Ten Steps to Landing the Perfect Girl (Ten Steps to Landing a Housewares Employee
She saw him for the first time from across the sales floor, just after he’d shaken hands with her supervisor and accepted the open job in housewares. It was a Two-For-Four-Super-S-Mart Saturday, and she had been sweating through a double-shift, not looking forward to closing and the mess that entailed.
He passed by Linda’s stand on the way by, hair that could be shaggy without a double-shellacking of pomade lay thick and close to his neck, his blue shirt open to the second button and untucked from brown slacks hemmed to the ankle.
He hadn’t even made eye contact and she was already hooked.
“Who’s the hunk?” she muttered aloud, completely confusing the nun she’d been cashing out.
***
He was staring at her again. For the fourth time in an hour. Ash reasoned to himself that it wasn’t creepy because she didn’t seem to notice what he was doing.
Or that he existed, he sighed. Two weeks into the job and he tried to force himself to face reality; a pretty girl like Linda was way out of his league. She would never see him, not in a million years.
But in the middle of his big sales pitch for the new Ronco 780, his eyes drifted toward stand number twelve again.
***
Linda kept trying, but Ash simply did. Not. Take. A. Hint. She laughed at his every silly joke, and flirted gently with him during their shared lunch breaks but he didn’t seem to know she was interested in him.
Was he blind? Or maybe gay? Was he with the guy who picked him up after work in that big tan boat of a car?
Linda was confused and frustrated. She’d watch him mop up broken jars of spaghetti sauce and the world would go into a hazy movieish slow-motion, and wind would blow through his hair as he turned toward her, winking, his polyester work uniform peeling back from firm shoulders and rippling arms to reveal…
“Lady, you just scanned my Fresca twice.”
***
His strategy was a simple one. Whenever Ash needed to buy something, he’d go to her register and spout out a fact about whatever he wanted. In the three months since he’d started working for S-Mart, he’d learned more than he wanted to know about how much coffee was worth in Uruguay, what sort of red dye went into an Oscar Meyer hot dog, and who had invented ketchup.
Her eyes were shuttered closed. “That’s nice, Ash,” she said, and turned away.
As a last-ditch effort, he bought himself a blender (he didn’t really need one, but Scotty could always use it as an ice crusher-slash-margarita-maker). Looking her right in the eye, he delivered his very best sales pitch, telling her every single thing that appliance could do.
Ash knew he was getting somewhere. When she handed him his bag their hands brushed, and she blushed.
***
The whole factoid thing was cute, but she didn’t know how to respond to it. Was he trying to impress her or…?
She tied her hair up in blue ribbons; she wore a different shade of lipstick and got a new haircut. Her supervisor reprimanded her for wearing a low-cut blouse to work, but it was worth it when his eyes bugged out when she bent over to pick up a lost receipt.
***
The whole dressing-up-for-him thing was a pretty huge hint that she was interested. At least she was flirting back now. Ash desperately tried to figure out a way to really – truly – impress Linda.
The opportunity finally came when a position opened up in sporting goods. The position would mean a big raise – which would mean more money to treat Linda with all of the respect she deserved. He practiced his sales pitch whenever he had the chance (To the point where Cheryl could recite it – mockingly – in tandem with him), and by the time of his interview he knew the double-barreled shotgun he had been assigned to sell inside and out.
And his pitch? It was superb, filled with action and gesture and color; at one point he climbed up on the counter to exult the joys of its steel blue cobalt exterior. At the very end of his speech he noticed Linda on the outskirts of the small crowd who had gathered to watch him. With great flourish, he’d pointed his rifle at a target and pulled the trigger…
And then rifle kicked back into his face.
***
In a terrible way, it was exactly the opening Linda was looking for. While Ash was home nursing a broken nose she took her chance and showed up at his bachelor apartment with a casserole and a smile.
His roommate – a be-mulleted, plaid-shirt wearing guy called Scott – stared at her lasciviously while she ferried water and soup to Ash. Cheryl, his sister, hovered nearby somewhat worriedly (something Linda would later learn was a habit of hers). She did her best to ignore them all and show off her devoted loyalty to Ash.
Ash? He lapped it up. At some point she could have sworn he had started faking the pain just to get her attention.
***
When he healed up he took her out to the S-Snak Bar. They had frozen pizza and greasy French fries and had (for the very first time) what he would consider an intelligent conversation.
Before they got to the S-Mart Chocco-Nutty Blast, he knew he was hooked.
***
(Years later he’ll look back on this and remember her, remember how sweet and good and nice she was. He’ll pass by her aisle and imagine her standing there, smiling at him, waiting for him to be done with the day so they could cruise away in the Classic. He’ll remember what it was like to kiss her on his way out after a shift. To make out with her in the stock room between crates of ramen on his breaks and smell the Pantene in her hair. To feel young and innocent and good again.
He scowls when someone brings up a new Waring, and asks him what the warranty is. Picking it up with his metallic right hand, Ash went about his business, furious with the world.
After what he’d been through, who cared about blenders?