Chapter Seven
The Assignment
Cliff got off the elevator on the fifth floor, the Globe’s hustling, always bustling newsroom. There was a huge maze of dull, carpet-paneled cubicles designated for reporters, columnists, sports, political and other writers. Copy and line editors, researchers, photographers, layout artists, the editorial team, the archive room and Tink’s office were all behind glass-enclosed sections on the newsroom’s floor.
Before starting his computer, he noticed a square, yellow Post-It pasted to its screen. It was from Tink:
“Come see me as soon as you arrive.”
Red-eyed and drained, Cliff trudged toward his bosses’ office. He knocked before entering. “You wanted to see me, Tink?”
“Clifford, how ya feeling?” Tink said measuring Cliff with his youthful, sea-blue eyes.
“Fine, fine, Cliff responded guiltily. “Thank you for looking after me last night. Man, I don’t know what it was…the food, the liquor…maybe I just haven’t been getting enough sleep. But whatever it was, I’m fine now.”
Tink seemed to survey Cliff from head-to-midsection for several uncomfortable seconds: “Cliff, don’t bullshit a bullshitter,” he said motioning for Cliff to take the seat in front of his desk.
***
The memory of their first conversation blipped in Cliff ’s mind as he waited for Tink to address his drug usage and job performance.
“Am I about to get fired?” he wondered.
“Something’s not right with you, my boy.”
Normally, Cliff would have chewed the head off any white muthafucka who dared call him “boy.” But, coming out of Tink’s mouth, it seemed warm, fatherly even.
***
Tink slapped the morning edition of the Globe on his desk. Those eyes of his were like lasers through Cliff ’s soul.
“Have you read today’s lead story?” Tink asked.
Cliff had not. Yeah, he had glanced at the headline about a crack-addicted woman who allegedly suffocated a baby but, as far as he was concerned, it was just another cumulative indictment, another validation of a centuries-old myth of black savagery. Sure, whites routinely committed horrid acts against children, but the multiple representations of positive “whiteness” couldn’t, wouldn’t impact the collective image of their almighty race. But stories like this one could easily erase decades of so-called “progress” by simple reminding whites that blacks have always been and will always be nothing more than soul-less animals.
***
“This is a life raft, son.”
Tink’s trenchant voice snapped him out of his moment of revulsion. “I’ll be goddamned if I’m going to leave this place with my prodigy in tatters.”
Cliff opened his mouth to protest but Tink raised a flat palm to silence him.
“This is your beat for the foreseeable future, son. You are going to take our readers into this woman’s dark, disastrous life. You are going to give us every sordid, ugly, depressing detail of this tragedy up until she’s tried, exonerated, convicted, incarcerated, put to death or sent to an insane asylum. You are going to resurrect those skills I saw when I first hired you."
“Accept this assignment or pack your things and get out of here.”
Tink continued with sad eyes and furrowed gray brows:
“The choice is yours.”
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