Unlike so many others around the city, when Monday morning finally arrived, I felt relieved it was time to return to work. I’d spent the weekend bingeing on yet more episodes of ‘Join Us’ and forcing myself to go out for walks until the combination of January sleet and tourists clogging up the pavements sent me fleeing back to my too-quiet flat. I knew I was lucky to be living in such a vibrant place with so many exciting opportunities on my doorstep, but somehow, even though I was surrounded by hundreds of thousands of people, I felt disconnected and alone. When I’d first arrived in the city as an eager music student, making friends had been so simple. Everyone was in the same boat, keen to hang out and bond over shared passions. I had taken it for granted that there would always be someone around to go out or stay in with. Now I missed that comfortable vibe, and battled to ignore the growing fear I was getting left behind while everyone else moved on with apparent ease. I wanted things to be different, but without the straightforward friendship-making structures provided by school and uni, I didn’t know how to make that happen. My loneliness seemed like a shameful thing to admit, a condition normally associated with frail pensioners, not a woman about town who should have had everything going for her.
Over the weekend I’d even toyed with the idea of re-installing the dating apps, but exchanging superficial messages with either bored or boring blokes, or having a random hook-up wasn’t exactly the kind of connection I was after at the moment. Besides, it was much more fun swiping when friends were on standby to gossip about the options and cheer you on, suggesting appropriate (or, more likely, inappropriate) opening lines, and carrying out the necessary background research, aka stalking. I suspected if I mentioned dating apps to the girls, their responses, probably several days later than I’d wish for, would be along the lines of how relieved they were not to have to be involved in ‘that scene’ anymore.
When I greeted the team on my punctual 9am arrival at work, eager to once again connect with actual human beings, my voice was slightly raspy from being underused over the last forty-eight hours.
‘Another one who’s obviously had a very good weekend,’ said Malcolm, misinterpreting my hoarseness. He gestured at his assistant Leonie who was gulping down a large espresso with the pained expression of someone who was debating whether the two-day hangover was worth the price of the night out. I grinned, much preferring that take to my colleagues instantly recognising my croakiness as the result of my unwanted hermit-like existence. I imagined Leonie, with her tattoos and incredible streaky pink hair, never sat alone at home on a Saturday evening willing her phone to ping. I mentally kicked myself. I was meant to be a grown up, not some teenager getting envious of the cool kid at school.
‘It was great, thanks, I had a good gossip with the gang,’ I replied, thinking of the podcast I’d listened to, ‘and then I had the neighbours around too.’ No need to mention that the neighbours I was referring to were of the four-legged hairy variety whose only interest in me was as an occasional provider of treats and scratches.
‘Excellent, an old fogey such as myself likes to hear that you young ones are continuing the proud Scottish tradition of living life to the full.’ Although his words were cheerful, something in Malcom’s tone didn’t match. But before I could ask what was on his mind, he lowered his voice and beckoned me closer, his expression serious. ‘Now, any idea why Ian has summoned us all into a full staff meeting? He’s even insisted the apprentices come in, and poor Leonie had to cancel plans as she doesn’t normally work Mondays. I can’t remember the last time he got everyone together like this. I’m not trying to be the workplace doom-monger, but it’s not a good sign.’ He shook his head. ‘It’s an announcement of some sort, and I can’t imagine it’s going to be that we’re all getting a bonus this year. Do you think I should call the union and ask for a rep to attend?’
‘I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about. You know the boss, he loves an audience. Maybe he’s decided to try reviving his stand-up career yet again and wants to test out his routine on everyone.’ I tried to keep things light-hearted—my boss Ian Sibley’s obsession with attempting to prove he wasn’t a comedy one-hit wonder was a long-standing joke in theatre circles—but it landed flat. Despite my attempt at humour, my own apprehension was growing, and I couldn’t help wondering if Malcolm’s pessimism might actually turn out to be realism. There had always been whispers that the theatre might have to close if the audiences didn’t improve, but in recent times those rumours had grown louder. I pictured the graph on the box office wall which proved in bright primary colours how dramatically sales had fallen. Perhaps we’d finally reached the reckoning point. I very much hoped not. If I lost my job, my calendar really would be empty, never mind the other terrifying, more practical concerns it would raise.
Malcolm, Leonie and I filed into the auditorium and made nervous small talk while everyone waited to find out why we’d been summoned. I looked around, trying to tell from my other colleagues’ expressions if anyone knew what was going on. They all appeared as clueless as I was, which increased my concern. If the meeting was about something ordinary, at least one other person in the team would have known about it. But everyone seemed tense, already bracing themselves for the worst, as the whispered rumours danced around and grew in intensity.
Eventually Ian strode onto the stage, wearing the least shabby of his power suits from his 1980s heyday, and glancing around with affected nonchalance, raised his hand in anticipated acknowledgement of a round of applause which was never going to come from his employees. The low mutterings from the staff in the auditorium fell silent. I tried to read Ian’s body language to see if it gave anything away, but as far as I could tell, his confident swagger wasn’t any different from his normal manner.
‘We are gathered here today,’ he boomed, taking on the demeanour of the parody vicar from one of the in-your-face comedy sketches he was briefly famous for.
The seats in the auditorium creaked as people sat up straighter, bracing themselves for what he was about to say. The noise seemed to bring the boss back to reality and he shuffled his notes, then started speaking again in a much more normal voice. I wondered if anyone else found that as unnerving as I did.
‘First of all, I’ve gathered you all together to say a heartfelt thank you for everything that you do. You consistently go above and beyond what your contracts require of you, and for that, I cannot express how grateful I am.’
He looked around the room, trying to catch everyone’s gaze as if to impress us with his sincerity. It made me feel even more uneasy.
‘It would be good if those thanks were reflected in a more tangible way than empty words,’ said Malcolm in a bad stage whisper.
Ian pretended to be absorbed by adjusting his gold cufflinks, although it was clear to everyone that he must have heard the comment.
‘There’s definitely a but coming,’ I muttered.
Right on cue, the boss continued.
‘But, as I’m sure you’ll all be acutely aware, we work in a challenging industry, one which has faced great financial hardship over the last few years. While the audiences have returned,’ Malcolm and I exchanged glances, holding a silent conversation which questioned the last time Ian had actually sat in the auditorium on a show night and seen how empty it normally was, ‘we operate in a saturated market, one in which we must innovate and adapt in order to stay at fighting weight. Which is why I wanted to cascade some information to you.’
He’d definitely been on a course somewhere learning to spout all this insincere management speak. I forced myself to concentrate on the meaning behind his words, while the growing anxiety twisted my stomach. I’d thrown everything at this job. Yes, it had very much been my Plan B, but once I’d accepted that it was the most sensible option for me, I had invested a lot of time and energy into making a success out of this career. I’d worked the long, anti-social shifts willingly, accepting the sacrifices I had to make in other areas of my life in order to achieve what was needed, toiling until I had the role of manager, even if it was only a glorified job title rather than a genuine reflection of a pay grade. If Ian turned around and announced that it had all been in vain, I didn’t know what I would do.
Fortunately, it seemed that my worst fears were not being realised. The theatre wasn’t going to shut. Yet. But we were entering a period of what the boss euphemistically called ‘consultation’, during which every aspect of the venue’s business would be analysed.
‘Any potential savings which can be made, will be, and if there aren’t enough areas to cut back, then…’ Ian let the silence speak for itself. We could all fill in the blanks of what he wasn’t saying. Although it wasn’t a complete surprise, I could tell I wasn’t the only one feeling shocked. Leonie was one of several teary-eyed members of staff to flee the auditorium as soon as we were finally dismissed with an entreaty to carry on with our day as normal. As if that was going to happen.
‘Should I go after her, and see if she’s okay?’ I asked Malcolm, gesturing at Leonie’s departing back. He knew her much better than I did, and I wasn’t sure if she was the kind of person who’d appreciate a near stranger seeing her in a vulnerable moment.
‘Leave her be, hen. Don’t worry, I’ll check on her in a bit, but I think we all need some time to get our heads around the situation,’ he said with a sigh. ‘It’s a lot to take on board. I reckon I’d better start looking for other opportunities. Not that there will be many around for an old codger like me. I never thought I’d have to go freelance at my age.’ He fiddled with the worn velvet on the back of the row of seats in front of us.
‘It’s not come to that yet. As long as there are performers on the stage, there’s hope for us all. Ian would be a fool to get rid of you, Malc,’ I tried to reassure him. ‘You’re the best lighting technician in Edinburgh, everyone knows it.’
‘That’s kind of you to say, but I’m too close to retirement age to be a sensible hire, and frustratingly not close enough to be able to take my pension now and dance off into the sunset with the missus. It’s different for bright young things like you and Leonie. You’ve got your whole lives ahead of you. There’ll be plenty of other options for you to explore.’
I wished I shared his confidence. While I had a steady job, I could at least maintain the illusion of having my life sorted. If that was taken away, there wasn’t really much else going for me in terms of normal adult achievements. Being forced to start over from scratch was a terrifying prospect.
‘Amy, can I have a little chat in private?’ Ian called across before I could respond to Malcolm, and gestured for me to follow him.
‘This doesn’t bode well, wish me luck,’ I said under my breath, wondering if I was about to get my marching orders straightaway. Everyone knew that ‘a little chat’ was Ian Sibley speak for a talking-to. It would be all too easy to blame our low audience numbers on a bad marketing strategy, even though half the time I was merely following orders because the boss always had such strong opinions on what should or shouldn’t be done to promote the theatre.
I felt everyone’s gaze on my back as I walked out of the auditorium for my private meeting, the only member of staff to be singled out. I stifled a nervous yawn, wishing I reacted to anxiety in a way which didn’t make me look tired and/or bored.
‘Come in, make yourself at home,’ said Ian, hustling me into his office at the back of the theatre and shoving his Edinburgh Comedy Award and various other bits of memorabilia out of the way. Maybe the real reason we were in so much trouble was because the rumours were true and he actually did spend all his time in here re-enacting his acceptance speech in front of the large mirror which hung behind his desk, rather than focusing on the business.
He looked at me closely, his head to one side, as if he was still weighing up an important decision. I forced myself not to shrink back in my chair under his scrutiny, sitting on the edge of the seat and trying to project an air of quiet confidence. Please don’t fire me, please don’t fire me, I repeated in my head, fixing my gaze on my nervous reflection in the mirror and trying to steer my mind away from the catastrophising black hole it seemed intent on diving into.
Ian nodded, a decision made in a one-sided silent conversation.
‘The thing is, Amy, I’ve got some difficult choices ahead of me, and I need someone I can rely on. I wanted to make sure I could count on your support during this period of consultation. I didn’t tell the others this amount of detail, and I would appreciate you keeping this to yourself, but I think we’ve got three, maybe four months max to turn things around. And then after that…’ He spread his palms and shrugged.
My insides churned as my brain completed the rest of his sentence.
‘That doesn’t give us much time,’ I said. ‘The programme is all booked up for that period, and—’
‘Oh I don’t think it’s a programming issue,’ Ian interrupted, instantly trying to shut me down.
‘Right,’ I said, remembering my conversation with Malcolm on Friday night about the dodgy choice of acts. If anyone had his finger on the pulse of Edinburgh’s arts scene, it was Malcolm. Dare I be honest with the boss and tell him what people were really thinking? If I wanted to keep my job, perhaps not. But if the theatre didn’t survive then there would be no job for me anyway. It was time to be bold and attempt to stand up to him for once. Ian’s strategy of giving the stage to his cronies with their dated ‘jokes’ obviously wasn’t working, and I knew I’d kick myself if I didn’t say something. I had enough regrets without adding this to the list.
‘I wonder if it is worth including programming in the review anyway? It makes sense to take a look at everything after all.’ I hesitated, trying to find the right words. Ian wasn’t exactly helping by pulling a face which made me feel like a complete idiot. But I had to do it for myself and my colleagues. ‘And if I’m being completely honest, we have fallen into a bit of a pattern with getting a lot of stand-up comics in. And they’re all of a certain … type, shall we say.’ By which I meant, they were all perpetually miserable blokes, with no more than one token woman or person of colour booked each season.
‘I don’t understand what you mean.’ Ian folded his arms, clearly determined to make this as difficult as possible for me.
I tried a different tack. If I openly asked the boss to cut back on the misogynists, he’d probably accuse me of being the one with a sense of humour failure. ‘When I go to see a comedian, I want to laugh. A lot. I want to experience that ache in my ribs which I get when I can’t control my laughter, and leave at the end of the evening feeling a real buzz from a great night. I want to have such a good time that afterwards I feel compelled to share it with other people so that they’ll go and have an amazing evening too.’ Ian was nodding away, seemingly unable to understand that what I was describing was not something commonly experienced by audiences at the Edinburgh Variety. Time to push the message. ‘I know there’s a lot of dark stuff happening in the world, and that it’s important to highlight it through the medium of entertainment. But sometimes, I think we’d all appreciate a bit of feel-good escapism too, something that everyone, from all backgrounds, can enjoy.’ Judging by the way my superior was defensively raising his eyebrows, he didn’t agree with me. But I forced myself to continue saying my piece. ‘Maybe we should shake things up, celebrate the diversity of Edinburgh, get more of a range of voices on our stage so we get more of a range of people in our audience. If we appeal to a broader market, it’s bound to have an effect on ticket sales, and we can build on that momentum.’
As soon as I let slip the word ‘diversity’ I could have kicked myself, knowing it would be kryptonite to the boss. Sure enough, Ian shook his head and put on his best patronising voice.
‘I’m not sure I understand what you’re getting at. I know I’m not all woke like you young people, but I do know what I’m doing when it comes to putting on a show. Folk aren’t interested in that kind of “right on” froth. Trust me. While the lights are still on in this theatre, I’m still going to have the final say about the performances we showcase on our stage.’
Maybe being fired would have been the better option after all. My face must have given away what was going through my mind because he quickly added, ‘But in terms of marketing, obviously, I trust your judgement. You’re doing a great job.’
I was surprised to hear him say this as his style of micromanagement had very much left me with the impression that he barely trusted me to post a tweet without his approval. It felt about as sincere as the thank you speech he’d delivered to the whole team.
‘I know you’ve relied on my support since you took on the role, but I wanted to let you know that you’re going to have to stand on your own two feet a bit more over the next few weeks,’ he continued. ‘While the consultation period runs, my entire focus will have to be on managing that. You’re going to have to take the lead and decide what the marketing priorities should be. Is that okay with you?’
So, I was finally going to have the chance to use my initiative and demonstrate what I was really capable of. I should have probably felt happy about the opportunity rather than uneasy for having been simultaneously undermined and undervalued.
‘No problem,’ I replied, my earlier supply of courage having run out. At this point, I would have said anything to bring this conversation to a close.
Ian nodded with satisfaction. ‘I shall look forward to seeing those box office sales soaring, thanks to all your hard work. I know that you can turn this around for us.’
It was exactly as I’d feared. If I wasn’t very much mistaken, this private meeting had been his way of setting me up as the scapegoat for when his plans came to nothing. Just what I needed.
I retreated to the admin office to try to come up with a plan of action, which in reality meant me staring into the middle-distance panicking about the scale of the challenge facing me and worrying more existentially about my future. The situation wasn’t helped by my colleagues trying to get information out of me, assuming, rightly, that I’d been told something they hadn’t. While I wanted to be open with them, I knew I couldn’t be, as it would be completely obvious that I was the source if they started talking about the four-month deadline.
By the end of the day, they’d stopped asking me, but some of them had also stopped talking to me, as if I was part of the problem. There was nothing like a consultation period for driving a wedge among staff. Some people were making it abundantly clear that when it came to a fight for jobs, it was going to be every individual for themselves.
I spent the next couple of days holed up in the office researching our rivals and trying to analyse what they were doing to make themselves so successful. I felt horribly out of my depth, and at night when I eventually managed to get to sleep, my dreams were full of stressy scenarios where I opened my mouth only for all my teeth to start falling out with a horrible clatter. That nightmare kept me running my tongue over my teeth throughout the day, worried that it had been a terrible premonition.
By Wednesday evening, I was longing for the weekend, not because my friends had suddenly got back in touch, but because I needed a break from the pressures at work. I knew I couldn’t carry on like this, lurching from day to day, wishing my life away as I longed for some unspecified improvement in my situation. But the thought of what it would take to initiate a change was perhaps even more unnerving, and I didn’t know where to start.
As I curled up with Eliza, Fraser, and a large drink on the sofa, I spotted something which brought a welcome distraction to my blues. The photographer had replied.
From: cameron.a@myemail.com
To: a.cameron@myemail.com
Date: 18 Jan, 20:03
Subject: Thanks
Hello Amy,
Cameron Armstrong here. Cheers for making the effort to track me down despite my meagre online presence and for forwarding the message from the Packwood Gallery. I’d have been very disappointed not to have seen it and to have missed out on what you were right to say is a great opportunity. Although thinking about it, I suppose you can’t miss something you didn’t know existed. Or can you? I went a bit deep there. Sorry about that. And sorry I couldn’t get back to you straightaway to send my thanks. The internet is somewhat patchy where I am right now—on a ship, trying not to throw up. I always thought I had a strong stomach, but the captain informs me that the Southern Ocean could turn Iron Man into a quivering wreck. And this is allegedly much better than the Drake Passage which we’ll be travelling across on our return leg. I was hoping they were joking when they said the expedition ship’s nickname was the ‘Vomit Comet’, but apparently not.
And another couple of hours have passed and I’ve still not finished this email and hit send. I could blame it once again on the dodgy internet, but honestly, it was because I had to go and have a lie down as the swell was sending me cross-eyed. I’m probably sharing far too much information with you—I can only apologise and blame it on the seasickness. I don’t normally ramble on this much, honest.
If you’ve got this far, well done, and thank you once again.
Cameron
PS: I remembered that you asked me to let you know if I got selected for the exhibition. I managed to adapt the application so I could send Pixie Packwood a link to my private online portfolio, as the internet is not powerful enough for me to send the images themselves. It probably wasn’t the best application I could have done, but the sea state was abysmal and I could barely type. I’m very much looking forward to reaching calmer waters. I’ll let you know if I hear good news back from the gallery. You deserve to be informed after being my guardian angel by forwarding the email.