Who's Calling Me?

by Kirk Gonnsen

On the way home from work I bought an answering machine from Value Village. There's a tape in it.

The tape is full of messages for Sabrina and Claudio. It seems they screen a lot of their calls and their family and friends are continually trying to reach them. Mom is always calling for one inane thing or another, plus every time someone shows up at the door they get the machine on the apartment buzzer.

Papa called a couple of times looking for his wife, talking in Russian or something, talking about lawyers and doctors and people going crazy in the head. It seems he really wanted to talk to his wife. He called back twice.

The guy with parking space 127. "It seems you keep parking in my spot!"

There's a sister or a friend with a baby who is throwing food, yelling, screaming, getting sick. This poor girl can't go out anymore. There's a brother who drops by once and a while, but he doesn't say much.

"Once again it's Gino Julliani who's running for city councilor."

Apparently Sabrina works at Home Depot. She wants to work at LCBO but they won't fax her the forms.

Somebody named Lisa invites Sabrina out for coffee or a movie with the girls.

Sabrina and somebody else have trouble figuring out who is going to drive on another night.

Somebody comes home from Florida. They're looking to buy a new house.

Then there are a couple of menacing hang ups.

Sabrina calls her mom, she's at work, she's tired, and upset. She wants to have dinner at her mom's.

Mom calls back and says she can't make dinner, she has to take someone to a Girl Guides' dinner.

The guy with parking space 127. He's mad. Somebody is in his spot again.

Somebody wants to know the name of a flesh eating disease.

Two urgent calls looking for Sabrina. One of them is regarding a man named Jerry.

A man at the front door wants them to open the door so he can give them 'a gift.'

The sister calls three times at this point asking for anyone to pick up the phone.

A man from Hamilton calls about an email from Slovenia.

The brother calls.

The sister calls again, and quickly hangs up.

Then there is a strange call that is taped while dialing out from the phone with this machine. There is fumbling, dialing, hanging up, dialing again, but the other party can not be reached. The Bell Operator Pre-Taped Message comes on. "The person you are trying to call can not be reached, this is a recording," followed by a horrible loud quick disconnect busy signal.

Then nothing.

Then suddenly a woman blurts out, "are you screening your calls?"

Then the tape ends.