Shoot Read Free

U.S. Senator, Ron Hardstein, now renamed Senator Hard-On for his online monkey business involving dozens of women, his smart phone and his penis. My colleagues were at that moment stalking the honorable gentleman, trying to uncover the names of all the women he had had sex with. Everyone in the country was on the story and it all seemed very predictable. The only thing more boring to me than someone else’s sex life was politics.
    “You’ve got to be kidding, Mel.”
    “Why is the biggest story in town not good enough for you?”
    “Because I don’t care what Hardstein does with his equipment. His sex life is between him, his wife and the women. It’s no one else’s business because it had nothing to do with his job. It’s not a story.”
    Mel chuckled. “You’re a beginner in this business, Shepherd. I’m the judge of what is and what isn’t a story.”
    To me, his reasoning seemed circular, a self-licking ice-cream cone. If he was the guy who decided what stories went in the newspaper, then all of his choices became news—proving his news judgment was one hundred per cent correct. When I continued to disagree, he threatened me with legal action.
    “Okay,” I responded.
    We sat looking at each other for a while, until Mel thought better of his threat and took a different tack. “Would you at least be open to fugging suggestions?”
    “Fine. But I don’t have to follow them.”
    “You’ve only been working for newspapers for a month or two. You don’t know how the news biz works.” He started listing ideas for stories, topics for me to dig up scoops on, mostly involving sex and celebrities.
    “The next big story will find me,” I told him.
    “You’re really kissing me off. What are you freaking talking about?”
    “News happens,” I explained, already walking through the door. “You can’t go out and create it.”
    Mel was still laughing uproariously when I left his office, his belly bouncing like a beach ball of Jell-O against his desk.

3
    As soon as I hit the street, I took out my phone.
    “Is Mel an asshole?” I asked Siri.
    “There’s no need for profanity, Shepherd,” Siri chided me.
    Siri is a lady. I apologized. I asked her to FaceTime Jane. As I waited for the call to connect, I got that feeling again, the one that had kept me alive this far. Someone’s eyes were on me.
    Once the call connected I didn’t bother with preamble.
    “Mel Greenbaum called me in for a chat.”
    “What did he want?” Jane asked, her face concerned. She was wearing her pink Dr. Jane lab coat, her stethoscope around her neck, and looked like a blonde movie actress playing a veterinarian. I could see her kitchen in the background.
    “Well, he shook my hand, patted me on the back, told me about his family, asked about you and Skippy, and then told me to get back to work.”
    “Then what?”
    “I told him the reporter gig may not be for me. He freaked. He tried to convince me I was wrong. Then he threatened to sue me but backed off when I said let the games begin.”
    “So?”
    “So, we’re still friends, I’m working on my dog-poop scoop and keeping an eye out for the Next Big Thing.”
    “Which is what?” she asked.
    “I have no clue. I think he’ll pester me with suggestions. Listen, I think I’ll stop by and pick up Skippy for a walk.”
    I heard a familiar bark. Skippy had heard my voice.
    “What’s up?” Jane asked.
    “Nothing,” I lied.
    “You’re lying,” Jane observed.
    I should not have done this on FaceTime.
    “Only a little,” I admitted.
    “We agreed about this,” Jane pointed out. “No bull.”
    “Sorry. Someone is following me.”
    “Ginny Mac again?”
    “Not her. Someone else, I think.”
    “Who?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “Then how do you know they’re following you?”
    “I’m good at that.”
    “Maybe Ginny Mac has someone else following you?”
    “That’s possible. I’ll see you soon.”
    I hit the phone camera app and reversed the angle. I held it