“That’s tempting, but no thanks. I’m trying to cut down on my ‘morning commute gambling’. Have a good day.” And with that, Dale snatches the $10 bill from the unusual man behind him. “Sorry for startling you like that.” He says to the large (and now VERY awake) man seated next to him.
“Oh, don’t worry about it. I’m the one who should be apologizing. I mean, how rude is it to fall asleep on a perfect stranger? I’m just so horribly jetlagged after my flight from Tokyo and I rarely take public transit. There were no Sumo-sized rental cars at the airport, so this is the only way I could get downtown.” The large man smiles politely.
“Whoa. You’re sumo wrestle in Japan?! You’re kidding me!!”
“Yeah, I’ve been living and competing there for seven years and came back to meet with a promotions company and a public relations firm about starting up a North American Sumo League. I hope it takes off, but I’m worried about how easily I can monitor what’s going on here once I get back to Japan. I’m not sure I can entirely trust the Promo or PR guys to maintain the integrity of Sumo or my reputation..”
“I use to work for a PR company and they are notorious for ruining stuff like that.” says Dale, taking a sip from his thermos mug.
“Really? What did you do there?” asks the Sumo, shifting in his seat to face Dale.
“I did market research for new campaigns. We would ‘feel out’ the market to see if new ideas would work or not.”
“Do you still do work like that now?” he asks excitedly.
“No. I really liked the work, but after some ethically questionable project changes, a few large portfolios tanked and I got laid off. Right now I’m doing temp work while I look for something else.”
There’s a brief pause for a few stops while the Sumo appears to be pondering something. When the bus jerkily starts moving after a stop, the Sumo turns quickly to face Dale.
“How’d you like to be my North American business representative?”
“What?!? We don’t even know each other!!” Dale is blown away.
“I’m Terry Palatzo. It’s a pleasure to met you….” Terry leaves the sentence hanging and extends his hand to Dale.
“Dale. Dale Merton.” Dale shakes his hand.
“So… how does 60k a year sound?”
Does Dale…
…accept the job?
…ignore Terry and go to work?
