The Late Shift – Part 1: Dead Air

The studio at Harbourside FM was a box of soundproof foam and blinking lights, and at eleven at night it was the loneliest room in Bristol. Hannah produced the late show, which meant she chose the music, booked the guests, and tried not to panic when the phone lines went quiet.

Ben ran the desk. He had worked there for six years, and in all that time he had never once smiled on air. He mumbled into his headphones, pushed the faders with a sort of weary violence, and spoke to Hannah only in grunts and one-word instructions.

"Ten seconds," said Hannah, into the talkback. "Then the jingle."

"Five," said Ben. "Then the jingle, if the cart isn't cursed."

"It's not cursed. It's from 1991."

"That's what I meant."

The red light came on. Hannah leaned into the microphone and began to speak, smooth and warm, introducing a caller who wanted to talk about the ghost of a lighthouse keeper in Clevedon. Ben nudged a fader, and the jingle began.

Then the desk went silent.

Not the jingle. The whole studio. The lights flickered, the monitors died, and the red on-air sign went black. Hannah stared at the dead board, her heart pounding.

"Ben," she hissed. "What did you do?"

"Nothing," said Ben, pulling off his headphones. "Something's blown in the main feed. Give me sixty seconds."

"We have sixty seconds before the network cuts us off."

"Then stop talking and let me work," said Ben, crouching under the desk with a torch clamped in his teeth.

Hannah grabbed the backup phone and started talking, improvising a story about the lighthouse keeper's cat, while Ben swore softly under the desk and the minutes ticked by. Her voice was steady, though her hands were shaking. Ben's voice was muffled and cross, but it had a rhythm to it, like he was counting.

"Keep going," he called, from the floor. "Tell them the cat was a witch."

"The cat was a witch," said Hannah, and the phone line crackled with laughter from somewhere in Clevedon.

Forty seconds later, the lights came back on. The board hummed. Ben crawled out from under the desk, dusting off his knees, his hair full of cables and his face flushed with effort.

"Done," he said.

Hannah stared at him. "You fixed it."

"I fix things," said Ben. "It's the only thing I'm good at without a script."

She laughed, unexpectedly, and he looked at her with a flicker of surprise, as if the sound had caught him off guard.

"Can I ask you something?" said Hannah, when the jingle had started again.

Ben plugged his headphones back in. "Yes."

"Why do you never smile on air?"

He was quiet for a long moment, pushing a fader up and down with his thumb.

"Because I hate being looked at," he said. "I like the sound. I don't need the faces."

"Then let me be the one who looks," said Hannah softly. "And you can stay behind the glass."

Ben's eyes flicked to hers, quick and startled, and then down again.

"Can I ask you something else?" he said quietly, under the music.

"Yes."

"Would you have a drink with me after the show? Somewhere quiet, with no microphones and nobody on the phone asking about the cat?"

Hannah's heart jumped. "Yes," she said. "But only if you smile at me once, right now, where I can see it."

Ben turned his head, slowly, and for the first time in six years, he smiled, a little crooked, entirely unguarded.

"Green?" he asked, very quietly.

"Green," said Hannah, grinning. "Very green. Now get back to work, Ben. The cat still needs a rescue."