Gus and I move on to try several neighbours’ houses with no luck before an elderly woman agrees to speak with us. Her bewildered expression and unfiltered comments make it obvious this is her first time being interviewed by the media. When she spends five minutes unloading about how aggressive the accused woman is, and how she once witnessed her wrenching another child out of a car, I know I have everything I need.
Gus and I are two minutes from Honeysuckle when Colin calls. He wants us to head over to the John Hunter Hospital to cover some interviews Meghan lined up for today about their new cancer centre. My stomach plummets.
Not me. Please.
‘Is Meghan sick?’ I mumble with full knowledge that, in TV news, you do what you’re told, no questions asked.
‘Yvette’s got the flu, and Genevieve’s away, so Meghan’s reading tonight,’ Colin rattles off, like I’m wasting his time.
My jaw drops. ‘Meghan’s reading the news?’
‘Gotta go, Josie, too much to do,’ Colin barks before hanging up.
My chest sinks into my gut. NRN News needed a back-up newsreader for tonight, and they picked Meghan Mackay instead of me. Lola already told me she’s not interested in presenting and much prefers ‘being amongst it’, as she put it, but I’ve dropped several hints to Natasha that I would love to be considered.
I tell myself that Meghan was probably picked because she was sitting in the newsroom when this all went down, right in Natasha Harrington’s sight line.
I tell myself it’s because Meghan has worked there longer than I have.
Then I tell myself it’s because she’s better than me, and Christina is on crack for thinking I could ever find myself on the Sydney presenting desk.
‘Two stories in one day,’ Gus grumbles as he pulls into the hospital carpark. ‘That place runs on the fucking smell of an oily rag.’ I resist the urge to break it to him that, down in Sydney, we often cover three news stories at once, trying desperately not to let our frantic timetables cause us to make mistakes and report something inaccurate that gets the network sued.
Gus continues to whinge all the way to the gleaming new cancer centre on the hospital’s third floor.
The head of oncology has clearly been media trained, and the interview goes smoothly until she warns me that the patient I’m set to interview is ‘having a bit of a bad day’.
The cheese scroll I demolished on the way here rises in my throat as I trail the doctor into a single-bed room that feels cold enough to store ice inside. I’m introduced to Margie, a forty-five-year-old woman with terminal ovarian cancer who was once considered cured, until the cancer returned nine years later.
Everything in this room sends me right back to my aunt’s and my grandma’s dismal final days, but I find my focus and fire off questions like:What were the first symptoms you noticed? What’s a typical day like for you at the moment? What more do you think can be done to support women with ovarian cancer?But then my questions succumb to what’s really on my mind:Are you in a lot of pain? What was it like to be told the cancer was back after you thought you’d beaten it? How do you hope you will be remembered?
Someone gasps behind me at that last question, either Gus or the oncology doc—I can’t tell. The room has spun into a whirlpool of sallow skin, sunken eyes and a hairless scalp.
‘I’m not sure … I don’t know if I …’ poor Margie splutters before I retract my question and apologise. Stammering an excuse that we need to get back tothe station, I push Gus and his bulky camera out into the hallway, wanting to fall into a hole where I can punch myself in the face.
I’m not the sort of reporter to ask such an insensitive question, but I know it had nothing to do with the patient. It was brought on by the same runaway train of terror that turned me into a choking mess two months ago during my live TV cross on Pink Ribbon Day.
Tears sting my eyes, and I clench them away as I send Gus to the car, lying about needing a couple of minutes to make a phone call.
The moment he’s gone, I double over outside the emergency department entrance, gulping air.
‘Josie?’
My head snaps up, meeting Zac’s surprised face. I haven’t seen him in his short-sleeved navy paramedic uniform in years. Behind him, an ambulance sits quietly in one of the waiting bays.
‘Is everything OK?’ He darts towards me, his eyes sweeping up and down, scanning me for injuries.
‘I’m here for work.’ My heart has pounded away all my breath. ‘I just did some interviews about the new cancer centre.’
I should explain why he just caught me in a full-blown panic attack, but my lips won’t open. Zac used to be the one person I could say anything to with zero embarrassment, but not having heard a peep from him since he crashed over at my place last week has left a sting in my side.
‘What are you doing here?’ I ask instead.He’s a paramedic, for god’s sake.
‘We’re just waiting for our patient to get a bed. The usual story.’ He rolls his eyes.
‘I heard that your girlfriend’s reading the news tonight.’
It’s my antsy mood that made me throw that in—a secret little test of loyalty that I hope Zac passes. It’ll make me feel better.
