Waffles was sitting on my lap—we’d discovered the hard way that he had a tendency to growl at either the boom mic or the boom mic operator; we still weren’t sure which, and as the time of the interview got closer and closer, I found myself smoothing down his ears nervously, which he thankfully didn’t seem to mind.
“Okay,” Jill said, clapping her hands together as she looked at us. Waffles jumped at the sound, and I ran my hand over his back, trying to calm him down. “Are we set, Grant family? We’re going to be live in”—she glanced at her tablet—“four minutes, so I need to make sure we’re prepped.”
“Where’s Jackson?” Liz called from the doorway.
“He’s getting ready,” Jill called back, her voice tight with tension. “So, like I mentioned, this isn’t a super-long segment—we’re going to go through the questions and answers we talked about. And don’t worry,” she added, glancing down at her tablet again, then speaking much faster. “Jackson’s a pro, so he’ll be guiding this whole thing. Okay? Great.” She turned and left the room without waiting for a response, speaking into her walkie as she went.
“So, this will be fun,” J.J. said after a pause in which the enormity of what we were about to do seemed to hit us all simultaneously.
“You guys will be great!” Jenny W. called from the doorway, holding up her mimosa glass and winking at J.J.
“Totally,” Jenny K. echoed.
“Okay, then, here we go!” Jill said, returning, her voice bright and cheerful, even though she was speaking twice as fast as she had been before. She gestured behind her, and Jackson Goodman came into the room. He was taller than he looked on TV—but he had the same close-cropped black hair and the same blindingly white teeth. For some reason, there were two tissues tucked into either side of his shirt. The Jennys waved at him and Liz pulled out her phone and started snapping pictures. “Jackson’s here, and we’re just about ready to roll, so is everyone set? Great,” Jill said without waiting for an answer. The crew was moving a lot faster now that Jackson had arrived—there seemed to be more of them than there had been just a moment before, everyone hustling around, and a chair was produced from somewhere and placed in the center of the room.
“Hi,” Jackson said, giving us all a bright smile. “I’m Jackson Goodman.”
We all nodded at him, just staring mutely, and Rodney was the one who recovered fastest. “Right,” he said, nodding a few too many times. “Hi.”
“It’s such an honor to be here in your lovely home,” Jackson said, looking around at all of us and holding eye contact with everyone. He seemed to blink less than normal people. I figured maybe it was an anchorperson thing.
“Thanks,” I murmured back, now looking a little nervously at the cameras that were pointing our way and getting closer, the camera crew pushing them into place. I didn’t watch Good Morning America all that often, but I knew who Jackson Goodman was, and he was sitting in our family room, only a few feet away from me. I glanced up at the lights and the boom guy standing just out of frame and felt my palms start to sweat. I quickly wiped them on the dog.
“Jackson, we’re going in two,” Jill said, glancing at her tablet. She gestured to one of the PAs, who handed her nine copies of the Stanwich Sentinel, which she fanned out on the coffee table. “Prompter is ready for you, and these are for the final shot, where we’ll film the family reading the paper. Then we’ll cut from you to a slide of the strip itself. Sound good?”
“Sounds great,” Jackson said. He had the same peppy demeanor that he had on TV, and I wasn’t sure if it was just the way he was, or if this would drop the minute he went outside to his temporary trailer.
I’d thought everyone was moving fast before, but it was like things went into hyperspeed, as crew members were practically running as they moved plants, adjusted lights, and hair and makeup people descended on Jackson, calling for “last looks.”
“Don’t worry,” Jackson said, his eyes closed as his face got powdered. “I promise this isn’t going to be painful.” The makeup artist stepped back, pulled the tissues from his shirt, and hustled away just as Jill shushed the group standing out of the shot.
“And if we could have quiet,” Jill said, eyes fixed on her tablet. “We’re being patched in live in five . . . four . . .”
I smoothed my hair down quickly, then the dog’s ears, and then Jill was pointing at us, and the red light on the center camera flashed on.
“Welcome to ‘The Family Behind Grant Central Station,’ ” Jackson said smoothly, straight to camera, and I felt myself staring into the lens, not blinking, thinking of all the people on the other side of it staring back at me. The lines Kevin had read were now scrolling on a little screen next to the center camera. I noticed my mouth suddenly felt very dry. “I’m Jackson Goodman. I’m here in the Connecticut home of the cartoonist Eleanor Grant, where she and her family have lived for more than two decades. We’re here to talk about the wildly popular comic strip Grant Central Station, which came to an end this morning—and to meet the people behind your favorite cartoon family.”
He looked at my mother expectantly, and a moment later, she seemed to realize this. The screen was flashing the line my mother had practiced saying—Welcome to our home. We’re so happy to have you here. But from the way my mother was squinting, I realized, much too late, that she didn’t have her glasses on. “Welcome?” she said, leaning forward to look at the screen, sounding incredibly unsure. “It’s . . . happy you’re here. Eleanor.” She frowned for a moment, then shook her head, and I realized she must have just read her name on the prompter like it was part of what she was supposed to say. “I’m so sorry about that,” she said, and I noticed her cheeks were bright pink. “I’m Eleanor. You’re Jackson.”
I heard a muffled, kind of squeaking sound and looked down, thinking it was the dog, only to realize that it was Linnie, pressing her lips together very hard, and I recognized the unmistakable signs of my sister getting the giggles. Rodney had clearly noticed too, as his smile had gotten a little frozen and he was patting Linnie’s hand while shooting her looks that clearly said, Keep it together.
“Eleanor,” Jackson went on, smiling like nothing was amiss, “you’ve been drawing a version of your family for twenty-five years. What has been your favorite part of the journey?”
Linnie burst into laughter, then clamped her hand over her mouth. “I’m sorry,” she said, looking stricken, but not like she was going to stop herself from laughing. “So sorry.” She put on a very serious face, one that cracked immediately. “It’s just . . . ,” she said, then took a big breath, clearly trying to get herself under control. “You said journey.”
“I . . . did,” Jackson said, still smiling, glancing toward the teleprompter like it might help him.
“It’s just that we had a band last night,” my dad jumped in.
“So to speak,” J.J. said, shaking his head.
“And they were a Journey cover band,” my dad went on, which seemed to set Linnie off again. “You know, like the band? Journey?”
“Right,” Jackson said, his tone getting a little more steely, even though his expression remained as smiley as ever. I glanced away briefly to see it looked like Jill had dropped her tablet and had both hands in her hair, like she was contemplating tearing it out. “So. Eleanor. You famously based the characters in your comic on your real family. What are the biggest differences between you and the characters in the strip?”
We all turned to Danny, who was supposed to answer here with an anecdote about how Donny was a slob but he wasn’t. But Danny was looking down, his shoulders shaking, and I realized that Linnie had just passed on her giggles to him. “Hrm,” he said, like he was trying to clear his throat and pull himself together. “I’m different,” he said, clearly trying to get a grip, which was manifesting in Danny talking more slowly and about an octave lower than he normally did. It was like he was suddenly imitating Darth Vader, and I could feel laughter start to build somewhere in the back of my throat. “I mean . . .” He cleared his throat again, and I could see that he was fighting against cracking up. “Not—I’m not messy.”