One Night at the Call Center

by Chetan Bhagat

  “He's copied in everyone. Senior management in Boston in the ‘To’ field, and India senior management in the ‘Cc’ field,” I said.

  “And yet somehow he forgot to copy us in,” Vroom said.

  I read out the contents of his short mail:

  Dear All,

  Attached please find the much-awaited user manual of the customer service website that has altered the parameters of customer service at Western Appliances. I have only just completed this and would love to discuss it further on my imminent trip to …

  I let out a silent whistle.

  “Boston? Why is that ass going to Boston?” Vroom said. The girls heard us.

  “What are you talking about?” Priyanka said.

  “Bakshi's going to Boston,” Vroom said. “Any of you ladies want to tag along?”

  “What?” Esha said. “What's he going to Boston for?”

  “To talk about our website. Must have swung a trip for himself,” I said.

  “What the hell is going on here anyway? On the one hand we're downsizing to save costs, on the other hand there's cash to send idiots like Bakshi on trips to the U.S.?” Vroom said and threw his stress ball on the table. It hit the pen stand, spilling the contents.

  “Careful,” Esha said, sounding irritated as a few pens rolled toward her. She had her mobile phone in her hand; she was probably still trying to call someone.

  “Madness, that is what this place is. Boston!” Priyanka said and shook her head. She was surfing the Internet. I wondered which sites she was looking at: wedding dresses, lifestyle in the U.S., or the official Lexus website?

  I was about to close Bakshi's message when Vroom stopped me.

  “Open the document,” Vroom said, “just open the file he sent.”

  “It's the same file we sent him. The user manual,” I said.

  “Have you opened it?”

  “No, what's the point?”

  “Just open it,” he roared so loudly that Esha looked at us. I wondered who she was calling this late.

  I opened the file containing our user manual.

  “Here, it's exactly the same,” I said and scrolled down.

  As I reached the bottom of the first page, my jaw dropped, partly in horror and partly in preparation for some major cursing.

  Western Computers Troubleshooting Website

  Project Details and User Manual

  Developed by Connections, Delhi

  Subhash Bakshi Manager, Connections

  “Like fuck it's the same,” Vroom said and threw the pens he'd picked up back on the table. One landed on Esha's lap, who by this time had tried to connect to a number at least twenty times. She threw an angry look at Vroom and hurled the pen back at him. He ignored her, his eyes fixed on my screen.

  “It says it's by fucking Subhash Bakshi,” Vroom said, tapping his finger hard on my monitor. “Check this out. Mr. Moron, who can't tell a computer from a piano, has created this website and this manual. Like crap he has.”

  Vroom banged his fists on the table. In a mini-fit, he violently swept the table with his hands. Now the pens were on the floor.

  “What is wrong with you?” Esha said and pulled her chair away. She got up and went to the conference room, desperately shaking the phone to get a connection.

  “He passed off our work as his, Shyam. Do you realize that?” he said and shook my shoulder hard.

  I stared numbly at the first page of our, or rather Bakshi's, manual. This time Bakshi had surpassed himself. My head felt dizzy and I fought to breathe.

  “Six months of work on this manual alone,” I said and closed the file. “I never thought he'd stoop this low.”

  “And?” Vroom said.

  “And what? I don't really know what to do. I'm in shock. And on top of all this, there's the fear he may downsize us,” I said.

  “Downsize us?” Vroom said and stood up. “We've worked on it for six months, man. And all you can say is we can't do anything ‘as he may downsize us?’ That fucking loser Baskhi is turning you into a loser. Mr. Shyam, you are turning into a mousepad, people are rolling over you every day. Priyanka, tell him to say something. Go to Bakshi's office and have it out with him.”

  Priyanka looked up at us, and for the second time that night our eyes met. She had that look; that same gaze that used to make me feel so small. Like what was the point of even shouting at me.

  She shook her head and gave a wry smile. I knew that wry smile, too, like she'd known this was coming all along. I had the urge to shake her. It's frigging easy to give those looks when you have a Lexus waiting for you, I wanted to say. But I didn't say anything. Bakshi's move had hurt me—it wasn't just the six months of toil, but that the prospects for my promotion were gone. And that meant—poof!—Priyanka was gone, too. But right now the people around me just wanted to see me get angry. People see you as weak if you express hurt. They always want to see you strong, as in a raging temper. Maybe I don't have it in me? That's why I'm not a team leader, that's why no girls distribute sweets in the office for me.

  “Are you there, Mr. Shyam?” Vroom said. “Let's e-mail all the recipients of this message and tell them what's going on.”

  “lust cool down, Vroom. There's no need to act like a hero,” I snapped.

  “Oh really? So, who should we act like? Losers? Tell us, Shyam, you should be the expert on that,” Vroom said.

  A surge of anger choked me. “lust shut up and sit down,” I said. “What do you want to do? Send another e-mail to the whites and tell them about the infighting going on here? Who are they going to believe? Someone who's on his way to Boston for a meeting or some frustrated agent who claims he did all the work? Get real, Mr. Varun. You'll get fired and that's it. Bakshi is management, but all he manages is only his own career, not us.” I was so caught up in the argument I didn't even notice Radhika, who was standing next to me with a bottle of water in her hand.

  “Thanks,” I said and took a few noisy sips.

  “Feeling better?” Radhika said.

  I raised my hand to stop her from saying more. “I don't want to talk about this any more. This is between Bakshi and us. And I don't need the opinions of random people whose life is just one big party.” I sat down and glared at Vroom.

  He opened a notepad and drew a 2x2 matrix.

  “What the fuck is that?” I said.

  “I think I've finally figured Bakshi out. Let me explain with the help of a diagram,” Vroom said.

  “I'm not in the mood for diagrams,” I said.

  “Just listen,” Vroom said as he labeled the matrix.

  On the horizontal axis he wrote “good” and “evil” next to each box. On the vertical axis, he wrote “smart” and “stupid.”

  “OK, here is my theory about people like Bakshi,” Vroom said and pointed at the matrix with his pen. “There are four kinds of bosses in this world, based on two dimensions: a) how smart or stupid they are, and b) whether they are good or evil. Only with extreme good luck do you get a boss who is smart and a good human being. However, Bakshi falls into the most dangerous and common category. He is stupid, as we all know, but he is evil, too,” Vroom said, tapping his pen in the relevant quadrant of the matrix.

  “Stupid and evil,” I echoed.

  “Yes, we've underestimated him. He is frightening. He's like a blind snake: you feel sorry for it, but it still has a poisonous bite. You can see it—he is stupid, hence the call center is so mismanaged, but he is also evil, so he'll make sure all of us go down instead of him.”

  I shook my head.

  “Forget it. Destiny has put an asshole in my path. What can I say?”

  Radhika took the bottle from my desk. “Sorry to interrupt your discussion, guys, but I hope you weren't talking about me when you mentioned people whose lives are one big party. My life is not a party, my friend. It really isnt—

  “It wasn't you, Radhika. Shyam most clearly meant me,” Priyanka interrupted.

  “Oh forget it,” I said and stood up. I
moved from the desk, just to get away from everyone. As I left, I could hear Vroom's words, “If I could just once have the opportunity to fuck with Bakshi's happiness, I'd consider myself the luckiest person on earth.”

  Chapter 20

  2:10 a.m.

  AS I WALKED AWAY FROM THE WASG DESK, my mind was still in turmoil. I felt like chopping Bakshi up into little bits and feeding them to every street dog in Delhi. I approached the conference room to find the door was shut. I knocked and waited for a few seconds.

  “Esha?” I said and turned the knob to open the door.

  Esha was sitting on one of the conference-room chairs. Her right leg was bent and resting on another chair as she examined the wound on her shin. She held a blood-tipped Stanley knife in her hand and I noticed a used Band-Aid on the table. There was fresh blood coming out of the wound on her shin.

  “Are you OK?” I said, moving closer.

  Esha turned to look at me with a blank expression.

  “Oh hi, Shyam,” she said in a calm tone.

  “What are you doing here? Everyone's looking for you.”

  “Why? Why would anyone be looking for me?”

  “No particular reason. What are you doing here anyway? And your wound is bleeding, do you want some lotion or a bandage?” I said and looked away. The sight of blood nauseates me. I don't know how doctors show up to work every day.

  “No, Shyam, I like it like this. With lotion it may stop hurting,” Esha said.

  “What?” I said. “But you want to stop the pain, don't you?

  “No,” Esha smiled sadly. She pointed to the wound with the knife. “This pain takes my mind away from the real pain. Do you know what real pain is, Shyam?”

  I really had no idea what she was on about, but I knew that if she didn't cover the wound up soon, I'd throw up my recently consumed chocolate cake.

  “Listen, I'll get the first-aid kit from the supplies room.”

  “You haven't answered my question. What is real pain, Shyam?”

  “I don't know, what is it?” I said, shifting anxiously as I saw fresh drops of blood trickle down her smooth leg.

  “Real pain is mental pain,” Esha said.

  “Right,” I said, trying to sound intelligent. I sat down on a chair next to her.

  “Ever felt mental pain, Shyam?”

  “I don't know if I have. I'm a shallow guy, you see. There are lots of things I don't feel,” I said.

  “Everyone feels pain, because everyone has a dark side to their life.”

  “Dark side?”

  “Yes, dark side—something you don't like about yourself, something that makes you angry or that you fear. Do you have a dark side, Shyam?”

  “Oh, let's not go there. I have so many, like half a dozen dark sides. I am a dark-sided hexagon,” I said.

  “Ever felt guilt, Shyam? Real, hard, painful guilt?” she said as her voice became weak.

  “What's happened, Esha?” I said, as I finally found a position that allowed me to look at her face but avoid a view of her wound.

  “Do you promise not to judge me if I tell you something?”

  “Of course,” I said. “I'm a terrible judge of people anyway.”

  “I slept with someone,” she said and let out a sigh, “to win a modeling contract.”

  “What?” I said, as it took me a second to figure out what she meant.

  “Yes, my agent said this man was connected and I just had to sleep with him once to get a break in a major fashion show. Nobody forced me, I chose to do it. But ever since, I've felt this awful guilt. Every single moment. I thought it would pass, but it hasn't. And the pain is so bad that this wound in my leg feels like a tickle,” she said and took the knife to her shin where she started scraping the skin around her wound.

  “Stop it, Esha, what are you doing?” I said and snatched the knife from her. “Are you insane? You'll get tetanus or gangrene or whatever other horrible things they show on TV in those vaccination ads.”

  “This is tame. I'll tell you what's dangerous. My own fucked-up brain, the delusional voice that says I have it in me to become a model. You know what the man said afterward?”

  “Which man?” I said as I shoved the knife to the other side of the table.

  “The guy I slept with—a forty-year-old designer. He told my agent I was too short to be a catwalk model,” Esha said, her voice rising as anger mingled with sadness. “Like the bastard didn't know that before he slept with me.” She began crying. I don't know what's worse, a shouting girl or a crying one. I'm awful at handling either. I placed my hands on Esha's shoulders, ready for a hug in case she needed it.

  “And that son of a bitch sends some cash as compensation afterward,” she said, sobbing. “And my agent tells me, ‘This is part of life.’ Sure it's part of life—part of Esha the failed model's fucked-up life. Give me the knife back, Shyam,” she said, holding out her palm.

  “No, I won't. Listen, now I'm not really sure what to do in this situation, but just take it easy,” I said. It was true; nobody would ever demand to have sex with me. Therefore, feeling-guilty-after-demanded-sex was completely unfamiliar territory.

  “I hate myself, Shyam. I just hate myself. And I hate my face, and the stupid mirror that shows me my face. I hate myself for believing people who told me I could be a model. Can I get my face altered?”

  I don't know of any plastic surgeons who specialize in making pretty girls ugly, so I kept quiet. After ninety seconds she stopped crying, around about the same time any girl would stop crying if you ignored her. She took a tissue from her bag and wiped her eyes.

  “Shall we go? They must be waiting,” I said. She reached for my hand to stand up.

  “Thanks for listening to me,” Esha said. Only women think there is a reason to thank people when someone listens to them.

  Chapter 21

  2:20 a.m.

  TO MY DISGUST, Priyanka's wedding was still the topic of discussion when Esha and I returned to the bay.

  Esha sat down quietly.

  “Now where were you?” Priyanka asked Esha.

  “Still here. I wanted to make a private call,” Esha said.

  “I'm taking mother-in-law tips from Radhika,” Priyanka said. “I'm so not looking forward to that part. She seems nice now, but who knows how she'll turn out.”

  “C'mon, you're getting so much more in return. Gan-esh is such a nice guy,” Radhika said.

  “Anyway I'd take three mothers-in-law for a Lexus. Bring it on, man,” Vroom said.

  Radhika and Priyanka started laughing.

  “I'll miss you, Vroom,” Priyanka said, still laughing, “I really will.”

  “Who else will you miss?” Vroom said and all of us fell silent.

  Priyanka shifted on her seat: Vroom had put her on the spot. “Oh I'll miss all of you,” she said, diplomacy queen that she is when she wants to be.

  “Whatever,” Vroom said.

  “Anyway, don't wish for three mothers-in-law, Vroom. It would be like asking for three Bakshis,” said Radhika. “Or at least it can be for some women.”

  “So your mother-in-law is evil?” Vroom said.

  “I never said she's bad. But she did say those things to Anuj. What will he think?”

  “Nothing. He won't think anything. He knows how lucky he is to have you,” Priyanka said firmly.

  “It's hard sometimes. She isn't my mum, after all.”

  “Oh, don't go there. I can get along with anyone else's mum better than my own. My mum's neurosis has made me mother-in-law proof,” Priyanka said, and everyone on the desk laughed. I didn't, though, as there's nothing funny about Priyanka's mum to me. Emotional manipulators like her should be put in jail and made to watch daytime TV all day.

  “Anuj will be OK now, right? Tell me, guys: He won't hate me?” Radhika said.

  “No,” Priyanka got up and went to Radhika. “He loves you and he will be fine.”

  “D'you want to check if he's okay?” Vroom said. “I have an idea.”
/>
  “What?” Radhika said.

  I looked at Vroom. What the hell did he have to say about Anuj and Radhika?

  “Let's play radio jockey,” Vroom said. Radhika was baffled.

  “I'll call Anuj and pretend I'm calling from a radio show. Then I'll tell him he's won a prize, a large bouquet of roses and a box of Swiss chocolates which he can send to anyone he loves, anywhere in India, with a loving message. So then, we'll all get to hear the romantic lines he has for you.”

  “C'mon, it will never work,” Priyanka said. “You can't sound like a DJ.”

  “Trust me, I'm a call-center agent. I can be a convincing DJ,” Vroom said.

  I was curious to see how Vroom would do.

  “OK,” Vroom said as he got ready, “It's show time, folks. Take line five everyone, and no noise. Breathe away from the mouthpiece, OK?”

  Radhika gave him the number as we listened in and Vroom dialed Anuj's mobile.

  We glued the earpiece to our ears. The telephone rang five times.

  “He's sleeping,” Priyanka whispered.

  “Shhh,” Vroom went as we heard someone pick up.

  “Hello?” Anuj said in a sleepy voice.

  “Hello there, my friend, is this 98101 46301?” Vroom said in an insanely cheerful, DJ's voice.

  “Yes, who is it?” Anuj said.

  “It's your lucky call for tonight. This is DJ Max calling from Radio City 98.5 FM, and you, my friend, have just won a prize.”

  “Radio City? Are you trying to sell me something?” Anuj said. I guess, being a salesperson himself, he was skeptical.

  “No, my friend, I'm not selling anything—no credit cards, no insurance policies, and no phone plans—I'm just offering you a small prize from our sponsor Inter-flora and you can request a song, too, if you want to. Man, people doubt me so much these days,” Vroom said.

  “Sorry, I just wasn't sure,” Anuj said.

  “Max is the name. What's yours?” Vroom said.

  “Anuj.”

  “Nice talking to you, Anuj. Where are you right now?”