Fake News

"Come in Kelly, it's your work station," I said dismissively, expecting the make-up artist to walk in. Instead, I was surprised to see Leticia, already made up and dressed for the broadcast, walk in alone. She smiled nervously and sat down in the chair next to me. I turned and looked at her. For the first time, I realized that the internet perverts were right about one thing, Leticia was an attractive woman. She was about my height, maybe a little taller. She had long, bouncy, black hair and large brown eyes. She had a delicate nose and a round face. Her lips were full and pink and they were offset brightly by the golden brown shade of her skin. She had large breasts, a thin but curvy built, and delicate legs. I was by no means attracted to her (or any woman for that matter), but I recognized that she was exceptionally pretty.

"Hi," she said nervously and I nodded back, "Have you looked at tonight's script?" she asked with no further pleasantries. I appreciated that.

"No," I said, honestly, "I have been meaning to get up and go look for a while now. Haven't made it up."

"They didn't change anything," Leticia said, "I mean they did. They changed it the way Gary said they would. It is...sexier. Subtle, but definitely there." I felt my face growing red and I clenched my fists.

"Goddamn it, are they trying to force me to quit or something, I said I wasn't going to do it!" As I spoke, I began to rise towards the door. But I felt something against my arm. I looked down and saw Leticia's arm on my forearm, holding me down gently. I returned to my seat, looking at her, "What?" I asked hotly. Leticia smiled wanly.

"I have been thinking about what Gary said since I left his office. I wanted to talk to you about it now, before the show."

"You should've come earlier, I need to talk to Gary now if I want this change in time..." I began.

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about," Leticia said, "I don't think that the script should be changed." My mouth dropped open and I pulled my arm out from under Leticia's hand. I didn't know this new woman very well, but she had always come across as extremely professional and dedicated. I was appalled by what I was hearing.

"You want to pretend that we are having a relationship to marginally increase the ad revenue of our parent company. Is that what you came in here to tell me?" I said, putting everything in the starkest possible terms, "You want us to be actors instead of journalists. Or whores?" Leticia's lips pursed and her eyes narrowed.

"I am a meteorologist. I am more of a professional in the technical sense than you are Brooke. Don't you dare talk to me like that. I take pride in the work I do. What I am suggesting has nothing to do with that," she spat back. I felt myself getting more heated. Where did she get off acting scandalized?

"So are you going to start telling people it will be sunny tomorrow, because that is what they want to hear? Who cares what the weather map says, we have to please our perverted audience. We have to lie to people get them to watch us, right?" I shot back. Leticia crossed her arms in front of her chest.

"Brooke, how're you transitioning out to the first commercial break today? How are you teasing?" she asked. I didn't know what she was getting at, but I knew the stories I was covering so well that I just blurted it out.

"The report on bug spray..." I started.

"No, what are saying at the commercial break, what's the transition?" she asked. I thought about it for a minute.

"I am going to say, 'Is there something under the sink that is making your dog sick? Stay tuned for a channel 10 exclusive report.'" I explained. I did that kind of transition three times a week. I could do it in my sleep.

"Is anything killing people's dogs?" she asked.

"It can..." I started, getting ready to explain the report. But Leticia cut me off.

"But is it?" she asked.

"No, but..."

"So we are lying to our audience," Leticia concluded, "We know that nothing is going to kill their dog, but we lie to them to keep them on the hook after the break." I shook my head.

"No, it isn't like that. This bug spray really is dangerous and..."

"Right!" Leticia said, "That is what I realized today after I left Gary's office..."

"I don't get it," I said, sitting back down in my chair next to Leticia. The heat went out of my quickly, now I was just curious. Leticia was leaning in towards me, her eyes lit up with intensity.

"We tell a little white lie to get them to watch because they need to know these things. There really is a danger, even if we have to exaggerate a little to get them to know it. That's what I am talking about here," Leticia explained. I shook my head. Those things were not the same. Right?

"We aren't exaggerating anything. We don't have any kind of relationship and even if we did, it wouldn't be pertinent to the news..."

"Brooke, when I took this job here as meteorologist, you were the first person I spoke to after I got hired. You walked up and introduced yourself. Do you remember what you said?" She asked. I shook my head. I couldn't recall. Even if I normally could, my brain was too scrambled by this day.

"You said," Leticia continued, "That Channel 10 does the absolute best news program in the Fairview market and that we didn't cut corners on anything that matters. And that if I wanted to work here, I needed to live up to that standard. Do you remember saying that?" As Leticia recounted my speech, it rushed back to me. I said something along those lines to anyone who started work at channel 10 news. I nodded my head. "And I watched old broadcasts and I've paid attention on all the ones since. And you're right. This is the best program in the city. We do the most thoughtful reporting and the most wide-ranging coverage. We are the best."

"I know that," I said, uncertainly.

"And no one fucking watches us," Leticia said, and it felt like she was twisting in the dagger. "Until now. Suddenly, people are watching. People who would never watch any local news are tuning in to see us."

"Yeah, to masturbate..." I said.

"Maybe. Maybe that is why they are tuning in. Because, like you said, they're perverts. But maybe they will get here and they will look at us and they will get bored with their lust. But they will stay because they will finally see what we already know: we do the best news broadcast. We lure them in with a sensational claim (an unstated claim) that the anchor and the weathergirl are an item. But they stay because they learn something. And they want to learn more," Leticia grew quiet as I dropped my head into my hands. Despite myself, I realized that what Leticia was saying made some sense. I mean, nothing that I had done to this point had worked. Now, accidentally, I was reaching more people. Wasn't it foolish to throw that away? And even if the means were a little unsavory, the end was pure: to inform the public. And it wasn't like I had to do anything truly immoral...I was just hinting at something that wasn't there.

I hadn't resolve all the issues in my mind when Leticia rose from the chair next to me. She patted my arm again and then began to walk towards the door. "You don't have to decide what you want to do right now. I mean you can read the script tonight and quit or throw a fit tomorrow if you want. But I am convinced that, all things considered., this is the only thing to do. I think you'll realize the same thing." And she walked out the door.

That night, I read the news in a monotone. I didn't even hear my own voice. I was just thinking about all this new information that I could barely process. I still felt nothing but distaste for what Gary and Leticia were suggesting. It was seedy, dishonest, and vulgar. But I had to admit that Leticia made some pretty compelling points. And didn't I want to have good ratings? Was that really so evil, to want some evidence that the work that I did was appreciated? I'd worked for so long and sacrificed so much for this, I deserved it. The more I thought of it, the more I realized that both choices seemed wrong and there didn't really appear to be a third option. Whatever I did, I'd be letting myself down in some way.

When I got to work the next day, I didn't even know what I'd decided. I just found myself walking through the hallways and between desks. I made my way to Leticia's office. I was going to give her my decision first. She'd been direct with me, and I owed her as much. Even if I didn't know what that decision was. And so, I burst into her office without knocking (making her choke on her coffee), and just let the words pour out of my mouth.

"Okay," I said finally, "I'm in." And I don't know who was more surprised.

* * * * *

At first it wasn't even really anything. I mean, I hadn't even noticed anything that first night, when I read the news without thinking. Even after that, when I was on the lookout it, it really wasn't that bad. One night, when she threw back to me following a weather report, I asked if she'd gotten a haircut and complimented her. One Friday, I asked what she'd be doing for the weekend and, when she responded, I said something along the lines of "that sounds fun! Maybe I will check that out!" and she responded "Well, you're always welcome." I mean it wasn't really anything at all. It was the kind of mindless banter that they always used to fill in time. Despite my fears, it rapidly became clear that I wasn't compromising my integrity. At least, not any more than I had been before with my other "teases."

The only way you could read something into my innocent conversations with Leticia is if you were looking for clues and hints and were predisposed to reading those hints in a certain way. And, of course, that is exactly what our most ardent fans were doing. Mike kept a close watch on social media, checking to see what things worked and what didn't. Then he would integrate his findings in the next day's script. If someone came up with a really outlandish theory, Mike would throw something in that would sort of hint that it was true. Mike said our fan club was growing bigger and more excited every day. I didn't bother to keep track of it, I never looked online. I had no interest in getting into the lurid fantasies of my viewers. I got all the confirmation regarding our little plan from the ratings reports. It seemed like every overnight report showed an uptick in the total viewership. With each comprehensive report, we saw greater and greater gains in overall viewership and even greater gains in the key 18-49 male demographic. In such a small market, it didn't take a big shift in absolute numbers to make a seismic change, but it felt crazy. Within two months, we were tied for second place in local news and in first place with our key demo. First place undersells it. We owned that group.

I have to admit, the success of our little scheme was disorienting. I knew that the reason more viewers were turning in was because of the prurient interest in my personal life. But, at the same time, I also knew that I really was reaching more people. It felt good. It felt empowering. Leticia was right, after a little bit of time, I didn't even really think of it as a lie or a seedy tease, I thought of it as a good marketing campaign to ensure that people got their news.

I guess that was why when Mike told me, about four months in, that internet posters were beginning to doubt their fantasy, that I felt a little pang of nerves. He said that many commenters had begun to say that they no longer believed that the romantic rumors were true and were suggesting that they wouldn't be watching any more boring news. Mike's concerns were corroborated when we found that, for the first time in a long time, our ratings had stopped rising. We had flat-lined at a new, higher level.

Now that I had tasted just a little bit of success, I didn't want to lose it. This was working. But like a drug, higher doses would be needed to get the same result. That went for my fans (who needed more to be convinced of a relationship) and me (I was willing to accept more self-exploitation than I would have been before). I told Mike and Leticia that we needed to ramp things up a little. They both immediately agreed.

I should stress that there was certainly nothing overtly lewd that was added, but things got a little bolder. Sometimes, we would conspire to have Leticia come over to the main news desk during weather reports and I would laugh loudly at her jokes, play with my hair slightly, or teasingly swat at her arm. Sometimes I would subtly imply that I knew the layout of Leticia's home or she would refer to my parents or siblings as though she knew them. We both dressed a little more revealingly (cleavage, no sleeves, shorter skirts) and this seemed to imbue even our more innocent interactions with a more sexual vibe.

As the ratings began to climb again, everyone at the station realized that we'd hit on the key to success. We were within striking distance of first place in our time slot for local broadcast news. We had to do what it took to get there. We'd come out timidly to start with, and that had eventually worn thin. The only thing to do was to keep moving steadily in the same direction, to keep giving our viewers what they wanted so that they would come back for more. And tell their friends.

It was that instinct, that unstated desire to push things farther and farther for ratings that actually led me to ask Leticia out on a date, live and on air. It wasn't really a plan. We were just talking near the end of the broadcast and Leticia asked me what my plans were for the evening. I said I needed to a little shopping at the local mall. And, in the same breath, I invited her to come along. Leticia had immediately accepted. I certainly didn't say that it was a date. And a "normal" viewer never would have seen it that way. But I knew as the lights dimmed during the broadcast, that our new fans would be overjoyed.

So Leticia and I went to the mall together. In the end, it was just two young women, out and about in town, getting some chores done. We stopped into a few stores, we bought some pretzels, we had a nice conversation. I'd never spoken to Leticia outside of work, but found that we actually had a lot in common. We shopped at the same store, were on the same diet, and had the same aspirations for the success of our studio. We had fun.

Initially, I had just thought of this as a sort of one-off situation. I'd asked her out on a date, that would work, and we'd move on to the next thing. But when I got to work the next day, Mike was ecstatic. He said that our old subreddit group was blowing up. There were actually pictures of me and Leticia walking into a Victoria's Secret (I'd gotten one of the ubiquitous coupons in the mail). I didn't even have time to feel scared or violated by the fact that someone in the mall had been stalking me. I'd hit onto something huge.

After that, Leticia and I often made plans to be together, always discussing them on air. At least once a week, we'd make plans to do something after work or on the weekend. We went to parks, museums, sporting events, and restaurants. We always made sure that it was a place we could easily be seen and there were always fans there, ready to catch a glimpse.

I guess maybe I should've felt weird about my "fake" dates and the stalkers dedicated to following them. This was far from the subtle comments I'd agreed to when the whole plan had first been hatched. But, it was like slipping into a steaming hot bath. Your toes tingle at first, but by the time your shoulders are under, you barely even notice. After a while, I didn't even really think of it as part of our ratings plan. At least, not entirely. I'd been so focused on my career for so long that it was actually nice to have a reason to go out and do the sorts of fun things I didn't think I had time for. I'd been dying to go to a AA baseball game for years, but never did it until I was with Leticia. In fact, Leticia was a big part of the reason I didn't feel self-conscious about my "dates." She was fun. We would talk about work, we'd talk about our lives (I found that she was actually a fascinating girl) and we got to know one another. It got to be that I was making plans on air with Leticia, in part, because I really wanted to hang out with her. And if I occasionally held her hand in public or put my head on her shoulder while we sat in a movie theater, well it wasn't like that was unpleasant. It was kind of nice. Being close to someone whose company I enjoyed.

That might make it sound a little too...clean. It wasn't like one day I stopped thinking about Leticia being my co-worker and co-conspirator and saw her as something else. It all sort of bled together, I was pretending I was close to Leticia until, all of the sudden, I was. And while our relationship...I guess you can call it that, while it developed slowly and under the cover of our ruse, I can still vividly remember the day when I realized that there was something real there.

It was a Friday, the last evening broadcast of the week. Shortly before credits, Leticia and I made a plan to go out to the state park on Saturday morning to kayak. I was actually looking forward to it. I exercised often, but always towards the goal of looking good for television. I was excited about the idea of going out and being active just for the fun of it. Plus, Leticia had never gone kayaking before, and I figure that it would be good for a laugh.

But on Saturday morning, I'd awakened at six to find that my sinuses felt like they were about to explode. I checked my phone and the tree pollen levels were off the chart. My eyeballs ached and my throat felt like it was on fire. I'd always been allergic and Fairview was in a particularly bad part of the country for someone with pollen allergies. The sinus pressure was so intense that I actually felt nauseated.

"Oh God," I moaned to myself, slamming my eyes back closed and laying down heavily on the bed. I didn't even know how I was going to pull myself over to the bathroom to take some loradatine (too late) and some aspirin. There was no way I could go back to sleep in this pain. I groaned again as I felt my phone vibrate on the night table next to me.

With my eyes still closed, I threw my hand out wildly, searching for the phone. I knocked a pen or pencil onto the floor, but managed to grab my phone. I pulled it over to my face and whined to myself as the bright light pierced my eye lids. I opened my eyes and bit my lip against the pain. There was a text. From Leticia.

"Hey Brooke, overslept my alarm. It is a Saturday, you know. I will be there. Twenty minutes late. Sorry," she wrote. Damn, the kayaking. I had really been looking forward to it. But there was absolutely no way now.

I quickly texted back, 'Hey. I have a huge sinus headache. I can't leave the house. Rain check." I wanted to write more but my stomach was slipping. I quickly put down the phone and put the pillow over my head.

I lay in my bed for a long time. I didn't move. I didn't open my eyes. I didn't even breathe too deeply. I usually got a headache like this once or twice a year. I knew there really wasn't anything to do but ride it out. But that was easier said than done. Every minute just sort of dripped by. After half an hour, I felt like I'd been throbbing there on the bed for two days.

Something had to give. I was just trying to give myself a pep talk into sitting up in the bed and going to the medicine cabinet to get some pills when I heard it. A voice, "Brooke?" the voice said very softly. I guess if I was feeling better, I would've jumped out of my skin. Someone was in my house. But instead, I just pulled the pillow off of my face. I was surprised to find that my room was dark. Someone had pulled the blinds and even the curtains in my room. My eyes, not strained by the light anymore, scanned the room. Standing at the foot of my bed, was the weathergirl