back. The dozen or so people in the office crowded around her while she made a short speech about what a pleasure it had been working with me and that I would always be welcomed back if the life of the idle rich ever got too much for me. It seemed churlish to contradict her, so I smiled and made a speech of my own about how much I’d enjoyed working there and how I’d be glad to see any of them on Ionia, if they didn’t mind sleeping on the beach; just joking, they’d always be welcome.
One of the production assistants had gone out to buy sparkling wine in the lunch break and this was produced, along with a present and a card, amid much teasing about licence-payers’ money and Producer Choice. The present was a book, a thoughtfully chosen anthology of writing about castaways which I made everyone sign. I felt a surge of affectionfor all of them, even Derek Braddock, whom I’d always found a pain. I thought to myself that even if work had replicated all the faults of my family, at least it had replicated some of its virtues too: the humour, the intelligence, the companionship. For the first time, I felt a sense of loss. For good or bad, the life I had made in London was something of my own, and I was leaving it behind. I was exchanging something real for something unreal. It suddenly seemed like a dangerous swap.
We went to the pub at five o’clock, a big, shabby crowd of us, looking conspicuously pale and also more awkward together outside the office. Derek Braddock bought an enormous round of drinks and clapped me on the back.
‘You’re a mystery man,’ he said. ‘Ten years I’ve known you and this is the first time we’ve had a drink together.’
‘That’s not true,’ I told him. ‘We had a drink after the US elections.’ Secretly, I was rather flattered that Derek had spared my private life any thought at all.
‘One drink in ten years! Oi, Wendy – he’s a mystery man, isn’t he?’
‘I’m sure it was more than one drink,’ I said.
‘Damien is very … self-contained.’ Wendy laughed. She looked much prettier outside work; her eyes were bright from drinking.
‘You’re making me self-conscious,’ I said. ‘Can’t you wait until I’ve left to have this conversation?’
Derek paused before his pint of lager reached his lips. ‘I’ve always wondered about your secret life,’ he said.
‘Secret life? I don’t have one, Derek. I don’t have a life. I go home to an empty flat.’
‘What about that girlfriend of yours?’
I shook my head. ‘Didn’t work out.’
‘Pity. She was a looker.’ Derek took a sip of his drink and stared down at the floor, jingling the coins in his pocket with his spare hand. ‘Well, then.’
I had never been able to dislike Derek properly since I had taken his notebook home one day instead of mine and found abrochure for a holiday home in Spain taped inside the front cover as though it was a talisman of another, better life. ‘Wend your way along the road from Puerto Pollença, while the lights of the porch glimmer in the gloaming.’ Glimmer in the gloam ing :you knew that the copywriter who came up with that thought he was Gerard Manley Hopkins.
I gave the book back to him the next day without mentioning it, but I still felt he had shared a confidence with me, and I experienced a pang of guilt whenever I found myself thinking that he was an arsehole. I said, ‘I’ll miss you, Derek,’ as a kind of penitence. Then he winked back at me as he swallowed his drink and squeezed my arm, and I felt marginally worse. I had an overpowering sense of all the small disappointments that wear you away over the years. I thought of work as a rhythm that marched Derek out of the house in the morning and back into his bed at night. And I remembered how quickly the employees in our department – men, particularly – died after retirement. Because that rhythm had gone, and it was too late for them to find another. Derek was about fifty-five; if he retired now,
One of the production assistants had gone out to buy sparkling wine in the lunch break and this was produced, along with a present and a card, amid much teasing about licence-payers’ money and Producer Choice. The present was a book, a thoughtfully chosen anthology of writing about castaways which I made everyone sign. I felt a surge of affectionfor all of them, even Derek Braddock, whom I’d always found a pain. I thought to myself that even if work had replicated all the faults of my family, at least it had replicated some of its virtues too: the humour, the intelligence, the companionship. For the first time, I felt a sense of loss. For good or bad, the life I had made in London was something of my own, and I was leaving it behind. I was exchanging something real for something unreal. It suddenly seemed like a dangerous swap.
We went to the pub at five o’clock, a big, shabby crowd of us, looking conspicuously pale and also more awkward together outside the office. Derek Braddock bought an enormous round of drinks and clapped me on the back.
‘You’re a mystery man,’ he said. ‘Ten years I’ve known you and this is the first time we’ve had a drink together.’
‘That’s not true,’ I told him. ‘We had a drink after the US elections.’ Secretly, I was rather flattered that Derek had spared my private life any thought at all.
‘One drink in ten years! Oi, Wendy – he’s a mystery man, isn’t he?’
‘I’m sure it was more than one drink,’ I said.
‘Damien is very … self-contained.’ Wendy laughed. She looked much prettier outside work; her eyes were bright from drinking.
‘You’re making me self-conscious,’ I said. ‘Can’t you wait until I’ve left to have this conversation?’
Derek paused before his pint of lager reached his lips. ‘I’ve always wondered about your secret life,’ he said.
‘Secret life? I don’t have one, Derek. I don’t have a life. I go home to an empty flat.’
‘What about that girlfriend of yours?’
I shook my head. ‘Didn’t work out.’
‘Pity. She was a looker.’ Derek took a sip of his drink and stared down at the floor, jingling the coins in his pocket with his spare hand. ‘Well, then.’
I had never been able to dislike Derek properly since I had taken his notebook home one day instead of mine and found abrochure for a holiday home in Spain taped inside the front cover as though it was a talisman of another, better life. ‘Wend your way along the road from Puerto Pollença, while the lights of the porch glimmer in the gloaming.’ Glimmer in the gloam ing :you knew that the copywriter who came up with that thought he was Gerard Manley Hopkins.
I gave the book back to him the next day without mentioning it, but I still felt he had shared a confidence with me, and I experienced a pang of guilt whenever I found myself thinking that he was an arsehole. I said, ‘I’ll miss you, Derek,’ as a kind of penitence. Then he winked back at me as he swallowed his drink and squeezed my arm, and I felt marginally worse. I had an overpowering sense of all the small disappointments that wear you away over the years. I thought of work as a rhythm that marched Derek out of the house in the morning and back into his bed at night. And I remembered how quickly the employees in our department – men, particularly – died after retirement. Because that rhythm had gone, and it was too late for them to find another. Derek was about fifty-five; if he retired now,
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