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A gentle crackle of static spills out of the dark, and Trent blinks blearily and investigates.
The old radio he wasn’t even certain worked has turned itself on, and faint static leaks from it, fuzzy and soft like gently falling snow—or like the snow of a television, obscuring and fuzzy and impossible to make out.
He squints at it, picking it up—it’s not a very large thing—and turning it in his hands. As he tilts it this way and that, the static morphs the slightest amount—he swears he can hear something.
So Trent brings it back to his bed and sits down. He clicks on the lamp, and dim light casts odd shadows over the room as he shifts on the bed and gets comfortable.
The static shifts, moves, and he swears—he swears—
It should be creepy, probably, or at least strange, but he feels calm. His heart beats steady and quiet; the darkness feels comforting rather than frightening.
Outside, rain patters on the windows and the roof, the gentle pattern blending with the static.
He strains his ears, tilting his head, and—
There! The faintest piano trickles in, a soft melody dancing between the white noise. He turns the dial, and it warps and wobbles. He gently adjusts it, back and forth, playing hot and cold with a radio signal until—
A soft, mournful voice drifts in, the notes of the piano, the static still encroaching on the edges of the song, and his fingers falter.
The music is soft, almost mesmerizing. The rain, the snow, the notes—he sits there for a moment, quietly enraptured.
A grown man sitting on his bed, feeling like a child staying up late to eavesdrop on something they’re not supposed to hear.
And then—then the song clicks, and the static gets a little louder, but the music is replaced with a voice.
It’s a warm, gentle voice—a man’s voice, with a strong, inexplicably US American accent.
Hope you enjoyed that melody, listeners, he says. Wherever you are, I hope you’re doin’ well. I hope this broadcast can soothe the lonely soul—like chicken soup, to half-borrow a phrase.
And he just—talks.
He talks, for a while, voice soothing and warm, with affection Trent almost feels is for him.
It’s nothing deeply profound or unusual. He just talks, and talks, tells stories and jokes and talking about the news and football (American football, Trent’s pretty sure) and rom-coms and television and occasionally says odd but still so warm and so gentle things, and Trent… listens. It’s nice. It feels like talking to an old friend during a long train ride in an otherwise empty car. It feels like staying up late at a sleepover—or what Trent imagines that would feel like, anyway—and talking into the late hours of the night.
It feels… good.
Eventually, Trent dozes off, the radio humming in his ears.
He swears he hears the man on the radio say, gently, sleep well, Trent. I hope you tune in again.
It’s the best sleep he’s had in years.
In the morning, Trent thinks it must have been a dream. The radio is still there, but it’s broken. It doesn’t even have batteries in it. He must have been dreaming, or sleepwalking, or something. Not listening to an impossible radio channel, a gentle voice in the static.
(The memory of the dream should be unsettling—but he can’t shake the feeling that the man on the radio means him no harm, that so long as he was listening, at least, he was utterly safe.
That not only would the man on the radio not hurt him, but would not let anything else hurt him, either.
…it’s fanciful, of course. People put structure to their dreams when they wake, and that’s all it is.)
Less than a week later, Trent’s alone again, and he can’t sleep.
The radio clicks on, and gentle static spills into his room, over the sheets of his bed.
Trent fumbles for it, turns the dial, searches for the signal—follows the dancer in the dark.
And that gentle voice floats back into his room, and Trent’s shoulders relax.
The man on the radio greets him—not by name, but it feels meant for him—warmly, and Trent lies back to listen.
It’s a nighttime secret, something he’s never shared with anyone else. A recurring dream. A security blanket.
(He knows what it would sound like, and doesn’t know how to explain—it isn’t threatening. It’s lonely. And so is he.)
(The people in his life, the ones he actually sees regularly, notice his subtle but very real shift in mood.
I’ve just been sleeping better, he tells them, and it’s not a lie. He’s so used to being exhausted all the time that it makes him feel oddly light to be fully rested.)
The man on the radio says, sometimes I don’t think anyone is listenin’, and Trent wants to shout into the radio I am! I am. I’ll always listen.
He feels as though he knows the man on the radio well, even though he doesn’t even know his name, has never spoken a word to him.
The man on the radio hums, soft, as if he’s heard or felt Trent’s insistence, as if Trent’s heart has leapt through the signal and flayed itself open on his desk.
Don’t you worry, he says. I’ll still be here.
Trent doesn’t generally think about it during the day. Wouldn’t let himself if it occurred to him. But at night, he sleeps with a broken radio by his bed—the few people he’s brought home always question this, his ex always questions this. And he brushes them off.
Some days, the radio doesn’t turn on, and Trent wonders where the man on the radio is. If he’s busy, if he exists outside the radio waves.
He seems so specific, for Trent to have made him up. His voice, his laugh, his stories—sometimes including facts and trivia Trent swears he didn’t know.
But then, what are dreams? Surely he must be one, right? A dream?
(He hopes the man in the radio knows—he isn’t alone. Trent listens to him. Trent listens.)
(Sometimes, the man on the radio gets sadder. More personal. Like he thinks no one can hear. And Trent listens, and his heart aches even as he tucks the man’s voice between its battered chambers and holds him there.)
One day Trent dreams that his mysterious man on the radio takes callers for the first time.
It’s silent, with wavering static, as no one calls—or maybe Trent just can’t hear it, can’t hear the responses, either, because the man says nothing, apparently content to let the static hum and the faint music play.
And then—Trent turns to his phone. He normally doesn’t look at it when he’s trying to sleep, especially not like this. Doesn’t even think to. Especially not in dreams.
But now, he turns to his phone and picks it up and… dials.
He just dials what feels right. And there’s a click. And part of him expects nothing, or a wrong number, or a voicemail, or a pizza parlor.
It’s raining again.
The call is accepted. Click.
The man on the radio says in his ear, warm, hey, Mary-Mae! You’re our first caller of the day—or night, I suppose. What you got to say? He laughs. Boy, that’s a lot of rhymes.
Trent’s mouth is dry. He has no idea what to say, after all this time.
You there, caller?
Trent’s heart leaps—he can’t hang up, can’t end the call now. What’s your name? he blurts out.
The man on the radio pauses for a moment, like he’s taken aback.
You never say it, says Trent. It’s been years, and I don’t know your name.
…Ted, says the man on the radio. Says Ted. Sounding a little lost. What about you, caller? You got a name?
Trent, says Trent. My name’s Trent. Are you…
He has so many questions. So much he wants to know. Who is Ted? Where is he? Why does he do this show, how, what’s the music he plays Trent can never identify, is Ted okay, is he safe, is something wrong, how does any of this work, what’s going on?
But Trent can only swallow it back, breath caught, and finally, he only says, I like listening to you talk.
The man—Ted—laughs, quiet and surprised. I’m glad, he says. Years, huh? That long?
That long, Trent agrees.
What you got to say, years-long friend? asks Ted, a touch playful, and Trent almost doesn’t know what to say.
And then—he. what if he just…
What you said a few weeks ago, about the best rom-com.
Now, Trent, says Ted, instantly catching on. Sleepless in Seattle is a classic.
But BEST? says Trent, injecting humorous disbelief into his voice, exaggerated, and Ted huffs out a laugh.
Well, what do you think, then, smartypants? he says, almost like he’s teasing a friend, like they’ve really known each other for years, and Trent takes the challenge.
They talk all night.
They talk all night, until Trent falls asleep too early in the morning.
(You sound so familiar, he thinks he hears Ted murmur, in those fuzzy, indistinct moments between the dream and the unconsciousness.)
Trent wakes with a bit of a headache, feeling very tired. And his phone says he called someone, but the number is corrupted.
Trent has no idea what to do with that.
It’s not the last time Ted takes callers. And every time, Trent calls.
The first time Trent hears a recording of the infamously horrific pick for new manager at Nelson Road, it’s a full-body jolt, a lightning-shock that burns in every piece of him.
It’s impossible. It’s ridiculous. He’s projecting. He’s dreaming, he’s—
Ted Lasso—Ted—looks exactly like Trent had imagined, down to the eyes.
(When Trent first speaks in Ted Lasso’s presence, he snaps to attention.)
That night, the static spills over and the man on the radio—Ted—the broadcast, the signal, is weaker. Distant, warped. An almost indistinct mumble.
Ted, please, Trent whispers, twisting the dial more and more frantically. Please.
I’ve got you, listener, says Ted’s voice in his dreams. We got a long, long road ahead of us. But it’s about time, don’t you think?
And Trent sleeps peacefully, faint piano and rain in his ears.