Zebra Station

Chapter 1

A string of static bursts raced through the radio station equipment like the snap of a whip.  Lights flickered.

“Calvin!” Jerome yelled. “What did you do now?”

“Wires floss-, uh, crossed,” Calvin called, flat on his back under the control board.  “If it’s not the wires, it’s his mouth.” Jerome said to the rest of the middle school’s radio team. “We’ve got dead air, people. If the homerooms could flip to another station, they would.”  

“All go-most-” Calvin clenched the rubberized handle of the pliers in his teeth as he wrapped the electrical tape securely. The rough carpet prickled through Cal’s T-shirt. Cold seeped up through the carpet from the metal floor of the old meat locker turned radio station.

“8:19, 8:20.” Jerome tapped his fingers on his papers impatiently. Under the counter, inches from Calvin, he tapped his foot, too.

Calvin twisted around, grabbed the access panel and wedged it into place. He settled his glasses on his nose, stuck a hand up over the edge of the counter and flashed a thumbs up sign.

He heard faculty advisor, Ms. Beyer, slap a hand on the counter. “In five, four, three, two…”

There was a click as a switch was flipped on the sound board. “Intro music- and cueing talent one,” said the boy running the sound board. Calvin could picture Jerome nodding seriously before leaning in to the microphone.

“Good morning from Zebediah Ray Middle School’s award winning radio station,” Jerome read smoothly. “This is Jerome McKay, news director. We apologize for the delay. We had technical difficulties beyond the abilities of our tech staff. So here’s today’s announcements….”

Blood pounded in Cal’s ears. “Technical difficulties beyond the abilities of the tech staff.” He closed his eyes and pictured the equipment he had to deal with. The old techs were the ones who had difficulties. He’d spent a year and a half reworking garbage wiring sector by sector.  

Calvin stared at the wires running under the workstation and blocked out the overhead chatter. He reached up to trace a bundle of wires with his finger. As he nudged it, Cal realized one of the brackets was loose. He’d left a screwdriver just by the wall—   The rough carpet snagged his T-shirt as he slid out from under the board.

“—-and next we have a feature from – Geez, watch it Calvin!” Jerome rolled his chair out of range and grabbed the workstation for balance as Cody bumped into him.  

Calvin’s head hit a corner of the counter’s metal trim, flipping his glasses onto the floor. Fuzzily, he saw Jerome grit his teeth, find his place on the script and continue to read. Calvin reached for his glasses and a drop of blood from a scratch by his eyebrow dripped on his hand.

Jerome continued on, but under his white blonde hair his face got angry, ruddy red.  

As soon as Maddy, the features reporter, started reading her story into the microphone on the other side of the workstation running up the middle of the room, Jerome grabbed Calvin’s shirt. “You ruined the show.” Jerome hissed, his fist bunching up Calvin’s black T-shirt. “You are so incredibly dead.”

Ms. Beyer put one big hand on Jerome’s shoulder and the other on Calvin’s to separate them. As a 6’2” former pro basketball player, she got them a fair distance apart. She grabbed a marker and flipped over the day’s timeline sheet. “GET OVER IT”, she wrote then pointed to the first aid kit hanging on the wall.

“….so great job to the environmental club.” Maddy finished. She pushed her dark hair back behind one ear and pointed to Jerome’s microphone.

Jerome shook his head angrily, then slid his chair back up to the workstation, “Thanks, Maddy. Now here’s a song for Rollo Falachi, from his friends.” Jerome clicked his mic off as he finished, and crossed the request off on the timeline so hard the pen’s point scratched through the paper.

“Request one is on. You have 3:02,” the middle school team’s sound guy said, checking the read-out on the disc player. He leaned back, adjusted the studio headphones over his ears and proceeded to ignore the situation.

Jerome clicked his NASA pen and pressed it down onto his notebook. “You absolute moron.” Jerome said calmly, as Calvin wiped blood off his eyebrow and pulled a bandage out of the kit, “If you don’t know what you’re doing, let me know. I’ll handle it.”

“You can’t run everything, McKay,” Ms. Beyer said.

Calvin knew she was wrong. Jerome McKay could and did run just about everything that counted at Z-Ray’s radio station.  

The station was a big deal. Loads of kids in school tried to get on Jerome’s good side, even the Zs, the school’s group of black clothes wearing tough guys. They always sounded threatening to Calvin, even when they just came up to Jerome in the hall with song requests. Jerome didn’t act like the Zs bothered him but Calvin noticed the Zs requests got played a lot more than the “Be Vegan, Not Violent” club’s requests for World Music.  

Xavier, running the sound board, waved to get their attention and pointed to Jerome.

Jerome rolled through the previous day’s sports scores, glaring at the paper, and then snatched an index card off the panel in front of him. “Our last song request goes to Becky Dragon, happy birthday from your friends. Signing off from ZRMS, remember wherever you go, you’re the best!”  

Xavier clicked back to the disc player. “Music is up.” He brought up the playback on to the station speakers and music edged into the room.

Calvin crumpled up the wrapper from the bandage, tossed it in the garbage and turned around to see everyone looking at him. Except for Jerome, who glared at Calvin with what looked like a mix of hate and disgust. Calvin smoothed the bandage over his eyebrow, and tried to look like everything was normal, perfectly fine. “It’s ho-homeroom, not netw-worork-”

“If you can’t take it seriously,’ Jerome said, “you don’t belong here.”  

Xavier popped his studio headset back on and checked the music’s sound level.  Calvin watched as Xavier absentmindedly played with the small black headphones he always wore around his neck or over his ears.   

Calvin took a deep breath and let it out slow. He tried to get his heart to slow down to normal. A blue light flashed overhead, signaling the end of the class period.  

Clunk-thunk. Ms. Beyer opened the door by the chrome lever handle and wedged it open with a milk crate full of cast-off equipment. Jerome, without another look at Calvin, was first out the door.  

“Adios,” Maddy said, sliding her books off the counter. She looked at Calvin for a second, shrugged a shoulder and left.  

Ms. Beyer tapped the studio headphones on Xavier’s ears. “Good job today, Xavier.”

Xavier took the ZRMS headset off reluctantly, with a last glance at the sound board. As he stood up, the cord from the headphones around his neck swung out and rattled through the knobs of the soundboard. Xavier whispered “Sorry”, grabbed the end of the cord with his skinny fingers, tucked it into his front jeans pocket and left.  

Calvin got up, but Ms. Beyer called him back.

“Sit,” said Ms. Beyer. “I’m not mad about you bumping into Jerome. That was an accident,” Ms. Beyer bent down to his level, a concerned look on her face, “But to say it’s just homeroom,” she shook her head, “not good, Cal. This show is the school day’s tip off. Good teamwork, good show, odds are everyone has a good day. Got it?”

“Sor-sorry, the wires-” Calvin mumbled, looking down at his scuffed high-topped black Converse sneakers.   

“Calvin,” Ms. Beyer said, “you know the equipment inside and out. A glitch here or there is nothing.”  

Calvin looked up at her.

“But” she raised a finger, “I told you and everyone else from the start, respect the audience or you’re gone.”