Chapter Nine - The Test

CHAPTER NINE

The Test

WE LEFT THE apartment on March 30, the last Sunday of the lease. I drove with my boy Caleb, and Zack drove down with Chris. We were already behind schedule. I think it was Chris’s fault, but knowing Zack, it could’ve just as easily been him. Either way, we got out late.

Dayton to Murfreesboro should’ve been a five-hour drive. We didn’t hit Murfreesboro until well after midnight.

And that drive?
That was the most terrifying weather I’ve ever driven through in my life.

There were tornado warnings almost the entire way down I-75. Wind gusts were slamming the car. Rain so hard you could barely see. Other cars were pulling off and stopping. Not me. I wasn’t stopping for anything. I was locked in. I white-knuckled that wheel like a man possessed and drove us straight into the storm.

And when we finally got there? No break.
Not even a minute.

We checked into some roadside hotel off the highway and immediately got hit with mandatory homework. Homework. At two in the morning after barely surviving the apocalypse. That was our welcome to Alta.

We were playing with the learning platform, clicking through modules. And for the first time, things started to feel off. Not because of what they said. But because of what they implied.

There were rules about when we had to be out knocking. Like, mandatory rules. Car buddies, schedule expectations. The tone made it sound like we weren’t going to have any flexibility. Which was strange. Because here’s the key, we were independent contractors. Not employees. No boss. No clock. That’s what we were sold.

So why did it feel like they were gearing up to manage us like employees?

That wasn’t the only curveball.

We were told to be at a government building a couple minutes away the next morning. No details. Just an address. Something about a test. What kind of test? Nobody could tell me. Nobody knew.

So I showed up exhausted, underslept, confused, and walked into a government testing facility where a bunch of confused dudes were sitting in rows like we were about to take the SAT.

But we sat down anyway.

The guy running the room was named Daryl. I liked Daryl. Daryl didn’t like us. Or maybe he just didn’t like Alta. He stood up at the front of the room and said “You guys come less and less prepared every year.”

Now here’s the deal, the test was for a technician license.

Let me say that again.
We were salesmen.
But we were taking a technician license exam.

It was a 100-question test. Mostly chemical safety, bug types, spraying procedures, and state compliance laws. None of which we were supposed to be doing. None of which we’d been told about. None of which we’d studied for. They didn’t even send materials ahead of time. They just threw us in.

I failed. I got a 65. You needed a 70 to pass.

Connor passed. Barely. Which, honestly, is hilarious. He was in Year 3.

I still don’t know what that test was really for.

Because here's the thing: we weren’t even going to be in Tennessee right away. The plan was to spend the first chunk of the season in Charlotte, North Carolina, then come back to Tennessee to knock in Knoxville and Nashville for the remaining months of the season.

That’s important.

Because if you go look it up yourself, like literally go Google it, to my understanding the law in Tennessee says you don’t need a pest control license to sell. Only to spray. So why did we need to take that test?

And more importantly, why didn’t they tell us what it was?

I included this whole thing in the first version of the book, the one where I didn’t name names. And at one point, I even sent that version to Tyler, one of the owners. Three brothers, remember. Tyler was the one I had the contact info for.

When I asked him about the licensing thing, he said:

“We absolutely needed you guys to get licensed to be able to knock there. Most states don’t, but it’s the way their law is written.”

Word for word. That’s the quote.

What I do know is that if you don’t do well at sales, the fallback is being a technician. That’s part of the system. And if you already happen to be licensed, or at least in the pipeline, then I suppose that fallback is easier.

I was offered a tech job when I left. Caleb was too. Hourly rate. Guaranteed hours. And now that I look back, I wonder if that test was less about Charlotte and more about laying groundwork for Tennessee. Maybe it was a fallback safety net. Maybe it was something else. I don’t know.

What I do know is this. To my knowledge, I never got any sales permit in Charlotte and we knocked without them anyway. And no one seemed to care.

The same company that made us take a licensing exam without warning had us out knocking in a different state the next day without the basic permits you’re presumably supposed to have. At least to my knowledge. Just something to think about.

Because yeah, the day after the test we were supposed to be headed to Charlotte. And Connor, with a straight face, asked us:

“Are you guys ready to knock tomorrow?”

Bro.
We hadn’t even driven there yet.
I didn’t have food. I hadn’t slept. I still didn’t know where I was sleeping that night.

But apparently, yes.
We were knocking the next day.
That was the plan.

No time to settle. No grace period. No groceries.

We were a-knockin’.