“Hey!” the airbag expert said. “That’s exactly my motto.”
“And we’re on in five,” Hank shouted. He finished the countdown with his hand. The red light on the camera went on. Terrance sat up straight, relaxed his face into a confident expression, looked into Camera One, and began talking. After he introduced the previously recorded package and the camera cut away, he sighed and went right back to shuffling his papers.
“Long week, I guess. So, do you like the other interns?” Jamie said.
“Sure,” I said. “I guess.”
Jamie smiled. “You sound enthusiastic.”
“We don’t have a lot in common,” I said. “Everyone seems…connected.”
“How so?”
“This one girl—her father used to be a producer. Tim Russert’s producer.”
“Ah,” Jamie said. “Yeah, I’d say that’s a useful connection.”
“She kept calling him ‘my late uncle Tim.’ Oh, you know, the time my late uncle Tim was talking to Yasser Arafat. Finally someone said, Tim who? She had been dying for one of us to ask.”
Jamie laughed, and I blushed. “Never mind,” I said. “I shouldn’t be talking trash.”
“Don’t worry about it. Those connections only matter at the beginning. Most of those people will wash out,” he said. “I didn’t know a single person when I started in news. Eliza completely took a chance on hiring me six years ago.”
Hank waved at us to shut up. The prerecorded package was over, and now Terrance was introducing the guest. During the interview, Terrance nodded and made eye contact and thoughtful “hmm” noises. It was a skillful performance, although when Hank started making “wrap it up” hand gestures, Terrance’s genuinely delighted smile undercut his previous posture of interest. This was what he was actually interested in—going home. “Well!” he exclaimed. “I’m afraid that’s all the time we have tonight.”
“And we’re clear,” Hank yelled when the red light switched off.
The studio was one floor below the newsroom. As Jamie and I climbed the stairs, he said, “They’re not stuck up like that. Rebecca and Eliza, I mean. They could be, with the success they’ve had, but they aren’t.”
I was intensely curious about Eliza. She was the executive producer of Frontline, her office adjacent to Rebecca’s corner suite, her shelves lined with a collection of news & doc Emmys. I’d googled her, of course, but this was the difference between talent and producers: Rebecca’s every movement was plastered across the internet, while Eliza remained almost anonymous. Mostly I knew that Eliza Davis was an exception in a business still dominated by white men: a powerful black female EP.
“I’d think that helps,” I said. “Not being snobby. Right? It keeps you outside the bubble.”
Jamie looked over at me. “Where do you come from, anyway?”
When I started telling him where I’d gone to school, he shook his head. “No, I mean, where are you actually from. Your hometown.”
“Oh.” I responded as I always did: “You’ve never heard of it.”
Back in the newsroom, Jamie said, “A bunch of us are going for drinks across the street. A Friday tradition. Want to join?”
I hadn’t gotten a paycheck yet, and my bank account was nearly bare. But I could afford one beer. I’d eat rice and beans for the rest of the weekend. “Sure,” I said.
“Good,” Jamie said, smiling. “More time to figure out what your deal is.”
“Honestly, it’s a nowhere town.” Didn’t moving to New York mean I’d never have to talk about my past? Then again, Jamie’s job was to ask questions. “On the Florida Panhandle. Barely even a real place.”
“Everywhere is a real place.”
“I haven’t lived there in a long time.” There was a tightness in my chest, and I was feeling uncomfortably defensive. “It’s not home anymore.”
“Okay, okay. You’re pleading the Fifth, then?”
I laughed. “Yeah.”
“We can talk about it some other time,” Jamie said. “But you know, I’m from nowheresville just like you. Small town in South Carolina, in my case. My momma would murder me if she thought I was disrespecting it. Here, look.” Jamie pulled out his phone, flicked through a stream of photos. “From the Fourth of July parade. See that lady dressed up like Martha Washington?”
“That’s your mom?” I said. This woman was wearing a powdered wig and a hoop skirt.
“You don’t get to choose them,” he said, but his bashful smile showed real pride.
The week before I started at KCN, Stella’s mother asked me to meet her at the apartment to discuss the—as she put it—“arrangement.”
It was a gorgeous two-bedroom on a leafy block in the West Village. A chef’s kitchen, a wood-burning fireplace, a terrace, a doorman. Anne and Thomas Bradley had their waterfront mansion in Rye, but they were looking ahead to retirement, to eventually wanting a pied-à-terre in the city. At least, this was their excuse for buying Stella the apartment. Even the wealthy feel pressure to justify these kinds of decisions.
“Violet,” Anne said, kissing my cheek. The kitchen was empty except for her Birkin bag, resting on the white marble counter. “So nice to see you.”
Living with Stella was the only way I could afford to be in New York. After graduation, Stella planned to travel with friends for an indefinite stretch. She was in Cannes, then Lake Como, then wherever the wind took her. “But so what?” Stella had said. “Obviously you should move in right away. That’s what the apartment’s there for, isn’t it?”
Anne Bradley seemed to see things differently. From her bag she pulled a folder, and from the folder a stapled document. “We took the liberty of drawing up an agreement,” Anne said. “Just to formalize things.”
“Okay,” I said. There were several pages filled with dense clauses and subclauses. As I attempted to decipher the first paragraph, Anne slid a pen across the counter.
“Could I read the whole thing through?” I said. “Just to be sure.”
“Oh,” Anne said. Then she smiled. “Take all the time you need.”
From what I could tell, it looked like a standard tenant agreement. But on the last page, a number jumped out: fifteen hundred dollars per month in rent, to be paid no later than the first of the month, by check or wire transfer to Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Bradley.
I swallowed. When her parents first came up with this idea and I’d asked Stella how much my rent would be, she’d shrugged and said, “I don’t know. Nothing, probably.” I should have known, by now, that Stella’s assurances were worthless. Her parents controlled the money, not her. Or maybe, to her, fifteen hundred was nothing. But still, the price came as a shock.
“Everything okay?” Anne said. The pen was in my hand but hadn’t yet touched paper.
I took a deep breath. “Mrs. Bradley, I’ll be honest. I can’t afford this. After taxes, I’m only bringing home about fourteen hundred a month with this internship.”