John Kenney - Talk to Me

He reached the West Side and the monks sang as Ted walked down into the subway at Seventy-Second Street. He rode the local downtown, standing room only, the faces so somber. The construction workers asleep on their way home, the groups of high school kids, the boys too loud and the girls laughing and hitting each other, sharing an earbud, listening to the same song. Crowds poured out at Fourteenth Street and Ted took a seat. He watched a mother and son, a boy of perhaps eight, Down syndrome. The boy sniffed at his hands and made kissing sounds at his mother. Ted assumed she was the boy’s mother. The mother smiled at the boy but mostly stared out the window. Legs double-wrapped around her calf, black baggy pants, white waffle long-sleeved T-shirt. She stared at a spot on the floor. He stuck his tongue out, plump lower lip extended. She looked over at him, stared at him as he looked out the window. He turned and he looked at her with such a look of love that Ted had to look away, the moment so real, so raw, so private.

Why not put this on the news, he thought. Film this and put it on the news with the monks chanting. Would that not tell his audience more about what went on in the world that day than any ten reporters on assignment in Kabul/Jakarta/the Pentagon/The Hague telling stories that were carefully scripted by governments or corporations or breaking news that told of nothing and offered not one scintilla of news? Maybe this was the new news. Micro stories about nothing, about everything.

Henke got the email late. The photographer he’d brought in to cover her. The shot was perfect. Franny’s underwear. You could see Franny’s underwear. The photograph showed her getting out of a car, an Uber. The photographer clearly having waited for her to move one leg to the sidewalk. It didn’t help that Franny had been drunk. But the photographer knew that, too. Because the photographer had a stable of bartenders he paid tips to. He’d gotten a call from one of them, heard that Franny Grayson had been in with a few friends, had downed four glasses of wine in ninety minutes, and had left in an Uber. The photographer knew where she lived, of course. He had that from Henke. It was too easy.

So was the headline.

FRANNY GRAYSON. EXPOSED.

He linked the photo with the interview with Lauren. He found a stock photo of cocaine on a mirror and used it next to the picture of Franny stumbling out of the Uber, even though the two photos weren’t related. True, she hadn’t known her father was in the room. But it didn’t matter. She’d gotten the story wrong. He could paint her as a liar. And she’d hidden the drug use. All in all this was a good day’s work.

Yet a curious thing happened the next morning in the office. Some employees found the photo offensive. Five women and three men signed an email saying they would quit unless the photo was taken down.

He thought hard about the email for almost forty-five seconds. He fired all of them.

Claire watched the footage in Bedford. She didn’t watch it the way people in offices watched it. The way young men on a trading floor at investment banks watched it, chuckling as the drunken woman stumbled out of the car, freezing the frame on her legs parting. She didn’t watch it the way hipsters at ad agencies and PR firms and design firms did, commenting and laughing. The way they did on university campuses, making a drinking game out of it. She didn’t watch it and then comment on YouTube:

Ha ha! Dumb bitch.

Whore’s got nice legs.

Rich kid drug addict.

She watched it as a mother who couldn’t protect her child. She needed to do something. She picked up the phone to call Dodge. But she dialed Ted.

Ted had seen it, too. His little girl, debased, shown drunk. Her underwear. There for the world to see. Because of him. Because of who he was. It wasn’t Franny’s fault. His rage built. Beware the man with nothing to lose.

“Ted,” Claire said. “Make this stop.”

He took the subway, purposefully going one stop past where he wanted to get out so that he could walk back, to see if anyone was following him. He felt like a reporter again. He walked for a time, the clouds bringing on an early dusk. He followed the directions on his phone and found the building. He stood out front and suddenly felt foolish, like an unhinged stalker. One doesn’t show up unannounced at a total stranger’s home.

He entered the building. The main door gave way to a vestibule with mailboxes and buzzers on one side. It smelled vaguely of cat urine and damp wool, the walls covered with half a dozen coats of peeling paint. Six buzzers, a United Nations of last names. Wizbicki. He pressed the buzzer and winced. No camera. Just a buzzer. He waited. She probably wasn’t home. Maybe buzz again. Maybe leave.

Ted had gotten the girl’s address from Lou, who pulled strings with human resources.

Through the metal speaker, an accented female voice. “Who is it?”

Every weeknight for twenty years Ted had said the name to eight million Americans. His name. Bigger than life. The most trusted man in America. Now he could barely get it out.

“It’s Ted Grayson.”

One one-thousand. Two one-thousand. Three one-thousand.

“I don’t believe you. You’re the paparazzi. I’ll call the police. Go away.”

It came into his head and was out before he knew it. “You saw my bald spot,” he said. “That night. And you used hair spray. Lou… my producer… told you to use hair spray.”

Silence.

“What do you want?” she asked.

“Just… to talk. Just for a minute. Please.”

Nothing. Ted waited. He thought of pressing the buzzer again but didn’t have the courage anymore.

He saw her boots coming down the stairs, through the glass door, arms folded tightly across her chest. She stopped at the landing when she saw him. She had an overcoat on, the kind that looked like it was from a secondhand store. Scarf. Behind her another woman. Her sister. It was the sister who opened the door.

“What do you want?” she said, pure hatred in her voice.

What did he want? He wanted to apologize. Simple. That was a lie, though. I want to be forgiven, he thought. He realized the absurdity of it. The foolishness of standing here, wanting something from her.

“I want to say sorry.”

They walked a block or two and then stopped, not saying much, until they found a coffee truck near a construction site. Ted bought them two coffees.

“I just wanted to say how sorry I am. I shouldn’t have screamed. Should never have called you what I did. I don’t have an excuse. I just… I was having a bad day, and…”

What else to tell her? About Franny? Claire? His birthday? His bald spot?

She stared at the sidewalk. “I’m sorry about what happened to you.”

“Don’t be. I probably deserved it.” He smiled.

He handed her an envelope. She worried for a moment that there was money in it.

“What is this?” she asked.

“It’s the names and numbers of some people at networks who’ll take your call. They can help you get work.”

She looked at the envelope, then to Ted.

“They call me, you know.”

“Who?” Ted asked.

“The networks. The… the cable news and the websites. They ask me to be on TV and talk about you.”

“Oh?”

She nodded. She looked so young.

“But… you haven’t,” Ted said.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s not really anyone’s business but mine and yours.”

She held up the envelope. “Thank you.”

“ Przepraszam ,” Ted said, and watched her smile.