NEPOTISM BABY [TYLER OWENS]

TWO : SCOTT STREET

CHAPTER TWO : SCOTT STREET

FIVE YEARS LATER

IT IS FIVE FORTY-FIVE IN THE EVENING AND WILLOW MAE THORNTON IS MORE THAN READY TO SIGN OFF. Her cheeks hurt from all the talking and smiling, her feet from her heels, and her brain from all the thinking. She is more than thankful when their esteemed director is signaling at her, a twirl of her finger that used to be a handshake rather than a sign to wrap it up. Willow is already stepping away from the green screen without a complaint and cuts back to the head anchors for their local puff piece of the day. It always follows the weather; especially today on her warnings of an impending outbreak.

A historic one; a mirror to 1996; a mirror she does not try to fit in anymore.

If you were to google "Willow Thornton" now, the first result is not her weather-related tragedy plastered across each and every written word. No, that result has been lost five pages down, the paper copies rotting in a dump somewhere far away from her. The first result is instead her pristine headshot, marking her as one of the leading television meteorologists in the mid-west.

It is certainly a reach, but the ratings have been on the up and up since her debut.

It seems like an entirely different world some days; the switch from chasing the weather down in beaten up trucks and vans to reporting it from the station. She trades her muddy boots and cargos for stilettos and pencil skirts. Her research presentation days become school assemblies on storm safety with just enough time for the local celebrity photo op.

First Alert Meteorologist Willow Thornton is a well-respected working woman reporting on storms, rather than that nameless nut job heading straight into the eye of them.

Willow has already started tugging off her mic pack and lapel by the time she hits the edge of the sound stage. Joel, of course, is there to meet her, all wide-eyed and bushy-tailed as he is everyday.

In the three years she has spent as lead meteorologist, she has never understood him. He should be seething, despising her as his years of interning experience at the station is passed over for her to win out over him with perfect timing and accuracy in the field of meteorology. Joel is nowhere on her level with the data, but he is certainly the better weatherman at heart with more of a shining television personality than she could ever offer.

But he never falters, never begins to despise her. When she offers to decline the position, he wears a bright smile and encourages her to plant her feet further in the station. Then she offers him the lead field-reporting position, a step up from his spot as assistant, as it is hers to now delegate and he declines with a wave, saying, "I don't really like being in the weather when reporting on it."