The Six O'clock News Slot

As we pulled alongside the house, Mom and Dad came out to meet us, and when we got Susan unbuckled, she ran to her Grandma's arms and demanded to go see the farm animals. Mom took her hand and led her around to the barn, but not before giving me a worried look.

I grabbed my bag, and Dad got Susan's, and we went inside to drop them off in my old bedroom. Afterwards, Dad led me into the kitchen and offered me a glass of fruit tea. It was already sweetened, and the taste reminded me of my childhood. Those days seemed very long ago.

"Okay, Tom, what's going on with you and Carol?" Dad asked bluntly. He'd never been one for a lot of chitchat, and I could see the concern in his eyes.

"Let's take a walk, Dad, and I'll tell you all about it."

I'd been dreading this conversation since I called them to ask if we could come and stay a week. They loved Carol and thought of her as the daughter they'd never had. I was pretty sure how this was going to hit them.

As we walked down the fence row, I began to tell him the whole sordid story. He kept his own counsel through most of it, but I could see the pain in his eyes whenever he looked at me. Several times he gasped at what I had to tell him. Finally I finished; there were tears in his eyes.

"I just can't believe that Carol would do such a thing. She was always so sweet to your mother and me, and such a good mother to Susan. How could she become so hard and selfish?"

He turned to look at me carefully. "You know I would never doubt you, Tom, but is there any way this could be some sort of misunderstanding, or maybe some kind of joke?"

I knew he was in denial and grasping at straws, but it still stung a little. Then I thought, "If I were in his shoes, I'd have to ask the same kind of questions. Hell, I'm still having a hard time believing it myself."

I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone. I queued up the video I'd shot at the green room and handed it to him. "Watch this, Dad."

When he took the phone, I reached over and touched the arrow to start the video playing. He half muttered to himself, "I can't really make out much of what's . . . Oh my Lord!" I could see that the picture had clarified as Carol's near nude body broke from Ted Stevenson's embrace and began to slide down his torso, reaching for his belt, unbuckling it and then unzipping his pants.

I took the phone back from him, and he stood there helplessly, his shoulders drooping and his face tight. Then he grabbed me and pulled me into a tight embrace. "Oh, son, I'm so sorry. It hurts so bad for me to see this, I can't even imagine how you must have felt."

We stood there for a few more minutes, then turned and began to make our way back to the house in silence. He kept his arm around my shoulder the whole way.

As we neared the house, I turned to him and asked, "Dad, can you tell Mom? I don't think I can do that."

He nodded solemnly. "I'll do it," he said.

Mom and Susan were in the kitchen having a snack when we returned. Mom looked at Dad, and when she saw his face, she was frightened. She started to speak, but Dad held up his hand to stop her. "Son," he said, "why don't you take Susan down to the pond so she can see all the baby ducks?"

When Susan heard that, she jumped up and began to tug on my arm. "Let's go see the ducks, Daddy. Can we go?" I nodded at Dad appreciatively and led Susan away toward the pond.

When we returned to the house, I could tell that Mom had been crying. She wiped her eyes with a dishtowel as we came in, then she walked over and gave me a big hug. "I love you, Tom. Your Dad and I will be here for you, no matter what."

"Thanks, Mom," I managed to croak out. Looking over her shoulder, I saw Dad and said "Thanks, Dad. That means so much to me."

We stood there like that for a long time, and the silence clearly was beginning to bother Susan, who couldn't understand what was wrong. So I turned to her and said, "Okay, Susan, let's go and unpack. Then we need to wash up and get ready for supper." That broke the spell, and she took my hand and began to skip back to our room with me in tow. I told myself that I would never lose my daughter, no matter what.

The next day was Sunday, and we all went to the old Baptist church that Mom and Dad had been attending for years. As they say in the country, I'd been a backslider for a long time, but it felt good to be back in church and hear the familiar words and sing some of the old hymns.

That evening, I had a call from Lou. He brought me up to date on all he'd been doing that weekend. As I listened, I realized that no matter what happened, I was lucky to have as good a friend as Lou, and that I would be in his debt for a long time. I tried to tell that to him, but I found it awkward to express my emotions, in that clumsy way that men have in such matters. He blew it off – "You'd do it for me," he said – but he understood what I was trying to say, and I knew it.

Then his tone changed. "Okay, Tom, it's all been for fun up to now. Are you ready to make it happen? Once we start, there's no turning back."

I didn't answer him right away, I really paused to think about what we were about to do. There was no guarantee of success. In fact, even if we succeeded, it still might end up badly for me. And if it all blew up in my face, things could get very ugly very quickly. I might well end up working on my parent's farm.

But then I thought about everything that had happened over the last two weeks. Through no fault of my own that I could see, Carol had humiliated me, had put me in a position I could not endure. Even if I chose to subjugate myself to her desires, there was no guarantee that the situation wouldn't become known – or repeated. If it did, what would Susan think of me when she grew old enough to understand? I didn't want to be that kind of model for a father to her.

No, I thought, Carol has backed me into a corner, and I have no option except to fight back. And by heaven, that's what I'm going to do.

"Lou," I said, "let's do it."

I think he must have understood what I'd been thinking just now, because he hadn't said a thing as I sat there pondering. But when I told him I was ready, he just said, "For what it's worth, Edy thinks you're doing the right thing." Somehow, that gave me a little encouragement.

He was all business now. "Do you have access to a computer?"

I laughed and said, "My folks may live on a farm, but they don't live in the 1800s."

"Okay then, I'll call you with information on where to find it tomorrow."

"Why don't you just email me the link?" I said. "I can easily log into my email from here."

"No," he said, "I don't want there to be a discoverable link to this. Just wait for my call tomorrow."

With that, he and I said our goodbyes, and I went off to make sure Susan was sleeping soundly in her new bed. Watching over her had become the most important job I had.

Lou called me mid-morning on Monday. "When you get a chance to have some private time on the computer, go to YouTube and do a search on WXYY," he told me. "You'll find it. After you've had a chance to view it, give me a call back and let me know what you think."

Mom and Dad had taken Susan out for a walk, so this was as good a time as any. I went to the website and did my search. There were a bunch of videos from the station, but my eye was drawn to one entitled "WXYY Co-anchor Carol Martin shares her personal philosophy on love and marriage."

When I clicked on it, the station's familiar theme music for the six o'clock news came out of the speakers, accompanied by a view of the standard opening set that WXYY used every week night. But as the camera zoomed in on Carol, her voice faded out and a voiceover began speaking. "Popular news co-anchor Carol Martin of WXYY recently gave an interview on her views about love and marriage."

The screen switched to another view of Carol, and I heard her saying, "Marriage is an institution that has existed as long as human society, but it is under siege today like never before."

I recognized the lines immediately: they were the opening on a soft news series that WXYY had run on the rising divorce rate around the country. But instead of continuing the series, which had actually aired some months ago, the voiceover returned. "And what are your views on the sanctity of marriage, Carol?" Suddenly, the scene shifted to our den, with Carol standing there and speaking, "Wedding vows were written for a different time and place. Nobody believes all that crap any more."

The scene froze and the voiceover returned. "And what about fidelity and constancy to your husband – how do you feel about that, Carol?"

Carol's onscreen image began to speak again. "If I want to go off and (beep) Ted Stevenson, I'm going to do it. This is something I want to do." A still picture of Ted Stevenson flashed on the screen, ensuring that the viewer would have no doubt about whom Carol was speaking.

The unseen announcer returned. "What about the views of the community? Do you think the majority of people in Birmingham who watch your news program would agree with you?"

Again, Carol began to speak. "I don't give a good (beep) what my fans think. They're nothing but a bunch of boobs and country bumpkins!"

The announcer smoothly filled in the sudden silence. "That's certainly a controversial viewpoint, Carol. Aren't you concerned about how that might affect public opinion?"

Carol's onscreen image quickly supplied the answer. "Listen, in six months to a year I'll leave this hick town and land a job in a real city where they don't roll the streets up at night. In the meantime, what the people here think means nothing to me."

Without a trace of irony or judgment, the unseen voice continued, "So you're set on pursuing a sexual relationship with your co-anchor, Ted Stevenson?"

Carol's answer was clear: "I've already told you, I'm going to go off and have my little fling with Ted Stevenson, and there's nothing you can do about it." But this time, instead of the scene of Carol talking to me in our den, her voice ran over the video I had captured on my phone in the green room. And, just as my Dad had experienced, the scene went from two figures intertwined in darkness to a clear view of a barely clad Carol sinking to her knees and beginning to undress the unmistakable figure of Ted Stevenson.

The scene froze on the erotic tableaux, and the voiceover returned for the last time. "Now the only question left on Birmingham viewers' minds is, 'Where are Carol and Ted this week?"

Then the WXYY news sign-off theme came up, and the view of the newsdesk with empty chairs filled the screen, and the video faded out.

I sat back in my chair, filled with an odd mix of triumph and sorrow. I grabbed my cellphone and called Lou.

He obviously recognized my number because he answered the phone by saying "Well, what did you think?"

"Oh my gosh, Lou, you're a genius. This is going to be brutal. That video will cut her career open like a carving knife on a Thanksgiving turkey."

"Pretty good, hunh? I have to admit, I'm proud of it," he said happily.

I began to feel a few pangs of guilt as I thought back over what I'd just seen. "Do you think we were too rough on her?"

"Listen," he said fiercely, "did she or did she not say every one of those things to your face?"

"Yes," I replied, "but . . ."

"No buts," he cut in. "She's changed into some kind of egotistical monster, and we have to expose that to the rest of the world."

Then his tone changed. "Listen, Tom, you're a nice guy at heart. I think a lot of times you'd rather suffer yourself than make someone else suffer. But if you don't do this, it's not you that's going to suffer, it's Susan. She's going to grow up with Carol as her role model. You don't want that, do you?"

I swallowed hard. "You're right, Lou. There really isn't any choice here. Thanks for helping to keep my head straight."

"Now," I said, "what do we do next? Do we send out mass emails with a link to the video, or what?"

"The beauty of a virus is that you don't have to do anything special for it to spread. Once there's a source of contagion, the flu virus spreads without any help until pretty soon there's an epidemic. This video is our source of contagion. I may drop a hint to a couple of people who love to gossip, but from there on it's going to spread on its own. You just have to be patient."

"Okay, Lou, you're the expert on this kind of thing. Just keep me posted."

For the next few days, Susan and I had a great time visiting with Mom and Dad. Susan had been to the farm before, but only for a day or two at a time. Now, with a whole week at our disposal, Dad and I wanted to give her a real look at how a farm works, and Susan began to learn where our food comes from. At the same time, Mom took Susan into the kitchen and introduced her to cooking. Our meals at home were more of the "open the package and heat the contents" than real cooking. Mom cooked almost everything from scratch, and Susan loved standing on a stool beside her, helping add ingredients and stirring them in the big bowls. All in all, it was a wonderful week for Susan to be exposed to many things that she would not have experienced in our urban life.

In the meantime, Lou called every day to keep me apprised of the snowball that was starting to roll down the mountain directly at Susan. On Tuesday, he actually chortled when he told me that Edy had heard about the video from a woman she worked with. On Wednesday, the video was the talk of the table at the weekly Kiwanis meeting Lou attended. He swore that he had not been the one to bring it up.

In Thursday morning's paper, the local media columnist had a few brief lines referring to the video in vague terms in her column. She wound up with the following: "And the question that has all of Birmingham buzzing this week is, 'Where are Carol and Ted?'"

When he called me on Thursday afternoon, Lou couldn't keep the glee out of his voice. "I talked to our guy in the Media Department who deals with WXYY. He tells me the whole station is in a panic. They're starting to get calls from other news outlets trying to get interviews with Carol and Ted about the video, and the WXYY people don't know what to do. Apparently, Don Sanchez also took off a few days this week, and nobody knows where he is or how to reach him."

On Friday, Lou steered me toward a write-up in Gawker.com, the media blog. It reported on the furor in Birmingham surrounding the two WXYY news anchors, and gave the link to the YouTube video. The article ended with the prediction that heads might roll. That morning, I called my attorney and told him to go ahead with the divorce filing. I also made special arrangements with him to have Carol served on Saturday at the Gulf Shores retreat where she and Ted were enjoying themselves. It would cost me extra, but I figured it would be worth it. My hunch was more a bet on a sure thing because I knew what Lou's next step was.

I also called Missy to let her know that I was filing for divorce and would have Carol served on Saturday. I asked her if she wanted to have Ted served at the same time. "No," she said calmly, "I plan to do that myself whenever he finally comes home." I wished her luck.

The other local tv stations in Birmingham had been insanely jealous of the success of WXYY. They picked up on the gossip early in the week, and smelled blood in the water when they checked out the video on line. Their only problem was how to play the story. Lou gave them the answer. He tipped off a news producer at the second-ranked station that I was filing for divorce. That tidbit represented an actual news event they could run on its own merits, without having to resort to having to report what was essentially gossip.

Then my attorney upped the ante. When a reporter for the station called to confirm the filing, the attorney let her know that the papers were going to be served on Saturday, and he managed to reveal the location where that was going to take place. Suddenly, the hounds were in full cry.

The news director decided that the story was too juicy to ignore, and they decided to go all out. The station contacted the process server charged with serving Carol, and they agreed to coordinate their activities. Once that was locked down, the station manager authorized sending a video crew and their lead reporter down to Gulf Shores on Saturday.

Lou called me Saturday morning with more news. Apparently, Don Sanchez had finally been reached; he had cut his vacation short and was trying to make arrangements to get back to Birmingham as quickly as possible. Lou's contact at WXYY told him that everyone at the station was terror-stricken; no one knew what would happen.

Lou also told me to be sure to watch the evening news on the competitor's station. "I think you'll find it interesting," he said, with wry understatement.

The thing about Saturday is that it's usually a slow news day, which means the tv stations are often grasping at straws for content. I guess that was the case that Saturday, because the Carol and Ted news was the lead story.

The rival anchor man, a somewhat oily type, came on the air with a photo of Carol and Ted behind him. It was a shot of the billboard I'd seen out of my office window a week ago. "All this week, the question on the minds of many people in Birmingham has been, 'Where are Carol Martin and Ted Stevenson of WXYY?' Today, in an exclusive story, we managed to find them in Gulf Shores, where they've been hiding all week."

The scene shifted to footage of the station's lead reporter, Hilda O'Reilly, an abrasive red-headed woman with a strident voice, striding across the shore toward a couple sunbathing on the sand. Of course, it was Carol and Ted. Neither of them heard the reporter, camera man and mike operator until Hilda reached the two of them and began asking in a loud voice, "Carol Martin, Ted Stevenson, what do you have to say about your relationship and the stories that are circulating back in Birmingham?"

Carol gave a little shriek of surprise and turned over to see who was speaking to her. When she did so, it became clear to viewing public that she'd been sunbathing topless. Seeing the small crowd and the video camera, she shrieked again and hastily covered her breasts, which had, of course, been blurred on the tv screen to meet FCC standards. She turned away to pick up the bra to her bikini, and as she bent down to put it on, she revealed that her bikini bottom was a thong.

The camera then turned to Ted Stevenson, who was desperately trying to retrieve his beach towel to cover the tiny Speedo swimsuit he was wearing.

Once she had regained a modicum of modesty, Carol turned angrily toward the red-headed reporter and yelled, "Hilda, what the (beep) are you doing here? Why are you intruding on us like this?"

Hilda wasn't fazed in the slightest. "What do you have to say about the video that's all over the internet?"

"What video?" Carol asked in confusion.

"The one where you told all the hicks in Birmingham you were coming here to have an affair with Ted Stevenson," Hilda responded coolly.

Carol began to sputter, and Ted tried to step in and draw attention away from her. But just at that moment, the unlikely appearance of a man wearing a suit and tie on the beach caused everyone to pause. Walking up to Carol, he asked in a loud voice, "Are you Carol Bailey Martin?"

Reflexively, Carol answered "Yes."

"Then Ms, Martin" he said, handing her an envelope, "you have been served. Your husband has also instructed me to inform you that the locks on your house have been changed, and you are no longer welcome there."

With that, he calmly turned on his heel and strode off the beach.

For a moment, Carol was dumbfounded; then, anger flashed in her eyes and she screamed, "That son of a (bleep)!"