He let go of the button and raised his eyebrows at my mother. There you go, grandma. Happy now?
Nothing came back.
You know how a radio sounds when nobody’s talking on it. A soft hiss, like a faucet running two rooms away. It hissed. It kept hissing. It hissed for what felt like a very long time.
The corn moved a little, finally, in some wind I couldn’t feel. There was a red-winged blackbird sitting on the fence wire across the ditch. I remember it because it was the only living thing out there making any sound at all.
Then the dispatcher came back.
And it was not the same voice. It was the same woman, but it was not the same voice. It was careful now. Slow. Like someone walking across ice.
“Fourteen, say again that name.”
He rolled his eyes and reached for the button.
