Jessica Harper Uncanceled

“Where are we on the talking cat?” I said.

“That story is on hold,” said Denver Kelly, one of my writers. “His agent’s been arrested for fraud.”

“Can’t we deal with the cat’s owners direct?” I said.

“You can’t own a cat,” interjected Ellie, our woke intern, who as usual was performing her yoga routine on the floor. “You can only be its human.”

“The cat’s owners have also been arrested,” said Denver, ignoring her. “As has the cat.”

“What the hell did they all do?” I said.

“It seems the cat couldn’t speak after all,” said Denver. “The owners were just good at throwing their voice.”

“That’s not the cat’s fault,” said Ellie.

“No, but he was unhelpful to the cops and has been charged with being an accessory.”

“What’s the world coming to when you can’t believe in a, um, talking cat?” I said. “Fine. Forget the cat. Denver, what else you got? How about your interview with the nine-year-old math prodigy?”

“She’s been arrested for running a numbers racket.”

“Sheesh. Erwin, where we are on the story about the guy who owns a steamroller?”

“Somebody hotwired it and crashed it into an ATM,” said Erwin.

“Seriously?” I said. “What is happening to this city?” I said.

“Democrats,” said our grizzled photographer Rusty. “It’s open season for the criminals of Truvy City.”

It was. Our mayor had recently won the election with the campaign slogan: “Truvy: a great place to live. Especially if you need a second chance in life, know what I mean?” Once elected, he’d appointed a guy who was big in the local Defund The Police campaign. Unfortunately for us, the job he was appointed to was chief of police.

“I’m gonna move to Chicago to feel safer,” I said. “Well, what stories do we have, given that press day is only two weeks away? The street mural?”

“Some angry graffiti artists turned it back into a nicely painted blank wall,” said Denver. “They said it was their turf.”

“God help me,” I said. “Do we have any stories lined up for the current issue which have not been scrapped due to crime?”

“The Truvy Blues Festival,” said Rusty. “The headliner’s six-string guitar mysteriously lost five strings overnight plus all the spare strings but he’s just tweeted: ‘The show is still on but don’t expect the hits the way they normally sound.’”

“One-string experimental guitar?” said Erwin. “Damnit, I was looking forward to that show.”

“How about I write an article called ‘Ten Stores It’s Absolutely Okay To Loot From?’” said Ellie.

“How About Ten Interns It’s Absolutely Okay To Kick Up The Ass?” said Rusty. This is the sort of comment that is not allowed in the modern workplace, although ironically it’s okay to talk about looting stores as that is probably just, you know, a social justice issue.

“Rusty!” squealed Ellie.

“Ooh, Ellie, it’s ten ten!” I said. I knew she was very easily distracted and I was keen to avert a lawsuit.

“Huh?” she said.

“Ten after ten, the second batch of muffins will be ready at JB’s.”

“Oh yes.” She unwound herself from the yoga pose, I chucked twenty dollars at her and she scooted off to buy muffins at the diner downstairs, having forgotten all about Rusty’s “toxic masculinity.”

The Monday morning conference was always fun, never dull. We were back in our old building in the Historic District, having managed to buy ourselves out from our former owners, who had forced us to reside in a hideous “tower” on the boring side of Truvy.

“So, thanks to the criminals of Truvy City, we have very little lined up for the next issue,” I said. “Why don’t we just have one of those ‘takeover’ issues and turn all editorial control over to them?” No-one actually objected to this. Maybe they thought that with the way law and order was going, it was inevitable the bad guys would take over everything.

“If this continues we’ll have nothing to put on the cover except some lame photo of Truvy’s hanging moss,” I continued.

“People have been stealing the moss to sell for mattress stuffing,” said Erwin.

“Uh-huh,” I said. “Sounds about right.”

“I might have one story we can run but there’s a teensy problem with it.”

“Go on.”

“I interviewed that eighty-three-year-old-woman who still runs six marathons a year.”

“Okay, an actual story, now we’re getting somewhere.”

“I said: ‘How do you find the energy?’”

“And what did she say?”

“Performance-enhancing drugs.”

The way today was going, I felt in need of some performance-enhancing drugs myself.

“Right, gang,” I announced, “as all our stories have fallen through, we need to do some serious brainstorming before this meeting is over. Let’s take five. Anyone who wants a hot drink from you-know-what can get one.”

“You-know-what” was the C-50 Cast-Iron Coffee Machine that we had blagged from the manufacturers in return for a nice little mention in our magazine (journalistic integrity, moi?).

Denver was first out of the meeting room. “Er, guys? Where’s the coffee machine?”

As one by one we filed into the newsroom we saw that there was a big space where the C-50 had until recently rested.

Only now did any of us notice the muddy footprints and broken glass in a corner of the newsroom. Truvy’s crimewave had claimed its latest victim, and the name of that victim was “our constant need for very strong coffee.”

“Right,” I said. “Takeout?”