This dissertation is a piece of creative writing in fulfilment of the Final Major Project for BA (Hons) Creative Writing.
My new tissue box made the wrong noise.
I know. The wrong noise.
Following my customary hand flurry that even an eighteenth-century dandy courtier would be proud of, my tissue didn’t make its usual whooshing sound while exiting its box. It was a pathetic paper crackling rustle that was nowhere near as dramatic in execution as the gesture required. With Marple-like sleuthing, I examined the box — the source of my distress was boldly staring back at me — its cellophane collar had been replaced with paper triangles. My disappointment necessitated a momentary pause; another of the memory sounds that would timewarp me back to childhood images had been permanently deleted. The new noise felt very wrong.
I concede that new technology and environmental issues may mean that noise and its function in the transaction between finger and operation have to change. But how dare someone tamper with the tissue-release noise I have been in a relationship with for over forty years? Its demise sent me searching for the culprit of such a heinous crime.
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