"Excuse me, but, do you have the time?"
Rudolph looked at the young man sitting next to him on the bus. Not only did the man not respond to Rudolph's question, which had obviously been directed towards him, but he seemed completely oblivious to Rudolph's existence. After several seconds, Rudolph noticed that the man was wearing a set of headphones, which had all but disappeared underneath his hair. That explains it, Rudolph thought.
He turned to the women on his other side, only to find that she, too, was listening to music via a set of headphones. Rudolph put his newspaper down on his lap and, for the first time since he boarded the bus, looked around. There may have been eight or nine people on the bus with him, each one listening to something on headphone, none stirring.
"That's odd," Rudolph thought as the bus hummed along in eerie quiet, a cacophonous jumble of sound barely audible.
Two stops later, Rudolph got off the bus. For the first time, he noticed that the neighbourhood was somehow quieter than usual. Something, some sound was missing. He walked to the apartment he shared with Janet, vaguely disturbed.
"Hon, I'm home," Rudolph shouted, dropping his briefcase by the front door and entered. There was no answer. Rudolph could smell food cooking, which seemed right because it was Janet's turn to make dinner, and she got off work half an hour before he did. But, where was she?
Rudolph entered the kitchen. Janet was standing over a skillet, stirring some vegetable and humming to herself. Rudolph leaned against the fridge and watcher her work, a smile on his face. It had taken him no time at all to notice the headphones.
Soon, Janet decided that the mixture needed some butter, and turned suddenly towards the fridge. "Oh!" Janet exclaimed, putting a hand to her chest. "What are you doing here?" she asked. "Why didn't you let me know that you were home?"
"I tried," Rudolph told her, "but, you didn't answer."
"What?"
Rudolph raised his voice, "I tried," he shouted, "but, you..." Janet looked at him, uncomprehending. Rudolph stepped up to her, kissed her passionately and gently removed the headphones from her ears. "I said," Rudolph repeated, "I tried to tell you that I was home, but you didn't answer."
"Sorry, dear," Janet responded. "I was listening to my Walkman. It's a great thing, don't you think?"
"Hmm..." Rudolph avoided answering the question directly.
"You should get one," Janet told him. "You'd like it."
"Is dinner going to be ready soon?" Rudolph asked.
"In no time at all."
Five minutes later, Janet and Rudolph sat down to eat. They ate in silence. Well, not exactly silence; Rudolph could just make out the strains of Thriller leaking from Janet's headphones.
Rudolph washed up after dinner, as was their custom. He felt that something had gone out of his relationship with Janet, but he wasn't sure if he could put it into words... When he was done, he went into the tiny living room and found Janet curled up in a reclining chair. She was gently rocking her head back and forth, listening to god only knew what, reading the Wall Street Journal.
"You only read that for the pictures," Rudolph had once told her. They laughed at that; how long ago had it been?
Rudolph turned on the television set.
As announcer was reading from a sheet of paper. He seemed to be having difficulty concentrating, possibly owing to the fact that he wore a Walkman over his studio headphones. "June...Weisbaden of 27...Searle...Avenue, and Rudolph...Isvestia of...333 Dufferen Street..." Rudolph started at the mention of his name."
"Again," the announcer said, "we would like to offer you a...portable cassette player...with built in FM radio receiver...and headphones...absolutely free of charge. All you have to do...is...drop by our offices at...1001 Queen Street...West and pick them up. Those eligible are...Martin..."
Rudolph angrily changed the channel. On the set, a shoot-out was taking place, with bullets flying and bodies falling. But, there was no sound. Rudolph switched channels repeatedly, moving though a typical evening's fare, but none offered sound.
"Great!" Rudolph said to himself. Hoping that the sound system wasn't broken, he returned to the announcer. "...vestia of...333 Dufferin Street," the announcer announced. "We now return you to...your regularly scheduled...programme..." A man and woman filled the screen. They appeared to be exchanging harsh words, but Rudolph could hear nothing.
He sat, mesmerized, for several seconds. He wondering what he was missing by not having a set of headphones of his own, and briefly considered getting his own set when somebody knocked on the front door. Rudolph turned off the television and got up to answer it.
"Please, may I come in?" a woman, a complete stranger to Rudolph, asked. He felt suspicious, until he noticed that she wasn't wearing any headphones, and he got out of her way to let her in.
The woman entered, looking momentarily at Janet, who was oblivious to her presence. "Who are you?" Rudolph asked the woman. She looked to be in her mid30s, not unattractive, but harried.
"My name is June," she replied. "June Weisbaden."
"They announced your name on the television!" Rudolph exclaimed.
"Yours, too," June reminded him.
"Can I get you something?" Rudolph asked, motioning towards the couch indicating that June was welcome to sit down.
"Just talk to me," June told him, sitting. "I haven't heard anything but the most rudimentary conversation in six...no, seven months!"
"What's going on?" Rudolph asked, sitting himself down.
"I...I'm not sure," June replied. "It's sort of like that play by...Ionesco, you know? Everybody slowly changes, and nobody thinks that anything is wrong. Only...only, the change is that people aren't communicating with each other any more. You...you weren't planning on getting one of your own...were you...?"
"I had considered it," Rudolph said. "But, not seriously..."
June shuddered. "My son was the first in our house to get one. I thought nothing of him coming to the dinner table wearing it. Then, he convinced his father to try it, and he was hooked. When I found one on the baby, well, I freaked, but...but, my husband insisted...
"Do you think we can go someplace and talk?" June asked, looking thoughtfully at Janet. Rudolph looked in his lover's direction, noticed the almost beatific smile on her face, and responded, "I think I'd like that. Let's get out of here."
Janet didn't hear them leave.
