Sellevision

by Augusten Burroughs

  Max stood dumbfounded, the shrillness of the little girl’s cry stabbing his eardrums.

  The little girl continued to sob into her mother’s skirt. “It’s him, Mommy, it’s him.” The mother examined Max more closely and a glint of recognition entered her eyes. She pointed at Max. “Oh my God, that really was you! You’re Max Andrews from Sellevision! That was your penis!”

  A store detective appeared before the three of them. “Is something the matter here?” he asked. “I’m in charge of security.”

  The little girl turned to the uniformed authority figure, and asked in awe, “Are you a policeman?”

  The detective looked kindly at the girl, “No, honey. Well, sort of, I guess. I’m the police officer of the store, I suppose you could say.”

  The little girl pointed at Max, then burst into tears again. “He’s a bad man, make him go away, I saw his thingie, he showed me his thingie.”

  The detective immediately turned to Max and glared.

  The mother tried to calm her little girl by bending down and stroking her head, repeating, “It’s okay, sweetie, there’s nothing to be afraid of, it’s okay.”

  The detective gripped Max’s elbow firmly. “You are in big trouble, mister.”

  “H

  i, and welcome to Sellevision. I’m your host, Peggy Jean Smythe, and you’re watching Gem Fest.” A small listening device, discreetly tucked into her left ear and hidden by her hair, allowed Peggy Jean’s producer to communicate to her from Control Room 2 on the other side of the building. On the floor in front of Peggy Jean were two large color monitors. One was a live-feed, displaying the exact scene that the rest of America was watching. The other monitor displayed the next scene, be it a long shot of the set, a close-up of the model who sat in a chair off to the side, Peggy Jean herself, or simply a prerecorded “beauty shot” of the object she was presenting. At all times, there was a colored box on the left-hand side of the screen that contained the name of the item, the item number, and the price, along with the Sellevision telephone number. The color of the box varied and could be coordinated with the theme of the show. It could be yellow for the Good Morning Show, pink for a Hosiery Showcase, or blue for a Gem Fest. During the JFK Jr. Memorial Collection, the box was black. The Sellevision logo was always on the lower right-hand side of the screen, and never left.

  At that moment, Peggy Jean was looking at the live-feed monitor, a medium shot of herself sitting behind a glossy, tan-and-black wooden table. Behind her was what appeared to be the evening skyline of an anonymous city. The windows of the “buildings” were illuminated and there was even a small, round moon in the sky, along with a smattering of stars. Very urban and upscale. The naked Barbie doll a key-grip had placed in one of the windows went entirely unnoticed by the viewing public.

  All the Sellevision sets were spectacular—beautifully designed and of the highest quality. The kitchen set was like a charming farmhouse kitchen, with a delightful view of trees that could be seen through the window above the sink. The trees looked extraordinarily real, especially in the winter when the branches were covered with artificial snow by prop stylists. There was a bedroom set complete with dormer windows and wainscoting. And the living-room set had a working stone fireplace as well as an overstuffed sofa, comfortable chairs, and accent tables—everything a tasteful, upper-middle-class living room might include, even a bookcase filled with color-coordinated antique books. Sellevision was far superior to the other home-shopping networks and Peggy Jean felt proud to be a part of it.

  “If you love amethyst, or maybe your birthday is in February, amethyst being the February birthstone, or you just love the comfort of lever-back earrings and the color purple and you are a woman who appreciates a real stone presence, my first item just might be for you.”

  The producers in the control room cut to a prerecorded beauty shot of the trillion-cut amethyst lever-back earrings.

  Then they cut back to Peggy Jean who was smiling and holding a wooden ruler, the earrings displayed on a black velvet stand before her. “This is item number J-0415 and they are our trillion-cut amethyst lever-back earrings, priced at a very affordable forty-nine ninety-five. I just want to give you a measurement here,” Peggy Jean said while she continued to smile broadly, placing the ruler against one of the gemstone earrings.

  Cut to a macro shot, Camera One. On the monitor, Peggy Jean’s fingers were each larger than a loaf of Wonder Bread as she positioned the ruler, displaying for the viewers at home that, “This is gonna measure about, well, a little more than eight-sixteenths of an inch across, and . . .” She measured the vertical. “. . . about one inch from top to bottom.” Her manicure was absolutely flawless.

  In her ear, Peggy Jean heard her producer saying, “Peggy, these sold out the last time they were presented which was on . . . lemme see here, okay, back in October.”

  Cut to medium shot of Peggy Jean. “Now, I just want to let you know, these earrings did sell out the last time they were presented, and that was way back in October. So it’s taken us a good seven months to get them back in stock.” Peggy Jean looked deep into the camera. “Keep in mind, the reason for this is because people actually have to go out and find the amethyst in nature, so that’s something to consider.” Gently tapping the stone with the tip of her nail, she informed the viewers, “These are absolutely beautiful earrings and they have a total gem weight of just over three carats, so that’s about one and a half carats per ear. And that’s a lot of stone.”

  “Peggy, the rings are already moving, this could be a sellout, so push hard.”

  “Let me just tell you, these earrings are extremely popular tonight. We could become very limited, so if you want these earrings, I’m just warning you not to wait.” A graphic appeared, counting the number of orders received. Quickly, it moved from 257 to over 500. The Teleprompter in front of Peggy Jean displayed: PHONE CALL. Marilyn . . . New Mexico . . . Purchased.

  Off to the side of the Teleprompter, a gaffer scratched his crotch and took a sip from a can of Jolt cola.

  “Let’s go right to the phones and say hello to Marilyn from New Mexico. Hi, Marilyn, and welcome to Sellevision.” Peggy Jean gazed pleasantly into the camera, as if she were sitting at a table across from a close friend. When no voice was heard, Peggy Jean tilted her head to the side and said, “Welcome, Marilyn. Are you there?”

  “Oh yes, I’m here. Hello, Peggy Jean.” It was the voice of an older woman.

  “Well hi, and welcome. Are you picking these up tonight for yourself, or as a gift?” Peggy Jean asked.

  “Oh, for myself, I need a little pick-me-up,” the caller said, slightly down.

  Peggy Jean beamed. “Well, good for you, sometimes we all need a little pick-me-up. Congratulations for ordering these beautiful, beautiful earrings. Do you have any idea where you’re going to wear them?”

  “Oh yes,” the woman said, “I’m going to wear them”—silence, then—“I’m going to, my, well . . .” The woman was struggling and sounded on the verge of tears. “I’ve had a tragedy recently. I’m going to wear them to my son’s funeral next Monday. My son Lawrence, that’s his name. He killed himself.”

  Her producer’s voice was suddenly in her left ear, unheard by the caller. “She’s a fucking basket-case, get her off, get her off, Peggy Jean!” he shouted.

  Completely unflustered, Peggy Jean adopted a sympathetic tone. “Oh, Marilyn, I’m so sorry to hear that. What a terrible tragedy. I have three boys of my own, and I cannot imagine what you must be going through, that is really just so terrible.” Then brighter, “But I’m glad that you’re being good to yourself by picking up these stunning trillion-cut amethyst lever-back earrings and I know you’ll enjoy them for many years. And what a beautiful tribute to your son!”

  “Excellent, Peggy, great segue,” the producer said. “Now get rid of her.”

  “It’s been nice speaking with you,” Peggy Jean said instantly.

  “I love you and all of the Sellevision hosts an
d I hope that none of you ever go through something like this. I pray for all of you each night.” The older woman paused.

  Peggy Jean leapt on the pause. “Thank you, Marilyn from New Mexico, and remember, because we ship UPS Two-Day Priority, your earrings will arrive in time for your son’s funeral at no extra cost. Bye-bye and God bless.”

  “Y

  ou are shameless,” Bebe Friedman said to her television, positioned directly across from the cream-colored shabbychic sofa on which she was curled. “Drop the earrings, Peggy Jean, this woman’s son just killed himself.” Bebe spooned one last bit of ice cream into her mouth, feeling not too guilty since it took her over a week to finish the pint.

  Bebe was Sellevision’s crown jewel. At forty-two, she was one of the original hosts when the network premiered eleven years ago. From day one, the self-deprecating, quick-witted, and very down-to-earth Bebe was a hit. And now she was on air only during the hottest of prime time. She had her own two-hour Dazzling Diamonelle show every Sunday night at ten, and she also hosted many special celebrity programs. Almost everything Bebe presented sold out.

  While Peggy Jean, certainly number two behind Bebe, was a slave to product details, Bebe preferred to simply provide viewers with humorous sidebars, engaging stories about her mother who was retired in Needles, California, and tales of her permanently single life. She was also not above making fun of her own “very Jewish nose,” or her “big mouth that gets me into trouble.” Like all Sellevision hosts, Bebe was polished, but there was a certain realness to her that no amount of hairspray or liquid foundation could obscure.

  On last Sunday’s Dazzling Diamonelle, for example, Bebe was presenting a fourteen-karat white gold tennis bracelet that featured alternating marquise-cut and oval stones—fifteen-carat total simulated gemstone weight. And instead of taking the ruler and measuring the diameter of the tennis bracelet or talking about how Diamonelle is the world’s finest simulated diamond, Bebe asked viewers to forgive her manicure, which had chipped while she was washing her Westie, Pepper. “I had to give her a bath, you know, because today at the park she felt this instinctive doggy need to go romp in the mud, and then roll around and, well, she was just a mess.” Then Bebe added, “Now I personally own a couple Diamonelle tennis bracelets, and I wear one of them pretty much every day. But do you think I would wear an actual diamond tennis bracelet to drag my dog out of the mud? Give me a break. Of course, if you are going to be mud wrestling with your dog, it doesn’t hurt to appear to be wearing a diamond bracelet while you do it.”

  The white gold Diamonelle tennis bracelet, item number J-1023, sold out instantly.

  Chuckling to herself over Peggy Jean’s ability to turn even suicide back to the amethyst earrings, Bebe got up off the couch, placed the spoon in the dishwasher, then dropped the empty ice cream pint into the trash can, which she opened by stepping on the pedal with her bare foot.

  Inside the trash can, a microchip alerted a small pump that the lid had just been opened, and the pump sent a small burst of liquid deodorant through a jet spray on the underside of the lid. Bebe had fallen in love with the trash can last year when it debuted, and purchased the clever item for herself.

  Returning to the sofa, Bebe noticed the close-up shot of Peggy Jean’s ear. A bevel-set peridot stud earring glinted beneath the studio lights. At first, she thought it was the lighting, but then she saw that no, in fact, Peggy Jean’s earlobe was bright red—irritated. Almost as if, Bebe thought, she had just waxed it.

  Having been distracted long enough, Bebe aimed the remote control at the television and turned it off. Then she refocused her attention on her mail-order catalogs.

  She double-checked her orders. From Pottery Barn: the Nautical Rope Clock, the East Hampton Votive Candle Collection, and the Country Comfort Bathroom-Tissue Cozy. There wasn’t much in the current Banana Republic catalog she was interested in, so she just picked out a few oversized sweaters and a man’s belt she thought she could send to someone, sometime, for something. Highly unusual was the fact that she saw absolutely nothing in the Franklin Mint catalog, which always had some unusual little something. So she just ordered a small brass travel clock that looked like an ancient Greek coin.

  “N

  o, you still don’t understand,” Max told the Toys R Us store detective as they sat in a small room upstairs, off the sales floor. Unlike the colorful, toy-filled Toys R Us showroom, this room was decidedly more adult, featuring a large gray metal table, numerous folding chairs, an expansive one-way mirror, and a video camera mounted in the far corner. “Like I told you, I’m a Sellevision host—er, I mean, I was, until this morning. But anyway, we had this show last night called Slumber Sunday Sundown and I was wearing a robe and my penis slipped out momentarily.” Just recounting the details was exasperating to Max; it was still so unreal. “So I guess what happened was, like I said, that little girl must have been watching and she saw the peek-out thing and, well, remembered me. And that’s all there is to it. You can’t detain me like this. I’ll press charges.”

  The detective was taking notes.

  “Ask her mother,” Max said, angrily. “Ask her. I didn’t flash her daughter, that little girl, I didn’t—this is insane.”

  Once the event had been cleared up and Max was allowed to leave custody, he marched out of the store, Beanie Baby–less, certain he would never step foot in the Woodlands Mall again, for the rest of his life, for any reason. “Christ, John Wayne Bobbit doesn’t know how lucky he was to have it chopped off,” he said under his breath as he unlocked the door of his SUV.

  two

  “Is it hormonal? Do I have an estrogen imbalance?” Peggy Jean asked her general practitioner, Dr. Margaret Stewart. She had made the appointment with Dr. Stewart immediately after she had seen the hairs on her earlobes for herself.

  “I really don’t think it’s anything, Peggy Jean,” the doctor told her. “It’s just natural. We all have hair on our earlobes—not just men but women, too.”

  Peggy Jean shifted uncomfortably in her chair.

  “You could say it’s left over from our caveman days. We all have faint, light hairs all over our bodies.”

  Peggy Jean did not believe in evolution, so her doctor’s explanation sounded like rubbish to her. Peggy Jean believed the world was created in six days, and that God rested on the seventh. “Yes, but the blood work, that will tell you for sure if there’s . . .” Peggy Jean paused, choosing the right words. “. . .a female problem going on?”

  Dr. Stewart was amused by Peggy Jean. “Yes, the tests will show if, in fact, there is a problem—which I am certain there is not.”

  Peggy Jean was not so certain. Just that afternoon she’d received a second E-mail from Zoe, part of which read: You haven’t taken up smoking, have you? The only reason I ask is because your voice sounded a little husky the other night on Gem Fest. I hope you’re not smoking. It can kill you . . .

  “And no, Peggy Jean, your voice does not sound husky to me. It sounds exactly like it always has,” Dr. Stewart said.

  That evening at home, Peggy Jean approached her husband, John. He was in bed, reading. “Honey?” she said as she slipped under the covers, her body sinking into the Cozy Nights Feather Bed (item number H-3424), “Do you think we should have another baby . . . while I still can?”

  Her husband simply replied, “Um-hmm,” absently turning the pages of an Amy Fisher biography, which he was rereading for the fourth time.

  She rolled over on her side and reached for the glass of Chardonnay she had brought to bed with her, something she seldom did. But that night, that one time, she felt it was okay; medicinal, even.

  She thought about her visit to Dr. Stewart’s office, wondering what she would do if the tests came back positive. And then it hit her: the M word. Wasn’t she too young to go through menopause? But what if? What if she were suffering not merely from a hormonal imbalance, but from the ultimate and final hormonal imbalance? What if it was already too late to even have another ba
by?

  She set the glass down on the table and rolled back over, placing her arms around her husband. “Oh, John, hold me,” she said.

  “Jesus Christ, Peggy Jean,” her husband cried, fanning her breath away from his nose with the book. “Have you been drinking?”

  “U

  ncle Max? Why didn’t you get me my Peanut like you said you would?” his niece was saying into the answering machine.

  Max rolled over on his mattress, bumping against the sleeping man next to him whom he had known for a total of nine hours, the past seven of which were spent unconscious. “Shit,” he said as he climbed out of bed, going into the bathroom to pee. As he looked at his penis, he said to it, “This is all your fault.”

  Judging from her message, his niece had not yet received the $350 McDonald’s gift certificate he had FedExed to her. Enough money to purchase at least ten thousand grams of saturated fat and guarantee that she would be an overweight, unhappy teenager. Yet another life, aside from his own, that he had ruined.

  “Hey, Mr. Handsome,” called the body from the bed.

  Max turned and saw a man probably ten years older than his own age of thirty-three. While six-foot-two Max sported thick, light brown hair, striking green eyes, and classic, all-American features that would not be out of place in a Banana Republic catalog, the man in the bed resembled a plump lawn gnome. Which was astonishing to Max, because only last night the man had resembled Mel Gibson.

  “Up and about so early?” the lawn gnome asked.

  Max needed the gnome to leave. As in, immediately. He made a mental note to never drink again.

  According to his most recent automated telephone inquiry at Merchant’s Bank, Max had $14,750 in his account, minus what he spent the previous night for drinks, which could easily have totaled over $100, maybe more. Max had calculated that he had approximately five months in which to secure a position as a host on one of the other shopping networks, five months until he would be forced to take whatever job was offered him, including, possibly, one on radio.