Setting Off The Sprinklers

         The man sat in reception was not at all what Stefan had pictured. Not even slightly. He was old, much older than he had been expecting, and he had this awful, ravaged sort of look about him. His suit, though not tattered exactly, looked as though he had been wearing it since he left school. His skin was yellowing and papery, his posture was crumpled, his entire body just seemed to have been beaten. In short, he looked as though he had spent his entire adult life in the dingy depths of a pool hall.
         Stefan had only been in recruitment for a few short months, but he knew instantly that the next fifteen minutes were going to be a complete waste of his time.
         “Mr Thomas? How are you doing? I’m Stefan.”
         Mr Thomas stands, brushes his palms down the front of his shirt and extends a hand to shake.
         “Sorry. I’m a little early.”
         “You can never be early for an interview; you’re can only ever be punctual.”
         Mr Thomas shrugs.
         “I’ve had nothing else to do today, is all.”
         “Have you been offered a drink at all? Tea? Coffee? Water?”
         “No, thanks. I’d better not.”
         “OK. Well, if you’d just like to follow me through, we’ll get started.”
         Stefan leads the way through the corridors of the building to a small interview room. Save for a desk, a couple of chairs and a large photographic print of a Caribbean sunset, the room is as barren as a squash court.
         “Please, take a seat.”
         “Thank you.”
         Stefan takes his place behind the desk and then looks towards his feet as he speaks.
         “Mr Thomas, I can’t help but notice that you appear to be a lot older than your application would seem to suggest you were.”
         “Oh,” he says, not particularly surprised. “How old does it suggest I am?”
         “It says you’re 26.”
         Mr Thomas shrugs.
         “People lie on their CVs all the time. You of all people should know that.”
         “How old are you?”
         “38.”
         Stefan was guessing 45, 50.
         “I see. And are there any other lies on here that you want to tell me about before we continue?”
         “I can’t really remember. It’s been a while since I wrote it.”
         Mr Thomas takes a packet of cigarettes out from his inside jacket pocket and begins turning it about between his fingers.
         “The thing is, Mr Thomas, I’m a junior consultant. The vast majority of opportunities that come my way are for low-level temporary jobs or graduate positions. My clients are looking for people in their early to mid twenties, people prepared to take lower salaries for the sake of experience or to fund gap years. I mean this with the greatest deal of respect you understand, but I don’t imagine that there’s going to be much, if anything, on my books that will be that suitable for a man of your age.”
         “That’s OK,” he says, looking down at his cigarettes, tapping the packet against his thigh. “I’m not really that fussed about finding a job.”
         Stefan tries to catch this man’s eye, tries to lift his head up, but cannot seem to manage it.
         “Then what exactly are you here for?”
         Slowly, he slides a cigarette out from the packet, pinching it by the filter and plugging it between his pursed lips. He rustles about in another pocket for his lighter.
         “I’m afraid you can’t smoke that in here. This is a non-smoking building.”
         Mr Thomas pulls his hands from his pockets and brings them up to his mouth, as if he were about to play the harmonica. When he removes them seconds later, the cigarette is lit.
         “Mr Thomas. This is a non-smoking building.”
         “Oh, I’m sorry,” he says, sucking in with a smile. “Set off the sprinklers, will it?”
         “Well, no,” Stefan starts, “but it’s, erm... it’s against...”
         He can feel his cheeks burning. It’s visible. Mr Thomas laughs, exhaling a messy cloud of smoke.
         “Wow. This really makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t it?”
         He brings the cigarette up to eye level and wiggles it. Stefan tries too hard to ignore it.
         “Well, I’ll tell you this much. If you don’t like me doing this, then you’re really going to hate what I’m about to do.”
         Stefan shifts in his seat.
         “What are you about to do?”
         “What I’m about to do,” the man says, slouching forward and crossing his arms across his knees, “is wet myself.”
         He is smiling, still smiling, but he is not joking.
         Stefan blinks. The red in his cheeks begins to blanch rapidly.
         “You’re going to what?”
         “You heard. I’m going to wet myself. I’ve been fit to burst ever since I stepped on the bus here, so I thought ‘what the hell?’ - I’d just go ahead and wet myself.”
         Stefan blinks again.
         “Mr Thomas, if you need to go to the toilet we have a men’s room just down the corridor there on the right.”
         “Oh, I have no doubt. An office this size, I imagine you’re legally obliged to have a men’s room. You probably have men’s rooms on on every floor, but I’m happy enough here, thank you.”
         He flicks some ash onto the carpet and spreads it about with his foot.
         Instinctively, Stefan picks up the phone but as he brings it to his ear he realises that he has no idea who he intends to call.
         The dialtone buzzing in his ear, he watches Mr Thomas take a long, crackling drag and lay right back in the chair, tipping back his head. Stefan runs his fingers through his hair and wonders if standing up is the right or wrong thing to do.
         Then it begins. The unusual yet unmistakable sound of urine trickling through the underside of a man’s trouser leg and landing on carpet. Like a muffled drum roll, it builds a sense of anxiety, a sense of expectancy in Stefan. It causes his brain to tick over quicker, to trip itself up. He becomes increasingly aware of his breathing and how arrhythmic it is becoming. By the time he is able to calm himself enough to be able to regulate it, it is all over.
         Mr Thomas lets a satisfied sigh out through his nostrils and lets the half smoked cigarette drop from between his fingers. It hisses and extinguishes itself in the puddle in front of the seat.
         “Well,” he says, slapping his hands down on his thighs and pushing himself up out of the chair, “I’ll see myself out.”

One Of Life's Hardest Lessons, Learned

         Outside a restaurant in Queenstown, New Zealand one Sunday morning, a family of five takes a table for breakfast.
         The family are regulars and know the menu as well as any waiter there, so they place their weekly order without so much as a second thought before settling into their seats and resuming an animated discussion about the people of their church.
         A few feet from where they sit a slight, scrappy blond child chases a duck around a patch of grass.
         The child is dressed in nothing but a pair of camouflage-effect cargo shorts and, though he is really too old for them now, the waistband and the unmistakable bulge of a disposable nappy are clearly visible. He squeals and plods clumsily about, taking heavy uneven steps towards the duck.
         The duck - a greyish brown creature with a majestic flash of purple on each wing - manages to waddle and quack its way away from the child. It does so in rather a wobbly line, bobbing its head up and down much in the manner of a carved wooden pull-toy that the child used to own and, up until recently, play with. This delights him no end and he shrieks with glee whenever the duck does it.
         The family of five, their coffees arrive, and they turn their attention to each other once more.
         They do not look in the child’s direction again; not until they hear the screeching of tyres, the tinkle of broken glass, and a sickeningly resonant thud.
         When they do, they see that a 4x4 Land Rover vehicle has swerved and crashed into a stationary motorcycle parked at the side of the pavement, shattering its front headlight.
         Ten, maybe twelve, feet in front of the Land Rover’s front bumper sits the misshapen, lifeless body of the duck - its legs splayed out in an unnatural fashion, its neck tucked awkwardly beneath its chest.
         And there, safe from harm at the pavement’s edge, stands this breathless boy - his soft, shoeless feet teetering on the edge of the concrete - watching it all with wide and shining eyes.
         Four feathers, scattered at random, float serenely down to the ground. As the final one touches the asphalt, the child’s father appears as if from nowhere and scoops him up into his arms.
         The child clutches on to his father. He wants to sleep.
         My french toast arrives.
         I barely touch it.

Executive Decisions

         So.
         The idea: a series on how to perform cosmetic operations at home.
         The concept: “transform-yourself-on-a-budget.”
         Prime-time slot. Thirteen parts. Your ideas, please.
         Hmmm.
         OK.
         My first idea - and I’m just riffing here - is like ‘How To Do An Acid Peel With Things You’d Find Under The Sink.’ Tell people which ones work, which ones don’t, dilution quantities, application times. That sort of thing. How does that sound?
         I’m thinking Season Premiere. Love it.
         Really?
         Yeah. It’s a keeper. Next.
         How about laser hair removal? Maybe with, like, the laser in a remote control.
         Or the laser part of a CD player.
         Would those work?
         I don’t know.
         Something to look into.
         Someone. Look into it.
         A needle and thread job to pin the ears back?
         In.
         Mole removal with scissors?
         In.
         A nose job with a fillet knife?
         I think I’ve seen that done somewhere.
         Everything’s been done somewhere. There are no new ideas anymore; it’s all in the interpretation. It’s something worth bearing in mind.
         Beside, it can’t hurt to show it again.
         Good point.
         So what are we saying?
         Nose job. In.
         Question.
         Yes?
         Are we going to be touching upon genitals?
         Hmmm. Tricky one.
         We probably don’t want to be too gender-specific. As you know, that’s the quickest way to alienate half the available audience.
         Ah, yes. Good thinking.
         OK. That’s settled then. Let’s stay away from genitals.
         Trouble is, if you don’t want to be gender-specific, you’ll have to think carefully about what you want to do with boobs.
         Boobs! Of course!
         Yeah, and I was kind of thinking they could be a three-parter. Augmentations, reductions, then a special on nipples. But if you don’t want to be gender-specific...
         DAMN IT! Making good TV is so damned tricky!
         Sir, I don’t think men wouldn mind looking at boobs for three shows while the women learn.
         You reckon?
         Fairly sure, sir.
         Really? OK, well let’s keep them in at this stage then.
         Boobs. In.
         Anything else?
         Yeah. I don’t know who you’d talk to about this, the producer or the director or someone, but maybe you could get the expert or whoever to do the demonstration and then we could fade the screen to black so that viewers can see their reflections in their TV set and, y’know, do a sort of ‘repeat after me’ thing.
         Fade to black? What? No picture?
         You could probably still have the expert talking them through it.
         With no picture?
         It’ll be like radio, but on TV.
         OK. I see what you mean.
         I like it. It’s a nice angle.
         Minimalist.
         I’m sorry. Can I stop you there a second? I have to say, I’m a little bit uncomfortable with all this.
         Really?
         How so?
         Just... Well, isn’t it a bit... y’know...
         What?
         Come on.
         We value your opinions.
         Well, just a bit... dangerous.
         I see what you mean. Like we’d be encouraging people to cut themselves up?
         Kind of.
         Well, that is sort of the point, but the way I see it is that we’d actually be taking the danger out of amateur surgery. We would be educating people; making it safe. Do you see what I mean? The sad fact of the matter is that as long as there are taboos about cosmetic procedures, then people will ill-advisedly continue to chop themselves up in their houses without the most fundamental understanding of surgical practice Are you happy to let this sort of barbaric behaviour continue? I know I’m certainly not. No, these are important issues which need to be addressed and I solemnly believe that, as television executives, we have a responsibility - nay, a duty - to to ensure the safety of our viewers, as should you all. They are, after all, the reason we are here. Does that help at all?
         I guess so.
         Good.
         So. Any ideas for the host?

Quiet And Shaky Voices

          My friend has a theory about old women's voices.
          Looking at it logically, he says, old women should have the loudest, most resonant voices of all. They have been talking the longest, they have a full lifetime’s worth of things to say and, as their hearing fades, their voices should adjust in volume to compensate.
          But they don’t. When women get old their voices turn quiet and shaky.
          The reason that they get so quiet and shaky, he says, isn’t because old women live to be old. It’s because they live to be older than everyone else.
          The vocal cords, like any other muscles in the body, are subject to the effects of atrophy and will weaken when not used. So as their husbands and partners die off and their circle of friends tightens in on them, so do their vocal cords.
          They die off.
          They tighten.
          That’s why when an old woman bumps into you at the supermarket, or thanks you for offering her your seat on the bus, or asks you to donate money for a poppy, you can barely make out a word she says.
          It’s all practice, he says, for the day that they become ghosts.