Day 50
„Are you okay, Mac?"
Jim looked worried and instinctively held out his hand to support his boss on their way from the conference room to her office where she had asked him to join her. „You are a little pale."
„I'm fine, Jim, thanks. I didn't sleep that well last night." Mac smiled at her brotherly friend. She should have realized that he would notice that she hadn't been there one-hundred percent during the rundown meeting, and just now she had almost stumbled over her own feet. He never said anything, but she knew he had taken it on as his personal responsibility to make sure that she got through the time without Will without losing sight of her own well-being.
Entering her office she walked over to ther desk. „Close the door, Jim."
The young man followed her instruction and then stepped in front of her desk behind which she had just sat down, slipping off her shoes with a relieved sigh.
„What is Bree up to now? You know more than me, being locked up in here most of the day."
„I'm honestly not quite sure. He is pretty tight with the big boss... Remember the app he pitched about a week ago? I think when we didn't jump on it Bree showed it to Pruit and got the okay to put it on our website..."
Mac frowned. „Without even talking to us about it? Does Charlie know?"
„He has to, doesn't he?"
With a sigh she leaned back in her chair and pinched the bridge of her nose. „I will talk to him. Keep an eye on Bree, will you? I don't trust him..."
Jim nodded and turned around, but stopped before he reached the door. „Sure you are okay? Can I get you anything?"
„No, thanks." Mac shook her head and smiled at him. „I just need a strong coffee. First, though..." She angled for her shoes again, got up and joined him on his way out of the office. „...I will go and see Charlie."
She walked over to the elevators and on the ride up to the executive floor she experienced a queasy feeling in her stomach, just like she had when coming in this morning already. She really hoped she didn't catch a stomach flu...
Stepping out of the car on the 44th floor she stopped shortly for a couple of deep breaths to calm her stomach down and decided to better take the stairs on the way down.
When she reached Charlie's office she asked his secretary Millie for a few minutes and opened his door after a slight knock once she was allowed to go in. Charlie was just finishing a phone call, and when he pointed at one of the chairs in front of his desk Mac sat down, taking the opportunity to study him for a moment.
He looked tired and pale, and once more she worried what this continuous balancing act between their new boss and the staff, between ratings and content, was doing to him. Still, as much as she hated to add to his worries, it was her job to fight for the quality of their show, and that's what she would do.
When Charlie hung up he closed his eyes for a moment before looking at Mac. „That was Pruit with another one of his fucking ideas for the morning shows..." He sighed but then turned his attention to her. „What can I do for you, Mac?"
„Jim just told me that Bree has put up this crazy stalker app on our website, although we told him not to when he pitched it. Do you know about this? And why wasn't I told?"
„It's been running for 5 days now already, didn't you notice?"
„You know very well that I don't follow our website that closely. In fact I never had to when Neal was in charge; it looks like that has to change... I will assign an intern to keep me updated on what happens on there."
Charlie looked at her for a moment and then sighed again „Mac, Pruit wants us to also report on some of the bigger stuff that comes in through that fucking app on TV; like footage of current events being send in. And he wants us to cover celebrities and starlets and whatever they are doing, especially when they are embarrassing themselves in public..." He looked disgusted but lifted his hand when she wanted to say something. „And no, not just dayside, the evening shows as well."
Mac was gaping at him. „Are you fucking kidding me?
Shrugging his shoulders he avoided to look at her. „I have the feeling he is hoping for a big scoop, like the Boston bombing, a cop shooting or even a second 9/11, and we have the exclusive pictures..."
Mac was almost speechless, but only almost. „We will not... Charlie, what happened to you? Four weeks ago you were at his fucking throat for ordering us to cover Will and my private life, and now you want us to put gossip and unvetted content on the show? You are not supporting this, are you?"
Charlie wanted to respond but she didn't let him get a word in edgewise.
„And how does Pruit know about the app anyway? Bree is working for me... He cannot just go to the head of the company directly!" Mac was fuming. „Did he come to you?"
He tiredly shook his head. „No. I was sent a memo that the app has to be implemented into the website."
Mac paused for a moment and then went on with a softer voice. „Charlie... I appreciate your precarious position between Pruit and us, but what happened to your principles?" She sighed. „Remember when you came to D.C. to get me out of that damn bowling alley? I was ready to produce a day show and you convinced me to come here to take over Newsnight for an hour of news that is a genuine service to the public. You offered me a 'fast car', to use your own words, and now you want us to ride a bicycle?"
Mac's last words reverberated for a moment, but finally Charlie straightened himself up in his chair. „Do you remember telling me back then that you didn't have any options? Well, we don't either. We have to find a compromise, Mac, or you won't have a show at all anymore..."
Charlie's tone was final and Mac knew, that she had been dismissed. She contemplated continuing this argument for a moment, but she realized that as her boss he would always have the upper hand in the end and got up to leave his office. Reaching the door though, she turned around and looked at him with a sad look on her face.
„You wanted to be proud of your flagship again, Charlie... Are you?"
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When Mac came back to her office a steaming cup of coffee was waiting for her on her desk. She couldn't prevent a smile at Jim's thoughfulness, but her mind was still dealing with the encounter she had just had with Charlie, and with a regretful sigh she sat down and took an appreciative sip before she closed her eyes and leaned back. Suddenly though she opened her eyes again and put the cup back on the desk. She stared at it for a moment before slowly opening the top desk drawer to look at the brown paper bag in there.
Her thoughts went back to when she had entered the bullpen in the morning, where Sloan had already been waiting and followed her to her office.
„Good morning, Mac! How are you feeling?"
„Fine, thanks. What's up?"
Sloan hesitated, looking slightly uncomfortable. „I was wondering...I'm not sure if I should congratulate you..."
A confused frown showed on Mac's face. „On what?"
„Well, today is your fifty-day wedding anniversary, but that also means..." Sloan's voice trailed off. „I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."
„It's fine." Mac interrupted her with a sad smile. „Do you really think that I'm not counting the days? Just... Let's treat this like any other day, okay?"
With a relieved smile her friend nodded. „Can I at least invite you for a drink tonight?"
„Sounds good, but let's see how today goes first; looks like it's gonna be busy. I'll let you know later."
„Great. See you at the rundown." Sloan turned around and left the office, while Mac took off her jacket. Suddenly she froze.
Fifty days... Today was Will's fiftieth day in prison, and if her count was correct that meant...
Like in trance she walked towards her desk and slowly sank down onto her chair, staring at her desk. She counted again, and then once more, and indeed it must have been about 60 days now that she had last had her period. With all that had been going on she hadn't even noticed... Could it be...?
Pressing the back of her hand to her mouth to stifle any sound Mac's gaze moved from the desk to her stomach and she moved her other hand to cover it. She hardly dared to think in that direction, but she had been feeling slightly nauseous once in a while lately, especially in the mornings. In fact just now on the elevator again... She had always pinned that on all the stress and her rather irregular eating habits which had gotten worse again since Will couldn't keep an eye on her anymore, but never would she have thought...
She glanced at her watch and seeing that it was a good time for her lunch break she quickly got up, took her jacket and left her office. On the way to the elevator she called out to Jim that she would be back in half an hour.
And now she was sitting here, looking at the bag she had brought back with her that contained a pregnancy test. She itched to take it right now, but she knew that there was no way that she would be able to concentrate afterwards, no matter what the result would be, so she would stick to her decision to do it at home, after the show.
Closing the drawer again she determinedly took the coffee cup and put it on the shelf behind her. If she had her own bathroom she would pour it down the drain, but she assumed her walking to the ladies' room or to Will's office to do that would most likely raise suspicion. Instead the cleaning staff would have to take care of it tonight, and for now she would at least enjoy the delicious smell of coffee floating through the room.
Sitting down again she took a deep breath. Focus!
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After the final rundown meeting Mac decided to go upstairs to see Charlie again. She wasn't able to get their earlier confrontation out of her head and knew that they needed to talk.
As Millie had already gone home for the day she knocked at his door and entered when he invited her in. „Do you have a minute?"
He didn't look at her nor did he answer for a second, but then he put his glass of Bourbon back on his desk and sighed. „Come in, Mac."
Stepping in she immediately spoke. „Charlie, I wanted to apologize for what I said earlier. I know you have our backs and seeing what you are facing..."
Now he did look at her. „Thank you."
He appeared to be even more tired and worn out than he had in the morning, and Mac couldn't help but ask. „Charlie, are you okay? You look terrible..."
„Thank you." He repeated himself, though very dryly this time, but then he went on. „I'm glad you are doing what you are doing, Mac. Just keep going and leave everything else to me. I promise you that I will try to do everything to keep up the quality of our shows, but you also have to realize that we will have to make compromises..." Mac nodded but didn't interrupt him.
„So, going back to the bowling alley... You could say that we have to alter our agreement to the original one segment for you, one for me... or better Pruit..." He paused for a moment befor he continued.
„We have to pick our fights, Mac. Give in to his knucklehead stuff to get some good quality reporting in as well."
„I know..." She sighed sadly, but then she gave him a warml smile. „And I hope you know that I'm there for you if you ever need anything, don't you? I wont' shy away from a good fight, even if it's Pruit. Just call me."
„You don't worry about me; just do your work, we need you here. And now get back to your show."
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The day stretched out and the later it got the slower time seemed to pass. Luckily in the end it wasn't a heavy news day or Mac might have not gotten through the show as well as she did, but as it was it didn't matter that once in a while her thoughts began to stray.
Finally though Sloan passed the baton on to Washington and the last jingle sounded, announcing the end of the program. After a few more words with her control room team Mac went to her office, quickly grabbed her things and went to the elevator.
Waving her hand at Sloan, who only now came out of the studio, she smiled at the memory of how difficult it had been to get out of the suggested date with her this evening. It had been difficult to convince her friend without giving away too much that she would not spend the night moping on the couch, but she did manage it while not even getting close to the real reason which was now safely hidden in her briefcase.
After a short ride home in the ACN company car Charlie still insisted she used Mac freshened up a little, changed into more comfortable clothes and then sat down on the couch, putting the brown paper bag on the table in front of her. After taking a deep breath the opened it and took out the pregnancy test, a rectangular box with lilac and pink being its dominant colours. After carefully reading the instructions she went to the bathroom to do what had to be done and then set the alarm on her Blackberry.
Never in her life had ten minutes felt so long and she wished nothing more than to have Will at her side right now. After pacing up and down in their bedroom for a while she finally sat down on the bed and looked at his picture she had placed on the nightstand, so that it was the last thing she saw at night and the first thing her eyes fell on in the morning.
Taking it into her hand she let her index finger run over it, tracing his cheek and then his lips. „Oh, Billy... How I wish you were here..."
For a moment she was lost in his face but then her alarm went off. After a slight startle she put the picture back down and turned the sound off. Taking another deep breath she got up and walked towards the bathroom, but suddenly she turned around and grabbed the picture frame again. Of course it was silly, but she wanted Will to be there when she looked at the result, and if this was the only way this was possible then so be it.
Stepping up to the sink where she had placed the test she pressed the picture frame to her chest, face front, and reached for the dipstick, but then she closed her eyes for a second. A nervous flutter spread through her stomach and she almost had to force herself to open her eyes again.
Pink! She could clearly see a pink line and that meant... Oh my God, they would have a baby!
Tears sprung to her eyes, but she couldn't take her gaze of the little plastic stick. Finally Mac couldn't prevent the wide grin taking over her face anymore, and she slowly went back into the bedroom. She put the test and Will's picture back onto the nightstand and just wanted to crawl into bed when a thought occured to her. She went over to the dresser with its large mirror to look at her profile, pulling her shirt up and her pants down a little.
No, there was nothing to see yet; her stomach was still flat as it always had been. She carefully placed her hand on her stomach, her thumb tenderly stroking her skin. She tried to conjure up an image of herself in the late stages of pregnancy, but then she shook her head. She had heard that these home tests weren't always accurate, so first thing tomorrow morning she would call her ob/gyn to get an appointment as soon as possible.
Still, she had a feeling that the test was right, after all she had missed her period and also hadn't been feeling all that well these last couple of weeks. Still smiling she went back to the bed and lay down on her side, facing Will's picture with her hand protectively covering her stomach.
She was wondering when it had happened and quickly settled on their last night before he was incarcerated. With all the stress that had been going on at that time they hadn't had sex for a few days before that and if she was right that last night must have fallen directly into her fertile days.
Stroking her belly again she bit down on her lower lip to prevent her tears from falling, failing completely, but finally she softly whispered in a tear-stained voice „Hello, my little darling, this is your Mommy... Your Daddy would also love to be here, if he hadn't something very important to do somwhere else. But I know that he will be just as happy as I am..."
Mac couldn't wait to tell Will, but while she started to imagine his reactions she realized immediately that she mustn't let him know as long as he still was in prison. If he knew that she was pregnant he wouldn't even wait for Lasenthal to come in to get the whistleblower's name from him but was likely to just jot it down on a piece of paper and stage a prison break.
She would not be responsible for him giving up the source. As much as she wanted him to know, she did not want to be the reason for him betraying his convictions – And he would do that if he knew, that she was sure of.
She had come here on her own and she would not tell him unless she had to or because she couldn't hide it anymore – If he had to stay locked up that much longer anyway...
With a happy smile she touched his picture once more. „I love you, Billy... I will take good care of our baby, I promise..."