He stood in the doorway to the newsroom and just looked at people working. Then he heard a giggle from the photo department, and he smiled.
“What are you doing here?” he asked Angie Wilson. “Didn’t you have morning shift Monday?”
“Yeah, and night shift tonight, and God knows what I’ll be doing tomorrow,” she groused. “We’re short-handed. What are you doing here?”
“Came in to check on something,” he said vaguely. “Heard you laugh.”
He grinned at her. “It’s an attention-grabbing laugh.”
“Well at least you didn’t call it a giggle,” she grumbled.
“Are you about ready to wrap it up?” he asked impulsively. “I’ll buy you a drink?”
“I thought you didn’t drink alcohol?” she said, but she started putting things away.
“Don’t. But you know what? Bars serve other things too,” he teased. “Do you know the Bohemian?”
She’d taken the bus into work, so they drove there together. Mac relaxed as they walked in. It was a Tuesday night, and the bar was quiet. Not even a live DJ. Mac liked subbing for the DJ on occasion, on a Friday or Saturday, when he could mix music, and create a mood that made people feel, and made them dance. But this was nice too. Some R&B, a table where they could get a drink and talk.
The waitress knew him. “Mountain Dew?” she asked.
“If you’ve got one,” he agreed.
She laughed. “We keep a six-pack for you, babe,” she said. “And when you drink them all? Someone runs to Safeway for another.”
He shook his head. “You know? I was at a bar in Marysville yesterday and they had Mountain Dew. The gun shop? It had a Pepsi fridge behind the counter, and it carried Mountain Dew. So why is it so odd to you here?”
“Hummm, let me see. Out in redneck country, they have Mountain Dew. Here in the sophisticated center of Seattle, we don’t. What does that tell you?” she teased.
She took Angie’s order for a Fremont Interurban. When did beers start having weird names like froufrou drinks, Mac wondered. He looked at the beer, and for the first time in a long time, he wanted one.
Wanted more than one was the problem, he admitted.
“So, what? You dump your girlfriend or something?” Angie asked.
“Now how do you know I have a girlfriend?” he asked, with a half-smile.
“There’s this thing called gossip,” she teased. “It’s what news people do. We gossip with our sources and call that reporting because we get paid to do it, and we gossip about each other, because... well, because that’s what we do.”
Mac laughed. He never gossiped at work. He didn’t even know what the gossip was or where the reporters and photogs hung out to gossip. He knew that about the cops. He knew all the cop bars. He knew the scuttlebutt around the various departments and agencies. He knew about the detective whose marriage was in trouble, the dispatcher who was cheating on her wife with an officer, the guy on horse patrol who was drinking too much.
He did not know that about his own colleagues. He considered that for a moment. “What else is the gossip saying?” he asked.
“You need to get plugged in,” Angie said. “Seriously. Because the gossip is that your boss is in danger of losing her job. And I don’t think you have a clue.”
“Janet?” he said. “She’s been a bit grim lately, but last fall was hard on her. And she still hasn’t started re-building her house yet.” And a lot else going on too. He hadn’t bugged her about it. Maybe he should have.
“Janet,” Angie said. “The knives are out. But I don’t want to talk about her. Tell me about this girlfriend. People say she’s gotten you to stop saying fuck.”
He laughed. “She did,” he admitted. “But I think we’re done.”
Angie was a good listener, and she coaxed the story out of him. “But not for the gossip chamber,” he warned her.
“So, you want a home, and she has a home, and so you thought you could marry her and have that home too,” Angie summarized. It sounded sarcastic, but her eyes were kind, and Mac had to admit it was a fair assessment.
“Pretty much,” he said. “Although I found her attractive, too, and I liked her and respected her brains. But....”
He shook his head.
She patted his shoulder. “But she wanted you to change who you are,” she said. “To become something you’re not. And that’s too high a price to pay, Mac. You can have a home without becoming the dream baby daddy of a Bible-thumping Christian.”
He smiled at her touch. “Time to take you home,” he said. “Because I’m in a mood, and I like you. And I really like that fuchsia streak in your hair. And if I don’t take you home now? I’ll invite myself in.”
She followed him out to the car, and gave him directions to the condo she shared with roommates in Belltown.
“Not the safest place to live,” he observed.
“Yes, Mr. Cop Reporter. You sound like my mom,” she said as she got ready to get out of the car. “When you decide you’ve truly broken up with your girlfriend and that you’d like to see more than the fuchsia streak, you know where to find me.”
She leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. He watched her until she was inside, before he drove off. He looked at the clock on his dashboard: 10:30 p.m.
What the hell, he thought, and he drove over to Janet’s rental apartment in Pioneer Square just blocks from the office. He buzzed to be let in. It took a while before she answered.
“It’s Mac,” he said, beginning to regret his impulse.
She didn’t ask him any questions, just buzzed open the main door. He took the elevator to the sixth floor. He’d been here to help her move in. They were close, but they didn’t socialize. Except for coffee. Her coffee.
“What’s going on?” she asked
