start

There’s the candied fizz deep in the ear canal and going further in. Pent up friction in a puffer gone greasy with age, caught by the rubbing of your headphone. The wire is released inwards. The itch. The insistent, unwarranted infiltration into and through. It’s short by the standards of the journey. But the moment is sheer panic. The connection there isn’t even remotely on your terms. It’s its own thing. The static is in charge.

Imagine if this feeling didn’t go away. If the pent up energy in the plastic in your jacket which discharged itself through the cable into the inside of your ears stayed there. Some hardening kernel that would occasionally jab or taunt or seethe. No sign if you look in the mirror, or open your mouth, or furtle feverishly with a cotton bud.