The phone rang at three in the morning.
No, that didn’t strike me as abnormal; not at first anyway. Anyone who knows me knows I’m never asleep by three.
I answered it. “Hello?” I waited, expecting Brent or possibly Holly. Or maybe even Dan, since I didn’t doubt he could figure out our number if he wanted.
But it was a girl’s voice on the other end; and she sounded nervous. “Hello?” she said tentatively.
I waited about ten seconds, puzzling over the voice. It reminded me of someone, but I couldn’t place it.
There was a deep breath on the other end. “Is someone there?”
“Yes,” I said simply. I checked the time again, just to make sure it really was three in the morning.
“Oh…” She had a tiny shudder in her voice. “I didn’t wake you, did I?”
I almost hung up right then, but I still wanted to know who I was talking to. “No. Who is this?”
“Me? Uh, I’m… doing a survey!”
“At three in the morning?”
“Um…it’s for, uh, insomniacs!”
I frowned skeptically. You have got to be kidding me. “Really?”
“Yes.”
“By calling at three in the morning?”
“Well, yeah,” she said lamely. “If we wake them up, then we know they aren’t insomniacs, and we don’t want to interview them anyway.”
I decided to play along a little longer. “So,” I said, “what’s the first question?”
“Question?”
“This is a survey, right?”
“Of course…” She hesitated. I think she was debating whether or not to plow ahead or save her dignity and hang up. She plowed ahead. “Great!” Her attempt at enthusiasm failed miserably. “So, uh, you have trouble sleeping?”
“Not really,” I answered.
There was silence from the other end. “You don’t?” she asked surprised. “Well then, why are you up?”
“Do you still want to survey me,” I asked, trying to make myself sound confused, “since I’m not an insomniac and all?”
“Uh, no, it’s really just for people who are up this late. Not just insomniacs.”
“Oh, okay.” Sure it is. “Well, I’m up because I get off work around ten at night.”
“I see…” she said. “And, uh, is there a reason for this?”
“Reason?” I asked. “For what?”
“For working late.”
I rolled my eyes. “Hey, you take what you can get. Besides, I’m used to staying up all night.”
“So,” she said, “you are an insomniac.”
I frowned. “If it makes you feel better to call me that, go ahead.”
She didn’t comment on that. “So what do you do for a living?”
“Oh,” I said blandly, “nothing special. I hot-wire cars and sell the stereos on the black market and my roommate’s a male prostitute.”
She went silent. “You’re joking, right?”
“Yes.”
For a second, I thought she was going to hang up on me, but then I heard her take a deep breath. “Seriously, what do you do?”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
I chuckled. “I enter the information on computer order forms. Kind of dull, really.”
“Oh. And what’s your roommate do?”
“You mean the prostitute?”
“Seriously.” She sounded angry.
“He stocks crap at Wal-Mart. Now, anything else personal you want to ask?”
“I…” She sounded flustered. “Your job is hardly something personal. It’s not like I was asking your sexual preference.”
“Straight.” I answered simply. “So’s my roommate. Yours?”
She paused, a little taken aback. “Straight.”
“Cool,” I said. “So… my place or yours?”
She hesitated for about a second. “I… that is…” Then I heard the phone click off.
I laughed to myself as I hung up. And it was just getting interesting.
I got back to work on my resume.
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