The Deadline

The Deadline



The phone rang, shrill and startling in the silence of her home. It took three rings to find the phone, while she forced her mind back from the far distant past, and the desperate people she’d been writing about.

Reading the number on caller ID, she clicked the speaker button. “David, how many times do I have to tell you not to call me after eight? You’re lucky I even answered."

“Maggie, sweetheart! I hope I didn’t disturb you?”

“Of course you did! I told you my inspiration had returned and that I’d be writing. What do you want?”

“Ah, Mags, don’t be so harsh. You won’t believe it, but the History Channel wants your story. They loved your outline and are intrigued by the premise. I’ve scheduled a time for you to meet with them in the morning.”

“You're kidding?” she squealed, a rush of adrenaline pushing her to her feet. “That’s fantastic! Aren’t they like the eighth network you’ve been to!”

“Indeed it was, and believe me, this was not an easy sell.”

“Yeah?” She forced a deep breath, grounded in reality. “So, what’s the catch?”

“Well…” His voice cracked, and she heard nerves behind his hesitation.

“What? David! What have you done?”

“Well, they have a slot to fill next season, and they need to start filming right away. I told them you could have the pilot to them by Monday.”

“You did what!? Are you crazy? It’s Thursday. I’ve barely written ten pages.”

“That’s great, Maggie! And you’ve got your muse back, you said so yourself. I don’t see the problem?”

“David, one episode can be up to sixty pages; most pilots are two episodes. You expect that by Monday?”

“But you already have ten pages! You know you work best under pressure; especially when your inspiration is back.”


*****

Maggie's thoughts were flowing faster than she could type, her fingers flying over the keyboard at a furious rate. She’d been working practically non-stop for the last three days, alternating between feelings of elation that her screenplay was going to be aired on TV, despair that she would never finish in time, and self-doubt that it wouldn’t be good enough.

The phone rang; a disturbance completely at odds with the scene she was writing, and scattering it into the ether.

She should have silenced the phone, Maggie thought despondently, even as she turned the device over to read the caller id.

"Hey Mom," she sighed, answering the phone and pushing back from the desk.

"Hi sweetie. I thought I should check in with you. How are you coming along with your deadline?"

"Oh, God, I don't know," she lamented, at once glad for the opportunity to vent, while mourning the lost time. "I've got about twenty pages left to go, and it won’t be accepted it if I don’t have it, in person, at the Network by 8’oclock tomorrow morning. I’m not sure I’m gonna make it."

"Of course you will! Where’s your faith?”

“I left it behind in the last scene, when my characters started acting up and refused to go where I needed them to.”

“Haha, that’s funny, dear. Just give them a stern talking to and get them back in line.” She snickered at her own joke. "Have you eaten?"

"I'm too amped to eat. What time is it, anyway?"

"It's just after 7:00; you must be engrossed in your story."

"I am! I just finished writing the earthquake scene, killing off most of the tribal leaders who were holding a meeting inside the caves of their homeland, and destroyed tons of people in tents gathered outside. It's getting desperate for these people, because their whole way of life is coming to an end, and they're panicking, because they don't yet know what they're going to do."

"Ah, but you know what's going to happen?"

"Yeah, I've got it pretty well outlined, and I'm not too far off where I need to be, but I still have twenty pages more to go, and my characters aren’t cooperating.”

“You sound as desperate as your characters.”

“You’re telling me!”

*****

“Maggie? Maggie, wake up!” A warm hand on her back gave her an insistent shake.

“Hmm? What?” She found her eyelids heavy and crusted with sleep, her neck stiff, and her cheek pressed into the keyboard.

“Darlin, you’ve got to wake up. It’s Six-Thirty, sweetheart; we need to be downtown at Eight. Wake up, damnit!”

“David? What are you doing here?” She couldn’t shake off the fog in her head. The last thing she remembered, it’d been 4:30 and she’d sent the finished episode to the printer. Her brain finally engaged, and she came upright with a jolt, her eyes focusing on the clock. 6:33. “Oh, crap!”

“Please tell me you’re finished?” Her agent, and, incidentally, her best friend, asked in a tone that brooked no argument.

“It’s on the printer,” Maggie yawned and stretched, reaching over to collect the work.

There were only about ten pages there.

“Oh shit! No! No, no!!!”

David, ever calm, peered at the readout on the printer. “It’s jammed.” He looked at his watch, then at her disheveled, panicked state. “No, settle down. Listen, Mags, I’ll get this printed while you take a shower. As long as we’re on the road by Seven, we should be ok.”

Ten minutes later Maggie returned, stylishly outfitted and running a comb through wet, curly hair.

The printer was still jammed.

She pushed David aside, investigated the inner workings of the printer and finally found a tiny sliver of paper jammed in a place it should not be.

“There,” she sighed with relief as the machine whirred to life. “Thank God it’s high speed.”

Traffic was backed up when they arrived at the interstate at 7:35, no way they could make the deadline by that route.

Chancing surface streets instead, they encountered a string of green and yellow traffic lights, like an omen of goodwill, and arrived with just five minutes to spar