She giggled through the telephone, she was stoned. Out of her gourd, he might have called it.

Through the digital dropout on the end of the phone he waited for the laughter to subside. When it did she said, What?

I didn’t say anything, he replied and winced at the lie. He had said something. In her mind, the glowing graphic MUTE never came up but it was obviously there. He hadn’t pushed the button, hadn’t even had control of the remote, but it was the instinctual twist of life’s volume knob he knew had happened.

So, do you wanna come over, her words melded into a teasing slur.

The handset became heavier in his hands at each breath. This wasn’t an unusual question and certainly the doubt in his mind wasn’t new. Conversation in the background –her end of course, he was alone– gave him a minute. His eyes turned up to their thinking place. Each crook and shadow of the plaster ceiling made him want to think about something else, but not someone else.

Are you binging this weekend, he asked.

Her breathing and muffled voice on the other end of the phone was playful and erotic.

Maybe, she said, do you want to join us?

She was having a good time, why couldn’t he? Pondering the question he also tried to isolate the year his response had come into being. It was before his time, likely to have been conjured while his parents were still too young to use it.

I don’t think it’s really my scene.

His eyes stopped deciphering the braille of the ceiling and squared, leveled. His mind was made up. He spoke one more sentence into the handset and hung up. Stepping away from the corner table that held the phone, he tossed his head back letting the beer flow into his throat. Mid-swallow he knew he’d need at least one more, just too many things to think about. It felt good to have said his piece, though.
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