Salesgirls

[Posted by Will]

I hate salespeople. People in sales constantly bothering you, looking to find new and creative ways to make you say yes. I wonder if they hate themselves as much as other people do? I would hate to live that way, going day to day constantly trying to screw over good, decent, hardworking people out of their hard earned dollars just to peddle my wears and make a sale. I don’t think there is any other group of people I hate more than these who call themselves in sales. Well I can think of one, salesgirls. They’re different…

Now, I don’t hate the fairer sex, although far more often than not are they ever that fair. And no I’m not sexist. I don’t hate them specifically because I think they are stealing their sales job from a man or that they are inferior to men at their job, just the opposite in fact. I hate them because they are just so damn good at it, too good. I hate salesgirls because they make life too hard and they're even harder to say no to, that’s why I hate them. Just by looking at them, they immediately make you want to say, yes and that was exactly the case one Saturday morning.

I was in my apartment in Florida, sitting on my couch, in my pajamas watching rerun television shows. I hadn’t even eaten my breakfast yet, when they came, followed by a knock at my door at eleven that morning. Who the fuck was bothering me before noon? I thought to myself. I got up and peered out the peek hole in my door and that’s when I saw them, angels. More like she-wolves in sheep’s clothing… but they were visions and of course their attire was provocative as most of the fairer sexes attire is. Which to me again begs the question, are they really ever that fair? I’m sure the wardrobe was intentional, as it almost always is. I’ve often wondered if girls, women even, knew of their power of provocation over men.

Just by the way that they dress can cause a man’s mind start to wander. A man’s imagination is a powerful tool and a terrible curse. Now, attire changes as it spans time, fads fade. However, there is one thing that never changes, provocation. Although, perhaps it isn’t always the clothing they wear that’s provocative, maybe it’s a man’s mind that remains never changing? I know one thing at least and that’s that a man’s mind never fails at being overactive. A man’s mind can and will wander and imagine; dream about, a woman’s body. Sometimes even if he wants to or not, regardless…

Times have changed drastically in which girls today, much like the girls on my doorstep, dress extremely provocatively, they wear less clothing and show more skin. More often than not it leaves little to a man’s imagination, it’s sad to think about really, the death of imagination… but I suppose that is my lot for being born in such an unfortunate time. Men a hundred or so years ago wanted, wished for girls, women, to wear less, more provocative clothes. In just the mere hopes of catching an accidental glimpse of a woman’s ankle or a bit of collar bone as they dreamt of seeing cleavage if not a bountiful bosom. Now with the way that they dress, cleavage is every where you go, you notice the tightness of the jeans they wear and the cracks of their ass as they bend over in their apple bottom jeans, sometimes exposing some form of underwear although that too has even become a dwindling expectation. With them revealing so much, too much, a man today has nothing left to dream about. I bet if you looked in the dictionary you’d find that under the definition of irony. Men a hundred years ago or so would truly be jealous of men living today. They saw less and dreamt more, we see more and dream less… the grass is always greener I guess…

I think that one could argue that all women are in sales, with the way that that they dress to impress for success. All women are in sales, they all want something and they know exactly how to get it. Just by showing some skin can cause even the most stone cold, harden man’s heart to melt and when he does he’s theirs and when he is, the world is their oyster. It’s funny isn’t in? How all it takes is one clam to make the world her oyster… We were born men after all and after all we were born to lose… that’s life.

Perhaps girls; women, dress that way thinking they’re doing men a service by showing it all off? Now, believe me I have no real complaint with seeing a little extra skin. Maybe, just maybe they are doing the men in this dreary world a little service… with a little extra skin, with the clothing being a little extra tight, with a little less clothing, with every jump, jaunt, jiggle, wiggle… can make a man’s heart skip a beat, we’re entranced by them. We seem to become mindless, spineless drones because of them.

As I maintained earlier a man’s imagination is a powerful tool and when we gander as we have been known to do, our mind’s eye imagines a woman’s body far greater, far better and far more glorious than it could possibly ever be. So perhaps women dress the way they do as a form of truth telling. Like saying, “Gaze upon them, my features. See me. What you see is what you get!” Now, I’m not saying that women don’t cheat their features with illusions or trickery with inventions like the padded bra or the push up to accent their breasts as larger than they are and men stare. We should however, remove our rose-colored glasses when we see them exit stores like Victoria’s Secret. Speaking of which, Victoria’s Secret? Objects may be smaller than they appear… secret uncovered.

Women seem to have a plethora of tricks in their bags when it comes to putting their breasts out on display. Is that why they are sometimes referred to as racks? Girls; women like the two on my door often put their best feature forward, in this instance, their heaving breasts, leaving them out for display like two big circular pies fresh out of the oven and left out to cool on a window sill. Putting them out there was a like a signal to all men, they were fresh, they were hot and they were ready, ready to be devoured by the world. The dinner bell was ringing and they were signaling, sending a sirens call out to all men, to come and get it. The dinner bell’s a-ringin’ and men are always hungry, always ready, ready to come and get it…

Those girls were at my door and when their knock came I made a mistake that day. I answered the call. One of the many things I’ve learned in my many travels through this crazy little thing called life is that women in sales dress provocatively and then ask men a barrage of questions to catch men off guard while we are as enamored as we are distracted. We are powerless to their charms. It is a flaw that all men share and a flaw that I am man enough to admit. The sad part is that I am not even revealing any man secret we all share, for women already know this and exploit it daily and they’re so goddamn good at it.

I saw the girls standing at my door through it’s peek hole and I stepped back, removed my glasses and rubbed my eyes in disbelieve. They knocked again. I was frozen. I quickly looked down at my loose pajama pants to make sure that my manhood hadn’t reared his ugly head or poked his head out as if to say hello. I breathed a heavy sigh of relief to know that turgidity was at a minimum.

“Thank god”, I sighed out loud.

I opened the door to their bright and shining faces. They were radiant angels at the time, but then again I was a sucker for pretty girls. They stared at me deeply, devilishly and flashed me their come to, come hither, bedroom eyes as they pushed their breasts out to me, forward. Pushing the boundaries of their extra small, tight shirts, their tops were about to blow, as I felt, as was I… I’ve always heard that you’re supposed to put your best foot forward; do you think this is what they meant? I think something was lost in the translation, at any rate the foot was on the other breast… but I digress.

“Yes?” I responded timidly, half awake.

They exchanged looks. They knew they had me. I was in trouble.

“Do you consider yourself a nonviolent person?” One of the girls asked.

“What?” I responded as if I could pretend I didn’t understand the question. They reiterated the question.

All I could think of was oh shit… is this a trick question? What is it that they want? If I answer yes, I’m open to them coming in and selling me something or if I say no, they would look at me like I was a freak or something. I cared then, what people thought, but never fear, I quickly outgrew that.

“Yes…” I answered.

They invited themselves in. I was a goner. They sat down on my couch and perused my coffee table. I had some books and movies out along with an old lilac scented candle. There were also some scraps of leftover weed sprinkled on it, stems mostly. There was a pause. The girls smiled. Well, I thought, at least they weren’t peddling religion. Then one of the girls broke the silence.

“You can tell a lot about a person from what is on their coffee table.”

“Oh?” I inquired.

“Yes.” She smiled.

She peered at my, then current, movie collection; which consisted of a few Kubrick films… particularly A Clockwork Orange and Dr. Strangelove. I also had Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Next to those there were some comic books featuring the Punisher and Captain America, I also had the complete works of Poe next to the novel Wicked and some other film course studies books for school.

“You have…eclectic tastes…” she continued.

Maybe the candle won her over, but it was probably the weed. Either way I didn’t care. I was just impressed that she knew the word eclectic…

“So what is it that you want?” I asked firmly.

“Ah good, right down to brass tacks.” She replied.

“How much for the ape…” I replied laughing.

The girls stared at me blankly. I had apparently lost them with my obscure Fear and Loathing reference. Then the girl started her pitch. Her friend didn’t say much. Actually she looked rather bored. I started to wonder how she got her job I thought… I looked at her again… it was her looks… definitely her looks. A condensed version of the girl’s pitch ended up being about how they needed to sell so many magazines in order to go on some trip somewhere, Europe probably… I’m sure at some point in your life you’ve heard or will hear a similar pitch.

“Well I didn’t have any plans on buying anything. I’m not really interested.” I said when she finished.

“That’s ok.” She said.

“It is?” I questioned her easiness.

“Totally, we understand. But please if you could take a look at our magazines and pick out two that you yourself would be interested in…”

I briefly looked over the brochure. At random I picked out Men’s Health and Entertainment Weekly. I looked over and the other girl was already writing down my information and then she made a phone call. As she did so the girl continued on about how they take any major credit card, check or cash. Oh fuck, I thought. These girls aren’t going to take no for an answer. The conversation had already led to payment options and I was trapped. There were two of them and one of me. I looked to my front door. It was closed. Damn. I was trapped and no one could hear me scream. I surrendered. They looked honest, I mean, I could only hope…

I gave up my credit card. I figured well I could always cancel it and dispute the charges later. But it wasn’t over. My card only covered one subscription. I reiterated that I had no plans to buy anything that day… to which they smiled and reassured me that it was ok.

“Where’s the nearest ATM?” She asked.

“Down the street.” I answered, defeated.

“Cool, we’ll all go!” She said brightly.

Goddamn it I thought… I went with it anyway. Whatever it would take to get rid of these vultures, I thought. On a side note, is that why British women are referred to as birds? Buzzards of a feather, flock to sales? Anyway we walked down the sidewalk, the sun was bright and hot. I was still a bit hung over from the night before so I perspired quickly. They didn’t. Hell’s angels must be used to the heat. They were cool as cucumbers. I always hated that expression. But then again, if there was anything I learned from my old tenth grade biology teacher it was this; women don’t sweat, they glow. But, moving on…

We made it to the corner convenient store and I hit up the ATM. I wouldn’t admit just how much this entire venture set me back; I’m rather embarrassed enough… fuck it… all together it was about a hundred and sixty dollars. Don’t judge me, like any of you could have resisted… The three of us walked back to my apartment, I figured that they got what they wanted; they must be done with me. Nope. We went back to my place and had an amazingly fantastically epic pornographic three-way in my queen sized bed…. Ok, not really but I wished that had happened though. In my mind it did. At least if it did it would have been well worth my money spent. Oh well… C’est la vie, as the French say.

However when we did get back to my place the girls brought up the stems they saw earlier on my coffee table and asked if I smoked.

“Yeah, doesn’t everyone?” I said indignantly.

They were carrying but we were baffled at how we could partake. My piece had gone missing since the night before. We attempted to craft a device out of an empty soda bottle, no such luck. Eventually between the three of us we found cigarettes, cut them open and replaced the tobacco, rolled them back up and lit up on the back porch. I led them to the back porch through my bedroom, maybe in hopes of one of them being inspired by the advantageous proposition… another failure.

As we sat on my back porch smoking and talking, suddenly none of the other shit that day mattered. Eventually they left in search of a new mark, I had bet. To peddle their magazines elsewhere and I’m sure they had many more successes that day and I’m sure eventually, conquest after conquest they made their way to Europe or where ever the hell they said they were going, I didn’t care. I just sat on my back porch, cracked open a few beers and enjoyed the rest of the day. I’ve laughed about those events later because I knew at least it would make one hell of a story some day.

A beautiful woman is trouble, a smart and beautiful woman… dangerous. Between their brains and their beauty, a woman could conquer the world. We men are weak; I admit that a pretty smile could make me sign away anything and everything, including a soul. We’re fools, let this be a lesson to ye merry gentlemen… be careful when you answer your doors. The fact is I was ashamed that I had been had. Well, that is, I thought I had. It wasn’t till some months later my phone rang. I came to realize that it wasn’t all a sham, I wrote down the wrong address. My mother called and asked why all these magazines started showing up at her house…

I laughed and breathed a sigh of relief. All I could think was, good thing I didn’t order playboy…