He has a cold, his
speech subject to coughing, and thus his voice filters through the telephone
audibly thick and blunted with its congestion.
deleted name: When I was in my
early twenties I went to a Hallowe’en party all dressed up in a black suit,
white shirt, black tie...
pause
deleted name: ..and a, a a, a skull
mask. The eh, the suit had actually been bought for my grandfather’s funeral
not ehm, not that long before, my first suit
before correcting
himself
deleted name: it wasn’t, it wasn’t
actually a suit, it was just, it was just a black jacket and trousers, but
coughs
deleted name: And the mask... it
stank; it was some weird rubber thing which, like a full over-the-head rubber
or latex mask, and it had a weird sort of synthetic... chemical smell; the
longer you wore it you could really taste it on your breath.
coughs
deleted name: I kept it on for as
long as I could. I think the, my original idea had been not to take it off at
all, and it had a hinged jaw... mandible, but it didn’t fit properly, way too
big for me, so whenever, I would have to manually pull down the jawbone
whenever I had to speak, which I tried to keep to a minimum, just... for eh,
for effect.
sounds of blowing
his nose, coughing
deleted name: Anyway, it all
eventually got to me, the smell, the taste, just... sweating away inside this
thing, so I did eventually have to remove it, but that left me just a guy in a
suit.
coughs
deleted name: Not... and having
already established this... persona, once they realised I’d had to... people
would now come up to me and say “oh, you’ve taken the mask off” because having
worn it for so long that had become a thing in itself, and whenever anyone
would say that, I would look them straight in the eye, point at my naked face
and say “No, this is the mask.”
delivered with some
finality, but his monologue usurped by her playing what she believes perhaps
some manner of trump card
ache1: I’m
pregnant...
his response
immediate
deleted name: I’m aware.
that much
disappointed in herself that she is surprised she is still surprised, still
ache1
(hoping to re-inflate a bubble she might yet subsequently burst): ..again.
all this being
replayed in his absence, a god outwith the machinery of its own creation; that
his part in the narrative has been replaced prompts
deleted name: ..being the exact
sole reason I am telling you this.
determining these
words, even as they are being spoken, to be their last direct communication.
deleted name (the handset placed back upon its cradle): Et in Arcadia ego.