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CHAPTER 1
"WHEN I THINK OF YOU, I think of death." Laura Walsh, carefully balancing a stack of videotapes in her arms, turned to her boss and grinned.
"Gee, thanks, Mike. I really appreciate that." She'd done it again. Sometimes it bothered her how much satisfaction she took from it. Professional satisfaction. She'd been prepared and had done her work well.
A human death. Usually, a sad event, leaving complicated repercussions for those left behind. But for Laura Walsh, death was a rush, at least in certain circumstances.
Today, it was an old movie star, long rumored to be failing. Laura had been ready to roll. Within minutes of the death announcement made by the actress's press agent, a two-minute video package re- capping the screen legend's life was running on the KEY Television Network for millions of viewers to see.
If they thought of it at all, the TV audience probably marveled at how quickly the television newspeople got everything assembled and on the air. So much research must go into deciding what to include and what to leave out when boiling a lifetime down to two minutes. Let alone coming up with a script. Didn't that take some time to write? Just getting the old movie clips had to be a project. How did they do it all at almost a moment's notice?
The fact was, they didn't. Laura Walsh had written and produced the movie star's obituary months before she actually died. "Ghoulish," "creepy," "gross," "morbid," were just some of the comments Laura got from people when she told them what she did for a living. But Laura loved her job. When working on her selected project - or "victim," as Mike Schultz called it- Laura did not think of herself as the "Angel of Death" her co-workers teasingly dubbed her. Rather, she saw herself in a position of responsibility. She wanted to do her subject justice, knowing that the images she chose would be seen across the United States and, eventually, through the various and complicated syndication deals that KEY News had with foreign broadcasters, her work would be seen around the world.
The obits were wrap-ups of a noteworthy person's life and career. A mini-biography. She knew others at KEY News might think her corny, but Laura felt honored to produce the videotaped obituaries.
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