To Live and Love In L.A.

by Ben Peller

  Luisa and I spent the last hour of our workday laughing and answering phones. It would be my first and last day at Mortgage Capitol, I figured, so why not spend it in laughter with a beautiful and intelligent woman by my side? However, I was curious exactly when Dave Stein was going to come up and fire me.

  I got my answer at ten minutes before five in the afternoon. A casually dressed tall Asian man stepped up to the front desk where Luisa and I were busily routing calls. “Shawn?” he asked in a gentle voice.

  I nodded, mistaking him for a loan officer at first. But quickly I realized he was way too composed to be one of them. The Asian gentleman who had a relaxed hand draped on my shoulder, and brought with him the unmistakable scent of a cologne I probably would never be able to afford, was someone who was definitely in command of things around here. “Mister… Stein?” I asked, stunned but not that stunned. After the day I’d just had, an Asian person named Stein settled comfortably into the disarray of the cosmos.

  Mister Stein chuckled with the patience of one who’d heard the question many many times before. “My father was a Jewish surgeon in the Korean war. My mother was a volunteer nurse. Let’s just say she was the dominant one in their relationship. So how’s your first day been?”

  I’d told numerous loan officers I was going to shove my foot down their throat, hung up on more people than I could count, and exposed myself to a co-worker. It seemed an extremely tricky question.

  “It’s been a trip, sir.” I answered.

  He laughed. “Please, none of that ‘sir’ crap. It’s Dave. I hear tell you gave a few of the loan officers a hard time.”

  “It’s just that…” I began. “They wouldn’t take loan calls and we have all these people calling-“

  “Exactly!” Dave said. “So you got on the loan officers’ ass! Bully work! That’s the kind of attitude I need from my receptionists. Those jerks back there are making too much money for their own good.”

  I nodded, a bit numbly. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Luisa smiling slyly as she continued to answer phones with a “Mortgage Capitol” so sweet you would’ve thought her vocal cords had been dipped in honey.

  “That fucking Morton,” Dave shook his head. “What a prick. But he closes deals, so what the hell. If he gives you a hard time, just ask him if he’s lost weight. That usually shuts the fat prick up.”

  I was now openly gaping at this man. He was six feet, well-built, most likely a multi-millionaire, and was going out of his way to treat the lowest level on his rung of employees like a human being.

  This was who I wanted to be when I grew up, I determined. A loser would’ve wallowed in the fact that Dave Stein looked to be roughly around my age. But, I told myself, being a winner I was able to assume he was at least fifteen years my senior.

  “Oh,” Dave said, pulling out a sheet of paper. “Got an interesting email earlier today. This wouldn’t happen to be your doing, would it?”

  I started to read when Dave instructed, “Read it out loud.”

  I cleared my throat, hoping it was something that would impress Luisa, who I couldn’t help but notice seemed to be listening attentively. “Dear Mr. Stein, My name is Sylvia Titasse the Third. Just twenty minutes ago I contacted your company to request a loan for my vacation home in Santa Barbara. After politely remaining on hold for a completely unacceptable amount of time,” I swallowed a bit, knowing pretty much well where this was heading. “the phone ‘person’ FINALLY came back on the line and informed me that I could ‘blow it out my ass’ if I wanted a loan. This type of behavior is COMPLETELY inappropriate and if I do not receive a notice of termination regarding this ‘person,’ I shall make sure to not only never do business with your company, but will instruct my friends to not do so either!

  “Umm…” I said. At times like these, when faced with a particularly vicious attack on my person, I usually rely on movie quotes as defense. As luck would have it I’d just watched One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest the other night. “She sounds like something of a cunt, doesn’t she?”

  Luisa’s sharp exhale, the kind used to hold back a laugh, was the first thing I heard. Dave made no sound, just continued to stare at me quizzically. “I didn’t tell her to ‘blow it out her ass,’” I explained. “I just told her I didn’t want to blow smoke up her ass.”

  By now Luisa was snickering with unadulterated glee. Dave’s sudden howl reminded me of a bird’s cry; unapologetic, seeking a mate. Phone lines were ringing and nobody, including the President of the company, seemed to give a damn. So I once again joined in the laughter. It sure as hell beat working for a living, and besides, we’d already put at least a thousand calls through that day.

  “Will he do, Luisa?” Dave asked my operator-in-arms.

  “He’ll do,” Luisa said. “By the way, Dave. This is my last day.”

  Dave looked like he’d been hit with a brick. “What…? Why…?”

  “I’m sick of dealing with all these people borrowing money for their second and third homes. I think I’m gonna join an organization and head to Haiti, somewhere where the people are lucky to have running water. I want to help build houses, teach schools… you know, stupid shit like that.”

  Dave exhaled a long breath, then shrugged. “We’ll miss you.” Then he gazed down at me. “You’ll be fine here, Shawn.” Dave said, holding out his hand to shake. “Welcome aboard Mortgage Capitol.”

  I liked him. Even if he was such a successful sonofabitch.

  After quitting time, with the phone lines still ringing even though all the loan officers had left the office well over an hour ago, I insisted on escorting Luisa down to her car in the parking garage. “Did you know this was going to be your last day?” I asked her.

  “I’ve been wanting to leave for a while,” she replied, leaning back against the rear wall of the elevator as we purred down to the parking garage. “But I hadn’t really made up my mind until today. Until I met you.”

  “Okay,” I half-nodded, unsure for what seemed like the millionth time that day if this was a veiled insult or a veiled compliment. “May I ask how I influenced this decision?”

  “It’s just that…” she tilted her head and rolled her eyes. “Oh, never mind…”

  “No, tell me.” I begged. “Please. You’ve made this the best first day I’ve ever had at a job.”

  Speaking this, I was surprised to find the words rang true. Luisa was warm, humorous and brilliant to be around. I was more than somewhat scared to find oblique thoughts of marriage, or at the very least a co-living arrangement drifting through my thoughts. Was this how people tumbled into domestic life? I could halfway picture us boring the shit out of our grandchildren, telling them the story about how their grandpa and grandma had first met amidst a barrage of ringing phones, angry callers, and general greed gone wild. But still, we’d hold one another’s hand. We found something more precious than a refinanced loan. We found love…

  “Shawn?”

  I blinked. The elevator doors had yawned open and Luisa was gesturing at the ocean of automobiles beyond. “We’re here,” she said, a tad tauntingly.

  “What were you just thinking about in the elevator?” she asked as we walked through the neatly aligned rows of parked cars.

  “I’ll tell you my secret if you tell me yours,” I said. “Why’d you choose today to leave this job?”

  We reached her car, a blue Ford Mustang convertible. “This is me,” she said. “And the reason I decided to leave today was that I’ve always made it a rule never to have sex with co-workers. Now what were you thinking about in the elevator?”

  I bit my lip. “Same thing,” I said.

  Luisa and I drove up the coast to the Pacific Palisades, top down. There we parked and made love in her backseat, just like in the movies. The only slight hitch was our soundtrack was a mix tape of hers made up of heavy metal songs rather than love tunes from a teenage romance comedy.

  There was another minor incident; during the throes of our passion Luis
a ducked down and began sucking on my forearm. I was too caught up in pleasure to notice how much it hurt, and it was only when I felt the distinct nip of skin being pierced that I shrieked and tried to throw her off me.

  But she remained on top of me, laughing, as she whipped her head back and gazed down at me with eyes that held no fear. On her teeth there seemed to be a hint of blood. “Ancient Aztecan ritual,” she kissed me. “Bonds us for life.”

  Surprisingly, rather than scare me this proved to excite me even more, and soon I was firing away inside of her as the ocean whispered and the moon cast its illuminated shadow, witnesses to our bond.

  “Thank you,” she murmured into my chest as we lay together, letting the night breeze wax in and out of the car.

  “My pleasure,” I murmured back. Her hair, I noticed for the first time, had a peppermint flavor. “What are you doing tomorrow night?”

  She giggled. “No, silly,” she said. “I mean for making it possible for me to say farewell to Mortgage Capitol. I really was sick of it all, the clients, the loan officers, the greed… but I didn’t have the guts to quit. But I did want to make love to you. So maybe I used that as an excuse. Either way, I don’t think I’ll be seeing you again.”

  “Why not?” I asked, perplexed, disappointed, hurt. I closed my eyes tight, blocking any tears that might come. From the physical wound she’d just inflicted upon me, I reminded myself, and not any other. “I thought you said we were bonded for life.”

  “Shawn, you’re going to be a cog in a machine I don’t want to be a part of,” Luisa said. “You’re going to be stressed out, pissed off, and having headaches all the time. It’s a hard job you’re going into, Shawn.”

  “I’m pretty tough.” I said uneasily, unsure whether I was nodding, shaking my head, or a combination of both.

  “Just don’t let the mortgage industry get these things,” she squeezed my balls lightly and then leaned down and gave them a prolonged kiss. “Thank you again, Shawn. For saying what you said earlier today.”

  “You’re welcome,” I said, pleased, then immediately doubtful. “About what?”

  “About your life being someone else’s research project. And how they’re just on the edge of failing.”

  “So you remembered.” I said, as she kissed me, this time on my lips, and I tasted the sweat a man builds up in his groin after a long day’s hard work followed by a wonderful sexual session in Malibu with a woman who he’s not only fallen half in love with after just one day but also been given his walking papers by. Sour and sweet.

  Two days later I received an email from Luisa. True to what she’d promised Dave Stein, she’d secured a position in a charitable organization, and was heading off to Haiti. Her message finished with: This may sound weird, but in the short time we knew each other you really did make a definitive difference in my life. Who knows? Maybe someday we’ll meet again. Love, Luisa.

  I printed out this email and kept it, propped right beside a Buddha statue atop one of my bookshelves. In the following weeks I found myself staring at it on occasion… when I got home from work, as I was eating a microwaved dinner, or when I woke up at three thirty in the morning. I wondered if sometimes these short relationships were in fact the dearest. The nectar that never gets stale, a wonderful meal that never grows cold. In a way, as much as I adored Luisa and the brief time we had together, I half-hoped I never would see her again. But there were those moments, tender and sad as the last drops of a fading spring rain, when I would stare at my forearm and imagine there was a slight scar there from where she’d bonded us, its ridged white the shape of a half moon, and thought, Wow. I could’ve really loved that one.

  The following weeks at Mortgage Capitol were chaotic. Phone calls, loan officers yelling at finance officers, secretaries weeping, funding processors throwing papers at anyone within range. Even our computer repair guy was on edge, storming into the office shouting, “You guys, again?! Which one of your goddamned employees hit the wrong button and crashed the system this time?”

  Above all the bedlam there floated Dave Stein. One moment he’d be consoling a screeching loan officer, and the next moment he’d be giving the finance officer said loan officer had been screeching at a light backrub. If Mortgage Capitol were a theatrical production, Dave was cast in the role of moderator, one who seemed to be immune to the den of infighting, ill will, and general toxicity he’d created. An unholy angel of sorts, it was a part Dave played to perfection.

  My role had already been well defined. I was the office eccentric, one who was crazy enough to be able to command the front desk and deal with fellow maniacs and people desperate enough to threaten murder over a botched $256 closing fee (read: customers), the “gatekeeper” who had nothing to lose. My coworkers had already learned to tread very lightly around me, given my propensity for outbursts and also that I most always reeked of vodka from drinking bouts the night before. Dave would coast by the front desk on occasion to check on me and whatever other temp they’d hired.

  “Doing good, all?” he’d sing.

  “Aces, Dave,” I’d say, while the new temp would simply offer a shy smile.

  Poor things. They had no idea what they were in for, dealing with a loan-crazed America. As the ones manning the frontline, we switchboard operators took abuse from all sides; officers who promised loans at ludicrously low rates without bothering to dwell on the fact that they were “adjustable”, processors on the other end who discovered “hidden” costs, and irate clients who were livid that their phone calls weren’t returned within ten minutes.

  “Is it always like this?” a temp named Debbie asked me, after being told by Morton to tell a “Mark” (Mortgage Loan talk for a customer, as in sucker, fool, shithead who’s ready to mortgage their life away) to go fist themselves with no lube, and then, after relaying that Morton wasn’t currently available, being told roughly the same thing by The Mark.

  “Nah,” I said with exaggerated breeziness. “It’s usually more busy. And a lot more intense.”

  Debbie went out for a cigarette break at eleven in the morning and never returned. She was of many in a long line. As the weeks piled up, it became apparent that being a switchboard operator at Mortgage Capitol was not a job for the weak at heart. Nor for the sane.

  Fortunately, my personality tended to bulldoze over both those nagging traits. Besides, I was simply there temporarily. I was an author, for goodness sakes. Therefore I could, in my own way, sail above all this in the same manner Dave Stein practiced. True, our professions differed slightly. His business was making money off people who believed in the American Dream of owning a home, while my business was composing literature that questioned the very reality of this American Dream (in the tradition of, I often assured myself, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. Sinclair Lewis’ Babbitt, John Updike’s Rabbit is Rich - the ease with which I could plant myself in a league of classic authors with only a barely published book to my credit was as delusional as it was impressive).

  The beginning of my second month on the job I marched into Dave Stein’s office and demanded a raise. “I’m the only one who can handle these phones!” I shouted. The past month had proven this to be, miraculously, true. Or maybe it wasn’t so miraculous after all; only a properly egotistical individual could cast aside the arrows of spite fueled by gluttony displayed on the part of both borrowers and lenders that we operators found ourselves trapped in the middle of every time we answered a call.

  “Yeah,” Dave nodded. “Okay. Four dollars an hour more sound good?”

  I’d been hoping for two, and ready to go for one. The ease of which Dave trumped these figures made me realize these guys putting out loans must’ve been making money grubby hand over grubbier fist.

  “Sure,” I croaked.

  “By the way,” Dave looked up from his copy of Vanity Fair. “When are you going to become a loan officer?”

  It was, in a sense, like when someone you’ve been seeing asks when you two are going to take it to
the next level in your relationship.

  Horrified, I mumbled what I usually mumble under these circumstances. “I’m happy where we are right now.”

  Dave nodded, and then a strange look overtook him. It was the first time I’d seen him look confused. “We?” he said.

  I smiled, a little proud at causing a man who seemed to have the world in the palm of his closing palm appear so befuddled. “No intention,” I smiled. “Just an old habit. You know how when women want you to make a further commitment…”

  He laughed and drawled, “Do I ever.”

  His wife, Marina, was one of the loan officers at Mortgage Capitol. She was of Eastern European descent and spoke with a thick accent that managed to be both stern and playful; kind of what you might expect if you called a phone sex line in hopes of talking to a dominatrix who would admonish you for being a bad greedy capitalist as she panted heavily into the phone. It was a standing order that all loans over a million dollars be transferred solely to Marina. Marina regarded all of us employees with a snide tolerance, as though we were puppies she would never deem to purchase. She would usually breeze into the office around eleven in the morning, collect messages we took for her (nothing like trying to explain to people looking for seven figure loans that their loan officer isn’t in yet because she doesn’t have to be as she’s the company owner’s wife, which of course we’d been commanded never to reveal), and be gone by two in the afternoon after maybe or maybe not returning calls, according to her mood. I often wondered if Dave had found her on a phone sex line, for though she had a marvelous voice she seemed to possess very little acumen for mathematics. Customers constantly complained about her lack of follow through when it came to getting back with just how much interest they would be paying on a loan. One customer called her “a dimwitted idiot who never returns calls,” before adding, “but with that voice she could probably talk a Jew into walking into a gas chamber.”

  Marina had obviously screwed her way into a good thing. But then I was making twenty-two dollars an hour just for answering phones and placing people on hold. So it wasn’t like I could judge her, especially since I was feverishly pumping my way up the ranks myself. My voyage started with Carolina, who worked as something called an “office runner.” Her main task seemed to be getting coffee for our Chief Marketing Agent and then spending an inordinate amount of time in his office with the door closed. She was from the San Fernando Valley and was only the second woman I’d ever met who lived up to the stereotype of a “valley girl.” She employed euphemisms such as like and whatever, and was under the impression that you know was a definition of some sort. Our first intimate engagement took place when Carolina cornered me in the office supply area where I’d come to enjoy a ten minute Vodkarade break. “What are you doing in here?” she asked, snatching the bottle from my hand.