Holly Day writes

Again and Again

The phone rings in the middle of the night

and I let the answering machine get it, the voice crawls out

through the tiny plastic speaker like something

sad and wet. “It’s me,” it gurgles, “I’m here

I’m still waiting, where are you?”

I don’t know who it is so I stand there by the phone, waiting

for the caller to hang up, give up, try the number

of the person they’re trying to reach again, but they don’t.

The coughing, the choking, the gasping continues,

“Where are you? Hello? Hello?”

My daughter comes into the kitchen to stand next to me and asks

“Who is it?” I motion for her to be quiet, as though

the person attached to that horrible voice can hear us talk

as if that person knows we’re standing here, waiting for him or her to go away.

“Why don’t you just answer it?” she asks

before tiptoeing back to her bedroom.

After a while, it’s only breathing, sighing and gasping

like someone’s fallen asleep while holding the phone, but then:

“I’m here, I’m here, where are you? I’m here!”

Finally, the machine hangs up

on its own, having run out of storage space.

The little readout blinks “1” in red over and over

I have one missed call, there is one message on my machine

this one new message and that is all.