Henry Powell and the Cursed Landline ☎️

From "The Henry Powell Is Concerned" Series

Welcome to another story in the “Henry Powell Is Concerned” series.

☎️ New here? Enter the fictional world of Henry Powell’s Oakbury, MN🌷Where suburban dread meets real world insanity.

Henry Powell stood in the electronics aisle of Donation Depot: Gently Used Goods To Support Street Urchins. He needed a new-used phone. He wasn’t about to pay retail prices for a landline that he only used for work.

Henry loved Donation Depot, The Superstore Of Thrifting. He was, after all, an inherently thrifty man. Some might have even called him cheap, but he didn’t see what was so wrong with saving a little money.

His wife, Kari, wasn’t a Donation Depot fan. She claimed that their cat, Chester, had caught fleas from a used scratching post Henry had dragged home from Donation Depot. Henry insisted that the fleas had come in through their three-season porch. She scoffed at that idea.

Henry’s home office phone had died the day before. He didn’t know why it had broken, but when he put the handset up to his ear there was nothing on the line. Just dead air.

Henry needed a phone due to the fact that he worked from home, plus his place of work paid for the line. That said, he was responsible for the phone itself, which he always thought was unfair.

Henry had a personal smartphone, of course, but he was suspicious of the phone. His friend, Eli, had told him that carrying those things around in your pocket would give you low sperm count. Henry had all the kids he wanted, one, Jaxon–with an x, but he still didn’t like the idea of irradiating his sperm.

He had searched Amazon for a phone but he didn’t want to spend $20 on a low-end, no-name phone. Donation Depot was just a mile down the road and it would be sure to have a landline phone for five bucks or less. That said, he had considered the four-pay option on Amazon. Just five dollars a month, but he put the idea out of his head.

He stood in the electronics section, such as it was, staring at a mass of cords and phones and old dial-up modems. Henry picked up the phones, one by one, and each cost $6.00. A little more than he had budgeted.

Donation Depot held an ongoing “Tag Sale.” It was simple: if the price tag was blue (that month), the item was half off. Unfortunately for Henry, it was the end of the month. That meant most of the blue tag items had already been picked over. The smart thrifters got there the first of every month to take advantage of the “Tag Sale,” but this was more spur of the moment.

He was frustrated and took a deep, centering breath. His therapist the year earlier had taught him how to take a deep centering breath, but he questioned the validity of the practice and decided to take another normal centering breath which worked.

Henry dug to the bottom of the tech stack. There was layer upon layer of phones and cords.

And then, when he least expected it, he reached the bottom of the bin and he spotted it:

A bright blue tag on an large white phone with oversized buttons.

Henry pulled it up through the mass of cords. The phone wasn’t a typical phone. The phone had oversized numbers. It was most likely for elderly folks who couldn’t see well. Henry was almost 49 years old, but his eyes were already going. His optometrist, Dr. Fielding, had informed him that he needed reading glasses. When he saw the phone with the oversized numbers, he thought, why not? Maybe he could put off reading glasses for another year with the phone.

He held up the phone and examined it. It seemed sturdy. The price was listed at six dollars, but the blue tag meant three dollars. He had his phone.

Henry had to be on an end-of-day Zoom call at 4 p.m., so he hurried to the front counter and paid for the phone, three dollars in quarters. The checkout clerk rolled his eyes at him and said, “Would you like to donate a dollar to further help the street urchins we help?”

He hated being asked this question, and the sales professionals asked it every time. He already worked at a nonprofit so he reasoned that no, he did not need to further help the street urchins and told him such. Thankfully, he didn’t seem to care.

Henry went to his car and sat the phone on his passenger seat gingerly. He examined the phone. It had a mute button and an emergency button. But that’s all it had, besides the oversized buttons. Good enough, thought Henry. He didn’t need anything else and he had voicemail through his phone company.

On his way home, Henry wondered if the 4 PM Zoom calls were to make sure the work from home home workers were really working from home and not out at the driving range. Henry would rather have been at home working than at the driving range, so he never really understood the folks that tried to get away with that kind of thing.

He turned his white Toyota Corolla onto his cul-de-sac: Juniper Loop.

Juniper Loop was Henry’s retreat at the end of a concrete semi-circle. He pushed the garage door button and sailed into his parking spot without even having to reposition the Corolla once.

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The next morning, Henry’s son, Jaxon–with an ‘x,’ was off to school and he was off to work. His wife, Kari, usually left for her law office by seven in the morning. He always felt sorry for her, but she said that she liked listening to audiobooks on the way in on I-94.

Henry remembered that he had forgotten to plug in his new-used phone. The Zoom meeting had gone until 5:15 PM the night before and Kari had gotten home early so they had sat out on the three-season porch drinking Tom Collinses until the sun set. It was a relaxing late summer evening.

Henry did not enjoy the 9 AM Zoom meetings. He almost hated them as much as the 4 PM Zoom meeting.

As a contract worker with a large nonprofit organization that raised money for other nonprofit organizations, he didn’t know why he had to constantly be in virtual meetings. He only ever communicated with Gregg, his supervisor.

Henry grabbed his oversized-number phone, peeled the half price blue price tag off and plugged it in. It was 9 and he jumped onto his Zoom call. Full crowd of little boxes of humanity.

The virtual meeting droned on for over a half an hour. Henry had a trick: every time he needed to yawn, he would turn off his camera. Around 9:45 AM the meeting seemed to be wrapping up.

Henry briefly turned off the camera on his computer to yawn when he looked out his big window at the cul-de-sac. He was surprised by what he saw.

Three police cars.

In Oakbury, Henry didn’t usually see three police cars at the same time. Something was going on. Juniper Loop was hopping with enforcers of suburban peace.

Henry set his Zoom to “Away” and pushed his face up against the window and attempted to ascertain what was happening. Perhaps one of his neighbors was having a heart attack? That did happen regularly on Juniper Loop and nearby Loops.

Recently, on Red Maple Loop somebody had a stroke. It had been in the local online newsletter. Henry hoped that if he ever had a stroke they would put it in the Oakbury Online News Source.

Just as Henry craned his head to the right, trying to peer into Elmore McClellan’s yard, there was a loud knock at his front door.

A louder than usual knock.

In fact, unless somebody from the local Church of Latter Day Saints was in the neighborhood, nobody but the mail carrier Stacie ever came up to the door. Ever. Well, unless you counted Elmore McClellan was there to complain about Henry mowing after six in the evening.

Another loud BANG at his front door.

“Police!” a voice shouted on the other side of the door. “Open up!”

Henry was confused. Why were the police at his door? Perhaps there was a gas leak which immediately had him worried. He quickly made his way to the front door.

More pounding.

Odd. If it was a gas leak, it was a serious gas leak. Henry’s stomach rumbled with IBS-laden fear.

Henry had never been in trouble with the police before. Well, once, but because he was going seven over in a school zone. Henry had protested because school was already out, but the officer pointed out that the fifteen miles per hour was enforced until four p.m. and it was only 3:45. That chapped his hide to that day, and it had been seven years earlier.

But that was neither here nor there, he thought.

Henry chained the front door with the thin brass door chain and opened it a crack.

Three of Oakbury’s finest stood on the other side of the door. The OPB. Two of them had the appearance of Marines, the third looked like somebody who had just finished having a full lunch at Krispy Kreme. The big butch guy had his gun out and up. This startled Henry.

“What can I help you with, officers?” asked Henry.

“Open the door, immediately! This is the Oakbury Police. We have probable cause to enter the premises!”

Henry enjoyed watching YouTube in his free time (which was sometimes during his work-from-home time) and he often watched videos on how to deal with police should the need arise. The only thing that came to mind was don’t talk to the police without a lawyer, but Kari was probably in her morning meeting..

“Just a moment,” he said, fumbling with the chain. As soon as the chain was off, the police burst in. The door just missed Henry by two inches. The audacity of these police was more audacity than Henry was used to.

“Detain that man!” the Sergeant ordered. Henry was wearing his indoor sweater and didn’t appear to be much of a threat.

“Right away sir!” said the oversized officer with a handlebar mustache. The obese man, stuffed into his uniform like an oversized sausage in an undersized casing, quickly had Henry’s hands behind his back and in handcuffs.

“Suspect is secure!” yelled the Sergeant. “Start searching the house immediately. The victim could be anywhere. K9 unit is en route.”

Henry was bemused. It felt like he was watching one of the police shows his wife, Kari, enjoyed.

“Please, officers,” said Henry, “What the heckfire is going on around here?”

“Calm down sir!” said the Sergeant.

“I’m perfectly calm,” said Henry, although he did have a metal allergy and wondered if there was nickel in the handcuffs. Nickel could cause a moderate eczema outbreak through direct contact. He didn’t even want to think about it.

“Search the house, boys,” said the Sergeant. “You, sit down,” he commanded Henry.

Henry sat on the couch and watched as the police began tearing through the house. The K9 Unit arrived. A German Shepherd. The K9 unit began searching the home as well. Henry worried about Chester, but the dog was muzzled.

The sergeant with the handlebar mustache pulled up a stool from the breakfast nook and sat in front of Henry.

“I need you to tell me what is going on here this morning? Immediately!” said the man.

Henry was flummoxed. He was often flummoxed, but the question flummoxed him so much he became bemused.

“I don’t know what’s going on! There’s no trouble here. I never even called the police.”

“What?” asked the policeman.

Henry was quite confused. “I said I never even called the police, I work from home, I was on a Zoom call when I saw your cars outside.”

“Listen, Mr. Powell, according to my information, you have called 911 at least 132 times in the last hour. You or somebody else. What are we going to find in the basement?”

“The basement?”

One of the other officers came back into the room. “We’ve searched the entire house–there’s nothing. Nobody here.”

“Dispatch said the call was coming from inside the house,” said the Sergeant. “The landline.”

“I only have the one landline for my work. I just got a new phone!” said Henry, realizing he was lying, it was a used-new phone.

“Show me,” said the Sergeant.

Henry had difficulty standing with his hands cuffed behind his back, so the Sergeant helped him to his feet.

The K9 unit left.

Henry led the Sergeant into his home office and motioned towards his new old phone with his nose. “Right there. I just got the phone. That’s the only phone in the house, besides my cellphone.”

Henry briefly considered that Jaxon was playing a prank on him, payback for not letting him go to the climbing wall the night before while Henry was drinking Tom Collinses.

In the silence of the room, the click of the phone and the distant sound of dialing could be heard.

“What the hell is that?” asked the officer.

“I don’t know, I’ve never heard that before.”

The sergeant picked up the handset and put it to his head. He heard on the other side, “Hello, this is 911, what’s your emergency?”

“Dangit,” said the sergeant, who unplugged the phone from the wall.

Henry was extremely confused. “Officer, what is going on?”

The policeman uncuffed Henry. “I’ll tell you what’s going on. Your emergency button is stuck in the call position.”

He handed the phone to Henry who looked closely at the phone.

Sure enough.

Donation Depot had sold him a phone that had an emergency button that was stuck in perpetual “Dial 911” mode.

“I… I… just got that phone. It’s brand new from Donation Depot!” said Henry.

“Well, you are going to have to get a different phone,” said the Officer Sergeant. “Come on boys.”

The police all left. They left the front door open.

Henry stood in the middle of his office holding his phone. His face was bright red.

The smartphone in Henry’s pocket rang.

Henry’s hands were shaking. He noticed a dull red line where the handcuffs had been. Great, there was nickel in the cuffs, he thought.

Henry pulled the iPhone out of his pocket and answered. “Hello, this is Henry Powell,” he said.

“Yes, I know who it is, Henry. This is Gregg Smith, your supervisor.”

“Oh, hello, Gregg, I’ve had quite the morning.”

“I see. That’s great, Henry. Listen, pal, we need to set a meeting to discuss your attendance at our required Zoom meetings. Alright, buddy? You know they’re required right? You can’t just log off whenever you like.”

“I know that, Gregg. I had something happen. We don’t need a meeting to discuss my meeting attendance. I tell you, I had quite the morn–”

Gregg cut Henry off, ignoring him. “Does two-thirty tomorrow afternoon work for you?”

“Sure,” said Henry.

“Great, I’ll send a Zoom link to your email. Talk to you tomorrow,” and he hung up.

Henry bent over and opened his calendar. He wrote: “Zoom Meeting w/Gregg 2:30 PM.”

In the margins he wrote: “Buy new phone at Best Buy.”

A bead of sweat had formed on Henry’s forehead.

He looked out the window and watched as the police cars disappeared up Juniper Loop.

The End

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