Talk To Me

Chapter Three

Chapter Three

“Gayline? As in “gay”? What had I walked into? I gulped down a knot in my throat.

“Today on Gayline,” Marly continued, “we’re going to feature music performed by San Diego artists. If you’re a loyal listener, you’ll recognize some of these groups. This first CD just came in the mail. I listened to it yesterday and hope you’ll like it as much as I did. They sent me two copies. The first caller who correctly names the artist wins one. Call me at 555-KZSD.”

I listened intently. Marly’s voice was rich in timbre, not too high or low. Each word was enunciated clearly, yet her speech flowed naturally. My first shock over, I was now curious about the upcoming music. Marly dialed up the correct track on the CD player and a folksy rhythm played loudly in my ears. I sat bolt upright. Marly sensed my discomfort and adjusted the volume downward.

She turned off her mic, slipped the cans off her head, and gestured for me to do the same. They caught in my hair, loosening my topknot.

“The phone lines are going to start,” she said. “You won’t hear them ring. You have to watch for the light to start flashing.” Marly shifted in her chair left to right. “s**t! Where’s the f*****g phone?”

I cringed as she flung papers into the air to uncover the tabletop. A blizzard of colorful sails flew around us. I slid off my stool to help look, delicately lifting a few paper piles where a telephone could be hidden. It occurred to me it might be a cell phone or even a deceptive piece of equipment cleverly disguised as something else.

“What’s it look like?” I asked.

“A telephone. Duh. Aha!” She focused on a point over my left shoulder and lunged my way. I dodged as she blew past me through an unlocked door and into a small adjoining booth I hadn’t noticed. A large pane of glass separated us, revealing an equally messy studio. She held up a desk phone as if it were a trophy, unplugged it, and brought it into our room. Starting near the operations board, she traced a wire to its end. When she plugged in the phone, three lights flashed in unison.

“Okay,” she said. “This is why I need you. Watch and listen.”

She picked up the receiver and punched line one. “Gayline…Hi, yes, who?…You’re absolutely wrong.” Without hanging up the receiver, she deftly pushed the button above line two. “Gayline…Jewel? I don’t think so.” Line one flashed again. She hit line three. “Gayline…Yes, uh-huh, yes. Hold on. Here, Clara, take this guy’s info.”

She shoved the phone at me. The receiver was tacky with grime. Marly turned over a crumpled orange flyer and smoothed out the wrinkles, indicating I should write on the back with a pen she tossed my way. I wrote down the caller’s name, address, and phone number, and thanked him for calling before ringing off. She snatched up the note, put her finger to her lips, and prepared to speak. After announcing the winner over the air, she pushed a cart into a black box—the player—using the heel of her hand, slapped a button on the operations board, and adjusted a slider. A commercial played, then another. She put on a different CD and marked the time in her log.

“You gotta be fast, Clara. Those phones can get pretty hairy, but I think you can handle it.”

“Claire. It’s Claire.”

“Okay, Claire, part of your job is answering calls for prizes, which we’re doing today because it’s easy. But you’re going to have to learn how to take calls in that other room and transfer them through the board so the caller and I can talk on the air. You’ve got another board in there.” She gestured with her shoulder to the small unlit room. “That’s where you’re going to be after you learn this stuff. Think you can do that?”

I nodded despite my total disbelief that I would be able to do any of what was expected of me. How, I wondered, had I managed to end up in this tornado of an environment when a day earlier I could have been at a clean, if ordinary, desk job with co-workers who didn’t say the f-word? Marly was calm as she sorted through her next batch of CDs. She had not sworn at me per se, but the rising and falling tension in the room was unnerving. It was not in my nature to be a quitter, especially on this first day of my first job. The squalid room repulsed me, yet I felt an adrenaline rush that excited me and dared me to continue. Rather than make a snap judgment, I felt it best to learn what I could. While administrative-type jobs were common, it was unlikely another opportunity of this sort would come along. I couldn’t afford to be thin-skinned at a time when I needed to muster courage. I had never meant to quit my marriage, and the last thing I wanted was for that specter of failure to spill into my new working life because I felt vulnerable.

Playing music during the two-hour show helped steady my nerves. Marly selected long tracks during which she explained the board op equipment and its functions. I enjoyed the new music, different from NPR, what I usually chose to hear at home or in my car. I did answer a few calls, and except for disconnecting one person—well, three actually—I was of some use. Time flew by. At eleven, when her time slot was complete, I was tired. I imagined that in the days ahead when I knew my job better, I would be able to relax in the adjoining booth with the music playing in the background, take calls, and enjoy the repartee between Marly and her call-in guests as they chatted about budding musicians and offered interesting critiques.

After a tuna sandwich and an apple in the employee lunchroom, I returned to find Marly listening to CDs, her feet propped up on the op board. She shut down the equipment and escorted me to her private office, a windowless room barely larger than the walk-in closet at my old home. As I suspected, the interior was post-cyclone—in short, the office version of Studio B with tapes, papers, clothing, and CDs strewn over desktops and file cabinets with more piles of clutter on the floor. Posters with gay and lesbian themes were taped to the wall. My eyes grew large and my jaw clenched involuntarily. Other than her announcement that we were listening to Gayline, I had no specific indication of how her show served the gay community, though I assumed some if not all of the musicians we heard were gay. It was unclear to me if Marly was gay, and it would have been impolite to ask. These answers would come soon.

My anxiety rose as I looked at a poster of two clothed women touching in a provocative manner. I felt a mounting urge to ask her, “Are you gay?” I couldn’t possibly say those words any more than I could follow up with my own admission: “I only ask because I’m, also, well, you know.” No matter her response, it was doubtful I would be able to laugh away my uncomfortable feelings over the coincidence, though with recent advancements, it seemed being gay wasn’t such a big deal anymore—at least for some people. For me, the realization was still unsettling. Other than my fling with Crystal, I had only my innate sense that there was another world waiting to be discovered. I had recently come to believe that in my childhood, heterosexuality had been assumed without a second thought as to what might have been a different yet more natural direction. Crystal said she could sense my secret longings by the vibes I emitted. Did Marly have those vibes? I couldn’t tell. And what if she could sense those vibes in me? During a break in the show, I mentioned being separated with two kids. She would have no tangible reason to think I was gay.

I sucked air in between my teeth and tried to appear casual as I picked up a magazine with lesbian topics splashed across the cover. Before I could discover the “Seven Sexy Secrets Every Girrrl Should Practice,” Marly handed me a long feature article about small radio stations in Southern California. KZSD was mentioned, but her show was not.

When I finished reading, I cleared my throat to get her attention. Marly extended her hand but did not take the article. Instead, she reached for my hair and pulled on strands that had loosened out of place. My freshly polished nails had chipped. She said nothing about my apparel; it wasn’t necessary. She wore jeans, casual clogs, and a T-shirt. Her straight dark hair, almost black, was medium-short, a wash-and-wear haircut that did not look especially messy after pulling her cans on and off throughout the show. Beltless jeans fit snugly below her waist. She did not wear makeup. Her ears, dotted with sparkling crystal posts, stood out like two exclamation points on each side of the unforgettable smile that now spread across her face.

“You were fine today,” she said. “And tomorrow will be better.”

“Thanks. You’re being kind.”

“I mean it.” Her eyes focused on me as if to drive home her point. “My show is very important to me, and I can’t make it into what I want without a call screener. I need help. Your help.”

I doubted the gravity, but I accepted her words and smiled in return. “Betty asked me to drop by her office to fill out a W-4.”

“See you tomorrow?” she asked.

“Yes.”

I spent some time wandering the building and eventually arrived at Betty’s office. As I drove home, I kept thinking how this was not what I had planned, but then what had become of my plans? We make plans. Life happens anyway.