"....little black submarines. Operator, please, put me back on the line.... told my girl I'd be back. Operator... Please, this is wrecking my mind."
Dan gripped the receiver tighter, but all the desire in his head couldn't will a sound to emit from the other end of the line. Silence, no proof if his message had been heard, but the words needed to be cried out regardless of whether anyone listened or cared.
"Oh can it be? The voices calling me get lost and out of time. Operator please."
But only the echoes of his desperation existed to provide solace in the unfamiliar phone booth.
"Call me back, when it's time. Stolen friends! And disease! Operator, please... Patch me back to my mind."
The strangeness in his own voice made him pause, his thoughts were fuzzy. Dan leaned back on the glass, sliding down to a crouched position. In one hand, a pure black phone receiver, in the other, his sweating brow. He struggled to remember how he had gotten there and who he was crying out to on the other line. All he knew was the urgency.
"Treasure maps! Fallen trees! Operator please. Call me back when it's time."
The silence overcame him, and his limbs went limp as the receiver fell from his hand. The device clattered as it swung into the glass, providing the only answer to the multitude of questions. Dan arose and replaced the receiver in its cradle, a quarter clinked into the change return slot. The metallic sound lingered in the stillness.
He picked up the phone once again, placed the quarter in its home, and pressed 0. The machine clinked, but nothing altered the black, dead, receiver. He spoke anyway, bargaining with nothing.
"You know me. I had plans... but... they just disappeared to the back of my mind. Operator... please... The voices calling me, I...." He paused. "They get lost and out... I, I... can't remember."
Dan's concern escalated as he listened to what he was saying. Although it had always been this way, verbalizing it brought him panic. He had no reason to believe that someone, if not something, could hear him. But Dan did believe, because the only other option was too difficult to imagine, so he pushed it from his mind.
End of part 1.
I'm procrastinating on campus as per usual and I decided to write a short story (it's not over) because of a song. One of my favourite part of lyrics is the lack of punctuation, merely putting in commas and periods can completely alter the meaning of the words. So I decided to mess around with lyrics but in a narrative structure. I'm not sure where this will go or when I decide to continue it. But I hope it caught your attention and was intriguing. Here's the song by the way.
Little Black Submarines- The Black Keys
