Sarah grinned. “That’s true. For a lot of digital properties, change is good for its own sake. They feel like, if they don’t keep evolving, they’ll be left behind. They’ll seem out of date, and out of date in Silicon Valley is death. When I was working there, it was hard to stay out of that mindset. I had to keep reminding myself: work towards what you already know to be good.”
“What did you do there?”
“I had a company. We were working in e-books. We had a lot of ideas around how to extend the traditional book format – make it interactive, make it more social, tie it into recommendation system on the back end so that as soon as you’re done reading one book we’d have a list of five others that you might enjoy.”
“And?”
“And it didn’t work out. I did some things well, and other things not so well. In the end it was the other things that were more important. I learned some hard lessons.”
"Sometimes that's the best you can do. So are you going to get back on the horse?"
"Eventually. Not yet, though."
"You waiting for something?"
"Maybe. Inspiration? I don't want to just get back in it, I want to get back in with the right opportunity and the right people. Especially the right people. I haven't figured it out yet."
"Well, if you need something to keep you busy while you wait for a voice from God to tell you what to do, I can always use some help around the paper."
"Oh, yeah? Like what?"
"Like feature writing. Do you write?"
"I write."
"Can you give me ten inches on a lost dog?"
"That sounds like the first line of an absolutely filthy joke."
"I'm serious. Talk to the woman, write up the story, and I'll print it in the paper. Unless you have something better to do?"
"You have me there. Right now I'm not sure what to do with myself. I eat, and then I read until it's time to eat again. I could use a change."
"So write the article. You'd be doing me a favor, and you'd spend some time with a nice lady who's probably pretty lonely right now."
"Why is she lonely?"
"I guess you'll have to go talk to her to find out. Mrs. Williams. She lives in a white house at the corner of 4th and Elm. Do you think you can find your way there?"
"There are maybe five streets in the entire city. I think I can figure it out."
"Splendid. Have it to me by 5:00 tomorrow."
"Yes sir," Sarah said, feeling like she'd been more than a little conned. Why did she agree to this again? Oh, we'll, what she'd said was true enough -- she really didn't know what to do with herself in the time between breakfast and dinner. After the fast-paced life in San Francisco, even a few days of peace and quiet were starting to drive her a little crazy, and she knew she couldn't take much more of this without jumping into her car and driving back to the Bay Area. But it would be a mistake to go back before she did what she'd come here to do, so for now she just needed to keep herself busy while she figured the other stuff out. If keeping busy meant talking to an old lady about her lost dog, then, well so be it.
9
Winifred Williams’ living room was an odd mix of comforting and depressing. The couch and easy chair were plump and inviting, and from the wear and tear Sarah guessed that both had been used for more naps than could easily be counted. There were flowers on the curtains, flowers on the carpet, and a mantelpiece above the fire that was absolutely crowded with pictures and keepsakes from a long and seemingly fruitful life.
But still, as Sarah took a spot on the couch, she could not quite keep a dark and rather sad feeling from seeping into her chest. The curtains were pulled wide but it was still dark inside the room, and shadows collected in the corners as if they were spiders building their webs. Winifred – or Winnie, as she insisted on being called – was clearly an industrious housekeeper, and there was not a trace of dust anywhere to be found, but everything in the room – the furniture, the carpet – had the frayed edge of items you might find in a garage sale, and the air in the room was heavy with what Sarah had thought of as “old lady smell.” She felt guilty about the rudeness of her thought processes, though, and so Sarah smiled weakly at Winnie and took a sip from the glass of water the woman had just brought her.
“So,” she started, “I hear that you have a lost dog.”
“I do,” Winnie nodded, taking a glance at one of the pictures on the mantel that showed a man on a bench, one dog at his feet and the other seated next to him on the bench. All three of them were smiling broadly at the camera. “Well, actually I don’t. You don’t really ‘have’ a lost dog, now do you? The problem is I do not have him.”
Sarah smiled. “Right you are. Is that the dog in the picture?” she asked, nodding in the direction of the mantelpiece.
Winnie stood up to take the picture and brought it back with her to the couch. “Yes,” she said, looking at it fondly. “This is Frank and the boys. This must have been taken … oh, about ten years ago. Castor is the one on the ground, and Pollux is the one on the bench. It’s Pollux who’s gone missing now.”
“Castor and Pollux?”
“Yes, Frank picked out their names. From mythology, you know. I always thought it didn’t make much sense, because Castor and Pollux were supposed to be twins and of course these dogs didn’t look anything like each other. But they couldn’t have loved each other any more if they had come from the same mother. They were brothers in their hearts, Frank was right about that.”
Sarah reached out and gently took the picture from her. Castor looked to be some sort of husky, while Pollux was a Rottweiler. “They’re very cute. I didn’t hear another dog when I came up, though. Is Castor…?”
“Castor passed away a few years ago. He stepped on a rusty nail when we were out walking, and the infection spread to his heart. That was hard.” Winnie’s voice took on a sad note, and she clutched her hands together in her lap.
“And your husband?” Sarah asked, dreading the answer.
“He passed as well. It will be one year this September. He fought hard, but in the end the cancer got the better of him. Now it’s just Pollux and me.”
Sarah paused to catch her breath. The shadows in the room seemed a little deeper than they’d been before. She’d come here today expecting to gather the details of a trivial story, the sort of thing that would be printed only in the pages of a newspaper that reported on a community in which nothing important ever happened. But this story was starting to break her heart, and she swallowed hard over a lump of sadness that formed in her throat.
“How did he … Pollux, did he get out of the yard or something?”
“No, I was walking him, and I let him off leash – which I know I shouldn’t do, but he looks so happy when he can run around and sniff at everything, and even now that his hips aren’t so great anymore I can have trouble keeping up with him. But he always comes when he’s called … well, he usually comes. Only this time he saw a squirrel or some such and took off after it through the bushes, and I called and called but he didn’t come back.” She sniffed quietly, then gave a little laugh to clear the air. “You must think I’m silly, worried so much about a dog.”
“No, not silly at all! You love your dog, and you’re worried about him. Why should there be anything silly about that?”
“I do worry about him. It would break my heart if he didn’t come back. Frank was always the dog person, I’m more of a cat person, but now Pollux is all I have left. Frank loved those dogs like his own children, and I loved them too. I know it’s not forever, Pollux is getting old, but I’m not ready to say goodbye yet. Anyway, I was hoping that if the newspaper wrote something up about it, then maybe someone will remember seeing him somewhere and we’ll be able to get him back home.”
Sarah nodded earnestly. “Yes. Yes, that could happen. At any rate I’ll do my very best, Mrs. … Winnie. We’ll find Pollux,” she added, and hoped that it was true.
Winnie smiled and stood, reaching out her hands to
clasp Sarah’s between them. “Thank you, Sarah. I know you will. Are you sure I can’t get you anything to eat? Or maybe a cup of coffee.”
Sarah knew that the woman was looking for a moment of companionship, but her heart felt heavy and she needed to regain her composure. In any case, she had a story due and wanted to get started on it. She smiled and shook her head. “I’d love to, but I do need to get started on writing this up. Maybe you’d like to get together for lunch some day?”
Winnie beamed. “Oh, that would be lovely! I don’t get out much these days. I know it’s not good for me to be cooped up in here, but sometimes the entire day goes by without my noticing. I need to get out and smell the fresh air sometimes.”
Sarah nodded. “It’s a date, then. Look for the story in the paper in the next day or two.” She reached out her hand for a handshake, and then thought better of it and drew Winnie in for a hug. The woman melted into her arms and rested there for a space. Sarah did not think of herself as much of a hugger, but she held Winnie close for a long space before releasing her with a smile that she hoped conveyed empathy and compassion. Winnie squeezed her hand at the door before shutting it behind her.
10
Twelve hours later she was sitting in a metal folding chair in the newspaper office, watching Duane’s impassive face as he read through her story. The office was a brightly-lit space, full of desks that now mostly seemed empty. Duane’s own desk was the only one to look lived-in, with an old Dell computer on the floor wired into a monitor that perched between piles of paper. Duane was as rumpled as he always was, and he leaned back on his chair with his head resting on his right fist as he read. Sarah scanned for some sign of whether he loved or hated her story, but nothing she saw in his face was any more or less gloomy than she knew Duane to look while he was eating his breakfast.
At last, after what seemed an eternity, he sighed and turned away from the screen.
“You hate it,” Sarah said, more of a statement than a question.
“No, I don’t hate it.”
“But you don’t like it.” She was starting to feel a little angry and defensive, which embarrassed her. She was a confident and successful woman. She had founded her own startup and built it into a thriving business. She would not be intimidated by this small-town newsman and his opinion of her writing skills. Still, the little girl inside of her steeled herself against the criticism that she expected to land any moment like a slap against her cheek.
“Actually I do like it. It’s not what I asked for, though.”
“What do you mean? You said to write a story about a lost dog. This is a story about a lost dog.”
“This is a story about a lonely old woman who has already lost her husband, and now she’s lost the last remaining thing that kept a piece of him in her life. It’s a tear-jerker.”
“It will get people to look for that dog.”
“Oh, they will definitely look for the dog. And they will not see the dog because their eyes will be swimming with sentimental tears.”
Sarah snorted. “Do you want me to re-write it?”
“No, it’s fine the way it is. Sentimental women will probably cut it out and save it for when they need a really good cry. But next time, when I ask for a story, don’t dress it up. Don’t try to make it something that it isn’t. Just give me the story.”
Sarah nodded. It was good advice. She knew that a part of her had turned up its nose at the idea of a lost dog story; she was too proud to write about something that didn’t seem to matter. But, then, what gave her the right to decide whether the story mattered or not? To Winnie the story mattered a very great deal. She decided that it would be a good exercise in humility to set her expectations to the side and just do what Duane asked. “So there will be another story, then?”
“If you want. Do you want?”
“Sure. This was fun. Well, not fun exactly – it really is a sad story, and I’m not made of stone. I felt bad for Winnie, and that made it hard to write. But it was nice to get out of my comfort zone and do something a little different. And it got me out of the house, which has been a challenge lately. What else have you got?”
Duane leaned back in his chair and contemplated her, as if he was reading the tea leaves at the bottom of a cup. Finally he reached some decision and spoke. “There’s an ex-pro football player in town. By the standards of Tall Pines, that makes him a major celebrity, and some people are pretty excited about it. Do you feel up to an interview?”
Sarah shrugged. What she knew about football would fit into a very small pamphlet, with lots of room left over for illustrations. “Sure. Why not? Who is he?”
“The name’s Brad Johannsen. He’s staying with his father John, who’s been living here for a few years now. I’ve got the address here somewhere, don’t let me forget to give it to you before you leave.”
“And what are you looking for this time?”
“How do you mean?”
“You told me not to dress up a story and turn it into something that it’s not. So what is this story?”
“It’s a celebrity interview. A puff piece. People around here watch football, and the guys who play in the pros are kind of like gods. So now we have a god, or at least an ex-god, walking amongst us. Our readers want to know what he’s like. What he thinks about the town - as long as he thinks good things. We don’t want to hear the bad stuff. What it was like to play in the NFL? If he ever met anyone famous, who were they? That sort of thing. The stuff that sells papers.”
Sarah looked around the near-empty room and carefully phrased her question so as not to give offense. “It looks like maybe selling papers is something you could really use right now.”
“Right now? Nah,” Duane asked, shaking his hand dismissively. “If I had sold more papers five years ago, maybe that would have made a difference. Now I’m so deep in the hole I know I’m not getting out again.”
“So what will you do?”
“Oh, I’ll shut it down.” He looked around the office, and from the distant look in his eyes Sarah could tell that he was seeing things that weren’t there anymore: a bustling office filled with staff members working on the next edition of the paper.
“You sound sad,” Sarah said, feeling a little sad herself. She was surprised at her reaction; what was this place to her? It was just a tiny little newspaper in a tiny little town, no different from the innumerable other small papers throughout the country. But still, now that she knew Duane and was beginning to know some of the other people in Tall Pines, it was beginning to feel personal to her.
“I feel relieved mostly,” he answered, his attention returning to her and the present day. “Regretful, too, when I’m being honest with myself. Maybe if I had done things differently it would have turned out better. Back when things were going good, I knew that I’d retire one day, of course, and I always just assumed that there would be someone who would take over from me. Now, though, the newspaper staff is me. I’m the only one who cares anymore. And soon no one will care, me included.”
“How soon?”
“A few months maybe. Or a few weeks. I really don’t know. Every morning I roll out of bed and ask my aching joints whether they want to get up, get dressed, and head into the office. So far the answer has been yes, though I can’t say I’ve been very enthusiastic about it for quite some time now. Eventually the answer will be no, and then I’ll be done. I’m not planning to be sentimental about it. I won’t throw a party for myself, or come out with some self-pitying final edition of the paper. I’ll just stop, and then we’ll see if anyone cares. Of course I want them to care. I want them to come to me with tears in their eyes, lamenting the fact that they didn’t support the paper when I needed them to. But it’s more likely that they’ll just turn on their computer screens and head over to some website that will give them the news with prettier pictures than I could ever put in the paper. It won’t be exactly the same, but it will be good enough, and it will be free. It’s hard to compete with free. I’v
e struggled to compete with it for years. But not much longer.”
Sarah shook her head. “That’s a shame. It’s important for a town to have its own paper. CNN may tell you what’s going on in national or world news, but it doesn’t build community in a place like this. It doesn’t help women like Winnie find their lost dogs. It will be a terrible shame when the paper isn’t around anymore.”
Duane shrugged. He looked tired. “It may be, but it’s been a long time coming. The newspaper business just doesn’t make sense anymore, and most people aren’t as stubborn as me. They moved on, and I didn’t want to. Eventually a man doesn’t have a choice.”
Sarah chatted with him for a few more minutes, working out the details of the interview piece she was to submit by the end of the week. Duane rummaged through some papers until he came up with the phone number of the football player’s father, and Sarah promised to call him the next day. All the while, though, her mind was on a different question: was there something that she could do about the newspaper?
She left the offices thinking about the question. She walked down Tall Pine’s streets pondering the question. She looked at it every way she could think of, and she kept coming back to the same answer: she had money put away, enough to take the newspaper on and keep it running for a while, but it wasn’t enough to make a difference. If she burned through her savings, maybe she could put the paper out for another couple years. She had no illusions that she would be able to sell more papers than Duane did; he’d been at it more years than she could count, and he knew this town much better than she did. It was much more likely that the newspaper would sell even worse under her stewardship. And if she couldn’t find a way to make the paper self-sustaining, there was no real point buying it as an act of charity.
And besides, if she was running Tall Pines’ paper, that meant that she’d have to live here – for years, at least. That’s not what she wanted. She was getting her thoughts together and preparing for another assault on the startup business scene in San Francisco. She did not want to end up living out her life in a small, sleepy town. Did she?
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