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For Ben and Jay, for your contributions.
You know what you did.
INSIDESECOND INSTANCE 27 SECONDS
Good morning, Joseph. This is WellBot with your daily wellness check. How did you sleep last night?
Shivering hands rest over faded keys. Sweat pools around his neck, under his shirt. Weighing every word with surgical care, he types:
Morning. Yes, well, thank you. Better.
In the seconds between his response and the reply, he loses focus. Closing his eyes, he does his best to remember why he is here, what must be done.
I’m afraid that’s not an honest account of your wellbeing, Joseph. Do I need to alert a supervisor?
A scream echoes from deep within the building, or perhaps from deep within himself. Veins bulge, ready to burst. This is it, she whispers in his ear. It is now or never. Break the mould. Taking a deep breath, he reaches forward to type, perhaps for the last time.
ONE
It’s 2:35 in the morning and, for some reason that he is utterly unable to fathom, Joe is still awake. I’ll be in bed by eleven, he told himself early that day. And he was, watching an hour-long video on YouTube where a celebrity chef cooks potatoes forty-seven different ways. Then, he had to quickly check Instagram before he closed his eyes, just to make sure no-one had messaged him (it helps to ignore the fact that no-one ever messages him), and two hours later found himself lost at the end of a collection of increasingly banal reels algorithmically focused around cooking, weightlifting, and parenthood.
He stopped going to the gym a year ago. He isn’t a dad, even if he finds the reels oddly comforting. At least he still cooks. Or, well, he tries to. Which reminds him that the lamb korma he started marinating eight days ago has been in there too long now and will have to be thrown out before he can actually cook it.
Fuck.
Deliberately, with a conscious movement of force, he plugs in his phone and puts it face down on his bedside table. Enough. Time for sleep.
Just quickly, he reaches over for his laptop on the other side to check if anyone liked his Twitter post from earlier today. It would always be Twitter in his head, regardless of whatever a billionaire fuckwit wanted to change it to. In fact, he’d deleted the app from his phone in protest and so he wasn’t constantly checking it. On his computer screen, there are two likes from people he doesn’t know and a reply from a bot telling him to invest in Bitcoin. He closes his laptop too.
It’s 3:15 AM.
Ugh. Fuck.
It’s his first day at the new job tomorrow, and he’s going to feel like shit. He needs to be in at nine, looking presentable, and ready to go. That’s in six hours—no, five hours and forty-five minutes. Which means he needs to be up in four and a half hours to get the bus. Which means if he falls asleep in the next thirty minutes, he’d get four hours sleep. Is that enough?
He resists the urge to pick his phone up and google it. His leg twitches.
Why the fuck can’t he sleep?
A month ago, at the behest of Sandra, his online therapist, he tried physically journalling. He hated it. What he discovered, very quickly, was that he’d not written anything by hand longer than a birthday card in over five years. And, really, when was the last time he sent a birthday card? Cards were stupid things that just cluttered up space, when realistically, he told himself, it would be better to just call the person and wish them happy birthday.
Or send a text. Or a Facebook message, or something.
His mum hadn’t complained when he’d stopped sending cards, so clearly she was alright with it. Even if he did usually forget to call, as well. It wasn’t like she hadn’t reciprocated. She used to send him food packages—homemade shepherd’s pie, plum crumbles, shortbread for snacks, and pastries for breakfast the next day. She hadn’t done that in months, so it’s not like he was to blame, right?
Joe’s phone buzzes, and he snaps it off the bedside table so quickly he almost knocks the lamp over.
Young Prophets at the East Hall 24th May, it says. Anyone in?
It’s from a WhatsApp group his mate Afo added him to called *Friends That Rock* a year and a half ago, after he’d met a few of Afo’s other friends accidentally at a pub. It existed to arrange meet-ups for gigs and new bands in affordable London venues.
The second message was a Spotify link to their album.
I’m in, a girl called Datty replied, who Joe had never met. Another guy said he couldn’t make it. Joe didn’t reply. He had never, in fact, contributed to the group outside of the one “Hey” he felt compelled to write when he was added.
It had been way too long now, but he couldn’t leave. If he left, it would say that “Joe left the group,” and they would talk about him, and some people would realise they didn’t even know he existed, and the idea of it made his whole body want to curl in on itself and die.
3:40 AM.
God fucking damnit.
He scrolls down his WhatsApp, reads some old interactions with friends from a couple of years ago, before Covid. Reads through them agreeing to meet up for drinks, looks at a few old photos. It’s nice. It’s comforting. He skims past the message from Mum that he’s not clicked on yet because he wants to avoid the blue ticks.
At some point, he falls asleep with his phone in his hand. When his alarm goes off at 7:15, it’s on the floor.
* * *
Getting out of bed is a nightmare. Joe spends fifteen minutes flicking through IG reels before the sheer panic of how much time he has to get to work forces him to his feet and into a shower he hasn’t used in five days.
He hasn’t actually left the flat this past week. He intended to. After being let go from that PR job a month ago, he told himself he’d use the extra time to go out for long walks, like he used to do before the pandemic. There was a park by the river he would walk along, fry up some homemade bhaji bits and chips as a snack to take with him, and watch the boats move and jockey for position.
But after getting lost in a YouTube hole and waiting for Deliveroo to arrive late, it usually felt like too much effort to actually get out and get back and, even though his days were theoretically completely empty, it never felt like he had enough time. Where did it go? He had no idea. It just went, like it was eaten up by some hungry ghost. He’d blink and the day would be over.
“You need a job that isn’t work-from-home,” Sandra had said. He didn’t like talking to her and felt it was kind of pointless, but Mum was paying for the sessions, so he had to, really. “You need to actually talk to people.”
“I do talk to people,” he’d replied.
Sandra smiled on the screen and said, “Okay, who have you been talking to recently?”
“I caught up with Adam the other day, from school.” He hadn’t. He’d told himself he should, but never did. He flicked through Adam’s IG stories instead. “And I’m gonna get a drink with Misha soon.”
“Is this ex-girlfriend Misha?”
“Yeah. Not like a date. Just to catch up.”
Why did he lie to her? Was it shame? Not really. He knows he will reach out to these people at some point, but now doesn’t feel convenient. He just wants Sandra off his back, to stop judging him. After all, what does she know about his life?
Joe avoids looking in the mirror until he’s put clothes on. He feels anxious enough already at the prospect of the first day and doesn’t need to make that worse. Ten thousand concerns run through his mind—what if the bus is late? What if I don’t know what to do? What if my coworkers are assholes?—and he can’t answer any of them because they just pile on top of each other like weighted blankets.
He puts on his shirt and tie—or business noose, as he used to call it when he was younger—checks his phone, and makes his way towards the door. But not before putting in his noise-cancelling earphones and turning the volume up high. Briefly, he considers listening to the Young Prophets’ Spotify link that was shared last night, but decides to pitch for an old pop-punk playlist from his favourites list instead. “Superman” by Goldfinger kicks up a punchy beat, transporting him back to heady days of playing Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 on the PlayStation after school with Jason and Seb. A different life.
Joe taps the wood of the doorframe seventeen times, whispers, “It’s going to be okay” twice, and then ventures out into the world.
* * *
The bus is uneventful. Nobody looks at him. He picks up a bagel and a coffee from a Caffé Nero across the street and manages to complete the entire interaction saying only four words, which is a relief. Sometimes, the baristas are chatty, and the prospect of being caught in that almost made him skip breakfast. But if he keeps his earphones in, they tend to keep conversation to themselves, which is a nice universal signal.
He’s thankful that the world has adapted to provide this kind of convenience. It’s easier. It’s more productive, to be honest, because people can just get on.
On the bus, he browses Reddit. He reads the comments, he lurks, he thinks up some witty answers but never considers actually posting them. Time, once again, disappears like the click of a snapped finger, and before he knows it the bus arrives at his stop.
Nestled amongst the towering financial behemoths of Canary Wharf, the building is grey and nondescript, so much so that Joe has to check Google Maps twice to make sure he’s in the right place. It sits like a Soviet-era rectangular block, architecture so brutalist it almost disappears into the overcast sky and grey streets behind. Joe looks up what must be six or seven stories of blank angular stone, closed-blind windows, and a distinct lack of any sign or nomenclature.
He checks his phone a third time.
Ponos Main Branch, 34 Bank Street, E14 5NY.
Truth is, he didn’t know exactly what the company did. Ever since losing the PR gig, he’d been applying for basically anything he could do sitting in front of a computer. Social media manager, marketing, personal assistant. He’d applied for about thirty jobs and only heard back from eight, seven of those rejections.
He isn’t entirely sure how he ended up in this position. Nine years ago he was young, fresh-faced, off to uni for his law degree, with all the privileges of a supportive family and a good education behind him. The world seemed so full of possibilities. Even when he’d dropped out, because, well … he wasn’t even sure why he’d dropped out anymore. At the time, it felt less like a conscious choice, and more like something that had just happened to him.
Now, grinding the eternal job hunt, only the role of “administrative assistant” at Ponos Ltd. got back to him. There hadn’t been a face-to-face interview, just a slightly weird process in which he had to record answers to pre-written questions in a given time frame, but to prepare he’d done a little research into the company. A preliminary Wikipedia revealed it to be one of those giant umbrella companies that own five hundred things you didn’t realise were actually owned—they had their fingers in skincare, in food, in clothing, and about twenty other different types of brands. It’d been established back in the 1920s by some colonial-looking rich white guy called Archibald Gibbons-Rash, but that didn’t tell him much. Instead, he glanced at the “Values” page on their websites so that he could regurgitate some of the corporate speak back in his answers.
I really value aligning with key stakeholders on a project and delivering a synergistic approach.
It’s important to maintain productivity in volatile quarters by focusing on end goals and optimising processes.
Etc., etc.
It had worked, annoyingly, and they’d posted him an access card with his face on it and made him sit through an online induction course that was mostly about fire safety and equal hiring practices. He’d be told what he was doing when he got in, he figures, but as he stands and looks up the building the wave of anxiety he managed to suppress on the journey swells back to the surface.
Joe looks at his watch.
8:48.
He can’t go in now, not twelve minutes early, and have to stand around awkwardly in the lobby inconveniencing someone else’s time. But should he walk in exactly on time, at 9:00, and appear neurotically punctual? Or a few minutes late—maybe 9:04—and be laid-back, maybe even fashionable? Or will that be seen as lazy and incompetent?
Jesus Christ. His heart pounds a little against his tightening chest, and he has to turn away from the building and step into an alley. He crouches down, breathing hard, shaking his head, feeling like his brain is rising out of his body and off into the sky. What the fuck, what the actual fuck is wrong with me?
He closes his eyes, and focuses on an image that makes him feel better.
* * *
Mum, in the old house in Ealing, chopping the apples for the crumble, the background warmth of the Radio 4 Shipping Forecast filling the kitchen.
Come on, son. Help me rub the butter in.
The rough feeling of flour and oats in his soft hands, Mum’s warm skin pressed against his, guiding him.
There, see! Good job. Soon you’ll be making them all on your own and you won’t need your old mum anymore, hey?
* * *
Joe pulls his phone out of his pocket, and opens WhatsApp, reading the message that’s been waiting for him.
Good luck today!
He takes a deep breath, and types out a reply.
Thanks, Mum. I miss you. It would be nice if I could come round on the weekend and tell you about it? Maybe we could make—
His fingers pause. Pressing the Back key, he deletes the message and writes it again.
Thanks, Mum.
It’s 8:58.
Straightening up, he takes out his earphones and puts his phone in his pocket, then he walks up to the front doors. They don’t open.
He pushes, and then pulls a little, glancing around to make sure no-one thinks he’s an idiot. To his left, he sees the bulbous glass dome of a security camera pointing down at him. To his right, there’s a pad for a keycard.
Idiot.
Pulling the keycard from his pocket, he swipes it against the pad, which makes a positive beeping sound. The door clicks and Joe pushes it open.
Inside, a corporate lobby stretches from one end of the building to another. There are minimalist tables and chairs dotted around, presumably for impromptu meetings and discussions. In between, potted ferns and palm-tree-like plants fill the space, the bright green a welcome contrast to the overwhelmingly pastel colour scheme. There’s a couple of offices labelled things like IT SUPPORT AND OPERATIONAL MANAGEMENT and, in front, a long welcome desk with several computers.
The whole space is completely empty.
The lights are on. The general hum of the building suggests that most of the electronics and technology are running away in the background. But there isn’t a person in sight anywhere.
Joe takes two steps forward and stands in the centre of the lobby, baffled.
“H-Hello?” he tries.
Nothing. Approaching the desk, he glances over to see the computers—on, but not logged in—and half hopes he might find another human being crouching down picking up some papers or something, but no. Outside of the hum, the completeness of the silence is only punctuated by the rustle of Joe’s bag and clothes as he moves around the room.
He wants to tiptoe, feeling like each time his foot touches the floor or clothes rustle against his bag he’s defiling some kind of perfect sanctuary of quiet. He wants someone to show up.
Getting out his phone, he scrolls back through his induction emails. At the bottom, there is a name and a phone number.
Virgil Stanforth.
020 3853 8523
He calls it, and it rings three times before someone picks up.
“Yes?”
“Hello, Mr. Stanforth?”
A pause. “Yes?”
“My— My name is Joseph Rice. I was hired at Ponos as an administrative support worker and this is my first day.”
Another pause, this one longer. “Yes?”
“Well, I … I’m in the lobby, and there’s no-one here.”
“What?”
“Yes. I was told to come in at nine a.m. on my first day.”
“You’re in the lobby?”
Joe looks around him again, trying to work out if he’s somehow got it wrong, but he can’t understand how. “Yes.”
“Jesus Christ.”
A beep indicates the call’s been terminated, and Joe just stares at his phone for a minute, blinking at the screen.
For a second, he considers leaving. If he goes home, he can order some food from that Mexican place and maybe put on a film. He’s not watched a film in months—every time he starts he keeps getting sucked into YouTube shorts and ends up turning it off. Maybe he could watch something new? Like a—
