Time and Tide By Sarah Morris
That’s the seventh door to slam in my face this morning and it’s not yet ten o’clock. I take a step back on the balcony that wraps around the resort and look to my left at the Atlantic Ocean. Need to calm down. Find some perspective. Can’t let this neg me out. (Golden rule #1: reps must stay positive. Negativity loses deals.)
Even in my early days as a rookie I didn’t get this much rejection. But, as I tried to explain to Dave earlier, today was always going to be a strange day. Flowers piled high against the gates of Kensington Palace. Elton John warbling a new version of Candle in the Wind. Two young lads walking behind their mam’s coffin as the whole world watches. And every Brit in Tenerife glued to their bloody TV screens, dumb with grief.
Me? I don’t have time for grief, especially on Saturdays. And neither does Dave.
‘Carly, I don’t care if the entire Royal Family’s been wiped out by Tony Blair with a machine gun.’
‘But it’s the funeral today. No one’s going to want to leave their apartment –’
‘Come on, Carls. How long you been doing this now? Basic training. If you assume you make?’
‘An ass out of u and me.’
‘Good girl. Now get out there and bring me back an up.’ Up: prospective buyer, from the old days when reps waited on chairs in corridors outside sales decks to be told ‘you’re up’ when it’s their turn to pitch.
I fix a bright smile on my face and knock on the last door of my weekly ups sheet. At least once this is over I can head to the beach, which for once won’t be rammed with fat red Brits on sunbeds, swatting away locals trying to make a peseta selling fruit and donuts.
‘Chicken and chips!’ the locals laugh back at them, in reference to the average Brit’s staple diet on Tenerife.
The door opens quickly, as though the person behind it didn’t have to waddle over from the sofa like the last seven did.
‘Oh, hi! Mrs…’ Caught off-guard, my mind goes blank and I check my ups sheet.
‘Call me Pam, love.’ The woman (sixties, grey-blonde hair, northern accent) steps aside, holding the door open. Her floral print kaftan over her swimming costume is damp as though she’s just come back from the pool. ‘You’re from the timeshare company, aren’t you? I wondered when you’d turn up. We want our tour and free car hire. Come on in and meet Terry.’
#
By the time we get to the Ocean Beach Club, I know that Pam and Terry live near Lancaster. This is great because I’m from Cumbria, the other side of Morecambe Bay, so we already have a connection. Pam is a social worker, she loves her job – talked about nothing else in the taxi – but she’s retiring next year. Terry is on long-term sick leave (yeah right, benefits cheat). They have two grown-up kids and five grandchildren; I know all their names, ages and hobbies. And I know Pam and Terry’s shoe sizes. This is Dave’s knowledge test: reps can’t begin pitching until we know the up’s shoe size, name of childhood pet or some other random fact.
‘Knowledge is power. The more you know about them, the easier it is to close them.’
Now that I’ve finished my warm up (gain trust, make friends, gather information), I can move on to the sizzle (smell those sausages sizzling in the pan? Bet you want a sausage now).
We’re standing on the balcony of the show apartment with panoramic ocean views. Much better views than Pam and Terry’s crap apartment in Playa de las Americas. I see them looking at the shimmering pool with water slides below.
‘Can you imagine Ruby, Courtney, Jason, Tom and Emily down there?’ I laugh. ‘I bet Courtney would get that swimming badge in no time! And I can just see Tom reading the next Harry Potter book under that palm tree by the pool.’
Sizzle sizzle
‘Ey, you’ve got a good memory for names, love,’ Pam smiles back at me. Her smile is warm and seems genuine. Normally when an up smiles at me it’s because they think they’re about to get a lifetime of luxury holidays for the weekly cost of a packet of fags. (The Silly Money Close: works best with smokers.)
Terry makes a throaty noise and I glance at him. He’s barely said a word so far, letting Pam do all the talking, but that doesn’t mean he’s not the decision-maker. I need to work on him before I take them to the sales deck. Dave won’t be happy if we get to the close only to find that Terry’s mind is still at home in Lancaster.
Or could Terry be more sentimental than Pam? Maybe he’s less bothered about the free car hire that ups get for coming on a tour and would rather be watching TV back in their apartment. I turn to face Pam and Terry, a filter of confusion over my still-bright smile. (A mini Columbo Close: my favourite, cos I used to love watching Columbo with my dad.)
‘So, guys, if you don’t mind me asking… how come you weren’t watching the funeral?’
Pam moves closer to Terry as though shielding him from me and takes his hand. Terry stares at the ocean and I sense he is now even more distant. Shit. I’m going to lose this deal if I can’t connect with him as well as Pam.
‘Terry’s got prostate cancer, Carly.’ Pam looks scared but she speaks gently as though Terry is someone I care about. ‘We don’t know how much time he’s got left, maybe a few months. I won’t waste a day watching the funeral of someone I never met. I need to save my tears for –’ Pam lets out a loud, barking sob and Terry’s shoulders sag towards her. He puts an arm around her and she mumbles, ‘Sorry, love. I’m fine.’
I feel awkward, like I’m snooping on a private moment between them. Then I realise, now Terry’s face has softened, that he looks a bit like my dad. Big nose. Kind eyes.
‘I’m so sorry to hear that, Pam,’ I say quietly. I realise that I really am a bit sorry for this couple I plan to make a grand from then never see again.
Pam blows her nose and smiles at me. ‘Thanks, Carly, love. Don’t be sad though; you’ve been a real tonic. You keep being your happy self. Cheers us right up.’
‘Yeah, but,’ I feel weird asking, like I’m stepping out of myself, but I want to know. ‘Why are you doing this tour? We’ve still got two more resorts to see and…’ I don’t say that it could take another couple of hours after that to close them on the sales deck.
Pam looks surprised. ‘For our kids, love. And the grandchildren. This is our last holiday here; we’re giving our timeshare week to them. And I know you can convert our week to points, which will give them better holidays. God knows they can’t afford much, so we’ll pay to convert the week to points, then they’ll be sorted for life, won’t they?’
My answer catches in my throat and I turn away as though to admire another aspect of the view. My face feels hot, and not from the sun. I look through the sliding balcony doors at the show apartment with its glass dining table, white faux leather sofa and plastic chandelier. It’s all fake. Including me.
#
I’m sitting on the beach at Playa de las Americas with a bottle of beer. But just one beer – I don’t want to dull the memory of Dave raging around the empty sales deck. He knew I’d been on a tour all morning.
‘Why the hell did you let them go?’
‘I didn’t let them go, Dave. I told them to go back to their resort and enjoy the rest of their holiday. He’s got terminal cancer. They haven’t got time to be conned out of their life savings.’
‘What did you say?’
In calling it out, I’d broken golden rule #2.
‘I said timeshare is a con, Dave. A massive con. Which is why the people at the top of our game end up dead or in prison.’ I paused. ‘I quit.’
‘What?’ Dave’s laugh was almost hysterical. ‘You can’t quit, you stupid bitch. Where would you go? Yeah, the lap dancing clubs will have you but you won’t earn a fraction of what you get here.’
‘I mean, I’m quitting Tenerife. All of it. The lies, the drugs.’ I looked at Dave. ‘You.’
Dave had never acknowledged our relationship. It wasn’t encouraged, managers sleeping with their reps. He looked at me in disgust.
‘Yeah? Where you going then, Carls? You’ve got nothing. And don’t think I’ll pay out on your deals this month.’
I’ve been staring at the ocean waves for over an hour; time I’ve never given myself since arriving on this island. The tide is going out now. I imagine it coming in somewhere else. Morecambe Bay.
Dave is right. I’ve got nothing. Except time. But that’s more than Diana – with her tiaras and her yachts and her millionaire boyfriend – has got. And it’s more than Terry’s got.
‘I’ve booked my flight, Dave. I’m going home. I’m going to retrain as a social worker.’
‘A social worker? Oh that’s bloody brilliant. That’s the best thing I’ve heard yet.’
‘Yeah. Pam, my up from today, she’s a social worker. We had a long chat. She’s going to help me. And I’m going to help my mam and my kid brother – not just by sending them money every month.’ Dave took a step towards me and I strengthened my voice. ‘I’m going to look after them properly. Like I promised my dad.’
I empty the rest of my beer onto the black volcanic sand, stand up painfully – my ribs are bruised from where I crashed into the filing cabinet – and walk away from the receding tide. Time to go home.
Judges Comments
In Sarah Morris's Time and Tide, the runner up in our Change Short Story Competition, the narrator Carly has a meeting that forces her to confront everything she's been led to believe about her job, her lifestyle, and the ethics she's been practising. Told with a frank first-person immediacy, we see everything from Carly's perspective but Sarah Morris has an eye for a wider view, carefully planting details so that the reader understands before Carly does the moral ambiguities of her work selling timeshares. There's the horrible jargon: up, sizzle, neg me out. And there's Dave, tastelessly chasing sales opportunities on the day of Princess Diana's funeral, who is setting the pace for Carly.
By contrast, Pam and Terry, the prospective timeshare buyers, are more bothered with human priorities. Sarah gives Pam in particular a warm persona: in the midst of her own grief as she prepares for Terry's death, she's trying to arrange some happiness for her family, and she treats Carly like a human being. She's innocent – it never occurs to her that Carly is there to force a sale – but her goodness and the couple's circumstances are the catalyst for Carly to see her own life in a new way.
Time and Tide is a straightforward tale where change happens suddenly, but Sarah's narrative choices, including the difference in tone between the italicised reported speech between Carly and Dave and the increasing uncertainy creeping into the interior monologue, give it a dramatic immediacy that works really well, and makes for a satisfying story with an immensely rewarding conclusion.