Retail Hell (29 page)

“OH MY GOD! PEOPLE ACTUALLY SAW YOU DO THIS?”

Uh-oh. An Employee Entrance blacklist is about to be born.

“YES! And that’s because ‘Hot Stuff,’ ‘YMCA,’ and ‘Celebrate’ are pissing us all off!”

“You are completely incorrect. I happen to know several managers who have complained to me when the music wasn’t on. They said it pepped them up. THEY LIKED THE MUSIC!”

“MANAGERS don’t have to use this entrance,” I railed back defiantly. “YOU don’t even have to use this entrance. The only reason you’re here right now is to bust me.”

“Yes I am! What you did was horrible. You are wrong; everyone loves the music.”

“They don’t.”

“They do.”

“They don’t.”

“They do.”

I gave up arguing with her. It was hard enough breathing while climbing.

We clomped up the remaining flights in silence.

At the summit of Mount Fancy, she turned to me and said calmly, “Well, Mr. Smartypants, since you seem to think that everyone dislikes the music so much, I need you to get me three hundred signatures agreeing.”

Did she actually think I couldn’t handle that challenge? Think again, Stephanator. I was the editor of my high school newspaper and launched a total rebellion over the crappy food in our school’s cafeteria. I instantly saw myself going from department to department with a clipboard.

“
Hate the repetitive, loud disco music in the employee entrance? Vote
No! On Disco Music. Sign this petition and
it’s
GONE!”
Three hundred
names? Easy.

“Not a problem, Stephanie. Uprising is my specialty.”

The Stephanator’s laserlike eyes tried to melt me. “I’ll be having a discussion with Suzy and Tammy to see what kind of disciplinary action will be taken regarding this incident. They will not be pleased with what you’ve been doing.”

At that moment I wanted to push her down the stairs.

But I held back on my cinematic fantasy of watching her tumble down, and I went into Retail Droid Team-Player Mode instead. Don’t ask me why, but I pulled open the heavy door leading into the store and held it for her. Stephanie walked through my kind gesture without a word. Talk about being mean-spirited.

“Have a nice day,” I said sarcastically to the back of her head as she silently stormed down the hallway toward her office and the plotting of my demise.

Hours later, I found myself seated in HR surrounded by Suzy Davis-Johnson, Stephanie, and Tammy, looking at me as if I had clubbed thousands of baby seals.

A serious tribal counsel.

In my hand was a long receipt roll from the register — the only paper I could find quickly to gather No!-on-Disco-Music names. I had managed to obtain twenty-five names of people who did not need any more Hot Stuff. Cammie’s name topped the list, followed by Marci, Glenda, Jules, and Marsha (I called everyone at home, waking them up for permission). I also got a few girls from Hosiery, a few dudes from Ladies’ Shoes, and a bunch of people from Cosmetics.

“That’s just from a few minutes of campaigning,” I calmly told Suzy, handing her the list.

Satan looked at me blankly. Was she really pissed off? Or was I off the hook?

“Dude, there’s no need for you to continue with your petition. I find it heartbreaking that many of you disliked what we did in the stairwell. We wanted to create something festive and fun that would be inspirational as you came in to work.”

Donna Summer singing
“
Hot
Stuff”
900 times is not festive and fun.
It’s
suicidal.

“I just don’t think the repetitive music was the right inspiration,” I said, trying not to add words I’d regret, like lame-ass or moronic. “The problem is the same three songs play over and over, and the blasting volume could be a potential health hazard.”

Suzy Satan shot a knowing look at Tammy and then said, “We thought the music would help wake up the employees so they would hold on to the handrail going up and down the stairs. The medical claims in the stairwell have been high. Employees are not being careful.”

No shit Sherlock! Mount Fancy is a deathtrap. You build eight flights of
stairs and have tired people in dress shoes and heels climb up and down them
every day, and
there’s
bound to be trouble.

“I don’t see why the company doesn’t just build an elevator,” I said, offering up my dream solution, “or move the Employee Entrance and close the stairwell down.”

“Close the stairwell down?” Suzy Davis-Johnson repeated, followed by a guttural chuckle. “That will never happen. There is absolutely no budget for a new employee entrance.”

But
there’s
one for yellow paint, silver streamers, a disco ball, and Donna
Summer?

At the end of my Mount Fancy Disco Disaster, I did sort of get off the hook with the whole unplugging thing. I wasn’t written up and nothing derogatory went into my performance file (which meant I could still use my discount to buy the $60 Ed Hardy cap Cammie had stuffed in a handbag on the hold shelf). However, I did get a twenty-minute lecture from Satan about my language and being a team player. She “encouraged” me to make amends with Stephanie, which I completely hated but executed with a nice shit-pleasing smile. The Stephanator responded with one of her I’d-love-to-rip-your- head-off smiles.

I also had to apologize to Marcella, the display manager. She glared at me, said, “I hate you,” and then walked away. It was a good thing Marcella didn’t turn around because she’d have seen the giant evil grin I had from imagining her fat ass hauling a stepladder up and down eight flights of stairs.

That’s
what you get for building such a noisy monster. Think before you
annoy.

The image made all my efforts worthwhile.

A short time later, Disco Nights came down. No more dizzying disco ball spots. No more dangerous silver strips. No more earsplitting Donna. The Great Stairwell was once again silent.

The multicolored railings and walls were the only thing left as they awaited their next
festive
transformation, whatever that would be. Climbing the fucking stairs still sucked ass, but at least I wasn’t forced to shake my booty, look for hot stuff, and see it’s fun to stay at the YMCA.

Like most Retail Slaves, most of the time the Handbag Angels and Demons fought over getting morning shifts. But on one fateful Big Fancy day, I regretted begging Jules to switch shifts with me so Cammie and I could go see our friend’s band play.

By the time noon hit, I wished I’d told Cammie to forget it; I’d catch their next gig. Then I would have gotten to sleep in and avoid the following hellacious events.

The night before, the General told me the store was having a special cosmetic-makeover-trendy-fashion-whatever show. Half of what she said did not even register.

I was too busy focusing on the fact she told me to come in at 7:00 a.m.

“Seven!” I cried — I wanted the early shift, but not
that
early!

“The store is opening at 9:00, right after the show,” said Judy.

I was dumbfounded. Women actually get up at 7:00 a.m. to attend some makeover-trendy-cosmetic-fashion-whatever show at The Big Fancy at 8:00 a.m.? Ludicrous.

But as I thought about it, I realized why ludicrous made sense.

Free makeovers and goodie bags.

There are women who will get up at 3:00 a.m. for a free lipstick. And Lorraine was one of them. (I made a mental note to get her a few goodie bags.)

When I got to the store, at least thirty boxes of stock were waiting. Within minutes I was sweaty, my pants were covered in dirt, and I had torn my favorite skull tie with the pair of broken scissors we used for opening boxes.

Great start. Nothing like zooming down the highway to Retail Hell at 100 mph.

Working alongside Mega-Mouth Marci and Judy wasn’t exactly inspiring either. They bitched about everything from the store to the economy to the weather, and I momentarily thought about stabbing myself with the scissors.

We had barely finished putting everything out when Suzy Davis-Johnson’s voice screeched across the PA. She was pissed about business and had decided to unload.

“Whyyyyyyyyyyy??? Oh Whyyyyyyyyy???” bellowed Satan, sounding like a hyena in heat. “This is tragic! How could it happen? What is wrong with us? Tell me what I am doing wrong. How can I help you? Are we not a team? Do we not love each other to death? Can’t we do well together? I love our store. It’s the best ever. We should be number one. I’m so sad, you guys!”

By the time the store opened I was irritated beyond belief. Marci had talked so incessantly about nothing, my ears were bleeding. Judy turned bitchy because Satan had called us out over the PA as one of the departments with unacceptable decreases. Teddy Bear Lady sat down in Ladies’ Shoes and stared at me. Jabbermouth sauntered up to the counter and started talking about her attack of food poisoning. Then a customer from the cosmetic-trendy-makeover-whatever-fashion show got all pissy with me because I didn’t have any goody bags and I didn’t know where she could get any . . . the hell went on and on.

All before 9:30.

On a normal day the store wouldn’t even have been open yet.

I took a deep breath.

What was I going to do? Tell Judy I had decided to go back home and go to bed?

You have chosen this path of retail damnation! Suck it up and get your ass
to work.
You’ve
got bills to pay and Coach handbags to sell!

As my morning wakeup cocktail of coffee, Rockstar, and 5-hour Energy swirled around in my empty stomach, I was suddenly overcome with that tingly feeling that says it’s time to pee!

I told Marci I’d be right back.

As I walked into the men’s room, the smell of shit assaulted my nose.

Whoa, somebody must have taken a big dump in here!

I had no idea.

Public restrooms are often stinky, especially if there’s a lot of traffic, and The Big Fancy’s men’s room often smelled bad because it was so small, but this stench was different.

It permeated the room like an air freshener gone wrong. Terribly wrong. Shitty wrong.

I headed over to the area where the urinals were. The stink got stronger.

As I wondered why it reeked
so
badly, I looked over and saw one of the urinals holding a mountain of poo.

I say mountain because it was no Lincoln Log or Baby Ruth bar. It was a pile so massive it could have been a model scale of Mount Everest.

Some guy must have dropped his pants, backed his ass up to the urinal and shit it all out.

The really strange thing about his urinal dump was that it was in perfect ice-cream-machine shape. No spills or splatters. Perfect form. It also looked like it came out of a large dog.

How in the hell was the poor Housekeeping Slave going to clean that up? They would probably have to go to the store restaurant and borrow a service spoon. Or a ladle. Or maybe they would call Maintenance for a fucking shovel.

Satan Suzy’s voice echoed in my head.

“
Whyyyyyyyyyyy??? Oh Whyyyyyyyyy??? This is tragic. How could
this happen!
I’m
so sad, you
guys!”

Satan and I finally agreed on something. Why is it people have to do such disgusting things with their poo in public places? I’m not safe even in the men’s room!

The smell was so awful I couldn’t even stand there for thirty seconds and do my pissing. Grossed out and sickened, I bolted for the down escalator. At least the private employee restroom downstairs in Receiving wouldn’t smell like shit. I hoped not, anyway.

The escalator was packed with fashion-show-cosmetic-trendy-makeover-whatever attendees, all clutching their Gifts-with-Purchase and talking excitedly.

Way too much happiness this early in the morning. Did someone lace the
free lipstick with Ecstasy?

I had to pee so badly, I nearly let it loose right there. What the hell! Everyone else was acting like animals at The Big Fancy; maybe I should have as well, just relieve my tension and let it all flow out of my dress pants, making an escalator waterfall.

When I got to the single-stall employee restroom, the door was locked. Fuck. Someone was using it. I stood by waiting, cross-legged.

Finally, the door opened. A salesman from Sportswear came out and said, “Whew. Had to come down from upstairs, someone took a giant crap in the men’s room urinal. It smelled awful.”

Rushing past him, I said, “I think it was a St. Bernard.”

When I returned from my fifteen-minute piss, the first thing Marci said to me was:

“You look sick. Have you eaten anything yet? I have some brownie left.”

Judy was standing next to her and followed it up with: “Maybe you need some coffee.”

Then a nearby customer jumped in: “You need some chocolate. That always works for me!”

What I needed was to stop being reminded of the stinking pile of poo that had forever blowtorched its image into my brain.