#wtnvrp

Oh, my—

𝑂ℎ.

Cecil is struck 𝑏𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑡ℎ𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑠 when Carlos leans over and kisses his cheek in return.

He doesn’t remember the last time he was kissed. Literally, he does not remember it; the last time he was kissed was years ago, by Earl Harlan, and Cecil doesn’t remember a single second of it, wiped clear from his mind after several ensuing— though unrelated— sessions of re-education that left Cecil blank, Earl heartbroken, and their relationship a broken, half-gone mess.

Regardless.

Being kissed now— and being kissed by perfect, perfect Carlos— on the cheek is the most tremendous feeling he’s ever had. And he had such fear when Carlos didn’t respond, at first, but now—

He couldn’t be more thrilled. He couldn’t be happier, really, and—

And he gets a second kiss.

And a third!

Esteban always comes up with such creative ideas— and so does Carlos. He’s so scientific, of course— both he and their son can be so scientific!— but that means they’re inventive, too, and Cecil loves to hear every idea they come up with.

Like names in a hat! What a dangerous idea! But Cecil loves how dangerous Carlos can be, how risky and reckless and fascinating he can be!

Carlos’s voice is so soft when he speaks, like a blanket wrapped around Cecil— and then he promises real blankets, even, and Cecil smiles, sighing, relaxing into Carlos, half-aware of what’s happening around him.

“That sounds 𝑠𝑜 𝑛𝑖𝑐𝑒,” Cecil murmurs. It’s the perfect night, really; it’s his favorite sort of evening between them. “What food do you think the baby wants? Maybe I’m just… just not giving them the food they want.”

Maybe that’s why he doesn’t feel well. Maybe he’s just doing this wrong already. It was easier with Esteban— he had just been born when he came into their lives. Cecil’s not used to doing everything that comes before a baby is born instead of after; maybe he’s already messed it up, somehow?

Hello, to anyone reading this! My name is Wednesday and I am an intern at the Nightvale Community Radio Station. Which, I’m sure you already knew because you read my about page. You read that one and not the one marked PRIVATE DO NOT READ. Don’t read that one. That would be a very rude thing of you to do.

It’s been a few days since I started at the radio station, but I think it’s important for you, reader(s), to know how I got here, to know a little bit more about me…as much as there is to know.

 I don’t remember much. Its like the past is there, just barely out of reach of my thoughts, lingering above me like something wet, heavy and rancid. Threatening to fall at any moment and cling to my skin with its tar-like slime, to then sink into my body through my pores and settle into my joints.

But I do remember the last day of my life before I became an intern.  I remember it like a dream, like someone else’s dream, or someone else’s nightmare, I suppose.

When I woke up, I did not expect the feeling of a well worn floral sofa beneath me or the smell of musty disuse and old coffee in my nose, I did not expect the dimly lit light of a low wattage light bulb to flood my eyes, or, when my eyes adjusted to the light, the look of a nervous man besides the sofa, I did not except my things neatly packed away in proper and labeled boxes surrounding me like those pointy things of a tower where a prince being kept by lust-hungry chain metal cladded dames.

Before I could even make sense of this all, the nervous man gave me his name. I did not retain it but later I got it again. His name was Johann. There was a low coffee table and he set a trap, I mean tray Haha what a silly typo, of prepared food down. It looked as though he had been standing there waiting for me to wake up.

The things he told me were incomprehensible at that point. He said that “The Voice had gone home for the night and had called him to check on the disturbance at the station.”

 At the time, it was like he was speaking a language I didn’t understand and I’m sure that was shown on my face.  I had so many questions to ask but as I sat up I just said:

“Thanks.”

He looked confused and I kinda nodded and gestured to the food. He looked more nervous than he already was and told me not to worry about it.

He then told me it was really late and he’d show me around orientation tomorrow.

“Orientation?” I asked, repeating his second to final word.

“Orientation,” He said gravely, nodding before leaving the room. I waited until I could no longer hear the echoes of his foot falls to get up and look about.

First, the familiar, I looked through my things. I untaped the expertly packed boxes, unpacking and re-packed no where near as perfect as when I had opened them.

 The boxes contained clothes, a few knickknacks I had remembered in the moment of seeing again that I loved them and it would have be able to easy replace them if they had not been packed away, paperwork that proved to me who I was, for I had forgotten about who I was until I saw it. 

Well, forget is a bit of an exaggeration, more like just one step before forgetting. A lot of the documents had been damaged with a black permanent marker. My date of birth and place of birth and last name were all blacked out.  Something about my last name being blacked out seemed really unnecessary and I remember feeling angry about it. Angry, but not really knowing why. 

But, as the rage subsided, I realized I had everything I needed and nothing I didn’t. There was a sense of…I don’t really know how to say it. A feeling of something final but in the way hardening concrete for the floor of a basement is the final step into starting to build a house (at least, I think it is? I don’t know anything about house building) that would then become a home.

I was now ready for unfamiliarity, the room, first in foremost. It looked like storage room of some sort, with boxes other than mine, with names of people I didn’t recognized. Names of people that I would never know. Some lightly used shoves were stood up against the wall next to heavily used shovels. There wasn’t much to the room outside of that and I didn’t really care about going through these other boxes, something felt wrong about that very notion. I picked up the tray of food and began exploring.

The station is huge. No, that’s too small. The station is massive, nearly unfathomable, its a wonder I didn’t get lost... 

And there are things living in here, unknowable things--things I do not want to know about and things that even if I wanted to know I would not be able to know about them. 

My first encounter with such a thing was on my very first day.  I had walked down a hallway with what appeared to be recording studios. There is just an innumerable amount of them. Some of them in use, red recording lights flickered like sluggish fireflies in the dark rooms. Some rooms were lit with low table lamps. In those rooms, I could see in through the glass better. In these barely lit room I could see something that, in my gut I knew, once had been human. 

They were fused to this radio equipment like a grotesque cyborg.

I was just about to go into one of these rooms, to get a closer look at these amalgamate of flesh and mechanics when something dark and pulsing came down from the ceiling with a thick flop. I threw my food tray at it without thinking about it. 

I felt bad! Johann had gone through the trouble making all that food for me and I didn’t even get to taste it! The thing ended up eating all of it and shriving up with a shrill scream of pain that I sometimes hear when I close my eyes at night.