Chapter 25
TWENTY-FIVE
If it wasn’t for reserved parking, I’d have to park on the street. As a business owner, this is what I like to see, my tenants thriving. As someone who has to go to work, I’m glad I’m the owner and can put up a sign that says: Reserved for the boss.
Actually, it says reserved but in my head it says otherwise.
There’s a second engineer at the board now, and a young woman I’ve never met, keeping pace with Bex without being told twice.
Down the hall, Paige has three screens going in her office, running the whole social side of the station and FMG Records.
A few months ago, it was me, Bex, Paige, and one microphone I was pretty sure I’d embarrass myself into.
Now I have to schedule time to see my own producer.
Bex calls it a good problem to have. I’ve never met a good problem, but I let her have the phrase, because she’s the reason there’s a show to have problems about in the first place.
“That’s Ember,” Bex says when she catches me looking. “She’s mine. Don’t scare her off.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it. Hi, Ember. I’m Liam.”
Ember lifts a hand without looking up from the board, which is exactly what you want from somebody running a live show.
New to town, I’d bet. She keeps half an eye on the room, still learning who everybody is.
She tells me she’s a fan, and I can tell she means it, but she says it quick and gets right back to work.
“Everybody’s a fan until they’ve worked a week,” Bex says. “Give it a week and you’ll hate him same as the rest of us.”
“Har, har, har,” I say childishly.
“We got the offer,” Bex says from her seat. I go into her space, something I try not to do because I don’t want my hand slapped for touching a shiny object.
“What offer.”
“The offer. National. Two hundred markets to start, coast to coast, five nights a week, and they want to keep it exactly as it is.” She watches me, waiting for me to come apart with it.
“That’s good,” I tell her.
“That’s good?” She sets the coffee down hard. “This isn’t something that happens over months, Liam. This is something that takes years. You managed to go from a few broadcasts to national in months.”
“I didn’t,” I tell her. “You did. Paige did. All I did was answer the phone. This is all you.”
Bex blushes and breaks eye contact.
“I’m proud of you,” I tell her, because that part’s true. “You took a washed-up singer and a call-in show and turned it into a network.”
“You’re going to be huge.”
“I’m home by ten most nights. That’s as huge as I need to get.”
Bex shakes her head at me and picks the coffee back up, and for the first time since I’ve known her, her eyes go glassy. She built this out of a man who told her no, and I let her have the moment, because she earned it more than I did.
Bex walks me through the money, the markets, and the schedule. I sign where she points and then I watch as she dances with joy.
I go down the hall to tell Paige myself, because I want to be the one to tell her. She’s writing on her wall when I step in.
“Uh, what are you doing?”
“Elle told the construction guys to paint my wall with whiteboard paint so I can have one massive calendar. Each color is a different band.”
“That’s genius. I apologize now for ever punishing you for coloring on your walls.”
Paige laughs. “What’s up?”
“We got it,” I tell her. “National. Two hundred cities.”
She screams. Actual screaming. Then she cries. Paige isn’t a crier. Not unless something isn’t going her way or she’s overly excited.
“Holy shit, Dad. This is so awesome.”
“Crap. You’re not allowed to say shit.”
“I’m allowed. Mom said.” She cocks her eyebrow, challenging me. I leave it alone.
“Thank you.” I pull her into a hug. “You really helped create this program. If it wasn’t for you, I’m not sure we’re doing much of this.”
“I’m happy to be on the team.”
I stop in the breakroom before heading into my booth. In Bex’s spot is Ember. I put my headphones on and chat with her quickly. She gives me a similar rundown as Bex would’ve and tells me she’s not afraid to cut anyone off. I like her already.
“You’re on The Love Line with Liam.”
“My wife wants to renew our vows and I think it’s a waste of money. Talk her out of it,” the man says.
“I’m not going to do that,” I tell him. “The vows aren’t for you. They’re for the woman who married you scared and hopeful, and she wants to stand up and say she’d do it again. Spend the money.”
He’s quiet for a second. “Okay.”
“You’re on The Love Line with Liam.”
“My husband got a job across the country and wants to take it. My whole family’s here. I’ve been sick over it for a week,” a woman says.
“Go look at it together,” I tell her. “Not to decide, just to see what the place is like. You can’t weigh a place you’ve never seen against the one you’ve had your whole life.
Then you talk it out as partners. Nobody gives up their family on a maybe, and nobody kills their husband’s shot without seeing it first.”
“You’re on The Love Line with Liam.”
“My husband passed in the spring. My kids want me to sell the house. They say it’s too much for one person, and they’re right, it is. I just can’t make myself put the sign in the yard. I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” a woman says.
“Nothing’s wrong with you,” I tell her. “That house is where he still is. You don’t owe anybody a timeline on that. When it’s time, you’ll know, and it won’t be because your kids talked you into it. Sell it when it feels like a house again instead of like him. Not a day before.”
“You’re on The Love Line with Liam.”
“My girlfriend roots for the team I’ve hated my whole life. And I mean screaming-at-the-TV, ruined-Sundays hate. My buddies keep telling me it’ll never last,” a man says.
“Your buddies are idiots,” I tell him. “You’re not marrying a team. Twenty years from now the standings won’t matter and she still will. Buy her a jersey in your colors, let her wear the other one to bed, and count yourself lucky the worst thing about her is her taste in football.”
“You’re on The Love Line.”
“Hi, Liam. I’m Becky and I have a question,” she says. “There’s a man. He doesn’t really know me. Not yet. But I know him. I know him better than anyone in his life knows him. And I know we’re supposed to be together. I feel it every single day. I just don’t know how to make him see it.”
“You can’t make anybody see it,” I tell her.
“Love that only runs one way isn’t love yet.
It’s hope. Hope’s fine, but it’s not the same as somebody choosing you back.
If this man’s meant to know you, he’ll know you because you’re in his life as yourself, out in the open.
Not because you decided it for him. The right person doesn’t need convincing. ”
The line stays quiet long enough that I glance at the screen to see if I lost her.
“You don’t understand,” she says, and the soft is gone out of it. “It isn’t one direction. He knows me. He just hasn’t let himself feel it yet.”
She hangs up before I can answer.
“Poor thing,” I say, mostly to myself. It sits with me a moment, then it’s gone. I’ve talked a hundred lonely callers through worse.
After we’re off, Bex comes out of the booth with her arms crossed. Ember’s already gone for the night. It’s just us.
“That last one,” Bex says. “Becky.”
“The one-way-love one.”
“That was Harley.”
I stop halfway into my coat. “You’re sure.”
“I have listened to that voice more times than I want to admit. New name, same woman. She figured out the screen catches her real one, so she gave us a fake and it cleared.” Bex doesn’t blink. “She’s not going to stop. She’s just gotten better at it.”
She opens the folder between us. It isn’t just Becky.
Three other names, all in the same small, even handwriting, spread across the last few weeks.
“I only caught it because she closed two of them with the exact same line,” she says, and turns one so I can read it.
Pages of it, and it never once asks me for a thing.
It talks about a future between us that’s already decided, a whole life she’s planned down to the details, waiting on me to show up for it.
I read for a while. I’ve gotten letters that scared me and letters that broke my heart. This one is different, and the difference is she isn’t upset. She isn’t angry that I don’t know she exists. She’s patient. Patient is worse than angry, and I don’t have a word for why.
“I thought she was done,” I say. It’s a stupid thing to say and I hear it on the way out.
“They’re never done.” Bex sets a hand flat on the folder. “I want to take this to somebody who can actually do something with it. Will you let me?”
“Yeah,” I tell her. “Do it.”
“Should I be worried?” I ask, and I hate the question the second it’s out, because asking it means I already am.
“I don’t know yet,” Bex says, which from her is as close to a yes as I’m going to get. “That’s why I want somebody who does. Don’t forget to tell your security team.”
Bex is it, there is no one else.
Josie and Katelyn are sharing a glass of wine when I come in. They congratulate me on the news, letting me know Paige broadcasted a message to my socials.
“National,” I say. She comes to me and wraps both arms around me. I hold on a moment longer than the news is worth. She feels it.
“You okay?”
“Long night.”
She doesn’t push. “Want something to soothe the worries?”
I nod. Katelyn finishes her wine and goes up to bed. Not before she tells me that Harrison passed out hours ago with Oliver in his toddler bed.
“We’re old,” I say.
Josie laughs as she put the kettle on. Tea for a good night, tea for a bad one. She brings two mugs over after the water has boiled and tells me to give the tea a minute. I do, mostly because it’s hot and I don’t want to burn my tongue.
But also, I need to tell the women in my life that I don’t like tea.
I don’t tell her about Becky. Worrying her makes things worse. I tell myself there’s nothing to tell yet, that Bex has it handled. I make a mental note to talk to Harrison about security and figure out what to do there.
Harley, Becky or whatever her real name is, is lonely. We’ve all been there and we’ve all made mistakes. This wouldn’t be the first time I’ve had a stalker, but also, I’ve never put myself out there like this before.
Most of that I believe.
The rest keeps me up a while after Josie’s asleep, thinking about how many strangers are about to know the sound of my voice, and how one of them has already decided it means she knows me.