Say Hello and Wave Goodbye Read online

  Who just happens to be my boss.

  We arrive back in front of Trina’s desk.

  ‘You’ll be sitting here.’

  I look at her blankly, are we sharing a desk? I’m just about to ask and make myself look like a complete basket case when I realise that she means the desk opposite hers. I feel relieved that I’m going to be sitting near her – I have a feeling that we’re going to get on and I don’t fancy sitting with lots of twenty-year-olds who make me feel ancient.

  ‘Great,’ I say, pointlessly.

  ‘But before we get into boring work, how about we get a coffee?’ suggests Trina.

  ‘Sounds like a good idea,’ I say. Trina and I are definitely going to get along.

  ‘I’ll show you where the restaurant is and the toilets at the same time, part of your induction.’ She marches off briskly and I follow her back through the door where we came into the office,up a flight of stairs and through double swing doors into the restaurant.

  It’s humungous; several large shiny stainless-steel counters are arranged in a circular fashion at the front of a vast hall and I can see lots of tables and chairs behind them. They seem to have counters for everything; hot drinks, salads, hot meals, there’s even a baguette station. I follow Trina to the hot drinks counter and fumble in my handbag for my purse but Trina puts her hand up and stops me.

  ‘My treat, you can get them next time.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Seems to be all I can say.

  We order our coffees and wait while a barista wearing what looks like a beige nurse’s uniform very slowly and carefully makes them; I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone make a coffee so slowly. When she finally finishes I pick mine up and follow Trina to a table and we sit down opposite each other. Quite a few of the tables around us are occupied and a queue is slowly forming at the coffee counter.

  ‘Do you come up here every day before you start work?’ I ask Trina as I stir my coffee.

  ‘God, no. I couldn’t afford to do this every day. I usually make one in the office kitchen ‘cos it’s free. I thought we’d come today with it being your first day and everything, have a bit of a skive. Also, no nosy parkers earwigging.’

  ‘Ah, I see.’

  ‘So, what did you think of Ed and our Em?’

  ‘Very nice,’ I lie.

  ‘Really?’ She raises an eyebrow.

  ‘Ed seems really nice and to be honest, I’d already met Emily. Em.’

  ‘What, when you came for your interview?’

  ‘No, I only met HR. I met Em when I viewed the room she has to let.’

  ‘No!’ Trina starts to laugh her donkey bray laugh again and several heads turn our way. ‘Oh my God, imagine sharing a house with the ice queen.’

  ‘It’s a flat,’ I say, ‘And to be fair, it’s a very nice flat. ’

  ‘Don’t tell me you’re going to live with her?’ Trina looks at me in horror.

  ‘No, I’ve got a place somewhere else.’

  ‘Christ, that was a lucky escape. Imagine house sharing with your boss.’

  ‘Um, well...’

  Trina looks at me quizzically so I tell her the rest of the story, the gentleman friends, the lying text, the lot. When I’ve finished she’s laughing so much she’s almost crying although the donkey braying has calmed down a bit.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she says, wiping her eyes, ‘...shit, my mascara’s going to run if I laugh much more. I shouldn’t laugh, it’s just... gentlemen friends...’ She can’t even finish the sentence for laughing.

  I sit impassively and watch and eventually Trina manages to compose herself.

  ‘Sorry, you must feel really awful, talk about bad luck.’

  ‘Tell me about it,’ I say. ‘Story of my life.’

  ‘The good thing is that you won’t have to have too much contact with her; she only really gets involved with us admins when there’s a problem. We’re pretty much left to our own devices.’

  ‘Really?’ I say hopefully.

  ‘Definitely. You’ll only see her at meetings, and booking holidays.’

  I look at her hopefully.

  ‘And if you’re off sick,’ she adds.

  ‘Oh, right.’

  ‘Yeah, she does the back to work interviews. Take my advice and come into work even if you’re dying and pray that they’ll send you home because the back to work interview is worse than being ill. It’s like being interrogated by the Gestapo.’ She pulls a face .

  ‘Okay.’ I swallow the last of my coffee. ‘So apart from booking holidays, meetings and back to work interviews I’ll never have to see her.’

  ‘That’s right, you won’t.’

  I mentally promise myself to never have any sick time or problems that will involve ever having to speak to Emily. Em.

  ‘Except,’ Trina looks around to check that no one is listening, ‘If she’s got it in for you. Then she won’t leave you alone.’

  ✽✽✽

  The rest of the day passes quite quickly and luckily I don’t see Em again. I spend the afternoon arranging my pens and pencils and trays on my desk and familiarising myself with where everything is. The sales admin system is exactly the same as the one at Westchester, the only differences to my old job are the different people and places that I have to deal with.

  Mid-afternoon, Trina and I have another skive up to the restaurant for a coffee, which I buy this time. Trina is very easy to get on with and I thank God she’s here because I don’t think I’d last five minutes on my own because everyone else completely ignores me. After a very long coffee break, Trina takes me down to the security office to have my photo taken and my security pass and parking permit issued.

  The security guard makes a bit of a fuss to start with because I should already have my parking permit and he says it’s a lot of extra work for him to do it now. I think he’s lying and just wants to feel important but I play the game and smile sweetly and beg. After a lot of exaggerated opening of cupboards while he looks for the correct permit, he finally agrees to do it.

  I have to have my photo taken for my pass and I’m made to stand against the wall while he takes a head shot of me with his mobile phone. We then wait while he prints out my plastic pass, complete with photo. I’d done my smiling not smiling face; which means the corners of my mouth are slightly upturned so I don’t look old and miserable and hopefully not deranged.

  After a lot of lip pursing and tutting he silently hands the pass and permit over the counter and makes me sign in a book that I’ve received them. He then walks over to the corner of the office, settles himself down in a battered swivel chair, picks up a crumpled copy of The Sun , gives it a shake and proceeds to read it. Trina says he sits there most of the day and doesn’t really like to be disturbed; apparently, he gets a right strop on if he has to do anything which is probably why I’m getting the silent treatment.

  I unclip the temporary pass and loop the new one onto my lanyard and look at it in shock. I wasn’t expecting it to be a good photograph but my God, do I really look like that?

  Yes you do , sniggers the Beccabird.

  He obviously took the photo either before or after I did my smiling not smiling face and I look miserable, old and my face looks about three foot long.

  ‘I look like a convict.’ I show Trina the pass. ‘Please tell me I don’t look like that?’

  ‘No, you don’t.’ She laughs. ‘I reckon he’s got a special app that stretches and distorts all the photos. Revenge for having to get off his fat arse.’

  ‘It’s awful, I look like a horse – my face isn’t that long.’

  ‘You should see mine, he managed to cut off the top of my head and I look like I’ve got a massive moon face.’

  I feel a bit better; Trina is so petite and pretty that I can’t imagine it’s possible to take a bad photo of her .

  ‘So, let’s see.’ Trina looks at her watch. ‘It’s four o’clock now so I’ll give you a guided tour of the building so you know where everything is.’

  �
��Sounds good.’

  ‘By the time we’ve finished it’ll be nearly time to go home so we need to pace ourselves. I never work too hard, just hard enough, have to tell myself to slow down sometimes because those youngsters spend more time yapping than they do working and I’m not doing more than them when most of them are on more money than me.’

  ‘How can they be on more money if they do the same job?’

  ‘Sucking up, that’s how. Favouritism. They make sure they get given a special project – which is basically a load of old tosh – and then they get a pay rise.’

  ‘Can’t we get a special project?’

  Trina snorts.

  ‘You have to be a favourite and I’m not and you won’t be either.’

  I frown at her.

  ‘Another of Em’s jobs - giving out the special projects.’

  ✽✽✽

  Our guided tour consists of going down to Reception and looking at the different departments on the building map followed by a long chat while we sit in the comfy seats for visitors in Reception. Trina has a clipboard in front of her to make it look business-like but actually has a piece of paper on it with a list of last year’s Grand National runners. The snooty receptionist greets Trina warmly but totally blanks me.

  By the time we get back to the office it’s ten to five and I can tell by the way everyone’s sitting at their desks gazing at their screens that most of them are surfing the internet. I sit down at my desk and push a few bits of paper around to make it look as though I’m doing something although no one’s even looking at me.

  At a couple of minutes to five there’s a mass exodus and the office is emptied in seconds; I’ve never seen a roomful of people move so fast. I grab my coat and bag and Trina and I head out of the door and into the stairwell.

  ‘What floor are you parked on?’ asks Trina.

  ‘This one.’

  ‘Good thinking, I’m on the next one down. This is the most popular floor but I never get in early enough to get a space. How did you find your first day?’

  ‘Good,’ I say. ‘I’ll be alright once I’m settled, it just feels strange being the new person.’

  ‘Give it a week and you’ll feel as if you’ve been here forever.’

  ‘I hope so,’ I say, laughing.

  ‘Have a good evening, I’ll see you tomorrow.’ She gives me a wave as she carries on down the stairs.

  I emerge onto the fourth floor of the car park with relief, thankful that the worst is over. It wasn’t a good start finding out that Em is my boss but the day has passed uneventfully and nothing else has gone wrong. I can go home and relax knowing that the worst is over.

  I rummage around in my bag and pull out my car key and click it to unlock the door. I open the door and am about to get in when a flash of yellow catches my eye and the day does get a whole lot worse.

  There’s a wheel clamp on my front wheel.

  Chapter Five

  S aturday morning eventually arrives after what feels like the longest week of my life. After the debacle of the wheel clamping the rest of the week was uneventful and thankfully, Em and I didn’t cross each other’s paths again.

  When I saw the wheel clamp on my car I felt like bursting into tears. The Beccabird went into a complete meltdown and cackled for hours whilst informing me that it was all my own fault .

  Which it was.

  I tramped despondently all the way back to the security office and when the security man eventually looked up from his newspaper, I told him that I’d been clamped. I’m sure I saw a hint of a smile on his miserable face.

  ‘So,’ I’d said, ‘Can you come and take it off, please?’

  He drew air in noisily through his nose and blew it out through his three remaining teeth and shook his head whilst pursing his lips.

  ‘You should have had a parking permit. Anyone without one gets clamped.’

  ‘Yes,’ I’d said, trying my hardest not to shout at him, ‘I know that now but obviously when I parked there this morning I didn’t know that. It’s my first day, you see. ’

  He’d tutted and mumbled something about that being no excuse and lumbered over to the back of the office where he took a black folder down from a shelf and slowly made his way back to the counter. He then ever so slowly leafed through every page until he found what he was looking for and then even more slowly punched some numbers into the grubby phone on the counter.

  ‘They might have gone by now,’ he’d said hopefully as he held the receiver to his ear listening to it ringing. ‘Might have to leave it ‘til first thing tomorrow morning.’

  Visions of stomping home in the rain – because of course it was chucking it down by then – and the humiliation of having my car unclamped while everyone was arriving for work the next day flashed through my head like a waking nightmare.

  Then someone must have answered the phone because I saw the security guard’s disappointed look as he spoke to them. After he’d put the phone down, he became quite animated and informed me importantly that not displaying a parking permit was actually a disciplinary matter because being so close to the town centre, illegal parking was rampant. He’d then delighted in telling me that he’d have to inform my line manager of my failure to display a parking permit so that they could take the appropriate action against me.

  A vision of Em’s face and the resultant telling off flashed before me and I have to admit that at that point I very nearly lost it; I was an inch away from telling him to fuck right off. I’m not proud of it and to be honest, if the Beccabird hadn’t been screaming at me to calm down I’d probably have said it and maybe even punched him on his big, fat nose as well.

  Eventually, after a lot of grovelling and repeatedly telling him it was my first day and how terribly sorry I was he agreed that he’d let it go. This time.

  The only good thing about it all was that by the time the unclamping began everyone in the building had gone home so there was no one there to see Dave from the clamping department - yes, really, they have a department for it, it’s a sub-department of security - remove the clamp from my car. Dave, by the way, thought the whole situation was absolutely hilarious and he didn’t shut up the whole time he was unclamping me. On and on and on...and he asked me out.

  It was totally my own fault because I was distracted and I wasn’t paying proper attention to what he was saying. When he said I expect your boyfriend’ll be wondering where you are, I stupidly said I haven’t got a boyfriend . The minute I’d said it I could have kicked myself because I could suddenly see exactly where the conversation was going but by then it was too late.

  I had to let him down gently because obviously I wanted my car unclamped pronto, so I lied and told him that I was sorry if I gave him the wrong impression but I was happily married to my wife . I’m usually a terrible liar but he completely believed me and his eyes lit up a bit and he said if I ever fancied trying a man I knew where he was.

  Yes, honestly, he said that.

  I should have been flattered because I don’t actually get asked out all that often but the thing is, I’m not all about how a man looks but I do like them to have their own hair and most of their teeth and to not be four inches shorter than me. There are limits. I did wonder if he asked every female out that he unclamped because I can’t see him getting a date otherwise. I also noted that not having many teeth is a prerequisite for a job in Atkinsons security department, perhaps they put it on the job description.

  So when I was finally unclamped and driving home it took all of my willpower not to call in at the supermarket on the way to buy a huge bottle of gin to drown my sorrows. But the Beccabird wouldn’t shut up and I agreed to go straight home as long as she stopped going on about it . Also, I didn’t want to be having a horrible hangover on my second day or, God forbid, oversleep and be late for work.

  It was a quarter to eight by the time I got in and I couldn’t be bothered to cook, so my dinner consisted of four slices of toast with butter, slavered in peanut butter with j
am on the top.

  Not surprisingly, I felt sick and had indigestion afterwards and had to glug down half a bottle of Gaviscon.

  ✽✽✽

  So here I am this morning, sitting in my favourite armchair in my pyjamas, slurping coffee and reading a trashy magazine and wondering what the hell I’m going to do all weekend. Saturday and Sunday looms long and lonely and I wish I had some friends I could call on. I didn’t have close friends in Westchester but there were four of us in our office who were single so we often went on outings together and there weren’t many weeks that went by when something wasn’t organised by one of us. Yes, I was the youngest so we didn’t exactly go clubbing but we had fun and I didn’t feel as lonely as I do now. I didn’t feel as if I was the only person in the world without any friends.

  There’s this assumption that you can do anything on your own and no one bats an eyelid nowadays but I know the truth of it; it’s lonely and embarrassing sitting in a restaurant on your own, people do look at you. I can just about get away with going to the pictures alone because it’s dark in there but it’s not the same as having someone to go with.

  I could visit Mum and Dad again but if I do I know they’ll pick up on the fact that I’m as lonely as hell and I don’t want them to start worrying about me. They’ve done enough of that.

  Maybe when I’ve been at Atkinsons for a bit longer I’ll get a bit of a social life. I don’t think Trina’s got a partner so maybe we could chum up and go out together, we do get on really well already.

  I hear the front door open so yet again Flynn is going to catch me slobbing around in my pyjamas, although I’m not that bothered because it is a Saturday after all and it’s only half past nine.

  ‘Morning,’ I call out.

  He appears in the kitchen doorway looking flustered. He has his work boiler suit on as if he’s ready to go to work.

  ‘Hey,’ he drags his hand through his red curls distractedly.