think about it—we’ve known each other forever. It’s not like we just met …”
“That’s true,” I said.
“And I’m very decisive. I know what I want.”
I smiled. “And what’s that?”
“You, baby,” he said, leaning down to kiss me.
I kissed him back, feeling like the luckiest girl in the world.
Eighteen
The following Monday, two days after a decisive win over Arkansas, I began my job as a sports reporter. Smiley didn’t give me a start time, but I left my apartment at six in the morning so that I could beat rush-hour traffic and arrive at the Bank of America Plaza in Dallas by seven. His assistant, an older lady channeling the sixties with her teased hair and cat-eye glasses, met me in the lobby and humorlessly escorted me to his office.
“Good morning, Ms. Rigsby,” Smiley said, glancing up from a completed New York Times crossword. His office reeked of cigars, though there was no sign of ashtrays or smoke. There was, however, a half-empty bottle of scotch on the corner of his desk.
“Good morning,” I said.
Smiley cleared his throat, as if on the brink of issuing a proper welcome, but thought better of it. “C’mon. I’ll show you around,” he said instead.
He then embarked on a tour of the newsroom, consisting mostly of a maze of cubicles under drab fluorescent lighting. Smiley made a few introductions in what he referred to as the “sports corner” of the floor, but only when he absolutely couldn’t avoid it, often omitting the names of his colleagues while making me sound as uninteresting and green as he possibly could. “This is Shea Rigsby. Kenny Stone’s replacement. She comes from sports information at Walker, but contends she can be objective,” he said once, mumbling a footnote: “We’ll see about that.”
He pointed out the assignment desk, where two phones were currently manned, explaining that it was a command center where various leads were phoned in on hard news stories. “Doesn’t really apply to us,” he said. “Our stories aren’t generally a surprise. Although these days you never know what athletes are going to do … If someone shoots his girlfriend or tortures dogs, it’ll be phoned in right there.”
I nodded as we stuck our heads into a bare-bones break room with a microwave and refrigerator, then an even more dismal room housing a watercooler and a copier adorned with a sign that said: ANOTHER DAMN PAPER JAM. He concluded our tour with my very own cubicle, located just outside his office. Lucky me. The whole floor was much quieter and less glamorous than I’d imagined, and I felt a dash of disappointment as I reminded myself that this wasn’t the Woodward and Bernstein era of journalism and most writers probably worked from home.
“So that’s it,” he said curtly. “Any questions?”
I shook my head.
“Okay, then. Your first assignment. We need a pregame piece on the Walker–Baylor matchup. Give me eight hundred, not a word more because space is tight. Damn advertisers,” he grumbled. “As for angles—maybe focus on the running back situation. Maybe look at the rash of injuries that squad has suffered … Find out if any of the assistant coaches hate each other. And I need it by eight A.M. tomorrow. Not a minute later.”
Before I could so much as nod, Smiley turned and headed for his office as the guy one cubicle over glanced my way and said, “And you caught him on a good day.”
I smiled, and he reached over the partition and shook my hand. “Gordon Chambers.”
“Shea Rigsby,” I said, feeling an instant rapport with this new colleague, as much for his comment as for his face. Everything about it was warm—from his honey-brown skin, to his full lips, to the dimples in his rounded cheeks that remained even when he stopped smiling. “What’s your beat?”
“Dallas Cowboys.”
I must have looked impressed because he said, “The low man on that totem pole. I do social media. Smiley’s necessary evil. And I cover injuries. Pulled hamstrings? I’m your guy.” His grin grew wider, his dimples deeper.
I smiled, wondering if he had ever talked to Ryan, as I put down my bag, then did a cursory exploration of my cubicle. I opened and closed a few drawers cluttered with stray rubber bands, paper clips, and a package of saltines that another reporter had left behind. Then I adjusted my chair, and inspected the ancient desktop computer, trying to figure out how to power it on.
“I wouldn’t bother with that piece of shit,” Gordon said as I noticed