Rerun Hang-Ups

by Linda2

Summer reruns!  Johnny frowned as he perused the TV listings.  That’s all that was on, reruns.  It was bad enough he was stuck at home by himself on a summer night, but all he could find on television was summer reruns.  He continued to read through the listings, hoping to find a program he had not seen the year before.  As luck would have it, they all sounded familiar.  Then he read the Adam-12 listing.  It sounded familiar too, as if there was something about it he should remember.

Finally it struck him.  That was the show he had been watching when they had been toned out to a rescue.  He and Roy had spent the rest of the night trying to find out how the show had ended, but had not succeeded.  Getting toned out in the middle of a show was nothing unusual.  This one, however, peeked his interest more than any of the others had.  Officer Jim Reed had been captured by two of the bad guys.  Johnny, imagining a hundred ways he could have gotten out of the situation, was curious to know exactly how it had been done.   

Now was his chance to find out.  The show was on in ten minutes.  As he reached for the remote, the phone rang.  He stood and walked around the end of the couch and crossed to the breakfast bar, where the phone was.

“Hello.”  He spoke into the receiver, a wide grin spread across his face when he heard the reply.  “Aunt Rose! I haven’t heard from you in a long time.”  His mother’s sister, Rose, was one of his favorite people.  They had always gotten along well.  As a teenager, he found he was able to talk to Aunt Rose when there was no one else. 

Twenty-five minutes later, he caught sight of a clock and realized the show he had been going to watch was almost half over.  Aunt Rose was in the middle of a very interesting story and Johnny didn’t want to interrupt her.  He had too much respect for his aunt to insult her by saying he couldn’t listen to the rest of her story because he was missing a TV show.  But he did want to watch the end of the show. 

Picking up the phone base as he continued to listen to his Aunt’s story with one ear, he walked toward the couch.  Halfway there, the phone cord pulled him up short.  Jiggling the cord and working it over and around obstacles on the breakfast bar brought him almost to the back of the couch.  The remote, his only hope of being able to turn on the TV without putting the phone down, was on the coffee table in front of the couch. 

Still half listening to his aunt, he tried to decide what to do.  When he attempted to set the phone base down on the back of the couch, it teetered, but he hoped it would stay long enough for him to reach across the couch for the remote.  He let go of the phone base and transferred the receiver to that hand.  Before he could make a move for the remote, he had to catch the phone base to keep it from falling.  Balancing it once again, he started to reach for the remote.  Once again he had to catch the base.  Then, trying to keep it in place with one leg, he leaned forward over the couch toward the remote. He finally touched it after several adjustments and subsequent attempts, and stretching as far as he could.  Inadvertently, he pushed the remote farther away.  Groaning in frustration, he stood upright.  The phone base crashed to floor, jerking the receiver from his hand. 

“Johnny!  Johnny are you there?”  Aunt Rose sounded alarmed and puzzled.  “What happened?”

“Sorry, Aunt Rose.  The phone fell,” Johnny said, sheepishly, when he had recovered the receiver.  “It’s okay.  What were you saying?”  Sighing, he picked up the phone base and returned to the breakfast bar.  Maybe she would finish quickly and he could catch the end of the program. 

After saying good-bye to his aunt, he jogged around the couch to turn on the TV.  The credits had just ended and the music was fading away as the set came on, and by the time the he could see the picture, a commercial was playing.  Turning it off, Johnny sighed.  By now he was wildly curious to know how Officer Reed had escaped.

A few moments later the phone rang.  This time it was Roy.

“Hey, did you see that Adam-12 program was on tonight?” 

“Yeah, I did.”  Hope began to gleam.

“Did you watch it?”  Both asked simultaneously.

“No.”  Both answered.

“I was going to watch it, but Aunt Rose called.  I just got off the phone.”  Johnny said ruefully.

“I was going to watch it, too.  But I was playing outside with the kids and lost track of the time.”  Roy explained.

“Hey, maybe one of the other guys watched it….”

*****

Thirty years later:

A whole channel devoted to reruns!  Johnny couldn’t believe it.  He chuckled to himself as he perused the listings, reading the short program descriptions.  Everything from Adam-12 to All in the Family was listed.  Some of the descriptions he recognized as vaguely familiar, others were totally unfamiliar.  Then one Adam-12 program description caught his eye.  What was it about that particular episode description?  It struck him as different from the rest, as if there was something about it he should remember.  Not about the show itself, but something lurked in the back of his mind.  After a moment he dismissed it and moved on. 

Later, the program description began to haunt him.  He dismissed it several more times, then suddenly it came to him.  That was the Adam-12 show he had never seen the end of.  The one he had been watching when they got toned out, and had bugged him the rest of the night.  The one he hadn’t been able to watch when it ran again in the summer because he was talking to his Aunt Rose on the phone. 

Picking up the TV listings, he found the program listing for that particular show.  It was on at one in the morning.  He would set his VCR to record it, and watch it the next day. 

Around twelve thirty that night he awoke and began to think about the show.  The more he thought about it, the more curious he became.  How had Officer Reed escaped from the bad guys?  Suddenly, he made a decision; he would get up and watch the show.  It was about ten till one. 

Creeping down to the living room in the dark, he turned the TV on with the volume low.  Making himself comfortable, he stretched out on the couch and settled in to watch the program.  Halfway through the last commercial before the show began, the VCR came on and started recording.  Johnny snored softly as the opening credits ran.  When the opening credits finished, the VCR stopped suddenly, furiously rewound the tape, then spit it out. 

Johnny snored more loudly….

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