One Night at the Call Center

by Chetan Bhagat

  “So what did you have to do to get this job? Fucking degree in nuclear physics?”

  “Sir, do you need help with your cleaner or not?”

  “C'mon son, answer me. I don't need your help. Yeah, I'll change the dust bag. What about you guys? When will you change your dusty country?”

  “Excuse me, sir, but I want you to stop talking like that,” Vroom said.

  “Oh really, now some brown kid's telling me what to do—” William Fox's voice stopped abruptly as I cut off the call.

  Vroom didn't move for a few seconds. His whole body trembled and he was breathing heavily, then he placed his elbows on the table and covered his face with his hands.

  “You don't have to talk to those people. You know that,” I said to Vroom.

  The girls glanced at us while they were still on their calls.

  “Vroom, I'm talking to you,” I said.

  He raised his face and slowly turned to look at me. Then he banged his fist on the table. “Damn!” he screamed and kicked hard under the table.

  “What the …” Priyanka said. “My call just got cut off.”

  Vroom's kick had dislodged the power wires, disconnecting all our calls. I wanted to check the wires, but had to check on Vroom first. Vroom stood up and his six-foot-plus frame towered above us.

  “Guys, there are two things I cannot stand,” he said and showed us two fingers. “Racists. And Americans.”

  Priyanka started laughing.

  “What is there to laugh at?” I said.

  “Because there is a contradiction. He doesn't like racists, but can't stand Americans,” Priyanka said.

  “Why?” Vroom said, ignoring Priyanka. “Why do some fat-ass, dim-witted Americans get to act superior to us? Do you know why?”

  Nobody answered.

  Vroom continued, “I'll tell you why. Not because they are smarter. Not because they are better people. But because their country is rich and ours is poor. That is the only damn reason. Because the losers who have run our country for the last fifty years couldn't do better than make India one of the poorest countries on earth.”

  “Stop overreacting, Vroom. Some stupid guy calls and—” Radhika said.

  “Screw Americans,” I said and gave him a bottle of water. “Look, you've broken down the entire system.” I pointed to the blank call screens.

  “Someone kicked the Americans a bit too hard. No more calls for now,” Priyanka said, rolling her eyes.

  “Let me take a look,” I said and went under the table. I was more worried about the wires tapping the emergency phone. However, they were intact.

  “Shyam, wait,” Esha said, “we have a great excuse for not taking calls. Leave it like it is for a while.”

  Everyone agreed with her. We decided to call systems after twenty minutes.

  “Why was Bakshi here? I saw him come out of the men's toilet,” Priyanka said.

  “To drop off a courier delivery for Esha,” I said. “And he said there's a team meeting at 2:30 a.m. Oh man, I still have to photocopy the board meeting invite.”

  I assembled Bakshi's sheets again.

  “What delivery,” Esha said. “This?”

  She lifted a brown packet that was lying near her computer.

  “Must be,” Vroom said, “though what courier firm delivers stuff at this time of night?”

  Esha opened the packet and took out two bundles of hundred-rupee notes. One bundle had a small yellow Post-it note on it. She read the Post-it and her face went pale.

  “Wow, someone's rich,” Vroom said.

  “Not bad. What's the money for?” Radhika said.

  “It's nothing. Just a friend returning money she borrowed from me,” Esha said.

  She dumped the packet in her drawer and took out her mobile phone. Her face was pensive, as if she was debating whether or not to make a call. I collected my sheets to go to the photocopying room.

  “Want to help me?” I called out to Vroom.

  “No thanks. People I used to work with are becoming national TV reporters, but look at me. I'm taking calls from losers and being asked to help with loser jobs,” Vroom said and looked away.

  Chapter 15

  1:30 a.m.

  I SWITCHED ON THE PHOTOCOPIER in the supplies room and put Bakshi's stack in the document feeder. I'd just pressed the “start” button on the agenda document when the copier creaked and groaned to a halt. “Paper lam: Tray 2” appeared in big, bold letters on the screen.

  The copier in our supplies room is not a machine, it's a person. A person with a psychotic soul and a grumpy attitude. Whenever you copy more than two sheets, there's a paper jam. After that, the machine teases you: it gives you systematic instructions on how to unjam it— open cover, remove tray, pull lever—but if it knows so much, why doesn't it fix itself?

  “Damn,” I mumbled to myself as I bent down to open the paper trays. I turned a few levers and pulled out whatever paper was in sight.

  I stood up, rearranged the documents on the feeder tray and pressed “start” again, not realizing that my ID was resting on Bakshi's original document. As the machine restarted it sucked in my ID along with the paper. The ID pulled at the strap, which tightened around my neck.

  “Aargh,” I said as I choked. The ID went inside the machine's guts, and the strap curled tighter around my neck. I screamed loudly and pulled at my ID, but the machine was stronger. I was sure it wanted to kill me and was probably making a copy of my ID for my obituary while it was at it. I started kicking the machine hard.

  Vroom came running into the room. “What the …” He appeared nonplussed. He saw A4 sheets spread all over the room, a groaning photocopier and me lying down on top of it, desperately tugging at my ID strap.

  “Do something,” I said in a muffled voice.

  “Like what?” he said and bent over to look at the machine. The screen was flashing the poetic words “Paper Jam” while my ID strap ran right into the machine.

  Vroom looked around the supplies room and found a pair of scissors.

  “Should I?” he said and smiled at me. “I really want the others to see this.”

  “Shut… up … and … cut,” I said.

  Snap! In one snap my breath came back.

  “OK now?” Vroom asked as he threw the scissors back in the supplies tray.

  I nodded as I rubbed my neck and took wheezing breaths. I rested my head on the warm, soothing glass of the photocopier, but I must have rested it too hard, or maybe my head is too heavy, because I heard a crack.

  “Fuck,” Vroom said, “you broke the glass.”

  “What?” I said as I lifted my head.

  “Get off,” Vroom said and pulled me off the machine. “What is it with you, man? Having a bad office supplies day?”

  “Who knows?” I said, collecting Bakshi's document. “I really am good for nothing. I can't even do these loser jobs. I almost died. Can you imagine the headline: COPIER

  DECAPITATES MAN, AND DUPLICATES DOCUMENT.”

  Vroom laughed and put his arm around my shoulder.

  “Chill out, man. I apologize.”

  “For what?” I said. Nobody has ever apologized to me in the past twenty-six years of my life.

  “I'm sorry I was rude and didn't come and help you. First there are these rumors about the call center closing down, then my old workmate Boontoo makes it to NDTV and Bakshi sends the document without copying us in. Meanwhile, some psycho caller screams curses at me. It just gets to you sometimes.”

  “What gets to you?” I asked. I was trying to copy Bakshi's document again, but the photocopier was hurling abusive messages at the screen every time I pressed a button. Soon it self-detected a crack in the glass and switched itself off altogether. I think it had committed suicide.

  “Life,” Vroom said, sitting down on one of the stools in the supplies room, “life gets to you. You think you're perfectly happy—you know, good salary, nice friends, life's a party—but all of a sudden, in one tiny snap, everything can crack
, like the stupid glass pane of this photocopier.”

  I didn't fully understand Vroom's glass-pane theory of life, but his face told me he was upset. I decided to soothe the man who had just saved my life.

  “Vroom, you know what your problem is?”

  “What?”

  “You don't have real love in your life. You need to fall in love, be in love and stay in love. That's the void in your life,” I said firmly, as if I knew what I was talking about.

  “You think so?” Vroom said. “I've had girlfriends. I'll find another one soon—you know that.”

  “Not those kind of girls. Someone you really care about. And I think we all know who that is.”

  “Esha?” he said.

  I kept quiet.

  “Esha isn't interested. I've asked her. She has her modeling and says she has no time for a relationship. Besides, she has other issues with me,” Vroom said.

  “What issues?” I said.

  “She says I don't know what love is. I care for cars and bikes more than girls.”

  I laughed. “You do.”

  “That's such an unfair comparison. It's like asking women what they prefer, nice shoes or men. There's no easy answer.”

  “Really? So we are benchmarked to footwear?”

  “Trust me, women can ignore men for sexy shoes. But come to the point—Esha.”

  “Do you think you love her?” I said.

  “Can't say. But I've felt something for her for over a year now.”

  “But you dated other girls last year.”

  “Those girls weren't important. They were like TV channels you surf while looking for the program you really want to see. You're with that Curly Wurly chick, even though you still have feelings for Priyanka,” Vroom said.

  The statement startled me.

  “Shefali is there to help me move on,” I said.

  “Screw moving on. That girl is enough to put you off women for ever. Maybe that will help you get over Priyanka,” Vroom said.

  “Don't change the subject. We're talking about you. I think you should ask Esha again for a real relationship. Do it, man.”

  Vroom looked at me for a few seconds. “Will you help me?” he said.

  “Me? You're the expert with girls,” I said.

  “This one is different. The stakes are higher. Can you be around when I talk to her? Just listen to our conversation, then maybe we can analyze it later.”

  “OK, sure. So, let's do it now.”

  “Now?”

  “Why not? We have free time. Afterward the calls will begin and we'll be busy again. Worst case, the management may fire us. So we'd better act fast, right?” I said.

  “OK. Where do we do it?” Vroom said as he put his hand on his forehead to think. “The dining room?”

  The dining room made sense. I could be nearby, but inconspicuous.

  Chapter 16

  1:45 a.m.

  Is EVERYTHING OK? I heard a noise,” Esha said, as we returned from the supplies room. She stretched back on her chair, so her top slid up, revealing her twinkling navel ring.

  “The photocopier died. Anyone for a snack?” I said.

  “Yes, let's go. I need a walk. Come on, Priyanka,” Esha said and tried to pull Priyanka up by her upper arm.

  “No, I'll stay here,” Priyanka said and smiled. “Ganesh might call.”

  A scoop of hot molten lead entered through my head and left from my toes. Try to move on, I reminded myself. At the same time, I had the urge to pick up the landline and smash it into fifty pieces.

  Radhika was about to get up when I stopped her.

  “Actually, Radhika, can you stay here? If Bakshi walks by, at least he'll see some people at the desk,” I said.

  Radhika sat down puzzled as we left the room.

  ⋆⋆⋆

  The dining area at Connections is a cross between a restaurant and a college hostel mess. There are three rows of long granite-covered tables, with seating on both sides. The chairs are plush, upholstered in black leather in an attempt to give them a hip designer look. The tables have a small vase every three feet. Management recently renovated the place when some overpriced consulting firm (full of MBAs) recommended that a bright dining room would be good for employee motivation. A much cheaper option would have been to just fire Bakshi, if you ask me.

  Vroom took a cheese sandwich and chips—they don't serve Indian food, again for motivational reasons—on his tray and sat at one of the tables. Esha just took soda water and sat opposite Vroom. I think she eats once every three days. I took an unhealthy-sized slice of chocolate cake. I shouldn't have, but justified it as a well-deserved reward for helping a friend.

  I sat at the adjacent table, took out my phone and started typing fake text messages.

  “Why isn't Shyam sitting with us?” Esha said to Vroom, twisting on her seat to look at me.

  “Private texting,” Vroom said. Esha rolled her eyes and nodded.

  “Actually, Esha, I wanted to tell you something,” Vroom said, fingering the chips on his plate. I'd already finished half my cake—I was probably a pig with a reverse eating disorder in my previous life.

  “Yeah?” Esha said to Vroom, dragging the word as an eyebrow rose in suspicion. The invisible female antennae were out and suggesting caution. “Talk about what?”

  “Esha,” Vroom said, clearing his throat. “I've been thinking about you a lot lately.”

  “Really?” she said and looked sideways to see if I was eavesdropping. Of course I was, but I made an extra effort to display a facial expression that showed I was focusing on my cake. She watched as I joyfully downed what was probably her entire weekly calorific consumption in just a few seconds.

  “Yes really, Esha. I may have met a lot of girls, but no one is like you.”

  She giggled and, taking a flower out from the vase, began plucking out its petals.

  “Yes,” Vroom continued, “and I think rather than fool around I could do with a real relationship. So I'm asking you again, will you go out with me?”

  Esha was quiet for a few minutes. “What do you expect me to say?”

  “I don't know. How about a yes?”

  “Really? Well, unfortunately that word didn't occur to me,” Esha said, her expression serious.

  “Why?” Vroom said. I could tell he thought it was over already. He had told me once, if a girl hints she's not interested, it's time to cut your losses and leave. Never try the persuasion game.

  “I've told you before. I have to focus on my modeling career. I can't afford the luxury of having a boyfriend,” she said, her voice unusually cold.

  “What is with you, Esha? Don't you want someone to support you …,” Vroom said.

  “That's right, with three different girlfriends last year I'm sure you will always be there for me,” Esha said.

  “The other girls were just for fun. They meant nothing, they're like pizza or movies or something. They're channel surfing, you're more serious,” Vroom said.

  “So what serious channel am I? The BBC?” Esha said.

  “I've known you for more than a year. We've spent hundreds of nights together …”

  I thought Vroom's last phrase came out odd, but Esha was too preoccupied to notice.

  “lust drop it, Vroom,” Esha said and put the flower back in the vase. Her voice was breaking, though she wasn't crying yet.

  “Are you OK?” Vroom said and extended his hand to hold hers. She sensed the move and pulled her hand away nanoseconds before he reached it.

  “Not really,” Esha said.

  “I thought we were friends. I just wanted to take it to the next level…” Vroom said.

  “Please stop it,” Esha said, and covered her eyes with her hands. “You chose the worst time to talk about this.”

  “What's wrong, Esha? Can I help?” Vroom said, his voice now full of concern rather than the nervousness of romance.

  She shook her head frantically.

  I knew Vroom had failed miserably. Esha wasn'
t interested and was in a really strange mood. I finished my thousand-calorie chocolate cake and went to the counter to get water. By the time I returned, they had left the dining room.

  Chapter 17

  1:55 a.m.

  I RETURNED TO THE WASG BAY with the taste of chocolate cake lingering in my mouth. I sat down at my desk and began surfing irrelevant websites. Radhika was giving Priyanka recommendations on the best shops in Delhi for bridal dresses, while Esha and Vroom were silent. My guilt over the chocolate cake combined with my guilt for not reporting the systems failure, and when guilt combines, it multiplies manifold. I finally called IT to fix our desk. They were busy, but promised to come in ten minutes.

  The spare landline's ring startled us all.

  “Ganesh,” Priyanka said as she scrambled to pick up the phone. I kept a calm face while I selected the option to listen in on the call.

  “Mum,” Priyanka said, “why aren't you sleeping? Who gave you this number?”

  “Sleeping? No one has slept a wink today,” her mother said in an excited voice.

  The tapped line was exceptionally clear. Her mother sounded elated, which was unusual for a woman who, according to Priyanka, had spent most of her life in self-imposed, obsessive-compulsive depression.

  Priyanka's mother explained how Ganesh had just called her and given her the emergency line number. Ganesh's family in India had also not slept; they'd been calling Priyanka's parents at least once an hour. Ganesh had told Priyanka's family that he was “on top of the world.” I guess the sad dude really had no other life.

  “I'm so happy today. Look how God sent such a perfect match right to our door. And I used to worry about you so much,” Priyanka's mother said.

  “That's great, Mum, but what's up?” Priyanka said. “I'll be home in a few hours. How come you called here?”

  “Can't a mother call her daughter?” Priyanka's mum said. “Can't a mother” is one of her classic lines.

  “No, Mum, I just wondered. Anyway, Ganesh and I have spoken a couple of times today.”

  “And?”

  “And what?”

  “Did he tell you his plans?”

  “What plans?”

  “He is coming to India next month. Originally he'd planned the trip so he could see girls, but now that he has made his choice, he wants to get married instead on the same trip,” Priyanka's mum announced, her voice turning breathless.