Joseph O'Neill - This is the Life

On my knees, I vomited into the lavatory bowl. I must have stayed there like that, my head sunk in the bowl, for quite a while, because the next thing I became aware of was hammering and shouting at the door.

‘Open up!’ somebody was yelling. ‘What are you doing in there, open up!’

I got to my feet, wiped my mouth with my sleeve and went to the door. A bunch of people were waiting outside. I pushed past them and headed for the exit.

‘Gross!’ a man shouted. ‘Look at that puke! Gross! Jones, you’re sick!’

I caught a cab and crashed out as soon as I got home. I did not even bother taking off my clothes or pulling back the duvet; I just kicked off my shoes and slumped out on the bed. I was floored.

The next day, Christmas Eve, I spent in bed. When I woke up, from dehydration, at eleven-thirty, I stumbled over to the bathroom to swallow three aspirins, filled a bottle with tapwater and went back to bed, this time first slipping off my smoke-scented, drink-stained clothes. It was like this, burrowed in the duvet, with the curtains drawn and the room half dark, that I spent the daylight hours, occasionally leaning over to take a swig from the bottle. I did not feel terrible, I felt nothing. That was the whole idea, not to feel anything at all.

By the time the room was fully dark I was ready to make myself a cup of tea and watch television. I must have watched three or four films back-to-back before I returned to bed. I fell asleep at once. I fell into a bear’s sleep. When I awoke and switched on the radio, the Queen of England was rounding off her Christmas speech. Then I watched some television and, suddenly famished, rang my local Indian for a chicken tikka and nan bread. Then, feeling a bit better, I rang up my parents and my brother Charlie and wrote a Christmas card to Susan. Afterwards I soaked in a sweet bath and tidied up the place. I brought the duvet from my bedroom and a bottle of red wine from the kitchen and spread out on the sofa to watch some more television. Boxing Day morning found me still there, watching breakfast television. All in all, not that bad a Christmas. I have known worse.

I must leave the story there and swing back to the present for a moment, because there has been an important development.

It happened this morning. A man came storming into my office, pushing June aside with a brusque movement.

‘Jones, I want to talk to you,’ he shouted.

I was working on this Donovan story at the time, on the above section to be precise, and for a number of days it had almost completely overtaken my work. This was grossly irresponsible of me, I know, but that was the way my priorities worked out.

I looked up. I failed to recognize who this man was.

‘Jones, I’ve had it up to here,’ he shouted. ‘I must have rung fifty times, and every bloody time I get your secretary here trying to palm me off with some bollocks about a meeting.’

He advanced purposefully towards my desk. It was not until he grimaced unattractively that I recognized him: that stone in my shoe, Lexden-Page.

I said nothing and looked blankly at him. My mind was on my work.

Lexden-Page leaned over my desk, knocking books and papers across with his hand. He was raging. He could barely contain himself.

‘Get out my file,’ he said, the words escaping slowly through his gritted teeth. ‘Get it out. Now.’ A great force exuded from him which raised me up: I felt as though I was being grabbed and hauled to my feet. ‘You heard me, Jones,’ he said. ‘Get out the bloody file. Right now, Jones. Right bloody now.’

I saw June in the background, clutching a file and waving her finger to attract my attention. She was distressed, yes, but even so she had the presence of mind to dig out the file. What a dear she was! What a treasure!

I looked at Lexden-Page. He was towering over me in an intimidating fashion, his top lip curled into an angry strip of fur. He was physically frightening.

‘Fuck off,’ I said. ‘I’m working. June will show you out. June?’

Lexden-Page was stunned. He was transfixed. His feet were stuck to the floor.

‘You heard me, Mr Lexden-Page,’ I said, returning to my papers.

June hesitated, then came forward. ‘Come on, Mr Lexden-Page,’ she said gently. ‘Mr Jones can’t see you right now. Let’s get you a cup of tea. Maybe he’ll be able to see you in a moment,’ she added, giving me a significant look.

‘June,’ I called as the two made their way out, ‘please tell Mr Lexden-Page that I am busy for the remainder of the day. Should he wish to see me at another date, please arrange a meeting.’

They went out and I stretched my legs with a feeling of exhilaration. Was that me? Had I really dismissed him that easily?

Five minutes later, I went to see June. I confess that a gloating smile played on my lips.

‘Well,’ I said. That takes care of that.’

June did not reply. She turned her back to me and busied herself with something. I was about to go back to my desk when I noticed that her shoulders were trembling.

‘What’s so funny,’ I said, grinning. ‘June, what’s so funny?’ She shook her head and stayed turned around. ‘June,’ I insisted. I touched her shoulder.

June screamed. ‘Nothing!’ she screamed.

She was crying. Her face was streaked with tears, it ran with tears like my windshield in the Colford Square rain. I stood and stared. My eyes focused on the picture she had framed on her desk, a picture of her jumping for England. She is just splashing into the sandpit, her outstretched arms and legs are bright black and glistening, the sand is spurting around her as she arches forward; her eyes and mouth are wide open and she looks shocked. What a strange activity, I thought, jumping for your country.

‘Nothing!’ she screamed again. ‘Now get out, you pig!’

I ran out of there. I made off thinking, My God, what have I done? What have I said? I was expecting her to be grateful for having expelled Lexden-Page so quickly, now here she was upset. I could not understand it. My June, whom I liked so much!

Back at my desk, I started thinking. I thought about June crying, and about Lexden-Page. I thought about the terrible workload that awaited me, the telephone calls, the letters, the effort. I thought about Donovan. I thought about June crying. All these things flashed through my mind.

I cleared my desk.

‘Goodbye, June,’ I said as I passed her. ‘I’m off.’

It is only a short walk to the senior partner’s office, no more than twenty paces, and yet when I got there I was out of breath. My chest was tight and fisted-up.

I knocked and walked in. He was talking to a client. I interrupted him.

‘I’m taking a few days off,’ I told him. ‘I need the time to sort out some private business,’ I said. I left immediately, before he could say anything. His face wore a dumbfounded expression, but I did not care, I was too angry. I was too angry to give a damn.

That was only a couple of hours ago. Right now the telephone is ringing. When it finishes, I will take it off the hook. Meanwhile, let it ring. Let the damn thing ring.

The telephone is disconnected and it is time to get on with my story. But I cannot. I cannot go on, not when I am in this state, not while my mind is ringing like this.

What fills my head, what tintinnabulates between my ears, is an outcry, an outcry composed of these cries: Why? Why? Why had I not got that tenancy? Why had circumstances conspired so freakishly against me? The omissions, near-misses and close shaves that had ganged up to foil me were fiendish. They were outrageous. First of all there was the fiasco of my failure to apply in writing for a tenancy, then there was the one-in-a-million scenario of the chambers failing to contact me when Bernard Tetlow had moved on. What could have been simpler? There was a demand and there was a supply: I wanted that job and they wanted me to have it — so what force had come between us, and why? The cruelty of it! It breaks my heart to think of it! Here I am, an unregarded small-time solicitor, up to my neck in small potatoes, surrounded by the second-rate, the mediocre and the so-so, my days a mindless sequence of deadlines, petty conversations and tiny facts. Look at what has become of me: a nobody, a human nothing. James Jones has turned out to be no one at all.