The Answer - Chapter 1

By Lynda Shermer

Chapter 1 - The Abominable Dr. Willis

One of the more unusual jobs I've held was for an answering service. I am Paul Burrows, although as you'll see, that can be optional.

---

Located in a small room upstairs in a building in Chicago's "Loop" that also housed a hotel, it offered a human touch to business and professional people seeking a more personal approach than voice mail or recording systems, which some customers highly valued.

We worked in shifts: early morning, afternoon and evening; and in the late night, when we went home, the computer took over and acted as an answering machine. The crew on each shift was usually one male and two females, as some clients didn't care who answered the phone, and others wanted to make a very specific impression, and that frequently included a female receptionist; this resulted in me being needed mostly when things got busy, so I had lots of time to study in the office. I was preparing to return to college, after having dropped out to care for my elderly parents for three years, until they passed away.

We all worked at desks, wearing headsets, with a computer in front of us. The computer routed the call according to the database, providing information about the client, any specific instructions, and the caller id information, if received, although we were trained not to address the callers by name; people found it disconcerting to be named before they announce themselves.

Clients either called for their messages, or (more rarely) picked them up in person. Mail could be held, as well. We actually had several clients who lived in the residential parts of the hotel, and would show up for their messages wearing slippers.

---

One day, while I was still new to the job, I'd been insulted by an insistent caller. As soon as I'd gotten rid of them, the phone rang again. Still irritated, I'd answered with something other than the calm professional voice and prescribed greeting. It was a doctor named Willis, calling to pick up his his messages, and he had his instructions amended to specify female only on his line. Then, a few weeks later, when everyone else was busy, he called again, and getting me (although much more politely), went ballistic. He complained to the boss, and the instructions were further amended to bar me from answering his line. I got a black mark on my employee records, and was warned, officially, not to do it again, "or else."

---

The day the whole thing started, I was working with June Sommers and Alice Blake. Alice had seniority, and was my shift supervisor. She was a bit of an enigma, not revealing much about her life outside the office, and always dressed in a very professional, conservative manner, despite the hours we worked, typically early afternoon, into the evening. She'd hand picked me and June, and kept the schedule so that we mostly worked together, three afternoon and evenings, and one morning, every week.

June, on the other hand, was very casual and informal, dressed accordingly, and was quite verbose about her personal life and preferences. She seemed to constantly have boyfriend trouble, and would discuss it during breaks between calls, if you didn't distract her.

As I say, most of my shifts were spent with Alice and June. When I'd first trained, I'd worked with Alice, another girl, and Phil Richards. Phil was one of the other two males working in the office, and clearly a major annoyance to Alice. As soon as I'd gone through the shakedown process, Alice moved to my shift, leaving Phil to the mercy of the assistant manager.

Initially, I'd worried about making friends at work; I was just there for a couple of years to earn money, while I prepared to return to college and my CS degree. I'd heard about the job from a friend who'd installed their equipment, and I guess they liked my voice, because I was hired shortly after my interview with Alice.

Initially, I'd tried to break the ice with all the employees at the service, even inviting my them to an improv show put on as a final exercise for a drama workshop I took to keep my hand in before returning to school. (My degree would be in CS, but I'd enjoyed my involvement in theatre and theatre tech in high school, and kept it up in College, volunteering for stage crew.) Phil proved to be a loud and obnoxious audience member. June had had a little better luck, getting our shifts to loosen up (except for Alice, of course) when she started dragging us to the bar around the corner after work, before we all went our various transit assisted ways. I don't normally drink much, but I would have one for the sense of camaraderie.

---

That day, June was complaining about this Ethiopian restaurant her boyfriend had dragged her to the night before.

"I mean, isn't Ethiopia where they are always having famines? How do they even have a cuisine?"

As the afternoon progressed, she was feeling queasier and queasier and starting to look a bit green, when finally she became nauseated. Alice rushed her down the hall to the ladies washroom, and left me manning the phones. It was a slow day, so there was a chance we'd get away with it. But just then, the phone rang. I hit the override, and the record came up on my screen. The totals showed several messages which claimed to be urgent. And then I saw who it was: Dr. Willis, presumably calling to pick up his messages. Worst case, realized. He was one of the longest standing customers of the service, so I had to do something. What had gotten me in trouble before? Too informal. The sheet said, female preferred, and most of all, Not Me... Formal and female. Well, I certainly couldn’t do anything about the "not me" part... Closing my eyes, my mind came up blank, until finally, one lone idea popped into it, born of an exercise in acting class. Taking a deep breath, and recalling years of Masterpiece Theatre on PBS, I said, "Good afternoon, Dr. Willis' office," in my best attempt at a cultured upper class British woman's voice!

He asked for his messages, and I read them off the screen, hoping he wouldn't figure anything out. But then, unlike the few times I'd dealt with him before I'd been banned, when I finished the messages, he continued.

"Thank you, young lady. And may I ask your name?"

"We don't generally give out that information, sir."

"But I am a client."

"Very well," I temporized, trying to think of an appropriate name. "My name is Felicity." Ummm, "Felicity Martin."

"Well, thank you, Ms. Martin; this was quite a pleasant call. I hope to talk to you again."

"Thank you, sir, but I am just a temp here."

And thought nothing more about it; Alice came back, having bundled June into a cab, to go home until she felt better.

Or at least, thought nothing more of it until the next day, when a call came in for Dr. Willis, and after June (feeling much better after a nights digestion, and some soup) had dealt with it, she froze the screen, and asked us in general, "Who is Felicity Martin?"

Alice, unwittingly acting as straight man, asked, "Who?"

"Dr. Willis' instructions say that Felicity Martin is to handle his calls, when possible. Do we have a Felicity on the schedule?"

Alice said, "Not that I can recall, and I do all the training."

"Ummm," I interjected, "Actually, that's me."

"You? But the rest of the instructions say female only, and specifically bars you.", June reminded me.

"Yeah, well, remember yesterday, when you were so sick?"

"Yes...", Alice led off, in a worryingly supervisory tone.

"How could I forget. I had to pay to get the back of the cab cleaned...", June said, at the same time.

"Dr. Willis called, to pick up his messages, and you two were gone. You know how picky he is, and what a major client, and he had some urgents, so I had to do something, but I couldn't risk being myself, after what happened before, so I made something up."

"It must have been quite something, if old sourpuss is asking for you by name, 'Felicity'! How about a sample?"

Embarrassed, I demurred, claiming it had been a stressful moment, and couldn't remember quite what I'd done.

I had not reckoned with how determined Alice was, nor remembered that she had access to the recordings made for quality control purposes, being the supervisor. She called it up, and put it on speaker phone.

They both listened, eyeing me. It had been me speaking, of course, and recordings of your own voice never sound quite like you think they will, so this was the first time I was able to objectively judge my performance, but I thought it was ok.

June was staring, "Listen to him compliment you! He never says things like that to me. I bet if you'd flirted with him more, you'd get a nice tip come Christmas!"

"Flirted! I just wanted to get off the line as fast as politely possible. I was the only one left in the office."

"You have hidden talents, it seems", June said, eying me speculatively.

"Well, you've seen me do improv."

"Yes, that's why I said hidden", Alice replied, "Were you trying for Jean Marsh there?"

"Something like that; something masterpiece theatre-ish at any rate. I was just trying to avoid my voice breaking in the middle."

"Do it again."

"What? No. It was an emergency."

"It could open up whole new angle to the business. Can you do any other voices?," Alice asked, sounding suspiciously like a supervisor looking to assign more work.

"As I said, I can't even do that one."

And with difficulty, I got them to stop picking at it.

---

Until, that is, we went around the corner after our shift, for a drink. With my defenses slightly lowered by the one drink I allowed myself on such occasions, they both pressed me again. Finally, I caved in.

Trying hard to recapture my mindset, I closed my eyes, took a breath, exhaled, and said, "What would you like me to say?," in the voice I'd used as Felicity.

"Why, hello, Felicity; it's good to meet you," June replied, "You've made quite an impression on Dr. Willis, evidently."

Alice chimed in with, "So how long do you think you'll be temping at our office, dear?"

"I thought you knew; that was my last day. I doubt you'll see me around after this," I attempted.

"Oh, I think something might be arranged, if you would stay. Dr. Willis is a very good client, and I feel certain a bonus for handling his calls falls within the purview of the supervisor’s discretion."

A bonus? What was going on here? Bonuses were rare indeed in our office.

Staying in character (I had had a drink, which is probably the only reason it seemed like a good idea), I mentioned how unusual that seemed. It seemed, Alice continued, automated answering services were cutting into business and incentives were now being contemplated for client retention.

---

A few afternoons later, when I came in, Alice greeted me as usual, and June added, "Hi, Felicity!"

I answered, noticing that June was doing her nails, as she tended to, between calls, "Hello, June. I like that nail color on you, what is it?"

"It's called Provence. I was hoping it would be a bit more matte, but it does look ok."

"Can't you just apply a top coat to make it matte? I think Sephora makes one...," I said, trying for a musing intonation.

"Freeze!," Alice said.

I should never have invited my co-workers to that Improv show. This wasn't the first time Alice had taken advantage, but my training held, and I froze.

"Ah, good to see people still keep up the classic exercises... June," she continued, "look at him."

"What?"

"The tilt of his head, what he's doing with his finger?"

"Oh, now I see it. Scary!"

"What?," I asked, recovering the power of speech now that it was clear I was neither on stage or in imminent danger if I moved.

"Your body language when you said that was TOTALLY feminine."

"No way. I don't even know how to read feminine body language, let alone mimic it."

"Actually, you've seen the same cultural conditioning we have, it just isn't aimed at you. Everyone is exposed to it in movies, school, tv, books. Your subconscious seems to have been paying attention, is all."

June added, "And how did you know about the Sephora, anyway?"

"I think I saw an ad somewhere." Actually, I built models, and when you wanted to dull down a paint job to age something, there were a variety of tricks used, and the matte coat was one of them. I had a bottle in my toolbox at home.

"Anyway, June, stop playing with Paul, you'll break him, and then we'll end up with Phil all the time."

"Ewwww. Ok, I'll stop."

---

All this was at the end of summer. As fall came in, the staff was invited to the Halloween costume ball at the hotel downstairs, a long tradition, with prizes. The offices in the building were eligible as groups. And Alice, in a rare moment of openness, seemed determined to win, and had a concept in mind.

"Typewriter girls," she said.

"Like the play?," I asked. The whole concept of 19th century office melodrama was very fresh at the time, with that play, and “Thoroughly Modern Millie” undergoing a revival in town, the road show of the broadway production.

"Yes. Between the theater, and this steam punk trend I see in the news, clothing that invokes Victorian or Edwardian fashions is quite in."

"Ok, so what's my part? The dashing employer, straw boater at a rakish tilt, who sweeps the girl off her feet and marries her?", I offered up, hopefully.

"Well, Felicity, you ARE part of the office,” she said, wickedly.

"No, no way am I going to something like that in front of an audience."

---

A day or so later, looking at the call I'd just handled, I was suddenly annoyed.

"Alice! That's not fair!"

"Ah; took you long enough to notice, girl." she replied, with a smirk. I noticed that June was barely restraining a case of the giggles.

Alice had set the computer to route Dr. Willis' calls to my station, and my subconscious, noting the instructions, had been dealing with them as Felicity.

She took me into the managers office, which actually mostly gets used to store spare office equipment and supplies. After talking to the big boss, she had indeed negotiated me a small bonus, if I was willing to deal with Dr. Willis' calls as Felicity, when I was on shift. He was a very good client, but nobody liked dealing with him much. He could be quite mercurial, and had the ear of the services owner. But I now suspected he was a closet Anglophile, and I'd accidentally tripped over the ideal way to deal with him. And the money would be useful at school, I told myself, as I acquiesced

---

So despite my earlier pleas to the contrary, Felicity hung around. A week later, I was on shift when Dr. Willis called in for his messages.

"Felicity? Is that you? Am I to understand you decided to stay on, after all."

"Yes, well, the other job I was after fell through, and a girl has to eat."

"I don't suppose you'd be interested in working in a medical office, would you?"

"No, Dr. Willis. My true field is tech writing, I only do office work when I have to."

"Pity; since you started taking my calls, I've had a number of patients linger after their office visits, trying to meet you. They seem quite disappointed when told you are just with my answering service. I can't help but think that with you in the office, they might actually start remembering to cover their co-pays on the way out, and when their next office visits are scheduled." Oh! The old schemer!

"Why, Dr. Willis, you flatterer."

After the call ended, June, who had overheard all that, said "You're a shoe-in for that tip in your Christmas card now, girl."

---

There were attempts to convince me to branch out further, explore whether my theater training could enhance the office ambiance on calls, and relieve the load on the girls on shift by filling in as Felicity (or someone else), I rebuffed them, although one evening, under the influence of a rare second drink, I did extend the repertoire with Susan, who was just a typical soft spoken girl from the midwest. But that was a temporary aberration, or so I thought at the time.

---

Conversation in the office had gotten a little odder since Felicity first appeared, with June making occasional attempts to involve me in the banter of girl talk, which I steadfastly maintained I was not equipped for. I did find I was paying more attention to my clothing and appearance, as well as that of my colleagues. I could now identify more than seven colors, for example.

June started talking even more about her boyfriend. They were having some trouble, and at times, the details she confided bordered on the intimate, making me blush. I could not understand why she felt comfortable confiding them in me. She certainly never shared with Alice, who remained above such petty concerns. Alice remained relatively closed, an enigma.

---

So, typewriter girls. Needless to say, I was not having any part of it. Alice tried to persuade me, on one of the rare evenings when we were short handed, running with just the two of us.

"Oh, come on, Felicity. This is perfect for you. Extremely prim and proper. Demure, even."

"And what makes you think I'm demure?"

"In all the time you've worked here, no mention of a girlfriend, no talk of dates. You go with us for an occasional social drink, and other than that, all I see is studying. You've never even hit on any of the girls you've worked with here in the office, that I've heard about."

"I was with a girl, back in school, but she died of cancer. I've sort of been in mourning ever since. I have my social circle, it's just that their interests aren't shared with any of you at the office."

"Oh? I suppose these are friends of yours from college. So, gaming, comics, SF books, and movies?"

"Yeah, things like that."

"What did you think of the latest Neal Stephenson? I thought he dealt with his problem with endings better than usual. And were you able to get all the way through Anathem? I'd swear I did, but can't remember a darn thing after the initial setup. And, I'd guess you are a Stross fan. And Pratchett? Bujold?"

"I've been reading Pratchett since before Discworld became a series. I bought Falling Free in the original paperback. Now you're scaring me. What, did you hack my Amazon account?"

"I hate to break it to you, but you're a stereotype. In fact, my dear," she said, archly, "so far, I don't think I've seen you deviate from it once. How you dress, the things you like, eat, read, and watch. Your studying, your limited social life. I have a cousin who was in marketing, and she taught me the profiles marketing people use to categorize people, and you fit your little market niche perfectly. You are utterly predictable."

It dawned on me that she was calling me a sheep! I wanted to try to prove my individualism, but the few things I could think of were really personal, and I found myself at a loss. So I tried a different tack.

"Well, I may be a stereotype, but you at least knew it. You could predict I'd know what you were talking about, and that all my friends would, too, I bet. And you and I merely work together. But you! You knew those things, too, and no one here would have a clue. How many of your friends would know those things, let alone know you liked them? So I'm predictable, but you are lying to those people, and HIDING parts of who you are!"

"For that matter, you've heard me speak of gaming, parties, dinner, and movies with my friends in my time here, all of which stitched me up in your stereotype, but I've never heard you speak of your life outside the office, and June assures me that, in all the time she's worked here, neither has she."

She was thunderstruck. I could see her mentally tabulating her friends and considering, and I didn't like what was happening to her face. Finally, she started sobbing, and ran out the door. Before it closed, I could see her turn for the ladies room and not the elevators, at least. Just then the phone at her station rang. I sighed, hit the override, and looked at the screen. Female requested. Barely realizing what I was doing, I dredged up my Susan voice, and dealt with the call. Then, I did something we were only supposed to do under the direst of emergencies, and put things on divert. All the screens turned red. Everything was going to the computer, which would deal with it like an old fashioned answering machine. I went down the hall, and taking a deep breath, entered the ladies room.

In passing, I noticed that it was in better shape than the men's room next to it: better lighting, fresher smelling, the wallpaper was in better shape, and there was a couch where the urinals would have been.

The strained voice of Alice came out of a stall, "Get out of here, this is the ladies room! You can't be in here!"

No way I was going to let her go sit there alone, she was a 'mate. Without thought, I called upon Susan again. "I have to pee, really bad!" and entered the next stall, dropped my jeans, and sat down.

"What are you doing? Get out of here!," Alice said, outraged.

"I'm peeing," I said, still as Susan.

When I finished, I stood up, pulled my clothes up, and flushed. Stopping at the outside of her stall, I rapped lightly, and said, "I'm sorry I said those things. You should come back to the office and berate me some more. Or ignore me, but please, please, PLEASE come back to the office. I put it on redirect."

She gasped, and opened the door, I turned away, so as not to embarrass her, and crossed to the mirror. Waiting to get behind her to herd her back to the office, I needed to kill a little time, so, in a silly mood, I went to the big mirror, and played with my hair, and pooched up my lips, like girls do at the mirrors in the movies. It must have been the right thing, as Alice kept coming, looked at me, and, rolling her eyes, did something to her face with some stuff from her purse, and then led the way out.

Back at the office, I checked the counter; one call, and not for someone that would hit the roof at having been left at the mercy of a machine. Good. "Oh, I took one call before I came after you. The details are on the machine," and with that, started transcribing the recording so it could be read to the recipient when they called for the message.

After which, two calls came in at the same time, and things were busy for a bit.

In the next quiet period, Alice turned to me at the desk, and said, "I'm sorry I called you a stereotype. I'm certain you are an individual. Stereotypes have the characteristics they do because they fit people, people don't try to fit stereotypes; at least, smart ones don't. We good?"

"You know it!"

"But... may I ask a question?"

"Sure."

"Why am I still talking to Susan?"