I paused the recording and opened the door, clutching the mic like a relic.
It was Margie, from two doors down. Her red walker stood in the hallway like a loyal horse. She leaned in, eyes wide.
“Mary,” she whispered, “someone’s asking for you in the lobby.”
“No one asks for me.”
“Well, they did now.”
I followed her down the corridor, heart thudding like it hadn’t in years. The elevator hummed. I could feel the dust of too many years on my skin. When the doors opened, I expected a mistake. A delivery guy with the wrong address. Maybe someone confusing me with another Mary.
But it was a young man. Twenties, maybe. Khakis, windbreaker, too much cologne. And in his hand—God bless him—a cassette tape.
“You’re Mary? Mary in the Morning?”
I blinked. “I used to be.”
He smiled. “I’m interning at KMKC in Jefferson City. We’re putting together a holiday special about forgotten local voices. My boss found one of your Christmas episodes online—‘84, I think. He cried. Told me to find you.”
“Find me?”
“Yes, ma’am. We’d like you to be part of the special. Just a five-minute segment. Your voice. Your stories. The real stuff. Like it used to be.”
I had to sit down. My knees weren’t ready for this kind of memory.
He added, “Do you still have your old mic?”
I nodded. And for the first time in decades, someone asked if I could still read.
We set up that Friday. He brought a soundboard, I brought my stories. Margie brought cookies. We recorded in the community room, beneath the limp banner from last Valentine’s Day that read “Love Never Ages.”
I told him about the morning fog outside Jackson County in ’82, when the cows got loose on Route 50 and the only warning anyone got was from our traffic guy who called in from a rotary phone on the overpass.
He laughed.
And when I finished telling it, he said, “You still got it.”
I went quiet.
Then he leaned forward, more gentle. “Would you… consider making more? Just stories. Memories. We’ll put them on our site. Maybe even a little morning segment. Could be called… ‘Still Mary in the Morning.’”
That night, I didn’t sleep. Not from nerves—but from a kind of waking joy I hadn’t felt since my daughter wore pigtails and ran to the breakfast table to hear me on the air.
I opened the letter from Denise again.
Then I opened a new notebook and wrote, “Episode 3: The Fog and the Cows.”
A week later, I sat in the laundry room again. But this time, I wasn’t crying. I had my earbuds in, listening to my own voice through the KMKC stream. They’d used a gentle guitar in the background. Just enough. The episode had been uploaded two hours earlier. It already had 412 plays.
Four hundred twelve.
More people than I ever imagined would still want to hear from me.
I checked the comments.
One said: “My grandma used to listen to Mary. Now I do too. She sounds like morning smells—warm and real.”
Another: “I live alone. This made my day.”
Someone else wrote: “I didn’t think voices like this existed anymore. Please don’t stop.”
I printed those. Taped them next to Denise’s letter.
The next day, a card came in the mail. From Brian.
It wasn’t long. Just a folded note with five words:
“Heard your voice today. Proud.”
I held it like it was the Declaration of Independence.
And then my phone buzzed.
Clara.
A voicemail.
“Hi, Mom. I just… I just heard your podcast. The one about the Christmas blackout. I forgot how strong your voice was. I think about you more than you know. Call me?”
I pressed the phone to my chest and cried. But it was the good kind. The full kind.
Because someone was listening.
Again.
