Assembly(6)

Well, shit. Ain’t I a woman?

Merrick hasn’t started yet. He’s fidgeting and saying oh um yes well. He places his palms flat on the table, says well, then leans back and adjusts his glasses. Um, yes. He looks from the woman to me.

The unpleasantness is behind us, he finally says. We’d like to put all that behind us and move forward. In a new direction.

He attempts a milky smile.

The woman puts it simply, they want diversity now.

Merrick nods with ludicrous gravitas.

Yes, he says. Indeed! Exactly. He drums the table. And that’s why he’s speaking to me now, he says. Lou’s already on board.

They go on:

Joint leadership, says Merrick.

A big opportunity, says the woman.

I’m very lucky, they both agree.



The floor, the tight-packed rows of suited men, operates with a lurching autonomy. Even after weeks without strategic direction from this glass box. The men are laughing, breathing, talking in twos or threes, gathered around a screen. Or standing, chests puffed, and pointing. Punctuated by an occasional woman. Some crouch down, their noses in plastic trays of early dinner or late lunch. There’s a stink to it. So many men talking and sweating and burping and coughing and existing – packed in sleeve to sleeve. Dry, weathered faces; soft, flabby cheeks; grease-shined foreheads. Necks bursting from as-yet-unbuttoned collars. All shades of pink, beige, tan. Fingers stabbing at keyboards and meaty fists wrapped around phone receivers. Or handsfree, gesturing and talking into slender headsets while tossing and catching a ball or pen.

Is this it – the crescendo of my career?

My life?

Lou stands, waves. He’s heading over, smiling.





Lou!


I grew up dirt poor, you know. Dirt-fucking-poor in a shack, essentially, in Bedford. So, I get it. I get the grind. All this – it’s as foreign to me as it is to you. Really. And I respect it, what you’re about. The hustle. I do. So, look, of course I agreed to share the promotion. Of course. You deserve this, just as much as me. Okay? Okay. Don’t let anyone tell you different. Fuck, I’m excited. For this, for us – the dream team! Alright, well. Just wanted to tell you that. Anyway. The boys are heading downstairs for a cheeky one to celebrate.

You coming along?



Back at my desk, I savour the rare moment of quiet. With Lou and the rest out celebrating, I feel an unfamiliar calm in this space. Curiously, I appreciate anew the physicality of my work area. I have the corner window spot. Lou’s desk is across from mine. A two-foot-tall felt-padded divider is all that separates us during the thousands of hours we spend here together. The various teams we will now jointly manage occupy the rows of monitors and softly whirring machines surrounding me.

This success, this attainment: everything I’ve strived for. Within my hands. My fingers tight around a joist of the proverbial ceiling. I have a two-thousanddollar ergonomic office chair and a Bluetooth headset that flashes, contentedly, from the glossy cube it reclines on to charge. Three thirty-two-inch monitors render red and green with breathtaking intensity. And a stack of business cards; each bearing my name and corporate title – another reprint needed now, on weighty stock beside the bank’s embossed logo.

This is everything.

I have everything.

In a panorama around me, the sky is melting: reds and oranges into inky blue and nighttime. I stare through the surely colour-distorting, anti-UV-tinted, floor-to-ceiling window-walls. Out past the skyscrapers and into the blurred green-grey horizon beyond. My fingers feel numb but my face is hot, and prickles. I log out of my workstation, pack up my handbag and head towards the lifts.





Here I Am At The Station, I Should


The departure boards display leisurely. Flick from one of two, to two of two, and back again. I find mine amongst the screens. A platform number shines blurry from a handful of orange dots.

So, here I am at the station. I should go find my platform and get on the train. It’s a forty-minute ride. He’ll meet me on the other end. Parked outside the station in his Mini, ready to drive me the rest of the way.

I don’t feel that I’m going on a journey. Here I am, no heavy bags or comfortable shoes. I’m still dressed for work, I’m here straight from the office. The leather tips of my shoe-boots wink against sharp-pressed hems.

It would have been better to make this trip tomorrow morning.

But I’m here now. And I should at least move. I’m in the way, standing here. Jostled by the currents of rushing people, dawdling people, people arranged as families, clustered like ducklings. I’m right in the throughway. So come on now. Lift left foot and swing it ahead, spring forward. Don’t slow down, don’t stop. Don’t think. Just keep it moving.

Go get on the train.

But here I am,

still

stood, still

at the station.

I really should





21 : 04

LONDON PADDINGTON [PAD]

TO

NEWBURY [NBY]




When the drinks trolley stops, I buy another miniature bottle of non-specific red wine. The train hurtles on. On from London, from the office. Fields and trees, shrubs, parallax past the grubby window.

I’m unsure about this weekend. It seemed fine, even enjoyable, when proposed. Months away, abstract.