[Author’s disclaimer:
The
following is an original work of fiction based on the television series Sports
Night,
created by Aaron Sorkin, and produced by Imagine Entertainment and Touchstone Television.]
SPORTS
NIGHT
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTIES
Chapter Two
Magic Time and The New Guy
Jack
Garrett
had been a security guard in this Manhattan high-rise for eight years,
and
walked the beat around here as a uniform cop for a dozen years before
that,
so he was used to the pattern. The lobby was emptying in a
gradual
manner, as it usually did this time of day. Most of the business
offices
were closed or closing now, and they’d all be empty in the next
half-hour
or so. He waved at a few of the hardier swimmers from the various
secretarial
pools, overheard the mixture of braggarts and social climbers half his
age
talking about their new SUVs - pretending they knew how the mechanisms
under
the hood worked was common conversation material - and mostly counted
the
minutes until his evening replacement would come on duty. By
five,
they’d all be gone.
Except for the TV people. They’d be busy all night, which wasn’t
new. They had shows to do. He was glad they were going to
be around for a
while longer. It would have been wrong for them to lose their
jobs because
the last owners were greedy and thoughtless. Most of the people
up
there seemed decent, and he enjoyed the conversations he’d had with
some of
them. They were smart, quick people, and usually the mood was
light around them.
More recently though, there’d been a change in the tone. Some of
them weren’t happy about the new ownership. He guessed the
biggest problem most of them had was that there was going to be a new
guy in charge. Garrett didn’t like the way some of the staff had
said those words: ‘the new
guy’. It reminded him of when his eldest son would come home from
school
and complain about ‘the new kid in class’ who was inevitably ‘a jerk’
or
worse. The attitude among the TV people was so similar, he
half-expected to hear that this ‘new guy’ had cooties. Garrett
grimaced. Never mind that a week later, ‘the new kid’ was hanging
around the living room with
his son, watching television and drinking soda pop, now referred to as
the
‘new best friend’. He wondered how long it would take the people
upstairs
to change their collective tune. Maybe as long as it was going to
take
the new boss to notice the intern trying to disguise herself by a
pillar.
As a CSC intern, Kelly Phang was often deeply entrenched in schemes
regarding new personnel. She had been given the basic
surveillance training by the intern she’d replaced a few months before
– how to hide in plain sight, usually behind a magazine or a plant or
something; how to watch for new faces, especially to notice the look in
the eyes, which was a good way to determine mind-set and mood; how to
decide who belonged and who didn’t. These were valuable skills,
the kinds of things you definitely didn’t learn in a
broadcast journalism class.
And
today, she was getting a chance to use them for a good cause.
Natalie, one of the people from Sports Night, had given her a
walkie-talkie and a prime assignment – identify and report the arrival
of the new boss. So she was there, posed casually by a painted
concrete pillar, pretending to read a magazine, and watching the
revolving front door. Where are you,
Mr. Executive Producer? she wondered. She glanced at her
watch.
Natalie had said he was going to arrive around five o’clock. She
noted
it was fifteen minutes to the top of the hour. Kelly hoped the
new
guy didn’t have a habit of running late.
At
ten to five, Garrett was noticing that a camera in the southwest
stairwell seemed stuck. As he prepared to check it out, he saw
the man in the dark gray suit walking into the lobby and approaching
the elevator. Garrett looked over at the visitor, giving
him a good once-over. Deciding that the visitor wasn’t an
apparent threat to him or anyone else in the building, the guard gave
the visitor a nod. The man in the suit blankly returned the
gesture, then turned his attention to the silver sliding doors once
more. The elevator dinged to signify its arrival, then the doors
opened, allowing the man to step inside. Once he was safely
aboard, Garrett frowned a
bit. “Must be the new guy,” he said to no one in particular.
Kelly had noticed the man’s entrance. There was no doubt in her
mind that this was the new guy. His expression was guarded, his
stride determined. She’d noticed the security man giving him a
sideways glance, and his non-action was the clincher. This was
Chris Murphy, new CSC Executive Producer, she was sure of that.
She was also sure that he was a
hottie.
In her mind, she saw his entrance again, and this time it seemed like
he was
floating an inch above the floor, gliding across the smooth, gleaming
marble
and tile, finding the elevator without even trying. He turned his
eyes
to hers as he pressed the call button and let a smile spread across his
lips,
and she felt her heart thrumming in her chest, and then he was
approaching
her, the smile growing closer and closer, his strong hands reaching for
hers...
A crackle over the walkie-talkie Natalie had handed to Kelly snapped
her back
to reality. The elevator had already taken him away. She
blinked.
“Yeah, I’m here,” she said, still a bit absent.
Natalie’s words were quick. Kelly could hear her nervous energy.
“Is he in the building?” she asked.
“Yeah. He’s on his way up.”
“You sure?”
Kelly flashed back to his face. “Uh-huh.”
“How’d he look?” Natalie asked.
Yummy, she almost blurted. But she thanked her lucky stars that
she actually replied, “Like he’s in charge.”
The elevator doors closed behind him. A glance at the time told
him he was early, maybe too early. He was convinced he’d never
been this early for a meeting. Then he noticed that his face felt
hot. He
tried to check it in the sliver of reflective metal on the elevator
button panel, but it simply stretched his face to a ridiculous
proportion. So no help there. Maybe his tie was too
tight. Hell, maybe his jacket was too tight. He tugged on
his collar, noticing once more that his pulse was off the charts.
Good God, man, get a hold of yourself, he thought. You’re
not a friggin’ intern, like the college girl
who was watching you in the lobby. She’d been staring at
him.
Dead giveaway. He figured she must’ve drawn the short
straw.
He checked his watch for the hundredth time since he’d walked through
the front door, and looked up at the lighted numbers ticking off his
rise. “Breathe, dammit,” he felt himself hiss in the void.
He closed his eyes,
listening to the emptiness and the soft hum of the fluorescence, and
waited
for her whisper. It didn’t come right away, and he worried for an
instant
that he’d forgotten it.
But he was wrong. “You’ll be okay,” she said, in that sweet and
quiet way. “You might not believe it now, but you will.”
She always made
him
smile. This time was no exception. His heart slowed down,
his
suit now fit like a dream, and he was ready. He took another
breath,
dropped the smile, and waited for the elevator to slow and stop.
Five minutes before five, he stepped off the elevator and swung the CSC
office doors wide open. A receptionist looked at him with a
general curiosity, and he responded before she could ask the question
that was coming. “My name is Chris Murphy. I have some
people to meet,” he said.
Natalie bolted up from her desk, and shot past Jeremy’s
workstation. “He’s here,” she said to him as she whipped past.
Jeremy was about to verify her assertion, but was struck dumb by the
fact that she was already gone and it would have been foolish to say
anything. Elliot appeared next to him, Kim in tow. “Is he -
?” he asked.
Jeremy began to
nod,
and that was enough to make Elliot and Kim disappear, too. Jeremy
shook
his head. “It begins,” he said to himself. “Again,” he added
wryly.
Indeed, it didn’t take long for the bullpen to whip itself into a
frenzy once
more. The activity now, Jeremy noted, didn’t seem to have as much
to
do with the earlier craziness of ‘who owns us’ as it did with the
near-insanity of getting a first look at ‘the new guy’.
Personally, he wanted to wait.
No need to rush headlong into a firing squad.
Casey watched the madness through his window, half-heartedly chewing on
a tuna sandwich. If he didn’t know better, he’d think this was a
busy news day. Watching the writers and producers and techs
rushing from desk to desk, huddling in corners and by doors, and
disappearing and reappearing, all of it was a bit disheartening.
It was close to a riot, or as close as he wanted them to get. It
was just a new boss, he thought, and almost instantly felt foolish for
having that cross his mind. He set the sandwich back on its paper
plate and pushed it away, a bit unhappy with himself. Of course
they’re nervous, they have every right to be, he thought. We have
every right to be, he amended.
“Casey?” Dana said, startling him.
Cripes. How’d she get in here without me seeing her?
Or noticing that sweet, subtle perfume she’d begun wearing, his
little
friend piped up.
“Shut up,” he said, under his breath.
“What?” Dana asked. “Am I interrupting Magic Time?”
Double damn. “No, Magic Time hasn’t started yet. I’m just –
uh – trying to find the right word here,” he lied, gesturing to his
monitor. “What’s going on? Murphy in the building yet?” he
asked, trying to shift
attention from his missteps.
“Actually, yes, he is. That’s what Natalie just told me.”
“Oh. So that’s why the gang is all a-twitter,” he said, nodding
toward the bullpen.
The word caught her off-guard. “A-twitter?” She smiled
broadly, genuinely. “I didn’t realize that term was still in
vogue.”
Casey gave her his best aw, shucks grin. “It’s making a
comeback.”
“I must’ve missed the memo,” she said. “How’s the tuna?”
She gestured
toward the plate.
“Okay, I guess. It sounded better to me when I ordered it than it
ended up being.” He decided that was actually about right.
“Yeah, that happens to me, too,” she said, with that wry smile that
always destroyed him.
Please leave, he wanted to think, but that little bugger in his head
dropped a ‘don’t’ into the phrase.
We’re close friends again. I’m totally over wanting anything
romantic from her. I’ve got someone else.
Yeah, the goofball whispered in his ear. Sure.
And then they were silent again for what felt like an eternity.
He was
trying to avoid her, she could tell. Maybe he was nervous about
Chris
Murphy, like everybody else. Or maybe it was that thing with Dan;
that
had been rather unpleasant.
Or maybe he wanted to say something else to her.
Like:
‘Hey, Dana, you wanna grab dinner later?’
Or maybe:
‘Dana, I’ve been wondering if you’d like to have a drink with me
after
work.’
Or even:
‘You were right, I was wrong, please take me back.’
But instead, he looked down at his monitor and started typing
again. Dana was about to take it as a sign and leave, but just
then Casey said, “I’m
having dinner with Sheri again tonight.”
Dana froze and replayed the sentence in her head.
Sheri.
Again.
Tonight.
She digested each word one by one, to avoid nausea. The thought
of Sheri
and Casey together had that effect on her. Dana remembered them
walking
through the bullpen on the way to their second date, Sheri hanging all
over
him, kissing him on the neck, giving him those gooey looks. And
him
returning them. Eww. She hadn’t said anything about it,
though.
She had no right to comment. They were friends again, finally,
and
if Sheri made him happy, well, then . . . Good God, she couldn’t even
finish
the thought.
A glimmer of hope hit her. He’d said it rather flatly, like he
was talking
about visiting the dentist.
But Sheri was a dentist. His dentist. His tall,
raven-haired, twenty-five year old dentist. So that didn’t prove
anything. “Great,”
she said, trying not to rush the response. “How’s it going with
her,
by the way?” she added, trying to gauge him.
He looked up, but didn’t give her any real hints. “Pretty well,
considering our schedules haven’t been conducive to us seeing each
other,” he said.
“Yeah, work can be like that,” she replied, trying to find something
that would sound supportive, and not sure if she had.
“Tell me about it,” he said with a chuckle.
Yep, bland, flavorless conversation. Just about our speed, she
thought. Time to end this particular uncomfortable
encounter. “Well, I’m going to head over to my office, get caught
up on my paperwork. See you at pre-show.”
Casey nodded in her direction, then returned to work, and Dana took
that as
her cue to spin on her heel and walk out. For a moment, she
thought about going back, but decided against it. If Chris Murphy
was going to drop by her office, she didn’t want to be caught
unprepared. Besides, he might want to discuss something that
would make her have to deal with the
memories of Sheri again, and that she could not take.
As Casey glimpsed her exit out the corner of his eye, he thought he saw
her pause.
Catch up to her, his buddy cried. Spin her around and
knock
her off her feet!
I can’t, he replied. I’m having dinner with Sheri again tonight.
The voice was wounded. ‘Can’t’? Try ‘won’t’.
That’s
more accurate.
And then the voice was quiet again.
Jeremy was headed for the men’s room when he felt the hand on his arm,
and before he could see who had grabbed him, he felt himself flying
into the empty
break room. Part of the trip had been aided by his nervous
reaction, most of it was courtesy of somebody else’s right arm. Jeremy
took a moment after landing to ensure that he would still need to use
the men’s room after this, which he would, thanks.
He looked around the room. Tony, Elliot, Kim, and Natalie were
looking back at him. “Finally decided to get a glimpse of the new
guy?” Natalie asked.
Jeremy shook his head. “No, just had a bit too much coffee.” He
was about to step out again, but Natalie blocked him.
“He’s coming now. He’ll be passing by any second,” she said.
“So I can’t go to the bathroom until then?”
“You might just have to get used to holding it,” Tony said. “I
heard he’s a tough guy to work for.”
Jeremy shook his head. “And Bob Epperson wasn’t? Or
Isaac? Or – hell, I could come up with a dozen names, and you
knew them first hand,” he replied. “And exactly how does grabbing
a passing glance at him help
anyone figure out if he’ll be easy or tough on us?”
“I just want to see who we’re dealing with,” Tony said. “His attitude.”
“So why hide in the break room? Why not just look busy in the
hallway, wait for him to pass – ”
The others gave him sideways glances. Finally, Kim said what they
were thinking. “Because we’re being devious,” she said, like she was
explaining it to a child.
“Ridiculous is more like it. Excuse me,” Jeremy said, ducking
around Natalie, and back into the hall.
And straight into the stranger in the gray suit.
The collision was painless, and not that annoying, simply an
interruption in Chris’s stride. He looked over at the young man
he’d bumped into. “You okay?” he said to the other man, who
seemed a bit dazed.
The younger man reset his eyeglasses. “Yeah, thanks. Just
on my
way to the men’s room.”
Chris turned his attention to the small crowd behind the man, who were
all trying to evade his gaze. Man, somebody needs to teach these
people how to spy, he mused. “Isaac Jaffee’s office is this way,
right?” he asked, gesturing ahead of himself.
The younger man cleared his throat. “Yes. Straight down
there,” he said, attempting to point the right direction and finally
just agreeing with Chris’s posture.
Chris offered a smile. “Thanks.” He held out his
hand. “I’m
Chris Murphy.”
It sat out in the air for a moment before the younger man made a
last-second grab for it. “Sorry, sorry. I’m Jeremy. I
work here.”
What the hell? Of course you work here, stupid,
Jeremy thought. He gripped the bigger hand with his own. It
wasn’t soft or manicured like most of the execs; this guy worked for a
living, he thought. Then Jeremy had a revelation: why the
hell am I noticing the new guy’s hands? He quickly dropped
the handshake.
“I gotta get going,” Jeremy said.
“Right. The men’s room,” Murphy replied with a smile.
Oh, God, why did I bring that up? “Yeah, yeah,” he tried to say.
“See you – all of you – around,” Murphy said as he walked away.
“Sure thing,” Jeremy said after him. He turned to see his friends
in the break room, all trying to avoid his eyes too, but this time to
keep from laughing. “Thanks a lot,” Jeremy said to them,
reserving a special glare
for Natalie, then walked down the hall and pushed open the men’s room
door.
Chris enjoyed the moment as he stretched his legs again. It was
unexpected, sure, but funny, nonetheless. As he noted the names
and numbers on the
doors, and how they were leading him to Isaac’s office, the smile
slipped away. It was reminding him of all the trips he’d made as
a field producer for one network news division or another.
Sometimes he ended in up in
places that people didn’t plan to visit. And the eyes on him, so
constant,
so observant. He’d see the thin smirks, the whispers of contempt
or
malice, and he’d wonder why he was the one chosen for the task.
He always remembered. He hadn’t been chosen, he
volunteered. He
loved the rush, loved the challenge, always wanted more, more, more.
And the coke and booze never hurt.
The smile had dissolved completely by the time he noticed the door with
Isaac’s name on it. Back to the business at hand.
After ensuring that the new guy was gone, and giving themselves time to
clear the guffaws from their throats, they settled into a quiet moment
of thought.
“He seems okay,” Elliot said finally. “Even
kinda
nice, you know?”
“Yeah,” Kim agreed. “He was cool with Jeremy.”
“I suppose,” Tony muttered. “I still don’t trust him, but I guess he
deserves a chance to earn it.”
Natalie nodded her agreement, and after a beat, added, “And he’s cute,
too.”
Kim didn’t need to think about that. “Oh, yeah,” she growled.
“Good Lord,” the men groaned, stepping out into the hall.
The women laughed out loud. “I can’t believe I said that,”
Natalie said.
“I thought it was just me,” Kim said. “You think so too?”
Natalie’s laughing slowed. “Seriously? You find him attractive?”
“Unbelievably so. You don’t?” Kim furrowed her brow, pretending
to check
her friend’s eyes. “Sorry, but have you suddenly gone blind?”
Natalie smiled apologetically. “No. I just don’t see it.”
Kim frowned a bit. “Maybe it is just me.” She shrugged. “Oh,
well. See you at pre-show.” Then she was gone.
Natalie folded her arms in front of herself. She couldn’t believe
she lied to Kim about something as silly as finding the new guy
attractive. Then she noticed Jeremy walking back down the hall,
and remembered why.
Isaac dreaded the knock. It was coming, he knew it, and when it
happened two ticks before five, he felt his heart skip a beat, which
was a sensation a former cardiac patient dreaded. But his heart
picked up the pace again,
so he rose to his feet, buttoning his coat, and said, “Come in,” in the
most
genial tone he could find. The door opened, and they were
face-to-face,
not in his worst imaginings, but for real. And it surprised
Isaac.
Murphy looked substantially different than he’d remembered; somehow he
was
taller and broader-shouldered than he had been those many years
before.
But his voice was virtually the same.
“Isaac,” Chris said. “It’s good to see you again.”
Isaac was surprised by the compliment, and even a little touched.
“Thank you,
Chris. You’ve changed,” Isaac replied.
“A little, I suppose,” Chris replied. He reached behind himself
and closed the door. Then Chris crossed the space between them
and extended his hand. Isaac accepted the greeting, then motioned
for his visitor to sit.
Chris took the seat across from Isaac. He’d been in this position
before. Of course, there were others in the room – editors,
producers, lawyers. Lots of those. He sized up Isaac.
The man had aged, changed jobs, gone through a stroke and
rehabilitation, and he was still able to pin you to your chair with one
glance. In other words, he hadn’t changed at all. And Chris
was glad to see that.
“Would you like some coffee? A soda?” Isaac asked.
“No, I’m fine, thanks,” Chris replied. Then, with a tentative
voice, he asked, “So do you want to dredge?”
Isaac’s head snapped up at that.
“‘Cause I’m not really in the mood to do that today,” Chris added,
offering a small, wry expression; not really a smile, but how else
could it be described?
The question had taken Isaac by surprise. It had occurred to him
to bring up their past dealings, but he had dismissed the idea as bad
form. And then this young punk – no, wrong direction to go in
this early, Isaac thought – Murphy decides to bring it up
himself. With a half-smile, like it was some kind of private joke
between them? Son of a bitch.
Isaac couldn’t hold it in. “Listen to me, Chris, and
carefully. I don’t want you here. I said as much to
O’Rourke. I still believe you’re a disaster waiting to happen, no
matter what you’ve deluded Stratosphere or any of their executives into
thinking. Maybe you don’t want to be, maybe you don’t believe it
yourself, but I was there the last time. You – yes, little old
you – nearly destroyed the careers of three fine reporters, not to
mention very nearly costing them their lives. You and I may have
a brief track record, but it is one that shows me that you have as much
concern
or respect for the craft of journalism as you do for your liver, lungs,
or
brain. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to let it happen to any of
my
people here.”
He was prepared to let his tightening emotions take the lead, but then
he saw the young man’s downcast eyes, and felt a blush of embarrassment.
When Chris looked up, Isaac knew he wasn’t going to feel it for long.
Isaac had swung hard, really given it his best. Every word drew
blood. And that buried Chris’s gentility. He felt his jaw
constrict. “I thought long and hard about bringing our history
up. I decided that if it was off the table, we could settle into
some kind of pleasant professional relationship. I didn’t expect
anything more than that. I’m keenly aware that we have no shot at
anything friendlier. But I had no idea that you couldn’t let the
past lie, and actually would prefer being at odds all day, every day.”
“Three reporters, Chris,” Isaac started.
“Alive and well and prospering. And they all forgave me,” Chris
countered. “I’ve worked with all of them more than a dozen times
since then. Hell, your bosses forgave me, my bosses forgave me,
even the God damn network and newspaper counsels forgave me. But
not you. Not the great and all-powerful Isaac Jaffee, who never
met a grudge he couldn’t nurse.”
Chris gritted
his
teeth. No turning back now. “And as far as you thinking I’m
going
to crash this place, have you looked at the trades lately?
According
to the rest of the industry, you’ve already done it. Stratosphere
is
this close to being a laughingstock. Nobody wants to keep CSC
together,
for Christ’s sake: our own bean counters say the sum doesn’t equal the
value
of its parts. The board of directors has a pool going on how long
it’s
going to take you to collapse. And that’s where your salvation
came
in, and he looks a damn sight like me,” Chris said, leaning forward and
giving
Isaac a blazing stare. “I practically – practically, how about
literally
– begged O’Rourke not to sell this place for scrap. That’s right,
little
old me. Little old ‘disaster waiting to happen’ saved your sorry
asses.
And I’m going to continue to do so, whether the hell you like it or
not.”
At that, Chris found his feet, then the door, and before Isaac had a
chance
to respond, he was gone, the door slamming behind him.
Isaac pushed himself deeper into his chair, and waited, his hands
folded on
his chest, like he was protecting himself from a physical strike.
He
could barely believe it. In the midst of a rather stinging
response (the ‘Great Jaffee’ point was particularly sharp, and
accurate, as little as Isaac wanted to admit it), Chris Murphy had
dropped a hand grenade. Right on Isaac’s lap. That’s what
it felt like, anyway.
Chris stood in the hallway, trying to avoid shaking. He only
hoped he
wouldn’t bump into any other CSC employees right now, for fear that he
might
tear their limbs off. He took a deep breath, exhaled, and hurried
down
the hall to the elevator. He wanted to punch everything.
Now
would be a very good time to check out the new office, see if it needed
redecorating.
Like maybe a few holes, here and there.
Dana tried to keep quiet and hidden as Murphy hurried past the door she
was hiding behind. She’d been outside Isaac’s office, approaching
the door just as the verbal fireworks detonated. When she
realized the conversation had finished – and rather abruptly at that –
she found shelter in the empty meeting room next to his office.
And in the nick of time, too. Murphy had come out of his meeting
with Isaac looking like a man possessed. She watched him close
his eyes and clench his hands, then open them again, seeming all the
while to be trying to find his breathing again.
Dana Whitaker’s mother didn’t raise a fool. There was no way she
was going to risk stepping into his path. Once he was on the
elevator, and
behind the heavy doors, only then did she step back into the
hall. Once
there, it was back to the office, to pretend to get back to work, and
wonder
who was next on his list.
Casey looked back at his computer screen. Something about NCAA
violations was being written, but his interest in writing had obviously
evaporated as the afternoon drew to a close, and the new boss drew
closer. And Dana’s drop-in didn’t help any. Well, this
nonsense had to end. “Okay, Case,” he muttered, “Break’s over.
Magic Time has begun.”
As he re-read his work, Dan stormed in, dropping a pile of videotapes
on his
desk. “God damn pile of – ”
Casey glanced up, then back at his monitor. C’mon, Magic Time!
“Stupid marathon piece. I don’t have any of the clips I
need. And why? Because a dozen of the tapes were
mislabeled. So I have to go through all of them one by one for
about the hundredth time. Pain
in the ass.” He slapped his desktop. “I shouldn’t have ever
started this project. Shouldn’t even have brought it up.
You were right.”
No magic. Casey typed the quick brown fox jumped over
the
lazy dog a few times, so Dan wouldn’t
suspect anything.
Dan waited for a response, but Casey wasn’t giving him anything.
“And – and – the two clips I could find are all screwed up for some
reason, so I have to try to fix them. That’s more time wasted on
this windmill. Which you warned me about.”
Casey sighed, and pretended to stare at something on his monitor.
“And now with Chris Murphy coming in, it’s just the rotting cherry on
my tuna
fish ice cream.” Dan noticed Casey’s sandwich on the edge of the
desk,
and Casey’s hand pushing it into the trash can. It rustled the
plastic
bag, and thumped against the bottom. “Coincidence. I swear.”
Casey finally met his partner’s eyes. “I’m trying to work here,
Dan.”
“I know. Magic Time, right?”
“Right. Magic Time. So if you don’t mind. . .” Casey
turned his attention back to the computer, re-typing the first part of
the story.
“I’m sorry. About what I said earlier.”
Casey stopped typing.
Dan decided to take this as a good sign. “You have your right to
an opinion, like me, like anybody else. So while I can’t agree
with you about Chris Murphy being the right guy for CSC – past history
being what it
is – but I had no right to be a jackass about it, either.”
Casey shook his head, a small smile crossing his lips. “Okay.”
Definitely a good sign. “So we’re still friends?”
Casey looked up at Dan. “I don’t know. I’ll have to talk it over
with Chris, him being my new best friend and all.” He said it
with a wide-eyed look that made Dan want to punch him.
Dan didn’t, of course. He deserved it. He’d never say that,
though. “Not funny, Case.” He picked up the top tape from
his desk, frowning at it, and then, without warning, his face lit
up. “That’s right, Bob was holding them!” he blurted.
“Uh, Dan?” Casey asked.
Dan grinned. “Bob had them! The tapes I wanted, I mean.”
“He might have already boxed them up, or had them picked up,” Casey
said.
“Ah, you’re a killjoy. I’m going up to his former office to see
if the
ones he’d found are still there,” he said.
“Happy hunting,” Casey said absently.
“Thanks,” Dan said as he left. Then he poked his head back
in. “Oh, and ‘quick
brown
fox’ is going to sound weird in your piece. Might
want
to change that part,” he said, slipping out the door again.
Casey frowned. This was officially the worst Magic Time in
history.
Chris was calming down nicely. The quiet of the dark office was
helping. He looked at the walls, already bare, and the boxes
brimming with personal items. Bob would be back tomorrow, with
security flanking him, and he
would take his paraphernalia with him. Chris would stay out of
the way
– he’d take meetings with Programming in the morning and Business
Affairs in the afternoon – mostly to avoid having to cross paths with a
person who might not like him very much. Chris didn’t want it that way,
but with the speed of his ascension, that’s how it was going to be.
Another person who won’t like me, actually, he mused. At least I
won’t have to deal with him on a day-to-day basis, he added. That
was something he wasn’t looking forward to, and his rough meeting with
Isaac convinced him
that it wasn’t going to be easy, dealing with people he’d pissed off
before.
Plus he had all-new people to meet and upset.
“Breathe, dammit,” he commanded himself.
Inhale. Exhale. It often amazed him that after all
these
years, he still had to remind himself to do it when his blood was up.
And on the topic of blood, he was still trying to figure out what to
say to
Dan Rydell. Chris was going to meet with the entire Sports Night
staff
at pre-show, a scant thirty minutes away. He had his speech to
the
troops planned, but the words to Dan, they just weren’t coming.
He
tried to form some semblance of pleasantries as he looked out one of
the windows,
and found the words lost in his admiration of the cityscape. At
least
I’ll have a nice view of the world from here, he mused.
The doors opened and Dan stepped off the elevator. He hoped Bob’s
office would be unlocked.
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