Nope - still the same problem.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

$_ = "converted";
tie my @test, 'StringArray', $_;

print map "$_\n", map {
    delete @$_[2,5];
    join '', grep defined, @$_;
} \@test, [ /(.)/sg ];

package StringArray;
require Tie::Array;
use base 'Tie::Array';
sub TIEARRAY  { my $str = pop; bless \$str, shift }
sub FETCH     { substr(${$_[0]}, $_[1], 1) }
sub STORE     { substr(${$_[0]}, $_[1], 1) = $_[2] }
sub FETCHSIZE { length(${$_[0]}) }
sub STORESIZE { $$_[0] = substr(${$_[0]}, 0, $_[1])  }
sub DELETE    { substr(${$_[0]}, $_[1], 1) = '' }
1;
__END__

covered
coveted
[download]

Makeshifts last the longest.