Customer Care

Donald Castro

Time was when you could actually go into a store and have a vague idea of what you wanted and someone would ask you if they could help you and when you said yes they actually helped you. They actually proved themselves helpful to your cause. They fulfilled your need. First you stood alone and desperate for assistance and they assisted. They explained how foreign sizes corresponded with American standards. They had candy for crying kids stashed in their pockets. They found you the shelving system that your friend assured you he bought at their store.

I'm not talking about fifty years ago - I'm not that old. I'm talking about maybe twenty years ago. Things were not this bad. People still took a job seriously. Just because you worked retail or food services did not mean you didn't give a crap. Today people treat their job serving you pizza or working the floor at Sears like it’s only something they have to do until they make it big as a rock star. Then they’ll leave their crummy job and all us lowly customers behind.

I was thinking all this as a third sales guy told me he had no idea what I was talking about.

"Look I saw it online. I called and asked if you had the ‘Tablut’ Storage system and they said yes." I pointed to the little yellow sticky note in my other hand as if it proved something.

The sales guy had a clipboard that he consulted. He held up a page looking down a list and then asked me, "Who'd you talk to?"

"What?"

"On the phone." This kid sounded like he had some kind of an accent - maybe Chicago, but it sounded more like he just watched way too many Chris Farley skits. He looked a little like Chris Farley. His nametag said “Kenny.” Kenny said, "Who'd you talk to?"

I had no idea who I talked to on the phone. I asked about a plastic storage system to try to organize my crap. I cared about my crap and the easy organization of my crap by means of the snazzy modular kit I had seen on the web site. I cared about getting the apartment into shape before our holiday dinner party. I did not care about the person's name on the other end of the phone only that she told me that they had what I wanted and that they could not hold it for me so I would have to come down and hope that they still had one for me when I got there. I wanted no excuses from this guy so I made something up. "Linda. Her name was Linda."

The Farley-looking kid nodded his head like a puppet and made a "Hmmm" sound like the name meant something. Could have been that I got lucky but I'd say the safe bet was that this guy had no idea who answered the phone and was just trying to get rid of me as quickly as possible and if he could just blame it on someone else – poof – problem solved and annoying customer goes away.

"Look," I said, "I know how these things work - can't you check on a computer - see what's in inventory and where it should be?"

"Well it should be here." he waved his arm and vaguely gestured at the aisle of furniture kits and the expanse of store beyond. "This is where all that stuff is."

"I understand but it's not here and on the phone... she said you had it. The Tablut Blox. With an 'X', see?" I pointed to the sticky note again.

The guy didn’t even look at it. "Did you check downstairs in the bedding section?"

“I started downstairs and they sent me up here. Then the guy up here said you didn't carry anything like that but I know that you do. I saw it online. On the web site. The computer. Look, I know you have computers here… can we not just check a computer?"

Kenny checked under that protective first sheet of his clipboard again. He looked worried. "Yeah..." he said as he let out a long breath. "Yeah. Yeah. OK. You just wait right here and I'll see what I can do.”

Kenny

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

I have no idea what I am doing. No really, man I don’t have a fuckin’ clue. I’m freaking out. Like you really don’t think it’s going to be a big deal when you see your parents doing it. Like, really I mean what is the big deal? You just do what you’ve gotta do right? Well wrong. I’m doing nothing but right things and they just don’t work. I just wander around asking myself over and over again “What am I going to do with a baby?”

No, I know, everybody says that you figure it out and yeah, whatever. But I can barely keep my own shit together – now I’m supposed to step up and be a father? Six months ago all I had to worry about was my major and making beer money. Now all of a sudden I gotta worry about Carl Jr.

“Carl Jr.” What the hell is that? I said to her, “We can’t call him Carl Jr. – my name is Kenny.”

But she’s all like “We’re naming him after me.”

And I go “You can’t call him ‘Carl Jr.’ if your name is Carla.”

“Fuck you,” she said.

Yeah. Fuck me.

I can’t stop looking at the sonogram. Carl Jr. Looks like a frickin’ alien. They do this 3D thing now so I swear he looks like an alien. I just can’t stop looking at it cause… cause its all just right there in the picture, my whole life now. And no matter what I did before, now I gotta get things straight and be clear about what’s important. People just don’t do that you know? Know what’s important.

It’s like today, at the store. I had to deal with this fuckhead who wanted to buy some kind of cheap-ass shelving furniture and he just could not accept the fact that we didn’t have it. Move on buddy. Deal with it. Go to a real store and stop expecting miracles at fucking K-Mart.

I gotta be good. I can’t say shit like that. I need this job just like I need the job at the video store and just like I need to sell the Camaro. The alien is already costing me money and he’s not even here yet. How about that Mr. “Tablut Blox.”

I really have no idea what this guy said to me. I know he wanted the Blox thing and I know we didn’t have any and I know I told him so and I know he just wouldn’t stop.

“Look loser,” he said, “They told me you had it. On the phone.”

I don’t know what kind of store he thought he was shopping in – maybe some kind of high tech Sharper Image place or something but there was no way we could keep track of every piece of merchandise unless we chain everything to the shelves. People move stuff. People shop. They wander around with their carts full for hours and hours. At the last minute they change their minds about half the crap they’ve been wheeling around and they just leave beach balls in the plant section or light bulbs in bedding. Customers don’t care. They don’t give one shit.

All I wanted to do was tell this guy where to go. Just wanted to jam his backwards ass priorities into the empty shelf and see if he could find anything in there for himself. But I needed this job and I couldn’t mess up like last time and so I kept my mouth shut and I kept looking at the sonogram of Carl Jr. I kept it under some inventory sheets on a clipboard and I swear it was the only thing that held me together.

At one point while this entitled prick was screaming I looked at Carl Jr. and I think I could make out his eyes for the first time. Like really see them for myself. His eyes. My kid’s eyes.