From 96ab7a3ce522f38a768e67c73021bf1071832a37 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Case Duckworth Date: Mon, 9 Feb 2015 12:04:05 -0700 Subject: Add Paul; move source files to src/ --- src/telemarketer.txt | 87 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 87 insertions(+) create mode 100644 src/telemarketer.txt (limited to 'src/telemarketer.txt') diff --git a/src/telemarketer.txt b/src/telemarketer.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e43b87c --- /dev/null +++ b/src/telemarketer.txt @@ -0,0 +1,87 @@ +--- +title: Telemarketer +genre: prose + +project: + title: Elegies for alternate selves + css: elegies + order: 25 + prev: + title: Swan song + link: swansong + next: + title: We played those games too + link: weplayedthosegamestoo +... + +It was one of those nameless gray buildings that could be seen from the +street only if Larry craned his neck to almost vertical. He never had, +of course, having heard when he first arrived in the city that only +tourists unaccustomed to tall buildings did so. He'd never thought about +it until he'd heard the social injunction against such a thing; it was +now one of the things he thought about almost every day as he rode to +and from work in gritty blue buses. + +Inside the building, the constant sound of recirculating dry air made +Larry feel as though he were at some beach in hell, listening to the +[ocean][], or more accurately at a gift shop in a landlocked state in hell +listening to the ocean as represented by the sound a conch shell makes +when he holds it up to his ear. The buzz of the fluorescent bulbs +overhead sounded like the hot sun bearing down all day in this metaphor, +a favorite of Larry's. + +His cubicle was made of that cheap, grayish-blue plywood that cubicles +are made of; inside it, his computer sat on his desk as Larry liked to +think an [eagle perched][] on a mountainous crag much like the crag that was +his desktop wallpaper. The walls were unadorned except for a few +tacked-up papers in report covers explaining his script. When Larry made +a call to a potential customer it always went the same way: + +"Hi, Mr/Mrs (customer's name). My name is Larry and I'm with (client's +name), and was just wondering if I could have a minute of your time?" + +"Oh, no, sir; I don't want whatever it is you're selling." (customer +terminates call). + +Larry had only ever read the first line of the script on the wall. +Sometimes he had an urge to read more of it, to be ready when a customer +expressed interest in whatever it was Larry was selling, but something +in him---he liked to think it was an actor's intuition that told him it +was best to improvise, though he worried it was the futility of it---kept +him from reading further into the script. So when Jane said, "Sure, I +have nothing better to do," he was thrown completely off guard. + +"Um, alright Mrs ... Mrs. Loring, I was wondering---" + +"It's Ms, not Mrs. Em ess. Miz. No ‘r,' Larry." She sounded patient, as +if she were used to correcting people about the particulars of her +title. But how often can that happen? Larry thought, and he was suddenly +deeply confused. + +"Oh, sorry, ma'am, uh, Miz Loring, but I wanted to know whether you'd like to, +ah, buy some..." Larry put his head in his hand and started twirling his hair +in his finger, a nervous habit he'd had since childhood, and closed his eyes +tightly. "Why don't you have anything better to do?" + +Immediately he knew it was the wrong question. Even before the silence +on the other end moved past impatience and into stunned, Larry had a +mini-drama written and staged within his mind: she would call customer +service and complain loudly into the representative's ear. The rep would +send a memo to the head of telemarketing requesting disciplinary action, +and the head would delegate the action to Larry's immediate supervisor, +David. David would saunter over to Larry's cubicle sometime within the +next week, depending on when he got the memo and when he felt like +crossing fifty feet of office space, and have one of what David liked to +call "chats" but what Larry knew were lectures. After about half an hour +of "chatting" David would give Larry a warning and ask him to come in +for overtime to make up for the discretion, and walk back slowly to his +office, making small talk with the cubicled workers on the way. The +world suddenly felt too small for Larry, or he too big for it. + +Quietly, with the same patience but with a [bigger pain][], Jane said, "My +husband just left me and I thought you could take my mind off of him for +just a minute," and hung up. + +[ocean]: theoceanoverflowswithcamels.html +[eagle perched]: mountain.html +[bigger pain]: arspoetica.html -- cgit 1.4.1-21-gabe81