December 13, 1987
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Leslie Dawson, the Night Radio DJ stared transfixed at her stale coffee next to the control board. It had already been reheated twice.
"Third times the charm," once more talking to herself as she placed the mug in the microwave.
It's not that the radio station is particularly busy at 2:00 am (or any other time for that matter). It is just that Leslie has a particular condition known as Attention Deficit Disorder and forgot about it, again, ignoring her growing weariness.
Leslie was WKVZ's sole employee. While she wasn't at work the newly introduced computer software kept the music running on a loop, allowing Bowie and Rick Astley to infiltrate the town of Night 24/7. As a matter of fact the only reason Night Radio has an employee is for maintenance purposes. It would take days, if not weeks for someone to be flown up from their parent station in Fairbanks to address any issues, causing the nearly 4,000 residents of Night music-less anguish.
Leslie did not end up in Night on her own free will. Her mother passed away when she was 8 and her father made a career out of being a radar tech in the United States Air Force, so they moved around a lot. His final post was the Night Point Long Range Radar Site in (you guessed it) Night, Alaska. Leslie, 16 years old at the time began as an intern at the radio station down the street after school. She had grown up fascinated by electronics, perpetuated of course by her father.
Once she turned 18 Leslie pleaded with Fairbanks to allow her to work at the station full time. It didn't take much to convince them of her continued service. She was an excellent employee and knew the radio equipment like the back of her hand. After a while Leslie started inserting her voice into the music broadcasts. The higher ups at first were hesitant to allow her to continue, but after polling the local community it appeared to be a welcomed change.
On a particularly blustery day in 1985 Leslie's world came crashing down around her. On his way into the Radar Site for work her father rolled his SUV into a ditch during a whiteout and suffered a severe head injury. He was rushed to Jeremiah Crawford Memorial Hospital just up the road where Leslie met him. The surgery lasted 12 hours, but was cut short when Robert Dawson's heart stopped.
Leslie practically lived at the radio station after that, drowning her sorrows in music and tearing apart and rebuilding old broadcasting equipment. She took up smoking and began missing payments on their house (her employer did not pay very well). When the house was foreclosed on she moved into the back room permanently, failing to inform her employer. Not that they would ever come all the way up to Night for a visit. As long as things ran smoothly they had no reason to intervene with her work.
Now, 2 years later Leslie still lives in the back room at the radio station.
She splashed her face with water and stared at her opposite in the bathroom mirror. With her short jet black hair and wearing a hand knit green sweater, she was a much paler and thinner version of her former self. She moved back over to her desk, pulled a cigarette out of the now expended pack and discarded the empty sleeve in the bin.
Outside the darkness was blinding. The air was frozen and quiet. The only light provided was from the lit cigarette dangling from Leslie's black nailed fingertips and the stars above. The sky was clearing.
"Right on time." Her icy breath threw fog back into the sky.
beep beep beep beep
Leslie snuffed out her cigarette on the railing and reset the alarm on her watch. She took one last look at the starry night sky then returned inside.
She could here the music fading out as she took her seat and donned her headset.
"That last song was 'Livin' on a Prayer' by Bon Jovi, a personal favorite of mine," she began. "If you haven't done so already step outside and look up. That's right citizens of Night, the clearing has begun. For the next couple weeks we will all get to enjoy a rarity in our small town, the sky!"
Leslie took a sip of her coffee, which had once again gone cold.
"Now let's get back to the music with this bound-to-be classic that is in no way played way too often on our station., 'Dude Looks Like a Lady' by Aerosmith." Leslie sighed heavily as she hit play on her control board, bracing for the monotony.
She put her feet on the desk, slung her headset around her neck and right as the guitar solo was about to begin the music stopped and everything powered down.
"Shit."
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