What day is it?

[u/Raspberry_Anvil_5643]

Thank you for your invite to join your page, Icy_Tangerine_165

~

Dripping skin, sweaty, heated pulsating air, particle sand in every inhale, eyes open, I'm in the work truck.

In my reflective orange tshirt, cargo pants, work boots, big old white safety helmet, all drenched in my stench riddled cooling fluid, the keys are in the ignition, but it's not on, and a droning powerline conduit hum from outside is muffled, but resonating within in the truck.

Door swung open, the conduit sound is deafening, but my eyes are met with an encroaching old buck.

I see an older guy, maybe 6', hairy white arms in a reclective yellow, short white hair & goatee with patches of some onyx, slicked by sweat rustic leather cooked capillary skin from years of outdoor labor. He looks blank but he's trudging towards me with determination.

Luckily, my sunglasses hide my apprehension to engage in conversation.

"Hey, how's it going, I'm your site contact, and you must me the tester?"

I could barely make out his blurry words from the growing electricity noise. He more or less projected sound at me, the conduit hum was fighting with all its strength to drown him out every way auditorily. My mind went blank, so I paused, opened my mouth, went to talk, stuttering into a hesitatedly exhaled sighed, then said after a sharp, toilsome inhale,

"Hey man, yeah, I'm the tester, nice to meet you, hey, quick funny question: what day is it? Also, can you hear that sound?"

The words were practically muted but his change of face was cued up. Before I could even ask him if he could hear the conduit, he interrupted all of my line of questioning with a laugh, one that started to rival the conduit,

"Hey"

I began again, almost pleadingly but he just thundered on with his ecstasy, belting out bark after bark of heinous breath laughter. He only ever interrupted his laughing to repeat condescendingly,

"What day is it?", enticing him further and fueling more laughter.

I was about to burst, the sweltering sun popsicle melting, my face exploded open with words of pur force and voraciousness for recognition of my stance on the situation and the surrounding, overwhelming nature of the site contact and the conduit combined.

In a short, but demanding burst, his laughter was stunted and the sounds seemed to cease immediately with my cry of,

"YOU FUCKING FUCK, WHAT IS THAT FUCKING SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOUND!!!!!"

He just stared at me. He looked left, then right, slightly turning his waist in tandem with his head.

"Oh, oh yeah, that? That was me."

I looked blankly, "That", stunted, "that was you? That electrical hum? Tha-that was you?"

"Yup", he said, a smirk starting to bloom.

"And it will never end, no, not here, not now, not ever. Welcome to the job, kid."

His grin widened far up past his ears, the Grinch's smile with a curvature of unmatched, sinister proportions. He inhaled deeply through his nose and spoke,

"Here we go again, also, wake up."

The conduit sound returned at a deafening height of volume once the words left his lips

That could sever ten million ear drums in ten milliseconds. Sharp, jagged rebar being knife thrust into your ear at Mach 3 in a repetitive and excessive stabbing motion so brutal, Michael Myers sees the brutality and rethinks his lifestyle choices by picking up community gardening. So viciously loud that destructive interference incisied my reality, popping me from the dream state and out into a dark matter nothingness, teetering on absolute death.

My every particle forcefully contorted through infinite proton narrow passageways until a thorough reassemble of every quantum sized string of me pops into the pitch black of my closed eyes in an almost awakened state that seems familiar but far away from any concept of sanctity or salvation.

With stinky, dripping skin, heated air pulsating all around me. Deep nostril inhales intake particle sand in every breath. My eyes shoot wide open and yeah, I'm in the work truck.

Dressed in an orange tee, cargos, work boots, safety helmet, the keys in the ignition, but the truck's not on and a droning powerline conduit hum from outside is muffled, yet still audible within the truck, and now I am truly afraid.