Fourth Comings_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [46]
“Bagel and a blow job,” I continued in my gleefully facetious vein.
“We don’t sell bagels,” she said, ignoring my comment because the only thing my sister lacks more than a snark detector is a sense of humor. “Anyway, this is not a customer service position. You wouldn’t be selling the donuts. You’d be selling a lifestyle as a paid representative of the Wally D’s/Papa D’s Retailtainment Corporation on the franchise level….”
“If we’re working off of the Hooters model, would I pair my DONUT HO’ T-shirt with a pair of shorts?”
“Any ideas are welcome. Grant is always looking for ways to grow our business. He appreciates the brainstorming process….”
Yes, he appreciates the give-and-take exchange of ideas so much that he couldn’t even be bothered to meet with me in person.
“Ooh! Ooh! I’ve got it!” I said, wildly waving my hand in the air. “A pair of silver short-short-short-shorts…”
“Okay…”
“I mean reeeeeaallly short,” I said. “So short that you’ll have to consider providing medical benefits that cover, you know, certain female infections.” I whispered these last two words. “Shorts like these don’t exactly, you know, breathe….”
“Great…,” Bethany said, losing interest.
“So picture a handprint on each butt cheek….” I smacked my own ass stripper-style—SSSSSLAP! SSSSSLAP!—to emphasize my point.
“I’m picturing it….”
“And in pink script: ‘HOT-N-STICKY BUNS.’”
“‘HOT-N-STICKY BUNS,’” Bethany repeated to herself, trying it out.
“Think about how Playboy has marketed its image to the masses,” I said. “DONUT HO’ T-shirts. HOT-N-STICKY BUNS trucker caps. DONUT HO’ lunch boxes. HOT-N-STICKY BUNS onesies…”
“I love it!” Bethany said, cheeks flushed. “See? You’re perfect for this job.”
“Bethany,” I said, my voice calm. “I’m joking. This whole thing is a joke.”
“Of course you’re joking! We’re all joking! It’s tongue-in-cheek!”
“It’s certainly tongue-in -something….”
“DONUT HO’. HOT-N-STICKY BUNS. It’s all fun and sexy.”
“It’s sex ist, Bethany, not sexy.”
Bethany set her still-steaming mug of chai tea on her gray marble coaster that was protecting her white marble countertop.
“If a guy wants to pay double for a donut served by a hottie in a DONUT HO’ T-shirt and short shorts, then why shouldn’t we profit from it?” she asked. “What’s so wrong about a woman using her feminine wiles for capital gain? This is a pro-female promotional campaign!”
This was a secondhand argument Bethany was making. I’m sure it was first made by her husband to gird himself for the inevitable protests from Christians and Friedan-model feminists and whoever else hasn’t had much to do lately since Howard Stern went satellite. And what better person to take this perverse pro-feminist argument public than a flat-chested corporate figurehead with a newly minted Ivy League degree? G-Money was an evil genius. He deserved every penny he had ever earned.
I couldn’t expect someone like my sister to understand why the DONUT HO’ promotion was just another pathetic example of “feminism” gone wrong. She has soared, swooped, and glided through life on the gilded wings of her golden good looks. I mean, it’s one thing to be a MILF and have other people refer to you as such in private. “Now there’s a mom I’d like to fuck.” But it is quite another to unapologetically and unironically refer to yourself and your circle of friends as MILFs, as my sister and her friends do.
I would love to lecture her on how embracing the porn aesthetic doesn’t liberate women, it only validates men’s right to objectify us. And objectification is objectification, even if the woman profits from it, and especially so if the profits come in the form of wads of bills stuffed into teeny