r.kv.r.y quarterly literary journal
fall 2006 fiction by P.Kobylarz
Me and her and my machine
fall 2006 fiction by P.Kobylarz
Me and her and my machine
Blinking red eye. The blinking red eye. How he dreaded it. Like in that crazy Poe story. The one about this man and he's, well, living with this other
guy, and, now, how does it go? And so anyway he gets real pissed off at this guy 'cause this guy has this eyeball that's milky white gross and so
this other guy, like, slices him up, and well, you get it. Quite logical if you think about it. For a while.
But what can you do to a machine? A machine with a blinking red eye. A fucking twenty buck heaping crap of technology you bought from a
derelict at a pawner's who had missing bottom teeth and cologne that smelled like sweat. A little black box of a machine that's got something on
you– that knows a little bit about your eventual future, knows who you hang with. A machine that has some vital information someone else has
entrusted to it, and not you. An answering machine that never not once answers to you.
I hate these things and so do you. Everyone does. They're the price we pay for living in modern times. We need so bad to catch all possible
information, invitations to parties, possible job leads, romantic intrigues of friends and co-workers. Any bit of information that tells us something
about us or who we want to be. Any possible reflection of ourselves. Narcissus with technologies. Narcissus in a Hall of Mirrors.
You sit there like an idiot, alone in a room, after three hours of trying how to figure out how to record a message, and when you finally do, then
you dread the deed. It's like cuddling in public. There are better times and places. One on one. Your worst date– you and yourself. Duration: sixty
seconds.
What makes it so bad is that you're on the spot with yourself. You fuck up– you stutter, you mispronounce– and you have to do it all over again.
Like being your own blind date on a mutually bad night. You and you in secret conversation. Overheard only by yourselves.
Who doesn't despise their own voice played back on tape? All day long, you walk around the halls at work, sifting some Sinatra tune from your gut
through your teeth into the air. Thinking the ladies are melting in their seats, you trill those vocal chords at others assured that the organ music
emitted from your pipes is wholly an original, mellifluous song. (Note: you have practiced how to say mellifluous).
You yourself a Benedict Arnold of spontaneity who rehearses what amounts to be almost prescribed messages to friends and beloveds in what
you have cleverly learned to be named dulcet tones, describing your exact state of mind and mental/spiritual bearing (that have oftentimes been
cut of by a rude beeping), but regardless of all this, you never think that of the betrayal done to all your grandiose croonings by the rare
instrument of your throat until that very moment that all of life stops, as you press the playback button and sit silently, open-mouthed in denial
hear the seal in heat croup.
You hate the way you sound. If only you recorded yourself having sex! And maybe even watched it in slo-mo.
Then there's the rhetorical problem. The message. What should it say, exactly. Should there be funky music in the background, the James Bond
theme, or classical, the sound of a busy city and people mumbling "peas and carrots, carrots and peas?" No one knows. But everyone thinks
about it. More than once.
Should it just be you– your voice– the humm of electricity– a confession presided over by the priest of reality? How does it go?
beep
"Hello, this is Pete's machine answering because Pete isn't here . . ."
beep
Why the hello?
"Hi, this is (#). Please leave a message."
A robot with an electronic soul. Too informal. Too– I am not a number! I'm a man! And why the please. This type of message solicits a lot of
messages from wrong number callers anyway. Never worth the listening. People are so sure they’re calling who they want to call. They choke up
in disbelief that they’ve screwed up. How could the telephone lie? How could they misdial? Technology can always be trusted. Technology never
means to let us down.
So there's no way to actually go about it. Strange the wrong messages left on a machine. These are great to listen to, probably because the
people are prepared and it's their choice if they leave a message or not. Those who need to reveal something about their personality. A dollop of
them. A pause you'd never want to interrupt. A catch in the throat that signals vulnerability.
beep
“Misses Jackson, you left your wallet in the pocket of your dry cleaning. We put it in a bag under the counter so you can come in and pick it up. It
looks like a wallet, but we didn’t open it, so we’re not so sure what in it. It is here though, so you an pick it up whenever. Your pocketbook that is.”
You got to believe it.
The reason why I’m even going into all of this is because I do not know what to do. The tv’s playing, birds are chirping outside even though it
night, I’m messed up and the phone is in my hand. My brain is dancing to that dialtone tune, that little tornado warning that the line makes after
the dialtone has hung up on you.
“eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee”
It began when she left this message I recorded onto a microcassette recorder. I listen to it periodically. I have a lot of these tapes. They keep me
busy. Anyway, hers kinda goes like:
beep
"mmmmmm-ello,(tune humming in background) thought you'd be (deeply seductive intake of breath) . . . home. But you're not and that's (pouty
baby voice) oh so too too bad."
After I heard this I fumbled through the receipts that I keep and invariably lose when it comes to checkbook balancing time. I ripped through my
wallet to find that piece of napkin or tear of post-it-note that I wrote her number on. God is willing and I find it. I called her back. I get her machine.
Her voice is as sultry on her message as it is on my machine. She sounds good recorded. How can this be so?
It beeps.
I hang up.
I'm not one for phone tag.
I call back immediately. Busy. Her machine is thinking to itself.
I wait five minutes. Ring.
beep
"Hey, what's going on? Got your message. Now it's your turn to call. Thought maybe we could hook up, hang out, have ourselves a time. Call me
back."
Yeah, I practiced it a few times in my head before I said it. So it would come out nice and smooth. So it would leave little waves of reverberation
that would cause her fingers to move and her throat to tremble and the creases underneath her breasts to sweat as she phones me back. Ready.
Willing. Eager.
It doesn't happen for days.
When I do finally get her message, it goes something like this. And, oh, I didn't re-record this one.
"Hey, what's up? Didn't get your message until too late to get back with you. If you want to go out, or something, I'm going to be at the
Massachusetts' happy hour on Friday. With some friends. Be there. We'll talk for real."
The Massachusetts is this kind of preppy bar downtown where people go to be seen. Drinks there are real expensive. The women there are
mostly beautiful. Sometimes they smoke cigars. The guys there are all assholes. Sometimes they smoke cigars, too. The other thing that freaks
me out is it's name. I don't know why it's called the Massachusetts even though I should.
This is a day later. I call her in the afternoon. I leave her this one:
"O.k., hi and everything. That bar thing sounds all right if I can get away at that time. Hope your friends are as pretty as you. See you then."
Guess what? I never went.
It just wasn't my kind of place. I mean, you got to feel right about where you are for things to happen, if you know what I mean. I don't even know
what that place's jukebox has on it– probably Bananarama and select soul tunes thrown in for flavor. I don’t even know if it has a jukebox. What's
a guy to do?
guy, and, now, how does it go? And so anyway he gets real pissed off at this guy 'cause this guy has this eyeball that's milky white gross and so
this other guy, like, slices him up, and well, you get it. Quite logical if you think about it. For a while.
But what can you do to a machine? A machine with a blinking red eye. A fucking twenty buck heaping crap of technology you bought from a
derelict at a pawner's who had missing bottom teeth and cologne that smelled like sweat. A little black box of a machine that's got something on
you– that knows a little bit about your eventual future, knows who you hang with. A machine that has some vital information someone else has
entrusted to it, and not you. An answering machine that never not once answers to you.
I hate these things and so do you. Everyone does. They're the price we pay for living in modern times. We need so bad to catch all possible
information, invitations to parties, possible job leads, romantic intrigues of friends and co-workers. Any bit of information that tells us something
about us or who we want to be. Any possible reflection of ourselves. Narcissus with technologies. Narcissus in a Hall of Mirrors.
You sit there like an idiot, alone in a room, after three hours of trying how to figure out how to record a message, and when you finally do, then
you dread the deed. It's like cuddling in public. There are better times and places. One on one. Your worst date– you and yourself. Duration: sixty
seconds.
What makes it so bad is that you're on the spot with yourself. You fuck up– you stutter, you mispronounce– and you have to do it all over again.
Like being your own blind date on a mutually bad night. You and you in secret conversation. Overheard only by yourselves.
Who doesn't despise their own voice played back on tape? All day long, you walk around the halls at work, sifting some Sinatra tune from your gut
through your teeth into the air. Thinking the ladies are melting in their seats, you trill those vocal chords at others assured that the organ music
emitted from your pipes is wholly an original, mellifluous song. (Note: you have practiced how to say mellifluous).
You yourself a Benedict Arnold of spontaneity who rehearses what amounts to be almost prescribed messages to friends and beloveds in what
you have cleverly learned to be named dulcet tones, describing your exact state of mind and mental/spiritual bearing (that have oftentimes been
cut of by a rude beeping), but regardless of all this, you never think that of the betrayal done to all your grandiose croonings by the rare
instrument of your throat until that very moment that all of life stops, as you press the playback button and sit silently, open-mouthed in denial
hear the seal in heat croup.
You hate the way you sound. If only you recorded yourself having sex! And maybe even watched it in slo-mo.
Then there's the rhetorical problem. The message. What should it say, exactly. Should there be funky music in the background, the James Bond
theme, or classical, the sound of a busy city and people mumbling "peas and carrots, carrots and peas?" No one knows. But everyone thinks
about it. More than once.
Should it just be you– your voice– the humm of electricity– a confession presided over by the priest of reality? How does it go?
beep
"Hello, this is Pete's machine answering because Pete isn't here . . ."
beep
Why the hello?
"Hi, this is (#). Please leave a message."
A robot with an electronic soul. Too informal. Too– I am not a number! I'm a man! And why the please. This type of message solicits a lot of
messages from wrong number callers anyway. Never worth the listening. People are so sure they’re calling who they want to call. They choke up
in disbelief that they’ve screwed up. How could the telephone lie? How could they misdial? Technology can always be trusted. Technology never
means to let us down.
So there's no way to actually go about it. Strange the wrong messages left on a machine. These are great to listen to, probably because the
people are prepared and it's their choice if they leave a message or not. Those who need to reveal something about their personality. A dollop of
them. A pause you'd never want to interrupt. A catch in the throat that signals vulnerability.
beep
“Misses Jackson, you left your wallet in the pocket of your dry cleaning. We put it in a bag under the counter so you can come in and pick it up. It
looks like a wallet, but we didn’t open it, so we’re not so sure what in it. It is here though, so you an pick it up whenever. Your pocketbook that is.”
You got to believe it.
The reason why I’m even going into all of this is because I do not know what to do. The tv’s playing, birds are chirping outside even though it
night, I’m messed up and the phone is in my hand. My brain is dancing to that dialtone tune, that little tornado warning that the line makes after
the dialtone has hung up on you.
“eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee”
It began when she left this message I recorded onto a microcassette recorder. I listen to it periodically. I have a lot of these tapes. They keep me
busy. Anyway, hers kinda goes like:
beep
"mmmmmm-ello,(tune humming in background) thought you'd be (deeply seductive intake of breath) . . . home. But you're not and that's (pouty
baby voice) oh so too too bad."
After I heard this I fumbled through the receipts that I keep and invariably lose when it comes to checkbook balancing time. I ripped through my
wallet to find that piece of napkin or tear of post-it-note that I wrote her number on. God is willing and I find it. I called her back. I get her machine.
Her voice is as sultry on her message as it is on my machine. She sounds good recorded. How can this be so?
It beeps.
I hang up.
I'm not one for phone tag.
I call back immediately. Busy. Her machine is thinking to itself.
I wait five minutes. Ring.
beep
"Hey, what's going on? Got your message. Now it's your turn to call. Thought maybe we could hook up, hang out, have ourselves a time. Call me
back."
Yeah, I practiced it a few times in my head before I said it. So it would come out nice and smooth. So it would leave little waves of reverberation
that would cause her fingers to move and her throat to tremble and the creases underneath her breasts to sweat as she phones me back. Ready.
Willing. Eager.
It doesn't happen for days.
When I do finally get her message, it goes something like this. And, oh, I didn't re-record this one.
"Hey, what's up? Didn't get your message until too late to get back with you. If you want to go out, or something, I'm going to be at the
Massachusetts' happy hour on Friday. With some friends. Be there. We'll talk for real."
The Massachusetts is this kind of preppy bar downtown where people go to be seen. Drinks there are real expensive. The women there are
mostly beautiful. Sometimes they smoke cigars. The guys there are all assholes. Sometimes they smoke cigars, too. The other thing that freaks
me out is it's name. I don't know why it's called the Massachusetts even though I should.
This is a day later. I call her in the afternoon. I leave her this one:
"O.k., hi and everything. That bar thing sounds all right if I can get away at that time. Hope your friends are as pretty as you. See you then."
Guess what? I never went.
It just wasn't my kind of place. I mean, you got to feel right about where you are for things to happen, if you know what I mean. I don't even know
what that place's jukebox has on it– probably Bananarama and select soul tunes thrown in for flavor. I don’t even know if it has a jukebox. What's
a guy to do?
