Leo Long Form – Job

Job

By John Lee

It would all go fine. Maxwell Fisher knew this perfectly well, at least on some level. But it seemed that on another level entirely, everything would fall apart. And not merely fall apart, but fall apart at that crucial moment, the very last minute, when everything seemed to be going well.

He would ask himself, of course, whenever that inevitable moment of utter, crushing despair didn’t actually arrive, whether his worrying about every single aspect of his life was the reason, paradoxically, for his consistent success. But to even dare to consider that his life, or any aspect of it, was in any way a success left poor Maxwell in a place of utter, inconsolable grief, that this revelation itself would lead to interminable misery and he became the abject failure he dreaded so much.

Today, though, he would be interviewing for a new job. As a content creator, he had found some success designing websites, and his specialty was making them so easily navigable that potential clients would find it a joy to visit any website he designed. Today’s interview would be at Collet, Richardson and Pearce, New York’s premier advertising agency. He was on time, was smartly dressed in his navy-blue Tom Ford single breasted mohair suit, his English Church’s black leather shoes, and sported a smart, silk Cerruti tie he’d picked up the week before for just fifty-seven dollars.

Of course, as a content creator his own personal image wasn’t relevant to the job. He’d be sitting in some anonymous cubicle, after all, for most of the time. And would rarely meet anyone in person. But he enjoyed his own presentation. Image was important to Maxwell, as it had been drummed into him incessantly by his mother for as long as he could remember. Clothes maketh the man, she would say. Dear mother.

The taxi pulled up outside the building at nine twenty-one, which meant Maxwell had nine minutes to enter the building, access the elevator, ride the seventeen floors to the offices of Collet, Richardson Pearce, and sit for precisely two minutes before being called in for the interview. To arrive late would be, of course, an absurdity. To arrive on time was a statement of arrogance. To arrive any more than three minutes early was a statement of desperation. But to arrive two minutes early was a statement of reliability, confidence, and precision. 

He checked his Seiko. Nine twenty-one and fifteen seconds. He took his iPhone from his pocket as he exited the taxi and stepped onto the sidewalk, the leather soles of his shoes crunching in the fine grit at the edge of the kerb. He checked the time on the phone: nine twenty-one and eight seconds. This was precise enough. He locked eyes with the doorman, a wide, grey-haired man in his late sixties with blue grey eyes and a broad smile that showed nicotine-stained teeth and a penchant for cruelty and proceeded to enter the building.

It was a short walk to the brushed stainless-steel doors of the elevator, and the sound of Maxwell’s shoes on the polished, marble floor echoed, even though the hallway itself was quite full of people. The glassy black marble reflected his image back up at him, and the tall, elegant mirrors on either side gave him the opportunity to check how he looked for the last time.

He used a bent index finger to press the button with his finger knuckle – no point in risking germs, even for so important a day – and the double doors opened with a respectful whirr and bump. He entered, stood momentarily, and the doors closed after him…except that a hand appeared at the last moment, severing the exquisite union of the two doors, and soiling the perfect isolation of his last holy minute before the interview.

“Sorry!”, said the hand, which was attached to a woman, aged approximately twenty-seven, with dark, bobbed hair and chestnut eyes. “May I?”

The sudden uninvited intimacy terrified Maxwell, who at even the best of times loathed company in any confined space. But his duty to his impeccable image offered his only possible response: a smile, a leaning in to help, and a hearty “Of course!”

And so began the relationship that would be the undoing of, and the entirely rebuilding of, one Maxwell Fisher, aged 29, of Newark, New Jersey.

Felicity Susan McDonald, who would never be known by her proper name except by policemen, judges, and her mother, knew from a very early age that she was different to the other girls. It wasn’t that she was rebellious, nor that she disliked people. She merely seemed to be a victim of a certain kind of self-imposed mischief that constantly got her into any kind of trouble with authority. An addition, she had an unreasonable fondness for the emotionally inadequate. It seemed that she’d simply gravitate to them, as though by some hidden mechanism.

And in Maxwell Fisher, she would find her greatest prize.

The elevator doors closed knowingly, and the tiny cubicle, with which they had an intimate, unspoken relationship, as do certain inanimate objects, breathed a sigh of relief. Maxwell, aware of his destiny at the seventeenth floor, lifted his arm and raised an exquisitely manicured finger to the control panel, bent it as was his custom in all public places, and pressed the button that said “17”, again using his finger knuckle. Fliss, as she’d preferred to be called since the age of seven, pressed number 19, and at that precise moment a deep rumble shook the compartment, and both felt their ascent up elevator shaft number three of the forty-one-year-old building. She turned to face Maxwell, who was already deep in an inner rehearsal for the following twenty minutes.

“You work here?” inquired Fliss, carefully studying the pattern on Maxwell’s silk tie. It was gentle whorls of cream on a violet base, with feint blue lines running either side. 

Maxwell, already flustered by the mere presence of a stranger in so confined a space, but still ready with an externalized grace that would impress any red carpeted celebrity or royal, answered crisply, “No. Just here for an interview.” He shot her a curt smile, without exposing his teeth. To expose teeth could be construed as aggression, after all. Only a lout would use such a grin, after all.

“Oh,” said Fliss, picking at a tooth with a fingernail. “I thought I’d seen you here before.”

Maxwell’s blood pressure, a consistent one hundred and nineteen over seventy-one, rose to one hundred and twenty two over seventy seven.

“First time,” replied Maxwell, now acutely aware of the fact that far too many of his synapses, glia and neurons were taken with dealing with the moment than dealing with the coming tsunami of uncertainty that would be the interview. Briefly, he was lost in indecision. Until, of course, the elevator stopped.

“Is this your floor already?” inquired Fliss, now sucking on the offending tooth, and cracking a tattooed knuckle.  Maxwell glanced up at the lights above the doors, which were currently showing both eleven and twelve. They were stuck, it seems, between floors.

Maxwell felt his stomach contract as his face flushed. It had been three years since his last panic attack, and he scrambled to remember the protocols his mind and body required before he lost complete control of himself and found himself blubbering, wide eyed and pathetic, as he had done on numerous occasions as a child, particularly, for reasons unknown to him, around his Aunt Doreen. His blood pressure rose to one hundred and twenty-four over seventy-eight.

Just count to ten, he said silently, as his pulse increased to ninety-six, and his pupils dilated to the size of toy tea-set saucers. For reasons he was quite unaware of, he remembered the time his father threw out his dolls house, his Barbies, and all of his fluffy toys, including his treasured Teddy bear, Andrew. He was now experiencing that same sense of panic, despair, and utter helplessness. And there was someone watching him this time. Right in front of him.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight…

“I think you’re going to miss your interview,” chimed Fliss, now looking into her reflection in the glass wall of the elevator, picking at the tooth some more, and finding, at last, a piece of spinach from her breakfast spinach and mushroom wrap. She rolled her tongue over her front teeth, watching herself in the bright, mirrored panels of the elevator.

“…nine, ten,” Maxwell said, unaware that he’d actually vocalized the last two numbers.

Fliss smiled, showing her now perfect teeth. “Ha. You do that too, do you?” she said, turning to him, and looking him directly in the eye. She’d moved a few inches closer and was now well and truly within what anyone with an ounce of understanding of human behavior would know as his space. It wasn’t that Fliss didn’t understand boundaries. It was just that she loved to trample over them. And any slight evidence of nervousness in her intended victim would inevitably lead to her greater exploration of her own mischief.

“Do what?” said Maxwell, now sweating slightly, so that tiny beads of perspiration pushed through his Clinique non streak bronzer and foundation and out from the miniscule wells that were his pores. He remembered that he’d applied a second layer of underarm deodorant that morning, anticipating possible moments of self-doubt, but wondered if he’d applied enough; although felt reassured that his single spritz of Creed Green Irish Tweed au de cologne would cover any unsavory odors. The desire to step back a pace was overridden by the fear that his actions would be a red rag to a bull: this woman was plainly unpredictable, and a greater display of self-composure would be in order. He kept his ground, breathed through his nose, and engaged smile number two, the one reserved for such rare occasions with spectacularly unpredictable strangers.

“Count from one to ten when you get nervous,” she said, now stepping back and leaning against the opposite wall of the elevator, whilst plunging her hand into her coat pocket for a stick of gum. He was already acutely aware of her natural unselfconsciousness and envied her. He recalled the failed hypnotherapy sessions, the books on public speaking, and the money he’d spent on the You Are A Badass series of audio books, to no avail. She, in the meantime, was a cat playing with a mouse, oozing with a level of confidence he could barely dream of.

“I..I…,” he stammered, sensing himself falling into an abyss of embarrassment, “I suppose I do.” He’d recovered, he supposed, by simply being honest about his feelings. It was his nuclear option, of course, and rarely used. But now he was feeling suddenly and terribly exposed, and she might well be in for the kill. Thankfully, the lights went out before things could get any worse.

“Well that’s interesting,” said Fliss, relishing the new aspect of the adventure. “I wonder if we’ll fall next?” The darkness seemed like a cloak that swallowed Maxwell. He was in uncharted territory. As was Fliss, the difference being, of course, that she courted such adventure on a daily basis.

The urge to either urinate or, worse, defecate now entered Maxwell’s mind. It wasn’t that he wanted to do either. It was simply that he was terrified he might. Suddenly, his shirt collar felt three sizes too small, and he loosened his tie, carefully monitoring the knot’s distance from his neck in his mind’s eye, in the event of the lights suddenly returning and his image being subject to scrutiny again. He searched his mind for an appropriately witty response but fell short of inspiration. His awareness of the time, and his sense that a secretary on the seventeenth floor will at any moment be expecting him compounded his anxiety to a degree he worried would actually pass out. And it wouldn’t be the first time. Maxwell had passed out so many times he was one of the few people in his own circle who was familiar with the word syncope. He would surely be late, and even with a valid excuse he knew he would be on the side of failure. Perfection slipped from its moorings and drifted down the river, and there was nothing he could do about it.

“You know I can feel your anxiety?” said Fliss, now sliding down the wall of the dark container, and sitting on the floor. “You almost glow with worry. I hardly know you, but I see you and it’s like I’ve known you forever. Isn’t that interesting? I’m right, aren’t I?” Her smile radiated in the darkness, like infra-red light.

Maxwell felt trapped, like a tiny bunny in a corner. There was no way out. This woman had X ray eyes and could see into his soul. Here he was, perched on the precipice of success, and it had become an abyss within five minutes. His entire life was laid bare by a complete stranger at exactly the wrong moment. He greatest fear had become reality.

And then, something came over Maxwell, the likes of which he’d never have imagined would happen. It was as though his fairy godmother had appeared right there and then in the darkness, at his darkest hour. The unimaginable happened in Maxwell’s mind and heart, and psyche. He surrendered. 

It was if all the anxiety of his entire life drained away from him, and he stood there, real for the first time in his life, in the darkness, with this woman he’d only just met, moments before. He breathed in, and he held his breath. And he breathed out. And for the first time in his life he felt he was who he was.

And then the lights came on again.

“Well that didn’t take long,” said Fliss, sliding herself up from the floor. “I had a feeling we’d be there all day.”

A deep rumbled followed by a dull thump, and the elevator started again. Maxwell and Fliss stood there, she beside him and facing him as if about to dress a child for school. There was a silence that took them both by surprise. Forty-seven seconds later they arrived at the seventeenth floor and the elevator gently slowed, docking at its appointed floor with a barely noticeable bump. The doors opened, Maxwell hesitated for two point five seconds, then stepped out of the elevator, with fifty-nine seconds to spare before his interview. He turned to Fliss, nodded, then the doors closed. 

Maxwell turned sharply and strode the twenty-seven steps along the ruby red wool carpet to the huge glass door of the office of Collet, Richardson and Pearce. The secretary, a short blonde woman wearing chopsticks in hair tied into a tight bun beamed at him. He was still on time. Maxwell’s blood pressure moved down to one hundred and nineteen over seventy-three, as he took a clean white cotton handkerchief from his pants pocket (his jacket pockets were still stitched together from new) and he wiped seventeen miniscule beads of now cold perspiration from his handsome, well-proportioned forehead, as the air conditioning, set at precisely sixty eight degrees, embraced him and welcomed him home. He would be a good fit here. He just knew it, and so did Denise, the secretary.

“Mister Fisher?”

He nodded, as he suddenly noticed the hairs standing on his neck, and the most peculiar visceral exclamation arising from the very pit of his being.

“Welcome to Collet, Richardson Pearce!” said Denise, casually remembering last night’s difficult breakup with her boyfriend, Roger, having declared himself gay, and concealing her fresh mistrust of men from Maxwell, whom she was noticing was rapidly taking on the air of a store mannequin.

Maxwell stood there, frozen.

“Mister Fisher?” inquired Denise, noticing from the corner of her eye a text from Roger, declaring his love for her. I’m confused, said the text, accompanied by what was, until Denise would delete it in nine minutes and fourteen seconds, their song.

“Are you OK?”

And then it happened. All became clear, and Maxwell Fisher’s life would take a direction that he, his mother, and all his friends would never believe. Without even so much as a hello, a sorry, or a nod of recognition, Maxwell took a breath so deep it caused his head to spin, then he turned on his heels, and fled the sparkling glass doors of Collet, Richardson and Pearce with such haste that he was out the door and down the corridor before Denise had even had the chance to digest her disbelief at Roger’s audacity.

And, exactly eighteen seconds later, he found himself once more at the door of the elevator, his heart now racing at one hundred and seventy-two beats per minute.

And the sight of Fliss, finger pressed on the door hold, and wearing a grin a Cheshire cat could be proud of, sent his pulse so out of its own comfort zone that even it was taken aback by the adventure.

“Told you,”said Fliss, with the assurance of a Kung Fu master. “I knew you the moment I saw you”.

Spring 2022