"Next Friday."

"Well... no. I've already made plans for next Fri-"

"Next Saturday."

"Why, all right, that will be nice. Martin, Where are we going to go?"

"I don't know. I'll call you."

"Okay. Oh, Martin... aren't you in my Soc Sci section?"

"I don't know; I've only been there twice. Goodbye."

Martin put the phone back in place, and immediately he began to feel very strange. Things were whirling around in his head: it was as if he were about to make some great discovery and knew it already. Martin shivered and looked at the telephone in the middle of the floor.

EVERY NIGHT that week Martin had one of his funny dreams, and by day the tension was unbearable for him. Something was going to happen to him soon; he knew it. Every minute seemed to heighten the anticipation. He couldn't study any more-he couldn't even concentrate on wasting time. He began sitting in the armchair again and staring at the phone: why, he didn't know. He just sat and stared.

Then, on Friday, something prompted him to go his Soc Sci section at ten o'clock. He got out of his chair, put on some clean clothes, forgetting to shower beforehand (he was really preoccupied, because he had been sitting in the chair without moving for four days), and went to the section in Emerson Hall.

He saw Betty as soon as he walked in the door-it must have been Betty, because she was a very sweet-looking girl-and said hello. Betty said hello too, and she came over to talk to him, but before he could say anything she got a funny look on her face and said that the class was starting and she had to go sit on the other side of the room. That didn't bother Martin too much, although it seemed to him that everybody was sitting on the other side of the room. Then the class was over and Betty came to talk again, but she said she was in a hurry and by the way she would not be able to go out Saturday night because a friend of hers was coming to stay with her for the weekend. Martin didn't understand why she couldn't get a date for her friend too, but Betty rushed off after promising Martin a date for the weekend after that.

As soon as Betty left, Martin's head began to reel again. Everything became distorted; he fell down four times just walking back to his room. He thought he was going crazy, for now he was having one of his dreams in the daytime. He was an earthworm, burrowing through a telephone cord into the receiver: Betty was in the other part of the telephone, and he was getting closer and closer to the receiver there, and something was about to happen-but before it could, he would see pictures, wildly distorted, of his old biology book's photographs of the cells, and the little cells would be swimming around trying to get to the big black one-but then he would see the telephone again!

This kept happening as he sat in the chair, staring at the phone, ill that day and the next. His roommate got scared and told Martin that he was going to sleep in Dave's room "because you're blowing your goddamned mind, you freak," but Martin didn't even hear him. He was completely absorbed in his hallucinations, which kept getting more and more intense, more and more frantic. Something was going to happen very soon now, and Martin didn't want to miss it. Soon he had to grip the chair to keep from being thrown out, everything was going around so fast. But he tried to keep his eyes on the phone, and finally, as he watched in disbelief, it began undulating to a strange ringing vibration. Martin crawled over to it as fast as he could and then pulled himself up to a kneeling position so that the phone was writhing at his knees. He picked up the receiver, for that was what he had to do first, and he put it to his ear and said, "Hello." A voice came from inside it, and it was Betty! Martin was overjoyed: Betty was the telephone after all She said, "Hello, Martin, I'm afraid I have some bad news." The anticipation was making Martin moan, but he managed to say, "Yes?" He knew it was going to happen now; his heart was beating a thousand times a minute, and he was breathing too fast to get air into his lungs; Betty said, "Martin, I'm afraid I can't go out with you next Saturday," but Martin was busy watching the earthworm crawl into the receiver so he just said, "Oh, that's a goddamn lie." Betty gasped and said, "No, Martin, really, this friend is leaving for Greenland tomorrow and I want to spend the night with him, and I'm not lying at all," but by now Martin couldn't care less, and he said so for the earthworm was in the receiver now and they were ready to go. But Betty was upset, and she said, "Look, Martin, I could have lied to you and told you I was stuck in the snow, or that it was my dog's birthday, but I'm telling the truth!" Martin barely heard her; the pleasure was intolerable. He screamed into the phone. "LOOK, BETTY, YOU'RE LYING!! IF YOU EVER WANT TO GO OUT WITH ME, JUST GIVE ME A GODDAMN PHONE CALL IF YOU DON'T GO FUCK YOURSELF!!!! "

With that, Martin's hand shot out to the phone, the receiver slammed right into place, and Martin fell sprawling to the floor at full length. He didn't remove his hand from the phone, but just lay there, trembling. His knees were shaking, he was sweating all over, but for the first time for as long as he could remember. Martin was completely calm.