Chapter 21
Arthur
Do you ever have those days where you question where everything went wrong with humanity? Like why we didn’t just continue living in the forest, parading round eating nothing but berries? No responsibilities, no corporate ladder 9-5’s and no stress. We were just free to be. Because for me, today is definitely one of those days.
I was already mortified enough that I started blubbering like an idiot on Ember’s shoulder the other day and I don’t know whether an alternate version of me must have decided to smash a mirror, open up an umbrella inside and crossed someone on the stairs for good measure, but either way, the odds were not stacked in my favour again today.
I slowly moved the hand away from my eyes to reveal the message on my phone screen.
Dear Arthur,
We thank you for your application for the role of Bookseller at Waterstones. Your interest in joining our team is greatly appreciated. However, we carefully review a vast number of applications and unfortunately, at this time we cannot invite you to the next stage of the hiring process.
We wish you the best of luck with all future endeavours.
Great. That was the third rejection I’d received this week.
To be honest, after the second rejection, you learn to expect it, but I’d really been banking on this one. I hadn’t told anyone that I’d been applying for a part-time job, not Sam or Ember, not even my parents and considering the outcome, I’m glad I didn’t. I hadn’t actually wanted to get a job, the thought of trying to balance my uni work with a job, even if only a part-time one, sent a chill down my spine. It was mostly because my student loan barely covered the bills for my flat, so I found myself trying to muddle together whatever shrapnel I had left to actually eat. I didn’t want anyone to worry about me, so whenever Sam and I did a food shop and he saw my lack of groceries at the self-serve, questioning how I lived off so little, I always just attributed it to not being a ‘snacker,’ knowing fully well that he’d caught me red-handed before shovelling down popcorn like there was a national shortage. I couldn’t let mum or dad onto this. If mum knew, she’d think I was trying to starve myself and become completely overbearing, and if I dared asked dad for money, well, he’d be even more berating and insufferable than usual, and I didn’t need that, I really didn’t.
Their visit the other day acted nothing more than a stark reminder that I wasn’t good enough. No matter how hard I tried to convince myself otherwise, I knew the truth deep down. In spite of all this and in a moment of throwing all caution to the wind, I thought fuck it. It was clear that I couldn’t continue to survive off chicken pot noodles for the remainder of the year, and unless I was going to win the Euromillions tonight, I needed a job. Granted, I was really selective, nothing too customer-facing. I didn’t fancy getting ridiculed by the general public, so I’d only applied for two different shelf-stacker roles, one at Tesco Express, the other at Sainsbury’s Local, something small, safe and behind the scenes. I didn’t have any experience, I just hoped they might do me a solid when they saw that I was a student. When they both rejected me due to lack of experience, (can I just ask how I’m supposed to gain experience without having a job in the first place to gain said experience?), the bookseller job at Waterstones had suddenly popped up and seemed like a hidden gem. You got a 50% discount on all books and any food from the café, the customer interactions were few and far between, it was only for 5 hours on a Saturday and the pay was pretty decent. I really thought I’d had a shot, but seemingly, much like everything else in my life over the past week, it had gone to crap.
Just to add to the crapness, I was painfully reminded that the presentation was looming over me like a dark raincloud. I’d managed to distract myself enough over the past month and up until last night, ignorance really was bliss. I’m not one to sleep to avoid my problems, but I was absolutely out like a light last night. Well, at least I was until I heard the manic buzz of my phone. After managing to successfully push every item off my desk whilst trying to scramble for my phone amongst the darkness, you could imagine my confusion when I heard her. As much as I appreciated Ember wanting to check in to see if I was okay, I really didn’t appreciate the bursting of my blissfully ignorant bubble. I don’t know why she’d called to ask me how I felt about it, she was fully aware already that I’d rather gauge my eyes out with a spoon than do this presentation. Then, before I could even respond, I was already cut off. It was fair to say, I did end up tossing and turning for the rest of the night after that.
I mean, it didn’t help that I was also expecting a formative proposal back today for my developmental Psychology module. We’d been asked to produce a research title for an individual project of our choice and write a 500-word plan with a brief explanation of how we were going to get from A-Z. I’d debated about what to do for my project, but decided on ‘the relationship between parental attachment styles and the development of mental health disorders.’ I know it sounded a bit on the nose, but not only was it a topic that was backed up by a mass of journals online, (free ones might I add, which makes every student jump up and down like a kid on Christmas day, trust me), but it was something in which I was genuinely interested. I’d spent a good few weeks trying to piece together all of my sources, reading a stack of books for it on top of my weekly course reading for my other modules, and for once, I was fairly impressed with what I’d come up with. It’s within that very moment, as if my phone was listening to my thoughts, that a notification pings on my lock screen from my student email address.
One new update in assessment portal.
I gulp.
Everyone knows that a formative proposal doesn’t count towards your final assessment grade, but it still gives you a clear indication whether you’re heading in the right direction and whether the blood, sweat and tears were at least going to be worth it in the long run. I found myself in exactly the same position I was in earlier, shielding my eyes with my palm as if that was going to magically change the result underneath. Once again, I pathetically opened my fingers, peaking through the gap to see the verdict. The document lit up and, shit. The black font had been overpowered by a deep Red, my work bathed in an array of angry exclamation marks, crosses and firm ‘No’s’ annotated all over the place. I physically cringed as I clicked on the ‘Assessor’s comments’ bubble at the bottom of the page.
Arthur, although I can see you have tried to include a bank of research, for which I applaud you. This is nowhere near a strong enough plan. You need a coherent argument in place. It seems as if you have just found research and splatted it all onto one page, as opposed to making an argument and using the evidence to back up/refute your points. I don’t want to just see recited research studies; I can look for that myself. The title could be interesting if you know how to appropriately use your sources. If you want to achieve top band marks, you will need to sort this out. Even if you wish to just pass, you cannot do so unless you make an argument. You will need to work harder than this I’m afraid.
I felt like climbing back into bed and hiding under the safety net of my duvet, never to resurface again. I don’t know who had my voodoo doll right now, but if they could stop stabbing me in the back that would be great. Sometimes I wonder why I even tried. Why do I bother putting effort into things that give me next to no payoff in return? I get that you have to be willing to accept criticism at Uni, they drilled that into me enough during sixth form, but I don’t know, that comment just felt personal. I’m not trying to be bitter, maybe it’s tough love, maybe the ruder the comment, the harder they think I’ll work and the better result I’ll achieve. However, after already receiving one rejection today, I guess it just stung that little bit more than usual. I had just under a month to try and get cracking with the actual research project, which was three thousand words in itself, not to mention that this was also alongside my presentation, weekly course reading and another piece of coursework for a different module on top, and this all had to be completed and submitted by the Christmas break.
If I had any chance at getting through the next month, I knew I’d have to knuckle down as much as I could. I couldn’t fail this semester. If I did, I’d have to carry over all three of these modules into semester 2, and then I’d certainly fail. Failure couldn’t be an option for me, I’d never live it down back home. I’d also continue with my job search on the back burner, after all, I’d need to be able to afford all the caffeine in the land for the amount of all-nighters that I was about to pull.
◆◆◆
I hear a thud at my bedroom door, followed by a voice, “You in there mate?”
When I finally pry my eyes away from the laptop screen that I’d been incessantly glaring at for the past 48 hours, my vision goes completely fuzzy. You know when you play that optical illusion game where you stare at a black dot in the middle of the screen for a few seconds, only to then ‘see’ the picture in its full colour when you look away? It’s kind of like that, apart from instead of seeing a colourful picture, all I can fathom when I look around my room are black smudges and blurry ghosts of the words from the journal article my eyes had just been glued to. When I was younger, my parents always told me never to sit too close to the TV for too long otherwise my eyes would turn square and stay like that forever, I don’t think they ever warned me about the same repercussions of sitting in front of a computer screen all day long though. It made me feel sorry for office workers who sat in front of a computer all day for 9 hours straight, their vision must be non-existent by now.
I stand up from my desk chair and can’t help but notice the loud grumble of my stomach and the dizzy sensation in my head. When I say I have worked non-stop for the past 48 hours, I mean non-stop, (aside from the odd toilet break, I don’t think pissing onto my bedroom floor would go down well with the maintenance team). I was definitely underfed considering I’d only eaten a mini bag of cheddars that I’d found hiding behind a book on my shelf, an apple, and a microwave ready meal lurking at the back of my freezer. I go to answer the door and am greeted by Sam, a face full of unease as he looks back at me. I’m not surprised really, I hadn’t gotten out of my dressing gown today, my hair was most likely sticking out all over the place, my eyes looked like they had Tesco ‘bags for life’ underneath them and I don’t think I’d even brushed my teeth…but I didn’t want to get close enough for him to put that one to the test.
“Arth, are you okay?,” he says, concern lacing his tone, “I haven’t seen you at all for the past 2 days? I did try knocking a couple of times and messaging but didn’t get a response.”
I grimace. “Uh-I’ve just had a lot on to be honest.” I didn’t want to tell him about the multiple job rejections, the fact that I had eaten next to nothing, or that I’d essentially been told that I had to work the hardest I’ve ever worked if I wanted to stand a chance of passing the semester.
His eyebrows raise in a confused ‘V.’ “Oh right, okay. Well, no one had seen you, not even in the kitchen. I thought you might have gone home for a few days, but I saw your light on.”
“I’ve just been a bit snowed under with work at the moment,” I respond. That’s not a lie, I really did have a ton of work to do.
Sam nods reluctantly, “Yeah, I get you and sorry if I’m being a bit weird, but no one has seen you come out of your room, like, at all. You must be starving.”
Don’t get me wrong, I really appreciate Sam trying to help, but the amount of time I’m wasting stood here trying to convince him that everything is hunky-dory, could be spent getting my work done. It’s as if my brain was on complete overdrive and all I could think of was work.
“No, not really. I’ve got some food in there,” I point behind me to the room.
Gurgle.
Of course, my stomach chooses now to deceive me.
A faint laugh comes out of Sam’s mouth, “could have fooled me.” He looks like he’s contemplating before finally continuing, “I know you’ve got loads to do, but I can’t be arsed to cook tonight, so I’m going to order a chippy in a minute, do you want me to order you something?”
Even though nothing sounded better than a greasy chips, jumbo sausage, and curry sauce right now, I didn’t want to face the embarrassment of telling him that I was pretty much skint until my next student loan instalment came in, and even then, that would only last me for a brief period of time.
I very reluctantly shook my head.
He put his hands up in front of him before replying, “look, I’m going to be greedy tonight and order extra anyway, so if I don’t eat it, you’re having it.” Looks like he wasn’t taking no for an answer there.
“Fine,” I agree, “but don’t purposely leave stuff just for me, I’m really not worried.”
With a knowing smile, as if he had some sort of a bullshit radar, he says, “sure thing,” before slipping away back down the corridor. He was onto me, and I couldn’t let him know the truth.