[Critique Group 1] Marcia January submission

[Marcia Wick]

The Reporter

Marcia J. Wick, The Write Sisters

Copyright January 2018

Word Count: 1140

 

 

Through thick glasses, I squinted at my first boss, the editor of a small
town weekly. Mr. Conway’s fat fingers danced like popcorn on the round
typewriter keys, clickety-clack, pressing words onto the page. His burning
cigarette rested neglected in the ashtray as he churned out copy. 

 

I was his cub reporter. New on the job, fresh out of college. I turned to my
notes from the town hall meeting as he banged out highlights of Homecoming
week at the local high school. Football, I was learning, was the only big
news in this little town.  He hit the return, advancing the page to the next
line with a “ding.”

 

Mr. Conway’s overflowing ashtray was perched on the edge of his oversize
wooden desk, which was backed up to mine. It was 1976, and it was common to
light up indoors.  

 

Through a continuous curl of smoke, I peered  as he lifted a corner of the
sheet for a quick scan. Seeming satisfied, he whipped the coarse paper out
of the roller and pinned it to the desk blotter with his left elbow.
Dwarfing a #2 pencil in his right hand, he circled the headline, marked up a
typo, and indicated the end with a “30” before into the “out” basket the
story flew. 

 

A police scanner perched on a tall table across the room  squealed and
squawked , alerting us that emergency vehicles were being dispatched to an
accident on the two-lane highway heading out of town. I blinked as the big
newsman’s chair scraped across the wood floor. He shrugged on a jacket and
crushed a pack of cigarettes into the breast pocket of his button-down
shirt. Grabbing a 35 mm camera and a film canister, he grinned at me.  I
remained rooted to my wooden swivel chair.

 

“You coming?” 

 

I had been on the job only one month. Until then, my boss had assigned me to
cover the desk while he chased the more urgent news. I leapt up, grabbing a
notebook and my coat. Mr. Conway’s unsmoked cigarette, cold ashes
end-to-end, still rested perfectly shaped in the tray.

 

I followed my editor out of the back room, the “news room,” through the
front office, the “sales room,” heads lifting and turning as we flew out the
front door. We jaywalked across Main Street to the parking lot opposite the
office. The newspaper boasted a prominent two-story storefront near the end
of the mile-long business district. The paper’s name, the Express Breeze,
was emblazoned bright white like a masthead across the barn red building
façade.  Hopping into Mr. Conway’s old Buick that day, I asked him about the
paper’s unusual name.

 

“The family had two rags,” he said. “The Express was a weekly and The Breeze
came out once a month. When we were bought out by the Freedom Newspaper
chain, they were merged.” 

 

At that time, many family-owned papers were being taken over by syndicates,
but 

Express/Breeze? I wondered if they had thought about changing the name when
they had the chance, but I kept quiet. Still the new girl on the job, I
didn’t want to be rude. My fellow grads wouldn’t be too impressed, I
lamented. They had landed jobs on solid papers called “The herald” or “The
Tribune” or “The Times.” 

 

Prior to graduating that summer with a Journalism degree, I had mailed out
100 mimeographed copies of my inaugural resume, but I had received only
standard rejection letters. Ultimately, I landed my first job by word of
mouth; the editor of my college paper met Mr. Conway at a conference and
learned firsthand that the small town weekly was looking to hire a reporter.
I jumped on the job. 

 

Not calculating culture shock, I moved 3,000 miles from my high country
Colorado home to the rolling hills of western New York. Without considering,
I traded in a campus swelling with 11,000 radical bodies, most in their 20s,
for a little town of 7,000 sedate souls ranging in age from one day to one
hundred plus years. 

 

I thought I was worldly and ready for adulthood after sampling the freedom
of college life, but sex, drugs and rock and roll in between cramming and
churning out term papers couldn’t have prepared me for rural life in small
town America. I would soon learn that I wasn’t in Kansas anymore.

 

In Dansville, like Mayberry RFD on television, families were rooted,
extended, crossed, and co-mingled for generations. Everybody knew everyone;
they were all cousins or in-laws, or so it seemed to me. Mr. Conway’s
brother was the mayor, and their wives were sisters. Extended family members
– aunts, uncles, children, and their childrens’ children - worked at the
bank, owned the men’s clothing store, coached at the high school, sold real
estate, taught music, and cut hair.

 

As Mr. Conway steered his sedan out of town on the tree-lined road, I
recalled driving my purple boat-of-a-car into Dansville for the first time
the month before. Cresting a hill, I had glimpsed a picturesque village
cradled in brilliant fall color. I couldn’t have predicted that my move to
this scenic valley would  prove nearly fatal.

 

New in town, I felt invisible, although hidden eyes watched warily as I
drove around. Scouting for a place to live, I picked up a PennySaver and
scoured the classifieds for rentals. It was easy in the tiny town to locate
most addresses. Still, there were some apartments for rent on streets that I
couldn’t find. 

 

Turning a corner, I spied the quaint Town Hall and decided to stop in and
ask for a map of the area. Walking into the dimly lit lobby from the bright
outdoors, I heard someone say, “You’re the new reporter.”

 

It wasn’t a question, so I replied with one.

 

“Yes?”

 

“You’re looking for a place to live.”

 

Again, this shadowy man appeared to know me. So, I asked, “How do you know?”

 

“Sue is my sister.”

 

I stood, hands in the pockets of my khaki pants, still puzzled. 

 

He continued. “She works in the sales room at the paper. She said you should
call Betty Fox. She’s looking to rent the top part of her house on Franklin
Street.”

 

It was like I had been transported into an episode of The Twilight Zone. I
wasn’t comfortable with this strange man knowing my business. I was used to
coming and going without anyone caring or knowing my whereabouts. I had
deliberately moved far away from the prying eyes of my parents, and I had
envisioned anonymity in my new life. 

 

Light drifted into the lobby from an opening door, and the silhouette of a
holstered gun took shape. The man, I now realized, was a cop. 

 

He led me into an office, pointed to a village map taped to a countertop,
winked at me, and walked out.

 

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