Last night, the phone rang. I almost never answer unless I know who it is when I look at Caller ID, but it was a local number and a cell phone. I debated, decided it might be someone I know, and I answered.
“Patti?”
“Yes,” I say cautiously. This is not a familiar voice.
“This is Marilyn.”
The only Marilyn that immediately springs to mind is one I know who lives in California, but I’m terrible with names unless it’s someone I’ve talked to over and over and over.
“You sound different,” she says. “I didn’t recognize your voice.”
“Um, yeah. You sound different, too.” As in you don’t sound like anyone I know and I’m frantically trying to remember who you are because clearly we know each other if you have my home number.
“I’m calling to see if you’re going to lunch tomorrow.”
“Lunch? Um, this is the first I heard of that.” Brain is now frantically working. Oh, yeah, my local writing chapter’s published author group was talking about getting together, but I thought that was in the evening.
“Oh.”
“It doesn’t matter anyway,” I say. “I can’t make it; I have to work tomorrow.”
“Work? Where?”
Um, huh? “Delta. The same place I always work.”
Confused silence. “Who is this?”
“Patti.”
More confused silence.
I finally say, “Um, I think you might have the wrong number, but the right name.”
“Is this Patti Parnelli?”
“No.”
“What number is this?”
I tell her. It turns out she dialed one number off. But how weird is it that a wrong number would ask for someone with the same name as mine? The odds against it have to be astronomical. To make it weirder, she was calling because this Patti Parnelli is a member of a group they both belong to and my first assumption was that this was someone I couldn’t remember from my writers’ group.
We both laughed, but it reinforced my usual behavior or letting voice mail pick up unless I recognize the number/name on caller ID.
