Righting the Ship
The server arrived with the drinks and Charlie accepted his bourbon with a smile and appreciative sip. "We're gonna try Elliot out at 10 o'clock. Starting in two weeks."
MacKenzie allowed the server to place the ice-filled glass and can of Diet Coke in front of her. "With the right E.P., he'll do great. I was sort of hoping that he would, you know, come to 8—"
Charlie affected surprise. "What? And replace Jane?"
"We've talked many times about replacing Jane. She isn't what's needed." Mac paused. "And, besides, she drinks before the show. It's just a matter of time."
"I drink before the show—"
"You aren't on TV."
He used a finger to stir the ice through his liquor. "Any more fall out from your little rant in the Times?"
She snorted. "Well, I seem to be a pariah in the news community. Fox has terminated its pool agreement with us and Sky is making overtures to the same. And Bill O'Reilly denounced me for an hour the other night."
"'When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him.' That's Jonathan Swift." Charlie shrugged and took another swallow. "You just told them their jobs, Mac. Of course, they're going to be a little pissed off."
She didn't respond.
"I hired a new anchor for you."
"You hired—you—I'm never going on holiday again—you hired a new anchor without my meeting her?"
"Him."
"Without my meeting him?"
"No, you've met him."
A realization coalesced. She brought her hands to the table, pushing back in her chair. Suddenly comprehending and wishing she didn't.
"What? Charlie—" rather than raise in volume, her voice dropped an octave, in consideration of being in the executive dining room of the Atlantis World Media tower. "Have you hired to front my show—"
"I had to right the ship. Jane's well on her way to irrelevance, we've both seen that coming. Your show is too big an asset to screw around with and Reese is making me aware of the dropping numbers—"
"Charlie—"
"He was in Kandahar for four months, in the Bolan Pass before that—Jesus, he's been filing stories from caves, Mac. He's been shot at in three different countries and abducted twice. Just a few months ago, he was in that convoy that hit an IED and he—"
"I know, Charlie. I know all that. But I can't give my approval." She gave him the fisheye. "I do have approval over the anchor selection."
"You would think so, wouldn't you?"
She reared back now, alarmed into motion. Stuffing her phone into her bag, rising. "I'm going down the street right now and check that contract."
"Mac. It's not gonna go your way." And when she failed to respond, Charlie called again, unmindful of the faces now turned and staring at the two of them. "Mac. When was the last time you saw him?"
She turned and looked heavenward briefly before continuing out. "Fuck me."
oooo
Margaret Jordan quietly entered the newsroom and looked to the glass-walled conference room, where staffers attentively followed a young man scrawling on a dry erase board. She dropped her bag on the floor and took a seat in one of the secretarial swivel chairs. And waited.
When the meeting ended and staffers filed out, she rose to greet the man she'd watched earlier.
"Margaret Jordan. Maggie's fine."
"Jim Harper." He ducked his head, then squinted up at her. "Sorry, I don't recognize your name—did we have a meeting or—"
"Will brought me in as floor director and A.P."
"Will? That would be—"
"Will McAvoy. The new anchor."
"For News Night? But Jane—and Mac didn't say anything to me about—"
"Possibly because the old anchor doesn't know yet?" she smiled sweetly. "You should probably keep this under your hat for the time being."
"If Charlie hired Will, we'd all know about it by now, from the sound of expensive television equipment being smashed against the walls. By Mac."
Maggie looked sanguine. "Then, you'd better break out the ENG video cam, because it sounds like there's gonna be a murder when he gets here. And he should be along anytime now."
"Fuck. I gotta go. Excuse me." He tore through the bullpen to Mac's office and, finding it empty, resorted to digging out his cell. His thumbs moved in a blur of motion.
Maggie watched with amusement until, hearing an approach behind her, she turned and saw Will entering from the elevator landing.
"Good. You made it." He dropped his own bag and a battered guitar case near hers. "Been here long?"
"Um, Will, there's something you should know—"
"Yeah?"
Behind Will, MacKenzie's entrance stopped Maggie's response. Instantly divining who this was, Maggie backed away, leaving the other two in a nowhere-near-private-enough conversation bubble.
"Hey, Mac. It's good to see you." He flashed his most affable smile.
She wore no expression but the color seemed to have drained from her face. He looked much the same, making her heart lurch, but he was different, too. The deep tan that accentuated his golden hair made him resemble some Nordic god. The two-inch scar above his right eyebrow, memento of his recent (and very well-publicized) ambush whilst embedded with 2nd Battalion 7th Marines in Sangin.
He pressed on, undeterred by her surprised silence. "You look great. Read your little op-ed piece in the Times a few weeks back." He shrugged and the smile got a bit bolder. "Vintage Mac. You're always repackaging the whole Don Quixote metaphor—but that's okay. It's you, I like it. You called for reclaiming journalism as an honorable profession, a return to the sacred tenets of the Fourth Estate—"
"In my office. Now."
She strode purposefully in that direction, and, after a short pause, he followed, years of dangerous location reporting having turned his gait into an unselfconscious swagger. All eyes in the newsroom watched as the two disappeared into MacKenzie's office.
Maggie leaned, ill-advisedly, on a line of books as she peered over the shoulder of the I.T. guy.
"'Jane's Way'? What's that?"
Sampat wheeled around to look at the limp-haired blond rubbernecking behind him. "The News Night blog. For Jane Barrow, our—"
"Got it." The row of books, anchored only by a tiny Beanie Baby [Tamara's] at one end, suddenly gave way, and Maggie fell onto the desk. She righted herself quickly, trying to salvage some dignity.
He stifled a snicker and stuck out his hand. "I'm Neal. I write the blog."
"Maggie Jordan—"
Raised voices emanated from one of the offices ringing the bullpen. It was clear the E.P. and would-be anchor were sorting through some old personal baggage.
"—and I may or may not be the new floor director and A.P. Right now, I'm guessing, probably not." She dropped into a nearby chair. "Hey. You've got a yellow iNews alert." She pointed to the screen at the workstation where she sat and added, with a slight inflection of superiority, "There's no iNews subscription in the field, so I really haven't seen one of these since I was interning—"
Jim Harper, passing near, leaned over and clicked the mouse. "'Well explosion in the Gulf of Mexico.'" He considered briefly before seeming to dismiss the significance of the alert. "Probably some industrial accident. Dull OSHA stuff. Tess, can you check this out?"
"'Flames reach 150 feet in the air. Fifteen workers believed missing.'" News collection wasn't technically in Neal's job description, and he hadn't intended to usurp Tess's assignment, but his finger was quicker on the mouse and—well, he had aspirations. Anyone in a newsroom would.
There were more loud voices from Mac's office.
"What's their history, do you know?"
"Huh?" Jim had been distracted by Neal's report and it took a moment for Maggie's question to register. "History—MacKenzie McHale and McAvoy—you've never Googled them or anything?"
"Too busy dodging RPGs in the desert, I guess," she deadpanned back to him.
"Are you working this, Tess? And, Kendra, see if you can get a comment from the Coast Guard." He turned his attention back to her. "In a nutshell, Will McAvoy is an oversexed narcissistic asshole who left Mac at the altar and fled to a warzone."
"Making Afghanistan the lesser of two dangerous situations?"
"Funny." He had his cell out. "I get that you're a loyalist, Maggie Jordan. I am, too. So's Mac, and I hope you get the chance to know her. But, right now, on the unlikely chance this explosion turns into a story, I've got to make some calls." Over his shoulder, "Gary, get a twenty on Jane, just in case."
The man in question raised his eyes to the wall clocks denoting multiple time zones. "Judging by the hour, I imagine she's at Chew's, gathering her fortitude."
Everyone suddenly having an urgent assignment, Maggie idly moved the computer mouse. Then, she keyed some letters into the browser. Stats began stacking up and her eyes widened.
"I've got it, too," Neal whispered to her. "Jim. Hey, Jim. We might be-we're chasing the wrong story—"
oooo
"Okay, I get that you're surprised, that Charlie should have handled this a little better—but we were always a great team, Mac—"
"'Were' being the operative word." Behind her desk, at the throne of power, she tried especially hard to keep the tremor from her voice. She needed to dispose of this problem as promptly as possible, before old emotion came flooding back, making resolve unreliable.
"—And if you'd read any of the emails or letters I sent, or taken my calls, you'd know that I absolutely regret how we parted and that I'd do anything—"
"I already did know and I already didn't care."
It brought him up short and he paused for several long seconds before embarking on another tack.
"Mac, this can be great. News Night with Will McAvoy. E. by MacKenzie McHale, the best in the business. It'll be a master's class in journalism for all those young pups out there," he added, gesturing to the newsroom staffers, hunkered over their terminals and phones.
"It's plain News Night. No 'withs' in the title. Jane doesn't have the title."
"Jane Barrow doesn't deserve the title. And you'll give it to me—"
"No."
"It's stipulated in my contract—"
"—Which hasn't been made operative yet." She glared at him.
The door opened, Maggie gliding in, closely followed by Jim.
"Yes—what?" Mac was reluctant to cede control and she didn't know why this young woman was interrupting.
"My name is Maggie Jordan and an oil well just exploded in the gulf—"
"The Persian Gulf?" Will and Mac ventured, simultaneously.
From the looks of it, Maggie had snookered them both on that count.
She shook her head. "Gulf of Mexico. Coast Guard's searching for 11 possibly 13 missing—"
"I'll fill you in at the rundown," Jim declared, hoping to end this gross impropriety.
"There's more," Maggie said, with a hopeful look at Will.
"They don't need to hear this right now—"
"I'd like to hear it," Will grinned.
"Shit," Mac said and Jim thought. This was getting out of control.
"The story isn't the fire," Maggie continued. "It's going to be an environmental disaster—"
Mac sat straight upright. "Who says so?" she asked, guardedly.
"Your guy, Neal."
"The I.T. guy?"
"Actually, he's your blog guy—anyway, if you can—"
"Neal!" Jim barked through the open door. "Tell us what you were telling her," indicating Maggie with a nod.
"This well, Deep Water Horizon—they're drilling at 18,000 feet below sea level. The pressure at that depth is enormous. You can't just yank the pin without consequences."
"What are the consequences?" Mac leaned forward.
"There should have been a fail-safe thing, called an Underwater Blow Out Preventer, that would automatically close and stop the well. But the flames are still 150 feet in the sky, so obviously that didn't happen."
Jim took over, flipping pages in his notepad. "I do have a source—pretty low-level—but the source tells me the pressure at that depth is such that closing the well mechanically is near impossible. Relief wells are the next course of action but they may take months—"
"—And the original well is still spilling oil at the rate of 4.2 million gallons a day," Neal finished.
"At that rate, it'll have spilled as much oil as the Exxon Valdez in 1989." Maggie gave a triumphant look to Will. "It may be the biggest environmental disaster in history." And we got here in time.
Will dipped his chin and looked at Neal and then to Mac.
Coolly, Mac turned to Jim. "Where's Jane?"
"Splashed. I can reel her in if you want, but at this hour, I wouldn't recommend it."
"Terry?"
"Doesn't answer."
"Elliot Hersh?"
"Dental appointment. Root canal."
She made a face. "Fucking Tony Hart?"
"No." Jim Harper shook his head. "We've got to go with what we've got, Mac."
It took two more seconds for her to snap into gear. "Call wardrobe. See what they can find for someone freakishly tall." Then, to Will, "Give your dimensions to her—" she pointed to Maggie, "get him into a suit—"
"I've got something with me—"
Of course.
"Jim, can we be ready by the top of the hour?" That would be a bit less than ten minutes.
"I'm on it. I'll grab Jake. He'll have to dual-seat for graphics—Joey won't be in until 8."
"Maggie can handle it," Will volunteered.
"Go, make it happen." Mac waved a hand to dispatch the two junior newshawks, but used it to arrest her de facto breaking news anchor. "This isn't a commitment, Will. I want you to understand that."
"Of course not." He gave her a salacious wink as he departed. "We both know how you feel about commitments."
oooo
He caught her at the elevator landing. Seeing him approach, she pushed again, more urgently at the call button.
"Good show tonight. Can I talk to you for a second?"
"8 to 9's over."
"That's when you talk to me, not the other way around." He offered the patented winning McAvoy smile, the one that always tore at her heart.
And he knew it. The bastard.
The elevator door slid open and she stepped in gratefully, immediately punching the button for Lobby.
He leaned against the door, preventing it from sliding closed.
"Yes?"
"You won't remember this but I first met you at the 2005 RFK Awards. You were being recognized for your series on the rise of political action committees. I was—"
"You were there with your girlfriend. Who was not getting an award that night."
He ducked his head guiltily. "You were the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen, and when I finally got to talk to you—you were smart and funny and perfect. I dumped my date—"
"A pattern for which you should probably seek treatment."
He ignored the jab. "—And we had drinks later in the hotel bar. We talked. There was a little jazz group and they played Cole Porter—"
"Because Cole Porter songs always had a great beat and you could dance to them?" she added, mockingly, now crossing her arms across her chest.
"—And that's why I think of you whenever I hear De-Lovely or You're the Top."
"Nice to know that I'm on your playlist. Along with every other piece of ass in the city."
"MacKenzie—"
"Let me go," she said, inclining her head to his hand holding open the elevator door.
He didn't seem angry or annoyed or contrite. She would have been pleased, if not mollified, by a little contrition. He just smiled and lifted his hand.
As the door closed, she distinctly heard, "Never again."