Work Text:
Jeno was sitting in his room, bored as always. He had already done everything he usually did to pass time so he was left for hours bored until his next shift came. That’s all he did nowadays, and honestly, he liked working. It brought him the entertainment he lacked in his lonely apartment. Plus, the customers that went to the small grocery store he worked in were absolutely entertaining and had the most amazing stories. Props to him for working in a neighborhood full of elderly.
Actually, Jeno thought about himself having an old soul since he could relate to these people and he got along with them pretty good. People thought he was weird for it, but he didn’t care. He was asked often why he would want to work around the elderly and he always excused it on how he was raised by his grandparents and wanted to help them.
Jeno smiled remembering his grandparents and pouted as he missed them a lot. They weren’t gone but he didn’t see him often ever since he moved away from their house. It was time he did, and he was also happy that he got out, but missing them was ever-present on his mind.
Reminiscing, Jeno started thinking about what his grandparents did to entertain themselves. He remembered how his grandma would often knit on her chair while his grandad read a book by the fireplace, and smiled because of how cheesy it all seemed. His grandparents were really a stereotype but it was cute. They were cute.
Another thing they did was listen to the radio a lot, and this drove Jeno a little crazy since they had the radio close to his room. It wasn’t unbearable but whenever he wanted to watch something on his tv, there was some type of music or broadcast in the background.
After thinking about it a lot, he wanted to give the radio a try. What could he lose? He had spare hours until his next shift and had exhausted all of his entertainment methods so he could turn on that old radio and see what’s in it.
He stood up from the comfort of his bed and went to pick it up from the top shelf. Upon touch, he could feel the amount of dust it had collected over time. He had it up there ever since he moved in so it wasn’t a mystery as to why it was like that but he was surprised at the amount it had collected over that short amount of time.
He knew he had to clean it so he went to the kitchen and retrieved a humid cloth from it. Then, he passed the cloth gently on the top of it, looking at how satisfying it was to watch the dust go away with one swipe.
Now that the radio was presentable, he connected it to a power source. He then proceeded to push the on button and much to his dismay, the volume was turned all the way up so when the audio started to come out of it, it scared him due to its loudness. He flinched and hurried to turn it down, letting out a couple of curses in the process. He then laughed, knowing his grandparents would’ve singled him out for his usage of vocabulary.
He made sure the radio was at an adequate level before browsing slowly through the channels. They ranged from classical music to modern music, to some dude making terrible commentaries, to political stuff, and it was honestly discouraging Jeno to the point of thinking of turning it off. The thought wasn’t put on the action since a singular voice caught his attention.
It presented itself with the name of Renjun, and the show was called Renjun Radio. Jeno thought it wasn’t that creative of a name but let it pass since he was intrigued by the tone and foreign accent of the so-called Renjun. It had this hint of innocence but at the same time seriousness. Adding to that, the theme he was talking about was equally engaging.
“Honestly, I know that a lot of people are not interested in this but here me out. Have you guys heard about the Fermi Paradox?”
Jeno nodded as if the guy could see him.
“To those who don’t know about it, it basically is an apparent contradiction proposed by Physicist Enrico Fermi, that was brought up by the lack of knowledge on Alien civilizations and the high probability of them being real. To put it simply, Fermi was one day talking to his colleagues and came to the conclusion that why have we not been in contact with any aliens when there have been countless estimates that there’s a high probability of life outside of the milky way. If we think about it, doesn’t that leave us with tons of questions? Like, gosh, I wish I could listen to you guys right now so we could have a discussion. @ me on Twitter with your guys' opinions and I swear I will take my time answering them. In the meantime, less space talk and more music. Next, Space by Seventeen. A sad song for a lonely night.”
Jeno sat there cursing at himself for never having the will to create himself a Twitter account. He thought of creating one now but it would seem weird that the sole reason for that account’s existence was to interact with the radio host so he stopped himself from doing so. He still wanted to keep listening to the broadcast though so he did.
He listened to the entirety of it and even entered the Livestream to hear whatever the guy had to say after the broadcast. He found himself adoring every single bit of the other’s personality. From how he cringed at himself by making weird noises, making Jeno giggle every time, to how he wasn’t confident that anybody was listening to him, prompting Jeno to spam the chat with “I’m here!” and “I’m listening~” The guy secretly wished he was there to witness all that in real life. He didn’t even know how the guy looked but he still was drawn and one day he wanted to see how the other looked. But for now, he was sure he’d tune into the broadcast every day.