Wednesday, Jan. 16, 2008
Chapter 9
After school people were rushing home to get to their radios or gathering around other kids with radios on the school steps. The ones who weren't gathered or speeding home on their bikes were roaming the empty halls of Roscoe high with headphones on all tuned into 88.1, RFR. Mickey's was filled with it's usual after school crowd which had increased with the new freshmen who were looking forward to hearing a station that was talked about so much since school had started. Back at Cougar Radio, Principal Waller tuned in to RFR in his office, feeling an unwanted sense of familiarity, he sat back in his chair and sqeezed a stress ball. River and Kim listened in the Cougar Radio booth. River scoffed and Kim felt connected to Robbie in a way, she knew he would be listening too.
It was 3:45, only 15 minutes until showtime. Robbie looked at Travis who looked at Lily who looked over at Ray. The four of them smiled and laughed. They knew things would be ok again.
"Well Robbie, we got the team back together and in less than 15 minutes, it's go time!" Ray said, leaning back in his chair.
Robbie sat silently, looking at his hands.
"Robbie, what's wrong?" Lily asked.
"What do we do? What are we going to say, how do we start? I don't know what to do!" Robbie shouted in a paincked voiced. He stood up and paced around, knocking over his mic.
Ray leaned forward, "Are you telling me that Mr. Schedual Writer, Mr. Anti-Sponinuity doesn't know how we should start the show? Are you kidding me?"
"We'll start like we always do," Lily said, "it's not a big deal."
"It is a big deal!" Robbie shouted back, "We've been gone for a while, people didn't think we were going to come back and now we are and our new show has got to be perfect... we have new listeners, guys. We need..."
"Robbie, calmed down." Lily said, she was annoyed at Robbie's behavior.
"Yeah, Robbie. It's not the end of the world. Unless one of those buttons on the switchboard sets off the stink bomb I left here last time, then we're in big trouble." Ray added jokingly.
"How can you joke at a time like this? We need to take this seriously!" Robbie replied.
The three friends fought amongst themselves. Time was running out, the big hand of the clock was reaching the 12, soon it would be 4:00 and they would have to go on the air.
"STOP!" Travis shouted.
waste-away at 2:19 p.m.