Picking Up the Pace By Kimberly LaFontaine

Chapter Two

"It's too early for this shit," Angie mumbled as she pulled into the parking garage, wondering for the tenth time that morning how she managed to pull off going to class or work hung over and with very little sleep. She was lucky she had come to the party prepared, as always, with an overnight bag stuffed in the back of her trunk. That's what saved her on that particular unpleasant morning. Changed now into gray slacks and a short-sleeved white blouse, she checked her appearance in her rearview mirror and nearly struck another vehicle in front of her. Shaking her head to wake up just a little more, she pulled past the offended driver and up to her parking space. Grabbing her coke, she hurried down the stairs and across the street, down to the office. She had exactly two minutes to make it to the fourth floor and meet with Tom, who was surely waiting, his impeccable timing almost legendary.

"Good-morning, Angie," he greeted her brightly, defusing her inexplicable fear that something was wrong and the meeting would discuss her performance. She smiled at him, set her bag down at her desk and joined him at the elevator.

"I hope you haven't been waiting too long," she said.

"Oh, not at all. But I'm definitely ready for that coffee. You look like you could handle a cup of joe as well."

"You're absolutely right," she tried not to look too embarrassed, though she clearly was. "I stayed up a bit too late. I don't think I'll ever let that happen again if I can help it."

Tom chuckled and let her enter the elevator first. They stood in silence for a few moments until they reached the ground floor and exited the building. Their steps were quick, efficient -- the sign of a journalist, always in a hurry. Deadlines will do that to anyone.

"So, you curious what we're going to talk about? I'm surprised you didn't try and pry it out of me yesterday. You aren't losing your touch, Mitchell, or are you?"

"Oh, no you don't. Last time I asked questions during deadline you just about had a fit and told me to -- what was it? -- 'Bug off.'"

They both laughed at the memory. Angie liked her boss, had since she met him during her internship four years ago. He looked like Santa Clause minus the beard and was a father of three. Both liked the banter and carried it on easily, relieving the stress of the day and amusing other reporters and editors.

"Well, I guess you'll just have to wait until we get to Starbucks with that kind of an attitude," he said and chuckled.

With coffees in hand they chose a table outside and sat down. Both pulled out their notepads, marking the official beginning of the meeting. Angie had a little trouble focusing and hoped the black coffee would clear her head. Her boss pulled out a pack of cigarettes, lighted two and offered the reporter the second.

"So, boss. Tell me what this is all about," she said, taking a drag.

"I can tell you're not too fond of the city council beat." She opened her mouth to object but he cut her off. "No, don't start. I can tell by your writing. Don't get me wrong, the stories you turn in are good ones -- important and well-done. But they aren't the brilliant stories we've all come to know you by. So, let's figure out how we can fix things." He paused for effect and Angie didn't interrupt, curious to see what he had in mind. "Jason turned his two weeks notice in yesterday because he took a job in Boston and Rhonda's husband got transferred to Miami, so she'll be leaving. That leaves two very important beats wide open. I'm taking you off city council. Do you want to cover crime or education?"

"Definitely crime," she answered without hesitating, hoping he couldn't hear her racing heart. Suddenly, she was wide awake. This was it, a real break. If she could cover cops, get some really good stories in, she just might be able to get her foot in the door with the Associated Press. She saw a smile spreading across his face and knew he could probably tell what she was thinking.

"That's what I thought. You're really going to grow on that beat and your training is good. There are other reporters that want what I'm giving you. But they don't have what you do. They're too stuck into a reactive type journalism way. You aren't. You're still young enough that we can shape you into something much better. Just promise me you'll be active."

"Oh, I will be. Trust me, I have tons of ideas and my sources will be good for this beat, too," she said, her words nearly tumbling over themselves.

They started throwing out ideas, argued over how they would best be presented with maps, graphics or photographs. Half an hour later they had worked themselves into some sort of frenzy -- as near physical arousal as anyone can get over a job. Goosebumps had formed on Angie's arms and neck when Tom dropped the words "investigative reporting," and he had become particularly flushed when she talked about linking reports to explore larger issues.

The editor glanced at his watch and sighed as if not wanting to conclude the meeting but knowing it was necessary.

"Good," he simply said, a smile on his face. "I want you to start setting up contacts, nurturing new sources. Carry the police scanner today and make some appointments. If anything happens, go check it out and we'll let one of the interns work on that other story you were supposed to do today. I'm going to let them cover you until we can find someone else, except for that big story, of course."

They quickly made their way back to the office and Angie grabbed the police scanner from the small cabinet by her boss' desk. Turning up the volume, she looked around the office and noticed that she was still the only reporter in. Well, she snorted, it was 8:50 a.m. and most wouldn't show up for another half hour or so.

When her computer sputtered to life she pulled up a file on the server and started making phone calls, booking herself up with appointments to meet with detectives, spokesmen and the police chief. She even scheduled a ride-along with a gang unit officer, curious to see how bad it really was.

She ordered new business cards from the office clerk, looking forward to seeing the "Angie Mitchell, crime reporter" printed on them. And she could still use her old contacts if she discovered larger issues. It would be a good back-up to have.

Ideas were bubbling in her head and she could barely keep up as she jotted them down in her notebook. Excitement, it seemed, was returning to her job.

On a routine check-up phone call to the Weatherford Department of Public Safety early in the afternoon to see if anything interesting had happened overnight, she found out that a truck had been pulled over in Parker County with 30 undocumented workers from Mexico and Brazil inside. The dispatcher told her the bust had happened just 20 minutes before she called and she ran to tell her boss and was in her car, off to Weatherford with a photographer, before 10 minutes had passed. It would be another wild goose chase for sure.

The scene at the local hospital was terrifying. The men and women had been locked into the back of the trailer for nine hours in the hot Texas summer heat. With no cracks for air and no one to hear their screams or fists pounding on the walls, nine of the immigrants had died. Others were badly injured and had burned themselves on the hot aluminum walls.

The only thing that had saved the others' lives was a trooper who pulled the truck over for a routine inspection. As soon as he stepped out of the car, he noticed how edgy the drivers appeared and decided to call for backup. Ten minutes later, six troopers opened the cargo doors and found the human cargo passed out and partially dead. They booked the drivers and hauled the human trafficking victims to the nearest hospital. Angie arrived there about 45 minutes later.

She had to sneak her way in, telling the photographer not to acknowledge her in any way and to meet her out back in two hours. Privacy laws don't allow reporters to interview persons in a hospital without permission and photographs certainly aren't permitted. She hid her notebook and convinced a nurse, who was outraged by the unnecessary deaths of those desperately trying to escape poverty, to let her into a room with someone who wasn't as badly injured as the others.

Juan Gonzales laid in his hospital bed, a weary look on his face. Her Spanish was rusty, but they managed. As he told his tale -- how he had managed to stay hydrated by drinking his own urine -- it was hard for her to remain objective. She was pissed. Stories like this always made her hurt inside. She could detach herself from deaths and mourning relatives, but stories of torture always got to her.

It made her question her decision to cover cops on a regular basis, but with an iron resolve she pushed forward, feeling distinctly as though she were being tested.

Her notes were written in shaky handwriting, but she had the story.

The rest of the day was spent chasing officials -- state troopers, police officers, hospital personnel and immigration authorities. By the time she returned to her desk to type her story it was 6 o'clock in the evening and she was exhausted, physically and mentally. She filed it, argued with her boss to grant her more length and better play in the paper's hierarchy of headlines, and left feeling sad but satisfied. Juan Gonzales would tell his story to thousands of readers.

Not that it would make much of a difference. Such stories always yielded angry calls from conservatives and ignorant white supremacist readers. They were always angry the paper would allow such a story in print, when "everyone knows this country's problems are because of those damned Mexicans jumpin' border lines."

To hell with them, she thought as she slammed her car door and peeled out of the parking lot.

*                *                *

Sighing, she plopped down on her couch and reached for the remote. Her stomach growled in frustration but she was too tired to make dinner. Her cell phone rang and she rifled through her purse, annoyed but worried work was calling with questions on her story. But it wasn't work, it was Jimmy.

"Hi, Jimmy," she answered with an unintentional sigh. "Do you miss me already?"

"Aren't we just chipper this evening?" he said sarcastically. "Actually, I was wondering if you're in the mood to hang out. I'm bored. That is, of course, unless you're still too hung over."

"Nope, not hung over anymore. I had one hell of a day, though, and don't want to leave my couch. But you can come over if you bring food."

"Hmm. Chinese? Mexican? Italian? What are you in the mood for?"

"Italian. Fettucini. Pronto."

"Got it. Just give me directions and I'll be over soon."

Angie did as directed and relaxed back into the couch. She couldn't help but feel a little better, knowing that someone was coming over to share an evening and it seemed as though Jimmy would quickly become an important friend.

She checked her living room to see if it was hospitable enough and sighing, decided to through away some old Coke cans and empty popcorn bags littering the floor. The rest of her small apartment was straightened up enough.

Forty-five minutes later she heard a knock at the door and found a smiling Jimmy standing with an Olive Garden bag in hand. Angie snatched the bag from him and set it down on the coffee table, quickly opening all the containers to see what he'd brought. He laughed when he saw her eyes lit up when she discovered desert.

"Oh," she said to the piece of chocolate cake. "I feel I've been waiting for you all my life."

"Stand up and give me a hug hello or I'll take your new friend away and won't share," Jimmy said feigning a little huff. Angie blushed when she realized that she was being quite rude and quickly stood up to give the man a hug.

They sat in silence for a few minutes, Angie trying to rush through the pasta to get to desert. The reporter caught a smug look on Jimmy's face our of the corner of her eye and casually said, "So, what gives?"

"I have some interesting information about a certain someone who was at the party," he let on and paused until she smacked him lightly on the arm to hurry him on. "Reporters are feisty, aren't they? Well, fine. It's about Lauren."

"Lauren?" She gulped. During her busy day she had nearly forgotten about the black-haired stranger. And when Lauren's image did cross her mind, she filed the balcony incident away with the "drunk" stamp on it. Sealed and done with. Nothing spectacular here. She and Jimmy hadn't discussed anything, really, but as far as his version of the party goes, she didn't last long after that last glass of wine and merely passed out on the couch. But now she was quite certain she did not like where the conversation was headed.

He watched her closely. She wasn't ready yet, but what the hell.

"She digs you -- thinks you're pretty cool, even if you did make a fool of yourself."

Angie choked on her coke. After wiping her mouth with a napkin, she stared at Jimmy and didn't say a word. What the hell was she supposed to say, anyway.

"You're not going to say anything?"

"I'm straight, Jimmy, you know that."

"So you don't want to know what she said."

She shook her head and picked at the napkin. The thought of getting laid did seem appealing, but this was not quite what she had in mind. A flash of the stranger's smile brought on that unfamiliar tingling again and she cleared her throat.

Jimmy eyed her suspiciously but decided to drop it -- for now.

"Oh, come on. You're not going to quit talking to me over this, are you?"

Again, she shook her head and felt silly. For the life of her, she couldn't figure out why it bothered her. Lost in thought, she picked at the Styrofoam container and played wither her noodles. Realizing she was being rude again, she turned her attention back to Jimmy.

"So what is she up to anyway?"

Her new friend let out a relieved sigh and proceeded to give her the run-down on Lauren's personal affairs. Always the gossip hound, Angie learned that the woman decided to stay in Fort Worth for a while, having found an apartment and enrolled at the University of Texas in Arlington to pursue a master's degree in teaching English as a second language. She learned that Lauren's parents lived in Tennessee, her brother was overseas with the Army in Iraq, and her sister had run off to marry some guy in Canada. It wasn't exactly a typical family story, but it did give the stranger some depth and take away the exotic nature Angie had assigned to the woman in their brief encounter.

Hours later, after playing Monopoly and letting Jimmy beat her, she yawned and her friend decided it was time to go. He asked if Angie was free Friday and it just so happened that she was.

"The three of us should hang out," he boldly suggested. "Of course, I'll explain to her that you're not interested. Come on, please," he insisted. "She's an interesting person, she has lots of stories to tell. We could meet at Sue Ellen's, I'll pick you up here at 9 o'clock sharp."

"Fine, but this is not a date."

"Of course not," he said laughing. "I don't feel like being the third wheel."

After he left, Angie wondered what kind of a bar Sue Ellen's was. She figured she'd just check it out online. Then she started thinking about her article ideas and possible follow-ups to the immigration story. As she picked them apart while readying herself for bed, she forgot about making a note to check out Sue Ellen's in the morning.

*               *              *

The phone rang for the sixth time and she threw a pillow at it. She knew who it was and would call back later. For now, she was wrapped up in her favorite movie, Indiana Jones.

It had been a nice, lazy Sunday -- the work she occupied herself with was chipping away at a mountain of laundry that had accumulated in her closet over the past two months. Tom had forced her to take a couple of days off since she stayed late Friday night and said something about upper management wanting to save a couple thousand dollars on over-time pay. She had grudgingly accepted, knowing the rest of the week would be busy as hell.

The reporter sat on her leather sofa, wrapped in a blanket with a big bowl of popcorn in her lap, watching as Indy sat perched behind a rock, always in a tight spot. Right as the evil priest was about to rip someone's heart out, the phone rang again and she let out a small cry of annoyance. "Fine," she said aloud and paused the movie. As she jumped up to answer the phone, popcorn went flying across her living room. Perfect.

"Hello, Mom."

"Where have you been? I've been calling all evening."

Angie forced herself into a state of calm, picked up her pen and notebook and began doodling while she let her mother's chiding wash over her. The first ten minutes of any conversation with that woman usually went in this manner. Dealing with parents is sometimes like that, particularly with hers. She couldn't quite pin-point when her mother had become so annoying, but loved her nonetheless.

When the chiding came to the point of the ridiculous, she interrupted.

"Hey, I went to a party Thursday night."

"Really? Oh honey, I'm so glad. It's about time you started getting out again. You know I keep telling you that you can't be a shut-in when you're so young. You'll regret it, you know."

"Yes, mother, I know."

"So, did you meet a nice young man?"

"Yes, but he's gay."

"Oh, my. You know, I could talk to Frederick for you. You know he's been after you for years."

"Mom, Freddy is also gay."

"What's going on in the world? Is everyone turning gay?"

"No, just the men around me, apparently. Besides, I don't think I need to be worrying too much about dating right now. It just doesn't feel right."

"I'm sorry, Honey. Things will lighten up if you let them, just you see." She paused for a moment to give the last sentence more weight. Then she switched the topic of conversation to more familiar grounds.

"Have I told you about your father's latest thing yet?"

Angie sat back down on the couch with her pen and pad, settling in for a long conversation regarding her father. A fix-it man, he was always working on something around the house, which drove her mother nuts. It turned out this time that he had tried to fix a leak above the kitchen sink and succeeded only in creating a large hole in the ceiling. They had been forced to call a contractor to patch it up. She giggled and continued her doodles. She drew a flower and a rocket ship. Her mothers started complaining about the neighbors. Angie drew a sailboat with two sails and a small pirate flag.

An hour later she hung up the phone. She looked at her notepad, covered in small drawings. In the bottom, right-hand corner two eyes peered back at her from behind jagged raven bangs. She shook her head and dropped the notebook on the floor. Back to Indy.

She hopped back on the couch ignoring the littered popcorn and again started the action flick. Two minutes later, the phone rang again. Angrily, she paused the movie and said, "What?"

"Hello to you too, sweet pea."

"Leslie!"

"Yes, the one, the only. So, are you going to tell me what the hell's gotten into you? Did I interrupt something?" And so the two best friends quickly slipped into a long and comfortable conversation. The art historian didn't call often, as time differences and busy schedules always got in the way. In Paris, it must have been around 2 o'clock in the morning. An hour later it came back down to that same question her best friend nagged her with relentlessly.

"So, have you met anyone?"

"Not the kind of someone you're thinking about. I did, I can proudly tell you, go to a party the other night and met plenty of new friend-types."

"Friends are good. Sex is better."

"Well, that'll just have to wait a little longer, my friend. For now, working a lot is best, you know that."

"I guess. Seriously though, if you don't find someone soon, I'm going to have to fix you up when I get back. I'll have guys lined up on your doorstep."

"Oh, like I can't do that on my own."

"Is there a line?"

"No, but ..."

"You are hopeless."

"So are you."

"And that's why you love me. I have to go, my phone card's about to run out."

"Alright. I'll talk to you again soon?"

"Soon it is. Bye." And the friendly voice was gone.

Angie sat quietly and thought about Leslie. She missed her.

She thought about calling Jimmy and stopped herself. It was too soon to start pestering him every other day. Instead, she again turned back to Indy -- always a safe bet for fun times later. Even if it was with just herself and her favorite toys.

Chapter Three

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