by James Birk
Chapter 24
‘Congratulations mate,’ said Rob, taking a large gulp from his half-finished pint, ‘so when do you start?’
‘Well, nothing has been confirmed, but I reckon it’ll be shortly after I get back from Paris,’ I replied, ‘but I mean, I’m not sure congratulations is the right word.’
‘You’ve been promoted though,’ Rob looked directly at me, ‘that’s usually a good thing isn’t it?’
‘Well yeah,’ I conceded, ‘but I’m not sure I’ve been promoted to a job I actually want to do, and I’m not sure I want to carry on working for FFS at all really. I’ve never really liked working there, and I’d really like to spend the rest of my life doing a job that is a bit more, I don’t know, worthy.’
‘Glass is always half empty with you isn’t it,’ laughed Rob, ‘so what do you want to do?’
‘That is the problem,’ I acknowledged, ‘I haven’t got a clue what I really want to do. I just know I don’t want to be involved in processing financial products for the rest of my life. I honestly bore myself when I think about my job.’
It was true; I had been offered a promotion of sorts. The previous day I had been called into a meeting with Dan, Grant and Caroline from HR. I was told that, given the recent increase in business, they were going to be recruiting a lot more people and were subsequently expanding the training team. As I had impressed with my last foray into training, and as I was one of the most productive members of staff in the department, my name had been mentioned straight away as a possible candidate. It meant an increase in salary of around a thousand pounds per annum, and an extra day’s annual leave. Essentially I would be moving to a new team on the seventh floor and working under Darren, who had irritatingly done particularly well during the restructure of the company. I would have a greater range of responsibilities than I currently had, although primarily the role was to be teaching new recruits how to input life assurance applications and to quality check the work of more established employees. It was not my dream job but it was better than my current job. It made me even more determined to evaluate my circumstances.
‘I’ve actually been thinking about going into teaching,’ I mumbled into my pint.
Rob looked at me with a broad grin on his face.
‘I’m sorry?’ he said, ‘Did I hear you correctly? I thought you always said that you didn’t want to be a teacher.’
‘Well whether I want to or not, I’ve sort of become one anyway haven’t I?’ I pointed out, ‘but I’m fairly sure there’s not much worthwhile in teaching people how to enter applications forms onto a database. At least if I was a proper teacher, I’d be doing something useful.’
‘You should talk to Nikki then,’ said Rob, ‘I’m sure she’d be able to point you in the right direction.’
‘Maybe I will,’ I mused, ‘but she’s busy with little Alfie isn’t she? How is he by the way?’
‘Bloody exhausting,’ groaned Rob, but there was a definite look of pride in his face, ‘I can’t remember the last time I had a decent night’s sleep.’
‘You love it though don’t you?’ I smiled; it was good to see him happy, even if it meant we didn’t get to do this as often any more.
‘I do mate, but the trouble is, now we’ve got Alfie, Nikki keeps on saying we should get married.’ sighed Rob.
‘You love her though don’t you?’ I said, ‘I mean, maybe you should think about it.’
‘I do love her,’ admitted Rob, ‘and I’m not against the idea, you know, but it’s an expensive business, marriage, and I know we’ve both got good jobs, but Alfie didn’t come cheap. Do you know how much nappies cost by the way? And Nikki doesn’t know if she’s going back to work once the maternity leave is up and I mean, the car’s on its last legs and that’s going to cost a fair bit to replace, so I’d like to marry her but unless her parents can help out, I don’t know if we’ll be able to afford it.’
‘Hold on, I thought her parents were loaded’ I said, ‘You’re just making excuses now.’
‘Yeah, I am, they said they would help, and my mum, bless her, she said she’ll help out too even though she can’t really afford to pay her own electricity bills, but yeah we probably could afford it,’ admitted Rob, ‘but, well, I’m still not sure if I can go through with it.’
‘Why not?’ I asked.
‘Well if I’m going to get married I’d need a good mate to be my best man.’ He paused as if giving the matter some thought and then as if the idea had just occurred to him he looked at me, ‘I don’t suppose you’d be up for it would you?’
I looked at him blankly for a second, ‘I’m sorry did you just ask me to be your best man? Does that mean you are getting married?’
‘Well, yeah, I asked Nikki last night and she said yes, on the condition that you would be my best man.’
‘No she didn’t’ I said, secretly hoping that she had.
‘Well no,’ admitted Rob, ‘she doesn’t really care who my best man is, but I do, so are you going to do it or not?’
I was genuinely taken aback, ‘Of course I will mate, it would be an honour.’
I fought to hold back the tears. My best mate was getting married and he wanted me to be his best man. Me! Rob had two brothers he could have picked before me, not to mention countless other more charismatic friends, but for some reason he had chosen me.
I drained my pint.
‘This calls for a whisky and a cigar!’ I proclaimed.
It was a tradition of ours, since the early days of university, to celebrate anything with a shot of whisky and a cigar. Being connoisseurs of neither, we always went for the cheapest options available, but it was a tradition we had upheld for many years now.
Rob looked at me dubiously.
‘Aren’t you supposed to be running a marathon soon?’ he asked.
‘Next week in fact,’ I said, ‘but I’m sure the effects will have worn off by then!’
Rob shrugged his shoulders.
‘If you’re paying, I’m up for it. But then I’d really better get back to the family. She’ll kill me if I’m back late!’
