Iris Has Free Time

Table of Contents

 

 

 

 

 

To my parents, Arthur and Popy Smyles
+
To Frederic Tuten, my Virgil, for seeing me through the fire

Because Dante the character is a fictional creation of Dante the poet, the reader should remember that the character’s feelings do not always correspond to those of the poet.... Indeed, on a general level, the kindness and compassion of Dante the character often contrasts with the feelings of Dante the poet, who, after all, has devised excruciating torments with which to punish his characters, many of whom are historical individuals with whom Dante was acquainted in life.

 

SPARKNOTES: THE INFERNO

To be an old man and finished at twenty-three . . .

STÉPHANE MALLARMÉ, LETTER 1864

Looking back, the vintage 1930s red and green tartan suit may have been a touch too much. But it was the most conservative thing I owned. And I
did
look great in it, I noted, crouching down on the ledge of the bathtub to check myself in the medicine cabinet mirror. Just like Rosalind Russell at the news desk in
His Girl Friday
. There was no way they wouldn’t hire me!

I skipped out the door, walking briskly to generate my own heat. I’d not worn a jacket for fear of corrupting my look and the sun was all but ignoring me. In the corner of the sky there it stood, aloof and cold, as if the lavish heat of summer were suddenly an embarrassment. Everywhere there is heartbreak, I thought, looking up at a thin tree, its leaves clinging desperately to branches that wanted no more to do with them. What a cad the fall is.

At the corner, I opened my newspaper. A reporter had solicited job-seeking advice from human resources personnel all over Manhattan. “Confidence is everything. You need to sell yourself!” one said. “The biggest mistake job-seekers make is not adequately preparing for the interview,” said another. “Ask yourself before you get there, ‘Would I hire me?’ If the answer is ‘Yes’ you’ve dramatically increased your chances.” The light changed. I turned the page to see what advice they gave if the answer was “No,” but the article was over.

I arrived at the convention center, at the head of a long line of applicants dressed somberly in gray and blue. I lifted my mesh veil. “Is this whole line for the job fair?”

“It starts around the corner,” a gray and blue man answered, in a voice that was also gray and blue. He motioned far behind him.

“I’m on the list,” I said, biting my lip. This is code in Manhattan: That you’re not on the list doesn’t matter; you should be.

He looked at me blankly. “What list?”

I walked the whole block and half the next one before finding the end, then took out my résumé and began looking it over. Four years in the city only to end up out in the cold.... I sighed and unpinned my pillbox hat; it was pulling my hair too tightly and the bobby pins were giving me a headache.

Two hours later, I was ushered into a great bustling hall. Booths! Banners! Balloons! “Free Gifts!” The Hearst table was doling out York Peppermint Patties. Hachette Filipacchi Media, pencils etched with the company’s name.
Star
was offering back issues, pencils etched with the company’s name,
and
York Peppermint Patties. I dug my hand into a bowl of caramels at
Us Weekly
, popped one into my mouth, and surveyed the room—always my first move when attending a party.

I got on line for the men’s magazine
Maxim,
behind a slightly nerdy yet well-put-together Yale grad. I knew he’d gone to Yale because the reporter who was interviewing people for a story on the current recession and its effect on recent college graduates, asked him.

The summer after Yale, he interned at a local newspaper in Connecticut, he told her, and went on to explain how difficult his job search had been even with his three languages and two internships at distinguished publishing houses here in New York and in Shanghai—he said something in Chinese, they both laughed—because the job market was just that bad right now, and so he was willing to try anything. This fair seemed like a good opportunity. He sighed. Perhaps talking to someone face-to-face, rather than just blindly sending out his résumé and performing millions of follow-up phone calls, would make the difference.

“And what about you?” the reporter asked, turning her attention to me. “What brings you to the job fair?”

“My mom,” I said, rolling my eyes. “She saw the ad in the
Times
and suggested I come. Parents, you know?” I began to laugh and waited for the two of them to join in.

The reporter stared, then thanked the Yale grad and disappeared into the crowd. The Yale grad turned away, too. Nervously, I worked to straighten the seams on my stockings. What
had
I been thinking when I put this on?

When my turn came fifteen minutes later, I removed my kidskin glove and gave the HR rep a firm hand. “Etiquette guides don’t require women to remove their gloves prior to shaking hands, but if women and men are to share the workplace, I believe they should be held to the same standards. I’m Iris.”

A pale, bespectacled boy a few years my senior, looked back. “How modern.”

He rattled off a list of stock questions, which I answered the same I would any man asking to buy me a drink. The key is not to appear too interested, while not suggesting complete indifference either. I flashed him a look that said,
We both know what you want,
a look that said,
No, I’m not that kind of girl—how dare you!—but I’d be happy to exchange a little witty banter while I down the whiskey you’ve so generously provided.

He looked down at my résumé. “Wow, you interned at
The New Yorker
. Did you apply there?”

“Nope.”

He looked up.

I gave the line a tug.

“I just felt like, ‘been there, done that,’ you know? Also, I dated a few guys in the office so it would’ve been awkward.”

He adjusted his glasses.

“This is actually my first interview,” I added, and flashed a reassuring smile. I could tell he was nervous.

“What have you been doing since graduation?”

“I was in Greece. My mom is Greek and I have family there so I go every summer. I stayed longer this year though, figuring I probably wouldn’t be able to get away much once I get a job. What did you do for the summer?”

“I worked.”

“Cool. Where at?”

“
Maxim
,” he said, looking down. “It says you went to NYU.”

“Yes, I started out studying Acting at The Tisch School of the Arts, but then in my junior year decided I wanted something more practical, so I transferred to the Gallatin School for Individualized Study and designed an interdisciplinary concentration in Literature and Philosophy. Also, I write poetry. Mostly free verse.” I guided him to that line on my résumé and to the three directly below it: “make my own paper,” “Reiki massage,” “fourteen years tap dancing.”

“Wow.”

“I also play the saxophone, but had to cut a few things in order to keep my résumé under three pages.” I directed him to the list of plays from which I’d performed scenes and monologues while still at Tisch.

“
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
,” he read aloud. “What’s ‘Alexander Technique?’”

“Theory of standing.”

“Sense Memory, Voice . . .” he went on, reading the names of NYU’s most competitive, invitation-only drama workshops, classes I’d had to audition for, classes that cost my parents upwards of twenty thousand dollars a year, classes that suddenly sounded preposterous. “Advanced Movement, Speech. . . .” Apparently, in order to master the basic skills most humans pick up during infancy—walking and talking—I had had to undergo elaborate and expensive training while at college. I blushed.

“Do you type?”

“Not well,” I said, trying to smile. I had lied before, but in this context where a little white lying was expected, my desire always to defy expectations prevented me.

“Do you know Excel?”

“No.”

“Could you learn?”

“Probably not. I find it very difficult to learn things I don’t already know.” Then, remembering the advice that I try to sell myself, I added, “But I’m sure I’d pick it up
eventually
.”

At last he lowered my résumé. “So, tell me. Why do
you
think we should hire you?”

Here was the big question. The one I’d worried about the whole walk over. I summoned all of what remained of my confidence and did my best to answer without crying.

“You shouldn’t,” I said. Perhaps he might hire me for my refreshing honesty? I laughed faintly, then added, “Just kidding,” and gave him jazz hands.

“Fair enough. So why do you want to work for
Maxim
?”

I played it cool. “I just went to the booth with the shortest line.”

“Is there anything you
like
about the magazine?”

“Couldn’t say as I’ve never read it. To be honest I don’t really read magazines. They’re expensive, and for the same price I’d much rather read a classic like
Madame Bovary
.”

“Yes, that’s a good book,” he answered politely. “Given your interests, Iris, I’m wondering why you want to work at a magazine at all.”

“That’s a good question . . .” I heard myself say, for at some point during the conversation, I’d lost control of the vehicle. It was like the way survivors of car crashes describe the moments leading up to impact. Everything slows down, your senses become keen, and while you are completely aware of the impending collision, you are also unable to stop it. “. . . I suppose I feel about working the way Thomas Paine felt about government, ‘at its best, being but a necessary evil; at its worst, an intolerable one.’” I paused. “A magazine job just seemed like the least bad. I’m actually working on a novel right now. That’s my main thing. Also, I draw cartoons. Does
Maxim
publish cartoons?”

He thanked me for coming and moved to file my résumé. Then he invited me to arm-wrestle The
Maxim
Man. “That’s our little gimmick for the fair,” he said smiling, and motioned to a small card table set up just next to his booth, behind which stood a man, six-foot-two, covered in red and blue lycra.

The
Maxim
Man’s superhero costume stretched over his whole face and body, so I couldn’t actually see him, though I was able to make out the contour of his nose and cast of his eyes. He held out his hand. I raised mine to say, “I’ll pass,” but he grabbed it firmly and wouldn’t let go. “Okay, okay,” I sighed and, like a good sport, planted my elbow on the table.

There, dressed like a 1939 career-gal and struggling arm-to-arm with a superhero, I reviewed the details of my disastrous interview, consoling myself that at least no one I knew had witnessed it.
Forget it, Iris!
I told myself, blinking back tears and gazing up into the shady hollows behind The
Maxim
Man’s lycra-covered eyes. I was looking directly into them, wondering what I was going to do with my life, now that it had officially started, when it hit me: The
Maxim
Man was Donald.