First a massive pile up by the Liberty Tunnel had shut down traffic for most of the south side of the city, making it near impossible for two of their crews to get to their story locations. One crew, they redirected to the accident scene, but the other still fought their way through traffic. Then the internet randomly went down to the entire neighborhood. Their engineers were frantically working to get it back up, but in the meantime, everyone was working off their phone’s networks, which did not make for speedy access to the web.
As if those two things hadn’t been enough, now both the dayside assignment editors had called in sick for the next day, meaning Charlotte would be stuck at work for twelve hours minimum. She would also have to run the dayside assignment meeting, which she hated. The meeting was triple the size of her overnight one. Just thinking about having to talk in front of everyone, hand out assignments to eight reporters and their photographers, and interact with all the people she never saw during her schedule made black spots swim before her eyes.
The only thing that kept her going was the thought that she might get to talk to Trey again. The amount of time she’d spent thinking about him since first hearing his voice the night before bordered on obsessive. Twice, she had brought up his Facebook page on her phone, just so she could look at that sexy as hell calendar photo.
A crash echoed through the newsroom, and Charlotte looked toward the noise to see what could be going wrong now. A photographer had been running out of the newsroom to load up his vehicle and race to the scene of a potential break-in at the same time a production assistant was rushing back into the newsroom to deliver the eleven o’clock scripts to the anchors. Both were sprawled on the floor with papers scattered, and most importantly, the photographer’s camera in pieces.
“Shit! Watch where you’re going, you idiot. My fucking camera better not be out of commission, or you are paying for it.” Harris was known as one of the station’s most angry photographers. He did nothing but complain about the poor pay, horrible hours, and bitchy reporters.
Charlotte often wondered why he had gotten into news in the first place if he hated it so much. He plucked two of the pieces of equipment from the ground, and Charlotte could tell from across the room that there would be no fast fix for the camera. “Goddammit! It’s fucking ruined. You need to get out of my face right now before I do something to get me fired.”
The poor PA scrambled around on the floor, scooping up the scripts and trying desperately not to show how flustered she was. But Charlotte knew all too well the tension in her body and flush which spread across the girl’s face meant that she would break down at any moment.
“Harris, shut your trap and get your camera into engineering. They should have a spare for you to take.” Michele’s voice rang out from the door to her office. Charlotte hadn’t known the news director for very long, only a year since she took over the position from the asshat before her, and even then, they only interacted through phone and email conversations due to their opposing schedules. But she had proven herself to be tough and fair in the few meetings they had together. “And next time you watch where you’re going. You are the one carrying a five-thousand-dollar piece of equipment like it’s a dirty diaper.”
The photographer picked up the rest of his scattered belongings and stormed through the door, mumbling something under his breath about Michelle being a bitch.
“In the wise words of Tina Fey, bitches get stuff done,” Michelle yelled after him.
Charlotte rose from her seat at the assignment desk and went to help the production assistant with gathering the scripts. “Erin, right?”
The girl nodded, her face to still bright red from the encounter with Harris.
“Don’t pay attention to that asshole. He seriously isn’t worth the stress.” Charlotte had had more than her fair share of run ins with the dickhead. The first few times had left her near panic attack, but with each interaction, she cared less and less about what he thought of her. The knowledge that she didn’t care about his opinion had been freeing, and he was one of the few people she could stand up against without feeling like she would pass out.
“Thanks, Charlotte. I’m just flustered that’s all.” The papers now off the floor and straightened, they both stood from their crouched positions.
“Trust me, I get it. Better get a move on. Only ten minutes to showtime.”
Erin nodded and hustled from the newsroom to the dressing rooms where both anchors would be applying their make-up.
As Charlotte made her way back to the assignment desk, Michelle waved her into the news director’s office. The two very rarely saw each other since Charlotte typically didn’t get into work until ten at night and Michelle left around seven. But once in awhile her boss would make sure to stay later, so they could touch base.
“How are you doing, Charlotte? I know you’ve been working a ton of hours with this damn flu going around.” Michelle sat in one of the chairs across the room and studied Charlotte intently.
“I’m fine. I’ll admit I’m a little tired. But nothing I can’t handle.” Being called into Michelle’s office used to freak Charlotte out. Her heart would pound, and her brain would work overtime trying to think of what she did wrong to warrant being called into the boss’s inner sanctum. But it didn’t take long before she figured out that Michelle truly just liked to keep in contact with her employees. She seemed to care about each of them, and that put Charlotte at ease. Or as at ease as she ever could be.
“Good, good.” Michelle took a deep breath and seemed to be working up towards something, but Charlotte couldn’t figure out what that would be. “Listen, Rich came to me today and let me know he’d like to retire.”
Charlotte’s eyes widened in shock. Rich had been with WQUZ for longer than Charlotte had been alive. First, as a lowly reporter in the seventies, then, working his way up to anchor in the eighties and nineties. About fifteen years prior, he had decided he’d had enough with the on-air life and transitioned to be the assignment manager, running the assignment desk. He was old school in a way which sometimes annoyed Charlotte, refusing to train up on new technology and never taking well to having women in the newsroom be anything other than eye-candy. But still, his retirement came as a surprise. She had been sure he would work until the day he dropped dead.
“Wow, I’m not really sure what to say.” Truly she didn’t. The news was interesting, but not something she felt warranted a sit-down meeting with Michelle. The change didn’t really affect Charlotte, since she only saw Rich once in awhile, less than she saw Michelle in fact.
“Well, I’m hoping you’ll say you’ll take his position.” The expression on Michelle’s face was equal parts determination and hope.
Charlotte’s mouth gaped open for a moment before shutting it again. Then opening to respond before snapping it shut once more. Surprisingly, her first reaction was overwhelming happiness, which Charlotte quickly dismissed and centered herself. Realizing she looked like a fish flopping around gasping for breath, she looked down at her hands resting in her lap and tried to collect her thoughts.
“You know I can’t do that.” The words hurt exiting her lips. On the rare occasion Charlotte dreamed of how her life could be without the debilitating shyness, the fantasy often included working during daylight hours, tracking down and fine-tuning story ideas until they were all but ready to be cracked open by reporters she would guide in the field. Being in front of a camera had never been her ambition but finding great stories and getting them to the viewers always was.
But that would be impossible. She could barely look at the woman across from her in the eye without having a panic attack, and it had taken her months to get to the point where she was comfortable handing out assignments. The idea of having to be assertive and act confident day after day in front of some of the strongest personalities in the city almost made her laugh, if it didn’t make her lungs constrict.
“What about Annabel? She already works alongside Rich everyday. I’m sure she would jump at the chance. Plus, she is great at bossing people around.”
Michelle chuckled, obviously amused at Charlotte’s characterization of the day time AE. “That she is. But she’s also a single mom, and as much as I want her to advance in her career, the longer hours and increased responsibility won’t work with her schedule, at least not until Kaleb is a little older. Though I would delegate more duties to her if you decide to take the position.”
“How so?”
“Well, we’d basically split Rich’s job in half. Anna would be in charge of telling the crews their assignments, changing crews midstream, and keeping track of their updates throughout the day. You would oversee the day-to-day story ideas. Cultivating them and presenting them in the meeting. You would do all research on stories before they ever even see the light of day in the meetings. You would help reporters fine-tune their pitches and help them find the best hook.
