The phone rang. We still have a landline. Mom told me to get it.
I answered. It was a recording, from Visa/Mastercard account services; I'd qualified for a 0% interest rate.
But this time, there was a difference. I pressed one.
There was a long pause, pregnant with the impregnable silence of the pit.
Then, sound; first, the background noise of a call center, and then a man with an Indian accent. I don't remember what he said. It didn't matter.
I inhaled, and screamed. A hideous, bone-scraping, mind-flaying scream, a wail drawn from deepest void of hell, a cry empty of sanity, of humanity, of hope. And as my breath slowly dwindled, my voice fading to a gasping, agonized moan,
I hung up.
I'd like to think I ruined his day.
I have a taste for this, now.
Next time will be worse.