“I’m so sorry, you’ll have to speak up,” she said unapologetically. The weight of Edgar on her hip digging in to her patience. His whine muting the other end of the phone.

These customer service types were all the same. Outsourced to some international, no foreign, company. Staffed by folks barely out of diapers themselves. Or maybe wearing diapers on their heads.

Dottie chuckled grimly to herself and missed the explanation again. “I’m sorry,” she sneered. “Say it one more time. Your accent is kinda thick.”

“Madame,” he spoke slowly, assuredly. “As I have heretofore attempted to mention on two previous occasions, I am of the firm belief that you have mistaken me for someone I am most certainly not.”

Dottie sat stunned. Edgar let out a piercing cry.

“If you are still unable to discern, either because of my enunciation or the protestations of your offspring, you’ve called Betelgeuse! Good! Day!”

He waited for the bodily “thud” and her crying child to hang up.

“Who was that, dear?”

“Just Earth. Again.”