All he wanted was a glass of water. The glass of water that he was looking at in fact, the one the receptionist had brought over and set down on the glass-topped coffee table in front of him.
But he knew that although he would have no difficulties picking it up, the moment he got it close to his face – the moment it passed out of his vision and into the area of dreadful uncertainty beneath his nose – his hand would start to tremble wildly. He would rush the final push to his mouth. He would rattle the glass into his teeth. Yes, he would swallow a small amount, but a far greater amount would spill over his lips and chin and, crucially, it would slowly blot across his lucky blue interview tie.
Thirsty as Ben was, he couldn't afford to let this happen. He could see through the glass partition that the previous candidate was reaching the Actually-there-is-one-question-that-I'd-like-to-put-to-you-from-my-side-if-I-may stage. Soon Ben would be called upon to cross the room and coordinate all the efforts of a smooth introduction. He just hoped that his hands would stop shaking for long enough to shake hands.
Ben swallowed back a dry pellet of panic, raised his eyes to the ceiling –
and slowly – breathed – out. If he could just keep it together for another twenty minutes, half an hour tops, then he might give himself a chance.
Ben noticed that the receptionist was eyeing him nervously. He tried to reassure her with a cracked grin. No doubt she didn't like the look of Ben, she was suspicious. And who could blame her? For a start she'd have noticed that, as usual, his eyes were red raw and streaming. She'd have noticed that he was chewing strong mint chewing-gum because his mouth and tongue were dry and sticky and tasted of metal and panic. And she'd have noticed that he was wearing too much cheap spray, chosen for its suggestion of the sports club, yes, but more fundamentally for its ambiguous ethanol undertones. Because he didn't want her to realise that, up close, he smelt a bit… well a bit medicinal. Only moments ago Ben had felt clean-collared and office-fresh. But now his careful preparations seemed nothing more than a misguided masking exercise; a distasteful cocktail of contradictory scents applied chaotically, like he was trying to confuse a dog.
Suddenly Ben had a good idea. The water in the glass wasn't the only water available. If he was quick he could probably go to the toilet and get as much as he needed from the tap. He stood up.
'Excuse me, er. The toilet?'
By the time Ben returned to reception there was no sign of the previous interviewee and the receptionist was just introducing a new candidate to her boss. They all turned as Ben walked in.
'Ah, Mr Thomas I presume. Simon Ratcliffe.' The boss held out his hand and did a near perfect job of failing to notice that a dark, wet stain was blooming across Ben's tie. Meanwhile Ben was too busy being badly thrown by how young this Simon Ratcliffe was to worry about much else.
'We did wait for you but then this gentleman arrived and we didn't want to delay. Would you mind awfully if we saw him first?'
Ben didn't answer. Instead he sat down and switched his attention to his new competitor, looking him carefully up and down. Everything about the man screamed "clean living". It was glinting off his pristine leather shoes, off the gold buckle of his belt and the brass buttons of his blazer, off the perfect whites of his eyes and teeth. It was shining in the flat lie of his hair and the soft nap of his trousers. Ben could practically hear the untroubled hum of the man's gorgeous liver as it processed a little of this and broke down just a bit of that.
As blazerman was being ushered towards the office he caught sight, as Ben did, of the cricket bat that was propped ostentatiously by the door. He took his cue with perfectly pitched social dexterity.
'Ah-ha. I spy a fellow fan.'
Simon Ratcliffe held up his hands in mock surrender.
'Guilty as charged. Do you play?'
'Not as often as I'd like, I have to say.' At this point – quite unbelievably to Ben's mind – the man made a bat of his double-cuffed forearm and moved forward to trap an imaginary cricket ball at his feet with a little click of his tongue.
'Well here in the firm we try to put a decent eleven together every summer.' Here the boss leaned back with a grin to clip a fuller ball to the midwicket boundary. 'We could do with some strength in depth.'
And as the door closed behind them, there they were: fully ensconced in a banal yet glossy exchange that appeared to be the public school equivalent of a masonic handshake.
How could Ben compete with this kind of old school ease? Like cricket itself, he could barely understand the rules, let alone play the game. Was cricket the only sport where you could ingratiate yourself with a potential employer through mime? Or did it work with others? Ben dimly recognised that golf would be OK. But football? Boxing? He imagined that if he went in there and pumped an imaginary football through the top corner of the window, or started throwing a tight combination of feints and punches, then security would, quite rightly, have to be informed.
At least if things started to go badly Ben had the consolation of knowing that the bat was handy, and that he would only have to crash it across the interviewer's shins to even things up a bit. Of course a good round American bat would be ideal. That was the difference between the English and the Americans. Ask the English to design something to thrash a ball with and they'll get misty-eyed about willow and leather, bat and pad, forward defensive and a neat edge past the slips. Meanwhile the Americans will be knocking the jacket off it with a metal club. Give the English a good round bat and they'll cut it in half and invent rounders.
By now Ben was forced to admit that he was allowing things to get to him, starting to dwell on things. Most of all he was dwelling on how he had got here, how the fuck he had ended up like this. He wanted to get some bearings, pin down some specifics of a dramatic downturn in his personal fortunes that he had only the soupiest comprehension of. The unbelievableness was overwhelming, the sheer bewildering un-be-fucking-lievableness of the fact that he had made a whole series of decisions - yes decisions and choices made by him - that had led him unerringly to this point:
Panic welling up in him like vertigo at the thought of FACING A FEW QUESTIONS FROM A MAN SEVERAL YEARS HIS JUNIOR.
About a job that he was SHAMEFULLY OVERQUALIFIED FOR.
And he was struggling to keep a lid on THE TACHYCARDIC TERROR OF IT.
Ben couldn't even claim that this was a job that he actually wanted. In fact, he was at a loss to remember what he was doing here at all. Had he really thought that getting an OK job, in a junior role, on a lowish salary, that he hated, would magically iron his life out?
Ben felt like one of those women that he saw every day on the telly, women whose kids had been and gone and whose husbands had fucked off and left them. Women with men's haircuts, who weighed upwards of twenty stone and hadn't been within wincing range of a pair of jeans since they got pregnant with their first child in 1986. Every day they would raise an earnest eye to the camera and assure him that it was time to take action, that what they needed to get their lives back on track was one or two pointers on what colour skirt would clash least with their varicose veins. And every day Ben would want to tell them to wake the fuck up, that it was going to take more than steering clear of spaghetti straps to get themselves happy.
But then sometimes, sometimes these women would reappear at a party, with a teasy little haircut and a pair of straight-legged trousers that really drew the eye up and down, and Ben could swear that it had changed their lives, given them the confidence to get started. Because you've got to start somewhere, haven't you?
Everyone was always telling Ben that he would have to hit rock bottom before things could begin to get better. But the problem with rock bottom is, how do you know when you're there? It's not like reaching the end of a marathon when you fall through the finishing tape and into a sea of helping hands and replacement fluids, foil blankets and St John's Ambulances on standby just in case. Maybe Ben had arrived already, and maybe getting this job really could be the first step of a long journey towards turning his life around. But what if he hadn't, and what if it wasn't? What if getting this job would just be delaying the inevitable?
Ben stood up. Blazerman was out of his chair and being ushered towards the office door. Finally it was Ben's turn.
'Mr Thomas. Let me speak frankly.' Ben had been waiting for this. The routine questions were over and they'd reached the crunch point. 'I'm well aware of your situation.'
Ben nodded sagely, although it wasn't necessarily clear to him which situation the boss was referring to. For Ben "situations" were like needles dropping from a Christmas tree. Every time he stooped to try to sweep up a few, dozens more would shower down around him. He could only assume it was the fact that he had been asked to leave two jobs in the last six months on alcohol-related grounds.
'Given your… um, your recent health problems…'
Bingo.
'…there are some very valid reasons why this firm - why I - shouldn't hire you'.
There was a "but", Ben knew it.
'But, I think I'm going to surprise you.'
No don't surprise me, thought Ben. For fuck's sake don't surprise me. With the blurry prospect of being offered this job rapidly sharpening into focus, Ben knew for certain that he didn't want it, that he simply couldn't face another second chance.
'Some would say I'm taking a bit of a risk here, going out on a bit of a limb. And in many ways it's true. But I think that you and I, Ben, you and I… we can operate on trust. And I trust that you're going to repay my good faith.'
He had that look: earnest, gratified, worthy. Ben was making the man's day. He could almost see him running through the dinner party scene in his head, filling in the lines of his lean, practical wife:
'I said to Simon, it's madness. He's too good to these people. I mean, the man's plainly an alcoholic. But he wouldn't have it. Just wouldn't have it'.
'That's all very well, darling. But the fellow's had a run of bad luck. We all need a helping hand once in a while. Who knows, it might be me on the on the other side of that desk at some point'.
Demurring murmurs of mirth run round the table.
Ben said nothing. Obviously the man was hoping for more of a response. Something wide-eyed and Dickensian perhaps. Like he should snatch up his little urchin's cap with joy and disappear into the fog tugging on his forelock and shouting "Oh thank you sir! Oh you won't regret this sir, truly you won't!" Couldn't this Simon Ratcliffe see what he was doing to him? With a job to go to, his flat secure, some cash in his pocket, a car even - if they were stupid enough - Ben could keep going for, how long? Six months? Maybe more. It might be a year before he could get this close to rock bottom again.
Another year before he would have gone as far as he could. Exhausted all possibilities. Reached the end of all responsibility. Just the phrase itself, 'rock bottom': the promise of an unambiguous crash landing, a jagged resting place to smash into, to lay his head down on and begin his slow dissolve.
And now he was going to have to face the fact that he hadn't got there yet.
Down on the street Ben was thinking fast, totting up the change in his pocket with his fingers and assessing his options. It wasn't looking good. But if he walked home instead of getting the bus, he might just have enough… well, it wouldn't be pretty, but it would do the job.
Ben took off his tie, dropped it into the road and walked away.
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