Three Way (19 page)

Ollie,

PM will come out to you at 1500. He will do a pre-recorded on-camera statement about North Korea’s nuclear threat towards South Korea. You need to do the statement and feed it via the sat vehicle which should be there not long after you. It’s a POOL statement so the other broadcasters will get it.

Call me when you get there.

Paul

‘I’ve got the postcode,’ I say. Paul turns on the sat nav and taps it in.

‘Gonna be tight, says fifty minutes,’ he says, indicating the sat nav.

‘Fine, let’s go.’

We head out of Bicester. My heart is thumping now. The Prime Minister. This is big. Never been to Chequers before. Must make sure everything goes smoothly. Phil drives fast, I don’t dare look at the speedometer but I can feel it’s over the limit. I load up the TBN app on my phone and read up about what’s been going on with North Korea in case there’s an opportunity to ask a question.

We arrive with five minutes to spare. I see the satellite vehicle already there, the dish on the roof just going up. I get out of the car and run over to it. The side door is open and two middle-aged guys sit inside what looks like a mobile control station for a nuclear bunker. So many buttons and switches I don’t have a clue what any of them do. Four small screens and a mixing desk. All fitted into a DHL delivery truck. Clever what they can do nowadays. Anyway…

‘Hey guys. It’s a pre rec statement, so me and Phil will do it and I’ll give you the card to feed.’

‘Sure. We won’t be ready for five minutes anyway,’ says the engineer with a scraggly beard.

‘Cool,’ I reply. I walk back over to Phil who’s setting up the camera. A car is driving towards us along the private road leading from Chequers. It pulls up next to us and a black man in a dark suit gets out. He looks like James Bond, almost a bit too glam for someone that works in Downing Street.

‘Are you from TBN?’ he asks.

‘Yeah,’ I reply.

‘I’m Marcus from Downing Street press office.’

‘Ollie,’ I reply, shaking his hand.

‘Phil,’ says Phil who also shakes Marcus’ hand.

‘How long before you’re ready?’ Marcus asks. I glance at Phil.

‘Ready now,’ Phil says.

‘Okay,’ Marcus replies. He pulls out his phone and makes a call. ‘They’re ready here.’

‘Can you give me a white balance?’ asks Phil, handing me a sheet of paper. I hold it in front of the camera. ‘Thanks.’ I feel the expectation in the air. From the road you can’t see the Prime Minister’s official country manor house, just the grounds.

‘So just to confirm, this won’t be live. Just a pre recorded statement,’ says Marcus. I nod.

‘Yep,’ I say.

‘Good.’

We wait. I walk back to the satellite vehicle.

‘You guys ready?’ I ask.

‘We’re always ready,’ says glasses engineer, think his name is Henry. I’ve worked with him before, just can’t remember his surname.

I walk back to Phil. We both look back down the private driveway. I breathe in, trying to calm my nerves. Mustn’t screw this up. I walk back and forth along the road. Five minutes go by. Then another five. The clouds are starting to look threatening.

‘How long?’ I ask Marcus.

‘Soon,’ he replies. I nod and start pacing again. Suddenly, I see two Range Rovers and a Jaguar driving towards us.

‘Here he is,’ I say. The Range Rovers get to the end of the driveway and stop. Four big guys in suits get out, then I see him. The Prime Minister and a female press officer who looks tired and stressed. The PM is shorter than I remember from our last encounter but has the air and authority of the most powerful man in Britain. His hair is slicked back and his suit is perfectly pressed. The bags under his eyes make him look older than he is. The strain of the job, I guess. They walk up to us. Marcus does the formalities.

‘Prime Minister, this is Ollie from TBN.’ The PM offers his hand. I shake it.

‘Nice to meet you,’ the PM says. Not sure why but I’m disappointed he doesn’t remember me. Suppose it’s a bit much to expect him to remember everyone he meets. I was only with him for five minutes, I guess.

‘You too. If you don’t mind standing just here, sir,’ I indicate where he should stand. He looks distracted or maybe he’s just focused on what he’s going to say. I stand as close to the camera as I can, looking at the PM. The female press officer is not far away, making sure she hears every word he says. The PM looks at me as Phil gets ready.

‘Okay, we’re rolling,’ says Phil.

‘Prime Minister, what’s your reaction to today’s events in North Korea?’

‘Well the first thing I want to say is we believe North Korea should stand down its nuclear missiles on the border and re-engage with the talks that myself and the US President attended only last week. And…uh…shit can we go again.’ I glance at Phil then over to the female press officer.

‘Of course, no problem,’ I reply. Phil puts his hand in front of the camera then says,

‘We’re still rolling.’

‘When you’re ready,’ I say. The PM clears his throat and licks his lips, repeating to himself quietly what he wants to say.

‘Okay,’ the PM says, ‘Ready.’ Phil nods.

‘What’s your reaction to today’s events?’ I say.

‘North Korea has to stand down its nuclear missiles and reengage with the talks that the President and I attended last week. This act of aggression will not be tolerated and I urge Kim Jong Un to come to his senses and enter full negotiations with us and the South Koreans to prevent this situation spiralling out of control. They have a choice, more isolation from the international community or reengagement with us. It’s in their hands. I hope they make the right decision. Thank you…okay?’ I look at Phil who checks the recording back.

‘Yep, good,’ Phil says. The PM shakes his head and turns to the female press officer.

‘Next time can we make it a little snappier, I’m not going to learn these massive paragraphs you come up with, I’m not an actor Anna.’

‘Of course sir,’ she replies. He walks back towards the Range Rover, Anna in tow.

‘Thank you, sir,’ I call. He turns back to me and waves, insincerity painted all over his face. What a piece of shit. That ladies and gentlemen is the man leading our country, God help us all. The motorcade moves off back towards the house.

‘Okay, thanks guys,’ says Marcus. He walks over to his car and drives back down the driveway towards Chequers. Phil hands me the SD card with the interview on it. I take it to the engineers.

‘Here you go guys. We’ll need to play this out on a clock start so everyone gets it at the same time.’ I take out my phone and call Paul.

‘Newsdesk,’ Paul says.

‘It’s Ollie, we’ve done it and it’s ready to go. Playout in ten?’

‘Yep, what did he say?’ My mind goes blank. What did he say? I was so busy concentrating that I didn’t hear what he was saying. Something about North Korea reengaging?

‘He said he wanted North Korea to reengage with South Korea and the West and to stand down their nuclear missiles to prevent the situation spiralling out of control.’ I hear Paul typing what I’m saying. ‘It wasn’t very long maybe, twenty seconds?’

‘Okay, playout in ten. Good job Ollie.’

‘Thanks.’

The guys on the truck cue up the SD card.

‘There was a false start so make sure you just feed the second answer,’ I say. Henry nods. We wait for the clock to hit three-twenty exactly then, making sure all the other broadcasters can see the paused image of the PM, we hit play. The clip starts playing, well done me. Except…for some unknown reason I realise it has jumped to the very beginning and starts to play the PM’s first answer. The one where he says ‘shit!’ Oh fuck no. TBN, SKY, BBC all cut to the feed live as it comes in.

‘NO! That’s the wrong clip!’ I shout. Too late, every broadcaster has cut to our feed transmitting the PM saying ‘shit, can we go again.’ I close my eyes. My phone starts ringing. It’s a car crash and I’m in so much trouble.

‘You have any idea the shitstorm that rains down because you can’t cue up a tape and press play at the right time?’ says Jonathan Crawley, Head of Home News. He’s wearing an expensive suit and looks like the Fat Controller. I stand in front of his desk, head down.

‘I’m sorry, we did cue the card correctly but the machine reverted to the beginning and by the time we realised, it had already played out,’ I say.

‘By the time you realised? You should have pulled it off the air the moment it started playing. If I wanted a fuck up, I’d have sent my four-year old son. We send you because you’re supposedly one of our best producers. All of us here expect simple things like this to go smoothly. When they don’t Oliver, I get fucked up the arse. And I hate getting fucked up the arse by anyone except my wife. I don’t send monkeys, I send producers who are supposed to know what the fuck they’re doing.’

‘You’re right, it’s my fault. I can only apologise.’

‘Are you a monkey Oliver?’

‘No.’

‘You sure? People will understand if they thought a monkey was sitting in that sat truck pressing play at the right time. Because monkeys are a lesser species, incapable of organising pool playouts. You sure you’re not a monkey?’

‘No,’ I reply, looking down. Jonathan huffs.

‘You know why it took so long to call you in here? Because I couldn’t get Downing Street off the fucking phone. I had to sit and listen to that prick Adrian Short give me lecture after lecture on how biased TBN is towards the opposition and how this episode proves it. How we deliberately stitched up the Prime Minister to make him look like a dick and how they will make sure we pay. They’ve been chewing my arse for two hours, I’ve got nothing left to sit on.’ I nod slowly and go to respond when suddenly the mobile on his desk starts to ring. He picks it up and looks at the display and rolls his eyes skywards.

‘Fuck me,’ he says, showing me the display. ‘My wife. And here I was thinking the day couldn’t get any worse. Get out of my sight, Hayward.’

‘Sorry,’ I say. He waves me away in disgust.

‘Darling, it’s daytime, this is an unexpected pleasure…’ he says.

I open the door and step out, red faced. I breathe out and walk towards the newsdesk. I feel the whole newsroom watching me.

‘You okay, Ollie?’ Julie asks.

‘Not really,’ I reply.

Saturday. I’ve had time to recover from the bollocking of a decade and I want to move my life in a more positive direction. No point in dwelling on the negative even if every newspaper did splash my screw up all over the front pages the next day. Nightmare. Anyway, let’s just pretend that it never happened and that my prospects for promotion haven’t just been dealt a fatal blow. What the hell, at least I still have my health, right? Although that mole on my hip looks like it’s getting bigger…

So it’s dinner with Lauren tonight at mine. I tell Ashley and Parker not to be in, which is a better conversation than I expect. Ashley is seeing what’s-his-face. Damn, what is his name? Norman, that’s it. Norm. Brilliant. Anyway, Parker wasn’t originally seeing Nicola but when I told him to not be in this evening he gave her a call and now they’re going to Pizza Express - he’s even printed off a voucher. He’s so classy, I totally get what she sees in him.

So first things first, I need to decide what the hell I’m going to cook tonight. As I’ve said before, cooking isn’t exactly my strong point. Not sure what is but it’s not cooking. I’m standing in the Asda cooked meat aisle, staring at a long chorizo sausage, unsure of what I’m doing. Maybe I should have looked up a recipe. Yeah, that would have been better.

I walk round looking for inspiration. Pasta? No, too simple and I don’t know any pasta recipes other than spaghetti bolognese and I have to do better than that. I don’t know what to cook. I whip out my phone and call Parker. It rings then,

‘What do you want, dickhead?’ Parker says.

‘I need a recipe for tonight. What’s easy to cook but will be, you know, impressive?’

‘Why don’t you just take her for a McDonalds, that’s more your speed, isn’t it?’

‘Funnily enough we did actually talk about fish and chips-’