Читать книгу Not Quite A Mom - Kirsten Sawyer - Страница 15

The walls of my office are glass, and before I even enter the room I can already see the pile of work waiting for me. It’s a two-show day, which means it will be nonstop. I’ve been working at The Renee Foster Show! for all of the show’s eight seasons. I’ll admit, it’s not exactly what I thought it would be. After graduation, I got my first big (mid-size) break in journalism as a runner at the Los Angeles ABC affiliate, KABC. Renee was coanchor of the 7 p.m. and 11 p.m. newscasts and, obviously, she was my idol. Not only did she hold one of the most coveted positions at KABC, she is happily married to her college sweetheart and has two adorable little boys. Her life is perfect, and following in her footsteps would be ideal. After two years I’d worked my way from glorified go-fer to second assistant to the news director. I still wasn’t exactly putting my education to good use, but I was getting closer. Then Renee made her big announcement: she was leaving the news desk behind to host her own daytime news magazine show. When she offered me the chance to come with her as a junior fact checker, I jumped on it.

At the time, I was under the impression that a daytime news magazine show would be what it sounded like…like 60 Minutes or 20/20, just during the day. The show turned out to be much more like The View, with more celebrity gossip than actual news, but eight years later I am the head fact checker and am generally able to convince myself that I am working in journalism and that someday this job could lead to my dream job as a news anchor…plus as head fact checker I get to do a brief on-air segment called “That’s the Facts.” For approximately sixty seconds, the camera pans over to me, seated behind a desk, and I give Renee a rundown on celebrity facts. I supply her with bullets of information on celebrity comings and goings, and then I say, “I’m Elizabeth Castle, and That’s the Facts, Renee.” Everybody’s got to start somewhere.

I take a deep breath as I set my bag under my desk. I don’t bother to sit down, though. I grab the pile of manila folders on my desk and head down to the stage, looking through them and passing out assignments to the group of junior fact checkers who work in cubicles surrounding my glass office. The junior fact checkers are a peppy bunch of recent graduates with degrees in a host of liberal arts subjects. I both love and hate them because none of them is jaded yet and none of them thinks that eight years later they will still be working on this show.

By the time I have made my way through the department, my arms are empty except for the red plastic clipboard that accompanies me wherever I go. I slip a headset over my mousey brown hair, which would be pathetic if not for a ridiculous amount spent on highlights every six weeks, and struggle to attach the transmitter to my waistband. The headset is a direct connection to my assistant, Hope. From the stage, I keep in constant communication with her, and she farms out all fact-checking requests on my behalf.

“Hope, are you there?” I ask as I clunk my way down the metal staircase that connects our offices with the show’s stage. As I wait for a reply, I enter the cold soundstage and see that the audience for the first show is already seated. I cross through the show’s set, a space that is part home living room and part home office. The home office part houses the desk I sit behind for my on-air segment (seconds).

“Good morning Elizabeth,” Hope chimes through the headset.

“Good morning. Do we have any messages?”

Hope rattles off a list of calls, most of which need returning but none of which are pressing enough to send me back up to my office this close to show time or even inspire me to have Hope connect me through my headset. In fact, most of the messages don’t even get my attention, except for one.

“A Buck Platner called asking for our address here. Do you know who that is, Elizabeth? Can I give him the address?”

A sick feeling shoots into my stomach as I answer, “That’s fine, Hope. Call him back whenever you get a chance and give him the address. No rush,” I add hoping that she won’t get around to it for days or even weeks, but knowing that Hope is far too responsible to wait any length of time. Part of me had hoped that perhaps my out-of-sight, out-of-mind approach might rub off on everyone else involved, causing them to forget about the whole guardianship issue; then it would all just disappear as if it had never existed.

“Wishful thinking,” I mutter to myself as I approach the hair and makeup area where I see the back of Renee Foster’s head in big rollers. “Good morning, Renee,” I say and make eye contact with her unmade-up face in the light-framed vanity mirror.

“Oh, Elizabeth, thank God you’re here,” she says, as she says every morning. “It says here that Halle Berry’s dog is a Lhasa Apso,” Renee says holding up the thick stack of papers that are her show notes, “but I saw it in the hallway and it looks more like a Shih Tzu to me.”

“Lemme find out for you, Renee,” I say calmly as the show’s makeup person starts applying a thick coat of foundation to her face. In need of the day’s second cup of coffee, I walk over to the craft services table. “Hope?” I say into my headset.

A few seconds pass before she says, “Sorry, Elizabeth. Buck Platner called again and I was just giving him our address.”

“Crap,” I think to myself, but I say, “Can you confirm what breed Halle’s dog is?” “Crap,” but this time I say it out loud and Guadalupe, our caterer, thinks I am referring to the coffee. After reassuring her that my crude behavior has nothing to do with her, I take a big sip of the coffee; it is crappy and it burns my tongue.

I’m thinking about the papers that will soon be on their way to me when Hope’s voice booms in my right ear, “Halle’s dog is a maltese.” I’m picturing Buck Platner, exactly as he looked in high school, wearing a letterman jacket, laughing as he puts the papers in a manila envelope and telling the postman to rush them to me. “Elizabeth!” Hope calls, and it jerks me back to reality. “Did you hear me? The dog’s a maltese.”

“A maltese? Are you sure?”

“Positive. I just got off with her manager’s assistant who conferenced me in with Halle’s dog trainer. The dog is a purebred maltese.”

“Who was on that?” I ask, needing to know which member of my staff ineptly supplied Renee with the wrong dog breed.

“Christy,” Hope answers

“I knew it,” I seethe, and with that, my mind is one hundred percent on my work and I take off to give Renee the correct information.

I sit down in the empty salon chair next to Renee and go over all the information for the entire show, including everything I will be sharing with her during “That’s the Facts, Renee.” When I share them with her on-air, she will act interested and surprised, but in fact not a single item will actually be news to her. We have spent the past week deciding together exactly which facts will be announced in today’s rundown.

“Okay, Elizabeth, sounds good,” Renee says as she rises from her chair with flawless hair and makeup and removes the black drape that had covered her from the neck down, revealing a black velour Juicy warm-up suit. “I’ll see you out there,” she calls over her shoulder as she heads to her dressing room.

I watch her for a second and then look back down at my clipboard as a loud voice booms overhead, “FIVE MINUTES TILL SHOW TIME.”

“Okay, Elizabeth, let’s touch you up,” Marcela, the makeup artist, says to me.

I nod appreciatively, and she dabs powder on my T-zone. I receive only a fraction of the makeup that Renee does, but Marcela is so talented that it does wonders for my appearance. When she is finished, the voice booms, “ONE MINUTE TILL SHOW TIME.”

As I head back to craft services for another cup of coffee, I hear the audience-warmer introducing Renee and the audience going wild with excitement. With another crappy although now not as hot cup of coffee in hand, I head to the wardrobe room, where I have my choice of the items from Renee’s last-season wardrobe that she didn’t like enough to take home with her. I select a black-and-white tweed Moschino jacket with silver buttons and put it on over my T-shirt. Since I sit behind a desk, there is no need to change anything from the waist down.

From the wardrobe room, I can hear Renee’s opening monologue and the enthusiastic laughter of the audience. I know that I have about five minutes while she banters with the show’s DJ, Karl, until I need to be in my seat behind the desk. I grab another cup of coffee from the craft services table and test it against my lip to be certain it has cooled down considerably before chugging the entire cup, while awkwardly bending forward in order to avoid dripping on the jacket. Caffeine is my lifeblood, especially on two-show days. As I swish cold water from the Arrowhead cooler in my mouth to remove any coffee from my teeth I hear Renee.

“And now let’s check in with the Fact Mistress, Elizabeth Castle.”

“Shit,” I say wondering how the ridiculous banter session was over so quickly, spilling water out of my mouth while ripping my headset off. Hoping my hair doesn’t look too horrible, I dart to my desk while the audience is maniacally laughing at Renee’s stupid “fact mistress” joke. Before the gigglefest has ended I am seated in the black Aeron chair that lives behind my stage desk, which is covered with charming prop-desk trinkets and looks nothing like a desk that anybody would actually use. Camera three rotates around, and before I have totally caught my breath it is staring me in the face with a brightly burning red light.

“Well, Elizabeth, what’s new and exciting?” Renee asks before taking a sip from The Renee Foster Show! coffee mug that I know contains room-temperature water (people have been fired over water that is too cold or too hot).

“So much is going on in Hollywood, Renee. Everyone is all abuzz over Jack Flight and Auburn Smith’s recent engagement. Not to mention the drama on the set of Desperate Housewives!” I enthusiastically reel off a handful of information about Hollywood’s hottest stars before ending with, “and that’s the facts, Renee. Back to you.”

“Wow!” Renee responds, and I am quite certain that she did not listen to a single syllable I have spoken. “Thank you, Elizabeth.”

I smile once more and watch as camera three moves away from my desk before I stand up and head back to the wardrobe room to hang up the blazer and retrieve my headset. I replace it over my head and reattach the transmitter to my belt.

“Hope,” I say into the headset, since I can tell by the audience warm-up guy’s voice on the stage’s PA system that the show is on a commercial break. “I’m off-air now and if you need me, I’ll be in the producer’s booth for the rest of the show.”

A split second goes by before Hope replies, “Actually, Elizabeth, I need you up here now. Buck Platner is waiting for you in your office.”