Chapter 11 — Late Night Radio

The email was sent to the station's internal mailbox at eight o'clock the night before, when Vy was still preparing for the broadcast: "All officials and employees of Cam Duong Radio and Television Station are invited to be present at the fourth floor conference hall at 9 a.m. tomorrow to attend the ceremony to announce the decision to appoint the General Director and the development orientation for the new phase of the station. We request all departments to arrange work arrangements to fully attend." There was nothing in that line that foretold a storm, just a dry administrative notice like the hundreds of others Vy had skimmed through in her eighteen months working at the station. But she still read it three times in a row, her finger stopping at the phrase "new stage development orientation", feeling a familiar, vague but persistent uneasiness, just like the gray cloud she had imagined for the past few weeks was now slowly lowering, so close that she could smell its moisture.

The next morning, the fourth floor auditorium - which is usually only used for year-end summary meetings or internal award ceremonies - was almost full when Vy walked in at eight forty-five. The atmosphere was completely different from usual: there was no laughter before the meeting, no calls from familiar colleagues, only the sound of plastic chairs scraping against the tile floor, sporadic whispers, and a tense silence as if everyone was holding their breath waiting for something unknown. Thao Nhi sat next to Vy, her hand clasped the pen, her knees shaking slightly in an unconscious rhythm. Hai Duong sat in the back seat, saying nothing, just looking at Vy once, as a reminder for her to stay strong.

At exactly nine o'clock, the hall door opened, and Mr. Cao Viet Binh walked in first, followed by three people in neat suits that most of the radio staff had never met. The leader, tall, neatly cut hair, sharp eyes and constantly scanning the entire hall as if evaluating each face, was Do Bao Toan. He was in his forties, wearing a well-tailored ash gray suit, no tie, only a thin leather briefcase in his hand - an outfit that exuded efficiency rather than ostentatious authority, but it was that calculated simplicity that made Vy feel a more obvious pressure than any luxurious suit.

Mr. Binh stepped up to the podium, his voice somewhat unusually solemn. "Dear all officers and staff of the station. Today, on behalf of the board of directors, I would like to respectfully introduce Mr. Do Bao Toan, who will officially take on the position of General Director of Cam Duong Radio and Television Station from today, according to the mobilization decision of the parent media group." He paused for a moment, his eyes quickly glanced at the row of chairs where Vy sat, then continued, his voice monotonous, trying to maintain objectivity. "Please Mr. Toan would like to say a few words to all of you."

Do Bao Toan walked up, didn't hold any paper, just put the leather briefcase on the table, opened the laptop and connected it to the rear projection screen. "Thank you, Mr. Binh. Hello everyone." His voice was clear, not too loud but had the weight of someone used to standing in front of a crowd, not flowery, straight to the point the way a project manager presents a report rather than a newly inaugurated leader expressing his thoughts. "I won't say much about myself, because I think your time is more valuable than formal introductions. I have worked in the media industry for twelve years, and was in charge of transforming the operating model at two other provincial radio and television stations. I came here with a specific task assigned by the group: to turn CDR Radio into a completely financially autonomous unit within the next three years, no longer dependent on budget support."

The rear screen turns on, displaying a column chart divided by broadcast time of the day, each column has a different color representing the ratio between operating costs and advertising revenue earned. Vy saw that the column representing the time frame from twenty-three o'clock to one o'clock in the morning - the time frame of "Sleepless Waves" - skyrocketed in the expenses section, while the revenue section was just a thin strip of color lying modestly below, almost insignificant compared to the other columns of the daytime time frame.

"This is an overall picture of the station's operating efficiency in the most recent twelve months," Do Bao Toan said, using a laser pointer to point to each column. "As you can see, there is a huge gap between the time frames that have a large number of followers, bringing stable advertising revenue, and the operating hours that are costly in personnel, equipment, and electricity, but the number of live listeners is very low, not attractive enough for brands to place advertisements. Specifically, the late night time frame, from eleven o'clock in the evening to morning, is consuming approximately twenty-eight percent of the total personnel and operating costs of the entire station, but only contributes less than four percent. hundred of total advertising revenue."

A heavy silence spread throughout the hall. Vy felt her hands cold, even though the air in the room was still air-conditioned at normal temperature. She glanced at Thao Nhi and saw that her friend had completely stopped shaking her knees, her eyes glued to the screen with unconcealed tension.

"I want to make it clear, this is not an announcement of a decision to cut any specific program," Do Bao Toan continued, his voice still calm and somewhat cold. "This is a direction announcement. In the next three months, we will conduct a comprehensive review and work directly with each department to re-evaluate the nighttime operating model. The general direction set by the group is to gradually digitize time frames with low economic efficiency, switch to a selective automatic music playback model, and combine automatic insertion of audio advertisements with new technology - a model that has been successfully applied at the two stations I was in charge of, helping to cut up to seventy percent of operating costs. operates in the night time slot and still maintains continuous coverage twenty-four out of twenty-four hours."

A hand went up from the front row, belonging to the editor in charge of the morning show, who had voiced concern during the briefing two weeks ago. "Let me ask you, what will the current radio programs in the night time slot, like the show Waves Without Sleep, look like in this orientation?"

That question made the whole hall hold its breath. Vy felt her heart beat slowly and heavily, all the sounds around her suddenly became distant, as if she were hearing everything through a thick layer of water. Do Bao Toan did not appear confused by that direct question. He nodded slightly, as if he expected someone would ask the right question.

"Very good question, and I will answer frankly, because I don't want you guys to have to live in rumors." He flipped to another slide, where the program name "Sleepless Waves" appeared along with a series of figures — average live listening, social media interaction rate, monthly personnel costs — neatly presented in a comparison table. "Sleepless Waves, in terms of pure data, is currently the program with the highest cost-to-revenue ratio in the entire night time slot of the station. I know this is a program with a long history and special meaning to the station, founded by the late announcer Lam Trung Hieu, and now continued by Ms. Lam Tuyet Vy." He looked straight at Vy for a moment, his eyes without malice but also without any softness, just the look of someone who is handling one variable in a larger problem. "I respect that. But I also have to be honest, in the next three months of review, this will be one of the programs included in priority evaluation, because its operating costs - including editorial staff and sound technicians on duty for two hours of live broadcast every night - are a clear burden compared to the revenue efficiency. I will not say the final result, because I want to base it on actual data after three months of review, not make a hasty decision right away. today. But I think everyone here, especially those who are directly in charge of night time programs, should prepare themselves for the changes that may happen."

Vy sat motionless, her hands clasped tightly together on her thighs, feeling as if a block of ice had just been placed on her chest, so heavy that she had to try to breathe evenly so that no one would notice the turmoil going on inside. She didn't cry, she didn't react outwardly - years behind the microphone had taught her how to keep a calm face even when her heart was stormy - but she clearly felt the eyes of several nearby colleagues silently glancing at her, a sympathy mixed with curiosity that she didn't know how to receive.

The meeting lasted nearly forty minutes, with other presentations on digital content development plans, expanding the short video production team for social networks, and advertising revenue growth goals next year. But Vy could barely hear anything after the slide that bore her program's name, her mind kept repeating Do Bao Toan's words — "prepare yourself for the changes that may happen" — like a stuck tape, playing over and over again without stopping.

When the meeting ended, everyone stood up, the sound of chairs rubbing the tile floor rang out chaotically, whispered conversations immediately erupted throughout the hall like a wave that had been pent up for too long and was now released. Thao Nhi held Vy's hand tightly, her voice trembling rarely. "Miss Vy, I... I don't know what to say anymore. We have to do something, we can't sit still and watch the program be wiped out like that."

"I know," Vy said, her voice was quiet but she tried to keep it steady, even though inside she felt like someone had just sucked all the air out of her lungs. "But now you need to calm down. We have three months left."

Hai Duong walked through the crowd and approached, without saying anything, just placing a hand on Vy's shoulder, the touch was gentle but firm, like a familiar fulcrum he had always had for the past eighteen months. His eyes met Vy's, and in them, she read a silent anger he was trying to suppress, mixed with worry for her more than for himself.

Mr. Cao Viet Binh stood behind the stage, briefly conversing with Do Bao Toan and two people accompanying him. His face remained serious, but Vy noticed that his hand was clenching the document in his hand so tightly that his knuckles turned slightly white. When the group of leaders left the hall, Mr. Binh stood alone for a moment, watching their shadows disappear behind the door, then turned around, his eyes searching for Vy in the fading crowd.

He walked forward, his voice low, only loud enough for Vy to hear. "Vy, I'm sorry. I knew there would be an announcement, but I didn't expect him to name your program on the first day like that. I tried to ask him to just leave the data in general, not to mention specific names, but—" He stopped, sighed, a look of helplessness evident on his aged face. "He said work must be transparent, not hiding anything from anyone. I don't know whether to be happy about that or worried, because this kind of transparency also means that you no longer have time to prepare mentally."

"It's okay," Vy said, trying to force a smile, although she felt it was definitely not natural at all. "At least now I know where I stand, instead of having to guess."

Mr. Binh nodded, looked around the empty hall, then lowered his voice even lower. "I will find a way, Vy. I don't know how yet, but I will find it. Your father built this program his whole life, I can't stand by and watch it turn into a row of numbers in someone's Excel sheet without doing anything. But I also can't promise you anything for sure, because this time, people are no longer talking about checking, but have already started measuring."

Vy left the auditorium alone after everyone had dispersed, walking slowly along the fourth floor hallway where the daylight slanted through the large glass window, different from the familiar soft yellow light of the studio at night. She passed by the photo hanging on the stairs—one of her father's old photos, showing him sitting in front of the microphone, his familiar smile slightly tilted to one side—and stopped for a moment, looking straight into the eyes in the photo as if searching for an answer, some advice from someone who was no longer here to tell her what to do next.

She thought of the tape she had listened to twelve years ago in the archives, of the words her father had said on the air in the midst of another financial crisis for the station — "we keep going, as long as we can, as wholeheartedly as ever" — and wondered if that statement, now, still had enough weight to stand against a cold bar chart, a percentage with no room for emotion, no room for handwritten letters, no room for a deep voice to ring out. exactly eleven o'clock at night every day for twenty-two years.

That afternoon, instead of going home to rest as usual, Vy stayed at the station, sitting quietly in the empty studio B, the lights weren't on, only the pale light coming in from the small window. She looked at her father's microphone, at the program's nameplate taped to the glass door, slightly peeling in the corner, and for the first time in eighteen months, she felt a completely new fear — not the fear that she wasn't good enough to carry on her father's legacy, but the fear that she wouldn't have the chance to prove it anymore, that the program might go off the air not because of her failure, but because of a spreadsheet that didn't know the existence of people like Ms. Bong at the bus station, like Mr. Enlightened with stories about the sea, like a man who stays up all night guarding the water pipes for a sleeping city.

She sat there for a long time, until the afternoon light outside turned dark purple, signaling that another broadcast night was about to begin, a night where she knew, whether she wanted it or not, her voice would have to carry everything that had just happened today, even though she didn't know exactly how she would say it, how much she would keep, how much she would reveal, in front of thousands of listeners waiting for a Vy who was still as calm as every night.