The Radio

Sebastian saw the old-fashioned radio at a garage sale he was passing by while walking Tyrannosaurus Rex, his mixed-breed dog. He stopped, mainly for the book sitting next to the radio, which was one by his favorite author that he did not own yet. But the radio intrigued him, so he bought it, too. It was one from the 1940’s, elaborately carved with dials on the front. The seller promised him it still worked.

Once he got the radio home, he set it on the kitchen counter while he figured out where its permanent home would be. Sebastian had OCPD, so everything he owned had to have a place it belonged. His home office could use a radio, he thought, so he moved it from the kitchen to the top of the filing cabinet.

Sebastian worked from home as an architect and liked to listen to jazz while he worked. He turned on the radio and started to dial to the far end of the FM spectrum, when he heard a voice saying his name. It sounded a lot like his father’s voice.

“Sebastian.”

He dialed slowly backwards, trying to find the station. Then he heard it again:

“Sebastian, listen to me.”

He froze. It was his father’s voice! But Dad had been gone for years, taken out in a helicopter crash. His father used to do the traffic report for a local news station, and the helicopter pilot had suffered a stroke that sent the chopper into a tailspin and eventually crash-landed in the river.

“Son, I need to tell you something. Are you listening?”

Sebastian nodded dumbly, and finally was able to squeak out a “Yes?”

“Good. Now, I am going to give you some advice that is going to make you a lot of money. You need to go down to that bookie joint on Madison and bet one hundred dollars on a horse named Hot to Trot. This Saturday is his first race, so the odds against him are huge, but he is going to win first place. We’re going to win some money and then you can invest it and make even more.”

Sebastian did not exactly have an extra hundred dollars laying around without dipping into his savings, but he believed his father. He turned the radio off and put his shoes back on.

The bookie thought he was crazy, but he took the bet and gave Sebastian his ticket. “See you Saturday!” the bookie said. When Saturday rolled around, he found himself in the stands at the race track, watching a long shot win by a mile. Once Hot to Trot crossed the finish line, Sebastian realized that his father really did have some kind of power and was communicating with him via the radio, and vowed to heed whatever advice he got.

After visiting the bookie but before counting his winnings, Sebastian went into the office and turned the radio back on.

“You were right about that horse, Dad! I’ve got a whole stack of dough!”

It felt both weird and natural to be talking to an inanimate object; he thought of it as a sort of phone that connected him to his father beyond the Veil. After a short burst of static, his father’s voice came out of the speakers once again:

“Great job, son! Now I want you to deposit all that cash and then go find an investment broker. It doesn’t matter who. I will tell you what to tell them to do.”

He listed a few stocks to start out with, indicating that Sebastian would buy more with the money he made from the first three or four.

“In the meantime, son, keep up with the architect gig. You are good at it, and it’s a reliable source of income. I’m going to sign off now; talking to you like this takes a lot of energy.”

The radio went silent. Sebastian checked the time and decided to find an investment broker in the morning. Maybe his bank had one, or could give him a referral.

Lying in bed that night, Sebastian wondered if his father was around all the time, watching him, or if he could only speak to him through the radio. Had the spirit of his dead father seen him masturbate? There was a creepy thought. It kept him awake for a while, but he eventually drifted off, to dream about trying to explain to his mother that his father was not really dead and they had buried him alive.

The next morning, Sebastian went down to his local bank branch and asked if they had an investment broker on staff. He was delighted to find out that they did, and made an appointment for later that same day. He went out for some lunch and visited a vintage shop to kill the time. When meeting with the broker, he gave her the list he got from his father, and she complimented him on doing his homework. At this, he only smiled enigmatically.

After the bank, Sebastian went home and picked up Max and they drove to a dog park where Max was well-known. They played fetch for a while, something the dog would play until he dropped, and took breaks where he played rough-and-tumble with another dog his own size. Sebastian chatted with the other dog’s owner, a young gay man who lived nearby, while the animals played.

The sun began to set, so Sebastian took Max home and they had dinner. Curious, Sebastian looked up the companies that his father had instructed to invest in. To his untrained eye, they did look promising. He wondered how long it would take to see dividends.

For the next few days, Sebastian went about his regular business, working and spending time with his dog and not thinking much about his stocks. He would listen to his father’s voice coming from the radio, reassuring him that he knew what he was doing and his advice would pay off any day now. Then, about a week after his meeting with the broker, she called him. One of his stocks had just skyrocketed; a tech company had just unveiled a new product that was expected to be incredibly popular. Another, a publishing company, was steadily climbing as well, because one of their contracted authors had come out with a new novel that everyone was reading.

Sebastian felt dizzy. His net worth had doubled overnight. He remembered his father saying they could re-invest a few times and then start living on the dividends. Now it seemed completely plausible.

He knew he could no longer keep this secret. He had to tell somebody, anybody. After a long internal debate, he called his best friend Seth.

“I have something to show you, and then something to tell you. I cannot explain it, but I have to share this with somebody. Throw on your shoes and come over.”

Waiting for Seth, Sebastian paced back and forth in the hallway between his office and his bedroom. He wished he still smoked; this would be a perfect time for a cigarette. Finally, he saw Seth’s headlights in his driveway. He waited until Seth took off his jacket and looked at him expectantly.

“You are not going to believe this, man. You just won’t. Follow me.”

He led the way back into the office and indicated the radio on top of the filing cabinet.

“Looks nice, ‘bastian. Really works with the décor in here. But I’m still waiting for the part I won’t believe.”

“Check this out, then” and he turned on the radio.

“Dad?” he said. The reply came immediately:

“I told you those stocks would explode, and they did. Now you’re trying to prove to yourself that it’s real by telling Seth about it. But he doesn’t hear me, son. He can’t. It’s a matter of quantum physics and the subatomic connections between our energies that makes it so you can hear me, but he is not my son.”

Sure enough, Seth was staring at him, looking as though he was trying to decide if this was intended as a joke of some sort. “All I hear is static, dude. What’s so exciting about static?”

Sebastian’s heart sank. What if he was hearing his dad’s voice because he was going crazy? But then, how did his father’s advice turn out to be so accurate? That horse was a long shot, and the stocks he invested in were not exactly hot commodities until after he bought them. Maybe he was just incredibly lucky. Or maybe his father was right, and it was a matter of quantum physics. What did he know?

Seth was still staring at him. Thinking fast, he came up with some cover:

“Sorry; it was supposed to be on a jazz station that I didn’t think I could pick up from here. Now it seems to be gone. Maybe it was just a fluke!” He tried to laugh.

“You are the weirdest dude I know, ‘bastian. It is one of my favorite things about you.”