Six of the Best

by Michael White

  “Here, John” said William, “Give us you matches.” Giggling John passed them to him and to Keith’s surprise he opened the box of matches and threw them all on the floor.

  “How many, rain man?” John said, releasing him a little so he could see the matches on the floor.”

  “I do not know” said Keith, puzzled.

  “I do not know” scoffed William, and he knelt down to pick them up, counting them back into the box as he collected them.

  “One... two.... three....”

  When he reached fourteen he closed the box.

  “There you go” said John. “Fourteen.”

  “Bloody useless” said William, releasing him. “Can’t even get that right.”

  “Yeah,” snarled John. “Go on - piss off” and to Keith’s surprise they had moved away from him. He remembered quickly leaving the warehouse with the calls of “rain man” ringing in his ears.

  That had all happened fourty one days ago and they still called him rain man. He still had not got around to Googling what they meant by this, but he suspected that whatever it was, it was not nice. From that point onwards he made sure that if he was ever called in to the warehouse Mr Edwards was there. If he was not he came back out and if he was called away Keith would follow him and return when he came back to finish the brushing up. He wondered on more than one occasion why William and John were not capable of doing it, but he knew that they were lazy and probably not very precise in brushing things up either.

  So Keith continued to sort the mail and when he was sure that he had it all in the correct piles he got ready to deliver it to the people around the office. Keith really liked the bustle of all the workers. Now that everyone had arrived the large open plan area was filled with the sounds of the staff talking on the phone, phones ringing, computer keyboards clacking away as they all got on with their work. There was lots of chattering too, and Keith liked all the noise as it reminded him of a great big machine, the sound of lots of human beings working around him in some way comforting. He now had ninety letters to distribute by his calculations, which was of course 5a, so he decided to get on with it.

  As per usual he started with accounts. There were always lots of letters for them - invoices and such, Keith thought, and there were only two members of the team, Enid and Peggy. Keith thought that these were really old people’s names, which was okay because Enid and Peggy were old ladies really, but he did like them as they made a bit of a fuss of him. Peggy in particular always used to come and say hello to him every morning when she arrived, and if they were on the same break together then she used to make him some toast, which was good. Keith liked toast, especially if it had marmalade or jam on it, and sometimes it did.

  Peggy and Enid had received some bad news recently, however. Keith knew that they were both being made redundant. This apparently meant that they would not be able to work at the office any more, as they were not needed any longer. He had also overheard someone talking saying that their positions were being rationalised in to head office and merging with the accounts team there. Keith knew that head office was in London which was a long way away and therefore they would not be able to travel there to work. Not even in a car. Keith noticed that although they were very upset they put a brave face on it and carried on as if nothing had happened. However, he did notice that several other people around the office began to behave differently around them, as if they were in danger of being rationalised too if they associated themselves with them. Keith thought was decidedly odd, if not a little bit cruel too.

  “Morning Keith” said Peggy and Enid waved at him as he dropped their mail onto their desk.

  “Morning Enid and Peggy” he said, “twenty two letters for accounts and one each for you both personally.” He could not help but notice Peggy and Enid exchanged a quick glance at each other when he mentioned the personal letters, but said nothing. Some things had to be private.

  “Thank you Keith, you’re a good boy” said Peggy and they set about opening the accounts letters first between them.

  “You are welcome” said Keith and moved on with his letters. It was often the case that he could leave mail for people on their desk without even talking to them, but sometimes he had to point out certain ones to people that had perhaps arrived recorded delivery or the like. Apart from a bit of noise from the accounts section as he made his rounds the delivery of the mail was completely uneventful and he had it all done by 9:35, which was ahead of schedule. With ten minutes to spare before his break he logged on to his computer and checked to see if he had any email. Apart from the usual company communications there was nothing really to speak about and ten minutes later he went on his break, then brushed the reception area after that.

  The rest of the morning was pretty uneventful too, apart that he noticed both Peggy and Enid had left suddenly, and he felt sad as he had the feeling that he would never see them again. Lunch time was a bit special as the canteen was laden out like a banqueting hall. There had been a delivery from the local catering company and there was food everywhere. People arriving at the canteen for their lunch hastily abandoned the salads and lunch boxes that they had brought with them and tucked in to the food on display. They all seemed puzzled by the sudden arrival of the buffet but tucked in none the less. There were lots of people milling about, and Keith thought several of the managers seemed to be wandering in and out of the canteen with bemused looks upon their faces, but that did not seem to stop them from leaving with a plate of sandwiches.

  He heard several people in the canteen chattering about Enid and Peggy, but could only make out the words, cheque and pounds, and that Peggy had apparently slapped Mr Dinslay’s face on her way out, which was completely out of character for her, Keith thought. Funny though. He would have loved to have seen that!

  Mr Dinslay was the general manager of the office and Keith thought that he was not a very nice man at all. He certainly did not seem to like him, and the feeling was entirely mutual. Mr Dinslay however seemed to dislike everyone in the office equally, which was a bit odd, Keith thought - if he really hated his job that much, surely he should leave? Keith held no hopes for that one though - Mr Dinslay seemed to enjoy making every one's life a misery.

  One day as he had been sitting at his desk sorting the mail out Mr Dinslay had been showing a client around the office and as he went past Keith’s desk he heard him say to the client, “You see the pile of shit I have to work with?” and the client had laughed loudly. Another time he had passed the main meeting room where he overheard Mr Dinslay giving Mrs Jones, who was the HR director, a dressing down in which he had heard his name mentioned along with the words “quota”, “retard” and “at least we get his wages subsidised”. This made him mad and a little bit upset, but it made him angrier at Mr Dinslay because he thought Mrs Jones looked more than a little bit frightened of him, which was not fair at all.

  Mr Dinslay seemed to have only one thing in his life that made him smile and that was his car. He had a very nice silver soft top sports car. Keith did not know what type it was because he was too scared to go anywhere near it in case Mr Dinslay saw him looking at it, and also because he was not really very interested in cars because the exhaust fumes from them gave you cancer, and he did not want that. He did however know that he had a personalised number plate which was DD30 LAY . If you added up all the numbers in the registration number you would get 1e, Keith knew, so that was okay.

  The reason he knew that this was Mr Dinslay’s registration plate was one morning in the spring it had been raining overnight but was a bright and sunny although cold morning. As he rode his bicycle up the last couple of hundred yards to the office Mr Dinslay had passed him in his silver sports car. As usual he was driving way too fast, but as he went past him he seemed to swerve slightly towards Keith, and splashed water all over him from the roadside that Keith had not noticed previously. The swerving of the car frightened him and he fell off his bicycle into the puddle. As he climbed soaking back onto his
bicycle he noticed Mr Dinslay looking at him as he entered the office, and he seemed to be chuckling to himself. Keith had spent all day in his wet clothes and subsequently had to spend two days off sick with a very nasty cold. Keith thought Mr Dinslay had soaked him on purpose and it was all his fault he got ill, though of course there was nothing he could do about it.

  When he got back from lunch Keith found that the caterers had been busy there too. Big bowls of sweets sat between every desk, and there was an awful lot of chewing going on, which meant that the office was a little quieter than usual. Again, lots of the managers were milling about and Keith could tell by their body language that they were trying to decide who should approach Mr Dinslay to find out what was going on, but they could not decide which one of them was the bravest, and Mr Dinslay’s door remained steadfastly shut. Keith did not really care. Helping himself to a big handful of chocolate eclairs he started on the stationery order.

  The office went through an awful lot of stationery, and his part of the job was to count how much they had. The floor supervisor, Terry, would then order the next weeks supplies based on his count. Keith was not allowed to do the ordering bit even if Terry was on holiday, in case he got it wrong, though there was not much chance of that. The primary part of this order was paper for the printers. They seemed to get through an awful lot of that, which he knew was not terribly environmentally friendly, but they needed it to get the job done. Each week a couple of dozen boxes of A4 paper would turn up and Keith would distribute them evenly to the cupboards below the printers. Each box contained 5 reams of paper and each ream was 500 sheets, or 1f4, and so therefore there were two and a half thousand pieces of paper per box, or 9c4. They were also awfully heavy, and he was always glad of a glass of cold water after he had finished putting the paper away. As he looked up from counting the boxes he could see the stationery wagon driving past the front of the building with the delivery. It was being closely followed by another lorry. Keith thought it may not be long before he got called to the warehouse to fetch this week’s paper through.

  The afternoon continued uneventfully, though at about two O’clock the fire alarm was set off and they all had to assemble in the car park. To every one's surprise several ice cream vans had gathered in the car park and seemed to be giving away free ice creams. Nonplussed, Keith patiently queued up and had two cornets. As it was a hot sunny day and the ice cream seemed to be endless, the managers had more than a spot of bother getting everyone back indoors. Everyone was stood around the car park, milling about in the sunshine and chatting. Keith did notice however that people seemed to avoid Mr Dinslay’s silver sports car which sat parked in the corner in the director’s parking space. It glinted brightly in the sunshine, the soft top pulled down to show the car at its best. Keith thought that this certainly proved that Mr Dinslay was definitely a fecker. It was only when Mr Dinslay started shouting about sackings that people began to reluctantly file back in to the building, muttering. They were also held up slightly by another couple of wagons that had arrived for the loading bay, and seemed to be queuing around the corner. Keith counted five lorries.

  Eventually they were all back at their desks. Keith noticed a group of managers pushing Mrs Jones towards Mr Dinslay’s office and they all proceeded to shuffle in. From the office everyone could hear shouting and Keith made out the words, “Well check with the catering company and see if it’s paid for. Now get on with your work!”

  The managers duly shuffled out and Mr Dinslay stood in his office doorway scowling across the office floor. Eventually Mrs Jones returned and Mr Dinslay could be heard shouting again. “Well there you go - if it is paid for then that is that!” Mrs Jones scuttled away only to be replaced by a very red-faced Mr Edwards from the warehouse, who seemed to be clutching several invoices. He muttered something to Mr Dinslay who gave him a dismissive look and just said, “Check with Head Office. If it’s paid for you will just have to find somewhere for it, won’t you?” and he slammed his office door in Mr Edwards face. Mr Edwards almost doffed his cap at the firmly closed door and scuttled back to the warehouse. Outside the office window three more lorries went past.

  There was definitely an air about the office now that there was not going to be much more work done that day, and people did not even try to give the pretence otherwise. There just seemed to be an awful lot going on. Keith saw Roland from the IT department running about from computer to computer. There seemed to be a lot of problems with the computers this afternoon! As well as this, two more lorries arrived and a few more were coming down the road. Intrigued, Keith left the building and went to have a look at the queue which was by now stretched around the corner and up the street. He counted fourteen lorries, which was e. Looking around the corner of the loading bay there seemed to be an awful lot of shouting going on.

  There was also a bit of a kerfuffle with several of the drivers. One of them shouted, “Well I don’t care mate, I’ll unload it here and you can carry it in yourselves. I’m not waiting here all bloody day! You should have an effing booking in system or something.” several of the other lorry drivers that were gathered about him could be seen nodding their heads in agreement and making back to their lorries and getting ready to unload.

  At Five O'clock everyone turned off their computers and made to leave. Keith noticed however that almost everyone was standing outside the building instead of making for their cars. He went to investigate what was happening. The problem seemed to be the long queue of rapidly unloading lorries. As he watched he saw that there was now a wall of printer paper boxes starting to stretch around the building that were nearly blocking the road.

  That was not the main problem though.

  Edging its way past the lorries a huge agricultural wagon was backing up the drive way. It had a huge tipper on the back that must have been ten (that is, a) feet high. From the fearsome smell that rose from the steaming top of the wagon, no-one was in any doubt at all what the wagon contained. Slowly it made its way backwards as if in slow motion. The entire office was stood outside now, watching the progress of the wagon. Almost to a man they turned to the entrance of the office as the back of the wagon began to rise. the smell intensified at exactly the same moment as Mr Dinslay emerged scowling from the back of the office. He looked at them all darkly, as if awaiting some explanation as to why they were all standing there. Then he turned slowly, taking in the growing wall of A4 printer paper boxes that were by now beginning to snake around the corner of the building. Then he turned towards the bigger wagon, the back of which was by now rising higher and higher, wrinkling his nose at the smell. And then he managed to place exactly where his pride and joy was, his silver open topped sports car, shining like a bright jewel in the summer sun.

  Managed to locate exactly where it was.

  Almost precisely three seconds before approximately six tons of raw sewage descended upon it, burying it completely.

  Almost instinctively, the entire office went “Ooooooooooooooo.”

  “Well.” said Keith, breaking the silence, “That certainly is a big pile of shit, isn’t it?”

  Everyone was silent. Then the giggles began. Then the roars of laughter. Mr Dinslay seemed to have gone purple and was not able to speak at all. The cab of the huge wagon opened and a enormous man descended to the car park. “Apologies for that.” he said. “Seems like a lever got stuck. Still I am sure the haulage will pay compensation.”

  It was a generally agreed consensus throughout the office over the next few weeks that it was extremely odd how the driver did not seem to be in the slightest bit perturbed by what had happened, and that the offer of compensation was offered so freely. Slowly all the workers from the office began to make their way to their cars.

  Their laughter followed them home.

  Whilst an ambulance was called for Mr Dinslay (who did not seem to be very well) Keith returned to the office to collect his sandwich box before heading home. He could not resist looking in to the warehouse where John and William wer
e slaving away like Trojans, carting what seemed to be an endless procession of printer boxes around the warehouse. Already a huge wall of them was rising up on the far side. There were an awful lot more of them piled up outside the warehouse, however. John and William did not look too pleased at all. Mr Edwards had been called away by a phone call to a family emergency an hour before, though (he related the next time he went in) when he arrived home in a hurry no-one there had a clue what he was talking about, which was odd. He had, however left strict instructions that there was no way that John or William could leave the paper outside. Rain was forecast, Mr Edwards had said, putting on his coat, and the paper would spoil.

  John and William looked up at him standing before them on the loading bay.

  “Keith” William panted, (it was the first time he had ever used Keith’s name and it made Keith smile just a little) “Give us a hand, mate.”

  “Can’t.” said Keith, “Health and safety.” Turning to leave he called, “Good night - ream man” and he went. As he passed through the door he heard John groan. “For Christ’s sake we’re going to be here until fucking midnight at this rate”.

  Passing through the now empty office he stopped to pick another chocolate eclair out of a near empty bowl on a desk nearby. Pausing, he picked another out just for the journey home.

  Of course, he thought, midnight was an extremely optimistic figure. Keith reckoned that even factoring in the two men slowing down with tiredness, and the limited cubic capacity of the warehouse itself, it would be approximately 3:27 am before they finished. Give or take ten minutes.

  And there was that smile again.

  Crossing the car park he passed the wall of printer boxes, circumnavigated the heap of shit that was once Mr Dinslay’s car and passed the ambulance that Mr Dinslay was now being helped in to the back of, swathed in blankets. The registration plate numbers on the ambulance added up to 14, which was of course e.