Who Tricked Bambi? by anonymouse
[Extended remix of Assignment 2 :) ]
She sat in her perfectly tailored gray suit waiting for her job interview. "Bambi!" she fumed. "How am I ever supposed to be taken seriously with a name like Bambi?"
"Relax," said the young man sitting beside her. "That's precisely what the university psychology department's study is all about - perception and preconception."
"But why must I be called Bambi?"
"We could have called you Flower. Or Thumper," he chuckled.
"Yes, but Bambi was a male deer," Alison said. She laughed as if to say 'I give up!'
"A buck."
"A what?"
"A male deer is a buck."
"That's fascinating," Alison said. She breathed deeply and tilted her head back a little to stretch her neck.
"So, you remember everything we discussed?" he asked.
"Yes. Pretend it's a real job interview, answer all questions honestly, and do whatever the interviewer asks me to do. Peter?"
"Yes, Bambi?"
'Stop calling me that!' She fumed again under her breath. "What happens if he offers me the job?"
"It won't happen," he replied.
"How can you be so sure?"
"The interview 'is' the job," Peter said. "The man you're about to see is a test subject, just like you. He's been briefed, just as you have."
"Oh." Alison thought for a moment and then asked, "What is the 'job' I'm supposed to have applied for?"
"Exotic dancer," Peter smiled and winked at Alison.
Alison felt suddenly numb. "Exotic..."
A voice from the speakerphone on the receptionist's desk crackled to life. "Send in Bambi."
Peter immediately stood and strode across the reception area.
By the time Alison struggled to her feet, the office door had already opened. A tall, sparrow-boned woman rushed from the room toward the exit. Her hair appeared disheveled; her glasses seemed unbalanced as if hastily put on. Her hands clutched the lapels of her gray suit's jacket; she was hunched over and, when she passed Alison, she briefly glanced in her direction. Alison immediately sensed the other woman's distress, but no words were exchanged.
A young man also emerged from the office. His broad smile and exuberant demeanor were stark contrast to the woman Alison had just seen. He paused a moment to remove a small videocassette from the camera in his hands.
"Here," he said to Peter. He handed Peter the camera. "I'll see you later back at the lab."
"Later, Rick," said Peter.
"Hello!" Rick said to Alison. He didn't stop and then disappeared from the reception area just as quickly as the other woman.
Alison's hands now clasped the lapels of her suit's jacket. Her heart pounded and she became aware that her eyes burned from lack of blinking.
"Hurry up, Bambi!" Peter stood in the doorway and motioned her with his hands.
The dread Alison felt when she stepped past Peter into the office was palpable. It wasn't an office in the regular sense, other than it was a large room with wood-paneled walls, non-descript carpet and an acoustic tile ceiling. There were no office desks or filing cabinets. Just three mottled brown leather sofas arranged in a semicircle around a golden metal pole in the center of the room.
"Hi Peter," a man said.
"Ron, I'd like to introduce you to Bambi," Peter said. "Alison, meet Mr. Jenkins."
Alison released the tense grip she held on her jacket and lightly shook hands with the man. His hand felt hot and sweaty to touch; a sensation that caused her to then discreetly wipe her hand on the leg of her trousers.
"Hello," Alison said.
"Hello," she repeated, when she realized her first attempt hadn't produced any sound at all.
"Please, make yourself comfortable!" Ron said. He gestured with a wave of his arm toward the first of the three sofas.
Alison sat as directed, though on the very edge of the seat and with a very straight back. Her hands balled into small fists that she rested on her knees. She stared down at the man's shoes when he walked past - scuffed, old, black leather shoes that appeared to be disproportionately large compared to his squat stature.
Peter sat opposite and raised the camera to begin filming. Alison felt conscious of the fact he had the lens aimed at her, but she refused to look in that direction. Instead, she turned her attention to the man in the sofa next to hers.
Alison couldn't look at him for more that a second at a time. In her mind, she assembled the mental snapshots of his ruddy, bespectacled face, together with a forehead that glistened with small beads of perspiration. His forehead rose well beyond the point where a hairline should begin and disappeared into a tangle of wiry, flyaway hair.
"So, tell me, Bambi..." Ron leaned forward slightly. "Tell me all about you."
Alison cringed, both at the mention of the name, and at the lecherous tone the man used to say it. She glanced in the direction of Peter for support, but quickly looked away again when she remembered the camera focused on her. "I..." Alison shrugged. "I don't know."
The man leaned back in his seat, rested his elbows on its arms, and tapped his fingertips together. "For example, what made you sign up for this experiment?" he asked.
Alison glanced at his eyes for the first time. They were dark, closely set and slightly distorted through the thick lenses of the glasses they hid behind. "I don't know," she replied. "Bored, I suppose."
"Bored? What do you do when you're not volunteering to be a research subject?"
The first thing that came to Alison's mind was, 'Sit by the pool all day, read romance novels and drink martinis.' "Nothing," Alison said.
"Nothing? I can see how that could be boring. But really, what do you do? You must do something!"
Alison thought deeply for a moment and then said, "I don't do anything. I'm a housewife."
Ron turned his head to Peter for a moment, and then looked back at Alison. "So, Bambi is married, is she?"
Alison sensed her answer wasn't one the man expected. "No. I used to be."
"Use to be," Ron said. "But not anymore?"
"No," Alison replied. She could tell he was happier with this answer, but wasn't sure why he should be so curious.
"But you said you don't work? How do you pay the bills?"
"I have an..." Alison was about to say, 'Inheritance.' However, somehow, this didn't feel appropriate to her. "I, I mean, my husband. My ex-husband; he left me the house and a few other things."
"So what you're saying is, you're a lady of leisure, out there in the suburbs, and bored," Ron laughed.
Alison's sudden guilt caused her to blush. "Yes," she confessed.
"And now you want to be an exotic dancer," Ron said.
Alison looked suddenly up at his face. Her mouth felt suddenly dry; her pulse quickened. She stared mutely at him for a long moment.
"That's what you're here for, isn't it?"
"Well, yes," Alison eventually said.
"Good! In that case, Bambi, let's begin!" Ron clapped his hands together.
"Now?"
"Yes."
"Here?"
"Of course!"
Alison looked past the man to the windows of the office. The broad expanse of glass captured a view of the cityscape outside, and the office tower across the street. This alarmed Alison. She could see people in their offices through her window just as surely as they could see her through theirs.
"Don't be shy, Bambi. Dance for me," Ron said.
"But, what about the..." Alison nodded in the direction of the windows.
"We're twenty floors up, Bambi. Nobody can see you."
The statement was patently untrue but Alison's intuition told her that to argue the point would be futile. 'Do whatever he says,' a memory of Peter's voice resounded in her head.
Alison resigned herself to the embarrassment and humiliation she felt lay ahead. Without a further word, she stood and smoothed down the fabric of her suit pants and jacket. "Is there any music?"
anonymouse
