The Liar
By Mark Anderson
I have never been comfortable
with the phrase "to be honest"
as if by not saying it
before or after
whatever it is I'm saying
is a lie
Then again, what do I know?
I lie all the time
Reverse Mortgage
By Michael Herman
This morning I was sitting in the breakroom doing the crossword. It was the USA Today puzzle, not the New York Times. The clues aren’t as difficult but considering I’m a scavenger I can hardly be choosy. It, at the very least, gives me the sense of accomplishment of being able to finish it. Sometimes I have to quit the Times or take the puzzle back to my desk to look up answers on the Internet. I’d feel worse about it if it weren’t just idle pursuit.
“Excuse me,” the short squat one said. “We need your help.”
I looked up from number 39 down “It may be about a foot”, four letters. There were three of them. The oldest looked to be in her fifties. The next one was in her forties. She’d asked the question. The last one stood there meekly. She looked to be about nineteen years old. Something about the general similarity of their appearance made me think they were related.
“Shoe,” I said out loud. “S-H-O-E, shoe.”
I penciled the letters into the boxes and turned my attention back to the trio.
“Okay,” I said. “What can I help you with?”
“We need to know about mortgages.”
Someone had apparently told these three about my previous job prospecting sub-prime mortgages before the big crash happened. Four years ago I would’ve considered this a hot lead, people who approached me. Now I wondered what use I could be to them.
“Sure, I know a few things about them. What do you need to know?”
“We were just watching the television,” said the fifty-ish one. “We heard about reverse mortgages and they said they were for old people. What are they?”
I’d been someone who had prospected sub-prime mortgages. What that mean was then, just like now, I was really good at getting people to believe in me, even if I was just talking out of my ass. I straightened my posture and leaned forward on the edge of the table.
“I’m not sure. Why would you need one?”
I was using a trick I’d used in those heady days. It was less important for me to answer a question than to find out what the person I was talking to wanted in the end. Back in the day, of course, I would subtly steer them towards wanting a three-year ARM. Now I was just genuinely interested.
The three of them looked at each other. They all knew why they would be asking me this question. In their mind, they would come to me to get the information, take that information and then make their decision. What they were asking each other now was how much they should let on, how much I should be allowed to know about their decision. The fifty-ish one was the first to speak.
“It’s our mother…” she said.
“Shhhh,” said the young one.
The fifty-ish one held her hand up to nullify her objection.
“It is our mother. She is very sick and she cannot pay her medical bills. The man in the commercial said a reverse mortgage was a good way to pay for outstanding medical bills.”
“Hmmm,” I said. “Well, I don’t know that much about them. Is it okay if I talk to someone who might and then get back to you?”
Again, I was using a technique from my earlier career. I knew exactly what I was going to do was go look up “reverse mortgages” on the Internet and read all about them until I felt I had a handle on what they are and what their pitfalls were. In a real pinch, I might even actually call someone who knew about them like my dad or one of his banker friends. The point was when I came back, my opinion would carry much more authority because I’d “talked to someone who knows about this sort of thing” and they’d “told” me what I was going to say anyway. This established trust which I would then use to guide people on to the next level.
They all looked inward at each other. Again they were deciding how much I, a complete stranger, would be allowed to help them make their decision. I could tell this was something which had caused their family a great deal of stress for a long time coming and they were running out of options and feeling desperate. Nothing was off the table for them and yet they were probably wary from seeing other better options turn bad. I’m sure it even occurred to them to just go look it up on the Internet themselves.
“Okay,” the squat, forty-ish one said finally. “We want to know what you can find out.”
“Alright,” I said. “I’ll let you know what I find. What are your names?”
They told me their names and I stood up to leave. Ten minutes and a stop at the bathroom later, I was back at my desk and logged into the worldwide Internet. I called up a browser window and typed in the words “reverse mortgage.”
to be continued
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