Mutiny Most Foul in the Digital Seas

My phone rang.

That sharp sound, known but so foreign at the same time. Recognizable in its sonorous cry. It was startling. Piercing. Unexpected. Enough so that I was abruptly roused from my mindless, zombie-esque social medial scrolling. That pang of adrenaline surging through my body.

Who uses the phone these days for actually calling? It’s almost to the point of being unacceptable to ring someone without textual warning first. 

You know:

Potential caller/bestie: Hey…is it okay if I call you?

[pregnant pause for dramatic effect]

Me: Ugh…

Potential caller/bestie: My fingers are broken and I can’t type, I would message if I could.

Me: Fine.

With a large dose of apprehension and spine-tingling trepidation, I pressed the green “answer” button to connect the call from that vaguely familiar, yet still mysterious number, and proffered my greeting because enquiring minds want to know.

Hello?

A moment of silence, that dead chasm of space in which the mind questions the absurdity of it all, of life, of purpose, before that familiar click. The connection instantaneously synchronized through fibre optics and satellites, from tower to tower, bits and bytes hurtling through the ether to bring two people audibly together.

A voice like no other I’d heard before greeted me. Saccharine and polished. Each utterance articulated clearly and precisely. No wasted words. To the point. Nothing was left to my imagination.

It wasn’t who I was expecting but the request was the same. The same entreaties as I’d heard dozens of times before. The same offers. Same same but different.

Apparently The Captain has been fired.

Or there has been a mutiny most foul in these here digital seas.

Amy is now the one calling to give me a free Bahamas cruise for answering a short survey, giving out my bank account info, my credit card numbers, my mother’s maiden name, and my DNA sequence.