Damned

Really, all the Kennedys are hereabouts, but that larger fact might not be such a great selling tool.

Still, despite the pain from her cancer and the sickening side effects of her treatments, the Memphis lady has her reservations about abandoning her life.

I warn her that in no way do people simply arrive in Hell and achieve some instantaneous type of enlightenment. Nobody finds themselves locked within a grimy cell, then slaps a palm to their forehead and says, "No duh! I've been a total asshole"

No one's histrionics are magically resolved. If anything, people's character flaws spin out of control. In Hell, bullies remain bullies. Angry people are still angry. People in Hell pretty much keep doing the negative behavior which earned them a one-way ticket.

And, I warn the cancer lady, don't expect any guidance or mentoring from the demons. Not unless you're palming them a constant supply of Chick-O-Sticks and Heath bars. The demonic bureaucracy, they might pretend to shuffle some papers in an officious manner, then promise to review your file, but their attitude is: Well, you're in Hell, so you must've done something. In that way, Hell is awfully passive-aggressive. As is earth. As is my mother.

If you believe Leonard, this is how Hell breaks people down—by permitting them to act out to greater and greater extremes, becoming vicious caricatures of themselves, earning fewer and fewer rewards, until they finally realize their folly. Perhaps, I muse over the telephone, that is the one effective lesson which one learns in Hell.

Depending on her mood, Judy Garland can still be more frightening than any demon or devil you might run across.

Sorry. I have not actually seen Judy Garland. Or Jackie O. Forgive me my small lie. After all, I am in Hell.

In a worst-case scenario, I tell the woman, if the Big C does kill her and she ends up in the Pit, she needs to look me up. I'm Maddy Spencer, phone bank number 3,717,021, position twelve. I'm four-foot-nine, wear eyeglasses, and sport the way-coolest new silver, ankle-strap high heels anyone has ever seen.

The phone bank where I work is located at Hell headquarters, I instruct the dying woman. You just go past the Great Ocean of Wasted Sperm. Hang a left at the gushing River of Steaming-hot Vomit.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Babette headed my way. In closing, I wish the cancer lady good luck with her chemo, and warn her not to smoke too much spliff for the nausea, since reefer is no doubt what got me express-mailed to my personal forever in the fiery pit. Before ending the call I say, "Now remember, ask for Madison Spencer. Everybody knows me and vice versa. I'll show you the ropes."

Just as Babette steps up beside me, I say, "Bye," and end the phone call.

Already the autodialer has another telephone ringing within my headset. On the filthy little screen reads a number with a Sioux Falls area code, where the window of dinnertime must just now be opening. In this fashion, we begin our shift by annoying people in Great Britain, then the Eastern United States, then the Midwest, the West Coast, etc.

Standing beside me, Babette says, "Hey."

Covering the mouthpiece of my headset, cupping one hand over it, I say, "Hey," in return. I mouth the words, Thanks for the shoes... .

Babette winks, saying, "No biggie." She folds her arms across her chest, leans back a smidgen, peering at me, and says, "I'm thinking maybe we should change your hair." Squinting, Babette says, "I'm thinking, maybe—bangs."

At merely the idea—bangs!—my butt's already bouncing little bounces in the seat of my chair. Within my earpiece, a voice answers the call, "Hello?" The voice sounds muffled and garbled with a mouthful of partially masticated dinner food.

To Babette, I nod my head enthusiastically. Into the phone, I say, "We're conducting a consumer survey to track purchase patterns for common household items... ."

Babette lifts her hand, taps the wrist with the index finger of her opposite hand, and mouths, What's the time?

In response, I mouth, August.

And Babette shrugs and walks away.

Over the next few hours, I run across an elderly man dying of kidney failure. A middle-aged woman apparently losing her battle against lupus. We talk for an hour, easy. I meet another man who's alone, trapped in a cheap apartment, dying of congestive heart failure. I meet a girl about my same age, thirteen, who's dying from AIDS. This last one, her name is Emily. She lives in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.

All of these dying folks, I pitch them on relaxing, not being too attached to their lives, and not ruling out the possibility of relocating to Hell. No, it's not fair, but only the late-stage folks will allow me to harass them with thirty or forty questions, they're so strung-out from their treatments or they're so alone and frightened.