With a Little Luck: A Novel (23 page)

Logistically,
Morning Mayhem with Riley and Lambert
is no sweat. We get into a routine that involves spending the night at each other’s apartment, taking turns every other night. We drive to the station in separate cars because his second show is earlier than mine and I can leave for a bit before my seven-to-twelve shift. I still meet Nat after work, but what was once every night and then waned to most nights has turned in to several nights a week, if that. She’s been a good sport about not complaining. (We had the obligatory awkward lunch where the best friend meets the new boyfriend and they became fast friends in record time.)

In our fourth week on-air we get our first ratings announcement and the station is beyond excited. We’re fourth overall, second in the desirable eighteen-to-thirty-five demographic, which tells you something about the fickle finger of most radio listeners in this area. I always default to the cautious—Nat would say the negative—but hitting our stride so quickly seems almost lucky. And speaking as one who knows, it’s not lucky being that lucky.

The station immediately slaps a curse on us by committing to an even more sizable ad campaign than they’d originally promised. Billboards, bus benches, buildings—we’re everywhere. The photo shoot is a study in the tired and true, and, no, I didn’t mean “tried and true.” Poses and concepts that were not used:

• Me balancing a pail on my head and Ryan dumping sand into it with a plastic shovel. “Fill your mornings with Riley and Lambert. Mornings on KKCR.”
  
• Ryan and me standing in front of two cars that have collided at an intersection, obviously exasperated but
  preciously so, which made it somehow more irritating for the L.A. drivers condemned to stare at it in rush-hour traffic. “Run into Riley and Lambert.”
  
• Ryan with fingers poised above my nipples. Yes, you read that right. Me looking surprised. “Tune in to Riley and Lambert.” (As a side note on this one: The reactions did not include the words “juvenile,” “inappropriate,” “sexist,” or “disgusting.” The station manager’s question was, “Do you think they’ll get what he’s doing?”)
  
• This one was odd—and maybe I’m paranoid (strike that: I’m definitely paranoid)—but at one point Ryan said, “How about the two of us dressed as clowns, with a headline like, ‘Put some fun in your morning’?” Sarcastically. And the account executive’s face went a little ashen, and she moved on, but the meeting wrapped up pretty quickly after that, and I could tell she’d skipped over one of the concepts on her agenda.
  

And our winner: Ryan and me, standing back-to-back, arms folded. Headline: “
Morning Mayhem
. It’s So On. Riley and Lambert, Mornings.” Eh. What it lacked in originality it more than made up for in predictability.

In week seven the ads started showing up on billboards and bus stops, and by our eighth week I had officially been defaced, defiled, and dick-ified. By that I mean someone had drawn a penis, inches from my mouth, on our poster at Sunset and La Brea. Mom would be so proud.

If it sounds like navigating the new show has been relatively
problem-free, it has been. Until one morning when a particular caller gets under my skin, and for whatever reason, I don’t laugh it off.

“So how many dates before you got down and dirty?” the caller asks.

“Okay, a) nobody said we slept together, and b) that’s none of your business,” I say, leaning into the mic, practically biting it off.

“What she means,” Ryan jumps in, “is that she doesn’t kiss and tell.”

“No … What I meant is that it’s none of your business.”

“Sounds like you’re a little uptight there, Berry,” says the asshat. “Maybe you’re not getting enough.”

“Oh, you’re ‘that guy.’ ” I lean in again. “That friend that every guy has who every girlfriend hates. Your name is probably Steve or Mike or—”

“You know what?” the caller says. “I’ll bet you’re so frigid you haven’t even done it yet. And it sounds like you seriously need to get laid, so maybe you should get on that.”

Is this really happening live on the radio?
All I can manage to do is toss it to Ryan, hoping he’ll tell this guy where he can shove it.

“Ryan?”

“Bro, that’s not cool,” Ryan says. “And if you’re this concerned with our love life, it sounds like you’re the one who needs to get laid. Good luck with that. You’ll need it.”

This was what I’d been worried about all along, this inherent invasion of privacy. I know you give up a certain quantity of rights when you put yourself in the public eye, even at the radio level. Tabloid journalism is so popular these days, it’s just something you have to accept. But when you’re just a radio DJ with a modest following, should strangers be able to grill you on how many dates it took for you to get between the sheets?

Apparently, yes. I discover this later that night. Ryan and I are at Swingers, a restaurant that’s open late for second-shift people like me and late-night eaters who must have really good metabolisms.

“You might need to lighten up a little,” Ryan says, with a knowing, almost obnoxious shrug.

“You might need to consider that I don’t want to broadcast when we first had sex on the radio.”

“That’s part of the deal,” Ryan says.

“Not the part I signed up for! Ryan, we’ve talked about this. I know I have to be open about some things. But there are limits. I signed up to host a morning show, not to be your sidekick in
Ryan’s Sexy-Time Show Part Deux.
”

I can tell he’s stung. We sit in silence for much longer than is comfortable. I don’t want to take it back, because it’s true. But I just belittled his other show, something that I’d find infuriating and a little heartbreaking if Ryan had done it to me.

And the beat goes on. And by “beat,” I mean Ryan tapping his foot aggressively, either trying to think of a comeback or trying not to say the one that’s on the tip of his tongue.

Finally I speak, because the tapping is unbearable.

“Look, I don’t want to fight with you—” I start.

“Ryan’s Sexy-Time Show?”
he interrupts.

“I’m sorry. I know it sounded demeaning. That’s not what I meant.”

“Okay, then what did you mean?”

“I meant to … I just meant … I just wanted to make it clear that I didn’t want our show to be about sex and relationships … like your show is. I mean, isn’t our show a morning show? Would you classify that as ‘morning fodder’?” At this point, I can’t stop my mouth from moving. “Is Regis asking Kelly about the last time Mark gave it to her good?”

“Slow down,” Ryan says. “That’s where we’re having a disconnect here. I didn’t ask you about your sex life. That was a caller. A caller I defended you from, by the way. Honestly, though, Berry, I shouldn’t have had to do that. You punted to me, and I knew you were upset, but people can ask what they want. That’s kind of how a morning show works. Occasionally you take calls, and occasionally the callers are assholes, but we can’t censor them.”

“We censor them all the time. That’s what the screeners are for. And I really don’t think they should be allowed to ask about our sex life!”

And again we sit in silence. Finally, Ryan opens his mouth, and I’m hoping he’s going to say something that guides us to the making-up part of this argument, because I hate this, hate this, hate this.

“I’m going to the bathroom,” he says. He leaves without even looking at me.

I sit there, shaking, waiting for him to return, wondering whether we’ll find a way to agree on this when he returns. I don’t know. Maybe this type of show just isn’t for me. Maybe I just said yes to make Ryan happy. Sure, it’s great exposure, but I’m not even sure I want exposure. I love music. I got into this business because I live and breathe music, and I thought, how cool would it be to be a DJ—to introduce people to new bands and sounds and to be the first person to say, “Here’s the new unreleased song by so-and-so …”? Granted, I’m working at a classic-rock station, so there’s not too much introduction happening, but that’s why I got into radio. To turn people on to great music and to be a part of a sadly dying business but at least to be a part of it in some capacity while I still could. I wanted to expose people to music … not to me.

“That’s heads up,” a voice says from behind me. I turn and see a guy I don’t know, pointing down toward my right foot. I look down
and see a penny, heads up. “Heads up means it’s lucky. You should pick it up.”

He’s telling me?
I look back up at the guy—who, if we’re being honest, happens to be pretty good-looking, not that I’m looking—and I notice he has a four-leaf clover tattooed on his wrist.
Are you kidding me?

“I know it’s good luck,” I say. “I’m like a beacon of superstitious knowledge.”

“Then you better get on that,” he says, and nods to the penny. I pick it up, wincing when my fingers touch Swingers’ potentially not very sanitary floor.

“Are you Irish?” I ask, motioning at his tattoo, hoping he’ll say yes, and that’s why he has the clover tattoo, because the last thing I need right now is a sign that I’m with the wrong guy, so maybe if this extremely good-looking person with deep brown eyes I could get lost in for three weeks is just Irish and not a proponent of luck or superstitions or anything I can relate to, he’ll just go on his merry way and I can get back to fighting with my boyfriend—the one who is technically unlucky Guy Number Three in a string of Bad News Boys.

“Yeah,” he says. “Plus, in college I somehow earned the nickname Lucky, and it stuck.…”

Fantastic
. “Oh,” I say. It’s all I can muster.

Ryan saves me from having to say anything more. He returns to the table, his head cocked to the side, on his face a genuine look that says “I don’t want to fight anymore.”

“I know you’re not used to this,” he blurts. “I know your radio and my radio are two entirely different animals … and you’re not used to the kinds of animals who call into my show.”

“You can say that again.”

“I know you’re not used to this,” he starts, repeating what he said, riffing off my “you can say that again,” and it breaks the tension. We’re back on track. I look up to see if Lucky Penny Guy has caught this moment of mature relationship conversation, but he’s gone, so I focus back on Ryan and on making up.

Our show’s third month is our best ever, ratings-wise, and I have to say, I’ve learned to lighten up … for the most part. I feel I’m growing comfortable with my private life being quasi-public as long as I’m in control of it. As long as the things we share are about the movie we saw last night or the restaurant we went to or how I nailed “Fergalicious” at karaoke. That’s all fine.

Until Ryan, during a show, casually mentions my undergarments being strewn around my apartment.

“Now, I do think lingerie is important,” he says to a caller, who is complaining that his girlfriend wears “ugly granny panties” and he wishes she would try a little harder. “But you should be talking to Berry here. She thinks lingerie is so important that it should be seen at all times, hence she leaves her bras and panties on the dresser, the bed, or the bathroom floor whenever she’s done wearing them.”

I’m stunned. I’m speechless. But only momentarily. I find my mouth moving before I can even stop it.

“Funny you mention that, Ryan,” I say. “Mission accomplished.”

He looks confused but rolls with it—he’s got his “Dr. Love” face on. “I didn’t know there was a mission. Want to enlighten us?”

“Well, folks,” I say, “Ryan here is always in such a hurry to get to the ‘good part’ that he wouldn’t know if I was wearing silk and lace or an ex-boyfriend’s boxers. So, yes, occasionally I’ll leave them on
the dresser just so maybe he’ll take a hint … like, oh, she wears sexy things under her clothes … perhaps I should take a moment when undressing her to actually notice.”

He must hear the bite in my voice, because he pauses. And Ryan never pauses.

“I … I had no idea you felt so strongly about whether I noticed your underwear,” he says, sounding genuinely uncomfortable.

A normal person would have ended it right there. But oh, no, not me. I’m out for blood. Ryan’s pushed it too far. “Yeah, that’s pretty clear,” I say and everyone in the control booth laughs, egging me on … so I deliver. “There’s a word for it.… What is it again? Oh, right, ‘foreplay.’ ” On “fore-,” I slam one hand down on the desk and use the other to shoot Ryan a nasty thumbs-up.

“Ouch,” Ryan says under his breath. I notice him turning a little red, something I’ve never seen before. I immediately feel awful.

“You heard it here first,” Ryan says into the mic, taking it on the chin. “Your trusted Dr. Love apparently has no idea what he’s doing in the sack.”

“That’s not what I’m saying,” I say, but the damage is done. Ryan’s not letting me off the hook.

“Oh, don’t backpedal now, Ber.”

“I said nothing about your … lovemaking.” I pause for a second, because I just said “lovemaking” on the radio, and I’m now actually actively participating in a discussion about my sex life, and this is spiraling into something really stupid. We’re in this uncomfortable area between doing a bit and really digging into each other, and I’m not sure where this is going. I was genuinely pissed about the underwear comment, but this is taking on a life of its own. I try to make amends. “I was just teasing you because … some lingerie is just meant to be seen. Women spend ridiculous amounts of
money on ridiculously tiny items that more often than not go completely unnoticed.”