Okay, mood slightly ruined. Richard isn’t here yet, so Mark can let his viciousness run rampant. Luckily Elaine, my work ally, is sitting right next to me, and I feel her body stiffen like a shield. She has no time for Mark’s BS.
She turns toward me. “I know Mark’s always been a dick, but is he losing his mind, too? Fainting?”
“I know, right?” I say, faking incredulity, mostly so I can see the veins in Mark’s forearms start to pop and pulse. He’s on the verge of a retort when Richard strides in.
Richard is in his late fifties, with a full head of reddish blond hair, mustache, and these eighties dad glasses that are accidentally back in fashion. He always stands for the length of the meeting and makes notes on the whiteboard in his incomprehensible handwriting.
It’s a slow news day, which means the head desk (Richard and the lead producers) are asking us for pitches. After shourchbar night, true to my word, I stormed Twitter looking for tips and snagged a juicy one. I’m taking a bit of a risk with it, pitching a story outside my usual fluffy zone of coverage, but I hear my dad’s voice telling his friends how his daughter covers the news, the real news, and it fuels me.
Everyone goes around the table, and when Richard gets to me, I start with, “I was hoping for a shot at a political story.” There’s a scoff from a few people in the room—Mark and the anchors. My cheeks flame. Deep inside, my tear ducts start to swell, at the ready in case I need them. God, why is that my first reaction? Keeping my voice as steady as possible—though it feels like I’mstepping along a wobbly plank—I continue, “I heard that Mayor Ortega is considering putting an emergency halt on the new salt marsh development, and a source close to the mayor’s office is willing to talk to me.”
The last part is sort of a fib, but I can get someone to talk to me, I know it. Richard turns to write down “salt marsh dev,” and we’re left staring at the sweat wrinkles striping the backside of his olive pants. “Is this true?” he asks. “Anyone got intel on it?”
Mark, with his disgustingly perfect hair, pipes up. “Yessir. I have reason to believe it is.”
He’s lying, but I can’t fault him for the old move of pressing the buzzer onJeopardy!first and making up the answer as you go. Richard says, “You should have brought this up earlier if you knew about it. But you’ve scored it, congratulations.”
What the—? Mark looks like he won a Press Club award. Which he probably will one day, the bastard. But no, no way. He is not going to take my story. I want to jump onto the table and roar it to the room, but there’s something in Mark’s smug face and Richard’s dismissiveness that turns my voice tiny. “Richard, respectfully, that’s my lead and my source.”
He barrels on. “And Mark’s got the political beat. Would you try to steal a story about the latest exploding tech gadget fiasco away from Elaine?”
Steal? What the hell. But what can I say to that?
“No,” I say, smiling, trying to look agreeable.
Because I can feel it, if I don’t come up with something good quick, I’m going to be assigned another worthless story. But I’ve got nothing.
Except. Explore Armenia. A diaspora community in the Bay Area sharing various elements of their culture, targeting theyounger crowd to keep traditions alive. Yeah, I can make it sexy. Screw it, I’m pitching.
“But I do have something else. This month, there’s an event that only happens every three years.”
“Bitconference is every two years,” Mark interjects. “And Elaine’s already covering it.”
My eyes squint a little too hard with my fake smile. “Not Bitconference, Mark.” God that feels good. I puff up my voice for the grand reveal. “Explore Armenia. It’s an event whose importance extends beyond the Armenian diaspora community of the Bay Area. It’s not only about preserving Armenian culture but sharing it with our local community. There’s a cooking class coming up that could be very—”
“I’m going to stop you right there,” Richard says. I’m not sure what I did wrong; that was sounding solid.
Richard appears some combination of bored and self-important. “Snoozefest. We don’t get any bites on quote-unquote cultural stories.” He spares me from doing those terrible air quotes to match the disdain in his voice.
But I dive back in, confident about my counterargument. “But food stories are always great for viewership. Last week you had me covering the food truck scene on Broadway—”
Richard barges into my sentence, voice calm but louder than mine. “Right. But those were about tacos. Everyone loves tacos. We’ve got a bunch of viewers, especially those white millennials we’re trying to target, who love tacos. No one knows who Armenians are, can’t find the place on a map, and they don’t care to anyway.”
I’m shell-shocked. I have a million responses to that, but they’re all jumbled in my head, and the only one that comes out is likepure id, though I am reigning in my emotions as much as possible. “Richard, you knowI’mArmenian, right?”
“And I’m a quarter French. If my boss told me not to run a story about France or, you know, croissants, I’m following that command.”
Um, he thinks being French, from a huge colonizing nation that brutalized civilizations around the world, is like being Armenian. I shouldn’t have brought it back to myself anyway. That’s not my problem with what he said. I want to get in his face and say, “So you’re saying I’m not allowed to report on an Armenian story because our culture isn’t sexy enough for white millennials?” because no one can deny that soundsbad. But now it feels too late, and something in the energy has changed, like he’s had the last word and lightened the mood with his pastry reference. I don’t reply, and he examines his computer screen.
“Where’s the slosh pot?” He types frantically. “Can anyone pull it up and project?”
Oh no, the viewer suggestions that come in through our website. They’re always small, petty stories, and guess who always gets stuck with them.
Mark types and clicks furiously, and the comments page appears on the TV behind Richard. I don’t bother reading it.
It could have been so perfect, the cooking class. I would have collaborated with Vache, an expert on Armenian food, and it would give Explore Armenia some press. And I’d get to strut my stuff in front of Erebuni. You know, totally platonically.
Richard runs his hand over his hair. “Why am I looking at the full list? Don’t we have someone to curate this shit? Meredith!”
