Fourteen Days

Like a maniac shooting flaming arrows of death…

I’m glad I don’t have one of those gas stoves where you have to flick a match to get the heat going. I always wear a baggy t-shirt whenever I cook.

Please remain on the line. Your call is important to us. The next available agent will be with you shortly is one who deceives their neighbor and says, “I was only joking!”

I might as well pop the kettle on. Oh Christ, did Nicolas let the damn washcloth touch the dirty half of the sink? Son of a bitch. I’m going to have to change my gloves and fetch that. Alright, there’s nothing in the stove basin. Nothing will catch fire. There is no debris in any of the stove basins. There is no dust on the bottom of the kettle. There is no way the house will catch fire. There is no reason to believe Nicolas has been anywhere near my kettle or the teapot. There is no reason to believe I am going to set the house on fire. There is nothing in the basin. It’s safe to flick the stove on for tea.

Oh lovely, they’re playing Frank Sinatra while I await the four horsemen knocking on my door.

“I remember as a kid my buba was a big Frankie fan. Let me play you a song.”

“Oh alright, for the sake of buba.”

Nicolas typed a search into my laptop, “Strangers in The Night by Frank Sinatra.” Our wine glasses clinked and the intangible magic of a Saturday night with your best friend filled the air. We jokingly slow danced, a hand delicately placed in the small of my back.

“Shite! We have to go catch the transit so we’re not late gettin’ an da cinema like. Hate to miss any part of the film,” I said as we bundled ourselves in hats and scarves and gloves and coats. Nicolas was ready before me, as always. I counted every light and ensured all five were off. I fixated on the stove to ensure not a top flickered with an orange neon glow.

Please hold while we connect your call. Without wood a fire goes out; without a gossip, a quarrel dies down.

There’s something so delightful about Saturday night at the cinema. The wafting scent of butter. A glow emanating from the marquee. Parents having a reprieve from macaroni paintings, snotty noses and bed time rituals. I gazed out into the neon lit street below and felt like I was in a paradise. Nicolas ordered himself a lager but I am a sucker for popcorn and a cola in the cinema. Of course I had to surrender popcorn to Nicolas while scrubbed my hands of whatever filth and corruption I handled on the transit before buying me snacks. I must have inhaled half the bag before the picture started.

“Thanks for inviting me Sinead. I would have missed it!” Nicolas said as the projector attempted to sell us local real estate that is beyond anything I can dream of affording. Well, at least not a week ago anyhow. The Revue has such lovely cozy seats. Lot of history there. People probably had the Spanish flu who sat in those seats though. A flu can’t incubate and live on old wood furniture, can it?

“No problemo mi amigo!”

The call volume is higher than normal. If you would like to leave a call back number press 5. As charcoal to embers and as wood to fire, so is a quarrelsome person for kindling strife.

“So, when does Sandy get back from the wedding?”

“Sooner than later I hope. Just gone, spending some quality time with the family. I didn’t feel all that up to it. Thanks for staying over, ta.”

“Ah, no problemo, you’d do the same for me… well minus the…”

“Yes, I know, you’re not a seahorse are ya?”

We giggled. This is what happens when you leave your wife behind for a wedding ladies and gents. I’d advise most people not to travel anyhow. Probably a lot of spouses presumed their pregnant wives and partners weren’t fuckable nor interested in fucking at their peril. I’m a good wife to Sandy though, it’d take a little more than Frank Sinatra and baklava to stray. How much more? I can’t exactly be certain. I keep an old cookie tin under the sink full of condoms. Sandy never tinkers much with the sink. Whoever picked the play list for the crisis line has a sick sense of humour, really, “Last Dance” by Donna Summer? The worst part is that they’re all tacky instrumentals you might have heard shopping for gelatin for Bertie and Myrtle’s cocktail party. Have you seen those mid century cookbooks? God awful food.

If you need to know the nearest unit location go to our website. Otherwise, please hold. The words of a gossip are like choice morsels; they go down to the inmost parts.

Jesus, how fucking long can it possibly take to get someone on the Goddamn phone. I bet the phone line is full of people with the sniffles wondering if they should call an ambulance like the usual eejits who fill up the A and E.

Like a coating of silver dross on earthenware are fervent lips with an evil heart. Enemies disguise themselves with their lips, but in their hearts they harbor deceit. Though their speech is charming, do not believe them.

I think the main problem with people who read Finnegan’s Wake is trying to make any sense out of it. They think there’s some kind of story that takes you from point A to point B encoded in the ramblings. So many readers think it’s a virus wearing a protein coat to hide the DNA coding. It’s not. The only story in it is the language itself. It’s some flighty writer who overheard some poor bastard after one too many pints and tried to make it some profound stream of consciousness. You know when you listen to music too intently and all you can hear are the flaws, versus when you just hear music going about your workday and it’s not grand, but it’s decent enough like? I find that when I read Finnegan’s Wake not trying to make any deliberate sense out of it, it’s a much more enjoyable experience. At least all the lights are still working because having no wifi is in and of itself horrendous torture.

A silence halts the music, and I hear breathing.

“Hello?”

“Yes, you’re connected now. How can I help.”

“Listen, I’m pregnant and I have someone with the virus in the guest room. What do I do?”

“Mam, keep calm.”

“Keep calm? I’m fucking pregnant during a pandemic and have been on hold for 3 hours.”

“Bad choice of words. I’m sorry. It does no good for you or the baby to have your blood pressure go up. Breathe deep. Are you experiencing any virus symptoms? Headache, fever, vomiting, sore throat, stuffy nose?”

“That’s the thing. I have very bad morning sickness and my friend is puking up a lot and we only have one bathroom in the apartment. Fucks sake.”

“Mam… please don’t swear at me”

“If I didn’t swear I’d implode.”

“Ok. Listen… do you have any scarves or pantyhose lying around?”

“Yes.”

“Ok. Tie it around your face as a barrier. We’re going to deliver N95 masks to your home. Because you’re pregnant, you are on the priority list for sterilized supplies. However, our delivery people are getting hijacked across the city. Do not tell anyone you’ve been approved for supply delivery.”

“Ok. But what about the washroom?”

“Just… don’t go into your washroom without some kind of gloves. We haven’t figured out whether or not humans can transmit this thing through bodily fluids. All we know is that it’s airborne and transmitting through coughs.”

“So… there’s a chance the shit particles that fly in the air when you flush the toilet could infect me?”

“As a government official, all I can advise for now is that you don’t directly touch any surface an infected person has come into contact with. There’s a lot of misinformation floating around in the media right now and it’s scaring people. It doesn’t do you any good to be p…”

“Paranoid?”

“No, preoccupied with worrying or speculation.”

“Ok. What’s your name?”

“It’s CGOV_26:18-28. For your own protection, you don’t know my name.”

“Well, now look whose paranoid! Can you at least stay on the line? I’m alone, my family lives in another time zone and are all asleep.”

“I can’t. I have to keep these calls as brief as possible. If you go on the site, enter the number ID I provided, we can chat there when I’m on my shift for the duration of your quarantine. You can’t leave for 14 days.”

“14 days? How the fuck am I supposed to eat? I’m craving vanilla ice cream with pickles every day and I’m nearly out of pickles.”

“Hope you got some vinegar and cucumbers in the fridge. I have to let you go, but if you need anything, send a message to me, don’t bother calling.”

I hang up the phone, pray to the lord that Nicolas didn’t cough in the vicinity of the battery charger. Flights back home are pricey and I can’t leave the house anyhow. There’s a storm in Praia so I doubt Sandy is going to ring us up. Funny, I might have been safer on the island than I am in the city right now. We all have to leave our safe little islands in order to money in the valley of death and condos. I’ll ring up home as soon as they’re awake. Just seven or eight more hours, it’s going to be Sunday morning there soon. I haven’t the foggiest what I can do besides another clean down of the washroom. I better grab the n95 box of masks in order to do that task. Fuck, what am I going to do when we run out of toilet paper? I guess I’ll have to throw on one of my old wigs that are downright filthy so no one knows I broke quarantine. No one should have to suffer using the phone book to wipe their arse, I didn’t go to uni to go back to that kind of hell.

As soon as we got home from the cinema, Nicolas went for a lie-down. I was just about ready to piss myself. I always strip naked before going into my bathroom after being out and about. It gets harder and harder to do as my belly swells, but it’ll keep us safe this way. No one has ever been allowed in my washroom without changing from their street clothes. I have a pack of tshirts and sweatpants available for all house guests to change into after been out in them filthy streets like. All the things people were teasing me about over the years all of a sudden seem normal and sane. The obsessive compulsion to reduce contact and reduce the chances of fire seems necessary for survival now. It’s like I’ve spent 25 years preparing for a pandemic I didn’t even know was going to happen.

I have Sandy’s and I’s engagement portrait in my heart-shaped locket . I feel the cold surgical steel near my jugular vein because I’m allergic to gold. I’d just have to row east, the opposite way that the sun rises once Nicolas is well enough to go back to work. I could save money on the flight and not have to sit next to any sick travelers. I gaze at the maps that line our kitchen, wondering if I could go on a lifeboat and row my way to him. The hours don’t feel like hours anymore, they just feel like a countdown to oblivion.