Start reading Over to You by Georgie Tunny

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Prologue

‘ENOUGH.’

Carter breathed, unsure if the one-word sentence was fully audible or if her lungs had exhaled the syllables too quietly, in a final defeated wheeze.

She shivered. The movement was evidence of either her body shut­ting down, or the glacial temperatures in the television studio. Both were strong possibilities.

It wasn’t a large space. Much smaller than it looked on TV. Simply a room packed with self-operated cameras, all mounted on a slippery, reflective floor that appeared more liquid than solid.

At its centre, a large white desk, an oblong shape with no corners. Apparently corners were too pointed— they would indicate the program had a particular political agenda. At least, that’s what the network’s expensive design consultants said. To the right-hand side of the room was a bright orange, five-seater couch whose style was rapidly losing relevance. If she wasn’t so broken she may have chuckled at the perfect metaphor.

She’d rebuilt and rebranded herself to suit the latest trends over her entire career. And now? She’d become so lost in the iterations she had no idea who she was anymore.

Don’t have an opinion.

Pick a side.

Never show emotion.

Vulnerability is king.

Say something.

Say nothing.

The orders had changed almost as quickly as the news cycle. She thought she could handle it. Thought she’d relish the dynamism of it all.

Carter blinked. Her eyelids heavy. Her make-up artist had insisted she wear two sets of fake eyelashes now.

‘Carter, how will anyone listen to what you’re saying if they are too busy worrying you have alopecia?’

Every blink felt like a bicep curl.

The studio lights were blinding. They hummed relentlessly. Sometimes, they were so loud she was surprised the viewers at home didn’t hear them; it was like they were moments away from blowing up with every story.

Carter’s co-host shuffled his papers absentmindedly. Tyler Petrie was a three-time-Walkley-award winning presenter. He was also completely oblivious to her presence. Resolutely staring at anything but her. Standard practice.

A producer’s voice filled her numb head, via her custom-moulded earpiece, telling her to prepare for the next bulletin. But the floor manager raised an eyebrow at her. He was standing behind the main camera. His kind, wrinkled face illuminated by the light from the autocue.

She had said it, then. Aloud.

Enough.

It was a word that plagued her. A sentiment that stalked her. Like one of her internet trolls.

‘Right.’

She picked up her plain black biro and stood up, leaving everything else strewn across the news desk. Scripts, newspapers, her affirmation of the day. Just keep swimming.

A cartoon blue fish popped into her mind momentarily. She blinked it away. The dishonesty.

She was drowning. She had been for a while now.

Carter kept the messy parts of herself— the ones with rough edges that scratched at her throat, fighting for air— sealed in carefully stacked boxes.

Her job.

Her relationship.

Her friends.

Her family.

Her self.

One on top of another. Towers of live bombs, each awaiting their unique triggers.

Dave, the floor manager, motioned at her wildly to sit down. His arms rotated up and down, back and forth, waving frantically in every direction, before finally coming to a stop in mid-air, in front of him— hands facing outwards, palms facing Carter, like he had some kind of magical power. One that could freeze her in place.

He didn’t understand, though. She’d been frozen for weeks now. Months, even. When had the nightmares first started?

Too scared to move. Too desperate to exhale. Too proud to frown.

Her whole career could be summed up in two words: too much. Alternatively: not enough.

She could still feel her boss’s spittle on her cheeks. The foaming dots she’d shot at Carter as she’d issued her latest order to ‘Get the fuck over it!’ Warm, at first contact. But then, just wet.

She replayed the interaction from mere minutes ago in her head. Each word crashing into her ego, with such force she thought she could feel her spine shake.

‘Carter, I pay you to swim, not sink. So let go of the fucking anchor you’re holding and kick those sizeable calves of yours!’

She swallowed quickly. Her stomach rolling as she used one of those calves to push her dodgy chair out of the way, its broken wheel catching on a join in the shiny floor.

‘Back in five, four . . .’ Dave whispered pleadingly. His hands still straining towards her. His fingers were shaking at the effort.

Carter ignored him.

She remembered to pull down the hem of her bodycon dress so that it covered slightly more of her upper thighs. She didn’t want a rogue arse cheek falling out and spoiling her poised escape. Especially when there were so many cameras.

Carter had taken another four steps towards the exit before Tyler even noticed something was awry.

‘Where are you going?’ he seethed, colour draining from his heavily bronzed face. His hazel eyes looked darker than usual, almost black in spite of the overly lit studio.

‘Dave! Dave! Where the fuck is she going?’

She was indifferent to his tone, to his panic. She had already decided she loathed him. What he’d done to her . . . She could never forgive him. Would never.

Carter honestly thought if he miraculously caught fire in the studio, right now, she would fan the flames with her hands, her arms, her breath. Anything she could do to keep the inferno swirling.

‘Back in three,’ Dave squeaked. The older man was frantically whis­pering into the headset’s microphone. It was attached to a battery pack, holstered at Dave’s hip. His sun-damaged fingers were jamming down various buttons at its side. He must have been giving the control room a play-by-play of her escape. His wild eyes never leaving Carter’s fleeing frame.

‘Two— ’

She refused to meet Dave’s grey eyes. She focused instead on not stacking it in the six-inch suede pumps that pinched at her pinky toes.

Carter’s eyes started prickling. She pushed the familiar feeling aside. She would not cry in this studio. Not again.

She marched past the Weather Wall— a hugely expensive, large screen that showed the forecast temperatures for Australia’s capital cities in highly saturated colour. She could vaguely hear Tyler demanding answers from Dave. Not politely. The unkindness steadied her. She kept going.

She made sure to avoid the booth in the middle of the room. Sly was on the autocue shift today. If she saw him and his perfect face, wrinkled in concern for her, she would crumple.

She just had to ‘keep swimming’ . . . right out the door.

‘One.’

‘Welcome back to The Morning Stretch, I’m Tyler Petrie and this is . . . erm . . . let’s begin with our top story— ’

Carter made it out of the studio before Tyler finished his sentence.

She made it out of the building before he’d finished the bulletin.

She clenched her jaw as she click-clacked all the way to her car, which was parked just outside the station’s front doors.

There was no one else on the street. No cars or trams. The sun was only just starting to rise.

Carter ripped her stupid heels off and threw them into the back seat, her toes unfurling in relief. She tumbled into the front seat, strapped herself in, gripped the steering wheel until her knuckles turned white, and started to scream.

Extracted from Over to You by Georgie Tunny, out now.

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Over to You

by Georgie Tunny

Take the ambitious competitiveness of The Devil Wears Prada, mix it with the complex female friendships of Big Little Lies and throw in the high-stakes drama of The Morning Show and the result is Georgie Tunny's gripping debut which rips back the glossy curtain on television news.

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