3. Lily
CHAPTER THREE
LILY
Last Semester
W hen Beth first started the podcast Seek and You Shall Find , she ran it out of her student accommodation with very basic equipment.
Now that it had gone from a uni podcast to a national show, the university provided us with the use of their recording studio at the campus radio station.
The caveat was that we had to stick to a strict schedule.
It was a professional setup, much like you’d find in any professional radio station.
A large booth for recording and all the recording equipment in a room separated by soundproof glass.
Kenny, one of the station producers, managed the sound and recording for us for a fee.
We all took turns editing, but Sierra did the final production.
“Ready?” Kenny asked into his mic. We heard his question through our headsets and gave him our go-ahead to start recording.
I always got a wee case of butterflies before we started a show.
While I did the outreach to listeners who wanted to call in for advice and had a general idea of what they were going to ask, listeners often went off on tangents.
Sometimes we never knew where the discussion would take us.
Today the butterflies were for something else entirely.
For weeks, a rival podcast, Potterrow Blokes , had been encroaching on our territory with a deliberate spitefulness that was driving us bonkers.
After a lot of back-and-forth, we’d finally gotten them to agree to speak on the podcast. A laptop sat in the center of the table and Madison was getting ready to connect to the Zoom call with them.
I didn’t want it to turn into a national argument, but I also wanted to know who the arseholes were behind the denigration and mocking of a show I’d worked extremely hard on.
With a small smile at Sierra and Maddie, I leaned into the mic. “Welcome to Seek and You Shall Find .”
Maddie hit the button on the Zoom call. It connected as I continued, “I’m Lily, and both Sierra and Maddie are joining me because we have a special episode today.
After weeks of our podcast being used as fodder in the Potterrow Blokes ’ attempt to profit off our success, I called them out last week and dared them to come on the show.
While it turns out they’re too cowardly to come into the studio, one of them has agreed to chat with us via Zoom.
And for the folks listening at home, we’re not staring at one of the Potterrow Blokes ’ faces right now.
We’re staring at a screensaver of the Hulk taking Thor up the arse.
If the expression on the Asgardian’s face is anything to go by … he’s actually really into it.”
Maddie and Sierra gave a bark of laughter. I could even hear Kenny chuckling in my ears.
Good. I wanted to set the exact right tone for this.
A deep, American accented male voice spoke from the laptop. “I’d like to say that the screensaver is not mine and I have no idea how to change it.”
Right.
Cowards.
I should’ve known they wouldn’t show their faces. My agitation got the better of me and I had a bite in my voice as I asked, “And to whom are we speaking?”
“I’m Elijah.”
I narrowed my eyes. His accent seemed to slip on his name.
“Well, Elijah, thanks for being on the show today. I guess I wanted to chat about the stupid rivalry between us, instigated by yourselves. Why do you feel there’s only space for one dating podcast at the university?”
“I don’t think that at all.”
The nape of my neck prickled. I felt like I’d heard that voice somewhere before. “That’s surprising to me, considering how much you guys have gone out of your way to discredit our show. It certainly feels like you don’t want to share this space with women. Are you misogynists?”
“Certainly not!” He sounded insulted.
I knew his voice from somewhere.
“Is it me, or is your voice familiar?”
“No. We’ve never met,” Elijah responded hurriedly.
“He answered that a little too fast,” Maddie said, giving me a look as if to say, “You’re on to something here.”
“I did not. Look, did you bring me on to interrogate me, or can we talk about putting this daft competitiveness to rest?”
Uh! The effrontery of him making it out like we’d started this moronic war.
“Daft?” Sierra butted in, expression gleeful. “I knew it! I thought I could hear a British accent coming through. He’s putting on a fake American accent!”
“Aha!” I knew there was something fishy about his voice.
Elijah’s twang got even more twangy. “I am not.”
Sierra scoffed. “Oh, really? Where in America are you from?”
“California.”
I watched Sierra as she rapid-fired questions at him. “Where?”
“Santa Barbara.”
“How long did you live there?”
“Jesus, are we really doing this?”
“Definitely a fake accent,” Sierra decided with certainty. She was right. I could hear the Britishness leaking through. “So fake! He’s a fake!”
“I’m not listening to this childish rubbish.”
“Rubbish? Daft? Only the Brits say rubbish and daft .”
Maddie raised her hands to get our attention. “Uh, guys, he hung up.”
“See? Totally faking it!”
I winced at Sierra’s outrage. We’d completely lost the calm, rational, mature tone I’d been hoping to maintain throughout the interview so that we looked like the calm, rational, mature podcasters in this scenario. Wonderful.
“Okay, can we lower the volume, please?” I sighed heavily. “Well, there you have it, folks. Elijah from Potterrow Blokes is not only a thief, he’s a coward and maybe even an impostor.”
“It is now my mission in life to find out who these guys are,” Sierra announced. “This feels personal. Like a vendetta against one of us.”
“I’m voting you,” Maddie cracked.
“Uh, why me? It could be Lily.”
“No. Never. Lily is like the nicest person ever.”
“Shucks, thanks.” I grinned as I shoved my bestie affectionately.
While she chuckled, Sierra huffed. “And I’m not?”
“You’re awesome,” Maddie insisted. “But nice is not your moniker.”
Sierra considered that. “Yeah, fair enough. It’s probably me. But that gives me a starting point. I’m making a list of everyone I think might have a problem with me.”
“Is that a very long list, then?” I teased.
“Hey, you’re supposed to be the nice one.”
Laughing, I turned to Kenny to see if we were ready for our first caller.
He gave me the thumbs-up, and I glanced at the laptop to see who was first in line.
“Let’s get back to doing what we do best and actually help some people.
Our first caller today is Hayley.” As Hayley started to tell us about the problem she was having with a boyfriend who didn’t want to have sex in any position but missionary, I tried not to let my mind wander to Elijah. To the rival podcast.
Our ratings had been down the last few weeks, and I knew it was because of them. If we weren’t going to achieve a ceasefire, our next move was to ignore their existence and try to pull our listeners back in with good content.