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do was brush their hair out and go on their merryway. If I brushed mine out, I’d be guest starring at work as Bozo the Clown.
    Sighing, I grabbed a bottle of leave-in conditioner spray and attempted my best patching job. In the end, I resigned myself to putting my hair up in what I hoped looked like an artfully messy ponytail, versus one constructed out of desperation and broken dreams. Then I spackled my face with a small amount of foundation and applied some mascara and lip gloss. I wasn’t normally much of a makeup girl, but at News 9 all the on-air people walked around looking like models just off the runway. Which could be ego crushing to the rest of us mere mortals, to say the least.
    Of course, that won’t be a problem once I get the overnight writing job
, I reminded myself.
Hardly anyone will be there to see me at that godforsaken hour. And the ones that are? They’ll be too bleary-eyed to notice.
    If
I got the job, I corrected myself. After all, it wasn’t a done deal by any means. Especially since I had had to bail on the wedding early and never did get a chance to talk to Richard about it. But my immediate boss, the executive producer, Gary, had to know I was interested. He had to know how much I wanted to move up. And there was no one there more senior than I was. Meaning I was the obvious choice.
    The thought got my motor running and I stepped out of the bathroom to change into my best suit. Which was also, admittedly, my only suit. Normally I didn’t dress up too much—News 9 was pretty casual if you weren’t on air. But today could be a very special day.
    A thrill of anticipation wound up my spine as I slid my pencil skirt over my hips. A writing job. A real writing job. It would be a dream come true. Maybe not a glamorous dream—as Asher had so sweetly pointed out yesterday, the hours kind of sucked. And it wasn’t as if I was suddenly going to be some on-air superstar like Beth.
    But I’d be a journalist. An actual TV journalist. Contributing to an actual TV show. That alone was worth the crazy wake-up time. In fact, it was pretty much worth everything.
    And that didn’t even take into account the new salary I’dbe getting. My current position paid only a little over minimum wage and was only for thirty hours a week—hence the second job at the Holloway House. This job, if I really did get it, paid fifteen dollars an hour and could turn into full-time work someday. Which would mean amazing, hard-to-imagine things like 401(k)s and actual health benefits. Not to mention a chance to get my mother out of her current living situation—and away from people like David.
    Sure, I still had to get the job first. But I’d done everything possible to make it happen and that had to mean something, right? Over the past year I’d stayed late, I’d studied scripts written by other writers. I’d written my own and uploaded them to the server. Even left printouts on Gary’s desk to read. Sure, I had no idea if he actually ever did anything with them except use them as coasters for his coffee. But surely his eyes must have swept over one at some point, right? To see the words I’d written? To realize I was the best candidate for the job?
    It was time to find out for sure.
    *   *   *
    I got to work with ten minutes to spare—a record, even for me. The morning newscast had just finished and all the morning writers were gathering up their things, ready to head home. Some of them would go to a nearby deli and order steak-and-cheese subs or fish tacos—not caring that it was eight in the morning: For them it was dinnertime. I wasn’t sure how I was going to adjust to that kind of thing if I got the job, but I was willing to make it work.
    I was willing to make anything work for this.
    Today, I realized, they were cleaning up from a good-bye party for Heather. Which meant she was definitely leaving, I realized excitedly,