occurrences were extremely unusual, and that it must have happened because she was a foreign citizen and the relationship hadn’t been registered anywhere, as well as being kept secret from family and friends. Correspondence with their South Asian office hadn’t been entirely without friction, and the systems there probably needed to be reconsidered. It had long been a problematic area.
On the way out of the lift by the reception desk on the eleventh floor I was met by an older woman in a jacket and tight skirt, who made a rather girlish impression in spite of her age. She smiled and tilted her head as she spoke. She had a little scarf tied round her neck, a bit like a flight attendant. She thanked me for my cooperation and promised compensation for the intrusion into my working hours. I didn’t mention the fact that I had simply swapped shifts with Tomas, who wanted all the extra hours he could get before he went off on holiday to Torremolinos. It was no problem at all. He had told me I could have the following day off too.
The woman in the scarf handed me an unwieldy bundle of forms, which she told me to fill in before the meeting. She led me through the open-plan office to the far end of the building, to another small room with glass walls. In one corner was a plant that looked like it was made of plastic. She pulled out a chair for me and asked if I’d like anything to drink while I went through the paperwork.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Some water, perhaps?”
“Still or sparkling?”
“Er…sparkling.”
I sat down on the chair and began to fill in the forms.
The questions were concentrated around the years 1997 to 2002. I made a real effort to answer as truthfully as possible this time, and not exaggerate.
After a while the woman returned with a bottle of mineral water, a glass, and a coaster. She put them down on the table a short distance from my papers.
“I’ll be back shortly with a bottle opener.”
I thanked her and went on answering the questions as best I could.
—
It got quite warm in the little room when the sun came out, and I had to take off both my jacket and sweater and sit there in just my T-shirt. I checked a few times to see if I could smell sweat. It was much quieter in there than in the last meeting room—presumably at the expense of any ventilation. Every so often I looked around to see if I could catch a glimpse of Maud, but then I remembered that they had said something about her working down on the second floor. Anyway, I had no idea what she looked like. Even if I imagined that I’d know who she was as soon as I laid eyes on her.
The woman in the scarf stayed in the vicinity the whole time after she’d brought the bottle opener. As soon as I was ready with one of the forms she would come in and get it. Otherwise she stayed outside the room. At one point Georg appeared and exchanged a few words with her. They both looked in my direction and I nodded slightly, but he showed no sign of returning my greeting.
After an hour or so inside the stuffy room I started to get tired. The questions were of various sorts: Describe an event. What happened first? What did you do next? Option 1, 2, or 3, and so on. There were various scales I had to make marks on. Circles and semicircles that I had to fill in or tick in the appropriate place. The questions kept probing into greater and greater detail. And into increasingly peripheral events. In the end my head was spinning and I was no longer sure if I was describing the truth or just a fantasy. How much of this had actually happened, and how much had I constructed in hindsight?
I tried to remember as many setbacks as possible. I made sure to give high points to anything related to pain and suffering.
Most of it was to do with my relationship with Sunita, but I also managed to squeeze in some of my and Roger’s failed attempts to pick up girls.
Roger often dragged up “that disastrous night” many years ago when he and I had
On the way out of the lift by the reception desk on the eleventh floor I was met by an older woman in a jacket and tight skirt, who made a rather girlish impression in spite of her age. She smiled and tilted her head as she spoke. She had a little scarf tied round her neck, a bit like a flight attendant. She thanked me for my cooperation and promised compensation for the intrusion into my working hours. I didn’t mention the fact that I had simply swapped shifts with Tomas, who wanted all the extra hours he could get before he went off on holiday to Torremolinos. It was no problem at all. He had told me I could have the following day off too.
The woman in the scarf handed me an unwieldy bundle of forms, which she told me to fill in before the meeting. She led me through the open-plan office to the far end of the building, to another small room with glass walls. In one corner was a plant that looked like it was made of plastic. She pulled out a chair for me and asked if I’d like anything to drink while I went through the paperwork.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Some water, perhaps?”
“Still or sparkling?”
“Er…sparkling.”
I sat down on the chair and began to fill in the forms.
The questions were concentrated around the years 1997 to 2002. I made a real effort to answer as truthfully as possible this time, and not exaggerate.
After a while the woman returned with a bottle of mineral water, a glass, and a coaster. She put them down on the table a short distance from my papers.
“I’ll be back shortly with a bottle opener.”
I thanked her and went on answering the questions as best I could.
—
It got quite warm in the little room when the sun came out, and I had to take off both my jacket and sweater and sit there in just my T-shirt. I checked a few times to see if I could smell sweat. It was much quieter in there than in the last meeting room—presumably at the expense of any ventilation. Every so often I looked around to see if I could catch a glimpse of Maud, but then I remembered that they had said something about her working down on the second floor. Anyway, I had no idea what she looked like. Even if I imagined that I’d know who she was as soon as I laid eyes on her.
The woman in the scarf stayed in the vicinity the whole time after she’d brought the bottle opener. As soon as I was ready with one of the forms she would come in and get it. Otherwise she stayed outside the room. At one point Georg appeared and exchanged a few words with her. They both looked in my direction and I nodded slightly, but he showed no sign of returning my greeting.
After an hour or so inside the stuffy room I started to get tired. The questions were of various sorts: Describe an event. What happened first? What did you do next? Option 1, 2, or 3, and so on. There were various scales I had to make marks on. Circles and semicircles that I had to fill in or tick in the appropriate place. The questions kept probing into greater and greater detail. And into increasingly peripheral events. In the end my head was spinning and I was no longer sure if I was describing the truth or just a fantasy. How much of this had actually happened, and how much had I constructed in hindsight?
I tried to remember as many setbacks as possible. I made sure to give high points to anything related to pain and suffering.
Most of it was to do with my relationship with Sunita, but I also managed to squeeze in some of my and Roger’s failed attempts to pick up girls.
Roger often dragged up “that disastrous night” many years ago when he and I had
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