There were no segments being filmed that day, and Billy could handle anything else that came up, so Walter lingered in his dressing room just long enough to finish his script and send it to the printer before leaving. Headway on Mandy’s story wasn’t going to be made until Kevin had been playing his role for a few weeks, and everything else that was going was all such small change, that the junior reporters could have handled them on their own. But the universe had other ideas. That, or Nichola was psychic, which Walter was seriously starting to believe, because she barged into his dressing room seconds before he managed to slip out and escape.

“If you say the word ‘intern’ I’m busting through that wall to get out,” Walter threatened.

“I’d like to see that, actually,” Nichola said as she closed the door and stepped over to Walter’s desk to drop a stack of folders on top of it. “I won’t mention the I-word, only because I have other things to talk about.”

Walter wasn’t going to escape this, and he knew it. Rolling his eyes, he sat heavily on the sofa and dropped his feet onto the coffee table. “How come you never just come to visit anymore?”

“Because someone decided to make me his producer,” Nichola reminded him. “Which means when the network’s pissed off with you, they complain to me.”

Walter suddenly knew what this was about. He was sick of hearing about this as well.

“You’d think a network that’s been around for seventy years would know that everybody’s ratings are dropping right now,” he said. “They knew what they were getting when they signed us on. Did you tell them that? They’re giving us two hours tomorrow. How concerned can they be?”

Nichola was not even remotely moved by his comments. “Oh, it’s not just the ratings anymore. It’s your demo as well.”

This was not a conversation Walter wanted to be having. He threw his paws into the air in despair, and seriously thought about making a break for the door. Nichola was far enough away that she probably wouldn’t be able to catch him. But she could probably drive one of those two-inch heels into his ankle if she got close enough. It was best to not risk it.

“My fucking demo?” he said, incredulous. “We’re a goddamn news show. Nobody under 30 watches TV news. They get it from Twitter and Reddit. That’s why we have a social media department.”

“We don’t even have a showing in the eighteen to twenty-five,” Nichola said, apparently taking the network’s side on this stupid, pointless argument that was going to go on forever.

Sighing, Walter started checking his pockets and searching around the cushions of the sofa. “Where are they? I can’t find them,” he said. “I’ve lost all the fucks I ever had to give about this. Look at that; they’re gone.” He threw his empty paws at her.

Nichola sighed right along with him. “Walter,” she said tiredly. “Just, for three seconds, could you try not to be an absolute ass? It was cute when you were just some punk kid in the website room, but you wanted your own show, and this is what comes with it.”

“That’s why I brought you with me; so you could take care of this crap, so I don’t have to deal with it,” Walter said.

“I am taking care of it. And now I’m telling you, the executive producer and senior reporter, what needs to be done.” She turned back toward the desk and picked the stack of folders back up. For one glorious moment, Walter thought she was going to take them with her. Instead, Nichola crushed all of his hopes and dreams by dropping the whole thing quite literally in his lap. “And if I get one more phone call about interns, I am coming after you with a knife. A dull one. For bread.”

Leaving Walter with that image in mind, Nichola turned and walked out of the room. Walter took one look at the stack of applications and letters of recommendations he’d had dropped on him, and immediately dropped them all to the floor. He’d hoped everything would spill out and get so mixed up that going through them would be an impossible nightmare, but apparently after twelve years of working alongside one another, Nichola knew him too well, and had stapled everything together. Damn. Still not wanting to deal with it, Walter left the mess where it fell and made a break for the door before anybody else could corner him with another boring, pointless argument he didn’t want to have.

The day was lined up to be easy, but packed. Last minute ADR, a conference with some higher ups who still labored under the impression Walter was local news — and who eventually got told to go fuck themselves accordingly — a surprise meeting with a guest. She was someone for Kevin’s segment the following week, which meant she was nobody Walter cared about, so he got her out the studio as quickly as possible. Days like this were easy days, but long. Last-minute prep for the recording the day after, random changes, shifts in the schedule. Walter watched over his own segment from Good Morning Cascadia earlier that week, comparing it to what he had planned for Friday. The story had grown much, much bigger than expected, giving them more content than they could even fit into the two-hour special slot devoted to dangerous internet pranks going around with the youth. The Cascadia segment had allowed him to stir up enough discourse to get some extra promos running during prime time. Walter already knew it was going to be his best episode of the season. He also thought it might kill him. It was nearly 8pm by the time Walter finally got out of there, satisfied with how the show had shaped up.

Penny had already gone, along with the chipmunk who probably wouldn’t last another week the way she didn’t seem to approve of anything. In their place was the security guard who ran the place at night. Instead of watching the building, he was watching feral cat videos on Penny’s computer.