Yes Man

by Wallace, Danny

  WANT TO BE A LEGALLY ORDAINED MINISTER?

  Yes!

  BUY OUR MINISTRY IN A BOX!

  All right then!

  Ten minutes later, and I’d filled in the on-line application and purchased my very own ministry in a box. I would now, apparently, be legally allowed to set up my own church, and then marry couples and baptise small children. Or large children. Hell, I could baptise anything I wanted, whatever its size! I was a bloody minister! And within twenty-eight days, I would have the small, plastic card which proved it—and all for a mere one hundred and nineteen dollars! And they say spam is bad.

  I was excited. Who’d have thought, a week before, that I, Danny Wallace, would be one step closer to founding his own church?

  As well as spam, I’d also started to get more e-mails from my friends. The first I found my way to was from Matt.

  Danny,

  Up for a kickabout? I’ve got a new ball! We’re meeting in Hyde Park at twelve.

  Was I up for a kickabout? Of course I was up for a kickabout! I wrote back and said I’d be there, shorts ’n’ all.

  An hour or two later, freshly showered and wearing odd socks, I made my way to the Tube. It was a sunny day; perfect for football and friends. But as I got to the station a few minutes later, I noticed a man with a white stick and a slightly concerned look on his face. He wasn’t really moving—just standing there—and I wondered for a second what the etiquette was in a situation like this. Should I be politically correct and ignore a blind man as I would anyone else looking lost outside a Tube station, or should I take the fact that he was blind into account? But then I thought … what if this was an opportunity? What if we struck up a conversation and became instant friends and ended up going on a wonderful adventure together like the kid and that bloke from Scent of a Woman? It was unlikely, but surely it was an opportunity?

  In the end I took a breath and took the plunge.

  “Hi. Are you okay?”

  The man seemed a little startled by my intrusion, and I instantly regretted my decision.

  “Yes. Yes, I’m fine. I’m just … waiting for someone.”

  Of course he was. I was an idiot. A patronising idiot. But then he added a gracious “Thank you, though,” and I felt less awkward. I started to walk away, the promise of a marvellous adventure with the man fading fast. But as I was nearly up the little steps, he said, “Actually … could you help me?” and I walked back to him.

  He had two fifty-pence pieces in his hand, and he held them up.

  “Do you have a one-pound coin?”

  He opened his other palm, ready for me to place a quid there.

  “Oh, right … Sure … Hang on …”

  I searched my pockets and gave a slightly unnecessary running commentary as I did so. But I didn’t have a pound coin. Just a fiver.

  “Hang on … I’ll go and get some change.”

  I jogged over to the little newspaper stall outside Bow Road station and bought the cheapest paper they had: the Sun.

  I returned to the man moments later.

  “Got one,” I said.

  “Great,” said the man, and I popped the pound coin in his hand.

  And then I waited for him to give me my two 50p pieces in exchange.

  But he didn’t.

  He just said, “That’s brilliant, thanks.”

  And I just stood there.

  “That’s okay,” I said.

  And I stood there some more.

  “I was just a bit short,” he said. But still there were no 50p’s to be seen.

  “Oh,” I said.

  And I waited another couple of seconds for him to give me my money. I didn’t really know what to do. I mean, he’d shown me those 50p’s. That was clearly part of the bargain. And yet the moment I’d given him my pound, they’d disappeared. But what could I do? He was a blind man! I couldn’t demand that a blind man give me two 50p’s! There was probably a law or something!

  “Thanks, then,” he said, clearly bored of my presence and willing me away.

  “That’s okay,” I said rather pathetically, and drifted away, confused by my encounter and slightly dirtied by it, too.

  I walked down the stairs and found my way to the train. Ah well. At least I had a newspaper to while away the journey. I suppose some good had come out of it.

  I started to flick through it, determined to make full use of it, taking in the day’s news and humming a happy tune. So engrossed was I that I didn’t even look up when something fell out of the middle pages and onto my lap. It took me another two stops to realise that whatever had fallen out was, on first glance, some kind of advertisement. I very nearly went straight back to reading the paper, but then something about it caught my eye. It was a competition of some kind. A sheet of scratch cards. With an instruction.

  An invitation.

  An opportunity!

  PLAY SCRATCH-A-MILLION!

  Okay!

  But hang on. What was Scratch-a-Million?

  I immediately scanned the rules on the back of the sheet. Inside the newspaper, it said, were six numbers. All you had to do was check your free scratch card for those numbers, and then rub them off. If you got three matching amounts, that was the amount that you would win. Simple!

  I set about finding the numbers and discovered, to my delight, that my scratch card had all six of that day’s numbers. I felt a bit silly all of a sudden. I scanned left and right just to make sure no one was watching me. I, like you, am all-too-aware of what a rip-off the scratch cards that fall out of newspapers and magazines are. I used to fall for them all the time as a kid. “Well done!” they’d tell you. “You’ve won a star prize!” And then you’d run to the phone and dial the number and spend fourteen pounds of your parent’s money in order to find out you hadn’t won one of the star prizes, like a boat or one of only three brand-new widescreen TVs. No. You’d won one of six million hairclips.

  But this was no rime for embarrassment. Not anymore.

  So I rubbed away the first panel.

  TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND.

  Cor! A great start! Twenty-five thousand pounds!

  I looked up, proud of my latest accomplishment, but no one was there to congratulate me, so I continued.

  I rubbed away the next panel.

  TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND.

  Brilliant! Another twenty-five thousand pounds! All I needed now was a third TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND, and then a world of unthinkable riches would be mine. But as you and I both know, that’s not how scratch cards work. They give you a thrill, a moment of escapism in which you’re happily tricked into thinking you might have a chance of winning a new life, and then they dash your hope just as quickly as they got it up. Oh, yeah. I knew how it worked, all right. I knew what to expect. I was one step ahead of those scratch card boys, and one step ahead of the rest of the Sun-reading public, too, as I scratched off a third box and saw …

  TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND.

  Hang about.

  What were those numbers again?

  Oh …

  Oh. My. Lord.

  TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND. TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND. TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND.

  I couldn’t breathe.

  I had just won twenty-five thousand pounds.

  I told you it was incredible.

  Chapter 4 In Which Daniel Makes an Unfortunate Error

  I was happy. Maybe a little too happy. But winning twenty-five thousand pounds on a scratch card you never would’ve normally scratched can do that to a man. Evidently it was rather suspicious.

  “Why are you smiling so much?” asked Hanne. I’d phoned her up, and we’d agreed to meet up again, in a café not far from Holborn. She wanted me to apologise for my behaviour; I wanted to tell her all about my scratch card win.

  “Danny? What’s with the smile? Really?”

  “I’m just really happy,” I said, building up to my moment.

  Hanne just looked at me.

  “You’re scaring me, Danny.”

  “I’m just h
appy, honestly. Happy for so many reasons. Happy to be here. With you. Hanne. My ex-girlfriend.”

  Hanne’s eyes got a little wider.

  “And I just wanted to say how fantastic—how really fantastic—it is that you’ve found this new man. I think it’s fantastic. I think it’s really fantastic.”

  I smiled broadly to show just how fantastic I really thought it was. And I did. It was fantastic. Everything was.

  “Danny … are you … high?”

  I considered the question and conceded.

  “A little.”

  I was, in fact, and to quote our American friends, high on life. My jackpot win had put me in a rather generous frame of mind.

  “First of all,” I said, “I insist on paying for your latte.”

  I held both my hands up to show that there would be no arguing with me on this one. This was on me.

  “Thanks,” said Hanne brightly (although some might say a little too quickly). “Why are you in such a jolly mood?”

  “A jolly mood? I suppose I am in a jolly mood. Wouldn’t you be, after winning”—I paused for dramatic effect—“Twenty-five thousand pounds?”

  Hanne looked stunned. Absolutely stunned. I laughed.

  “You won twenty-five thousand pounds?” she said. “You really won twenty-five thousand pounds? How?”

  “Well …”

  I thought about it. Do I tell Hanne exactly how? Do I tell her I owe it all to what she’d call a “stupid boy-project”? The very thing that had split us up? Maybe it would finally convince her that these are good things! But that would also confirm everything she thinks she knows about me … So do I project a new me? A new, smarter, grown-up, career-minded, pasta-making, garlic-crushing me?

  “All I had to do was scratch …”

  She looked impressed.

  “You’re good at that,” she said. “You were always scratching when we went out. But my God, Danny! It’s incredible! Twenty-five thousand pounds!”

  “I know!”

  “So … when do you get the money?”

  Ah.

  Now, that was the problem.

  One hour later. The Yorkshire Grey with Ian.

  “Ian, I am going to tell you something. Something brilliant.”

  “You’ve written a poem.”

  “No. Better. This …”

  I pulled my diary out of my bag.

  “… is my diary. I want you to read it. It will tell you all the things I’ve said yes to over the past week and give you some idea of my dedication and commitment to the cause.”

  Ian started to flick through it, found a page, and stopped.

  “’Bought some new printer cartridges.’”

  “Ignore that,” I said, taking it from him and finding the correct week. “Here …”

  Ian started to read out loud.

  Monday

  Passed the Scientology centre on Tottenham Court Road. A lady asked me if I wanted to undertake a free personality test. I said yes. It took forty minutes, and it turns out I am quite nice.

  “Are you sure she did it properly?”

  “Read on.”

  The mad preacher on Oxford Street, who walks around with a loudhaler telling people “Don’t be a sinner! Be a winner!” shouted at me as I passed him today. He said “You! Are you ready to take the Jesus test?” I walked up to him and said that yes, I was ready to take the Jesus test and asked him what it was, and would Jesus be doing it himself. He didn’t seem to know what to do next and ignored me and just carried on shouting about how we shouldn’t be sinners but winners instead. I wonder how many people have taken the Jesus test, and whether if they passed, they were actually allowed to be Jesus for a bit.

  “Danny, what’s all this leading …”

  “You’ll find out. Read on.”

  And I stood up to go to the bar.

  When I came back, pint in hand, Ian had made good headway.

  “So … you attended a golf sale, yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you said yes to a waiter’s recommendation of the fish, even though you don’t eat fish, and you never have?”

  “Yes. I was wrong about them. I always thought they were looking at me strangely—even the ones without heads. Turns out they were just being tasty.”

  “Okay….”

  Ian retraced with his finger what he’d already read.

  “And you went to a gig…. You bought a new type of shower gel and a sandwich from Boots, ‘thanks to clever phrasing on their in-store marketing’ …”

  “Yep.”

  “You took a leaflet for an English language school and did as it said by checking out the Web site…. You tried a new type of chocolate bar…. You sent off for a brochure about Turkey….”

  “Turkey: Land of Great Wonder.”

  “You said yes when someone asked if you’d mind lending them a tenner.”

  “I did.”

  “You bought some stamps off an old woman. You said yes to going out for a drink with a boring colleague. You made good use of a money-off voucher. And you attended the leaving do of a man you’d never met and consequently weren’t all that sorry to see go.”

  “All that and more. Where are you up to?”

  “Thursday.”

  Thursday

  A heart-stopping moment on the Tube today. I saw an advertisement, which read CAN YOU REALLY AFFORD NOT TO BUY IN SPAIN?

  For a second I knew one thing: I was going to have to invest in a villa.

  And then I reread the ad and realised that, actually, yes, I really could afford not to buy in Spain. The only people who can’t, I think, are probably Spanish.

  Ian rolled his eyes, which I thought was a little unfair, because that’s actually quite an important social comment, and he scanned on.

  Said yes to giving a bloke some change. Said yes to a market researcher.

  He started to speed-read.

  Yes to meeting with Wag next week. Yes to applying for a new type of credit card. Yes to going for coffee with Hanne. Yes to man obsessed with saving the whales.

  He got to Friday.

  Friday

  I bought a ministry in a box.

  “What’s a ministry in a box?”

  “I can do weddings and stuff. Read on.”

  “What do you mean you can do weddings and stuff?”

  “I’m a minister. I can do weddings and christenings and stuff. Read on.”

  “You’re a minister?!”

  “Read on!”

  He did as I said but then stopped, dead. He didn’t look up. He read, and reread the sentence in front of him. And then he said it out loud: “I won twenty-five thousand pounds.”

  He looked up at me, slowly.

  “You’re bloody kidding me.”

  I shook my head.

  “You’re bloody kidding me!”

  I had prepared for this. I reached into my pocket and brought out my winning scratch card—the same scratch card that had stunned Hanne into silence just an hour earlier. I slid it across the table to him.

  He picked it up and took in the numbers.

  TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND. TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND. TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND.

  He shook his head, bewildered.

  “How did …”

  “I said yes to going to play football, right?”

  He nodded.

  “If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have left the flat when I did. I bumped into a man, who I otherwise wouldn’t have met, and he needed a pound. I said yes. But I had to get change. So I bought a newspaper, which I wouldn’t have done if I hadn’t said yes, and in the newspaper, which I wouldn’t have bought if I hadn’t needed change for a man I wouldn’t have met if I hadn’t said yes in the first place, was a scratch card. And it said I should play it, and I did. And I won.”

  Ian laughed. “Wow …,” he said.

  “It was a chain reaction, Ian. Each yes took me closer to that twenty-five thousand pounds. Yes wanted me to win.”

  Ian slid the scratch card back
across the table to me.

  “God … so … When do you get the money?”

  Ah.

  Now, that was the problem.

  What I now had to tell Ian, and what I’d had to tell Hanne before, was a little difficult for me to go through.

  It’s something that, until you’ve won twenty-five thousand pounds while sitting on a Tube train dozens of miles underground and surrounded by complete and utter strangers, you may find a little difficult to relate to. But this is what happened, and there’s not a part of me that wishes it hadn’t.

  Ten minutes after winning twenty-five thousand pounds …

  … I lost twenty-five thousand pounds.

  The very second I’d won the money I’d wanted to tell someone. Anyone. But phones don’t work underground, and it wasn’t as if I could just run up and down the carriage screaming and dancing, as this is London, and even sneezing in public is illegal if you make eye contact. So I just had to bite my lip and sit there and try somehow to suppress my giggles and smiles.

  Twenty-five thousand pounds!

  I’d get off at the next stop. I’d get out of the train, head for the streets, and then phone the claim line. And then I’d go to Rio or Cuba or wherever the travel agent recommended this time of year, and I’d smoke elaborate cigars offered to me by dusty street urchins, and I’d … I dunno … I’d buy a panda. Yes! I’d buy a panda! For my mum! And a top hat for my dad! A top hat of solid gold!

  But as the train lurched and rocked its way through the tunnels, I suddenly started to feel a little paranoid. What if I’d done this wrong? What if I was mistaken? What if I hadn’t won twenty-five thousand pounds after all?

  I rechecked the numbers. My fears were unfounded. I’d definitely won. They were the same.

  But what if it was an old card? From another day?

  Nope. It was today. Absolutely.

  I rescanned the rules. “Scratch off the six numbers …”

  The six numbers? Well, I’d only scratched off three. So, quietly and secretly, I found the other three numbers and matched them too.

  FIVE THOUSAND.

  Next one …

  FIVE THOUSAND.

  Blimey! What if I got another five thousand?

  I scratched the next one….

  TWO.

  Gah! Nearly another five thousand there! How cool would that have been? To have landed the only multiwinning scratch card ever produced! And it made me wonder … What was under the other squares? If there was another five thousand, would that mean I could claim for thirty thousand pounds?