The pulse and flow of the music surrounds you as you sit in the booth. The On Air sign is lit up above your head and your show partner from the last hour is outside, making obscene gestures at you through the window. You casually flip him off as you set up your time line and watch the phones. It's your second year at this school and they've given you a late night slot on air.
A solo late night slot.
Even so in the hour before you work with a first year. He wears stupid sunglasses even at eleven o'clock at night, but he's a pretty cool guy with a thick Texas drawl. It works well on the radio as he lilts and the way that his sentences are practically poetry rolling past his lips. Honestly you'd had a crush on him when you'd first seen him, but now you know better. He's cocky, like you are, and there's really only room for one smooth-talking cool kid in a relationship. And it's always you.
Plus the first rule of DJ-ing is that you never do anything with your show partner. Bad karma.
But he's left you to your own show at this point and you're the only one in the station.
It's a freeing feeling as you sit, working on writing a song of your own as the music plays. Soon the song comes to an end and you start to check the phone lines. Before you answer, you clear your throat and then smile. "Hello listeners, this is Daddy Dualscar. Who's calling?" It's kind of nice to use your real voice for once instead of the one you put on.
You answer the first call and the first few callers are just generic names, telling you how much they love your voice or your show or your music choices.
But caller number five is different. "Hello, listener, this is Daddy Dualscar. Who's calling?" A canned response, but your listeners seem to like it.
"Hello." The voice is soft, barely there.
"Hello, Hello. What has you calling?" You grin to yourself. You've been trained in the art of dad jokes since you were little, but you doubt that anyone listening caught that one.
"I've been... Sad. Lately." The voice sounds sad. A high timbre and a flowing, oratory voice. It must belong to someone used to public speaking. Possibly someone in student government.
"You've been sad? What's got you sad there, lad?" You never did catch a name. You hope that it's a man on the other end.
Silence. Dead air. You're supposed to cut the line after five seconds of dead air, but you feel like this caller needs you. Finally he speaks. "I've felt very alone..."
"Alone?"
"Yes... And. And your show... You kept me going til now. I just wanted to thank you and to let you know that I'm sorry."
"Sorry? Lad, no. Whatever it is you're going to do to yourself, don't."
You can hear him breathing on the other end. "Don't...? Why not?"
"Because, dear caller, if you do then I'll miss this voice of yours."
"You've... You've never heard me before."
"No, but I'd like to hear you again." You swallow, hoping that it's enough.
"You do?" You can practically hear the smile in his soft voice and you want to reach out and hug him through the line. To tell him that it's okay.
"I'd like it if you could call me. And to tell me what I can call you."
"Call me..." You hear a loud swallow. He must be nervous. "Signless."
"Signless?" You nod. "Signless, listen to me. You are wonderful and I'd like to talk to you again, okay?"
"Okay..."
"Call in again. Any night you'd like. But I'd like to hear from you at least once a week." Words that your therapist had told you as a boy. Words that kept you from hurting yourself. Words that kept you alive.
Words you hope will help Signless.
"Thank you."
"It's no problem, Signless. But I'm being motioned at to end my show, okay? I'll hear from you later. I hope that you're doing okay when I hear back from you."
"All right. Next... Next week. Same time." You can hear him tearing up.
"Now this isn't goodbye, this is just talk to you later."
"Okay... I'll. I'll talk to you later."
"Talk to you later, love." And without another word the line goes dead.
You sit for a few seconds to see if he's still there, but now it really is just dead air. So you prepare yourself and turn your personality back on. "Thank you for calling, Signless. Hope to hear back from you next week." You brush hair out of your eyes as you speak. "Now as for the rest of you, wigglers, this is Daddy Dualscar, getting off." You turn off your mic and you can hear the next show starting in your headphones before you take them out and leave the building.
There's a thick layer of snow on the ground. As expected from this shitty upper Midwestern weather... You trudge through the snow, wrapped up in your heavy leather jacket and then you sit in your car, lighting a cigarette to try and warm up. To no avail.
You really should know better at this point.
But you start your car and go through the process of letting it warm and scraping it off.
Fucking winter anyway.
You're heading for home, driving across a bridge over the river when you seem him.
He looks like he's about your age and he's sitting on the edge of the bridge.
You stop the car and trudge over to him, making sure you put on your best American accent. It's gotten easier for you since coming to the States. "Hey, chief. What're you doin' out here this time a night, huh?" You lean against the side of the bridge.
He turns his face and you can see trails where he'd been crying. "Pardon?"
His voice is shaky, which makes sense. He's only wearing a pair of jeans and a light turtleneck as he sits on the edge of the bridge. He must have walked here from the campus. "I asked what you're doin' out here." You lean against the edge of the bridge, staring down into the water.
He swallows and this time you realize that the shakiness in his voice is not from the cold at all. "I was going to jump." It's from fear.
"Jump? Why?"
"I hate myself and my life. No one seems to notice me anymore. All of my friends... They hate me. They ignore me." He stares down at icy depths below. "They tell me that I'm just a waste of oxygen and... And you can only take so much of that!" He practically shouts the last sentence and shakes his head. "Sorry. I'm sure that what I said could have been incredibly triggering. I hope that I didn't offend you with anything that I said."
You sigh and pull off your coat, slinging it over his shoulders. "Hey, now. We all get those days, yeah? You just gotta keep going. And if those friends a yours do that to you then they ain't your friends."
He pulls the coat around him. It's almost comically huge on him, but it just succeeds in making him look like a pale child under the moonlight. "I... I couldn't do it."
"What?"
"I couldn't jump..." He's shaking visibly. "I couldn't do it. How can I want to do it, but not be able to?" He looks at you and you can see the hurt in his eyes. He's asking for help. A total stranger. Twice in one night? This could hardly be a coincidence.
"It's because you want to live." You shrug a t-shirt clad shoulder and rub your arms, trying to stay warm. "You don't want to die. No one wants to die, honestly. It's just that some people don't want to deal with life anymore."
He swallows and you watch as his tears hit the denim of his jeans. "M-Maybe..."
"And you know what? You're not alone, okay?" You sit on the edge next to him, legs facing the street. "I just fuckin' met you and I can tell that you're a pretty cool guy."
"Thank you..." He smiles for the first time since you've seen him.
And, somehow, you know that this is the beginning of something big.
