The Thorne at My Side

CHAPTER 3

“Who died?”

MAGGIE

DCFox: My grandfather is buying another boat. He took me out to see it being built last weekend and I have to admit, there wasn't much to see that you haven't seen before. A yacht is a yacht. He insists it is all state of the art, but I just see a bunch of anchors and knots.

I laugh as I read his message. Considering I've only been on pontoon boats back in my hometown in upstate New York I can’t even imagine what the interior of a yacht looks like. But my mom has embraced our town’s annual pontoon decorating contest which makes me think I might have a few ideas for sprucing things up that I could pass along.

It was a long day at the office but a good one. The senator is gearing up for her second debate which is focused on domestic policy. These are the issues voters really care about. The things that impact their daily lives.

My mind is racing with all the snippets we need to write. Two minutes on each with a list of bullet points for the rebuttals. I pull out my trusty pack of post-it notes and felt tip pen and get to work. We won't know who will speak first but there are ways to word responses so it doesn't matter.

"My opponent will suggest," I start to speak out loud as I jot down ideas and slap the colored squares on my white board.

After an hour, I boil water and pour it into the mason jar ramen I prepped on Sunday and take the meal with me to my bed. My studio apartment doesn't have room for a dining table so I either eat at my desk, on the floor, in my overstuffed chair, or on my bed. Right now the chair is covered in my clothes, so, bed it is.

I cue up She's The Man on my laptop, my comfort movie of choice, and press play right before I wake up my SMS Connect phone. DCFox’s message about the yachts make me chuckle. Sometimes our conversations are back-and-forth, get-to-know you exchanges. But other times we simply put our thoughts out there and let the other person into our consciousness a bit.

When Viola decides to take matters into her own hands after the girl’s team gets cut, I write a note back.

TalkShopGirl: I have watched She's The Man 200 times. When it came out I was the student council president fighting for additional funding for after school activities so I saw a lot of myself in Viola.

Not that I’ve ever tried to pass myself off as a man, but her commitment to what she believed in resonated with me.

And, I remember falling hard for Channing. And getting caught up in how cute Amanda Bynes looks as Sebastian and then how hot she looks as Viola at the fair. Truly a masterpiece of early 2000s pop culture. I hate to love all the moments that Duke should figure it out but doesn't.

Watch it, you'll love it.

◆◆ ◆

My alarm sounds at 5:15. Waking up early was a habit I nurtured during law school. So many of my friends would stay up late trying to study and I had a few late nights but learned that if I went to bed by 11:00 I could be up by 6:00 to get a jump on the day. When I graduated I kept adding to my morning routine and had to add another 10 minutes when the SMS phone arrived.

Speaking of…I roll over and poke the sleep out of the corners of my eyes with one hand while the other hand pulls out the little phone. I press the power button and wait.

Ping.

DCFox: She’s The Man huh? I think it is brave of you to admit that your favorite movie is about a girl who dresses up to pretend to be a boy and falls for her roommate. But then again, my favorite movie is Angels In The Outfield and we probably don’t need to psychoanalyze me for that.

I was surprised to get your note tonight, I always pictured you writing to me with morning hair and hot coffee. For the record I’m writing mine before bed. I was up working later than I wanted to because there’s a lot going on with my job at the moment. I know we can’t share details but I’m excited for what is in the works, and where it’ll lead me.

◆◆◆

A few hours later I am smiling as I carry my Sunrise Bakery breakfast with me to the senator's office. Sam has been eerily quiet so far this morning. Usually I’ll have heard from her at least twice by now. She’s my morning news source. When I first started this role I would wake up and read every headline myself and that would determine the tasks for the day. Now Sam takes the first pass and flags things for me before I go in and read everything myself when I get to the office.

My smile disappears as I walk into the conference room and see Sam’s expression.

“Who died?” I ask assuming we’ll be rescheduling our week around some senator’s memorial.

“Our jobs.” Sam says stoically.

“What are you talking about?” I ask with a laugh as I sit down next to her at the table.

“She doesn’t know?” Jorge asks as he comes in with a tray of muffins and fruit and sets it on the table.

“Know what? Seriously, what has gotten into you two?”

With the drama of a made-for-tv movie both Sam and Jorge slowly turn their attention to me.

“Maggie,” Sam starts.

“Stay seated while we tell you this,” Jorge cautions.

“There’s been some news.”

“If this is all some prank to tell me that we’re like seventy points ahead in the polls I’m going to kick both of you in the shins.” I say as I rip a piece of my croissant off and pop it in my mouth.

They both pause and then flash eyes at each other.

“I’m not gonna tell her,” Jorge insists but he makes no move to leave the room.

“Ugh, fine,” Sam pouts, turns back to me, “I’m just going to say it. Quickly. Rip the bandage off.” She inhales and exhales. “Go time.”

“Sam?”

“Okay, Thorne Media Corp announced a new AI Media app that will create custom news content for its users.” She rushes through the sentence then gasps for breath.

“What?” I ask, blinking hard and squeezing my hands into fists. It is nearly impossible to stay on top of the 24 hour news cycle as it is. Then add in social media and it becomes exactly impossible. How am I supposed to do my job effectively if a robot is writing news too?

“TMC, is set to release, “AIM” their calling it, but it’s an app that will deliver custom news stories to consumers all day long.” Sam repeats slowly.

“That’s,” I stutter, “that’s,” I throw my hands up in the air, one still clutching my now decimated croissant.

“It’s something, alright.” Sam mutters.

“Impossible!” I finally spit out.

The election is three weeks away. The debate is next week. My news alert listserv gets updated every 15 minutes and there’s always something new about the senator. My position has always been that she shouldn’t care about news but Ben, the campaign manager sees things differently. I slump back down in my chair and toss my mangled pastry onto the table.

“I’m glad I was here to see that.” Jorge says before he turns and steps out of the room. “Oh,” he pops his head back in with a saccharine smile on his face, “remember the seminar starts at 2:00 and you’ll be in this room so clean up any crumbs, thanks.”

I turn to look at Sam who is watching me with observant eyes, trying, I’m sure, to figure out what is going through my mind. I’d tell her if I could. It is hard enough as it is to keep track of all the news mentions, to adapt to the rapidly shifting trends and opinions. One commencement speech can go viral and start a national conversation on child care and we not only have to know the ins and outs of the speech but we need to have a response ready to go because reporters are everywhere and the first thing they do is ask a “relevant” question.

I would argue, and I’ve tried, that whatever conversation has spun up on social media isn’t always relevant. It might be timely, and some are truly important, but more often than not when an important figure like Senator Quinn comments on it, the issue gains credibility. She’s a person who can make a discussion happen. And her silence can speak volumes.

Maybe this is a thing that we can be silent about.

My brain registers the lie but I’m going with it.

“It’s going to be fine,” I finally say to Sam after my mental pep rally. “We’re making a mountain out of a molehill that hasn’t even been built yet.” I am not sure who needs to hear this more; me or Sam. She is well aware of my frustration with writing reactionary content.

“Okay,” Sam stretches the word out into four syllables. “So the official campaign line is “it’s going to be fine?”

“We might need to wordsmith it a bit.” I smile and then busy myself cleaning up flakes of pastry that have fallen on the table, the floor, and on my top. Classic writer move, cleaning when there are mountains of other things to do.

"This is a nightmare come true. A night terror come true. This is literally the worst case scenario!” Sam spits back at me.

"Stop spiraling," I tell her, "this has nothing to do with us. It's a computer trying to do the job of intelligent people and it won't go anywhere. People want to hear from experts with insight."

"Well now I know you’ve lost it because that’s an outright lie. They're going to customize news for every user," Sam says as she scrolls further down the article.

"That's basically impossible so really they're just going to be feeding the same story to different people and the consumers are going to think they're getting something custom. It's a sham. "

I can’t look at Sam because she’ll know immediately that I’m lying. She’ll be able to see on my face how worried I am about this.

First of all, the speed with which AI could produce articles is scary. And if a news source, like Thorne, is behind it they'll be publishing the content far and wide almost immediately.

There's no way for our team to keep up with everything that is said about the senator online. But I made it a point to identify key drivers of content and keep tabs on the general consensus. I have a dashboard that tracks certain hashtags and skims comments on our posts. The secret service does too so we don't have to worry about any of the threatening ones.

And trust me, as a single woman running for president, the senator receives plenty of them. The shit people (read: pencil dick men) think they can say from behind a screen is atrocious.

“Plus,” I add as I walk my scraps over to the trash can, desperate for a change of subject, “we have to get ready for this afternoon.”

Senator Quinn is co-hosting a Young People in D.C. day alongside her most public opposition, Senator Williams. In an attempt to show bipartisanship, she and Senator Williams will be giving PolySci majors and Senate interns tours of the Capitol Building and our offices. Then, they’re invited in for small workshop sessions with people on their teams. I'm hosting one with Sam on the art of speech writing in the modern age.

"Good morning!" Senator Quinn comes in and takes a seat at the table. I shoot eyes at Sam and she hurries to her seat as Jorge strides in to take notes. "I'm glad you're all here. I'm excited to bring people in through the office today and I wanted to talk with you for a moment before I get started."

"What's on your mind Senator?" I ask .

"I wanted to let you know that I'll be bringing in a new AI writing solution to support you. We’re closing in on this thing and I expect you to do everything you can to keep my momentum going!"

"Absolutely," I cheer with a smile on my face. I can hear the way my voice is climbing as the predicament I’m in starts racing through my mind. My heart rate sky rockets as I try to envision how this will actually work.

I can feel Sam looking at me, waiting for a tirade of some sort on how AI will be the end of the original thought. And while I've gone deep on the subject after a glass of wine, or two, now isn't the time.

"This could be really good for us, the best of both worlds!" I continue. I’m head speech writer. I am the person people rely on. I’m the one who is going to get this done and I set the tone for the team.

"I'm so glad to hear your support for this, Maggie.” Senator Quinn says, “there will be more information in the next few days but in the meantime, keep up the good work."

With that, the Senator stands and leaves the room with Jorge on her heels.

"So, are you really okay with this?" Sam asks wide eyed with concern.

"It’s not like she gave me a choice.” I roll my shoulders back as my foot starts to bounce under the table. “But it could be good. It's going to be good. We'll make sure it's good."

"That's a lot of ‘goods’. As a professional writer I've got to intervene here."

"Fair, right, yes, okay. Umm, just give me a minute?" I throw my thumb over my shoulder and Sam nods. I turn and head out of the office, down the stairs at the end of the hall, and past my favorite security guard, before striding out onto the steps for some fresh air.

What I didn't admit upstairs was that we are already having trouble keeping up with the volume of content that hits the internet everyday. Factor in the 24-hour news channels, network news, and local coverage, and it is essentially impossible.

I can feel the stress creeping across my body. My jaw already feels tight so I work it around for a minute and then roll my head a few times. I knew the last three weeks before the election would be demanding but the addition of an AI co-worker is going to only make matters worse.

But I need to get a handle on this if I ever want to run for office myself. I need to learn how to toughen up, how to deal with the pressure of being in the game as the clock winds down.

If my right eye starts twitching that’s when I’ll know it’s bad. That’s always the sign of impending doom.

I take a seat on the steps and lean forward to rub my temples, a tension headache starting and it's only 9:45 am. It’s going to be a long day.