"h.e.l.lo, Artemis," I say. I log back out of my phone and turn round warily to face him.
"Francis, Francis, Francis." He sits on my desk. And lowers his head so that his face is close to mine.
"Yes," I say.
"You"ve been cutting people off, haven"t you?"
"No," I say. Hoping the odd occasions that I have cut people off haven"t been picked up by the RCRS Random Call Recording System. Or Arsy-a.r.s.e, as Graham calls it. "Why would I do a thing like that?"
"Pride," he says. "Or maybe some silly little sense of righteous anger. I would say laziness, but not in your case, Mr Wood. No. You"re too sharp. But there is no room for idealism in the workplace, not when we have to get the money in. We"re seven million behind our year-to-date target. Remember that. Cash. Cash. Cash. Do you understand me, Francis?"
"I think so," I say.
"Now, I know that you"ve been cutting people off and abusing our customers, but I only know because I can tell tell, because I"m experienced in this line of work. Once we have proof, you"re sacked. OK?"
"Yes," I say, "I understand. Thank you, Mr Black."
He claps me on the back. He points up at a huge A0 poster that reads PAYMENT IN FULL. EACH AND EVERY TIME. "Don"t mention it," he says. "I"ll see you soon."
"Any news on Kenny, Mr Black?" I ask.
"No," he says. "If he does turn up though, he can forget coming back here to work. Not having that kind of pathetic behaviour pardoned on my watch. One foot out of line is all it takes, Francis. OK?"
"OK," I say.
He stands up and starts to walk away. My mobile starts ringing. He turns around. Grinning like a madman, like he"s delighted to have an excuse for some serious disciplinary action.
"Now then," he says, "that wouldn"t be the ringing of a mobile phone, would it? You do know that the use of mobile phones is strictly prohibited in this place?"
I pull the phone out of my pocket. I maintain eye contact. I answer it.
"h.e.l.lo?" I say.
Black"s face is turning red.
"It"s me," Graham says over the phone. "I was just wondering if you were at work?"
"Yes," I say. And then Black s.n.a.t.c.hes the phone out of my hand. He twists it into two.
"Mr Black," I say.
"You might think that you"re clever," Black says, "but really you"re just a smarmy little p.r.i.c.k. A smart-a.r.s.ed, arrogant b.a.s.t.a.r.d. You think you are ent.i.tled to the kind of life you want, but you"re not. You fantasise about something bigger, about something important, about some sort of ideology that will give your life meaning. But there"s nothing there, Wood. All there really is is the need to eat and drink. A hungry stomach. Each person is just a mouth, Francis, and no better than whatever it takes to fill it. You"ll find that out as you get older. Now get out. Get out!" Francis, and no better than whatever it takes to fill it. You"ll find that out as you get older. Now get out. Get out!"
I open our front door and stumble through into the hallway of our house. Shivering like a dog in a thunder-storm. "Taylor!" I shout. "Taylor!"
"I"m here," he says, quietly. He slowly emerges from the living-room. He"s holding an unopened bottle of red wine in his hand. "I"m here. What is it?"
"Keep me from that awful p.r.i.c.k," I say, "or I"ll beat his head against the wall. Until there"s a hole in it."
"You can only mean Graham."
"Yes!" I say. "Graham! Is he in?" I"m taking off my shoes and coat. A puddle grows beneath me as the rainwater trickles from my clothes.
"He is," Taylor says.
"He got me sacked."
"How?"
"He rang me up! To ask if I was at work. Right in front of Arty f.u.c.king Black."
"And you answered it?"
"Yeah, of course I did."
"It"s not exactly his fault then, is it?" Taylor says. "I mean, you could have ignored it. Pretended it wasn"t yours. Even turned it off and apologised. I mean, you could have had it turned off in the first place like you"re supposed to. But I bet you made a big deal out of it. And you know why."
"Do I?"
"Because you wanted wanted to get sacked. You know that, without a shadow of a doubt." to get sacked. You know that, without a shadow of a doubt."
"Taylor," I say, "you infuriating b.a.s.t.a.r.d. Why haven"t you opened that wine yet?"
"I was waiting for you before I opened it, naturally," he says. "And I"ll open it once you stop asking me questions. I have to go to the kitchen and get a bottle opener, see."
"Go then. Hang on. Did you say that Graham is in? Is Erin in too? Taylor?"
"I"ll see you in a moment, Francis. I"m going to open this wine." He turns and heads downstairs into the bas.e.m.e.nt kitchen. "Set the console up. Mario Kart or Monkey Ball. But not Resident Evil. I"ve had too much."
I head through the open door into the living-room and fall onto a beanbag.
"Evening, Francis," Erin says, from the sofa.
"Erin," I say. "I didn"t know you were there."
"How are you?" she asks.
"Very well, thank you. I got fired. But it"s no great loss. I was thinking of trying to be homeless for a while anyway."
"You don"t have to go homeless. We can cover you till you get another job."
"No, I mean like an experiment. Like Orwell."
"What would you eat?"
"Oh, I"d find something. I"d eat the bodily secretions of women. With my dirty unwashed mouth."
"Ever the charmer."
"Taylor didn"t say you were here."
"He was probably hoping I"d scare you."
"Listen, Francis," she says. "It"s Jack"s birthday in a couple of weeks. We"re thinking of organising a surprise party. It would be a house-warming too. And a Christmas party."
"What?" I say. "Up there?"
"Yeah," she says. "We"ll go up in a week or so, say that we"re going up for his birthday, you know. And then one night, the world and his dog turn up out of nowhere, armed with drink and fancy-dress costumes. It couldn"t possibly go wrong. And it has to be one of the best parties. One of the best parties we"ve ever been to. It will be the first party since he moved out. We have to set a precedent. Because we should never stop seeing each other. It is too easy to get too busy. We have to make this clear."
"That sounds like a good plan," I say. Because it would mean seeing Jennifer again. Properly. If nothing else. Jack never said anything about my stupid attempt to kiss her. But the way he acted, and the way he never brought Jennifer around after that, makes me think she told him. "But then," I say, "your beautiful, beautiful voice could make any plan sound good. I could listen to you all day."
"Make your own tea, Francis," she says.
"You know you"re very beautiful," I say.
"So you"re complimenting a girl on her physical appearance in order to persuade her to cook you your evening meal?" she says. "And in this day and age. You should be ashamed."
"All I"m capable of feeling is hunger," I say. "Otherwise I"m sure I would feel guilt and remorse. I would have some sort of conscience."
"Must we do this every night?" she says.
"Sometimes you say yes," I say.
"Rarely, Francis," she says. "Get off your b.u.m and go cook yourself."
"I"m too hungry," I say. "Do you think Taylor would want to make me some tea?"
"Francis," she says.
"Yes. I know. The party." I run my tongue around my teeth. "Have you spoken to Jennifer?"
"Yeah," Erin says. "Yeah, she was up for it."
"That Jennifer girl is hot hot," Graham says, as he bounds into the room.
"You got me sacked," I say. "Artemis Black saw me answer my mobile."
"Fool," Graham says. Slowly.
"No," I say. "I"m not a fool. I wanted to leave anyway."
"Then stop whingeing," Graham says.
"Yeah," Erin says. A pause. "But anyway. The party."
"What party?" Graham asks. His head jerks up.
"We"re arranging a surprise birthday party for Jack," Erin says. "Also it would be a house-warming. And a Christmas party. But mostly a surprise birthday party for Jack."
"Amazing," he says. "I"m going to charm like there"s no tomorrow. I mean, the girls there won"t know what hit them. I"ll be a bull in the china shop. I mean, like a kid in a sweet shop. A shark in the swimming pool. With no ladders."
"Not a pretty picture, Graham," Erin says. "You don"t paint a pretty picture."
"I"m only speaking metaphorically."
"Yeah," she says. "I"d gathered that." She runs her fingers through her hair. "Maybe you need to think about the way you present yourself."
"Well," he says, "I might have a haircut."
"That"s not what I mean," Erin says. "I mean by the things that you say and do."
"What?" Graham says.
"Graham," I say. "Graham, Graham, Graham. I"m really hungry. Could you make my tea, please?"
"OK. Wait. No! Make it yourself. You"d be the worst dictator ever."
"Worst as in most evil or most incompetent?" Erin stretches as she asks the question. Her arms uncurling out from the end of the sofa.
Graham thinks for a moment. "Both," he says. "Francis would just be c.r.a.p. As dictators go. At any job, in fact. As proven just today."
Taylor appears at the entrance to the room. He looks at the TV. "Francis," he says. "Where"s Mario Kart? Where"s Monkey Ball?"
"I"ve been busy! And where have you been, anyway?"
"I was making Erin a sandwich. Here you are, Erin." He hands over the plate.
"Too kind, Taylor!" she says. She grins.
"You make Erin a sandwich, but for me, nothing?" I say. "That"s, you know, I think that"s probably s.e.xist."
"We have this deal where we"re nice to each other," Taylor says. "Works well. Besides, she said she was hungry. You just wanted me to open the wine. All you ever do is take. Erin gives something back." You just wanted me to open the wine. All you ever do is take. Erin gives something back."
"Don"t want to know!" Graham says. He never misses a trick. Or at least never an easy one.
"Not like that, k.n.o.bhead," Taylor says. "Like, she took my books back to the library when she went earlier." He sits down. "Anyway, what kind of boyfriend would I be if I didn"t make my girlfriend a sandwich?"
"So," Erin says. "The party. We have to make it special. We need loads of people. And it needs to be fun. A decent sound system. Enough fairy-lights to illuminate the whole house. Maybe fancy dress. Definitely fancy dress. What"s the theme going to be?"
"Bad taste," Graham says.
"Black and white," I say.
"Christianity through the ages!" Taylor says.
"Let"s ask Jennifer," Erin says. "She"ll know best."
I"ve been meaning to go shopping for days. Weeks. But never got round to it. I"m standing in the kitchen. Alone. Looking up at the Terminator 2 Terminator 2 poster that looms over the table. I turn to my cupboard, and open the cupboard door. There"s nothing inside but a nearly empty packet of bread. I look inside and there"s only one piece left. I take it out and start to nibble. Work my way around the mouldy bits. Once upon a time people would have eaten everything. Because they wouldn"t have had anything else. But I read that mould can give you cancer. Once upon a time people wouldn"t have worried about cancer. Because they were poster that looms over the table. I turn to my cupboard, and open the cupboard door. There"s nothing inside but a nearly empty packet of bread. I look inside and there"s only one piece left. I take it out and start to nibble. Work my way around the mouldy bits. Once upon a time people would have eaten everything. Because they wouldn"t have had anything else. But I read that mould can give you cancer. Once upon a time people wouldn"t have worried about cancer. Because they were too scared of the wolves. And the woods. And the dark. The bread comes apart in my hands and falls to the floor. I look at it for a moment and then pick it all up and throw it into the bin. A spider runs out from behind the bin. The thing is huge. It criss-crosses the floor around my feet. Then lurches off towards the shadows behind the washing machine. I turn the kitchen light off. I make my way out into the small hallway at the bottom of the stairs. I lean against the wall. The stairway walls are gold in the light from upstairs, but where I am it is dark. I could eat a horse. A hoss. A scabby hoss between two bread vans. I slip my hand down into my boxers and check my t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es for lumps. Whether my fear is genuine fear or media-inspired paranoia I don"t know. It"s just, you know. You read and hear so much. Probably there isn"t any difference. too scared of the wolves. And the woods. And the dark. The bread comes apart in my hands and falls to the floor. I look at it for a moment and then pick it all up and throw it into the bin. A spider runs out from behind the bin. The thing is huge. It criss-crosses the floor around my feet. Then lurches off towards the shadows behind the washing machine. I turn the kitchen light off. I make my way out into the small hallway at the bottom of the stairs. I lean against the wall. The stairway walls are gold in the light from upstairs, but where I am it is dark. I could eat a horse. A hoss. A scabby hoss between two bread vans. I slip my hand down into my boxers and check my t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es for lumps. Whether my fear is genuine fear or media-inspired paranoia I don"t know. It"s just, you know. You read and hear so much. Probably there isn"t any difference.