A Touched by an Angel Story

By: Yvette Jessen

The pile of papers could have reached the sky as Andrew ambled into the room. So this is my new assignment, the Angel of Death thought as a woman came running up to him and nearly ran him over. "Excuse me, Sir," she offered out of breath as she gave him the once over. "Are you Andrew by any chance?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I am, but I don't believe we've met," the angel responded all the while wondering who this woman was and how come she knew his name.

"My name is Sandra Wilkinson, I'm the head of this television station and we have been waiting since practically forever for you to get here. We have to go on for a special newscast and our regular broadcaster is at a newscaster's convention across town."

"And it's not possible to get him back or at the very least, to get someone with more experience to go on in his place?" Andrew asked.

"Not someone with as much visual appeal as he's got. Our viewers like to look at good looking guys," Sandra said smiling.

Andrew flushed crimson, his green eyes literally starting to roll. "What kind of channel is this, if I may be so bold as to ask?"

"As you know the call letters are OFW, and we're on the local and satellite cable system. We're one of the most popular channels, and our newscasts tend to get hundreds of calls per day from single women wanting to go out on a date with our anchormen."

"Why is that?" Andrew asked softly. "I mean, what difference does it make who gives the newscasts?"

"Is this a trick question or have you even been listening to me?" Sandra asked.

"No, but maybe I will better understand when you tell me what the letters OFW mean," Andrew said, all the while sighing as a station hand came over to him and affixed a microphone to the lapel of his beige jacket.

"You need some color in your cheeks, Sugar," one of the other women said, and before he could object or even get an answer to his inquiry, she had toted him off to a make up table and began to apply some makeup to his cheeks. This stuff had the same consistency as plaster and smelled a funky mixture of baby powder and chocolate mousse.

Sighing, Andrew remained seated as the woman finished her task of putting the makeup on him. "Is everything OK, Sugar?" She crooned softly in his ear when she saw his contemplative face.

"No, none of my questions are being answered," Andrew sighed. "I'm supposed to go on the air this afternoon and have no idea what I'm reporting on or who I'm reporting to."

"Well, the news doesn't stop, Sugar…" the makeup artist replied completely oblivious to anything he had said, but her voice trailed off when he interrupted her.

"…Please call me Andrew," he said, all the while hoping that his voice did not have the indignant tone he figured it carried whenever someone had the audacity to call him 'Andy'.

"OK; Andrew, but what do you want to know?" She asked as she began to comb his hair.

"First, what does OFW mean?" Andrew asked.

"Only For Women. We're the network that gives the news that women can get into," she answered. "Why else do you suppose that we have men giving the news? Women don't watch other women reporting the news unless they offer something visually pleasing to look at. Most of my friends have the attention span of a ant," she shrugged her shoulders as she finished styling his hair and began to shake an aerosol can and apply a massive amount of hairspray to his blonde locks of hair. "You look great, Sug…I mean, Andrew."

He glanced over and looked in the mirror, his face a depiction of someone who had just been told that they would have to bungee jump from the Brooklyn Bridge in the middle of January.

"Is our newscaster finished?" Sandra came over and looked at Andrew. "Sorry that there is no time for you to rehearse the news. Just do your best, and if you get tongue tied, then add-lib the words, 'this just in'."

Andrew sighed again for what appeared to be the twentieth time, and took his space behind the newscasters' desk.

"All you have to do is read the print on the paper," the woman who was working the sound system said as she got right up into his face to test the microphone, her breath a strange mixture of spearmint gum and chili-cheese-dogs. She blew across the object, and once he heard the static cackle resonating from it, he knew that she had been successful with that part of the sound check. At the same time, the entire scenario gave him the distinct impression that he was in a college classroom and was about to give a dissertation on the ways not to run a newscast.

"Now give us a test, Andy," the woman who had breathed against his microphone said.

"It's Andrew, I don't like being called Andy," he said trying to keep his voice level.

The woman seemed to ignore the words because within a few agonizing moments, they could all hear the words of the announcer as she spoke. "We interrupt our regularly scheduled program to bring you this special report. We take you now, live to the newsroom where our hunky newscaster is waiting to give you ladies the latest."

As the camera shot to Andrew, it was obvious that he had heard the woman's words and he took a deep breath and let it out slowly. His face now the same color as a tomato left out in the sun too long. It was completely obvious that the plastered on makeup did not do any good to conceal the overwhelming redness that emanated from his crimson face. If truth were known, he now looked the role of the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland, as opposed to being an angel of God.

Seconds slowly ticked by when he saw that the green light over the camera was on and the object was now directed at him. Andrew's gaze moved to the woman behind the camera who was waving her hands frantically as a means to get him to start talking. "Good evening. I mean; of course good afternoon…this just in." He stammered, his gaze now on Sandra who was standing in the corner of the room with her hand slapped over her face.

As she raised her head and he studied her face for a split second, he could tell that the expression she carried on her face clearly said: 'who hired this dolt? Oh yeah, it was me…how could I be so stupid?'

Andrew was now completely ill at ease with the situation, but he looked down at the notes that were placed in front of him. "This just in…they are all dead…" His voice trailed off and his thoughts were now racing. 'Who's dead? I'm an Angel of Death, I'd have been informed if someone had died.' The color drained from his face and he looked at Sandra expecting to get some sort of help.

"Keep reading," Sandra looked at him.

Andrew looked down at the paper. "…Every piece of electronic equipment is dead. The satellite dishes, the VCRs, the toasters, and even the high-speed Internet connections have all been affected. It is as though someone had come along and pulled the entire electronic community out of the wall socket. This may explain why it is you can't send the station an email, because it's all dead. Don't even bother trying to reset your VCRs when everything starts to work again, simply because not even your husband's can do that successfully." Andrew looked up all the while wondering if all the electronic equipment was dead, then how were they broadcasting this foolish report?

He cleared his throat once again and began to speak, thus trying to block out the strange thoughts that had been filtering through his mind since arriving at this building. What on earth was going on, and why was he here? Am I the Angel of Death for a Pentium computer?

"Read the report," Sandra mouthed to him for what appeared to be the umpteenth time and he sighed and continued to read the report.

"We take you now out into the city where Monica is talking to the head of the largest Internet community in the city. Take it away Monica."

As the camera stopped rolling, Andrew looked at Sandra. "Watch the monitor," the head of the station said and suddenly Monica was on the street with another woman. Behind them, the entire street was in chaos, cars were honking and no one could make out anything that was being said, although Andrew figured that it looked remotely like New York City in the middle of rush hour (complete with rudeness).

Once things seemed to be remotely quieter where she was standing, Monica spoke.

"Good afternoon, Andrew. I am standing here now with Ms. Lyons, the head of the largest Internet company in the city. Ms. Lyons, could you please tell our viewers what happened this afternoon?"

"Well, easily put, we blew a fuse," came the answer.

"Yes, well, is that all?”

“No, I had to send my secretary to the pharmacy for aspirin, but I suppose my health is of no concern to your viewers,” she rambled on.

“How does all of this affect your work?" Monica asked.

"Yes, well it doesn't help things. Headaches that is,” she stopped and cleared her throat. “Well, anyway, whoever it was that said that electronics were easy have obviously never tried to program a VCR to record something that only aired at three in the morning."

"Excuse me?” Monica looked perplexed. “OK, can you tell us what specifically happened with the fuse blowing?"

"If I knew that, we wouldn't be having so many problems now, would we?" The answer came almost immediate. "All I know is that we have had more users contacting me today to complain that something is not working than in the past six months all together."

"I see, and what are you doing to solve the problem?" Monica asked.

"Advil," Ms. Lyons responded with a wave of her hand. "Oh, you mean with the computer problems. Well, I'm telling people to just be patient while we work on getting all the bugs out. But if you ask me, I think that it must be a bigger problem, because on my way here this afternoon, not one of the crosswalks was working properly. It's as though someone has pulled the plug on the entire city, and anything operated by power has taken the brunt of it. It’s time to pull out those bicycles folks."

"How would be broadcast if that was the case?" Monica asked.

"Heck if I know,” Ms. Lyons said. “But if you ask me, I have seen a lot of people with less brains than the scarecrow from 'The Wizard of Oz' doing an awful lot of talking. Hey, and these words probably only will reach one or two people."

"What do you suggest we do if this is a computer problem?" Monica asked.

"Your guess is as good as mine, and if there has been a power outage, then I can tell you right now that these computer glitches are not in my department. You’d have to ask my co-worker, Brian Smitherspoon, but he and his family left for Bermuda this morning. They’ll be gone for the next three weeks.”

“So where does that leave us?” Monica asked.

“I don’t know, but you know what I always say?”

“What do you always say?”

“Computers are sometimes like canker sores."

"How do you figure?" Monica asked.

"Well, they may be one little itty bitty problem at first, but then they start to grow and then hurt like the dickens. Sometimes, they have a habit of spreading…and well, you get the idea," the woman said shrugging her shoulders.

"I see, well, there you have it…I think…now back to Andrew in the studio," Monica said.

What do you have? This newscast is crazy, Andrew mused under his breath all the while shaking his head. "I mean; why stop an entire program for this?"

"Just move on to the next story," Sandra said with exasperation as she looked at him.

Andrew nodded and put the paper to one side and began to read the page that was now on top. "Our next breaking story, Hurricane Tess has been sighted heading for the west coast…hey wait a minute, there are no hurricanes on the west coast…"

"Just read the paper, Sugar and leave the science to someone else…" Sandra said and Andrew sighed.

Sometimes I really start to wonder why it is that God sends an angel to do these kinds of jobs, he thought. I guess that will remain unknown as this story…"Hey, now who went and turned off the lights…?"

"…No, it's not the lights, we blew a fuse, Sugar…"

In the darkness, Andrew released a pent up sigh. "…Call me Andrew…"

The End

Back