*
“But why?” Clifford demanded.
“He said he wanted Tim to do it.”
“That’s crazy. This is mine. I know what I shot.”
“I know, Clifford. I told him that. Maybe if you talk to him?”
“Fuck that shit.”
His body stiff with anger, he marched away from her and into the photographers’ room where he paced and swore. The other photographers stayed away from the room. Later they could give him a pat on the back and tell him about the stories that were taken from them and edited by some idiot who knew nothing. Finally, Tim Johnson himself would search him out and tell him he was sorry and he would do the best job he could.
Even the reporters would shake their heads and tell him it was a tough break. Not that it meant anything to them, not really. It was good for some talk though, a line or two back in the cubicles or on their way to their next story. Dumb decision, they would sneer, per usual.
The only person who wouldn’t be talking to Clifford was Jim Brown and Clifford wasn’t going to be talking to him. He didn’t like Brown, never did. He called him the Fat Boy, like the Fat Man in the Maltese Falcon. That’s how he saw Brown, only smaller, much smaller.
“He took my fucking story,” he chanted. “He took my fucking story.”
Now, it hurt, the memory of the trip, the whole golden, dusty light of that day on the land and the people they met. He felt raw.
“They want Tim to edit it,” Debbie told Ellen. “I don’t want that but Brown says he’s better than Clifford.”
“Who the hell knows? He is good, though.” Ellen reached for her purse and her notebook. She never fought over who edited her pieces unless it was one hell of a story and then she would insist someone like Tim Johnson did it.
“Gosh,” Debbie moaned, “I wish I could do it myself.”
“Tim will do a good job,” Ellen said, “and sometimes it helps to have a third person on the story. He sees things you didn’t see. He can make it a better story.”
“Brown said it could win an award.” Debbie looked at her hopefully. “You think so?”
“Indian story? You bet your ass, if Indians are in this year.” She left the newsroom for her first story of the day.
13
Debbie’s series hit the air the following week on the six o’clock news Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, again at ten, and ran again on the following day’s noon newscast. Each segment was allowed to stand at a ponderous two minutes plus.
“Two-five? Where the hell am I going to put that?” Tony Santella yelled. “You have got to cut it down. Cut it or I will.”
Each day brought the same threat and each day Debbie steeled herself and shook her head. She and Tim worked long hours making each piece so tight that nothing could or should be eliminated, not one shot, not one word. Each day Brown looked over the finished piece.
“Great piece,” he said each day. “Good work, guys.”
The pieces stood even with Tony throwing up his hands, pulling other stories from the lineup, and arguing with muffled shouts from behind the closed door of Brown’s office.
Every night Clifford watched the pieces as he sat in the photographers’ room. He didn’t focus on them. He glanced at them.
“Goddamn, incredible shots of that old Indian man.” Steve slammed into the room.
“Man, that’s some nice stuff.” Cappy came in with his last cup of coffee for the day. “Nice.”
“You got to get that on a résumé tape,” Jason Osner told him. “That’ll get you out of this place.”
“Did you call the network?” Debbie asked George.
He shook his head in annoyance as he tried to hear the caller promising him a good story.
“Well, could you?”
He shook his head harder.
“Darn it.” She flipped through two of his Rolodexes before finding the scribbled name and number of the man who could buy her story.
“I think I might have something for you,” she said on the call to New York. “It’s about a radioactive spill on the Navajo reservation.”
He told her to send it out.
“We’ll make some extra money if they use it,” she told Clifford. “We’ll split it. That’ll be good, right?”
He nodded.
“Johnson, too,” he said.
It was a flat statement without sarcasm or self-pity. The man edited it. He deserved his piece of the action.
That night, after the last part aired, Tim Johnson stood in the doorway of the editing room, watching and waiting.
“Night, Cliff,” he said as Clifford passed on his way out of the station.
“Night,” Clifford echoed and left the building.
*
The nights the stories on a radioactive spill ran the front-desk operator was kept busy with phone calls from viewers. The first night fifteen people called about the slight change Jean Ann Maypin had made in her hairstyle. There were ten calls about her hair the next night. On the third night, when her hair was back to normal, twelve people called to say they were glad. Two people called to say they liked the new style and wanted to know why she had changed it back again.
14
Brown leaned over Debbie, his hand on her shoulder.
“Told you, didn’t I?” he grinned. “Johnson did one heck of a job.”
“Clifford would have been good too,” she said.
“Not as good as Johnson,” he said, giving her shoulder a final pat. He made a short tug at the top of his slackes and went into his office to sit in the high-back vinyl chair.
God, sometimes he loved it so much he almost cried. He loved this business. He loved his people, loved them. He was forty-two years old and they were like his kids.
He grew up in the station, came in right out of his second year of college. He never finished, never had to. This place was his education, his school, his home. He knew he spent more hours caring about it and how it ran than he had ever spent wondering or caring about his family. He knew his work led to the divorce but he loved it.
He loved how they came to him, like Debbie, all excited and talking a mile a minute.
“They called,” she told him. “They’re going to use it. They want me to cut it down, but they’re going to use it. Next week, that’s what they said. It will be national.”
“That’s wonderful, Debbie. Have you told your father?”
He knew about her father. It was his business to know about their families, the people of his people.
“I’m going to call him. It will be on next week, that’s what they said.”
“You deserve it,” he told her.
He cared about them and they knew it. They were all so young and happy and in love with the business. They still got excited when they beat somebody else to a story. They shouted and laughed when the network gave a nod in their direction. And, when they got their first offer from a bigger market, they came to him. Sometimes the men shuffled their feet, almost embarrassed but also proud.
He knew why. Like children, they were growing up and proud of it but also worried they might be punished. They weren’t. Not by him. He only wanted the best for them.
If someone in his newsroom seemed unhappy or frustrated, he’d tell them, “Hey, if you want, I’ll make some calls for you.” He wanted them all to be happy even if it meant helping them find another job.
Only the most frustrated and the angriest of them asked him to make those calls. That only happened a half a dozen times in as many years.
“I want you to be happy,” he would tell them before they left the station. “Be happy. That’s all that counts. Right, guy?” If only they could all be happy.
He believed most of them were, these kids, these great hardworking kids. He laughed when he thought about them.
Sometimes you did have to pull them up, tell them the way it was. Sometimes, like with Clifford, you had to do what was best for all of them. Clifford was a slow editor, not too much imagination. And, there was
something about Clifford that made him uncomfortable. He wasn’t sure why but he did have the feeling Clifford didn’t like him.
Clifford was his second black photographer. The first went on to another job. They did have a black woman reporter, Cynthia Reid. She had been there two years, their only on-air black.
He liked her and he liked Clifford. He really did. He liked and cared deeply for all his people. They would fight and swear and stomp around outside his office. Some would come in, all of them at least once, and yell about things they thought were wrong. But, have an emergency, a flood, a prison break, and they would come together like a machine and he would run it all. They were his army, an army that might be sloppy or slow in peace but boy, could they come together to fight the war. That’s how he saw it, a band of soldiers.
He even liked Ellen Peters. The thought brought a small smile to his face. Sure, she was mouthy and loud but she was one heck of a reporter and she was going to stay. He knew that. You had to have one pushy woman, he supposed.
He nodded thoughtfully. There was some outstanding photography in Debbie’s story. He’d have to tell Clifford that and he would. Sometime in the next couple of days he would say to him, “Nice work on the Indian story, fella.” If he saw him, that is, if he actually passed him in the hall.
15
He checked the clock again, resisting the urge to stand and pace his office. He was looking forward to this call.
The phone rang exactly on the hour.
“Hi,” came her soft voice.
“How are you, Debbie?”
“Great. I’m great.”
“That’s good to hear. And, thanks for the letters. It’s sounds like you are making a good life for yourself out there.”
“Yes, yes, things are good,” she said, her voice stronger.
“So, why did you decide you needed a session?”
“You know, like you said, for a tune-up, a check-up.”
“Nothing else?”
“No, no, everything is fine,” she said brightly. “There are a lot of nice people at the station and I have a nice apartment. I had this little garden too, but it was too hot to grow anything. I didn’t think it was going to be so hot.”
“Hotter than Bakersfield?”
“Hotter than anywhere.”
He chuckled.
“It’s a city,” she said and he could almost see the small lifting of her shoulders.
“Is there something on your mind, something we should talk about?”
Seconds passed.
“Sometimes I don’t think I’m very happy,” she said finally. “It sounds stupid, I guess. And, it isn’t all the time, only sometimes.”
“That sounds normal, doesn’t it? No one is happy all the time.”
“I know. You’re right, but sometimes I don’t know how much I like television, the job, the whole idea of it.” There was a slight tremble in her voice.
“I mean, it’s good most of the time and I like the people I work with but, well, I don’t think it’s all that great. It sounds so silly.”
“You wrote me about that story you did on the radioactive spill,” he said. “You enjoyed doing that.”
“Yes, but …”
“But?”
“You see that’s not what you do all the time. That was special and even that didn’t turn out right. Not really. And, that is not what you do all the time.”
“But, it is part of it, right?”
“Yes, I guess.” There was a slight hesitation before she began again.
‘You see, most of the time you are doing these nothing stories everyday and people come up and say, ‘Oh, your job must be so interesting,’ but it isn’t, not all the time.”
“Almost all jobs have a day-to-day routine, Debbie.”
“Yes, I know, but a lot of the things we do aren’t much fun. They’re boring or awful and the people, the ones we report on, they can be awful too.” She gave a startled laugh.
“What that’s about? You laughed.”
“I didn’t know,” she almost sang. “I didn’t know that I felt that way, that it can be awful.”
“What? Tell me what is so awful.”
“Well, there are a lot of stories about accidents and women getting raped or about abortion clinics.” The words tumbled after each other. “Or about kids nobody wants. Or we go to these meetings like city council meetings and we sit there for hours and nobody says anything and we have to make a story out of it.”
“Every job has its boring parts, Debbie. But, it seems to me that television can also be exciting. You get to use your mind, your talents. You can be with people, meet new people. That’s important, especially for you.”
“I know.”
“And, you have done well there, haven’t you?”
He heard the sigh.
“Debbie?”
“What I mean about being awful is like what Ellen told me. She’s one of the reporters and she’s great. She did this story about a little boy dying after somebody stabbed him. She was right there with the paramedics and she was watching the little boy bleed to death. She said she was taking notes and when she got back to the station all she worried about was getting it done in time for the news, this story about a little boy dying.”
He could hear the tears building in her voice.
“And you know what happens? This guy Jim Brown, the news director, tells her that he didn’t think it wasn’t emotional enough, her story. Can you believe that? He’s the guy who’s in charge and he didn’t think a story about a little boy dying was emotional enough. How could it not be emotional enough?”
“Okay, I agree. That does sound rather callous, but what does it have to do with you and what you’re doing? You’re not telling me about you.”
“I know it all sounds silly.”
“No, I didn’t say it sounded silly. I said you haven’t told me anything about what is going on in your life. Are you making time for friends, getting out, that sort of thing?”
“Sometimes, and I have people over. I cook for them, dinner. But, then it got so hot. Nobody wants to do anything here when it’s so hot.”
There was a whine in her voice he hadn’t heard before.
“Any special friends at the station?”
“There is Ellen, that reporter I told you about. I really admire her. She is the best reporter there.” Her voice lifted.
“Oh, I have a feeling you are right up there.”
“No,” she said. “I’m pretty good, but not as good as her. But everything is fine,” she said strongly. “Really, it is.”
He had no reason to doubt her. He also had no reason to believe there was anything wrong but a vague discontent with the job and a city known for its oppressive summer heat. Probably nothing more than the usual boredom that comes when a job is learned. Still, was she telling him everything? He was beginning to think phone sessions were almost useless.
“You know, Debbie, you might consider seeing someone there, if you feel the need.” He said it casually, as though it didn’t matter, and perhaps it didn’t.
“Why?” There was a note of fear in her voice.
“I think it helps to know you have that option. Don’t you think so?”
“No,” she said, her voice tight. “I don’t think I need to see anyone. Everything is okay. I’m a little tired, that’s all.”
“I’m only saying it’s good to have the option.”
“You think there is something wrong?” Again, the fear.
“No, no. You sound fine. And, it doesn’t hurt to check in once in a while with me or someone out there. Just think about it, will you, Debbie?”
“Okay,” she said. “I will think about it.”
She lay back on her bed, the phone in her lap. Why would he say that about another doctor? It made her feel shaky, him saying that. She was tired, that was all. Maybe she didn’t explain it the right way. That was it. She needed to call him back and explain how she was working hard and sometimes she got blue.
That’s all. Everything else was good. It was.
This was nothing like what happened in Baja and that only happened because she lied to herself about Michael and he had lied to her. This was completely different. She could tell him she knew that but if she called him back now, so soon, it would sound crazy.
Besides, who wouldn’t be tired and sad with all this heat. Like Ellen said, humans weren’t supposed to live in the desert.
*
Ellen didn’t tell Debbie the story about the dying boy the same way Debbie told it to the doctor. Ellen was neither shocked nor angry by Jim Brown’s reaction to the piece. In fact, as she told Debbie, it made her laugh.
“Didn’t think it was emotional enough.” She rolled her eyes at Debbie. “What an idiot.”
What bothered Ellen was her own reaction to the story.
“There I am watching the paramedics trying to stop all this bleeding and I am standing there trying to figure out if I can get back to the station in time to get this on the air.
“Then, I get back to the station and I am trying to confirm whether the kid died. I had to get that one piece of information before the piece went on. I am yelling at someone at the hospital to confirm death. That’s all I wanted. That’s all I cared about.” She sighed and shook her head. “Then, I go home and sit on the couch at stare at the wall. I realize I have no feelings at all about the boy, no feelings at all.”
She looked at Debbie then, to see her reaction. There was none.
WEATHER
“Art, when are we going to start having some of that weather that makes everyone want to move here?” Jean Ann beamed.
“Very soon, Jean Ann,” Art Novak beamed back from his standing position at the end of the anchor desk.
Tom Carter gave a hint of a smile. No words now but he’d have his say later. Sports was his baby.
This is what the audience loved, ate up, the anchors relaxing, talking. The consultants Back East told them that.
“Relax, chat,” they said. “This is the place for it. Right before weather or sports. Weather is a big draw, you know. You know, some people watch the whole newscast just to get the weather.”
The Best in the West Page 9