Henry Calls
Originally written July 2010 • Uploaded to Facebook on Jul 5, 2010, 6:01 AM
“The lunch last night was fantastic, wasn't it, dear? This is Henry. Yes, your lover for the past five years? What do you mean I am calling the wrong person? I have called this exact same number for the past five years. Well, I am truly sorry for calling so late, but you must understand that we absolutely must talk about lunch last night.”
Henry calls people on the phone every single day. His routine is unyielding: he must call one person every hour on the hour. If a woman answers, Henry attempts to build a conversation. He asks completely random questions and listens closely to the answers, meticulously writing all of the silly things people say inside a notepad. Over the years, Henry has accumulated hundreds of these notebooks. Most days, they lay stacked high against the walls of his small house, just waiting to be used as fuel during a bitter winter night, or serving as perfect kindling for an accidental fire that is just waiting to happen. Or at least, that is what Henry hopes will happen.
Henry calls one person every hour, and if a man picks up the line, he begins with a brief introduction of who he is—or who he is pretending to be—and immediately accuses whoever is on the other side of sleeping with his dear wife, Patricia. There is no Patricia, but Henry thoroughly enjoys using the name because, in a way, it reminds him of those wholesome women on television who sell wholesome bread that isn't actually wholesome at all. Henry gets visibly angered when the stranger refuses to acknowledge the whole sleeping-with-his-wife phenomenon, and he will insist on the point multiple times until the other person becomes angry, too. In this sense, Henry believes in strict equality. If Henry is to be angry, then the other person must match his rage.
If it is a woman on the other line, it is up to Henry to figure out how to react. He normally knows the names of the people he is dialing. He knows their name and their address, but nothing else. At least, that is all the phone book provides. Henry picks out a fresh name every hour and dials. It matters very little if it is three in the afternoon or two in the morning; Henry demands to speak to whoever is on the other side. This is simply who Henry is.
When Henry calls you and you are a woman, he will say incredibly kind things, mentioning how much he enjoyed your cooking last week or how deeply he appreciates the birthday card you sent him last year. Even though you won't have the slightest clue who Henry is, you won't be able to hang up the phone because of his eloquent, fine speaking manner. Henry was educated in the most well-regarded institutions of the most regarded country at the most regarded time, even though he himself cannot quite remember it. Henry was not born an actor, and every phone call is a distinct ordeal, but his kind of ordeal is bearable simply because Henry is determined to be remembered by as many people as possible. It is his ultimate hope that he will remember every Mary, Joe, John, Rashid, and Jose he has ever called.
Sometimes people actually call back, and Henry welcomes these interruptions wholeheartedly, especially when they don't land exactly on the hour. Sometimes it will be telemarketers trying to sell him some cheap trinket he doesn't need. Sometimes it is his real mother, who tells Henry that he never calls her anymore. Henry never replies in kind; instead, he tells her that this isn't Henry and that she has the wrong number. Consequently, his mother always ends up calling the wrong number on her second attempt to reach someone else. Indeed, it is not simply Henry who has a problem with his phone; it is the people on the other side of the line who limit exactly what Henry can tell them.
Last week, however, Henry was thoroughly surprised to receive an incoming call at four o'clock sharp. It was a Wednesday, and Henry never received calls on a Wednesday. Never. This time, Henry responded with a loud, aggressive, “What!” hoping to scare the caller away before four o'clock and one minute struck. He grew intensely nervous when the voice introduced itself as Ralph. He said his name was Ralph Nader the Third. Henry didn't know anyone by that name, but he couldn't bring himself to hang up because the person spoke so eloquently, so calmly, and so beautifully. Most people Henry dialed had long, slow drawls and sometimes didn't even speak his language. This was not the case with Ralph Nader the Third, who warmly insisted Henry just call him Ralph.
Henry called him Ralph, and Ralph spoke extensively about their golf match last week when they had visited the local country club. Ralph congratulated Henry on a game well played and insisted that he attend his son's wedding next month at the distinguished hotel downtown—five o'clock sharp. Henry replied that he would gladly attend, and they continued to converse about the weather, the last time their wives went out shopping together, and oh, how they had enjoyed those cold beers at the bar while the ladies were out spending their money.
Minutes crept by, and Henry began to panic. He panicked because the clock was ticking closer to 4:59 PM, which was his designated, unalterable deadline to hang up on a long call and attempt a brand-new number. While Henry was trapped in this thought, the line suddenly went dead. Henry looked down at his notepad, found another name in the phone book, and began to dial, feeling entirely cheated because he couldn't for the life of him remember who this Ralph Nader the Third actually was.