He fell asleep last night watching Trump on C-Span. “What dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil…”
The phone rings. Its intrusion fractures the morning’s silence. He looks at his watch, 7:06. Who calls at this hour?
He checks the caller ID for a clue. No luck. ‘Unknown Number’ it reads. The ring continues. Should he answer? He can’t decide. He picks up the phone, and then puts it down. He curses. Why ruin my day? So he doesn’t answer.
He sits there, soaking in his dilemma. Is there a problem? It’s always something. Surely bad news. Just to what degree. Good news never calls early. He knows from experience. Good news waits. Bad news is urgent.
Confusion clouds his mind. He weighs the options. Which is better, answer and be bludgeoned by the news, or wait, hear it on the voice mail? But what if there isn’t a voice mail? He wishes he were fishing.
The early morning solitude returns. Briefly. The phone rings again, 7:11. Annoyance begins. Now the whole house will be awake. There goes my quiet coffee with the dogs. What fool is calling? Probably wrong number he concludes.
He lets it ring. It dies a silent death on the fifth ring. He checks for a message. Nothing. Two calls, no voice mail. What’s going on?
Questions arise. Anxiety festers. The ‘what if’s’ slide into his mind. His coffee gets cold. Why does bad news invade my Saturday morning sanctuary? His mind refutes the notion, counters with the suggestion that it might be good news. He rejects it.
Mentally he disputes the point. “Good news never happens in the morning,” he argues. His mind answers, “There’s a first for everything.” He quotes statistics on early morning heart failures. He wonders who’s had one. He gulps a Zantac just in case.
He walks outside, listens for the sound of sirens. Nothing. All is quiet on his street. Minutes tick by. Birds sing. The newspaper lies on the grass, limp and damp. To hell with it, only bad news anyway. Debt, drugs, bickering, bombs and social media. Who cares, things he can’t do anything about. He wonders why he pays for such printed drivel. He’s convinced the day will be bad.
Suddenly the phone rings again. Curiosity clutches him. He decides the morning’s shot. Just face the situation. He hesitates momentarily, rushes back inside, grabs the phone.
“Hello,” his sonorous voice shouts a menace. A dial tone answers back. Damn, missed it, he mutters. He waits. No voice mail. A creeping sense of paranoia seeps into his veins. He checks his watch. 7:14. He slumps into his chair, seethes in silence. For what? He doesn’t know.
He debates with himself, questions without answers. “Why do I avoid things?” His coffee, now cold and congealed, mocks him. He knows why. It’s because he’s fatalistic. Happened in youth. He worried incessantly about things like moles, zits and warts. Nothing good comes from chapped lips, dandruff and girls who avoided him.
He remembers parties. Nobody talks about the good fortune of others, only themselves. No, they thrive on the bad news about people, gloat on their own good news. Somebody’s always clinging to the bottom rung of the ladder. What do they say about him?
He looks at his watch and fidgets. 7:19. Will the phone ring again? Probably not, he concludes. Just forget it, he tells himself. But he can’t.
Suspense consumes him like a canker. Images of train wrecks, market crashes, plagues and famines cloud his judgment. Seconds crawl by like hours. He paces, helpless in his syndrome of avoidance.
He becomes restless. Anguish torments him. He hears voices. He has to know. Not knowing is unacceptable. But fate fiddles with him, teases him with the riddle.
His wife shambles sleepily into the kitchen. “Who called?” she asks. “Don’t know. Didn’t answer,” he says.
“Again? Why?” she asks.
“Because,” he says. She knows why, shakes her head. He avoids her sneer, takes the dogs outside.
The phone rings again. He checks his watch, 7:28. He bolts inside. Too late. She answers. “Really? What good news. Yes, I’ll tell him. ‘Bye,” she says.
“Who? What?” His voice trembles. “Fix my coffee please,” she says with a smirk. “I’ll tell you later…maybe.”
So much for the paranoia of avoidance. Who’s calling you today? You’ll know if you answer!