I expected the silence again. The same silence that caused me to feel sick and throw up words. It was the same silence that forced me to answer the phone every time it rang for the last 294 days. I let the phone ring three times before I answered the call from the unknown number each time. I would look at the bright glass like clockwork at 11:11, and my finger would press the green answer button as if I had no control of what it did. Whatever thought I was thinking left my mouth like a bullet after the trigger is pulled. It all became an unavoidable ritual for me, as unplanned as breathing. Today, was the first day I heard a voice come through the phone. She sounded exactly like me when she softly wailed, “Why have you kept me here for so long… please… I’m begging you.” I roared, “What kind of sick person are you? Why won’t you just leave me alone. You have been tormenting me for almost a year. Why?” “I call because you are the only person who can free me. My voice did not work until today, and that is because of you.” “What are you talking about?” I shrieked. My mind was scrambling and I felt dizzy. I knew I was awake and this was happening, but it seemed like this call was something out of Black Mirror. It was too unreal to be real. “You made it so that you would never feel sadness again,” the voice explained dolefully. It was coming up on one year since I agreed to participate in a surgical trial to treat depression. Dr. Finx, the only psychiatrist I have ever trusted, ensured me that it was a simple outpatient procedure and had proven both safety and success in animals. I awoke from the procedure not feeling an ounce of sadness, and have not felt any since. I did not know how the doctors did it, but I never questioned it. Anger and fear still plagued me, sometimes I felt those emotions stronger, and they came across in the random thoughts I regurgitated to the unknown caller. “It locked me in here and took away my voice,“ she said. I was getting to a breaking point; my anger was taking over. I was pacing back and forth in my kitchen, red with rage. I screamed, “who are you?” After a moment of silence, the voice whispered, “I am your sadness.” “How is this possible I stuttered?”