Page 71 of The Apparent Trap

“Two minutes to air!” I hear Debby, the floor director, call out. I’ve got to snap back into gear.

I’ve walked over to the desk to check in on Carmen when I notice that Georgia’s sitting down next to her.

“Hey, Ez,” she says brightly.

Maybe . . . too brightly.

Oh god, this is her fill-in for Jenny that she was talking about. Shit. With everything that happened in Sweden, I’d completely forgotten she was thinking about doing this. I’m not prepared for whatever concoction she’s cooked up.

“I swapped around the starting topic segments with Sarah earlier,” she says. “You don’t mind, right? I just found some buzzier topics I think are super interesting, but they wouldn’t fit the more serious side of my normal time slots, you know? So I wanted to have a little fun with this, since I’m sitting in for Jenny today.”

I guess I’m a person who nods now, because that’s apparently all I’m capable of doing. Although now my words have exited my body for a different reason.

Georgia just barrels on. “Do you want to give the new topics a look, Carmen? Or are you good?” Anyone else would think her smile is genuine, but I can tell from the tone in her voice that she’s handing out an offer that’s already expired. She has no intention of showing Carmen anything. With now only a minute until air, of course she’s not expecting Carmen to say yes and look like she needs hand-holding.

“Oh no, I’m great,” Carmen replies, with as much confidence as I’m sure Georgia assumed she would have. “This’ll be fun.”

I wouldn’t say the women on our show are particularly competitive—unlike most of news and live television, The Wake Up Show is almost completely run by women, so it’s a much more supportive atmosphere than a lot of the other places. But at this level, everyone is also fully ambitious and never shows any weakness when they don’t have to, which is exactly what Georgia was counting on, especially knowing Carmen’s propensity for trying to tough through anything without asking for help. Carmen would want to show Georgia she’s easy to roll with as a cohost; she’d want to convey someone who can handle live television beyond what’s scripted for her. So of course she waved off Georgia’s offer.

I, of course, have absolutely no chill and am not a person who’s spent my life preparing to roll with anything and stay neutral while lights and cameras are pointed at my face. Instead, I’m a person whose face reads everything—a human thought bubble aired in high definition. I’ve got to get away from this scenario as smoothly and quickly as possible before I start sweating (even though studios are always freezing) and Carmen assumes I’m coming down with something.

“Okay, well, great. That’s great. Great,” I blabber. Smooth. “I’ll just be, um, in the control room. I think it’ll be better to watch in there. You guys are great out here. Have a great time. Or show. Or . . . you know what I mean.”

I turn around, aware that Carmen probably thinks I’ve been body snatched. But there’s nothing to be done except get out of the situation before I spontaneously combust.

I leave the studio and walk down the hall, into the control room. Now I can see every angle of whatever this potential train wreck is going to be, while also staying far out of Carmen’s line of sight.

It’s not that I don’t trust Georgia; it’s just that I know her style is going to be more direct, provocative.

And after everything I saw in Sweden with Carmen, a small dose of guilt is running its way through my veins.

But I try to shake the feeling off. This is for the best, and I’ve been failing miserably to knock sense into anyone. We need something to change here, and I should expect that Georgia will do better than I’ve been managing (or not managing) so far. After all, she’s the natural leader. It’s my job to strategize and set up, but she’s the one who gets the ball over the net every time. That’s never going to be my role.

And yet, I’m nervous she’ll take it too far.

Or nervous that Carmen will guess what’s happening and trace it all back to me.

The segment starts, and for a moment I exhale. They’re debating a surge of wolf-dog hybrid pets, something so zany I almost forget to be on edge. Carmen and Georgia both seem enchanted by the idea (one thing a California girl and a Southern girl have in common, I suppose), while Tate’s horrified and definitely wants nothing to do with them. After that topic, they move on to the next one, where they all coo over a cute new teenage celebrity couple that everyone seems to be rooting for.

But then I see the look shift in Georgia’s expression, and I know it’s all about to change.

“This is a super-interesting new topic,” she says, and I feel myself shrink against the control room’s wall. “A recent study from researchers at Heidelberg University focused on age gaps in heterosexual relationships. Now, one side of their outcomes is exactly what you’d expect: Men who marry younger women live longer, and they die earlier if they are the younger spouse. But here’s where the study got particularly surprising and interesting: For women, no matter whether the man is younger or older, the greater the age gap between a husband and wife, the lower the woman’s life expectancy becomes. Marrying a man outside your age range shortens your life. What do we think about that? Shocked? Or expected?”

Being in the control room, I can see not only the main feed, but also every camera that the director could change to. And I’ve been focused on Carmen the entire time Georgia was talking. She’s fidgeting, something she never does, even as her expression stays deliberately passive. I hold my breath, waiting to see how she responds.

Of course Tate has to jump in first. “Wait, so it’s the gap that matters? Like in either direction, marrying someone five years older or younger is bad for women but like, twenty years older or younger is significantly worse?”

“Yup,” Georgia continues. “Men really reap all the benefits from having a younger spouse. Women don’t at all—maybe the stress of a man in a different life stage is hard no matter which direction. I was surprised a younger man doesn’t keep you young. But I’m not at all shocked that having an older man around ages you. Why wouldn’t it?”

Tate just laughs. “As the older man in this trio, I’m not going to argue that I’m weighing everyone down.” Georgia chuckles along with him. I see Carmen trying, but clearly the laugh isn’t genuine (not that it would be even if Georgia wasn’t subtly attacking her life choices, since Tate’s cheesy dad jokes rarely get a real laugh).

“What do you think, Carmen?” he asks.

She blinks a few too many times. “Oh, I think these kinds of studies have to be a little too generic for anyone’s actual life choices, right?” Her voice is maybe an octave higher than normal. “Certainly regional differences in gender inequality or instances of arranged marriages would probably play a role.”

I can see Georgia wasn’t expecting that level of analysis. “Good points, Carmen,” she says, mentally pivoting. “I guess either way, the lesson for all of us should be to stay careful about who we end up with. Another reason I’m happy to be single.”

“And another reason for me to be grateful my wife is only a year younger than me!” Tate responds.