"Cooney, Caroline B - Janie Johnson 03 - Voice on the Radio" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cooney Caroline B)

"You don't have to stay with me, Br!. You can wander off and see what you turn up. Might be something special over in Hardware."
Brian's heart broke for his mother. All these years. of restrictions and rules, of tension and anxi
ety: that iron grip she had kept on her children she could let go.
She knew that. But her body's reactions weren't trained to the new life yet.
It occurred to Brian that he and his twin had been pushed so hard into sports because a sport kept them in one place. When your children were at baseball practice, you knew where they were. You knew there was a coach keeping watch. You could breathe.
We're going to become the family we should have been, thought Brian.
A family that can let go, and have space, and not whip around in stores, sick with fear.
S S S
Reeve felt as if he had reached another plane of living, the kind people talked about on the talk shows that weren't into sex or violence. A plane of joy and light.
The mike was his; he was the mike.
The audience was his; he was theirs.
The milk carton became Janie's blanket. She used my penknife to slit it open, so she could flatten it out. She carried it under the clip in her blue-cloth three-ring binder. You know the kind. Where you write in ballpoint pert on the cover. After the milk carton, she was still my dizzy redhead, but dizzy meant stumbling and scared. If the milk carton was right, she had been kidnapped when she was three. Janie sort of moved
deeper toward being a three-year-old, as that way, she could understand. Maybe even remember. It was just a matter of time before she started sucking her thumb. Meantime, a flattened milk carton from' Flower Dairy became her blankie.
Vinnie, Cal and Derek were motionless with listening.
"Well," said Reeve breezily, knowing the incredible pride that comes from owning an audience, "I really liked that number by Visionary Assassins, didn't you? Hey, Assassins! Revere is my dorm, too; come visit me. I've never met any assassins, let alone assassins with vision. Let's listen to another song from the Assassins."
S S Х
The phone lit up at WSCK. Vinnie answered. Vinnie was a neoconservative who hated all ethnic groups, all causes and all man- and womankind. He made a perfect station manager, since he never worried about hurting anybody's feelings. Vinnie took four phone calls.
He looked happy, which was not like Vinnie.
Visionary Assassins shrieked on, their lyrics grim and their chords threatening.
The phone lit up again and again.
Vinrjie said, "Reeve. The callers want more
about Janie."
CHAPTER
THREE.
All talk-ups were automatically recorded on a tape called the air check. It was a reel-to-reel tape, the big, old-fashioned kind you didn't think existed anymore.
Vinnie, Cal, Derek and Reeve played back Reeve's hour. With no music in between, it was much shorter than Reeve had expected.
His own voice sounded unfamiliar. He would not have known it was him. He felt uncomfortable, as if that voice were somebody else, using his words.
"You have a great radio voice," said Vinnie, who despised everybody and their voice. If Vinnie said Reeve had a great radio voice, it was true.
Reeve listened to his great radio voice saying that any minute now, Janie would start sucking her thumb.
Reeve had made that up.
It was a good line. Dramatic. But it wasn't true. Janie had not acted three. She had acted the way any stricken person would, trying to protect the parents she loved from the truth she feared.
Live, Reeve's words had felt quite literally airy. The airwaves were his; and the power and the voice were his also.
But now the words were not air. They were per-
manent. They were, like the name of the station,
SCK.
For a inoment Janie was there with him, in the comfort posture she liked, tight against his chest, her eyes closed inside his hug.
What would she think of this broadcast?
He felt as if air had entered his gut, not his lungs. It was a sick floater feeling, like a drowning person.
Oh, well, he thought, she'll never know. Next time I'll talk about baseball. I've followed the Red Sox my whole life, and this year they actually might not screw up, so there's lots to talk about.
Vinnie said, "When it sounded as if you were finished talking, Reeve, 'we got thirty-nine calls wanting more about Janie!" Vinnie slammed his fist against a flimsy desk. A row of cassettes toppled. High numbers made him joyful. "It's only your first night!"
Which certainly implied Reeve would get a second night.
A CD by the Fog was coming to a close. Derek Himself signaled for silence. Vinnie, Cal and Reeve moved into the hall so that they could talk. Reeve watched Derek through the glass walls.
Deejays adjusted the mike every time they spoke. The need to touch the mike and be sure of it was strong. Derek actually launched his body with each sentence; a tiny dive into the deep, cold waters of an audience. Derek could not sit when he
was talking. Nervous energy kept him on his feet. Vivid expressions crossed his face, as if the audience were in the room.
An hour ago, Reeve had hated Derek. Now he
watched avidly, drinking up the techniques of someone who'd been doing this for a long time.
"Okay, now, tomorrow night, Reeve," said Vinnie, "same format. A little on Janie, some music, another taste of Janie."
"Or do you think," said Cal seriously, "that he should just be on two nights a week? Say, Tuesday, Thursday. We don't want the audience to overdose."
This is me they're talking about, thought Reeve.
"Kind of save it," Vinnie said, nodding, "keep 'em coming back."