A Shocking System - A Shocking Short Story By Jez Cartner

Notes: The following story is dedicated to anyone who has ever worked in a call center and been on the receiving end of the abusive customer. I've been there and feel your pain. Enjoy.

The call center was a hive of activity. Amongst the constant babble of voices and buzzing of phones ringing Sue Carson sighed deeply, disconnected the previous call and sought sanctuary from the mug of coffee in front of her. She knew it was a vain hope that the caffeine might somehow improve things, but after the morning she'd had a vain hope was better than no hope at all. As she answered the next call she glanced down at at the shock'em switch she'd secretly installed at her position after one too many wines at the previous years Christmas party. The switch had been installed as a joke and she wasn't even sure if the thing would work, but as the latest abuse from her customer began in earnest she found herself thinking the time to test it had finally arrived. Her hand nervously hovered over the switch, and as the customer dropped his twenty fifth F bomb she pressed the button, without once thinking of the consequences

For a long moment nothing happened. The customer continued his abuse unabated for a good five minutes, until what sounded like a swarm of angry bees drowned him out. The sound that followed would haunt Sue continually for the next few days; an ear splitting scream followed by unsettling silence.

"What the hell was that? And why can I smell charcoal chicken?"

Startled by the voice Sue glanced over at her neighbor Maria Gonzales. Maria made the concept of the work email virtually redundant. Whatever was happening in the office at any given moment the chances were very high that Maria would know about it long before anyone else.

"Um, I'm not sure." Sue replied, still not sure whether the scream had been the result of her drunken revenge. As they watched pandemonium broke out around the office. First aid officers and paramedics came running and disappeared into her supervisor's office, a universally hated man by the name of Bill Shackleton.

"Holy shit, he must have been monitoring me." Sue whispered to herself, realizing the horrible truth as they wheeled her slightly well done boss past them.

Phil Norris, one of the many team leaders suddenly appeared at the front of the room and did his best to restore order to the floor.

"Alright everyone back to work please, the paramedics have the situation under control."

"Oh my God, he's not dead is he?" Maria exclaimed.

"No, thank god but he's incredibly lucky. He's just had a very nasty shock."

For the remainder of her shift Sue was transformed into a very nervous young woman. If Shackleton had only received a minor shock by remotely listening to her call then what the hell had happened to the caller? It was something she didn't like to dwell on, because logically once the authorities discovered what had happened it wouldn't take them very long to trace the source back to her.

Somehow she made it to the end of the day, and still shaking made her way home. Her flatmate Martha, who never seemed to work, looked up from her meal of champagne as Sue walked through the door.

"Oh hey, how was the day?" Sue managed a half smile.

"Alright, I think I may of killed someone but on the whole not bad." Martha laughed at this, and Sue joined in not wanting to ruin the illusion.

"Hey did you happen to catch the news? Apparently a customer of the firm you work for received a nasty shock while querying his bill."

"Really?" She asked nervously.

"Yeah, the police say he's luck to be alive. Remind me to never do business with you lot. Sounds like a risky venture to me."

"No problem. Look I think I'm going to turn in early, It's been a hell of a day."

"No worries. Sleep well."

Once in her room Sue threw herself onto the bed, and tried desperately to compose herself. What the hell was she going to do? If she somehow managed to get away with what she'd down she could make a fortune hosting a master class on the best way to cook abusive customers. The funny thing was, although she was upset by what had happened to Shackleton and the customer she didn't really feel any remorse either. As far as she was concerned the caller had got what he deserved, it was just unfortunate that Shackleton had happened to get caught in the cross fire. She decided the best course of action was to take a few days off, to allow the heat to die down down a bit, and then go back and cop whatever came her way. Her mind made up she settled down and attempted to sleep, she was unsuccessful.

When she returned to work a week later she wasn't at all surprised to find Shackleton waiting for her.

"Good morning Sue. Well rested I trust?" She nodded weakly. "Good. Before you start do you mind if we have a quick chat." It wasn't a question, so she stepped meekly inside his office. Once inside she found the CEO Michael Fitzpatrick waiting. He motioned towards the seat opposite him.

"Hello Sue. Please sit down." He gave her a stern look and continued. "I'm not a man to beat around the bush so I'll get right to the point. We found the switch." Oh God, she thought to herself, here it comes. Say goodbye to the daylight girl, your fears are about to become a reality.

"What you did was reckless and irresponsible and could have easily ended the lives of two innocent people."

"I understand, and I'm sorry but I'll come along quietly." Fitzpatrick looked sideways at her.

"Come along quietly where? I'm not arresting you, although we should. No, I've had a few people look at this switch of yours and I can't deny the idea is a work of pure genius. The media as you know had a field day with this at first, but there's been a side effect I have to say we weren't expecting. Since that customer got fried at your touch there's been a significant turn around in the amount of payments we've received. These people have become terrified of what we'll do to them if they don't pay their bills, so they've been paying in their hundreds. We'd be mad not to let this opportunity pass us by, so I'm here to offer you a deal."

"What sort of a deal?" He handed a document over.

"The figure you see here is not a misprint. If you agree to sign the switch over to us we'll pay you that amount. Naturally you're employment with us will be terminated effectively immediately if you agree. Well? Do we have an understanding?"

There was a long pause. Ice ages came and went. It all seemed a tad surreal, and any moment she expected to awake from a particularly good dream. However this was no dream. Her drunken frustration at abusive caller after abusive caller had actually paid dividends. She looked up at Fitzpatrick, grinned and signed her name.

END

copyright Jez Cartner 2012

The Reunion - A Short Story By Jez Cartner

* Notes: A short story that examines how you would react if your past happened to knock on the door of your present, in the most unlikely of places.

Life has a nasty habit of throwing you a curve ball. You can never know what form you're curve ball will take or even when it will happen, but take my word for it there's no avoiding it. My particular curve ball came in the form of a face from my long forgotten past. Now no matter what you hear in regards to the past the important thing to remember is that it doesn't always stay buried. Trust me, I speak from experience. My past recently knocked on the door of my present in the most unexpected of places; the local shopping centre.

I say unexpected because if you were to set off with the intention of uncovering your past then your destination would be your local library of council archives, and not a shopping centre. In my experience shopping centres are ideal for disappearing and generally one doesn't go there in the hopes of re-living one's past. I was there supposedly doing the grocery shopping, but if the truth be told I had spent the majority of the morning flitting in and out of book shops.

My wife once introduced me to her work friends as the only man capable of becoming lost in a library. That's not to say I have a lousy sense of direction or anything like that, rather I have a tendency of disappearing into a world of words.

Whenever I visit a library, or a book shop for that matter, it is usually with the intention of stopping for a few minutes but when I emerge I am usually shocked to discover several hours have passed me by. This has resulted in many conversations with my wife over the years on the subject of time management, the resolution of which generally involves a heartfelt apology followed by a pricey gift.

The honest to god truth is that I'm most contented when in the company of words. What I mean by that is simply I find the honesty of the written word almost impossible to replicate. While a person communicates using words, they may mot always mean what they say. Most books, and as with everything there a exceptions to this, provide us with a snapshot of the author's thoughts and feelings at the time of writing. The same is also true of fiction. All fiction, whether it be a novel or short story, are born from an idea. My high school English teacher put it best when she likened the creative process to planting a seed. The seed of course is the idea or inspiration behind the story and over time the writer will tend and nurture it as it grows and develops. Wherever we read a novel we are experiencing the completed thought process of a specific individual, and thus we gain a unique insight into the imagination of that particular person. Put simply books provide us with an opportunity to know someone whom on normal circumstances we wouldn't necessarily have an opportunity to meet.

Now that I've gone and proved my wife's point I'll get back to the story in hand. I saw her before she saw me. Panic overwhelmed me and I ducked into the nearest shop and pretended to check out the specials. This was unfortunate as I had accidentally landed in a lingerie store. Once the coast was clear I emerged, sheepishly returning the bra I'd been studying while waiting for my quarry to wander past. I quickly set off in the opposite direction.

It is an unfortunate part of human nature to run away from the things we have no desire to face, and I'm ashamed to admit I fully embraced this particular emotion but it didn't matter because in the end it transpired that fate had other plans for me I had only gone roughly twenty yards or so when a soft voice stopped me in my tracks.

I turned and found myself face to face with the one person I had been desperate to avoid. She smiled, seemingly oblivious to obvious discomfort.

"Jerry Carter, as I live and breathe. How's things?"

At that exact moment I really wanted to channel the spirit of Bogart and say something cool like "Out of all the shopping centers in all the world, you had to walk into mine." instead I came out with this. "Oh hi Alyssa, it's been a while. Um, I've been good thanks. How's things with you?"

Again she smiled, ironically with the same mouth I used to long ago caress with my own.

"Oh you know, keeping busy."

"Well you have to don't you? Otherwise life has a habit of passing us by."

"Well Quite."

There was obviously more to this conversation, but in the interests of not wanting to bore you to death I'm not going to record it here. Besides it's not important what was being said, rather I want to share with what I was feeling while it was being said. As I outlined above I was terrified of being reunited with this woman, after all we hadn't exactly parted on the best of terms, but during the ten to fifteen minutes we spent in conversation I found myself more and more at ease. I had been afraid that I would inevitably find myself trying to imagine what life with this woman may have been like had things been different, but instead I found myself silently thanking her. You see I was happy with my life and although there had been a few bumps along the way I never once wished things were different. I couldn't say whether she felt the same, and although we established she had moved on and had a family of her own as had I, i got the distinct impression she wasn't exactly happy with her lot.

We parted amicably enough and promised each other we would stay in touch, although I knew very well this would never happen. I glanced back and watched as the pages of my past disappeared amongst the throng of faceless shoppers. I was now glad that I had encountered my ex-lover as I had been reminded how good my life now was, and how I would never want to change it. The reunion had been bitter sweet and ultimately unavoidable.

The past is a road map that shows us the path we have traveled. Time as we know goes in one direction only, and that is forwards. We can't ever go back and do it differently, but occasionally the past finds a way to remind us of the person we once were and we have no choice but to look back fondly and wave, because if it weren't for the person we once were we would never become the person we are now.

END

Book Review: Neverwhere By Neil Gaimon

In the lead up to the Sydney Writer's Festival kicking off May 14 2012 I've decided to review novel that have fired up my imagination with imagery and concepts that have stayed with me long after the cover has been closed. Neil Gaimon's Neverwhere is one such novel. It is one of them novels that take you on a journey to a world you never knew existed. In this respect it's comparable to The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum, where an everyday person is thrust into a world of magic wonder and colorful characters that leap off the page. Richard Mayhew, a young businessman, is introduced to the London he never knew existed when he rescue a young women who is being pursued by two men keen to remove the last vestiges of her family. It is this single act of kindness that catapults him out of his everyday life into a London that is both familar and utterly bizarre.

Like American Gods before it this novel introduces us to a world and characters which has co-existed alongside the rest of us unseen for countless generations, and once you experience this life for yourself then there's no going back no matter how much you may want to. If you have never experienced the imagination of Neil Gaimon, then this is a good place to start. You won't regret it I assure you!

Your in writing,
Jez Cartner