Half Plus Seven

by Dan Tyte

  ‘Oh, Bill.’

  ‘Why she never threw him out there and then I’ll never know.’ But I did know. He was hard to shake. And when she did shake him for Barry, I resented her for it. Poor old Mum couldn’t win.’

  ‘That’s terrible, Bill. Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m always okay.’

  ‘So this is what buddies do then?’ she said. It felt like a support group for two. Hello, my name is Bill and I’ve been fucked up for about, phew, well let me see, 29 years now. Maybe we’d get to hug later.

  ‘But everything else aside, you’re settling in okay?’ I asked. I thought it was time to change the subject. She bit her bottom lip. She seemed wrong-footed.

  ‘Yes, I, uh, suppose I am. Everyone continues to be,’ she paused, if not for effect, for thought, ‘interesting?’

  ‘You could say that.’

  ‘Trent is a friendly one, isn’t he?’

  ‘Again, you could say that.’

  ‘I don’t think anyone’s ever started calling me “babe” after so short a time.’

  ‘He’s probably forgotten your name. I wouldn’t take it personally.’ She ignored that.

  ‘And he keeps offering me a lift home in his car. I’ve told him I’m in the middle of a page-turner and like to read on the bus and that it really isn’t the weather for a soft-top anyway.’

  ‘If he bothers you again, let me know.’

  ‘I can handle it.’ Is that all you’ve got Trenty boy? Is a ride home the new roofie? Think again, fuck-face.

  ‘But sleazeballs aside, everything at Morgan & Schwarz is good? No work-related queries for your best buddy?’ I cringed as I finished the sentence.

  ‘Well, the handover from the last girl – Dina was it? – was patchy to say the least but I’m picking it up, little by little.’

  ‘Yes, Dina did leave in rather a hurry. She was in a rush to save to her soul.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘She joined some religious cult out west. Thought she had a few sins she needed absolving of.’

  ‘What bullshit,’ she said.

  ‘Amen to that.’

  ‘You’re born, you live, you die. The concept of any kind of afterlife is just a fairy story,’ she said. ‘Probably gave people some comfort of something better to come during the dark ages but now we’ve got hamburgers and TV, how could heaven compete?’ She paused, and trained her dark eyes onto mine. ‘What about you, Bill?’

  ‘Heaven? Fuck that. I don’t like heights anyway.’

  Chapter 11

  Since the meeting with Sister Gina, the hacks of The McDare Mercury had taken on a new, more positive brief. The imaginary newsroom was a nicer place to be, pumping out propaganda to the masses of my mind like The Daily Planet on happy pills. The front page flashes of personal apocalypse had been turned around to semi-heroic hubris about my recent bravery. Headlines ran: ‘McDare Saves Girl, Dog, Civic Pride’, ‘Bill: My Healthy Living Regime – Sex, Drugs and Sausage Rolls’. I was, if not invincible, or scared of Kryptonite for that matter, certainly not knocking at death’s door. Well, if Sister Gina was to be believed anyway. And why wouldn’t she be? She’d just become the newspaper’s horoscope columnist.

  The fortune of my most morally reprehensible colleague – Trent, if you hadn’t guessed – would have read something like this at present: ‘Your suspicion is aroused by workplacetête-à-têtes which may be more than the sum of their parts. Calm your mind, centre yourself and the inner strength to confront the culprits will come. Tread carefully, and beware black cats on Tuesdays.’

  Now, the email which pinged into my inbox after my post-buddy session smoke break could hardly be filed under ‘E’ for ‘egg-shell walking’, but then that had never been Trent’s style.

  From: trent.rogers@morgan&schwarz.com

  To: bill.mcdare@morgan&schwarz.com

  Subject: The new project:update

  William,

  It’s come to my attention that you’ve been spending a lot of time working on the new project. While your commitment to the cause is to be admired, it does seem that you’ve somewhat neglected your other responsibilities to clients and colleagues.

  Please debrief me on progress as soon as possible.

  Best regards, Trent

  From: bill.mcdare@morgan&schwarz.com

  To: trent.rogers@morgan&schwarz.com

  Subject: Re: The new project: update

  Trent,

  What the fuck are you on about?

  Regards, Bill

  From: trent.rogers@morgan&schwarz.com

  To: bill.mcdare@morgan&schwarz.com

  Subject: Re: The new project: update

  Billy boy,

  Don’t play hardball with me.

  Have you tapped that ass yet?

  T

  From: bill.mcdare@morgan&schwarz.com

  To: trent.rogers@morgan&schwarz.com

  Subject: Re: The new project: update

  Trent,

  Fuck you.

  Bill.

  It was best to give nothing away to Trent. Not that anything was going on. But any scrap of extraneous information surrendered to him could be used to inform the planning process of his next forced sexual activity. I wasn’t going to fluff the fucker. Trent was unbearable to be around when you had something he wanted, however small. Whether he was after your last Rolo or your sister’s cherry, he boasted an unbelievably thick skin, astonishing ignorance and a huge sense of entitlement, giving him an ethic of perverse persistence. To use the parlance of the profession, I was getting Trent well and truly off my radar, for now at least. This left me with pretty slim conversational pickings in the office. Sometimes I felt I’d have had richer dialogue in the hole of a Turkish prison, interacting with sadistic guards through just a smattering of self-taught phrases, a compliant nod and a low pain threshold. Maybe I was laying it on

  a bit thick. I’d go talk to Jill. Jill always had something to say.

  ‘Hey, Jill.’ I was stood behind her swivel chair. Over her shoulder pad I could see she was tapping out a press release. The headline read: ‘Disabled Youth Get Chance Thanks To Workington Wads of Cash’. Hardly subtle. Just like Jill.

  ‘Jill,’ I said, louder this time, ‘what’s going down?’

  The patter of the keyboard stopped and she turned to face me. I moved to her side. Jill was wearing a trouser-style suit stolen from Annie Lennox and had a mop of ashen blonde curls that were more Sideshow Bob than Shirley Temple.

  ‘What do you want, Bill?’

  ‘Ah, you know. The skinny, the QT, the 411. What’s going down?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. You on the new girl?’

  Jill was rarely off target with her gossip. Unfortunately, today her sight was not set on the bullseye.

  ‘Fuck off, Jill.’

  ‘Drink making you tetchy is it, Bill?’

  ‘No.’ Unlike most at Morgan & Schwarz, Jill could always tell when I’d had a sup.

  ‘You ought to watch it, you know,’ she said, ‘because Miles is onto you’.

  ‘Because you write everything you think you know on the toilet door?’

  ‘Maybe because Miles is a perceptive human being.’ She’d totally fallen for the ‘Miles has a massive cock’ yarn.

  ‘Well thanks for the heads up, Jill.’

  ‘All part of the friendly service.’ Perhaps Jill wasn’t my best bet. I looked around the office. People worked on engagement strategies on Apple iMacs sat boastfully on sleek desks. Photo-shoot briefs were thought out to the beat of designer heels tip-tapping on the parquet floor. In the distance Miles’ outline could be seen against the horizontal blinds of his glass box of an office. Even his silhouette was convincing. It was a toss-up between Carol and Pete. Both had their drawbacks. According to a selective group email Jill had sent earlier this morning, Carol was on her period and while this didn’t make her aggressive, an emotion uncommon in her 5-foot frame, it did make her acutely emotional and if I had to chair any more counselling sessions w
ith Morgan & Schwarz-esses today I was going to have a strong case for sticking a roll-neck sweater, a pipe and a chaise lounge on expenses. And if I was going to keep sneaking the odd bottle of 15-year-old scotch through on the ‘sundries’ column of my claims spreadsheet, it would be best not to draw undue scrutiny.

  Pete it was, then. I walked over to the side of the office where he spent his nine to five. Never earlier, never later. Pete was a stickler for routine. His desk looked like it’d been airlifted from a show room in Ikea. The papers were very neatly arranged. A stationery tidy housed his pens, stapler and rubber bands. Unseen ties kept cables hidden from his ergonomic keyboard. Dark wood framed a couple with a mock happy, blank expression. They looked like the kind of soulless people who existed only in the sample pictures supplied with off-the-shelf photo frames. They were Pete’s parents. Pete was on the phone.

  ‘…but as I say, it really is a super project. Just super…’ Pete was selling in a story, ‘you know, I’ve been around, oooh, let me see, five, ten, fifteen years now, and I’ve never heard of a corporate giving this much back. It really is super to see. The blind school are overjoyed.’ Pete looked at me like I was a distraction. ‘Right you are then, I’ll send the story your way. Good man. All the best.’ He put the phone down and sucked his teeth.

  ‘Bill, how are you?’

  ‘Surviving, Pete, surviving.’ I picked up a rubber band from his desk tidy and started twanging it between my fingers. I knew this would grate on him.

  ‘Jolly good,’ he said, if not meant. A sudden look of realisation came over his face. The glasses on the end of his nose twitched ever so slightly.

  ‘It’s fitting you came over actually, Bill. There was something I wanted to ask you about,’ he then lowered his voice, ‘but it’s a bit personal. Do you think we could perhaps go into the kitchen to chat?’ I nodded.

  ‘I’ll follow you in,’ he said.

  I leaned against the mock marble worktop. Now just what could the sad fucker want?

  ‘Tea?’ Pete offered. He knew how to push the right buttons.

  ‘Always,’ I replied. Pete flicked the switch on the electric kettle.

  ‘Fresh water please, Peter.’

  ‘Oh gosh, sorry, Bill. I forgot for a moment there just how particular you are about your tea.’ I was more pedantic than a man who ironed his socks.

  ‘So what can I do for you then?’ I nudged. ‘What counsel can I offer? I’m becoming quite the shrink around here.’

  ‘Oh it’s nothing like that, Bill.’ Pete looked flustered. His cheeks reddened. ‘But it is, umm, it is, personal, in a manner of speaking.’ Pete didn’t have a personal life. Pete creosoted fences to the musical version of War of the Worlds in his spare time.

  ‘Go on…’ I said.

  He handed me a small business card and looked sheepishly at the floor. The design was discreet. A small swirling typeface read: Brief Encounters, Modern Mating Services. ‘Pete, this sounds like a brothel. I didn’t think you had it in you, you old dog.’

  He looked at me with disgust.

  ‘Bill, how dare you. I would never be involved in such abhorrent activities and find it frankly insulting you would suggest otherwise.’

  ‘Jeez man, take a chill pill.’

  ‘I won’t be taking any pills either, thank you very much.’

  ‘Okay, Pete. No sex or drugs. I got it. Are you going to shed any further light on this?’

  ‘Well, if you’re going to be sensible…’

  ‘Very sensible.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Great.’

  ‘Okay then, it’s a, umm, evening where you have the opportunity to meet like-minded people…’

  ‘A singles club?’

  ‘No, Bill.’

  ‘A gay club?’

  ‘No, Bill.’

  ‘What then?’

  ‘It’s a speed dating evening,’ he revealed. Now, I’d dated on speed before. I had a feeling Pete’s night would be slightly more sedate.

  ‘Speed dating?’

  ‘Yes. Speed dating. It took me a while to get used to the idea, but you know, I’m cash rich, if I say so myself, but time poor. I’m not getting any younger, Bill. And neither are you.’ I’d worked with Pete for longer than I care to remember and this was the first time he’d shown any suggestion of a sexual need. A Ken doll had more meat in his seat.

  ‘Well, Peter, the Lord moves in mysterious ways. I certainly didn’t think this is what you wanted to talk about. Actually, what was it exactly that you wanted to talk about?’

  ‘Well, I was thinking that maybe we could go along to one of the evenings together. You could be my wingman.’ And then he winked at me.

  ‘Christ, Pete, it’s not Top Gun.’

  ‘I know, I know, but that’s what lads do isn’t it? Help each other out, back each other up…’

  ‘What the hell has gotten into you?’ The kettle whistled. I gave Pete my best ‘this-situation-calls-for-tea’ look. I had this down to an almost involuntary raise of one brow line. Pete took the cue and set about the elaborate tea-making routine he knew it was wise to follow in moments such as these. He tried to explain himself as the leaves brewed.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know what’s got into me. A sense of urgency? Because, God knows, excuse the language, I need it. A bit of life? Because I’m not sure I’ve been living it. Isn’t it meant to be for sharing?’

  I was quite sure I was witnessing a mental breakdown first hand. No need to read about this ‘Office worker realises life is vacuous and guns down colleagues one Tuesday morning’ story. I was front and centre. And quite certain he’d turn the two barrels my way first. Oh well, what will be will be. There might be the chance to chase some tail in the meantime. Pete was looking at me with a sense of anticipation.

  ‘Pete, the tea.’

  ‘Yes, sorry, Bill.’

  ‘You know what? You’re right. Life is for the living,’ I said.

  ‘Exactly! What was it Robbie Williams said? No Regrets?’

  ‘I have absolutely no idea, Pete.’

  ‘But you get my meaning. It’s time to grab the bull by the horns…’

  ‘Steady on, Pete.’

  ‘Sorry, I’m getting carried away. It’s just been a while since I’ve done this kind of thing.’

  ‘What kind of thing?’

  ‘Been in the dating game.’ I dry heaved.

  ‘So we’re on then?’ he said.

  ‘Okay, Pete, we’re on. When is it?’

  ‘Well, there’s one on tonight.’ He gave me an expectant-dog look.

  ‘Tonight?!’

  ‘You’re not busy are you, Bill?’

  ‘No, Pete, I am not busy.’ I could put off pleasuring myself with a bottle and the internet until another time. Who knows? I might even find someone else to do it for me.

  ‘You’re buying all the drinks though.’ I said.

  ‘All the drinks?’

  ‘All the drinks.’

  ‘You’re on.’ I finished my tea and headed back to my desk.

  Pete shouted after me, ‘I’m looking forward to our brief encounter!’

  Jill overheard.

  ‘Saucy.’

  I killed the afternoon by convincing an internet illiterate client to give us 30k for a social media campaign. When I was on it, I could sell ice to the Inuits like no-one bar Big Cock Miles. Digitally duping an old duffer was like flogging time-shares on the Costas to lower-middle-class social climbers: they knew everyone else was doing it and wanted a piece of the action to keep up appearances. The rub was they didn’t have a fucking clue how the thing worked. Which was where we came in. A tour guide to Tron, giving our accountants hard-ons and us a carte blanche to piss about on the internet for hours while someone else footed the bill for broadband and Bellinis.

  Today however I used the free time not to Facebook-stalk future ex-girlfriends but to gen up on the seemingly unsordid world of speed dating. Like a typical PR man, Pete didn’t give me the whole story – we h
ad to submit a thirty-word biog for the briefing sheets. As if I didn’t have enough bullshit to write. As ever, Google was my most steadfast friend. A few searches later I came to realise that, like every secret society, this lot had their own language. A lexicon of love, it was cheesy as fuck. But I’d promised Pete. I’d promised him. This was my chance of only suffering a flesh wound in his demented corporate killing spree. I’d go along. I’d support. I’d try to enjoy. First off, I’d better learn the lingo. Didn’t want to look like a dog in a cat fight. So here goes:

  GSOH – Meant ‘Good Sense of Humour’ (While I could appreciate the simplicity of a man falling off a log, and had laughed, once, at situation comedy Friends, it’d only be fair for my date to realise my sense of humour was good, but dark. Very dark. With the odd cock joke thrown in for good measure).

  WLTM – Meant ‘Would Like To Meet’ (A more toned down subversion of other acronyms I was familiar with, like MILF etc.).

  LTR – Meant ‘Long Term Relationship (Let’s have a drink first, yeah, sweetcheeks? Could also be visually represented by her post-coitally holding her knees up to her chest and counting to twenty).

  OHAC – Meant ‘Own House And Car’ (I have a home. My non-car owning status was my little planet-saving protest. Plus, I was mostly too drunk to drive. Yes, believe it or not, I did have a moral code of sorts. Underperforming in work/bed I could handle, killing a kid who’d chased his ball into the road and getting arse-raped in prison, I couldn’t).