by Freeman Hall
Then she put on bright green reading glasses, which matched her blouse.
“Since I’ve had to come back to your store I might as well start looking for a bag to match a St. John dress I’m wearing to the gala dinner for my husband’s surgical conference in Miami. Show me everything you have in black.”
My head started to pound.
I hoped it wouldn’t be long before she demanded I get one from the back, because hidden in my box of business cards on my hold shelf in the stockroom was half of a Xanax in case of an emergency. A raving Picky Bitch certainly qualified as an emergency.
Humph-humph. Smack-smack-smack.
The Vampire Bavaro
For centuries, one of the most notoriously draining customers in Retail Hell has come to earn the title Bloodsucker. No matter what type of store you work at or shop in, you’ve probably encountered one of these coma-inducing freaks wreaking havoc on everyone around them.
Bloodsuckers have no need for fangs.
One look, movement, or word out of their mouth, and the energy vacuum revs into full blast. The poor Retail Slave waiting on them goes pale, then limp, completely bled dry, falling into a helpless heap of exhaustion in need of B-12 shots and a keg of beer.
The Big Fancy was teeming with Bloodsuckers.
The Two Virginias were considered Bloodsuckers with their nonstop lobotomizing chatter.
Sometimes Shoposaurus Carnotaurus Lorraine Goldberg could turn into a terrible Bloodsucker as she stopped at nothing to obtain three extra pairs of Ferragamo shoes in orange. And more often than not, I’d have absolutely no blood left after waiting on Mrs. Beamount.
But the most feared Bloodsucker in all of The Big Fancy was Marguerite Bavaro.
The Count Dracula of customers.
Lestat’s ugly sister.
The love child of Vampira and Barlow.
The Vampire Bavaro looked so frightening, she could raise the dead and make them run away. She had gnarly black-widow hair, usually crammed under a baseball cap or visor (red or blue), and bulging, buglike eyes with dilated black pupils sticking out from a gaunt face that had seen numerous skin diseases. Sometimes it was patchy and sickly, sometimes it was speckled with tiny reddish black bumps. Bavaro moved her bony body in slow, mummified motion, and when those bulbous black eyes caught you, it felt like they were hypnotizing you into a trance that would make you do whatever evil bidding she commanded.
Every time the Vampire Bavaro appeared out of thin air, I wanted to scream.
But screaming on the sales floor at Big Fancy was frowned upon.
Seeing Bavaro’s horrific face wasn’t the only thing that made me want to scream; it was knowing she was about to open her mouth and start speaking.
“JEFFERSON!” she would say, sounding like Gloria Swanson from Sunset Boulevard, “You must help me! Everything is a God-awful mess. It needs to be taken care of right away. I’m not at all pleased with what’s going on here, Jefferson.”
The Vampire Bavaro never got my name right. It was always Jefferson, no matter how many times I corrected her.
“Jefferson, I don’t understand how this bag works.”
“Jefferson, you wouldn’t lie to me about this, would you?”
“Jefferson, everything is a God-awful mess, I need you to correct it.”
Marguerite Bavaro also refused to acknowledge the correct names of everyone else in the Handbag Jungle. She called Marsha Margo, Tiffany Brittany, and Jules Debbie (WTF? Doesn’t even rhyme). Cammie was known as, “That blond girl I dislike immensely”; Douche was, “That foreign woman”; Marci, “That chatty girl”; and Judy was simply “The Manager.”
I couldn’t help but think she played games with our names on purpose.
If I wasn’t so scared of her, I’d have changed her name and called her Bloodsucking Bitch.
The Vampire Bavaro was an equal-opportunity Bloodsucker. Exclusive to no one, she roped us all into her brain-twisting, energy-draining dramas. The unlucky person who answered the phone or was standing in her path when she appeared was the victim du jour.
“Jefferson! Everything is a God-awful mess,” she’d whine to me over the phone, “This needs to be taken care of immediately! The last person I spoke to — that blond girl I dislike immensely — did not call me back. Debbie has a Marc Jacobs on hold that Margo was supposed to get me but never did because the one I bought from that foreign woman has a scratch, and the one Brittney has on hold is not the right color, but I may be interested in it, and that chatty girl was supposed to get me one from another store but I haven’t heard from her either. Your manager also said I could have a discount on the scratched one, so I want the one that Debbie has, but I also want another one, and there are two other handbags I want to ask you about.”
I almost collapsed from exhaustion just listening to her on the phone.
Given the way the Vampire Bavaro looked, I’d much rather deal with her over the phone rather than in person. When she’d appear out of nowhere like a B-movie ghoul, it totally creeped me out.
“Jefferson, I’m glad you are here,” she’d moan as I accidentally ran into her on my way out of the stockroom, “Everything is a God-awful mess. I don’t want that foreign woman helping me. I wish to converse with someone who can clearly speak English. I’ve had a horrible day. I’m having an allergic reaction to my medication and I’m in no mood.”
Neither am I. The blood bank is dry. Maybe you should just leave now and spare us all.
Besides “everything being a God-awful mess” with whatever ongoing handbag situation she had created, there was always a black cloud of tragedy hanging over Marguerite’s head.
“Please extend my hold,” she’d say, “I can’t come in right now; the plumbing in my house is being repaired, and I can’t leave the workmen alone. It’s going to be a three-day job and then I’m having the roof repaired from the tree that fell on it last week during the storm. I don’t know when I’ll be in.”
Or, “I need to return this bag. My sister just fell and broke both her legs. I want to take care of the return now because I won’t be home for a while. I’ll need to be a nurse for my sister.”
Or, “I was in a car accident three days ago with a cable TV van and my body hasn’t been the same. It was their fault, of course, and if I suffer any further medical problems they will be paying for it.”
The Vampire Bavaro wasn’t kidding when she mentioned any kind of further medical problems.
There was always something wrong with her, and she had no qualms in letting us know all about it: “The Manager said I could have the discount today even though the sale is over. I couldn’t come in yesterday because I was ill. I’m on ten medications. I’ve got lupus, diabetes, osteoporosis, carpal tunnel, arthritis, clinical depression, high blood pressure, psoriasis, hay fever, and dry mouth.”
Shouldn’t she be dead with all that?
Besides being one of the worst Bloodsuckers ever, Marguerite Bavaro was also shady.
Nasty-Ass Thief shady.
She was always exchanging and returning with no receipts or with torn receipts and trying to get deep price adjustments on things by telling lies about when she bought them, claiming they were damaged, or producing coupons from other stores that were either expired or not the right coupon.
One time Judy denied her a return on a Kenneth Cole hobo because the price ticket she had with it wasn’t even from our store. It was the correct price and had Cole’s name on it, but another store’s logo was stamped across the top.
“I know I bought it here,” The Vampire Bavaro said, “and I’m not leaving until you give me the refund on this bag. What are you saying? That I stole it? My husband is a police officer and he’s not going to be happy when I tell him that you accused me of stealing.”
We all knew her husband was a police officer because she constantly reminded us, as if it was some kind of name-dropping power tool she had to use. None of us could understand why anyone would be married to her in the first place, let
alone a cop. We all thought it was a lie.
“No one has accused you of stealing,” said Judy, becoming frustrated, “I’m only saying that the ticket to the bag is not from our store.”
“Then I’ll take the ticket,” said Bavaro, snatching it from Judy’s hand. “Now you can credit it to my account without a ticket. Unless, of course, you’d like me to go upstairs and talk to Suzy Davis-Johnson about it?”
Judy wouldn’t like that at all. Satan disliked the Vampire Bavaro almost as much as we did because she was always putting out numerous Bavaro fires all over the store and giving her thousands of dollars back in questionable returns. Because Marguerite bought as much as she returned, Suzy commanded that we give her whatever she wanted in the name of customer service.
“I know she doesn’t have a receipt for this Fendi satchel,” Suzy Davis-Johnson once told Cammie, the blond girl Marguerite disliked immensely, “but we can’t afford to lose her as a customer. Mr. Michael’s philosophy behind this is proven. She often spends more in this store than she returns.”
I wouldn’t be so sure about that, Satan.
The Vampire Bavaro had purchased and returned so many hand-bags at so many different Big Fancy stores, I was convinced she didn’t keep anything and more than likely made quite a nice profit from her underhanded Nasty-Ass Thief ways.
Like most Bloodsuckers, Marguerite’s favorite time to come feeding was at night, right before the store closed. She rarely made an appearance during the day because those hours were reserved for hellacommunications, when she’d call and stir the shit up with mass confusion and unreasonable demands.
I also think the Vampire Bavaro swooped in at night so often because Suzy Davis-Johnson was off, and so were half the managers. This gave her full access to wield the maximum amount of terror on Big Fancy salespeople and get away with whatever she could.
Ten minutes before closing one night when I was working by myself, the Vampire Bavaro materialized at the counter.
Looking scarier than normal, her pulsating, bloodshot buggy eyes seared into me, and her face was an absolute horror show, a chemical peel gone wrong.
“JEFFERSON!” the Vampire Bavaro moaned, “thank God you are here! I require your assistance. Everything is a God-awful mess!”
Your fuckin’ face is a God-awful mess. I think you better look into that first, Marguerite.
I felt her fangs sinking into the back of my head as she dumped several tattered shopping bags on the counter. The contents were a closing Retail Slave’s worst nightmare. She had a DKNY backpack I’d never seen before that she wanted to return, with no receipts; a Coach cross-body bag she also wanted to return, with no tag and a torn receipt; a season-old Cole Haan hobo she wanted a price adjustment on, with no receipt and only a price tag; and a Kate Spade satchel she wanted another adjustment on, with an expired 25% off coupon from a competitor.
While I removed the handbags from the shopping bags, she blurted out:
“The foreign woman and Debbie are holding three identical Burberry bags for me. The chatty girl was supposed to order one from another store, but she never called me back. Typical. She talks too much, probably not doing her job.”
As usual, the Vampire Bavaro had dropped a bloodsucking bomb in my face. I wanted to fall to the floor and cry like a baby or run out of The Big Fancy screaming, but I knew none of that would happen.
I had to help the Bloodsucker.
Giving it my best shot, I charged in and tried to organize, in hopes of speeding up her messy transaction.
“Okay, let’s see what we got here,” I said, sounding like the deadline-driven host of a home-improvement show. “We’ll put all the bags you’re returning over here, the one you want a price adjustment on next, then the competitive coupon one.” As I moved them into an order I could cope with, the Vampire Bavaro’s craggy face turned to molten lava.
“NOT SO FAST!” she wailed, “You’re rushing. I don’t like it when people rush me. I get confused, and you make mistakes that cause me problems later on.”
“I’m only lining them up so I can see what’s what,” I said.
“I’ll tell you what’s what. We are going to take this slowly. My way. One handbag at a time. First I want you to go get the Burberry bags I have on hold.”
NOOOOO! GOD NO! WE WILL NEVER GET OUT OF HERE! I’LL BE SPENDING THE NIGHT AT THE BIG FANCY! BAVARO WILL KILL ME!
Marguerite’s red marble eyes stared at me like she had just heard every word my mind had shrieked.
Then she opened her old Gucci satchel and pulled out a white plastic stick, which she began sucking on. I watched, trying to figure out why she was sucking on a plastic stick.
“Aren’t you missing the candy with the chewy center, Marguerite?” I said.
“It’s not candy, Jefferson, it’s medicine. This place is making my whole body ache.”
I wish I could make it disintegrate.
“We’re all just trying to help you Marguerite,” I said, glancing at my watch.
Ten minutes till closing.
“You can help me by paying attention to me instead of looking at your watch. Are you in a hurry to go somewhere Jefferson?”
“Umm . . . it’s just that . . . it’s almost closing time, that’s all.”
“To my understanding, The Big Fancy stays open until I’m finished shopping.”
“Yes, Marguerite, it does.”
“Before you get those Burberry bags I have on hold and I do any exchanging or buying, I want to look at the new Betsey Johnson collection,” bellowed the plastic-chewing Vampire Bavaro.
And the bloodletting began.
Big Nightmare #2
In the world of retail, having two days off in a row is unheard of. Three days is like a vacation. So when the General accidentally gave me a Saturday, Sunday, and Monday off because the schedule over-lapped into the next week and she wasn’t paying attention, I took it and ran like I’d been awarded a Get Out of Jail Free card.
The screenplay I wanted to finish was not the World War I monster movie. After becoming bored with explosions and dragon-barbecued soldiers, I decided to change course. A Million-Dollar Screenplay had to be provocative! My new script would be critically acclaimed and win me that Oscar.
It was titled Love in a Fitting Room. An intensely dark, romantic thriller, the story took place in an upscale department store where two Men’s Sportswear salesmen fall in love. At first they hate each other and fight over sales, but then all that rage turns to lust.
I saw studs Colin Farrell and Orlando Bloom as the salesmen.
Things become complicated for lovebirds Colin and Orlando when they both get cruised by a handsome executive customer, to be played by none other than Hugh Jackman.
In the wake of Brokeback’s success, my script would be a sure-fire hit. In Love in a Fitting Room, Colin, Orlando, and Hugh fight over each other, and everything ends up all stalker-like. Someone would die. It wouldn’t be Hugh, I could guarantee you that much. Maybe Orlando.
Before I could decide on who died, I had to start writing. . . .
My three-day weekend was all planned out. Ten pages a day. By the time it ended I would have half my script! If only.
If only I had been given three days off to prepare for my three days off. You see, in order for me to end up with three days off in a row, I had to work eight days in a row. During those eight days of opening, then closing, opening, then closing, and opening, then closing, without a day off, all the normal living shit that needed to be done didn’t get done. I’m talking about laundry, cleaning, grocery shopping, haircut and color, tanning, and exercising. Oh and sex, lots of sex.
After taking care of all those things and then going to a movie, shopping, and drinks with Cammie, I had to have the brakes fixed on my car, which cost $700 (on my credit card, of course). Then it was e-mail, surfing the net, and returning phone calls to family and friends who were wondering why they hadn’t heard from me in eight days.
By the end of the seco
nd day, I was exhausted.
On the third day I slept in.
It was around 4:00, after brunch with some gay buddies, when I freaked.
Where did my weekend go? I haven’t done any writing! Shit! I still have thirty pages to write!
I knew that wasn’t going to happen.
The best I could hope for was to keep the television off and park my ass in front of the computer.
Maybe I can do ten. Ten pages is better than no pages.
The first five pages were a snap.
I breezed through them so fast, by 6:00 p.m. I thought maybe I’d make my aggressive goal. Everything was going along just fine until I got to the dump scene.
No, I’m not talking about the action related to a bodily function.
In clothing departments with fitting rooms, “dump” is the term for tried-on clothes left behind by customers. Salespeople assigned “dump”duty have to gather up the piles of clothes, and refold, and rehang them. It’s a hideous retail task, loathed by all.
In my scene Colin and Orlando are assigned joint dump duty in Men’s Sportswear. But even though I’ve experienced massive amounts of dump, I just couldn’t seem to make the piles of clothes jump off the page. I wrote:
INT. FITTING ROOM — DAY
COLIN and ORLANDO stand in front of a pile of pants and shirts that need to be hung. The tension is intense. Orlando is struggling with folding the pants correctly on the hanger.
COLIN
You’re doing it all wrong. You fold like this. . . .
ORLANDO
I know how to fold.
COLIN
Dude, it’s like this.
He moves in closer and places his hand over Orlando’s to show him the right way. Their eyes meet. A moment happens. They . . .
They . . . ? I don’t fucking know! Kiss? Rip each other’s clothes off? Do it in the handicapped stall? After all, this is LOVE in a fitting room. Maybe they get into a huge fight? Beat each other up with hangers? Maybe Orlando isn’t out of the closet and Colin is? Should Hugh walk in, needing to try on workout clothes? Maybe Colin and Orlando fight over who is going to wait on Hugh?
