Work Text:
Rolling Thunder
1997
'This is Mikey MD, your late night MC coming to you live from Virgin Radio, right here in London, and I am taking your call-in requests for the next hour,' Mike said boisterously into his microphone. God, this job was shit sometimes. The pay was hardly worth the nonsense that came with being the overnight deejay at a relatively new radio station called 'Virgin Radio' of all things. Mike would be surprised if it lasted through the year.
Call-in request hour was the worst. Giggling teenage girls up past their bedtime, drunken uni students, and psychos were the only ones who ever called. Mike had begged Stanley, the station manager, to do away with it, but Stan felt that allowing every Tom, Dick, and Harry their thirty seconds on the airwaves while they shouted and hooted like lunatics was the best way to 'gauge what the public really wants' and 'make themselves accessible to the People'. Sometimes Mike hated Stanley more than he hated Virgin Radio; the man was such a twat.
Within seconds of Mike's on-air proclamation, lines one through four lit up red and began blinking. With a groan he took the first three calls, two of which requested the same insipid pop song, whereas the third just made some inhuman screeching noises, then abruptly disconnected. So it was going to be that kind of night — fantastic. Mike set up the requested song to play after two other songs he selected at random, and glanced at the phone again. Thankfully, there was only one light left blinking.
Mike hit the button for line four, suppressing the urge to cringe away from the microphone. Instead he forced a smile into his voice and chirped, 'You're on with Mikey MD, what can I play for you?'
Only silence answered. Mike paused uncertainly and cleared his throat. 'Hello? Caller, are you still with us?' he asked, annoyance creeping into his voice. He heard a rush of static against his headset as the caller exhaled sharply, and Mike pursed his lips. Another late night psycho, then.
'Caller, if you can hear me, I can't hear you so I'm going to have to discon-' Mike started, but the mystery caller interrupted him.
'I'm here,' a muffled baritone voice sounded in Mike's headset. The caller let out another gusty sigh and continued, 'I, uh, I just wanted to ask-' he stopped and let out a quiet groan of frustration. Mike swore he heard the caller mutter 'wrong' before obviously forcing himself to continue, 'I meant, I would like to request a song.'
Mike rolled his eyes, 'Well, that's what I'm here for,' he said, trying his best not to sound too condescending, 'What song can I play for you?'
Another awkward pause, 'Do you- rather, can- I mean, could you possibly play 'Better Man' by Pearl Jam for me?' the caller asked, his words coming out in a jumble of starts and stops. Mike was able to identify a faraway quality in his voice that usually indicated some degree of intoxication.
'I should be able to do that,' Mike answered more kindly than he intended, probably because he was just glad he wouldn't have to put on yet another Madonna song, 'That one's going back a couple years. Any particular reason you'd like to hear it?'
Mike didn't know what compelled him to ask that last question; usually he did all he could to avoid the long sappy soliloquies that came with radio requests and dedications, but it was such an unusual choice that he found himself mildly interested.
'I just- it's... It's just an important song to me,' the caller admitted, reluctance clear in his voice, 'I had the album at one point, but it got broken.'
'Broken?' Mike asked before he could stop himself. He checked his player and saw there was only forty seconds left of the third song. Hopefully he could wrap this call up quickly, play the Pearl Jam song, and move on with his night.
'Yes. It was thrown and shattered against a wall,' the caller explained flatly, this time without any trace of a stutter. Mike frowned.
'Well why would you throw a record?' he asked, noting there was only twenty seconds before dead air, 'Seems a fool thing to do if you say you liked it.'
'I didn't throw it,' the caller replied coldly, 'It was thrown at me. Along with the record player.'
Mike's mind went blank. That was certainly not the explanation he was expecting. Blindly, he added another song to the queue to buy himself some more time on the phone.
'Someone threw a record player at you?' he asked seriously, suddenly glad he had the option to keep calls from airing live, 'Mate, that's a bit not good there.'
'It's fine,' the called said with a sigh, 'He apologised after, and we replaced it the next day. Just not the record. Besides, most everything is on CDs these days. I just happen to prefer vinyl still.'
Mike didn't feel the need to point out that that was hardly the point. Instead he just asked 'Who threw it at you?'
'My boyfriend,' the caller answered after a long silence. He did not elaborate.
Mike didn't say anything right away, just tried to gather his thoughts. The fourth song was ending.
'Listen, I have to go back on the air for a moment, but will you stay on the line? I'll play your song next, but please- don't hang up yet,' Mike said, and hit the hold button on the phone without waiting for an answer. He put his loud, happy DJ voice back on and named the song titles and artists for the songs he'd just played, and then announced the next song up, all the while keeping his eye on the phone. The light stayed red.
He hit 'play' on the Pearl Jam song, and flipped back to the phone.
'Caller, are you still there?' he asked, nervous for some inexplicable reason.
'Yes,' came the quiet reply, and through the other end of the phone, Mike heard the faint notes of the requested song bouncing back to him.
'So you said your boyfriend was the one who threw the record player at you?' Mike asked. The caller didn't respond, so he continued uncomfortably, 'Does he... Does he chuck things at you a lot? Or, you know, hit your or any of that?'
Mike heard an angry grunt through the phone and knew he'd crossed the line.
'That,' the caller spat angrily, 'Is absolutely none of your business. Thank you for playing the song. Good ni-'
'Wait,' Mike interrupted, wanting to get the words out for his own peace of mind, 'Listen, I'm training at St Bart's during the day... If you ever... You know, need some help, you can look me up there. You don't- you don't need to put up with any bloke who thinks it's okay to... Well, you know. No one deserves that. You can find a better man.'
Mike held his breath for a long minute, waiting to see if the caller would reply, and he heard him inhale sharply, as though he was going to speak, but a moment later, the dial tone sounded in his ear. The caller had hung up.
~~~~~
The next day at Bart's, Mike was tired and irritable. John, one of Mike's classmates kept shooting him concerned looks, until he finally cornered him later in the afternoon while Mike stood in a daze at the coffee machine.
'Everything alright, Stamford?' he asked cautiously, 'That deejaying gig taking the piss out of you again?'
'Something like that,' Mike replied vaguely, unsure of how much he should disclose. In some strange way, he felt like sharing what had happened last night was a breech of doctor-patient confidentiality, which was utterly absurd seeing as he wasn't yet a doctor, and the conversation had occurred while he was in no way acting as a medical professional. He decided giving John a brief overview would be safe enough. 'I just had a strange call last night during request hour. Disturbed me a bit, I guess.'
John nodded and rolled his eyes, 'It wasn't that bloke with the panty hose again, was it?' he asked with a shudder, 'I'm telling you, mate, you couldn't pay me enough to have to put up with that shit.'
Mike shook his head and frowned, his shoulders slumping, 'Nah, I think that weirdo found someone else to harass after midnight. This other person called in last night and requested 'Better Man' by Pearl Jam, and I think -- I mean, I could be wrong -- but I believe has an abusive boyfriend.'
'Poor girl,' John said sympathetically, 'Any man who treats a woman like that ought to be shot.'
Mike didn't bother to correct him, instead said, 'I mentioned that I was training here... I wonder if they'll show up. Anyway, I suppose there's nothing I can do about it now. I'd rather not think about it anymore. How about you - still thinking of joining the Army?'
John nodded and launched into a long explanation of his plans for after he completed his training at Bart's and Mike did his best to listen attentively and push all thoughts of his mystery caller aside. He'd done all he could, so the only thing left to do was let it go.
~~~~~
2012
Sherlock stood at the window of 221B Baker Street, earbuds jammed obstinately in his ears, glaring at the street below. He made no move when a hand appeared on his shoulder, shaking him from his reverie, but after a moment turned to see John standing next to him, lit up red-orange in the setting sun.
'What's on your mind, love?' the doctor asked him once Sherlock had pulled the headphones from his ears.
'Nothing of consequence, John,' he replied moodily. John nodded and glanced down at Sherlock's phone. The familiar album artwork looking back at him took him by surprise.
'Rearviewmirror?' he asked curiously, 'Sherlock, did you raid my CDs again?'
Sherlock snorted, 'Honestly, John, you're the only one who still bothers with those things. Everything is online these days,' he said condescendingly, but then sighed, 'But yes. I had Vitalogy on vinyl once when I was at uni, before... Well, before. I- I just wanted to listen to a few songs.'
There was an uncharacteristic hesitance in Sherlock's voice, and John saw the words 'Better Man -- Pearl Jam -- Rearviewmirror (Hits from 1991 - 2003)' scroll by. Pearl Jam and Sherlock just didn't seem to belong in the same sentence -- in fact, Sherlock constantly scoffed at John's love of the band, and often complained through the bathroom door when John showered and sang along to 'Alive' or 'Jeremy'. (Though truthfully, that had as much to do with John's dreadful singing voice as it did the content.)
The familiar strains of the song reached John's ears from the discarded headphones hanging around Sherlock's neck. 'She loved him/ She don't want to be this way/ She needs him/ That's why she'll be back again/ Can't find a better man...' Eddie Veddor belted out at them. Sherlock closed his eyes and took a deep breath, and a long forgotten memory from over fifteen years ago stirred in the back of John's mind, just out of reach.
Giving his head a shake to clear it, John reached up and pulled Sherlock into a tight embrace. Automatically, Sherlock leant down and John laid a kiss against his cheek.
'He was nothing, love,' John murmured into Sherlock's neck as the next song began to play from the phone, 'Nothingman.'
Sherlock nodded mutely, also lost memory, and returned to his earlier contemplation.
That idiot deejay from Sherlock's uni days had been correct -- he had found a better man. He thought back to the night before his twenty-first birthday when he was depressed and lonely and strung out on cocaine, and how it has seemed like the most important thing in the world at the time to hear that stupid song. Then he thought of the afternoon at Bart's two years ago when an unremarkable man with a cane and an ugly jumper had limped into his life and changed everything irrevocably.
That was two things he owed Mike Stamford for.