t have left for the office yet. Taking out the much-thumbed business card from 86
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her wallet, Jay dialed her friend’s home number. It was picked up on the second ring.
“Hello.”
Jay thought she sounded a little distracted. “Hi. Is this a bad time?”
“No, it’s never a bad time for you, Jay. Are you okay? Is something wrong?” They weren’t supposed to talk until later in the day, and the older woman was the one who was supposed to make the call.
“No, no,” Jay hastened to assure her tall friend. “Everything’s fine; in fact, I think it’s pretty great right now.”
“Oh yeah? Why’s that?”
“Well, for one thing, the editor and the managing news editor loved my story. Trish said it was the best piece she’s seen in ages!” The wonder was clear in the writer’s voice.
“That’s terrific, Jay, I told you your stuff was awesome; I’m glad to see that others have good taste, as well.” The note of pride and happiness was clear even over the phone. “Really, that’s great news. We’ll have to celebrate sometime, I’ll buy you dinner.”
Jay hesitated, suddenly unsure of herself. “Well, now that you mention it, there is a part two to this news.”
“Hmm, what’s that?” She sounded distracted again.
“Kate, are you sure this isn’t a bad time?”
“Huh? Oh, no. It’s just that I was on the floor wrestling around with Fred and I lost an earring. I’m on my hands and knees just trying to find it before he swallows it or I step on it.”
Picturing the scene, Jay took a deep breath and plowed ahead. “They want me to do a related story for next week. It may be another cover, they’re not sure yet.”
“That’s great.”
“Yeah, I think so too. Especially since you’re the subject of the story.” There was a loud thump on the other end of the phone. “Kate, are you all right? Kate?”
“Oh yeah, I’m fine, just lost my balance for a second there; must have been the way I was kneeling.” She paused for a moment. “Let me make sure I understand you correctly. Your bosses, the editors of Time magazine, want you to write a story about me. Does that about sum it up?”
“Yep.”
“You’re not making this up to get one over on me, are you?”
The writer was charmed by her friend’s befuddlement. “Nope.”
“Are you going to give me more than one-word answers?”
Jay smiled mischievously. “You never do.”
“That’s different.” Kate sighed in exasperation. “Jamison, please tell me more details,” she said in her most contrite voice.
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“That’s better.” Jay gloated at the small victory and explained to her friend what she wanted to do. “So, I can be there in a few hours, get myself settled in the hotel, and then come over to the station.”
“What?” Kate practically screamed into the receiver. “There’s no way you’re coming to my town and staying in a hotel. You can stay with Fred and me. In the guestroom,” she added belatedly, rushing on, “we have plenty of space, as you know, and it would be much easier for you to study your subject.”
“I don’t want to impose, Kate.”
“It’s no imposition at all, and I won’t hear another word about it.
How about if you catch the 3:15 p.m. Amtrak and I’ll pick you up at the train station on my dinner break? The timing should be just about right and we can get a bite to eat and I’ll take you back to the station with me.”
Jay didn’t even want to say no, so she didn’t.
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CHAPTER NINE
hil beckoned to Kate as soon as she arrived at the station. “Hey.
PHow are you feeling?” The producer was almost never serious, so his tone took her by surprise.
“I’m all right, Phil. You know me, tough as they come, a few cuts and stitches aren’t going to stop me.”
“Yeah, I know. But I have a right to worry, too, okay?”
“There’s nothing to worry about, friend.”
“Good, ’cause the next few days aren’t going to be easy.”
“Why don’t I like the sound of that?”
“The brass wants you to put together a one-hour special, ‘Crisis at the Capitol.’ They want you to talk to the families who lost loved ones, and people who were in the building at the time. They want it to be a gritty, moving piece. And they want it to air on Thursday.” At the last, he couldn’t even look her in the eye.
She let out a slow breath. “Geez, they don’t ask for much, do they?”
she asked rhetorically. Her wheels were already spinning. “I get to name my crew, including the cameraman, the editor, and the producer.”
“Absolutely.”
“Am I expected to anchor at the same time? I can’t put together a quality program and do my regular job properly.”
“They want you to stay visible, Kate. Heck, you’re the hottest thing since Miss America lost her crown for posing for explicit lesbian photos!”
The anchorwoman glanced sharply at Phil, who, in his oblivion, was busy eyeing one of his cuticles. Nah, he couldn’t know. It wasn’t that Kate wasn’t comfortable with who she was. It was more that being a woman in her business was difficult enough; being an out lesbian when she was as recognizable as she was simply was out of the question. She would have been fired in a heartbeat and blacklisted in the industry. That was one of the reasons why she had been so careful about who she slept 89
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with. That and the fact that she couldn’t find anyone who could keep her interest or capture her heart.
She thought about that. In college, she and Jen had become lovers when they both served on the ski patrol. It had been a mutually satisfying arrangement: good sex, and someone to have some fun with. Since her lover hadn’t been a student and lived on the other side of town from the campus, there were few complications. Kate preferred it like that, since it allowed her to keep her private life just that. They had things in common, like their love of skiing and hiking. Jen knew the area like the back of her hand, since she was a forest ranger by day, doing the EMT thing on a volunteer basis.
Everything had been going fine, or so Kate thought, until the night that Jay had been attacked. The EMT had taken one look at her lover’s face as she sat there with the small blonde in her arms, and she had known that her secret dreams of having a real future with Kate were dead.
Jen had never told Kate how much she loved her, or how much she wanted to make a life with her. Instinct had warned her that such declarations would send her lover running in the opposite direction, so the ranger had kept things light and fun, even though her heart had demanded more. The expression on the senior’s face as she had held Jay so tenderly had told Jen more than Kate ever would: she understood that her love would never be returned the way she wanted it to. It was as if Kate’s heart already belonged to the petite stranger.
Jen hadn’t been able to handle knowing that she could never have her lover on her terms. Shortly after that incident, she had broken it off with Kate.
“I ju
st can’t do this anymore, kiddo,” Jen choked out through her tears.
“Why? I don’t understand. What’s different now?”
“Because, Katherine Kyle, I have been waiting two years for you to look at me the way you looked at that young girl, and you don’t even know her; two years for you to want me the way I want you in my life, and now I know it’s never going to happen.”
“What are you talking about, Jen? You’re not making any sense.
Haven’t we always had a good time? Haven’t you enjoyed being together, making love together? I thought we both wanted the same things. I never knew you needed more than that. And what the hell look are you referring to? Is it because I asked you to follow up on Jay’s condition that night and the next day? Why the hell should that bother you? Shouldn’t I care how she made out? Didn’t you?”
“Never mind, Kate. I just need to let us go, okay?”
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“If that’s what you want, Jen. I’m not going to stand in your way.”
Of course, in the years since, Kate had tried hard not to examine too closely the reasons why she had insisted on keeping tabs on Jay and the reason why, whenever she heard something about the writer or read one of her articles, it made her stomach flip and brought a smile to her lips.
Well, there was no denying what Kate felt this time around; she had known it the second she had looked up from her seat on the bench across from the capitol to see Jay standing in front of her. She had been glad to be sitting, because the jolt in her guts would have been enough to bring her to her knees. No one else had ever come close to making her feel that way before. It was terrifying and exciting at the same time, and Kate had no intention of running away.
To Phil she said, “Fine. Then at the very least I want to name the copywriter for my stuff so that I don’t end up looking like an idiot on the air.”
“Done,” the producer promised, relieved that she hadn’t put up more of a fight.
“Oh, and buddy,” the tall woman towered over him as he sat behind his cluttered desk, “I think you should know that Time magazine is doing a feature on me for next week’s issue, sort of a ‘New Breed of Journalist’
type of thing. There’s going to be some backlash, I’m sure, but I expect you to see to it that the writer who will be putting the piece together is given full access to anything she wants and is treated like royalty.
Right?” She growled the last.
“Anything you want, Kate.”
“Good.” She walked away to begin planning the special.
Making her way to her desk, Kate was surprised to find it papered with phone messages from family members of people lost in the blast who wanted to talk to her and from people who had been in the building at the time.
As she returned the first few messages, the pattern became clear to her: the media was crawling all over these poor folks like vultures, leaving them feeling overwhelmed. They had seen Kate’s coverage, had watched her run back into the ruins to help the injured. They only wanted to talk to her—the rest of the media be damned. She made appointments to visit one of the victims and one of the families tonight, and more tomorrow. By the 4:00 story meeting, she had returned every phone call and made arrangements to see all of them; these interviews would form the backbone of her special.
The 6:00 newscast was a blur, as Kate had too many things swirling around in her mind. Although her performance was flawless, it was unlikely that she remembered a single story. As soon as the red light 91
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went out, the anchorwoman bolted from her chair and hustled down the corridor from the set to the newsroom, grabbing the keys off her desk and flying out the door.
Making her way to the inbound platform just as the train from Grand Central Station pulled in, she watched anxiously until she saw a familiar blonde head pop out of the business-class car. With three strides and without thought, she met Jay as her feet hit the platform, catching her up and spinning her around.
Even as she thrilled to the greeting, the writer’s face turned beet red.
She pulled back a little in the circle of the taller woman’s arms. “Yikes, how am I supposed to stay professionally detached with a hello like that!” There was a note of teasing in Jay’s voice, but also a kernel of truth, which Kate heard without difficulty. She dropped her arms to her sides and quickly took a step back, giving her friend some space. The rebuke had stung a little, even as gentle as it was, but the anchorwoman understood what the writer was telling her: this was business.
“Of course. I’m sorry, Jay, I guess I got carried away.”
Her friend looked like a spanked puppy and Jay couldn’t stand it.
Achieving distance from this amazing woman was the last thing in the world she wanted to do. “No, Kate. That was the best greeting I’ve ever gotten; I’m thrilled. I’m the one who should be sorry.”
“Forget it,” she shrugged. “I hope you’re hungry, because I’ve got a great place picked out for dinner.”
Jay noticed the abrupt change of subject and the fact that her friend had put about three feet of distance between them, but let her get away with it for now. “Sweetie, I’m always hungry,” she said with a laugh.
As they made their way out of the station, Jay couldn’t help but notice the stares that her companion was getting. There were some wide-eyed looks of recognition, like those that might accompany the sighting of a celebrity, which, she reminded herself, Kate was. And then there were some folks, mostly men, who turned to watch the blue-eyed woman simply because she was breathtaking. What amused Jay about all of this was that her friend appeared to be completely ignorant of all of the attention she was getting.
Dinner was at Sam’s, an out-of-the-way Italian restaurant on the outskirts of the city. The food was fabulous and Jay loved that everyone catered to her companion as if she were royalty. The chef came out to make sure that their meals were satisfactory, the owner came over to make sure the service had been good, and the bartender sent over free sodas, knowing Kate was still working.
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Jay kidded her friend gently about the treatment she was receiving, and Kate blushed an appealing shade of pink and mumbled something about this being one of her favorite restaurants.
From dinner, the anchorwoman drove them back to WCAP, where Gene and Phil were waiting with a station car; she made the introductions, explaining teasingly to Jay that she’d been given her pick of a crew, and, motley as they were, this was it. Jay thought she might recognize the cameraman as the man her friend had hugged at the scene of the explosion that night, and she knew the name Phil from her friend’s phone conversations with him, first at the doctor’s office and later in the green room. If Kate had hand-selected them, she must have thought very highly of their work. The writer made a note to herself to get each of them aside and talk to them about their co-worker.
Kate did not miss the appreciative looks both Gene and Phil gave Jay when they thought no one was paying attention. While she admired their taste, she was surprised to find herself feeling both protective and a bit jealous. But this was no time for that; this was business, after all.
She had already filled Jay in on the parameters of her assignment and how she had spent her afternoon. Allowing as how this would be great material for her story, the writer asked if it would be okay to come along on the interviews. Kate agreed, as long as the families were comfortable with the arrangement.
The first visit was to a man who had received burns to his hands and arms and suffered a broken leg. The anchorwoman remembered him as one of the unfortunate folks who had been trapped on the first floor under the rubble of the second blast; she had helped to free his leg that night.
As soon as she walked into the room his face lit up with a smile. She had made the crew and the writer wait outside for a minute to make sure that the man was okay with being taped and with Jay’s presence. He enthusiastically agreed, and
she motioned the three stragglers into the room.
While Gene set the camera up, the burn victim gestured to Jay to approach the bed. In a conspiratorial stage whisper he told her,
“Katherine saved my life, you know. She was amazing; I’ve never seen a woman that strong. She moved that marble pillar like it was made of Styrofoam. I’ve thanked God for her every day since.” His voice choked with emotion and tears threatened to leak out of the corners of his eyes.
“She’s an angel.”
The writer smiled at the man gently and patted his shoulder, thinking to herself, I know what you mean.
The interview didn’t take very long, the anchorwoman managing to get her subject to take her through his actions up until the point of the explosion and his thoughts once he knew what had happened. It was 93
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poignant and emotional, and powerful: just what she had been looking for.
The group thanked the injured man, Kate lingering behind at his request for a more personal goodbye. Hugging her, his eyes moist, he began, “I don’t know what to say to you except you are the strongest, most courageous person I have ever met. I wouldn’t be alive today if it weren’t for you walking right into the face of danger like you did. You’ll always be my angel, Ms. Kyle, always. And I’ll keep you in my prayers.
Thank you.”
Kate leaned over and gave the man an awkward hug. “I didn’t do anything anyone else wouldn’t have done in my place, but you’re welcome. You just get well now, okay?” She winked at him on her way out the door.
When they gathered outside in the parking lot, Phil looked at his watch and then at Kate questioningly: it was 9:00. It was up to her how close she was willing to cut it to get back to the station and get ready for the 11:00 broadcast. She told him they could fit in one more interview.
