Leave It to Me - Bharati Mukherjee [5]
Elastonomics, Tony Tucciani explained, was the newest product manufactured in Asia by Fong Home Products, a multinational fitness equipment company. “We’re in the business of promoting all-round well-being” is how he put it. Tony, then, offered some of FHP’s tested-in-Hong Kong tips on making the sales pitch. Like, turn the question “Expiration date?” into a command. Like, if a sucker doesn’t bite in four frames, cut him off. After that he made his move. Bending forward, he said, “In other words, Debby, leave his dick flapping in the wind.”
I asked for him to practice me a couple of times. I’d had the usual upstate after-school and summer jobs, waiting tables, ringing up cash registers in the mall, demonstrating everything from sorbet makers to electric drills, but selling invisible fitness equipment for a Chinese company was a first. Tony wasn’t worried about taking a risk on me, because I had this great telephone voice, he said, gritty and seductive, like I was lying naked in bed smoking raw Camels and swilling gin. I was going to ask him if he praised all his interviewees like this when he explained, “The boss doesn’t do scripts anymore. Improv’s his new shtick.” Niceties over, he said, “So when we going out, Debby?”
I saw what I saw: sweaty-frontman longing, motel, fifteen minutes, cute girl wants the job, give it a shot. I did need the job; he was right about that. I said, “Zip it up, fat boy!” and slammed down an imaginary phone. Then, sweetly, “How was that? Did I come on a little too strong? Too rude?”
We both knew to keep my triumph low-key. “No, no, just testing,” he mumbled. “Just don’t mention fat. Guys who call in think they’re not getting laid because they’re fat. When you work the midnight-till-six shift, you’ll get all types.” Then he launched into the list of sales videos that FHP and I were going to blast the American consumer with.
“I did okay?”
“You were good,” the frontman assured me. “Very good.”
So I became the sexy nun with the 800 number selling contrition by UPS. The telemarketing job made it possible for me to move out of the DiMartino split-level. I’d graduated from SUNY-Albany earlier that week. It was time. The sad, fat people punching out 800 numbers weren’t the only ones looking for change.
The surprise for me was that my callers were romantics. They believed in me, not in salvation through Elastonomics. They begged, If I call back, how do I know I’ll get you? I made them effortless promises. Just ask for me, Helena. Or depending on the mood of the day, Staci, Traci, Eva, Magda, Desiree. Some nights I tried out thirty personas. My lies paid off. Loverboys and couch potatoes parted with bucks. What did they expect from me? Phone sex passing itself off as self-improvement, a date once they got in shape? Sounds good, Roger! You never know, do you, Dave? Expiration date?
Debby DiMartino’s body might have been stuck in a cubicle in a failed mall, where fifty other telemarketers for eight hours a night were talking up rock-’n’-roll CDs, scam cruises, fat-burner pills, discontinued cosmetics and underwear in XXL sizes, but I felt I’d broken free of Schenectady. Most of my callers assumed I was in Florida or in California. Sleepless in Jersey told me he smelled surf in my voice. Three o’clock in the morning out here in East Orange, babe. Just midnight where you are, I bet. I never let on I was deep into eastern time. The customer’s always right. I’d never in my conscious life been out of eastern time, never west of Niagara Falls or south of Atlantic City. Hawaii, actually! the telephone voice taunted. Sun’s just going down. It’s lei and luau time … Expiration date?
Mixed in with the dreamers, I got my share of jerks. Doesn’t it get to you, taking calls at three in the morning from