“The Message on the Radio” Stories of Suspense

Jorge Ávila had been a radio host for nearly two decades. He started his career at local stations in his small town, but his charisma and deep, calming voice earned him a spot on the late-night radio of a major station in the capital. His show, “The Midnight Voice,” was known for its blend of soft music, intimate conversations with listeners, and philosophical reflections on life. He often received calls from lonely people, insomniacs, or just those who needed to vent in the darkest hours of the night.

The radio booth was located on the top floor of an old brick building, right in the city center. From his window, Jorge could see the sleeping city, the streetlights flickering in the distance, and the distant echo of nighttime traffic. That night, like many others, Jorge entered the booth at 11:30 p.m., preparing for his midnight show. He turned on the dim lights, placed his coffee cup in its usual spot, and reviewed the records he planned to play.

“Good evening, night listeners,” he began in his usual tone. “Welcome to another edition of The Midnight Voice. Here we are, together, in these hours when the world seems to stop, and only we, our voices, and our thoughts remain.”

He put on a soft jazz song and leaned back in his chair, closing his eyes, enjoying the moment. It was a lonely job, but he loved it. However, that night would be different.

Just fifteen minutes had passed before the first call came in. Jorge pressed the button to take it.

“Good evening, you’re on The Midnight Voice. Who am I speaking with?”

There was silence on the other end of the line. Jorge waited, thinking the connection had failed. He was about to hang up when he heard a faint breath, like a whisper cutting through the air.

“Hello?” Jorge repeated, frowning.

Finally, a voice responded, low and rough, like a knife scraping over rusty metal.

“Hello, Jorge.”

Something in the way they pronounced his name put him on alert. It was as if the voice carried a strange weight, a familiarity he didn’t recognize. But it wasn’t unusual for his listeners to know his name—after all, he mentioned it frequently on the show.

“Who is this?” he asked, trying to keep his tone calm.

“Someone who knows you well,” the voice replied.

Jorge felt a chill run down his spine. The line abruptly cut off, leaving only the empty hum of the dead signal.

He stared at the control panel, hoping the call was just a bad joke. However, there was something in that voice, something that deeply unsettled him. But he couldn’t afford to be affected by it. He restarted the show, making sure to maintain his professional tone.

“Sometimes we get all sorts of calls, friends. That’s life in late-night radio. Now, let’s get back to the music.”

Over the next few nights, the calls from that anonymous listener continued. The caller never revealed their name, but they always knew Jorge’s, and with each call, they seemed to know more about his life. They asked questions no one else could ask. They mentioned places Jorge had visited in his youth, intimate details of past relationships, even painful episodes he had buried long ago.

One night, as the city outside was covered in thick fog, the voice spoke of something Jorge hadn’t shared with anyone in years.

“Do you remember that night at the lake?” the voice said, slowly and deliberately. “The storm, the overturned boat… and what you did afterward.”

Jorge froze. The memory hit him like a hammer to the chest. The image of a dark lake, turbulent water, and a pair of terrified eyes flooded his mind. He had spent so long trying to forget, but in that instant, it all came rushing back.

“Who are you?” he demanded, his voice trembling for the first time.

“I’m just someone who knows the truth,” the voice replied before the line cut off once again.

Jorge stared at the control panel, his breath quickening. That particular secret was one he hadn’t shared even with his wife. It was an event buried deep within his soul, a summer night many years ago, where tragedy and fear intertwined in a series of desperate decisions. No one should know. No one could know.

With each passing night, Jorge grew more and more paranoid. He arrived at the station early, checking everything around him. His coworkers noticed his change in demeanor, but he pushed them away with vague excuses. The feeling of being watched haunted him even when he wasn’t on air. The once calm and in-control radio host now lived in constant fear of the next call.

Finally, after a week of torment, he decided to confront his stalker. One night, during the show, he decided to take the initiative.

“Tonight, I want to speak directly to the person who has been calling. If you’re listening, and I know you are, I want you to know that what you’re doing is sick and disturbing. Stop calling me. You don’t intimidate me.”

The silence that followed was heavy, as if the city itself was holding its breath. He played a song and waited. Minutes later, the call came in.

“Good evening, Jorge,” the voice said, almost with an audible smile in its tone. “Don’t misunderstand, this isn’t intimidation. I just want you to remember who you are, what you did, and what still awaits you.”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about!” Jorge burst out, breaking his usual protocol of staying calm. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“I know more than you think. And if you’re not careful, everyone else will know too.”

The phone slipped from Jorge’s hand. Who was this person? What did they want? And most importantly, how did they know so much? He wondered if he should go to the police, but what would he say? That someone was harassing him with mysterious calls on the radio? He had no proof, and besides, questions about his past would only complicate things. What if the secret he feared so much came to light?

Things began to worsen as the influence of the voice seeped into his daily life. He started receiving anonymous letters at his house, notes that appeared on his car windshield, and in his email, all signed with the same phrase: “Remember what you did.” The stress was slowly consuming him; he had started losing sleep, his wife noticed something was wrong, but he couldn’t explain it to her. Telling her the truth would mean reliving the painful memory, and worse, it would mean putting her in danger too.

One night, as he was heading to the radio station, he noticed something strange. As he left his house, there was a figure standing across the street, a shadow that disappeared as soon as Jorge turned to look directly at it. In the days that followed, the figure reappeared, always keeping a safe distance but always present.

He decided to confront it. The next time the shadow appeared, Jorge ran toward it, crossing the street at full speed. But when he got there, no one was there. Only the echo of his footsteps resonated on the pavement.

Fear became something physical, a knot in his stomach that never left him. The weight of the threats, the constant stalking, was slowly destroying him.

The day before what would be his last show, Jorge received an envelope at his house. It had no return address, but inside he found an old, wrinkled, and yellowed photograph. In the image, he could see himself, many years younger, next to a boat at the lake. There was another person in the photo, a young man Jorge recognized instantly, even though he hadn’t seen his face in decades.

The boy in the photo was smiling, unaware of what awaited him. Jorge felt the air leave his lungs. On the back of the photo, in large red letters, it was written: “Everything will come to light tomorrow.”

The promise wasn’t just a threat; it was a sentence. If this became public, if the truth about that night at the lake came to light, his life would be ruined. He could lose everything: his career, his family, his freedom. Desperate, he sought the help of a lawyer friend, who advised him to hand the photo over to the police. However, Jorge knew it was useless. Any attempt to control the situation would only serve to accelerate his downfall.

That night, he went to the station feeling as though he were walking toward his execution.

Jorge sat in his booth, in front of the microphone, with trembling hands. He had decided that this would be the last broadcast of The Midnight Voice. If things were going to fall apart, they would do so on his own terms. He began the program with his usual greeting, but soon directed his words to the anonymous listener.

“You, who have been stalking me these past few weeks, I want you to know that you’ve won. This will be my last night on the air. But before I go, I’d like to hear what you have to say.”

He waited, and the phone rang almost immediately.

“Jorge,” the voice sounded different this time, calmer, almost triumphant. “You finally admit it. It’s time for everyone to know the truth.”

Jorge took a deep breath.

“You’re not going to win,” he said firmly. “You can’t do this to me.”

The laughter on the other end of the line was cold and sinister.

“It’s not me who will do it, Jorge. It will be your own conscience. The truth always comes to light, and you knew it from the beginning.”

Jorge hung up the phone, and for a moment, he considered telling the truth on the air, confessing his sins, and letting the audience be his judge. But instead, he stood up, grabbed his jacket, and walked out of the booth.

That night, The Midnight Voice ended early, with only the sound of static filling the airwaves.

The next day, the news spread like wildfire. Jorge Ávila, the famous radio host, had disappeared. His car was found abandoned near the lake of his childhood, the same lake where the accident had occurred so many years before. In the passenger seat, they found an audio tape, with a recording of his voice confessing everything.

The secret he had feared so much was finally revealed. Jorge had been involved in the death of a friend during a stormy night at the lake, a death he had tried to cover up all his life. That friend, the victim, had been the brother of the anonymous listener, someone who had sworn revenge since that fateful day.

Jorge’s body was never found, but the last broadcast remained as an unanswered echo, a voice lost in the night, carried away by the wind.

And so, The Midnight Voice went silent forever, leaving only a trail of shadows, whispers, and a secret that could no longer stay buried.

But what happened at the lake?

It was a summer night more than twenty years ago, when Jorge Ávila and his best friend, Marcos Ortega, decided to go to the lake for a ride in an old rowboat that belonged to Jorge’s family. The lake was near the small town where they had both grown up, a quiet, secluded place, surrounded by tall, dense trees. They used to spend a lot of time there, talking about their dreams, their future plans, and, as teenagers, venting their frustrations.

On that particular night, the weather had been unusually hot and humid, and the air was charged with electricity. They had drunk a bit more than usual, stealing some beers from Jorge’s father’s refrigerator before heading out. The moon reflected on the water, and the sound of nocturnal insects was the only accompaniment to their carefree laughter.

But something changed that night. There was a tension in the air that neither of them mentioned, an invisible weight that seemed to drag them toward a breaking point.

While they were in the middle of the lake, a strong, cold wind began to blow, a harbinger of the storm that was approaching. The waves started to rise, rocking the boat from side to side, and within minutes, what had begun as a peaceful night turned into a nightmare.

The argument started over something trivial, a harsh joke Jorge made to Marcos. But the words grew harsher, more cutting. The alcohol and adrenaline fueled their anger. Marcos said something that struck Jorge to his core, a painful truth Jorge had been denying: the fear of being a failure, of not being able to escape the small life of their town.

Furious, Jorge abruptly stood up, making the boat sway dangerously. Marcos, also on his feet, pushed him, and in an instant, both lost their balance. The boat capsized, and they both fell into the freezing water.

Jorge was a good swimmer, but Marcos was not. Amid the chaos, Jorge heard Marcos scream for help. He turned to see his friend desperately struggling to stay afloat. The water was dark, churned by the storm that was now in full force. Jorge swam toward him, but something inside him hesitated. The anger hadn’t completely subsided, and for a second, he froze, watching Marcos struggle, his hands reaching out to him, panic in his eyes.

That second was enough.

Marcos’s body was suddenly pulled under by a swift current, disappearing beneath the surface. Jorge swam to where he had last seen him, frantically searching, but it was too late. Marcos did not resurface.

Panic overtook Jorge. He swam to the shore, gasping for breath, his heart pounding in his chest. He knew he couldn’t tell the truth to anyone. What would they say if they knew he hadn’t done everything possible to save his friend? What would they think if they knew he let him drown in a fit of anger? He was sure they would blame him, that his life would be over.

When he reached the shore, all he could think about was how to cover up what had happened. He knew that if he claimed it was an accident, he might get away with it. So, he lied. He said that the storm had caught them by surprise, that they both fell into the water, and that Marcos simply disappeared before he could do anything. The community believed him, accepting the tragedy as a sad accident. Marcos’s body was found days later, floating in a remote part of the lake.

Jorge, devastated by guilt, did everything he could to bury that memory. But the truth is a persistent shadow, and though the town eventually moved on, Jorge could never escape what he had done that night. The guilt gnawed at him from within, and the image of Marcos, fighting for his life while he hesitated, haunted his dreams.

Years later, when his life seemed to be in order, that shadow returned to claim its due. The voice on the radio, the stalker who knew too much, wasn’t just someone seeking revenge. It was the embodiment of Jorge’s remorse, a manifestation of a past that had never left him. And in the end, it was that guilt that drew him back to the lake, to the place where it all began, to face the darkness he had been avoiding for so long.

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