Work Text:
The thing Keith hated about being the new guy in LA was getting stuck with the shit-ass assignments. The assignments invariably involved talking to fans before and after games, and Keith had strict rules about who he would talk to. His preference was, of course, to talk to no one. In lieu of that, anyone with bodypaint was out, as was anyone wearing more than two articles of team apparel. He'd rather pick someone wearing an outdated jersey -- someone who knew the team, who had been following through good and bad.
That's how he ended up picking this kid. His hair was a little too long, he was a little on the scrawny side, but he had on this hat, this old, worn hat. You didn't get a hat like that as a hand-me-down, not if you were anything less than shit broke. (And if you were shit broke, you weren't at this post-season game.) You held on to a hat like that from when you were eight.
"Excuse me," he said to the kid, and when the kid turned around, that was when Keith realized this fourteen year old boy was more like a sixteen year old girl.
It made him kind of a sexist asshole, in retrospect, that his first reaction was disappointment. Keith had thought he'd found a good interview, but now it was looking more like he'd found the girlfriend of the kid who would have been a good interview. If nothing else, he could talk to her until the boyfriend showed up.
He didn't get to say anything before the girl said, "You're the new sports guy on the local station, aren't you?" She didn't give him a chance to answer. "My dad likes you. I could like you, but I think you try too hard. You don't have to act like an ass just to prove you're smarter than everyone else on the channel."
He should have been annoyed, but he was preoccupied with staring at her brown eyes, her crooked smile, and telling himself he was about fifteen years too old for her, regardless of the fact he still acted sixteen half the time.
"You don't talk as much in person," she said, crossing her arms, waiting. She was wearing a T-shirt, but not a team one. It said ACT UP, and he vaguely recalled the name from a few local stories about AIDS activists and acts of civil disobedience.
"I was looking for your boyfriend," Keith blurted out, because it was less likely to get him slapped than the brilliant observation of You're not wearing a bra.
The girl laughed. "You're going to be looking for a long time," she said. "I don't have one, and even if I did, I'm here by myself." Something flashed across her face, the lingering memory of lectures about how you don't give that much information to strange men. She held out her hand and said, "I'm Rachel."
"Keith," he said, because even though she already knew who he was, it seemed like the thing to do. He shook her hand and, when she smirked at his introduction, he reminded himself he was thirty. God, he was old. "I need a fan interview for the eleven o'clock. You looked promising."
"And then you saw I was a girl," she supplied. "I cut school to be here, you know. I think I can probably give as good an interview as my hypothetical boyfriend would have."
"You're not worried about getting in trouble for playing hooky?" He was pretty sure his cameraman, who had decidedly more seniority plus the responsibility of lugging around a heavy camera, was not amused.
She looked down at her shirt, and Keith was smart enough not to follow her gaze. "Considering what happened earlier this week? No."
He couldn't let that one go. "What happened?" he asked. Oh, yes, his cameraman was going to kill him. This wasn't even vaguely related to their assignment.
"You should consider watching the news," she said. "The people you work with, they might not be as smart as you, but there's some useful information on there. A lot of ACT UP demonstrators were arrested."
"Were you part of 'a lot'?" he asked. It was mostly rhetorical.
"I thought you wanted to talk baseball," she said.
You are thirty years old, he reminded himself.