Page 3 of Breaking News

“Mostly just Mr. H. Or, according to last semester’s student survey, ‘a cringey millennial who needs to get laid so he’ll stop assigning so much homework.’”

I couldn’t control the burst of laughter erupting from my mouth. “Stop! Is that true?”

He gave a deadpan nod, his expression stoic besides the twinkle in his eyes. Running his hand through his tousled hair, he deadpanned, “I mean, I only memorized every word of that feedback because it cut so deep. I hastily assigned five additional discussion boards and cried myself to sleep.”

Suddenly, I was biting my bottom lip without even realizing it. There was just something about his casual, self-effacing humor that made me smile internally. Graham often spoke like he was leading an improv class or performing a dry stand-up routine, and he never stumbled over his delivery. It was part of the reason I loved having him around.

“You poor thing,” I said, shaking my head at him as I reached for my pen. Giving it a few clicks, I said, “Well, if you need a break from grading papers, consider wandering over to the Gardners’ for a drink.”

“Thanks, but something tells me Meghan and Xander don’t share your enthusiasm for my presence. Besides, I’ve got a long night of being ignored by mean teenagers ahead of me.” He took a few backwards steps away from the desk, saying, “Anyway. Have a good weekend, Jill.”

Damn it. He was going to have to stop it with the sexy self-deprecation. I had a boyfriend.

chapter two

Graham

Nothing I’d said in the last ten minutes had anything to do with the day’s lecture—or journalism, for that matter.

A nagging voice in the back of my head told me to get back to the mock article up on the screen, but we were too deep into a debate about whether hot dogs were sandwiches to turn back now.

We were supposed to be composing a news article about a small-town hot dog eating contest. How did it devolve into this?

“Wait, wait, wait. Hear me out on this,” I said, pacing the front of the room. I wiped the sweat from my forehead with the back of my Expo-marker-wielding hand. Pausing for effect, I made sure all twenty-two pairs of eyes in the room were on me before dropping this bomb: “None of you have even considered the fact that hot dogs more closely resembletacosthan sandwiches.”

This declaration had its intended effect, with half of the young adults in the room gasping in protest and the other half laughing at my absurdity. Michael, the kid in the back who thought I didn’t know he hid his vape pen in sleeve, declared, “You’re oncrack,” to which Nia replied, “No, I think he’s actually making sense for the first time!”

Truth be told, I enjoyed getting a rise out of them. Arguing over the taxonomy of a hot dog was more interesting than the inverted pyramid structure of informative storytelling. I just hoped the department chair wasn’t lurking in the hall outside the lecture room. Then again, it was late Friday afternoon, and she was probably gone for the day.

Remembering I had somewhere to be myself, I glanced at my watch and muttered, “Shit.” It was a forty-minute drive back to Woodvale, and I hated keeping Andrea waiting. “Listen, this has been fun, but I’ve got to head out before my ex-wife has my throat for being late.” A few students chuckled at the mention of an ex-wife, and I kept talking to prevent them from asking any personal questions. These kids loved to pry. Just last week, I accidentally let it slip that I was once arrested at a protest in my early twenties. In a matter of minutes, I was staring at my own mugshot on seven different phone screens.

And it was all we talked about for the rest of class.

“Does everyone feel like they have a clear understanding of today’s lesson?” Knowing nobody would raise their hand for clarification, I quickly rattled off the key points I’d been trying to teach that day and reminded them of their assignment. “And as always, you can reach out via email if you have any questions, guys.”

As they began to shuffle out of the room, I disconnected my laptop from the smart screen and gathered up my own things. Reese, with his bag slung over his shoulder, cleared his throat and stood beside my lectern. “Mr. H?”

With a subtle inhale, I braced myself for the conversation I knew was about to follow. “What’s up, Reese?” I asked, tossing the HDMI cord I’d used on the shelf below the lectern.

“I’m really struggling with this profile assignment,” he admitted, glancing over his shoulder at the students exiting the room. “I’m having some regrets with the person I chose to interview, but I feel like it’s too late to set something else up.”

This nineteen-year-old brought a new existential crisis to the podium every week. Last Friday, it was about whether journalism was even worth pursuing in the age of AI. The week before that, he had a full-on panic attack when he realized journalism involved making lots of phone calls—his biggest fear.

“You’ve got, what, a week?” I’d asked them to profile an entrepreneur in their community, someone they could meet in person and observe in their element. It was one of the bigger assignments of the semester, worth enough points to make or break a grade. “In the real world of journalism, you might have less than a day to prepare for something like that. Itcanbe done.”

“But I’ve already set up my interview with the chef.”

I knew this. He’d emailed me about this. For some reason, Reese treated his emails to me like a damn diary, detailing everything he was working on and requesting my feedback at every turn. I liked the kid, but he had even less confidence than I did at that age.

And that was saying something.

“And you’re second-guessing yourself about the chef because…?”

“He doesn’t seem like he wants to talk to me. He thought it was going to be published somewhere. When I said it was for a class, he just… I mean, he sighedreallyloud.”

I blinked a few times, wondering if he’d elaborate. If a loud sigh could have him so rattled, he wouldn’t last a day in the real world. I’d been hung up on, threatened, kicked out, and even swung at while working for theWoodvale Times. Journalism wasn’t for the thin-skinned or the overly sensitive—it chewedpeople up and spit them out if they weren’t tough enough to handle it.

I ran one hand along the stubble on my cheek, choosing my next words carefully. “You could offer to print it for him, so he’ll at least have something to show for it,” I suggested. “And just, you know, be courteous. Maybe buy a meal at his restaurant as a thank you.”

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