The words begin to form in my mouth but stay there. Frozen. I cannot speak, I feel my voice trapped somewhere in my throat. Instead of words, bile rises into my mouth and I feel the uncontrollable urge to retch.

“Hello? Hello? Anybody there?” The same voice and the same nausea filling my stomach. I begin to gag. I run outside and with trembling hands I light a cigarette. Halfway through the cigarette, I feel better. I stay there for about fifteen minutes, just smoking, waiting for I don’t know what. Then I hear the ding! of the elevator from within and quickly avert my face as the people start to come out. All of a sudden, I can hear Dave’s voice.

“Oh come on! The movie wasn’t that bad.”

“Yes, it was! Half the audience was asleep, didn’t you notice?” The woman’s laughing voice answers him, and I know who that voice belongs to. Marisa. I wait and listen for any sounds of a child, some whining whimper from Junior. But all I can hear are their voices playing back and forth, and then the bark of a dog.