Chapter 17 Channel 4 TV
Cassidy drove to work with one eye closed. It seemed the only way she could focus. She kept flashing back to waking up in the tub, her hands floating like starfish.
Yesterday felt like a terrible nightmare. Today seemed just as unreal. Jim couldn't be dead, could he? And all the plans he had talked about had died with him.
"Pull yourself together, Cass," she said out loud. Once she walked through the station's double doors, she had to hit the ground running. The events of yesterday would spin off into several dozen stories today. Yesterday she had been the disaster reporter. But that wasn't her--or anyone's--normal beat. Today she would be back to being the crime reporter. And it was clear what crime would be number one on everyone's mind: Jim Fate's murder.
Working in TV news meant you had to be able to perform at a second's notice. Today it felt to Cassidy like she would need more like a couple of hours. It wasn't enough to write a good story. You had to be able to look into that camera and convince people that you knew what you were talking about. You couldn't be threatened or nervous or silly or inarticulate. You couldn't fumble your words or lose your train of thought. Yesterday she had managed it, but today it seemed impossibly out of reach.
The last person Cassidy wanted to see this morning was Jenna. So of course, the intern was the first person she saw when she walked into the station.
Jenna looked like she had spent the first part of her day skipping through a meadow and singing. Her tanned cheeks had a rosy glow. Her long hair fell down her slender back like a blonde waterfall. And her unlined face, Cassidy thought sourly, was practically dewy.
"We are all so proud of you, Cass--" Jenna broke off. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine." Her tongue felt thick.
"Are you sure the air where you were yesterday was okay? You look, um, you look like you don't feel well."
Cassidy hurried to the restroom. In the mirror, she regarded herself with horror. Her hand must have slipped when she applied her eyeliner. On the left side, the line was slender and neat. On the right side, it was so thick that her eye looked like it belonged to Amy Winehouse. Amy Winehouse on her way to rehab.
The thought of rehab brought Cassidy up short. She had never done anything quite as crazy as falling asleep in the tub. But there had been two or three times when an entire package of cookies or cheese disappeared in the middle of the night and she had no memory of what had happened, just the clues of crumbs in her bed and a crumpled package in the garbage can.
Should she have taken her doctor's mumbled warnings more seriously? Was Somulex hurting more than it helped? But the very thought of not having it, of having to go to bed at night knowing that she wouldn't sleep, made Cassidy's hands grow cold and her stomach contract. She had to take Somulex. She had to.
Besides, yesterday had been one of the hardest days of her life. She deserved a little slack. So what if her hands had been shaky while she was putting on makeup? So what if she hadn't noticed? Before she went on camera, she would have to redo her face anyway for high-definition TV. She took a travel packet of makeup remover cloths from her purse and wiped both eyes clean. Then she hurried down the hall for the morning story meeting.
She was the last to walk into the conference room. As soon as she stepped over the threshold, everyone jumped to their feet and started clapping. Even though Cassidy knew it was for her, she had to suppress the desire to look around to see who they were really applauding. Jenna was jumping up and down like a high school cheerleader, Jeff Caldwell actually looked teary eyed, and Anne Forster, who covered the business news, was clapping her hands so hard they must hurt. Even Brad was applauding, although his smile looked like someone had hooked the corners of his mouth and yanked them up.
"Great work yesterday, Cassidy," Eric said, "you and Andy, great work! No other station had live footage from the scene. No one else had reporters who were willing to put their lives on the line to report the story at the source. But you were there, and you did the work. And if something like this had to happen, at least it happened during sweeps month!" As people settled back into their chairs--and Jenna on her ball--he added, "We'll be adding the footage into all our promo commercials for the news. 'Channel 4 Action News: there when you need us!'"
He picked up his dry-erase markers. "We need to brainstorm about follow-up stories. Except for sports and weather, everything today is going to tie back to yesterday. So what should we cover?"
"The key question, obviously," Brad said, "is what exactly happened yesterday. Was it terrorism? Or something more personal?"
Eric wrote "Terrorism?" in purple.