Monday Week
By
Clive William Carr
Smashwords Edition
Monday Week
Copyright © 2012 by Clive William Carr
Smashwords Edition
License Notes
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Monday
That morning the city of London had taken on the outward appearance of a ‘snapshot’ devoid of any real defining colour or contrast. This was due to the blanket of cloud blocking out the summer sun, an occurrence that all the ‘weathermen’ had been confidently predicting since the end of last week. However, now it was here, not one of them was prepared to give any real ‘odds’ on how long this period of unrelentingly bright humidity would actually last. Not that employee Rod Steiger really gave a toss one way or the other what the day outside offered weather-wise. Instead he just stared at his feet as he began his lethargic climb up to street level and muttered to himself what he really didn’t need to say,
‘London is, when all is said and done a right fucking toss of a city. In fact, if I really think about it, it’s an absolute…’ but that was just about as far as Rodney managed to get in his unsolicited testimonial, before he was suddenly struck by a sharp pain between his ribs. Just as though the city itself was giving him a ‘bit of a poke’, as a way of reminding him to keep his big mouth shut.
‘Or else.’ the walls seemed to echo menacingly as Rodney gasped for air and the appropriate expletives as the pain’s decisiveness twisted him about on the spot and threw him back against the stair’s hand rail. ‘Cor bollox! Fuck that.’ he wheezed as he instinctively clung to the wall for dear life, in a bid to stop himself from being trodden under foot by the hoards of other city workers crowding past him. ‘Sorry, sorry.’ he found himself mumbling to no one time and time again. Until at long last the flow of workers temporarily ebbed and he was at last given a quiet moment to regain his breath and internal equilibrium, not to mention his manners.
During which time and whilst he stood motionless in-between the city’s heartbeats, he gave some, not too serious, thought to his own health. Worst of all, he actually chastised himself for making the terribly twee analogy of his own condition to that of the many ‘Tube trains’ that ran below his feet. Just as though they were the tired pulses of the city’s blood struggling through the Underground’s cholesterol furred arteries: which was precisely what they were. Then, when he at last felt strong enough to continue, after his little altercation with the city, Rodney returned all his attentions back to the task at hand, which was basically that of getting himself to work on time. So wearily reaching forward to grab another area of the hand rail, he sulkily slapped a foot on the first of the many remaining steps he had to climb. Until at last, he was allowed to rest his tortured eyes on the great corner stone of the building where he worked, and which stood a few hundred yards away.
‘You do know it’s a classic of it’s’ time don’t you?’ he asked himself. ‘And today would be the perfect day to take a photo of it,... No shadows.’ he smugly added in reply to his own rhetorical question. Before turning another corner to take a minute’s more exercise down a minor road to the ‘employee’s’ entrance that stood, almost hidden, on one side of the ‘sixties’ facade. Whereupon, he was dourly greeted by two guards attired in grey from their skin to their hair. Both of whom patiently waited for him to find his pass before they could allow him through.
‘There, wasn’t so hard now, was it Rod?’
‘No, I suppose it wasn’t.’ he replied with an absent, almost foolish smile on his face as he took one last look up into the bright silver grey of the outside world.
‘Come on, we’ve seen you now.’
‘It’s much too late to have second thoughts now you know?’
‘You should have thought about that before you got out of your bed this morning.’
Sitting at his desk, unable to motivate himself, Rodney’s mind began to wander.
‘People are always asking me, so what’s it like Rod working in Honest House in the Department of Acquisitions and Funding? Yet whenever I actually tell them, they never seem to believe a single word I say. They say I’m exaggerating, making it all up. But as I sit here now with my hands upon my head, counting down the minutes till they open up the doors to the public and the world outside, I know I’m not. I mean you only have to take a look at the area I’ve been confined to. To realise that even though it’s only just been recently restructured and redecorated, it has already started to take on the warm familiar glow of an area worked in and wearing out. Which effectively means, it is already falling into the category of ‘dilapidatory’ and ‘needing to be decorated’. A description that in this particular instance is fully justified, as the wall-paper has already started to bubble and leaver itself from the plaster. Whilst directly above me, the concealed lighting, has cleverly managed to conceal the fact, that due to its close proximity to the heating ducts, it is destined to constantly fail. Not that that is the end of it, not by a long shot. As in addition to all those other added extras, my co-workers and I, also have to put up with all the other usual office irregularities as well. Such as the temperature either being too high, or too low. Or if there is any special equipment needed, it either being in abundance, but not capable of fulfilling its required function, or always capable, but never actually available when needed. In fact the situation has got to such a stage that my comrades and I have actually started to declare, quite often and quite openly; that it seems as if everything in the running of this office has been done to make our simple ‘sentences’ as impossible and soul destroying as possible.
‘I mean, I don’t know, I might be exaggerating here. But I wonder just how many other workers during the officer’s ‘head count’ in the courtyard in the morning, take time to recall how pitifully their fellow comrades have fallen. I couldn’t even begin to count the number of times I’ve seen poor, desperate, insane workers cold bloodedly shot in the back by those unfeeling bastards in the office guard. God, how I hate that petty ‘Berlin Wall’ that boarders the ‘public side’. Who would believe that a barrier just four feet high and two and a half feet wide could cause such pain. It’s ridiculous, but still we just let it keep on happening day after day, year after year.
‘I can recall some recent events where some poor workers’ decomposing bodies were left rotting where’d they’d fallen on the counter. Yet no one on either side, thought to do a thing about it. In fact, the management were all for leaving them there indefinitely as they at least kept the employment figures balanced. So for countless days the bodies of those poor unfortunate bastards were just left out there in the full, embarrassing gaze of the viewing public. All of which is in total contradiction to our employer’s own ‘Codes of Employment’. A document which was drawn up and agreed through mutual arbitration between both sides. Yet for all that, it honestly seems like the senior officers in this particular office are quite prepared to risk a major health risk, just so they can safeguard their own jobs.’
‘God I just feel so fucking tired’ Rodney informed himself as he momentarily halted his train of thought and begged whoever it was who controlled the world and time, to allow him just five minutes sleep. That was all he needed. ‘Just five minutes, please, I beg you.’ was pleaded as he restlessly tried to slump himself across his desk in a bid to find some rest.
‘This is Hell.’ he whispered irritably as he forced himself to sit back up again. ‘A thousand time this morning ‘hello’ will ring with its sister bell ‘good morning’ as if they were the despicable almost identical twins, ‘Tedium and Torment’. Or is it ‘Torment and Tedium’? I can never tell them apart. All I know is, if I don’t reply to them and there, there and then, they’ll mark me down as a ‘trouble maker’, a domino that refuses to fall, a tossed coin that lands on its edge. So that I will no longer be regarded simply and harmlessly as just an oddity to be overlooked, but instead…’
Only fifteen minutes had passed since that particular week had begun. Yet for some inexplicable reason, Rodney realised that without anybody seemingly acting to lift a finger, he and his rebellious spirit had finally been broken. And that furthermore, because of that, he was going to have to suffer ‘like no man had ever had to suffer before’. For today for the first time in his life, he had come to work ill prepared. As he had forgotten to bring with him that little phial of excess mental energy he had always used in the past to evaporate away the interminable length of the working day with whimsical thought. Moreover it was the very same thing he had been using to anaesthetise himself to all the pain he would otherwise had to suffer as his ‘life as a nobody’ hammered another nail into his regulation 262 (standard) crucifix. A thing which he had only just received, ‘brand spanking new’ from the Stationary Department, as a replacement for the one he had accidentally mislaid well over a month ago.
Though it was whilst he was there waiting to collect said replacement, that he had accidentally been made privy to some, if not all of his future. Or to put it another way: he had taken a sneak peek in the file marked ‘Rodney Stieger’s Future’ when no one else was looking. The only downside was, all the information he wanted to know had somehow been encrypted into the image of a painting he had seen ages ago whilst on a school visit to the National Art Gallery.
At first he could not figure it out at all. In fact the only thing he could remember about the painting was that it was large. But whether it was really any good he could not say now or then. However it did not take him very long to come to the conclusion that even if the art work itself was of some merit, his part in it was not.
‘Still,’ he had told himself, ‘I’ve come this far to glimpse my own future, I might as well see it through to the end, no matter how dishwater dull it may eventually turn out to be.’ and so he let the full remembrance of the work by a painter he could not recall, yield at long last what he had finally grown up enough to understand.
‘No.’ he shook his head brokenly, as he once more recalled the image of hundreds of naked people clinging to a rock in a stormy sea. ‘How typically untrendy and dull. God, ‘my picture’, the one that has to say so much about me, would just have to be in the rooms where no one but the old farts go. Why couldn’t it have at least been an ‘Impressionist’ painting or something like the ‘hip’ people have. I wouldn’t have minded, even if it was very small.’
But worst was to come, for the longer Rodney concentrated on the work the more his mind drew him to the conclusion that even if the painting was attempting to illustrate the strength and will of man. Still he had to accept that the image his life identified most with, was that of a figure whose body could just barely be made out lying below the waves. A person, who a second before might have also been bravely clinging to the rock, preying that they too could survive. But now, with his fingers cut and bleeding, he had been completely taken up within the wave.
‘A wave of what? What did that wave represent?’ wondered Rodney as he stared into space and sucked thoughtfully on the chewed cap of his umpteenth ‘Bic’ pen, as if the concept of wondering in itself was of some sort of merit. ‘What does it all mean?’ he again asked as he watched half interestedly as his work colleagues busied themselves about him.
Two hours had passed since Rodney had last asked himself ‘What does it all mean?’ and in that time he had done little more than get on with what he was paid to do. Not that he was complaining, and why should he? Nobody ever took any notice even if he did. So instead he just did his best to keep his head down and prey for some a sign that someone out there cared. Just then, a fellow employee of questionable integrity sat down at the desk opposite him so that he could, with the dexterity of a drunk with three fingers, unfurl a scrap of paper in front of Rodney’s eyes.
‘Give it here you stupid fucker.’ whispered Rodney as he snatched the scrap of paper from his hand, ‘You had it the wrong way up, you Pratt.’ was added as he perused the badly scribed message that simply read: ‘I ‘vE GOT A PLANe.’
‘What does that mean: I’ve got a plane?’
‘What?’ snorted the work colleague ‘it doesn’t say that.’
‘Yes it fucking does.’ Rod hissed back with a smile.
‘No it don’t.’
‘Look I’m not going to argue with you. Take a look for yourself if you don’t believe me?’ he offered as he tossed the strip of paper back on to the other desk.
‘Oh yes, so it does.’ The other began to snigger gripped by something only he found funny.
‘Told you. I’ve got a plane. What a twatt!’
‘Sorry, sorry what I meant was plan. I’ve got a plan is what I meant to say.’
Well whatever you meant to say.’ hissed Rodney coarsely as he bent forward to get out of his seat. ‘I suggest you tell me later as I’m going for a break. And being I can see a ‘certain someone’ you know ‘very well’ coming towards you, I would suggest that you do the same.’ he smiled knowingly as he raised himself up fully and made ready to quit the room. But just before he did and because he always liked to think of himself as a bit of a ‘character’, he stretched out his arms and loudly proclaimed to the rest of the office like he was talking to the ‘five thousand’. ‘In case anyone is vaguely interested, I’ve decided to finally get it over with, and make the ultimate sacrifice. Yes that’s right,’ he smiled to the few who had bothered to raise their heads. ‘I’m going for my first legally entitled tea-break of the day. If that’s ok with everyone else? Course it is.’ he added absently as he momentarily rested his sorrowful gaze silently upon the ‘one of his flock’, who, despite being warned, still appeared totally ignorant of what was heading his way. Then as Rodney slowly moved out of harms way, his friend finally caught on and with seconds to spare rose hastily to his feet so he too could avoiding a futile clash of personalities. Though the officer concerned would have personally preferred to have described her act of petty vindictiveness, as one of ‘endeavouring to comply with office policy’. But by then neither of them gave a toss what she thought, as they were already at least half a world away from their desks, silent computers and other inmates’ blank minds and blank expressions.
For the last ten minutes the two comedians had been sitting around a white table in an empty room, applauding their own individual funny acts with the spasmodic stamping of feet, clapping of hands and crying of tears. As again and again, each one laughed at what they were thinking and never at what they were saying, sharing nothing, especially the plan that one had been so keen to discuss only minutes earlier. When all of a sudden a packet of cigarettes was thrown down from a gaunt hand to land dead in the centre of the table in front of the two selfish comedians. Instantly all their laughter dried up as they turned to stare up at the person standing, swaying before them like a palm tree on a windy beach with a hair style to match. Of course Rodney’s imagination then had to go one better by visualising a giant ‘spider like’ crab locked around the suited figure’s waist like it was a world title boxing belt. But being Rodney did not like spiders or crabs, he very quickly shook that particularly repulsive thought from his mind, just as the third person finally sat down to join them. Then with his very first sentence, he burst what little was left of the humorous atmosphere the other two had had going, just as if it was a bubble of pink gum.
‘So how long a break have you two had?’
‘Well hello my friend. Nice to see you too.’ replied Rodney cattily, before turning to the other. ‘Oh look Watson, what luck, if it isn’t ‘Mr Mirth’ himself. I said I hoped he’d join us at our table didn’t I?’
‘That you did and now he’s here, what luck…’
‘ ‘Mr Mirth’, I like it.’ smiled the man, clearly un-perturbed by his cold reception as he lit his cigarette, took a long drag and then slowly lent himself back on the chair to make himself more comfortable. Not to mention, clearly signal to the other two he would not be intimidated, and even less, moved. A point that he neatly underlined with another long drag from his cigarette, as it pulled about another twenty per cent of fun out of the atmosphere. Just so he could then replace it a moment later, with an equal amount of grey mist and misery, whilst he, patiently awaited the right opportunity to ask again: ‘Tell me again, just how long have you two been out here?’ but this time the tone of voice had changed and the three understood precisely what the question actually implied.
‘We do our fair share.’ was answered defensively. ‘In fact recently, I’ve been doing other people’s fair shares too! They call me...’ Rodney puffed out his chest and raised his voice in mock self praise, ‘The ‘Work Finder’. And this fine specimen of a man.’ he pointed to J with a glint of pride in his eye. ‘Is the ‘Work Detector’.’ who, upon hearing his name and recognising his cue, automatically vied for some humorous impact by placing both his palms flatly upon his shirt and thumbing his chest with pride.
‘That’s me he’s talking about don’t you know?’ But all he actually succeeded in doing was attracting ‘Mr Mirth’s’ gaze for a condescending second.
‘Yeah he detects it. He don’t fucking do it.’ he scowled.
‘Steady on old man. You know we didn’t mean it.’ replied Rodney trying a different tact and twiddling his imaginary waxed moustache. ‘Anyway we were both leaving now anyway... Did I just say ‘anyway’ twice then?’
‘That’s three times now.’ J replied breezily as both looked upon the ‘Misery’ for a reaction. Then the moment they recognised the mood he was once more in by the line of his mouth, they rose from the table and left the third of a human alone with his nicotine.
‘Yes well.’ J tried to add, but by then both could tell they were both being well and truly ignored. So instead Rodney turned back to J and barked in a military voice: ‘Worker, Wait for it. Wait for it, ...De-Tect!’
Closing the door on the amenities room, the duo then started their slow meandering walk back to the office. Only to find themselves separated in a matter of yards by the call of nature and the sign of the open legged man.
‘See you in a minute.’
‘Yeah in a minute.’ echoed Rodney miserably as he continued his journey down the corridor towards his place of work. And even though he was still some forty yards or so away from it, he was already beginning to think of all the possible problems that were awaiting him there.
‘Rodney, you do realise that all your mental thoughts are in total and complete contradiction to all your physical actions don’t you?’
‘Yes.’ he replied out loud as with one final push through the heavy, fire doors, he found both his mind and body back in the hell.
‘Brrrrrr.’ he shivered the instant he felt himself cross the invisible boarder that marked the boundary between those brief moments of freedom, such as the tea break he had just had, and the area set aside for the rehabilitation of inmates, of which he was just one. Though, in his imagination, he always liked to promote himself to the top of the pile, maybe to the position of Mr X himself.
‘My job is so unfair, constructed as it is to break my will. Whilst with many of the ‘others’ who are forced to toil under this regime, their sentence is just one of burden and suffering. For them, their labour is made up of simple, mindless tasks that lead nowhere, do nothing and are just meant to waste their time away. But for me, because of my radical ideas, which I don’t think I need to justify here, I feel my sentence has been made, -I could say for exceptional reasons, but I won’t,- ‘different’ in so many ways. For example, those bastards are deliberately trying to make me repudiate everything I stand for, by deliberately and inextricably binding my duties with the labour of others. So that the more that I do, the more others are forced to do also. Yet if I try to cut down my work load so that those I forward my work to can have an easier time of it. I am then accused openly of not doing my ‘fair share’ and another detainee is forced to handle the work I am seen not to be doing. So that no matter which way I turn, I am forced to burden someone else with work. Which of course leads to a great deal of resentment and friction building up between myself and a majority of the other inmates in the camp. I mean I’m not stupid, I know very well that I’m despised by a great many, if not nearly all the other inmates here, though that really isn’t that surprising, when you think of it from their point of view. ‘cause as far as most of them are concerned, my stupid, ‘stuck up my own arse’, -their expression not mine,- ‘principals’, have inadvertently been the cause of a great many other ‘inmates’ having to work up until their deaths or retirement, whichever comes first. I mean either they’re going kill me, or I’m going kill me. Because that’s the only real way I can see out of it. I hate myself. I never wanted to do this, I never wanted this...’
And so Rodney would have continued if J had not unintentionally distracted him from his spiralling thoughts by nudging the table as he moved to sit back down directly opposite him again. Then, as the both of them sat staring at each other J decides to take the only course of action left open to him in situations like this. He leaned forward and picked up the phone, dialled a number and then started talking. Whilst opposite him, deaf to all, Rodney’s thoughts once again began to roam.
‘Ah, how I remember my youth. The things I used to do, the things others used to do. The things that none of us did, but we always said we had, or at least until we were found out. Basically the lies we told. Funny though, but lately when I look back at my past I am constantly surprised by how much has become a dream, and how so little has become reality. Things I thought may have happened may never have happened, and so many things I can’t even imagine, may have happened. I mean who knows, it’s even possible that somewhere along the line, I’m the ‘lost child’ of some sacred religion. Or maybe thinking further on, I could possibly be the actual flesh and blood embodiment of some sacred old religion, the reason for a whole society’s way of life. Or maybe I never lived a life before now. Maybe I never even existed before today, this morning, just like a character in a book who only lives when his life is read. Then of course, if that’s so, I must then ask myself: do I have aspirations to be something, or is my only lot in life, that of coming to terms with the fact that I’m not going to be anybody. Or to say it another way around: learn to be a ‘nobody’. I mean surely there are loads of people we think of as famous and great now, who must have lived really terrible or even worse than that, boring lives in their own time.’
‘Rod, will you serve that customer please?’ a senior manager requested. But of course Rodney just continued to sit there, deaf to the world as his mind continued to wander.
‘Rod! Are you going to serve that customer?’ the voice enquired in a more than agitated manner.
‘I’d really love to your honour, but it’s my lunch time. And I needn’t tell you how much emphasis some people in this place, put on going to it at the right time. I mean it may appear an inconvenience now, but you will thank me later, I’m sure. So it is with great regret, that on this particular occasion, I must sadly decline your request and leave.’ he smiled smugly as he watched the remark reach its intended target. Immediately after which, the minor manager got out her little black book of ‘trespasses against her’ and put another cross against his name. Then as she continued her crusade for lunchtime regimentation, she turned her attentions towards another employee and demanded the same thing. Whilst behind her back, J looked towards Rodney and stated quite correctly: ‘You’re tired ain’t you?’
It was five past twelve and Rodney was already sitting in the ‘Star Burger’ burger bar. In front of him was a burger the shapes of a star, tea which was the colour of the heavens and some chips. All around him, he could hear the sound of ‘Madonna’ being played. Whilst to his left, he could quite clearly see her sitting with her dad, as she kept repeating to herself, ‘Papa don’t preach.’ Something that Rodney found very easy to ignore as he returned himself completely to the house special, fatty, flaccid chips.
He was just sorting out a green chip from the rest, when he suddenly became aware that someone was coming to join him. A someone who had already passed the ‘Ugly Woman’ outside the shop as she sat there begging with her three small dogs playing on her lap. ‘How coy and cute,’ he thought to himself coldly as he observed her from the other side of the glass window as she asked for change. ‘Scrounger.’ he was half through thinking, when his mind reminded him of the person who had just ordered some fish in a bread roll from the counter. Surreptitiously, Rod tried to glance his way. But due to the many glass columns built into the place, he discovered little more that the fact he was starting to move his way. So instead, Rodney attempted to work out the person’s movements, by focusing all his attentions upon the peculiar sound that seemed to follow him. Then suddenly the sound stopped, as above the piped music, the quietest voice was heard to ask. ‘May I please?’ Instantly, Rodney’s vision took the longest route to discover who had asked such an unnecessary thing, firstly by suicidally jumping over the edge of the table to the floor. Where, surprisingly unscathed, it quickly picked itself up and ran along floor until it rested upon a pair of naked feet. Again the voice asked,
‘May I please sit here, Rod?’
‘How does he know my name?’ questioned Rod to himself as his eyes began their slow accent up the man’s fair, lightly tanned legs and across the cloth wrapped around his waist. ‘Unusual attire in the city.’ thought Rod drolly, as he forced his eyes to move again. This time as they did, they quickly skimmed over the visitor’s soft, feminine chest, before finally reaching his face and resting on his kind, but hurt eyes.
‘Can I?’ the voice whispered and pleaded at the same time.
‘Of course. Be my guest.’ gestured Rod with a wave from his relaxed right arm. After which, the man awkwardly removed the Cross he had been carrying and laid the clumsy, impractical fashion item across the row of seats behind.
‘Will that be all right there?’ enquired Rodney with a waved finger, as though he was doing the management’s bidding. ‘What if others want to sit there?’
‘It’ll be all right. If others want to sit, there is plenty of space for them, all are welcome.’
‘Well if you’re sure it won’t be nicked.’
‘I’m sure.’ smiled the man calmingly. Then just at the moment that he bent his knees to sit on the orange plastic seat, something happened that Rodney had never in all his visits to the burger bar ever witnessed before. One of the staff brought over the customer’s fish burger, and laid it politely on the table before him.
‘How the hell did you manage to do that?’ asked Rodney in amazement. ‘It’s a bloody miracle that’s what that is. I’ve been coming to this place for years and they’ve never once served me at the table. It’s always ‘wait, it’ll just be a few minutes.’ Come to that while we’re about it.’ he pointed his finger in mock aggression while still wearing a smile, ‘How comes? How comes, you know my name eh?’
‘I know all things Rodney, if you just care to ask.’
But no sooner had such a wish been granted, than Rodney had already wasted away the most valuable moment of his life on a series of stupid and humiliating questions such as:
Why was he here? How did he get in here? Was he famous? How did he know his name? If he wasn’t Willem Defoe, who the hell was he? At which point Rod finally realised who he really could be, and then with that ideal solidly grasped as to who, or what he had sitting before him, he then went on to ask an even greater number of banal and insulting questions like: Did he really screw that prostitute? Was he homosexual? Could he really do tricks? And what was the meaning of life? To which his answer was always exactly the same:
‘Read my book.’
‘No, no, no, not another nobody trying to plug his book every chance you get. I’m not a sodding chat show host you know?’ Rodney joked. Then before he could add another word the man said: ‘I’ve had my bread and fish. I must go. But before I do, is there one more question you would like to ask of me, as I have come all this way just to visit you.’
‘Yes I have actually.’
‘Good.’ nodded one agreeably as he thoughtfully anticipated another’s redemption, whilst the other only laid the foundations for his own downfall.
‘Tell me now, and if it isn’t a trade secret. How was it that you knew my name?’
‘Ah ha.’ smiled the man meditatively as he tried to swallow his frustration. ‘I really am sorry Rodney, you have touched on the one thing I now feel I could never really reveal to you.’ he joked ironically as he began to slowly raise himself from the seat to stand up. After which, he then placed a hand gently upon Rodney’s head as he stood for a second or two, just simply smiling into his eyes. With much the same affection as it could only be hoped that a child would see whenever they looked into their father’s eyes. Then, without saying another word, he just turned around and picking up his Cross, passed through the nearby ‘Exit Only’ doors. Leaving Rodney just as he had found him.
Well maybe not precisely as he found him. As it was just then, as Rodney watched him disappear from his view, that he also became aware of just how hollow and empty his world actually was. More to the point, that there might actually be something missing from his life. Though what it was exactly, he still was not that sure. But being that he always went for the easiest of solutions first, Rodney simply decided it was a lack of real friends. Most probably because he had always believed that he had a lack of real friends and that an increase in their numbers, would definitely make a greater difference to the quality of his life. So with his mind made up, he then instinctively started to look about himself in the vain hope of just stumbling on ‘some more company’. Just as if it was the kind of thing you find accidentally on the beach, in a shop, on a street, anywhere in fact, which, when Rodney began to think about it, was the truth. Except of course, when one was actually searching for it, then as always, it was just as elusive as the thirtieth day of February on a calendar. So Rodney pretended he was searching for something else and noted the time instead.
‘I’ve got ages to go yet.’ he told himself in exactly the same tone as a lonely man with no friends always ends up using when they are talking to themselves. ‘I think I’ll get me-self another cup of tea. Yes that’s just what I’ll do, get myself another lovely cup of char.’ he again sadly mumbled to himself as he navigated his bent body out of his chair and made his way back to the counter to order another tasteless drink. Then, when he had just got to within a yard of where he had left his jacket. He noted something that would put his own personal spiritual growth further back in ‘real time’ than the actual date of his birth. As there standing out from his opened uniform jacket was the laundry tag that clearly stated its owner’s name.
‘Thank God.’ breathed Rodney in a sigh of relief as though the worrying question that had been dogging him for the last couple of minutes had finally been resolved. Not to mention the fact that his faith as an agnostic had similarly been completely restored.
And so momentarily comforted by his discovery, he sat staring out of the window and looking at all the ‘horny fanny’ as it passed by. Yet still for all that, he could not stop himself from worrying that maybe, just maybe, he had, as irreligious as he was, somehow let something important slip by. Something as yet not quite tangible in the present, but later...
‘One o’clock. Time to join the flow.’ he cursed to himself a moment before he took his last mouthful of tea and placed the empty plastic container thoughtfully upon the table. Then picking up the jacket that now shouted out his name, he too passed through the ‘Exit Only’ doors to join the flow of: horny fanny, drunken bastards, cigarette smoke, beggars with dogs, boys in jeans, girls in dreams, granddads with small steps and three layers of clothes, grandmothers with ‘Reebok’ trainers, shopkeepers and hairdressers.
Crossing the threshold into ‘prison time’, Rodney returned from his lunch date on a spiritual ‘downer’. Just as if he had personally discussed his situation with his ‘Saviour’ and been told point blank that:
‘Really, truthfully in your particular case, and I’m not bullshitting you here Rod, you know me? But in all honesty I’ve had a word with those in charge and there really isn’t anything I can do. I’m sorry to have to say this, especially as I am supposed to be the voice of hope and all that other malarkey, but in your particular circumstances things are really quite, well, what can I say, hopeless.’
Which, as opinions go, was one that Rodney could not help but echo. Especially, as he stood there with his hands in the air as he felt the heavy, intimidating hands of guards pat and search his body for whatever was deemed to be the ‘enemy of the day’. Whilst Rod himself casually checked to see if both gun posts were doing what they should. ‘Clear?’ ‘Clear.’ he thought he heard voices say. ‘You can go in now Mr Steiger.’
Opening the ‘Fire Door’ into the ‘public section’ of the office, Rodney was greeted by a ‘clamour’ of ‘press men’ as they pressed against the counter before them in a bid to get served satisfactorily. Something that he could just tell from where he stood, and what he knew of the part-time staff’s ineffectiveness, simply was not happening.
‘Oh I expect I’ll just have to come to the rescue of those poor unfortunates, like I always do.’ he smiled to himself as he passed undetected behind the angry mob’s backs and walked in through the side entrance of the counter. Whereupon and instantly recognising most of the faces as regulars he lewdly called out in a ‘Mae West’ voice: ‘Well hellow boys, looks like you’re all waiting for someone to come along and give you complete and utter satisfaction.’
A statement that was, in general, welcomed by the reporters. As it gave them an opportunity to relieve some of their frustrations by returning a small number of insults and humorous retorts his way. Whilst he, to the best of his abilities, tried to make all the difference. Then, once the crisis point of being ‘unable to cope’ was passed without due concern or stress, Rodney discreetly moved himself off to another area. Somewhere where he could feign complete engrossment in some other menial task, whilst at the same time reflect on what he had just done.
‘If an employer had spotted me working as efficiently as that, there is no telling what they would have had me doing. Mad, mad. I must have been fucking mad. God if they’d seen me, I would have been dead. Let just one Capitalist spot you working well and they’ll immediately give you more work to do. Why is that I wonder? Actually I know the answer, really.’
And so, in the peace and quiet of a solitary moment he sat and recollected what, during a conversation with some of his friends, had now become one of the major dictates of his life. That being:
‘That in the particular example of employment, those who often cannot meet the basic standards necessary to keep a job, are often given less work to do. While others, who can justly do their work and do it well and without the need of assistance. Are, for arguments sake, then put upon and sometimes verbally attacked, for not doing more of what they are easily capable of.’
A serene smile then took control of Rod’s lips as he became completely oblivious to the outside world as he mulled over thoughts that to others, were as dull as dishwater.
‘What it really is, the crux of the matter that is: Is that the ‘caring society’ is totally hypocritical. For a start, tokens of ‘equality’ and ‘caring’ are forced upon the masses by the unseen administrators of our society. And then we, the majority are left to deal with these concepts that create unease and dissent amongst us. No wonder a great many of us feel unfairly treated.
‘Now here’s a typical example: ‘positive discrimination’. It’s the biggest load of bollocks going. It does the exact opposite of what it is supposed to be doing, and instead of integrating groups within the society, it is separating them. Simply and basically driving a wedge between them. I mean it doesn’t need an ‘Einstein’ to work out people will always resent the fact that someone got something for every other reason, other than that they deserved it. I can see it now:
‘Yes, you are perfect candidate for the job. Yes you do meet all the criteria, and looking at the observations made, actually excel in some key areas. But be that as it may, I’m sorry to say that at this particular moment in time, we are not employing people from your particular section of society, perfect or not. Pardon? I didn’t quite hear that? What? But you would have though that you are at least deserving of a chance? Well maybe you may think that should be the case, but I must inform you are clearly off the mark and have no real idea how these things are done. So you might as well go and stop wasting anymore of either of our time, thank you. Oh, and young man, I do hope this won’t make you bitter towards the person who did get the job. We want you to think well of them, they did need it you know. Pardon? No need to take that attitude you undeserving ingrate! Just think, that’s most probably why you haven’t been given the chance in the first place! What me? Have I got a right to this position? Of course I have. I was born into it. Now go and change your attitude then maybe we’ll see at a later date and if you are finally suitable for another job, now there’s a good boy.’
A switch was thrown in Rod’s mind, and again his thoughts were concerned with people doing their fair share of work.
‘But what if those who don’t do much work are just taking the piss? What if in fact, they’re actually laughing at all the others who are carrying their load and saying behind their ‘thank you’ smiles. ‘Which one of us is really the bigger fool? You don’t see me doing too much work do you?’ I bet goody, fucking two shoes ‘Jesus’ would have something nice to say about that. And no matter how big a cunt I was making of myself, and how much I was being taken for a ride on earth down below, he’d most probably still turn around and say: ‘Don’t worry Rod ol’ mate, you’ll eventually receive your reward in heaven... along with everyone else mind you.’ Well that’s just a bit too fucking late.....’
‘Rodney, serve that customers. Thank-you! We’re not here to carry you, you know?’ a clipped voice pointed out.
‘Well maybe,’ chuckled Rodney to himself as he casually rose to his feet and pretended to ignore the command. ‘Maybe it is me, taking everyone else for a ride. How I fucking wish.’
‘Yes sir, and how may I help you?’
‘As and when he was finally dismissed from his desk’, Rodney idly wrote on a piece of scrap paper. A moment before he finally lifted himself from his desk and anxiously waited for the final seconds of his daily sentence to pass. ‘You know I quite like what I’ve written there.’ he told himself as he glanced down at the words for a second, and even a third time to read them all over again whilst he struggled to drag on his jacket. ‘It sounds so like a ‘Dickensian’ phrase. Over laden as it is with images of buckled shoes, frock coats and other stylish, but dated, apparel.’
Yet Rodney knew his life was not like that at all, for even when it was at last possible for him to walk again with normal people, he knew that he was still an outcast, a marked man. Everyone else could see he was different, and it was not just the prison uniform that he wore with his prison number sewn above his chest pocket and across his back that made it so. Same as it was not his prison haircut of one inch all over either. No, the reason he was marked different from everybody else, was because even when he finally left the building and the oppressive administration it housed within, he still physically dragged it behind him. Just like it was a giant monument to his working life and more especially, his particularly contemptible and servile place in it. Something that Rodney was again doing his best to forget, or at least put to the back of his mind, by making a number of arbitrary and pedestrian observations as he whiled away the time on his journey down the escalator:
‘Sweet chick, glasses chick. I wonder what her legs are like? Three adverts repeated. I’ve been there. I didn’t know they were still going. Will my foot be crushed between the crushing stairs? Shall I move into the fast lane? Everywhere is a circle, below my feet it continues. I could die today, a bomb, an accident, a knife attack, a rise in fares! I’d give her one. Only this city has real ground in grime. What they need is new ‘Ariel Automatic’ in every station.
‘2 MINS. I bet. No fucking bins. One minute. Bound to be full. Should get a seat. If I don’t, I’ll walk with a limp. Hot clammy wind on the left of my face. NEXT TRAIN APPROACHING, I can fucking see that. I’ll say it again, those signs are a waste of money. It’s bound to be a special, or I’ll miss the doors. You know they say there’s ghosts on the tube. I can’t believe it, doors stop right in front of me. One opens, the other’s stuck. Nicotine yellow light. Tube ain’t even full. My lucky day. Any fanny? All blokes. I hope no drunks or nutters, Good! Just Indians, blacks, whites. Oh no! white American tourists. Life’s a bummer. Hard cloth seats, just like sitting with a brush right up my arse. It’s so hot my shorts are sticking to me.’
Rodney smiled to himself as the train lurched forward and his journey began. ‘Why do the traps in the floor, never match the rest? And what exactly does that little gauge do?’
The key turned in the lock. It was turned. The door was pushed open. Tension and tensioner were released. The key sprang back and was withdrawn from the lock to the rhythm of a metal clicking ratchet running over chromed teeth. A shadow of sound passed over the metal carpet clip. The door was absently pushed and closed with a ‘thunk’ as the lock immediately recast itself. And the ‘Bed-sits’ occupier removed the jacket and hot, clammy stiff collared shirt he was wearing, before moving over to sit heavily on the corner of the lumber un-supportive bed. So that he could more easily untie his shoes and slip off his socks. Where, resting on his knees he inspected his white ‘broad-fitting’ feet as he raised and stretched his toes.
‘Ah feels good.’ spoke Rodney to himself absently as he raised himself up to take an ‘admiring’ look down his chest to the three slight rolls of fat that protruded just beneath. ‘Like a sex machine.’ he whispered ironically as with the minimum amount of effort he threw the weight of his head and shoulders onto the un-ironed duvet and laid there with his arms above his head. Then, being he was in the perfect position to do such a thing unobserved, he then turned his head and smelt each armpit in turn. After which, he then thought about absolutely nothing as he stared up into the ceiling and lost himself in its network of cracks and other textural anomalies. That was until he was annoyingly interrupted by the humidity of the ‘outside’, as it made its presence felt by pushing on his un-cleaned window. ‘Bollocks’ he declared irritably as he forced himself to weigh up the pros and cons of whether the window should be opened or not.
‘Damn it.’ he begrudgingly cursed as he fell off the bed and rumbled across the floor on all fours, before getting back to his feet and lifting up the sashed window as far as it could go. Immediately he wished he hadn’t, as the smell from the drains below was sickening. So disgustingly sickening in fact, that he had actually wondered more than once, and rather macabrely it must be said, if a serial killer didn’t live above. Not that that particular thought was actually occupying his mind on this particular occasion as he turned himself back towards his bed. Instead, he was more concerned with the presence of gnats, mosquitoes and any other flying parasitic insect that might be contemplating flying in on the off chance that there was a free meal going.
‘I bet I get bit to fuck now. Fucking blood sucking parasites I hate them.’ he moaned as he let his heavy, un-heavenly body fall back upon the bed. ‘Ahh that’s better.’ whispered Rodney to himself assuringly as he felt his eye lids fall and his mind struggled half-heartedly with the sheet of ‘light sleep’ it was attempting to wrap his body in for a while. Then when he was at last comfortable and his breathing had almost slowed to a stop, his mind took the opportunity to remind him of his childhood desire to control his dreams, and his adult wish to be conscious enough to remember them as a ‘real life’ experience after.
Ha!’ he scoffed to himself as he placed his forearm heavily across his eyes and eyelids in a bid to block out the light that was still seeping through. ‘What shall I order for my dream this evening?’ he quipped sceptically as his eyes unbeknownst to him, began to move back and fourth below his eye lids just as though they were perusing a menu. ‘Sex with a beautiful, slave like woman is always a possible starter. How about the day I get back at all those who have made my very existence hell? Gratuitous violence. Being a spy. All’, he conferred with himself, ‘are indeed, very tempting. But maybe just a little bit too rich for my taste today. So instead I think I’ll just have something light, something like... ah yes, perfect.’ he smiled as he communicated his choice to his invisible waiter with a pointed finger. ‘A beautiful, very relaxing time, where everything was just perfect.’
‘Yes, a very good choice sir. I must say.’
‘Thank you.’ he replied politely, just moments before his selection arrived and he fell into a brief, but very deep sleep. During which time his thoughts began to follow his wishes in aspects unimaginable. Whilst to the world outside, all that could be noted was that his body had sunk heavier into the duvet and his finger had finally lost all their previous tension and begun to slightly curl. ‘Mmmm...’ he sleepily moaned as his head turned more comfortably to the side and the foolish smile of a contented dreamer was gently laid across his face.
The whole dream continued for approximately another ten minutes before he was once again revived by the day’s uncomfortable, sweating heat. Though the world would not have known it as he continued to just lay there motionless, staring at the window. Yet at the exact moment that he admitted that self same fact to himself, his body, in an act of persecuted energy, bent the elbow of his left arm and caused its hand to land upon his chest with a slap. So that he could just while away the following few minutes drawing lazy little circles with his fingers on his clammy skin as he laid there thinking of the dream he had just had.
In fact it was not until quite some time later as he was spooning out some coffee granules from a jar of ‘Nescafe’, that the unbelievable truth finally hit him. So hard in fact that he did not even register what he was looking at as he stood there facing the wall as he flicked off a switch, lifted up a kettle and poured boiling water into a cup. As all his mind could see was the neon sign that lit up his imagination and rudely flashed: ‘A Simple Scientific Miracle’ again and again. And that, as far as Rodney was concerned, was precisely what it was. As from the moment he had awoken from his ‘Dream’ until now, ‘The Experimenter’, ‘The Guinea Pig’ had realised and recalled each and every second of his dream. But not as though it was a dream at all, as in all he had experienced there was no haziness, no incongruities, and more importantly, nothing too fantastic. The walk he had experienced in the beautiful, fresh green land to a clean, white house set between a river and a small wood, had all been so very normal that he had actually heard the grass crush beneath his feet and felt the sun on his arms. In fact his skin was still tingling, just as if he had even caught the sun a bit. And that was it exactly, that was the crucial point about it then and there. It was not just a dream, but a complete physical experience. The walk was not just a memory, it had actually happened and even managed to ache his legs so much so, that he could even feel the ‘pull’ at the back of his calves even now.
Instantly the blood, pushed by his excited, and to some extent, frightened heart, began to race around his body, whilst he, feigning a calm exterior, picked up his cup of coffee and walked back to the bed and sat down on its edge. So he could again stare out of the window with a dumb smile wiped upon his face. ‘The important thing is.’ he told himself, ‘I’ve maybe lived an hour’s experience in less than ten minutes. I don’t know how, but I have.’ A moment’s silence was heard as he then attempted to make some sense of it all and put it in some kind, any kind of perspective.
‘But if that is indeed possible, then that could mean that maybe, now I’m not talking actual time here, but I could be able to live four or more other people’s life spans in my own life!’ he speculated excitedly. Then just before he started to get too carried away, ‘life’ decided to bring him back down to earth, and preferably with a bump. ‘of course all that is only possible if it wasn’t a fluke?’ another part of him echoed as he felt himself visited by the spirit of ‘muggy scepticism’ as it stood itself silently all about him, filling up his bed-sit like a myriad of grey stone-sculptures.
Then quite unexpectedly, the new invigorated Mind suddenly lost its temper and flung the lot of them straight out of the window. ‘Now fuck off you miserable grey cunts.’ it screamed after them, before rejoining Rod on the edge of his bed so they could consider more important matters.
‘I’ll just drink this and try again.’ A second thought overlapped the first. ‘What if the caffeine keeps me awake?’ ‘Ah-ha.’ he answered himself cleverly with a pointing finger as he took just one sip to wet his whistle, before placing the cup down beside the bed. Whereupon, he then laid himself back down to try again. His last thought before regaining un-consciousness being: ‘I know I won’t be able to get to sleep now that I want to.’
The next time he awoke, the ceiling had passed from whitish grey to charcoal black. The sun had fallen and the air was much lighter and cooler. Smiling, he lay mesmerised by what had just occurred and been experienced. Now the concern was not if what had been wished for was possible, but of which of the two lives he had experience of, was the ‘real’ one. As the feelings he had encountered upon entering the white house had been those of a whole and complete new life, of being born. In those few hours of sleep, or maybe life, he had experienced, or was it rediscovered, a loving childhood with happy parents. Not to mention a great group of good friends, who together had explored all the possible acts of childhood, normally associated with a healthy attitude. It had all been fantastic. The days and nights had been never ending. Now Rodney could recall every second of old black and white films that until then, had only ever come to him as half remembered glimpses. Every minute of radio from this life’s beginning could be recalled: ‘Like a wheel within a circle of an ever spinning...’ School was a pleasure: ‘Ladybird book’ Eleven C. The long words written on the piece of white card read as he stood by the teacher at her very tall desk. Each syllable studied, every sound created.
Hunger for food eventually crept into Rodney’s stomach at approximately eleven O’clock. Whereupon, and in the image of a fully rested athlete, he then swiftly rose from his bed and turned on the light, at which point he also registered the memory of his long since wasted, stone cold coffee on the floor. First though, he had to answer the call of nature. So opening the door of his ‘bed-sit’, he climbed the steps to the ‘relief station’ at the top of the stairs. Just so he could return a minute or so later with thoughts of a deflated rubber balloon bouncing in his head. Then, once he had switched on the radio, the ‘New One’ resumed the making of a cup of coffee, that this time would be drunk, and the making of some beans on toast that would definitely be eaten. Though, at that moment in time, he was still in the process of pouring the usual two thirds of a can of beans out into a saucepan.