From 43e2b69dfb0d37cce157ea78a35b47e54c85c7d3 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Case Duckworth Date: Mon, 9 Feb 2015 12:13:08 -0700 Subject: Fix bad commit / other issues --- telemarketer.txt | 87 -------------------------------------------------------- 1 file changed, 87 deletions(-) delete mode 100644 telemarketer.txt (limited to 'telemarketer.txt') diff --git a/telemarketer.txt b/telemarketer.txt deleted file mode 100644 index e43b87c..0000000 --- a/telemarketer.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,87 +0,0 @@ ---- -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