the bus stopped and
jostled their way out, the moment it did. They just couldn't wait to get stuck
into their day’s work. The exception was, of course, Mr. Dawson, who always
waited until last and allowed Polly to go before him , probably in the
hope that he might grab a glimpse of her tits as she stepped out of the bus.
Seymour was still
in bed, his thoughts chaotically rolling around in his head, doing his best to
avoid the inevitable conclusion. Get a job. The very suggestion made him shake.
It wasn't work itself that concerned him so much: when he was on a roll he'd
been known to keep going for hours, even days without a break. But that was
different. That was his work. But
being a cog in some meaningless machine that droned on and on, with all those
other cogs beside and above him, never below him, endlessly spinning? Lunch
boxes, tea breaks, pin-up girls, overalls, clocking on, clocking off, canteens,
dirty jokes, stinking toilet cubicles, bus-stop queues with people who looked
like they were waiting to be shot. He'd experienced it all first- hand on a
careers information school trip onc e.
‘Shit, shit,
shit,’ whispered Seymour, desperately burying his head under the pillow.
'Hang on, hang
on, don't get hysterical. There is a solution, Seymour. You've just got to
think it through. One step at a time. OK?' Seymour's head slowly emerged from
the pillow and nodded to the voice inside.
'Right. Now think
about it! How about if you split right now, before this thing gets really
messy?'
'Yeah, right,'
thought Seymour, considering the notion.
'What have you
got to lose? Nothing! Remember what Bob Dylan said? “When you ain't got
nothing, you ain't got nothing to lose.”
‘Well, look how
well he's done for himself! Right. Now where can you go? Friend's house, maybe?’
‘Um, friends,
friends. Now, let me think. Tracy maybe? No, last he'd heard she'd been evicted
from the bus station and it was now a club called The Buzz station. OK, go
overseas for a while, yeah, have a break from all this. Oh, that's right, no
money. See? Fucking money again!’
Seymour slammed
his hands down on the bed, sending another waft of Polly from under the sheets.
Turning onto his side he curled his body into the foetal position, his eyes
clamped shut. Bizarre squirming ideas popped into his head, ranging from
suicide to becoming a milkman. Quite by accident he slipped into a deep sleep,
waking occasionally throughout the morning, but not for long. Being awake only
made things complicated.
Polly always
delayed going into the administration building for as long as possible and sat
on a park bench overlooking the meticulously maintained front lawn which had
been laid to honour the memory of the company's founder, Henry Hogarth. The
lawn was about half the size of a tennis court. A flower bed around its
perimeter glowed with sickly colours which nature must have been corrupted to
produce. In the centre was a huge soot-stained stone monument with a bust of
the stern-looking old man on top, surrounded by a cast-iron fence. There was
some kind of script engraved in its base, which was hard to read due to the years of grime accumulated from the heavy traffic and
billowing toxic fumes from the Hogarth chimneys. Polly had tried to make out
the inscription a couple of weeks before by peering through the bars of the
fence, but had been stopped by the panicked shrill of the security guard's
whistle. It was, she discovered, strictly forbidden to go anywhere near the
monument for anybody except the gardener and senior management. ‘Why on earth can’t
I have a look at it?’ Polly had asked. The security guard told her that
somebody had written certain insulting words on the monument during a strike
three or four years before. ‘What did it say?’ Polly had asked.
‘Well, let's just
say it sort of crudely described a lady's toilet parts,’ whispered the guard
from behind his hand, pointing out a particularly clean spot on
jostled their way out, the moment it did. They just couldn't wait to get stuck
into their day’s work. The exception was, of course, Mr. Dawson, who always
waited until last and allowed Polly to go before him , probably in the
hope that he might grab a glimpse of her tits as she stepped out of the bus.
Seymour was still
in bed, his thoughts chaotically rolling around in his head, doing his best to
avoid the inevitable conclusion. Get a job. The very suggestion made him shake.
It wasn't work itself that concerned him so much: when he was on a roll he'd
been known to keep going for hours, even days without a break. But that was
different. That was his work. But
being a cog in some meaningless machine that droned on and on, with all those
other cogs beside and above him, never below him, endlessly spinning? Lunch
boxes, tea breaks, pin-up girls, overalls, clocking on, clocking off, canteens,
dirty jokes, stinking toilet cubicles, bus-stop queues with people who looked
like they were waiting to be shot. He'd experienced it all first- hand on a
careers information school trip onc e.
‘Shit, shit,
shit,’ whispered Seymour, desperately burying his head under the pillow.
'Hang on, hang
on, don't get hysterical. There is a solution, Seymour. You've just got to
think it through. One step at a time. OK?' Seymour's head slowly emerged from
the pillow and nodded to the voice inside.
'Right. Now think
about it! How about if you split right now, before this thing gets really
messy?'
'Yeah, right,'
thought Seymour, considering the notion.
'What have you
got to lose? Nothing! Remember what Bob Dylan said? “When you ain't got
nothing, you ain't got nothing to lose.”
‘Well, look how
well he's done for himself! Right. Now where can you go? Friend's house, maybe?’
‘Um, friends,
friends. Now, let me think. Tracy maybe? No, last he'd heard she'd been evicted
from the bus station and it was now a club called The Buzz station. OK, go
overseas for a while, yeah, have a break from all this. Oh, that's right, no
money. See? Fucking money again!’
Seymour slammed
his hands down on the bed, sending another waft of Polly from under the sheets.
Turning onto his side he curled his body into the foetal position, his eyes
clamped shut. Bizarre squirming ideas popped into his head, ranging from
suicide to becoming a milkman. Quite by accident he slipped into a deep sleep,
waking occasionally throughout the morning, but not for long. Being awake only
made things complicated.
Polly always
delayed going into the administration building for as long as possible and sat
on a park bench overlooking the meticulously maintained front lawn which had
been laid to honour the memory of the company's founder, Henry Hogarth. The
lawn was about half the size of a tennis court. A flower bed around its
perimeter glowed with sickly colours which nature must have been corrupted to
produce. In the centre was a huge soot-stained stone monument with a bust of
the stern-looking old man on top, surrounded by a cast-iron fence. There was
some kind of script engraved in its base, which was hard to read due to the years of grime accumulated from the heavy traffic and
billowing toxic fumes from the Hogarth chimneys. Polly had tried to make out
the inscription a couple of weeks before by peering through the bars of the
fence, but had been stopped by the panicked shrill of the security guard's
whistle. It was, she discovered, strictly forbidden to go anywhere near the
monument for anybody except the gardener and senior management. ‘Why on earth can’t
I have a look at it?’ Polly had asked. The security guard told her that
somebody had written certain insulting words on the monument during a strike
three or four years before. ‘What did it say?’ Polly had asked.
‘Well, let's just
say it sort of crudely described a lady's toilet parts,’ whispered the guard
from behind his hand, pointing out a particularly clean spot on
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