There’s only one other person at the bar, a figure in a burgundy jacket hunched over a glass.
“Drinking your feelings?” I say as I slide onto the stool next to Russell, rearranging my skirt so I don’t flash him. The bar is all warm lighting and mahogany furniture. Cozy. Not lavish enough for me to feel too out of place, given I’m not in the habit of haunting hotel bars.
“Something like that.” He takes another sip of his drink before setting it down on a black napkin. “Nice of you to join me. I’m guessing you’re here to drink your feelings, too? Possibly for the same reason?”
“Unfortunately. What is that, by the way?”
“Whiskey sour,” he says, and I signal to the bartender and order one for myself.
“Cheers to feelings,” I say when it arrives, clinking my glass with his. He watches me as I down three-fourths of the glass at once. And—oh god. That was a mistake. It goes down like a bag of Sour Patch Kids. I’m grateful when the bartender places a glass of water on the counter next to it. “How much of a nightmare is work going to be on Monday?”
“Category seventy. At least.”
Russell’s collar is unbuttoned, his light brown hair a little mussed, nothing like the expertly combed way he looks on TV. It’s interesting, talking to someone in real life when you know their TV persona, too. Both people are them, but one version lets you see their blemishes, and the other doesn’t.
“That was the most aggressive game of white elephant I’ve ever played,” he says. “And then—well, you know.” He gestures toward the bar’s exit. The window. Seth’s Emmy. Any semblance of dignity KSEA had left.
“Ughhhhh.” I drop my head dramatically to the counter. “Let’s talk about something else.” There’s a silence, and suddenly I’m worried Russell and I don’t have “something else” to talk about. We’ve only ever talked at work, about work.
But then he asks, “You were flying solo tonight?” and I’ve never been so relieved to bring up my broken engagement.
I tip my drink to him. “That’s what happens when your fiancé dumps you on Halloween. While dressed as one of those flailing tube things they have at car dealerships.” I’d painted a couple cardboard boxes red to turn myself into a used Toyota Camry. We would have killed at his firm’s couples costume contest, had we managed to make it out of the apartment. When Russell stares at me, I say, “It’s okay. You can laugh. It’s almost funny.”
Even as I say it, there’s a tug at my heart that feels a little like longing. I don’t want to be thinking about Garrison—not now, not after tonight. I was so convinced we’d be spending the rest of our lives together: marriage, kids, a house in the suburbs, though I joked to Garrison a couple times that he’d have to drag me kicking and screaming out of the city.
When you spend so long imagining your life with someone, after they leave, you don’t just lament the loss of that person. You have to grieve every piece of your life they touched that they don’t anymore. Every image of your future that you planned together.
“I wasn’t going to laugh,” he says. “I’m so sorry to hear that.” He sounds genuinely sympathetic.
I shrug, staring down at the ice cubes in my drink. “It’s a good thing, because at least he didn’t have to witness this shit show.” I almost ask him the same question, but it’s clear he was flying solo, too. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be drinking at a hotel bar together.
“What happened to talking about something else?”
“There is nothing else!” I must say it too dramatically, punctuate it with a too-hard bang of my fist on the bar, because Russell’s eyes widen. “Do you know that Torrance hasn’t done an actual performance evaluation with me for the past three years? She’s my boss, and she doesn’t care about her employees getting better at their jobs.” I glance around the bar, worried about speaking about them this candidly, even after they were kicked out. “Most people probably want less attention from their bosses, not more. I realize that. But Torrance is the whole reason I wanted to work here. I grew up watching her, and I was so excited to get this job—to have a chance to learn from the best. And she completely ignores me. Sometimes I feel like if she were happier, if there weren’t all this drama at work . . . she’d be more available.
“Maybe one day I’d like to be in a top ten market or go national, but I won’t have a shot if I don’t have better training or mentorship. For now, I love this job and I want to be good at it. I want her to tell me I’m not fucking up my forecasts. Or even better, give me advice on how to improve. That’s it. Sure, I’d love for her to bring in a talent coach for us, and I’d love to be a guest on Halestorm or do some field reporting, but god, I’m not even on her radar. I’ve given up hope of any kind of promotion at this point. The most I ever get is a pat on the shoulder and ‘keep it up, Abrams.’？” My face has grown warm, and when I reach for my glass of water, I nearly knock it over.
Russell isn’t blinking, and I realize this is more than I’ve ever said to him at once. And . . . oh my god. It was too much. Way too much.
The alcohol is clearly already doing its job, mucking up my brain-to-mouth filter and letting out all this negativity. It’s the only explanation. This isn’t me. Not around anyone who isn’t my brother, at least. Every time Russell and I have bitched about our bosses, it’s accompanied with a well, what can you do? shrug. This was so far from the Ari Abrams I am on TV, and even further from my real self. I’m convinced he’ll signal for the check and disappear into an Uber, leaving me to continue drinking my feelings on my own.
“She’s not bad at her job,” I say, backtracking. “I still admire the hell out of her. She’s just . . .”
“Distracted,” Russell fills in. “Yeah. Seth too.”
“Things must be going okay for us if our worst problem is that our bosses aren’t paying attention to us.” I force a laugh, silently willing Russell to say more than three words. “Or—well, I don’t know Seth, but . . .”
Russell is quiet for a moment, staring out at the shelves of liquor behind the bar before swiveling his head back toward me, a new determination in his eyes. “When I was hired . . . it must have been pretty soon after they got divorced. I was in a meeting with him and Wilson, who didn’t want me on camera at first. Said it wouldn’t look good to have a sports reporter who was a fat guy. And since he’s the GM, I worried he might have the final say.”
I’ve never heard anyone speak so brazenly about their size like this, and I’m not entirely sure how to react. After a brief pause, I decide to go with honesty. “That’s really fucked up.”
“All throughout the interview process, Seth had been so excited to have me on board, and he didn’t say a thing. The worst meeting of my life. It wasn’t that I expected him to defend me, necessarily—I mean, he barely knew me. But I thought he’d at least say something. He kind of checked out after that, like he thought he’d made a mistake by hiring me. But when my ratings are great, because I’m good at my job, he’s been all over it. Happy to claim that for himself.” He doesn’t say any of this arrogantly—he’s stating a fact. Russell’s ratings are great. “The most frustrating part is that I’ve been here for four years, and I’m still covering college sports.”