Page 10 of Anxious Hearts
Chapter Ten
‘So, what’s so special about you?’ the journalist asked.
Kelly was taken aback. She’d only met him moments earlier, when he’d belligerently introduced himself as Evan Banbury, collapsed into the chair opposite her at the hospital cafe and taken out a small notepad. No other preamble. Just straight into it.
Evan Banbury was old and fat and wore an ill-fitting brown suit. He scowled at her over reading glasses as though she were a walking colonoscopy.
After Kelly’s initial shock passed, her stomach muscles tightened.
Nobody got away with looking at her like that.
‘Listen, mate. I don’t want to do this article any more than you do.
So why don’t you drop the whole superior journalist routine so we can get the article written and get the fuck out of each other’s lives? ’
Evan slowly took off his reading glasses and placed them on the table. He raised his chin, folded his arms across his chest and looked down at her like he was appraising a rare museum piece.
Kelly held his stare.
‘This story might just end up being more interesting than I expected,’ he said.
Kelly scoffed. ‘What did you expect?’
‘Privileged young white girl who thinks she’s Superwoman because she saves kids’ lives.’
‘Fuck you. I do save kids’ lives.’
Evan laughed. He placed his glasses back on his bulbous nose, picked up his notepad and put pen to paper. When he asked her the question again, it was with a broad smile.
‘So, what’s so special about you?’
Kelly smiled back. She liked this cranky old bastard. ‘I’m fucking Superwoman.’
They talked for an hour.
Evan asked about her background, education, motivation; everything Kelly had expected.
But he also wanted to know about her personal life, her family and her plans for the future.
She was guarded with her responses, but he was like one of those personality tests: if he didn’t get what he wanted, he circled back to ask the same questions in slightly different ways. He was a lot smarter than he looked.
The interview ended as abruptly as it began, when Evan closed his notebook mid-way through one of Kelly’s responses, put his glasses away and hefted himself out of the chair.
‘What are you doing?’ she said.
‘It’s eleven o’clock. I’m covering some mind-numbing fundraising lunch at midday and it’s on the other side of town. Hopefully, I’ll die in a car crash before I get there.’
Kelly narrowed her eyes. ‘Why do you do this job if you hate it so much?’
Evan pulled his pants higher around his waist, grunted and glared at her from sunken, black-ringed eyes. ‘Because I’m a failed novelist with an ex-wife and a crippling mortgage.’
Kelly watched him shuffle away. What a waste of a life.
But before she had time to think about it any further, there was a MET call over the loudspeakers. Kelly sprinted back to the emergency room, Evan Banbury all but forgotten.