Off the Record

by Camryn Garrett

  It seems like a strange thing to say since we’re all, well, working. But it doesn’t feel like work. After all, I won a contest to be here. This—writing, reporting—is something I’ve always done on my own time, after school or work. But it is a job. I glance at the other reporters around me. No one looks excited or nervous. Does this feel like a normal office job to them?

  The room has one big, circular table in the center where people take their seats. Right away, other reporters pull out their notebooks and sheets of paper and recording devices. I grab a seat on the far right, which leaves me directly facing Penny. She raises an eyebrow at me.

  I’m not sure what that means.

  Alice seems to notice, since she gives me a look as we’re sitting down.

  “Well,” she whispers, “maybe this will be as interesting as Housewives after all.”

  I would nudge her, but I don’t want to call too much attention to us. I force myself to take everything in. There are a few people sitting against the walls, chatting quietly to each other. They aren’t sitting with us, but they’re dressed pretty professionally and were already here when we got in, so I’m guessing they’re PR.

  I don’t know why, but PR people seem scarier than other journalists. Maybe it’s because they’re basically access in human form. If you can’t work with a PR person, there’s really no chance of you getting the story. They’re probably here to make sure everything goes smoothly—meaning they’ll shut us up if we approach a topic they aren’t happy with. I swallow and glance down at my questions. Probably better to stick with the “normal” stuff, then.

  I glance up to see both Penny and Marius looking at me. Marius smiles. Penny doesn’t.

  “All right, looks like that’s everyone,” Dennis, the director, says, patting his hands against the table. “According to the people who run this thing, we get thirty minutes with each group. So get ready to do your worst!”

  He and the cast—Art, Grace, Marius, and Penny—laugh. The PR people in the back do not.

  “I suppose I’ll start,” a lady with a French accent says. “What do you hope audiences will take away from this movie?”

  That’s how it goes. Everyone has their recorders faced toward the talent and alternates between asking questions and writing things down. I mostly stare at my notebook, but I look up at everyone when I don’t think they’re looking.

  “I really think Art and I just wanted to work together again,” Dennis is saying now. “We’ve been getting together over the years, running into each other, and every time, we’d always say, ‘Wow, we need to find something to work on together.’ It was just hard to find something that wouldn’t be a waste of time.”

  “So that’s interesting,” a man says, adjusting his cap. “This was a chance for the two of you to work together again, after a string of box-office successes in the nineties. But it wasn’t exactly going to be fun. How did you come to the heavy subject matter?”

  “It was after seeing stories like this in the news,” Dennis says. He tosses a glance at Art, who nods. Without a cowboy hat, his long ponytail rests openly on his shoulder. “Not necessarily Peter’s story, but seeing that conversion therapy is still legal in many states, and wanting to do something about it.”

  I want to raise my hand, but no one is doing that, just talking and artfully stepping around each other if they speak at the same time. It doesn’t seem like the type of thing I’m made for. I swallow, but my throat remains dry.

  “Um,” I say. My voice sounds squeaky, so I clear my throat. “Do any of you have a personal connection to the story? Besides watching it in the news?”

  Dennis stares at me like he didn’t realize I was here. For a second, the table is silent as everyone seems to think. The other journalists hold on to their pens, waiting for an answer. Marius stares right at me. Silent.

  “I think a lot of us have family members who are gay,” Art offers up. “My son is gay, and I wouldn’t want anything like this to ever happen to him.”

  The rest of the cast nods, seemingly pleased with this answer. It’s…not exactly what I was expecting. I thought they’d talk a bit more. But maybe it’s not the type of question anyone wants to answer in front of a bunch of people.

  “So,” another journalist says, “Grace—”

  “I’m sorry,” Marius says, cutting them off. “Josie, you asked me a question the other day, and I never got to answer it. I want to answer it now.”

  Everyone looks at me.

  I open my mouth, but nothing comes out.

  “You!” Art says, pointing a finger at me. “You’re the little lady from the press conference.”

  I try to slide down in my seat, but Alice smacks my shoulder.

  The other journalists continue writing. Something tells me they’re also writing about me—the journalist who got called out by name by one of the stars of the movie at a roundtable. On the bright side, I’m not being called out in a bad way. At least, I don’t think I am.

  “Yeah, it’s her,” Marius says, leaning forward. “It was a really good question—if you weren’t there, Josie asked me how race influenced my character’s experience. She didn’t get the time to finish, but I’ve been thinking about it for a while.”

  Penny turns her attention back to me. I can’t read her expression.

  “I think, even though it’s not explicit, it influences him a lot,” Marius continues. His gaze bores into me, but it’s so heavy that I don’t think I can look away. “Peter’s pretty much the only Black person in his community, besides his mom. Between not being able to be out—or really open—about his sexuality and then being one of the only people of color, he’s pretty isolated, so that influenced how I played him. I wanted him to be quiet and sort of—I don’t know—”

  He pulls his arms closer to his body, wrapping them around his torso.

  “Closed in?” He makes a face and a few people laugh. “And that’s before he has this horrible experience at the camp, where again, he’s like the only Black person. He’s with other queer kids, but they’re not…they don’t have the same experiences. Peter finds a sort of community with them. It’s just, if they were to have certain conversations…they probably wouldn’t go the way he hopes. And I think he knows that, even as he makes friends with Emma”—he points at Penny—“and everyone else.”

  People nod, jot things down, but I’m frozen. Alice glares at me.

  “Um,” I choke out. “Thank you.”

  Dennis glances at Marius and then at me.

  “Of course,” he adds, “this isn’t really a story about race. Marius just happens to be Black. Peter, he wasn’t—he wasn’t written with any race in mind. He’s supposed to be a character anyone can relate to.”

  Penny rolls her eyes. I bite my lip to keep from laughing.

  “Right,” one of the other Black journalists says. “Jumping off of that point…”

  Her question fades out as I jot down as much of Marius’s answer as I can remember. When I glance up, he’s still looking over at me. He smiles. I smile back.

  @JosieTheJournalist: love it when people forget about me. truly. it’s the best

  The next day is more of the same. We’re invited down to the conference room, but instead of lunch, we’re served breakfast: fluffy little pastries and tea and all sorts of fruit.

  “Is this Texas culture?” I ask Alice. She loads her plate up with everything and flags down the waiter for more coffee every time he comes within a ten-foot radius.

  “I don’t know,” she says. “I always thought Texas culture was Juneteenth and Beyoncé.”

  That’s…not too far off from what I thought, honestly.

  Today, instead of breaking into roundtables, people are called for individual interviews with the talent. That means it’s taking a lot longer for people to be escorted out. I’ve already h
ad a full cup of coffee and Alice has had three. Now I’m even more jittery than usual. Part of it is definitely the coffee, but it’s also because I’m supposed to interview Marius again.

  I shouldn’t be this nervous. This isn’t the first time I’ve interviewed Marius on this trip, and it won’t be the last. It’s just…I don’t think I’ll be able to disconnect. If he’s nice, I’ll be filled with pleasant feelings, and I’ll beat myself up about having a crush. If he’s rude (which I sincerely doubt), I’ll feel bad about that, too. And now there’s even more pressure to make sure my questions are good. Is he going to be comparing them all to the one I asked at the press conference? The one I thought of off the top of my head?

  Alice taps down on my phone, making me look up.

  “Do you need me to come in with you?”

  “Why?” I ask genuinely. “Do you have somewhere else to be?”

  “I’ve been hanging out with some of the interns.”

  She points a thumb toward a table several feet behind us. Instead of casually dressed journalists with their noses in notebooks, this table is full of young people wearing suits or skirts, most of them gray. They chatter to each other and sip from coffee mugs. All of them have name tags on their lapels.

  “Interns?” I repeat. “Since when…?”

  “I need something to do when you’re not around.”

  Alice doesn’t look up from her phone. At the intern table, another girl pulls out her phone, looks down at it, and laughs.

  How is Alice making more friends than I am? I mean, this isn’t even about making friends, but somehow Alice is doing it faster than me. She’s always been like this—bonding with people after a three-minute conversation, while I struggle to even keep a conversation going for three minutes. I kind of hate her for it.

  Chill out, Josie. I force myself to take a deep breath. Even though it sucks to admit, Alice needs something to do while she’s chaperoning me.

  “Oh,” I say. It comes out harsh and awkward. “Um, so what are your friends like?”

  Alice glances up, quirking an eyebrow. “Do you really care?”

  “Yeah!” I say. “Why wouldn’t I?”

  She narrows her eyes so slowly that I feel myself squirming in my seat. Finally, she opens her mouth to say something, but she’s interrupted by a man appearing next to our table.

  “Josephine Wright?” he says. “You’re up next.”

  I clear my throat and pick up my bag. Alice shoots the peace sign at me, sliding out of her seat. For a second, I think she’s coming with me, but then she’s grabbing her bag and going over to the intern table. The other girl with the phone glances up and smiles, saying something to the rest of the group. Smiles spread around the table. Alice grins.

  How does she do that? It’s so unfair.

  “Miss Wright?” the man says. “Right this way.”

  I glance back at Alice one more time. She’s leaning against the girl’s chair, laughing loudly about something. No one else in the room even seems bothered by how loud she is.

  I’ve always prided myself on being different from Alice in pretty much every way. She’s tall and thin, while I’m short and fat. She wasn’t interested in grades when she was in high school, but I was. She was in a ton of extracurriculars, like student council and yearbook, while I mostly stayed at home, working on articles for the school newspaper. She’s always had a lot of friends. I haven’t. It doesn’t normally bother me, but right now I’m jealous. I’m jealous of Alice, and I hate it.

  * * *

  The room is like the one where we did the roundtable, except the table is smaller, and there are people brought in, one by one. A PR person actually sits at the table with us. As I set up my notebook and recorder, I feel her studying me. My neck starts to sweat.

  Art Springfield walks in a moment later, all movie star, and part of me wants to snap a picture for Dad. He wears a big black cowboy hat, blue jeans, and a strand of leather around his neck. He actually swaggers over to the chair. I swallow.

  “Well,” he says, leaning back in his chair. “Been doing this all morning. I’m game for whatever you’ve got. Ask me anything.”

  Judging by the sharp look the PR person gives me, I definitely shouldn’t ask anything I want. I quickly glance down at my notebook.

  “Um, right,” I say. “I think one of the interesting things about your character is that, like, he isn’t just one thing. He thinks he’s really doing the right thing for his son, and even once his wife starts pushing against the choice they’ve made, he’s stubborn about it, even as he does his own investigation. It’s like he’s this macho guy who doesn’t want to listen to anyone else, but he’s also really loving and emotional about his relationship with his son. How do you build the layers of a character like that?”

  The PR person looks up at me. Art Springfield cocks his head to the side.

  I bite my lip. Did I say something wrong?

  “Actually,” Art Springfield says, leaning forward, “that’s real interesting. When I think about it…”

  I’m still writing notes fifteen minutes later when Dennis Bardell shows up in the room. He glances between Art Springfield and me before taking a step back toward the door.

  “Oh,” he says. “Am I early?”

  “You’re actually right on time,” the PR person says. “Mr. Springfield’s interview ran over.”

  I feel myself flush, even though it isn’t technically my fault. I only asked three questions. Who would’ve thought that the guy would have so much to say? I’ll have to tell Dad about it tonight when I call home.

  “It’s not a problem,” Art Springfield says, waving the director over. “Just got a bit lost talking to this little lady. She really makes ya think.”

  I bite back a smile. When I glance up, Dennis Bardell is staring at me. I can’t read his expression. He’s even harder to read once he’s seated at the table and Art Springfield is out of the room.

  “I actually have a question about the shot at the very beginning of the movie,” I say, shifting in my seat. “The one where the camera lingers on that pack of dogs as they’re crossing the screen? And it feels like they’re taking forever? What was the meaning behind that?”

  “Wow.” Dennis Bardell rubs his hand over his balding head. “I hate to say it, but that was actually a happy accident. Our cameraman happened to be rolling when we were setting up for one of the rural scenes up in Maine. I thought it was an interesting shot to pull viewers in with.”

  Oh. That’s it? I figured there’d be more of a complicated metaphor or something.

  “It definitely catches the eye,” he says, as if he can read my mind. “Doesn’t it?”

  “Oh, yeah,” I say. “Definitely.”

  My chest tightens as we get closer to the end of the interview. I’m supposed to talk to Marius next. What I’m feeling isn’t anxiety—it’s something else. Something bubbly.

  “Well, thank you so much,” I say. “For your time.”

  He nods, barely lingering long enough for me to shake his hand. I only have a few seconds to myself before I hear someone else approaching. At the sound of the door opening, I whip my head around.

  “Oh,” I say. “Um, Penny? Hi?”

  The PR woman glances up, eyebrows drawn. “Miss Livingstone? Your interview isn’t scheduled for—”

  “Marius and I actually switched time slots,” Penny says. She walks into the room like she owns the place. “I thought that’d be okay.”

  The PR woman purses her lips and stands up.

  “Just one moment,” she says, already typing into a phone as she walks out the door. “I need to make sure this is approved….”

  Penny plants herself down next to me with an eye roll.

  “Louise, huh?”

  I blink over at the door, cracked open a few inches, and rub my temples. />
  “Sorry,” I say. “This is just— What’s going on?”

  “Well, it looks like the shining star didn’t show up.”

  “Uh,” I say. “Why didn’t his, um, publicist call me?”

  Penny shrugs. I glance down at my notebook, questions scrawled for Marius. Part of me is disappointed. But maybe his publicist called Ms. Jacobson and she just hasn’t gotten the message to me yet? I pull my phone out of my pocket, but there aren’t any messages waiting for me, not even in my email inbox.

  Outside, Louise’s sharp voice says something I can’t make out. I bite my lip. Is this a big deal?

  “Look,” Penny says, leaning forward, “I’m not supposed to tell anyone. But the director for his next movie already has him doing rehearsals.”

  “His next movie,” I repeat. “Uh—the one with Roy Lennox?”

  Penny makes a face that looks like a grimace, but it vanishes so fast that I’m not sure if I imagined it or not. Even if it was there, it’d be understandable, since Roy Lennox is one of those directors white boys latch onto and worship and mansplain about.

  “I’m not supposed to talk about it,” she repeats. “Honestly? He overslept and I’m trying to buy him some time. This is his first movie, you know? Don’t want him to get in trouble.”

  “Right,” I say. “Um, you and I could talk right now. It’s just that I was supposed to have an interview—”

  “Yeah, that.” She chews on her lip. “I think his publicist is scheduling phone interviews with all the journalists he’s missed, but you can probably come out with us tomorrow.”

  Tomorrow? Everyone is flying to Chicago later today—does she want me to go out with them in the next city?

  “Uh,” I say. “What?”

  “We’re supposed to—” She waves her hand. “Explore. Chicago. It’s, like, our one day off, so—whatever, it was his idea. But he’s the one who screwed up here, so he should have to make up for it, right? So you can just interview him then.”

  “But…” My voice trails off. I’ve already gotten face time with Marius, so that isn’t a problem, but this entire situation just rubs me the wrong way.