ONCE UPON A TIME, a friend of my family married a "collector" for a big-name bookie. Supposedly, she was unaware that her husband, a linebacker of a man we’ll call Big Guido, was a high-rolling henchman — that is, until the cops infiltrated the bookie’s crooked enterprise and discovered Big Guido’s fingerprints (or in this case, fistprints) everywhere. Not surprisingly, she filed for divorce and Big Guido spent a few years crafting license plates in the slammer.

Trust me when I say that Garth Brooks don’t know jack about friends in low places. Although Big Guido’s been out of the pen for nearly 10 years now, his Rolodex remains a pop-up book of Who’s Who in Really, Really Low Places. And it’s an unspoken understanding among those still in contact with him that his shady connections can score anything. Call this guy on Monday evening, ask for a three-toed sloth, and by Tuesday afternoon, the animal will be lying on your doorstep. Ask politely, and it’ll be headless in your ex’s bed.

So five summers ago, when I was a junior in college and needed a lucrative part-time job, I knew whom to see.

"Big Guido," I said, staring at the burst capillaries mapping his face, "I need a summer job."

He sat back clumsily, moving in the awkward way a man crowded by his belly moves. "Can you answer phones?" he asked.

Of course.

Big Guido’s hairy-knuckled fingers flipped through the legendary Rolodex, slipped out a business card, and punched a few numbers on his phone. In less than 10 minutes, he’d scheduled me a perfunctory interview for a well-paying receptionist’s position at a company called something like Eden Entertainment. I’d be meeting with the owner, an "old friend" of Big Guido’s named Beau.

Sounded good to me. Despite Big Guido’s seamy associations, criminal record, and affinity for thick, gold neckwear, I trusted him. He had a big heart (both literally and figuratively), and his teddy-bear-like demeanor somehow managed to nullify his reputation as a shin-smashing thug. To his acquaintances, Big Guido seemed like a greasy-haired nice guy who simply chose poorly when it came to friendships, careers, and style. Besides, he’d come through once again.

But three days later, when I learned what my responsibilities would be at Eden Entertainment, I had to rethink my benign perception of Big Guido. Yes, I should’ve asked questions about the job. But why didn’t Big Guido mention that I’d have to pretend to be a melon-chested stripper?

The entranceway of Eden Entertainment didn’t look like the threshold of any professional office I’d ever seen. Situated on the second floor of a seemingly abandoned, flaking-paint city building, it had no windows, no foot traffic, no doorbell, and no EDEN ENTERTAINMENT sign. Only a dusty set of stairs and a hulking metal door.

Confused, I knocked. Thump, thump, thump.

Thirty seconds passed. No answer.

Thump, thump.

Slowly, the door slid open. Standing behind it was a svelte girl with crimson lips, a tangerine tan, and a moussed bramble of ponytail clustered at the top of her head.

"Hello!" she squeaked. "Can I, like, help you?" Her nipple-hugging belly shirt looked like it had been shrink-wrapped to fit.

"I have an interview with Beau."

"He’s not, like, here!" Nips squeaked. "But c’mon in!"

I’d just assumed that Eden Entertainment was a production company or a booking agency. But not only did the outside look uncannily like a crack house on Cops, the interior wasn’t what I’d imagined either: the dusty room was a sparsely decorated loft with lacquered-hardwood floors, two white wicker chairs, and an empty-looking desk. From where I was standing, there were no visible computers, although I did see several manual cameras screwed onto tripods. Was this a portrait studio?

"So what’s your interview with Beau for?" Nips asked, eyeing my breasts.

Lipstick lesbian, I guessed. "A receptionist’s position."

"Oh, that makes sense!" she said, showing me a seat. Clumsily, she riffled through the desk and snatched out a piece of paper.

"Here, like, fill out this application." For lack of anything better to do, I started writing. "I’m calling Beau," she whispered, as if it were a secret.

Apparently, Beau had something "important" come up at the last minute, so he couldn’t meet me. But in his absence, Nips was to inform me about the position. The job involved answering phones and booking appointments. It was really, really easy — so easy that Nips’s notebook was graffitied with hearts and doodles. And the pay was amazing for a part-time seasonal job: $20 an hour.

But the most important aspect of the job, Nips giggled, was being very, very, very congenial to customers. "When guys call, they always want to talk to the girl they’re booking. So you just, like, pretend to be the dancer they want — "

Maybe it was with the word "dancer," followed by the names Bunni, Panther, Jessie, and Scandal, that caused it to dawn on me why Nips was checking out my chest. Maybe it was the room’s pink shag rug, white parasol, and fuzzy, zebra-striped chair that tipped me off. Or maybe it was when Nipsy added, quite proudly, "But don’t worry. You won’t need to, like, do things to make your voice sound sexy. You can just act."

That summer, I ended up working in my university’s language lab for a measly $6.25 an hour. I never asked Big Guido why he hooked me up with a stripping agency (that probably doubled as a soft-core-porn studio). Needless to say, I never asked him for another favor, either.

But it wasn’t until a friend sent me an article from a November 1999 issue of the Houston Chronicle that I figured out the whole story.

A Florida phone sex operator has won a workers’ compensation settlement claiming that she was injured after regularly masturbating at work.... The woman used one hand to answer the telephone and the other to note customers’ names and fetishes and to give herself an orgasm during the verbal exchanges.

So that’s what perky ol’ Nips meant by doing things to make my voice sound sexy.

Camille Dodero can be reached, for wholesome inquiries only, at cdodero[a]phx.com