Private Scandals

temple. “I thought we had another ten days.”
    “Tell that to Big Ed. Breathe, Fran, don’t forget to breathe.”
    “Look, I won’t hold you up. Just tell me if she’s okay.”
    “She just finished half a pizza—that’s why she didn’t tell me she was in labor. She already contacted Bach. Looks like you’re going to be preempted tomorrow. No, damn it, you’re not going to talk to her, Fran, you’re going to breathe.”
    “I’ll be there as soon as I can. Tell her . . . Oh, Jesus, just tell her I’ll be there.”
    “I’m counting on it. Hey, we’re going to have a baby! See you.”
    With the line buzzing in her ear, Deanna rested her brow against the wall. “What a day.”
    “Finn Riley reported the air strike.”
    “What?” Alert again, she spun around to Jeff. “Finn? He’s all right, then?”
    “He was on the line with the studio when it hit. He got about five seconds of pictures across before they lost the feed.”
    “So we don’t know,” she said slowly.
    “Hey, he’s been through stuff like this before, right?” He put a hesitant arm around her shoulders as he led her out to their waiting car.
    “Yes, of course. Of course he has.”
    “And look at it this way. We’re getting out of here at least an hour early, because everybody wanted to get home and turn on the tube.”
    She nearly laughed. “You’re good for me, Jeff.”
    He beamed back at her. “Same goes.”
     
    It was six A . M . when Deanna finally unlocked the door to her apartment and staggered inside. She’d been up for a full twenty-four hours and was long past fatigue. But, she reminded herself, she’d fulfilled her professional obligations, and she’d seen her goddaughter born.
    Aubrey Deanna Myers, she mused, and smiled blearily as she walked to the bedroom. An eight-pound miracle with red hair. After watching that incredibly beautiful life slide into the world, it was hard to believe there was a war raging on the other side of the world.
    But as she tugged off her clothes, unspeakably grateful that her show was preempted that morning, she switched on the television and brought that war into her home.
    What time was it in Baghdad? she wondered, but her mind simply wouldn’t cope with the math. Wearily she sat on the edge of the bed in her underwear and tried to concentrate on the images and reports.
    “Be careful, damn you.”
    It was her last thought as she slid down over the bedspread and tumbled into sleep.
     
    Late during the second night of the Gulf War, Finn set up at a Saudi base. He was tired and hungry and longed for a bath. He could hear the roar of jets taking off from the airfield to make their way to Iraq. Other news teams, he knew, would be broadcasting reports.
    His mood was foul. As a result of the Pentagon’s restrictions on the press, he would have to wait his turn in thepool before he could travel to the front—and then he could go only where military officials instructed. For the first time since World War II, all reports would be subject to censorship.
    It was one of the few words Finn considered an obscenity.
    “Don’t you want to take time to shave that pretty face?”
    “Cram it, Curt. We’re on in ten.” He listened to the countdown in his earpiece. “In the predawn hours of day two of Desert Storm . . .” he began.
     
    On her couch in Chicago, Deanna leaned forward and studied Finn’s image on-screen. Tired, she thought. He looked terribly tired. But tough and ready. And alive.
    She toasted him with her diet soda as she ate the peanut butter sandwich she’d fixed for dinner.
    She wondered what he was thinking, what he was feeling, as he spoke of sorties and statistics or answered the scripted questions of the news anchor. The Arabian sky spread at his back, and occasionally he had to raise his voice over the sound of jet engines.
    “We’re glad that you’re safely out of Baghdad, Finn. And we’ll stay tuned for further reports.”
    “Thanks, Martin. For CBC, this is Finn Riley in Saudi Arabia.”
    “Good seeing you, Finn,” Deanna murmured, then sighed and rose to take her dishes into the kitchen. It wasn’t until she passed her answering machine that she noticed the rapid blink of the message light.
    “Oh, hell, how could I have forgotten?”
    Setting the dishes aside, she pushed Rewind. She’d slept a blissful six hours, then had rushed out again. A stop by the hospital, a few hours at the office, where chaos had reigned. That chaos, and the war