Lucky Caller(26)

“Yeah, right,” Sasha said. “Who here knows a celebrity?”

Jamie looked my way, and unfortunately, Joydeep clocked it.

“What?” Joydeep said.

Jamie just shook his head, looking apologetic, and I remembered our conversation about my dad: I just want to leave him and everything out of it. I don’t want it to be about that.

“What?” Joydeep said again. “You guys are doing that thing.”

“What thing?”

“That thing where you communicate with your eyes.”

“We don’t do that,” Jamie said.

“You definitely do,” Sasha replied, glancing at Joydeep. “I noticed it really early on.”

“Same, and let’s definitely circle back to that, but in the meantime, which celebrity do you know?”

“He’s not—” I shook my head. Sighed. “It’s my dad. But he’s not a celebrity.”

“He kind of is, though,” Jamie said gently. “Here, at least.”

“What? Why?” Joydeep looked between us, head swinging back and forth like he was watching a tennis match. “What’s he do? Is he an actor? Does he do the news?” His eyes widened. “Is he a serial killer?”

“How are those your top three kinds of celebrities?” Sasha said.

“He’s … I mean. Technically. He’s…” I mumbled.

“Sorry?”

“A … radio host.”

“What?” Joydeep said.

“A radio host,” I repeated.

“No, I heard you, I just can’t believe you have an actual radio host as your literal next of kin and our show is as shitty as it is.”

“Hey!”

“It’s flowing through your veins, Nina! You should be a goddamn ringer, but instead, after three complete shows you can’t even keep track of the fact that ‘light off’ means broadcasting and ‘light on’ means not broadcasting!”

“Hey,” Jamie said, suddenly stern.

“I’m sorry.” Joydeep looked at me, eyes imploring. “I am. It’s just … We have to do something.”

“I thought you didn’t care about the show,” Sasha said.

Joydeep looked away. “I became … more invested.”

“Because Tucker might flunk us?” Jamie said.

“Yes. For sure. I can’t flunk, I need a good final transcript. But also…” Joydeep trailed off.

“Also what?”

He looked suddenly uncomfortable. “We kind of … put a wager on it.”

“Who?”

“Me and Colby and a couple other guys in class,” he said. “For most-listened show. We put a bet on it before the whole … Cat Chat breakdown this week. Whoever has the lowest listenership has to buy everyone else’s tickets for prom. And I can’t stress to you how much I can’t do that, so we have to do well.”

“Why did you agree to it if you can’t do it?”

“That’s the whole point of a bet. It has to hurt to lose,” he said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Jamie frowned. “But—”

“But,” Joydeep continued, “it only hurts if you lose. So we can’t lose.”

“Is that why you were messing with their show?” Sasha asked. “Sabotage?”

“No, I did that because it was hilarious. It actually had the opposite effect. More people are listening to them than ever, which completely sucks.”

“Maybe we should have a bogus advice section,” Jamie said thoughtfully. “You’re a lot funnier thinking up fake questions than you are trying to do the weather and stuff.”

“Hey!”

“Welcome to the show, this show, on the station you are listening to,” Sasha replied in a wooden, not-inaccurate impression of Radio Joydeep.

“Point taken.” Joydeep turned back to me. “What’s your dad do on the radio, then?”

“He has a morning show. They just talk about random stuff, play music, do games and things.” This morning they gave away concert tickets with a game called Guess That Sound: Animal or Adult Video? Edition. It was about as highbrow as you’d expect. “It’s not even here, though. The show got bought a few years ago, and he moved to California.”

“Do a lot of people listen?” Joydeep asked.

“I mean, I guess? It’s a bigger market there, which is why he moved. But he’s not, like, a celebrity celebrity.” He had interviewed some famous singers and bands before, had hosted big concerts for the radio station and stuff. But it wasn’t like he was out there getting recognized on a daily basis—that was kind of a main feature of radio fame.

“He used to be on-air here, though?” Joydeep said.

“Yeah. 99.5, in the mornings.”

Joydeep nodded slowly, wheels turning. “We can say he’s a local celebrity. A hometown hero back on the airwaves.”

“He’s not even local anymore, though, is kind of the main point,” I said, but Joydeep wasn’t listening.

“A hometown hero returning triumphant!”

I looked to Jamie and Sasha for help. To my surprise, Jamie was nodding too. “We could interview him on-air. And maybe he could visit our class or something, give a talk about being in the business for real. That could score us some points with Tucker.”