With a sigh, I picked up the phone and tapped the screen.
Meetings finally wrapped. We need to talk plan. This silence is making everyone nervous.
I snorted softly. “He wants to make a plan.”
“And you?” Brewster hadn’t moved his gaze off of me. “What do you want?”
I didn’t answer immediately, clicking the phone screen off and putting it face down on the desk. “I am making a plan.”
“You said you had an idea.”
“I do, I want to do something small—like his annotation—but somethinghewould notice.”
“Because he’s paying attention,” Brewster said slowly, like he was testing the concept out.
“Yes,” I continued. “So, I thought we could get a pulled clip from the archive, an older segment and recirculate it without update or commentary. Just…put it back out again. Dribble it through the network’s TikTok and social media channels as well as a new upload on the website.”
Eyes narrowed, Brewster sat forward again. “Which clip?”
Smart man knew I already had one in mind.
“This one would be from before the Auditor ever appeared, from an older broadcast, clearly, and from a time when if he was active here, he wasn’t actively a media story.”
“Why would this clip interest him?”
“On the surface,” I said, spreading my hands. “It wouldn’t. It has nothing to do with him. It wouldn’t send up flags anywhere else if I ask for someone to pull it and put it back out there.” I touched my tongue to the back of my teeth.
He waited a beat, eyebrows raised.
“You need to play avid audience better,” I said by way of a scold. “The story I’m thinking about related to some politics at the time, a wider sweeping investigation into various rumors of financial misappropriations as well as personal indiscretions without naming names, because the moment one is named, then the story is about the story and not actually about the facts.”
Frowning, Brewster nodded slowly. “Go on.”
“In this case, the investigation worked to debunk several rumors over the past few years that derailed campaigns, and while some proved to be factual—the majority were not. The rumors did what they were intended to do, create a storm of scandal and pushing candidates out of the way.”
That story had taken a lot of fast dancing and talking on my part to even get on the air. Because the meat wasn’t delivered until the final segment when I did name names, reclaiming reputations and proving allegations false—although in a couple of cases, I threw a bone to the mob in the form of the ones that were true.
“In the end, the reputations might have been exonerated, but they were never fully restored because more people remember the scandals and the whispers, than they do the facts. It’s whyrestraintmatters. It’s whyfactsmatter. It’s whyinvestigationmatters.”
Head tilting to the side, Brewster looked considering. “You’re using an older story and series of clips to tell him that restraint mattered long before you began this conversation with him and that it still matters now.”
“Of course,” I told him. “I’m also telling him that I’m not in a rush to ratings. I want facts. I want to know what I’m reporting is accurate and not just scandal.”
“You won’t tag him or caption it or in any way relate it back to this story.” While his attention seemed far away, thoughtful, his tone said he was impressed.
“Precisely.”
A slow smile ghosted the corner of his mouth. Gone almost as soon as it appeared.
“That’s risky,” he said, his gaze flicking back to mine once more.
I held his gaze. “So is doing nothing.” Then I shrugged. “Right now, I prefer action to staring at the wall. He’s reached out. It’s my turn.”
“I want to see the segment—all of it—first,” Brewster said abruptly. “I want to review it and the plan. Show me where and how you think it will work and the exact clips you want to use.”
“Right now?”
My phone buzzed again.
