“Do you mind if I go on? There’s just so much I want to tell you. Not many people want to listen once I get into it. I know it’s me and all my talking, and I completely understand if you want to go. I know how I must sound. It’s fantastical. Unbelievably so. You’ll be entertained either way: a crazy person’s detailed delusions, or an fantastical and sad story.

“That is kind of you.

“Before I called you? I was studying the phone. When I’m not talking on it, I spend a lot of my time studying the phone. I stare at it for hours at a time, some days. The phone is red and heavy. It is much larger than the phones I remember. Of course, it’s been so long time since I’ve seen other phones, it’s hard to know for sure. My memory is no longer my friend. It tricks me sometimes. Makes me think I remember something that I don’t, or creates a memory that I know couldn’t be real. What do phones look like today?

“Oh, that is interesting. That small, really? I’m not doubting you. It’s just this phone is not small. I know things have changed. My little window into the world gives me at least that much information.

It’s a bit of a cliché that I have a big red phone but I enjoy the color. The walls and floor in the room are white, as is the table. The table has a few blue and red speckles as well. The chair at the table is a worn white leather chair. And the toilet and sink are both porcelain white. If it wasn’t for the red phone, I think I would lose the ability to discern colors.

The phone has a rotary, with the ten numbers working their way around the dial counterclockwise. I sometimes sit at the phone and turn the rotary. It doesn’t do anything, mind you. When I lift the headset, it automatically connects somewhere. I don’t know who does connection or who decides on what number. If they listen in on my conversation, they never say anything. When someone hangs up on the other end, another call is placed, and another, until I hang up the phone on the receiver.