Chapter Text
Neal often felt bad days started out with little irritations, little things to get under his skin before everything snowballed into a complete shit storm. Today was no exception when he split coffee all over the shirt he'd wanted to wear.
"Aw, you've got to be kidding me..." He exclaimed, rubbing it futilely with napkins. "Right before I have to leave?"
“Why does it matter Daddy? they aren’t going to see you.” His daughter Marty pointed out. Her and her brother had just come home from school, and this was the brief fifteen minute period they got to spend together before he had to rush off to his afternoon radio show 'making sense with cents'
“Maybe not honey, but other people at the station are going to see me, and if I attract their attention my show will get put into a better slot, so I don’t want to look like a slob. Dress for the job you want as they say.”
“Would you be famous?” She asked excitedly.
“I wouldn’t call it being famous, but it certainly has more respectability and clout.” He called as he went to his bedroom to get another shirt.
“Marty, why don’t you find your brother, tell him Daddy's leaving for work.” Susan told her.
Neal came back wearing a new shirt, tucking it in with the belt unbuckled. He looked up, smiling nervously. “What do you think?”
“You look fine.” She said adjusting his tie. “Just…make sure you don’t forget us when you get famous.” She teased, and he rolled his eyes.
“Never.” He said and she smiled, pulling him down by his shirt collar to give him a kiss.
---
He forgot the sandwich he usual brought for dinner, so he stopped at the deli by the station for one.
“Crowded today huh?” A woman behind him remarked as he waited for them to make his meal
“Yeah, just one of those days.” He frowned, turning back to look at her, a petite woman with blonde hair cut in a bob, and when he did he she flashed a pleasant ‘suburbanite out on the town’ smile, dressed in a green nurses uniform leading him to believe she was headed to or from work.
"...Not to be that jerk, I'm shamefully spacing on your name, but I'm pretty sure we've met."
She laughed at that. "Its fine...most people don't recognize me at all, I'm practically invisible at the station especially when I'm not with my husband Del."
"Right, Del's wife, Dammit...you must be Marie then." He said with tired triumph.
She groaned a little. "He talks way too much about me on the air. I know he means well, but sometimes it's a bit much."
"I don't get it, I've always preferred to keep my personal life personal."
"From what I've heard of your show you don't mention Susan much." She remarked. When he looked at her peculiarly she elaborated: "We've been to several of the same station parties."
"Oh right..." He laughed nervously. "I guess you would've been."
"But hey, at least you knew me from the radio show." there was a kind of pointedness to the statement that gave him pause.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing...I mean, you bring him up a lot on your own show, so I assume you listen to his." She said with an apologetic little smile.
"What? No...look, he talks about my show, which might I say is odd for a show about alien abductions and conspiracy theories-"
"It's really a mixed bag, what he's interested in." She insisted. "Sure that includes a lot of oddball things that involve aliens and and Sasquatch-"
"And my show, oh-" He said said with a maniacal smile, shaking his head. "-He likes to bring up my show because it's right before his and there's fresh opportunity to 'explore' topics I brought up, grossly over exaggerations I have to correct. And he always does it at the first half hour because he knows I'll be listening on the ride home."
Marie tried to stifle a laugh at that. "If you know he's trying to get a rise out of you why do you listen in the first place?"
"What do you mean?" He said with a frown. "If someone's going to talk shit about carefully crafted show I should hear it."
"Did it ever occur to you he might be doing that so you'll react on your show?"
"...Not exactly." He admitted.
"Believe me, change the channel, stop bringing it up and eventually he'll get bored." She insisted.
"...I guess that's something to keep in mind." He acknowledged as his order came up.
---
"Where have you been?" The station manager hissed as he slid in. "I had to make Ralph go on longer." He said, referring to their evening news guy who was currently droning on about current events.
"I got a little held up, but I'm here now." He insisted before slipped into the broadcasting booth, as the sound guy played his intro, putting on his headset and going into his usual opening statement
"...Hello this is 'Sense for cents,' I'm your host Neal Page about all things financial from stocks to investments...and even day to day spending." He said, glancing down at his notes, 'Corrections' in bold over several bullet points, all of which were about Del's last show. He narrowed his eyes, pushing it aside.
"This is where I'd usually go into the corrections segment of the show like I do everyday...instead I'd like to talk about investing your time wisely. Because as they say: Money is time, and it's important to invest your time in things that really matter."
---
'-For that matter, that also extends to people that don't matter. That are irrelevant to the subject matter at hand and just want to bring you down.'
"Oh no, I managed to make it worse." Marie said with dismay as she drove home. Sure enough Del was sitting at the kitchen table with a pensive look on his face, cigarette in hand as he listened fervently to the radio
"...You know I don't like it when you smoke those, it just makes me want to start again." She joked grimly as she set the dinner she'd gotten at the deli on the table and pulled up a chair close to him. "...now what sort of example would I be setting then?"
"Aw I know, I guess I had a bit of a slip up." He said as he snubbed out the cigarette. "How was work? Do I want to know why you're in you're back up uniform?"
"You do not." She said curtly, pushing off her tennis shoes before perching her crossed feet on Del's knee. "...Without getting into the gnarly details lets just say I didn't feeling like making dinner, picked something up at Carson's Deli, the place near the station?"
"Suits me." He said with a grin. "You run into anybody interesting?"
"You could say that, I ran into him." She said, nodding towards the radio, where Neal was currently talking about when the best time to sell stocks was.
"No...you're kidding."
"Dead serious, it was right before his show. I think he came in to pick up a sandwich."
"Must've forgotten his at home, he was running a minute or two late." He said contemplatively. "He wasn't an asshole was he? He can be an asshole sometimes."
"No, he was fine...even remembered who I was." She said, not bringing up the context of how he remembered, least she fuel the weird feud the two had.
"Really? He's only met you once or twice."
"Well you do mention me on the show a lot." She said reluctantly, and he laughed triumphantly.
"Oh, of course. Because that bastard always listens."
"And you don't?" She pointed out skeptically as the pitch of Neal's voice rose on the radio as complained about a recent rise of gas prices.
"I don't know, if someone's gonna talk shit about me I might as well hear it." He said defensively, turning off the radio.
"Don't take this the wrong way hun, but don't you think that's precisely why you shouldn't listen?"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean he's probably trying to get a rise out of you, and it might be a good idea to break the cycle?"
He smiled sheepishly, reaching for her hand and giving it a squeeze. "Son of a bitch darling, you're so right."
She shrugged, smiling back at him. "...I occasionally am."