Death by Answering Machine

Happy (Real) Birthday, Neenie!

I can’t bring myself to write about the serious subjects I want to write about. I guess I’ll go with another slightly humorous story from my life. I’ll try to get to one of those serious things Friday. I’m going to go off the board with this one. I’m going to deviate from the list.

Until I was 9 we never lived in a neighborhood with other kids. For my first 9 years I had only my older brother to play with. At the time it wasn’t a problem. We didn’t really know any different. We did a good job of keeping each other entertained, and pretty much out of trouble.

Just before I turned 9 we moved to Oak Hills. We soon learned (within the first week) that this neighborhood was full of kids. We quickly met and became fast friends with Chris, who lived up the street, and Chris & Ryan, the brothers who lived next door. There were others also, but these were the closest and, therefore, the ones we saw most often.

Over the years we did as most boys do. We tried to make as much mischief as possible without getting caught. We were pretty good at it, too. Unless we were stupid. Which we usually were. Especially when we got bored.

The summers tended to be the most boring times. One of our favorite ways to pass in the summer was making prank calls. We loved to look up weird and/or famous names in the phone book and call them. The local KKK branch was a favorite target. They never answered. James Bond was another. Yes, there was a James Bond in the Florence, AL phone book.

When we ran out of fun numbers to call we would dial a random number. We used the old standards: “Is your refrigerator running?” “Do you have Prince Albert in a Can?” Every now and then we would get an answering machine.

On one particular day my brother, Chris from up the street, and I were at our house making prank calls. We happened to get an answering machine. We left some silly message and quickly hung up. We were not quite satisfied. One of us had the bright idea to call back and leave the most vulgar, profanity-laced message our pre-teen minds could conjure. We were young, but we had a treasure trove of worldly knowledge.

All three of us got on a phone, and we called back. As soon as the machine beeped we let loose an unending torrent of the most vile language known to the English language. I couldn’t tell you what we said, but I know it would make Andrew Dice Clay blush.

Finally we exhausted our stores of offensiveness. We added a few previously used phrases for good measure. As we were hanging up, someone had a brilliant idea. We’ll leave the name and number of someone we don’t like. So he did. I don’t remember who left the name and number. It was likely more than one of us. Most likely someone said the name and another gave the number. We left an obscene, indecent message on an unknown answering machine, and left the name and phone number of my next-door neighbor, Chris. We hung up, giggling at the thought of this poor man hearing this obscene, indecent recording. Our mission accomplished, we went off to other tasks.

That night, the phone call was far from my mind as I sat in my room watching TV. A knock on my door interrupted my peace. It was my dad and my brother. He told him to sit down on the bed. I immediately knew we were in trouble.

He started with false naïveté. “What did you guys do today?”

“We just watched TV.”

“Who came over?”

“Nobody.” (Because of past incidents, we were not supposed to have anyone in the house while my parents were at work.)

“Did you make any phone calls?”

There it was. He knew. We were caught. From that moment on most of that night is a blur. We eventually admitted our crime. But not until my dad explained that the recipient of our call called our next-door neighbor and played him the tape from his answering machine. He immediately recognized our voices and called my dad.

I know I got a spanking that night. It was probably the last one I ever got. I’m sure it hurt, but it was not the worst part of the night. That moment came before my dad sent my brother to his room so he could punish us individually. He asked both of us, “What did you say?”

My stomach lurched and churned as he looked to me first.

I answered, “The ‘s’ word and the ‘d’ word.”

He looked hard at me. “No, I want you to say what you said on the phone.”

My heart dropped to somewhere around my toes. At that point my resolve broke. My eyes fell from my dad’s face to the floor. Tears began dripping onto my legs. It took several moments, but I finally was able to say the actual words to my dad. I didn’t look up. I couldn’t look up. My eyes stayed locked on the floor as my brother answered the same question.

I didn’t look up even when my dad and my brother left the room and shut the door behind them. I crumpled myself into a ball on my bed and cried. I didn’t cry because of the punishment I knew was coming. I didn’t cry because Chris was banned from the house until further notice. I cried because of the disappointment I saw on my dad’s face as he asked me what I’d said. It was that look that kept me from looking up as I spoke to him, because I knew it would deepen as I answered.

Eventually I cried myself to sleep. My dad came back to my room a couple of times that night. Once for the spanking I knew I deserved. And again later just to check on me and give me a hug. Well, as much of a hug as he ever gave. That second visit told me what I needed to know that night. He still loved me.

That night made an impact on my life. It wasn’t the last time I got in trouble as a boy, but it was definitely the last time I used a neighbor’s name as an alias.