Weather Girl(80)

“Was that the one with Patrick Stewart as the poop emoji?”

“You know, he did what he could with it.” He glances down at the melting marshmallows in his hot chocolate. “I never had the time to decide whether I wanted kids. It just happened, and maybe it happened in a completely backward way, but . . . things are really good right now.”

“I’m so, so glad,” I say. “I used to worry whether everything with my mom would make me a bad parent. Around college, I started thinking it would be really great to have a family of my own someday. Obviously it would be different, and I’m sure it would be imperfect in its own way, but I want that. The imperfections. All of it.”

“The imperfections can be pretty damn great.”

We sip in silence for a few moments, until it occurs to me that we haven’t talked about Torrance or Seth once all day, and it’s a freeing thought. Maybe we found each other because of them, but what we have here—it’s all our own.

“I think part of the reason I was scared to give a hundred percent in relationships was that it meant I could potentially get to that place where I might start a family,” I say quietly. “I don’t even know what that would look like, if I’m being honest. But with you . . . I think I could get close.”

Whatever percentage of myself I was giving to those boyfriends, I realize now that wasn’t nearly enough.

Or maybe it’s that Russ is the first person who’s felt worth it.

“Come here,” he says, pulling me up against him. “I need you closer.” When I rest my head on his belly, Russell pats it and says, “Is this what they mean by a dad bod?”

“I don’t know,” I say. “Whatever it’s called—I like it. I like all of you.”

“I like all of you, too. Every version.” He brushes some of my hair out of the way, pressing a kiss to my temple. “I like you when you’re talking about sun in the forecast.” His mouth moves lower, lips fluttering over my eyelashes. “I like you when you’re gleefully telling everyone to expect about a hundred more days of rain.” A kiss at the corner of my mouth. “But I like the real version best. And I feel really fucking lucky that I get to see that Ari Abrams.”

When our hot chocolate gets cold, we can’t bring ourselves to care.





27




FORECAST:

The calm before the storm

“YOU TEND TO say ‘right now’ a lot,” the talent coach says. Matter-of-fact, not an admonishment.

On a monitor in the weather center, I watch myself deliver last Tuesday’s forecast. Right now you can see showers moving in this evening. And we’ll take a look at your seven-day forecast right now.

I haven’t had this kind of feedback since my college internship at one of KSEA’s rival stations. Melissa, the talent coach, is exactly right. Now that it’s been pointed out, it seems so obvious. But I’m not embarrassed—I’m learning.

“And you had a lot of slides too fast there.” Melissa points to the screen. “You could slow those down a bit more.”

“Absolutely, I can see that now. Thank you.”

Across the studio, Torrance is chatting with one of the cameramen. She catches my eye and gives me a wink, and I bite back a smile.

For the past couple weeks, I’ve floated. My body forgets to be tired when I wake up at two in the morning, and even when Russ is sleeping over or I’m at his place, he never complains about my early starts, though he drags me back into bed on more than one occasion. He’s always too warm and too attentive for me to decline.

We spend most nights together the weeks Elodie is at her mom’s, sometimes at my place and sometimes at his, though I’m partial to his fireplace. When he has Elodie, we eat gelato in the park and help her with her homework and make plans to see The Prom when it comes to Seattle in the summer. I take my antidepressants and never worry whether he’s watching me, never hiding.

Since the reorg, the station has been calmer than I could have hoped. Caroline Zielinski has been easy to work with, both understanding and decisive in all the ways a manager should be, always open to one-on-one meetings and eager to help me set professional goals. And as a mentor, Torrance is . . . well, she’s still Torrance.

But she’s also more available than she’s ever been. We have regular lunch meetings, and she spends more time telling me about her career trajectory, even teaming up with me on a big air pollution story we’ll debut on Halestorm once it’s ready. It’s a role she takes seriously, and I’m grateful for that. Even if sometimes I still have to sneak into her office to water her plants.

And I have a mentee of my own, a bright and eager junior from the University of Washington named Sophia who dreams of one day working for the National Weather Service.

Melissa and I go through more clips, and she pauses to replay a moment where I’m speaking too quickly and have to gasp for air. “It’s a weird one to have to remind people to do, but don’t forget to breathe,” she says with a smile.

And I’m really trying.



* * *



? ? ?

    ELODIE’S MUSICAL IS at the end of March, and she gives it her all, transforming into the wicked Queen of Hearts, complete with an evil cackle I didn’t know this sweet twelve-year-old was capable of. We wait for her in the middle school lobby with a bouquet of red roses, to match the song, and after hugs and congratulations, she hands the flowers back to Russ and promptly asks if she can grab burgers with her friends. She’s still in full makeup, red hearts painted around her eyes, face smudged with white.