The Voices Inside My Head Are Not My Own

The dying booths--they’re not called that of course-- remind me in that dreary way of people that have lived too long, with too many memories crowning their daftie heids, of the old red telephone boxes, connected by overhead wires strung along every street. Two pence for a call, or ten pence if you’d lots to say, but there’s none of that today. The dying booths don’t cost you anything, but there’s no queues for the dying booths, no one standing outside peering through the Perspex and huffing because it’s raining and it can’t really be an important call you’re making because you’re too young and you’re just larking about with your daft pals and it was probably those louts standing brooding at the garages with their ripped and safety-pinned shirts and hair the colour of a cockatoo that were hangin about you girls that peed in the phone box.

None of that my girl. None of that. Tut. Tut. Tut. Tap. Tap. Tap on the Perspex, with a fistful of coins to show that the old cow Mrs Wilkie from up the street meant business and our high pitched voices and gaggling giggles, pulling the handset from each other, was interfering with it, interfering with her busy-body life.

The door slides smoothly open. There’s a slight whiff of medicinal ether, but no smell of pee in the dying booth. Everything is transparent and glows, apart from me. When you step inside only a pulse of light tell you the metrics have begun. Heart, liver, kidneys, colon, bone density, skin elasticity. They can’t use a client’s brain-- yet. But there’s some talk that’s the next big thing. Wouldn’t matter to me. My primary school teacher Mrs Boyle always said I wouldn’t amount to much and was a bit doowally. Never thought I’d be glad to agree with her.

She’s long dead now, of course. One of the lucky ones. Used to be called died of natural causes. They don’t talk about death, of course. They talk about payback, about meeting our obligations, of once more being useful. A simple matter of numbers. There’s brokers that promise you the week of your life if you come over to them, use their service. Funeral parlours for the living.

I can’t stomach those places. I come here because it’s where home used to be. The layout of the streets are still the same, but the houses are for the 1s and the 2s, those that still work, those that still matter. I’m a 5f, whilst not a criminal classification is an offence against common decency. It’s not paranoia; people do talk about you all the time.

I used to bump my gums, saying silly things like ‘they can never do that’ and think of the future.

Now in weighty-silence, shedding false expectations, I’ve become more like myself.

You expect a robot voice to lead you through the process of disengagement, but it’s not like that. Obviously they’ve trawled though my files and it’s the voice of George, not the elderly tottering- voiced George, but the young virile-- couldn’t wait to get my pants down George.

‘You sure you want to do this Massie?’ the machine-voice says.

I almost gasp with pleasure in hearing his voice, it seems to come from everywhere at once. There’s a small prick as the machine administers a soothing anaesthetic to help keep you calm.

‘Is that you?’ I say and try to turn round, but there’s no room in the dying booth and a greenish light begins scanning my irises.

‘Ah hen, Ah think you’ve made a good choice, but are you sure you want to do it?’ Mother’s voice has a slight burr, but an added buzz that makes me jerk back, but my head is suddenly locked into place, by a contraption like a muzzle with ear flaps.

I shout ‘No! No! No!’

‘Massie stop your carrying on!’ Da’s voice has that growl, as if he’s goin to flip at any time. ‘Just say yes, and that’ll be it finished once and for all.’

My body begins to relax, sink down as if I’m riding on clouds.

‘You know you want to,’ says Da in a more conciliatory tone. ‘Just say yes for me, will yeh pet?’

‘Fuck off Da,’ I say, adrenalin star- bursting through my body. ‘After what you did Ah still hate you. Even though you're dead, fuck-off and die.’

The door to the dying booth slides open. ‘This visit number 92 292 will be used for training purposes,’ says a robotic voice. ‘You are free to leave at any time.’

I stumble outside and the noonday light has a clarity that unclutters my eyesight and I see the wonders of twigs and trees in what remains of the old short-cut. My trousers gape at the waist and my stomach rumbles with hunger. I’ve nowhere to go and nothing to do, but none of this matters. Anywhere is better than here.

That winter is colder than most, but it’s the rain that gets you, rots you from the outside in. I stake out the dying-booths near my old house and watch them turn up with the lights flashing and sirens going as one person after another goes in and is carried out by the booth wardens. My life has shrunk to a bit of pavement and some packing cardboard and I just want to be warm. Tomorrow will be better I say.

The door to the death-booth slides open. I step inside. It’s warm in there and steam begins to rise from the layers of my clothes. I’m no longer a death-booth virgin and I'm ready for George’s voice this time.

‘Massie, is that you?’ George has the voice of a young Sean Connery.

‘Aye, it’s me,’ I say, playing along.

‘Just say yes for me Massie,’ his voice whispers. ‘Just say yes. Just this once.’

‘Yes!’ I scream. ‘Yes! Yes!’