Lucky Caller(24)

“Oh, so that’s why you host the way you do—it’s a conscious choice to not be funny and interesting,” I said. For some reason, I was weirdly annoyed on Jamie’s behalf.

“Okay.” Joydeep feigned surprise. “Is it ‘pick on Joydeep’ night again? Did I miss that notification?”

“I’m just saying,” I replied. “You can be funny and interesting in real life. Like, you have the capacity. But you become all weird and wooden whenever the light goes on.”

“Technically, it’s whenever the light goes off,” Sasha said.

“Sorry?”

“On the soundboard. When the light is off, it’s broadcasting. Remember Mr. Tucker said it’s like the opposite of what you’d think?”

Running the audio control board is not difficult, Mr. Tucker had told us. It looks like there’s a lot going on, but really there are only a couple of things you need to worry about. You’ve got sliders for volume—the music and the mics all have their own sliders—and the buttons underneath that broadcast them. The sliders? No big deal. Slide up to increase volume, slide down to decrease. The buttons, though, you’ve got to keep in mind. Look here all the way on the left of the board—this is the slider for the main mic. See how the button underneath is lit up right now? Press it down, and it’s not lit—this means your mic is on. When you’re done talking, slide the dial down, press the button again, it lights back up. It’s now off. You have to keep this in mind, okay, because it’s the opposite of the big old sign outside the studio that says ON-AIR. That sign’s lit? You’re broadcasting. This button is lit? You’re not broadcasting. The sign outside is not what puts your voice on-air, okay, that just indicates what’s going on inside the studio to people outside the studio. It’s this button right here that tells the tale.

“That’s what I meant,” I said.

Sasha just looked at me, and then we both looked at the soundboard.

The button for Joydeep’s mic was not lit. Not even a little bit. Not that a partially lit button was even an option; it was very much a binary. Press it down, and it’s not lit—this means your mic is on.

The horror on Sasha’s face was probably reflected right back on mine.

“Uh-oh,” I said weakly.



* * *



I got them. I broke Colby.

We all stood staring at the monitor as our archive file played back.

Congratulations?

Now I just gotta get Sammy.

“Is that what I sound like on the radio?” Joydeep murmured.

“No,” Sasha murmured back. “You sound like a robot whose motherboard is slowly melting.”

“How did this happen?” Joydeep said.

“I got switched up,” I said, like that somehow justified it.

“You weren’t switched up before!”

“That’s what switched up means—I knew what it was before but I just got it backward this time! I wasn’t paying attention, okay?”

Jamie shook his head mournfully. “Tucker’s gonna flunk us when he hears this.”

“It’s not that bad,” Joydeep said.

“Every time we thought music was playing, it was just broadcasting us sitting here talking! And every time we thought we were broadcasting a link, it’s just silence!”

“We could say we were … experimenting with a new format,” Joydeep suggested.

“What about the part where you admitted to sending fake shit into Cat Chat?” Jamie replied.

“Ahh.” Joydeep looked chagrined. “In that case, I guess it is that bad.”

“Unless…” I said.

“What?”

Technically, it wasn’t a good thing to do. But that didn’t necessarily make it a bad idea. “We delete the file.”

The three of them blinked at me.

“We’ll get a zero for not archiving,” Sasha said.

“We could get kicked off the air if he actually listens.”

“She’s right,” Joydeep said.

Jamie’s brow was wrinkled. “We shouldn’t.”

“Let’s vote.” Joydeep threw his hand in the air. “All for deleting?”

I raised my hand, studiously ignoring Jamie’s gaze. Sasha looked between me and Jamie and then sighed, raising her hand too.

“Great.”

“Wait. It should be unanimous,” Jamie said, reaching out as I went for the mouse.

“We never specified that.”

“We didn’t not specify it either.”

“That makes no sense,” Sasha said.

Jamie squeezed his eyes shut. “Just … Let’s vote again.”

“Fine. Who doesn’t care if it’s unanimous?” Joydeep asked. The three of us raised our hands again.

“Sorry, Waldo,” Joydeep said, and then to me: “Send it to hell.”





20.


WE GOT THE NOD FROM Mr. Tucker at the end of class on Friday. The stay where you are nod. The we have things to discuss nod.

I could hear the hustle and bustle of the hallway, the footsteps and shouts of a midafternoon class commute, but it was quiet among the four of us as Mr. Tucker joined us in the back, where we had taken to sitting together since the first class. He settled atop one of the desks, the hem of his pants shifting up to reveal socks patterned with bottles of ketchup and mustard. His face belied the whimsy of the socks.