How to be invisible
Welcome to London — Episode 07
London. Wednesday. 11.45 am. With a gentle ping, the lift doors slide open and like a thieve I peak around the corner first, spying up and down the empty hallway, before I set foot on the second floor.
I am fairly new to the entire office, so I didn’t have the chance to see the lower floors, yet. The IT bunch lives so isolatedly on there little cloud up in the sixteenth floor, that they basically never have any contact with the outer world.
Today I am going to blend with the mortals on the second floor. The hall is gently lit by indirect lights far up at the high ceiling. The offices hide behind translucent glass walls.
I approach the door at the end of the corridor and open it with my pass. As my retractor is broken I now wear it casually at my belt, like I saw the guys upstairs doing it and I feel pretty cool, walking into the office as if I do that every day.
However, no one pays attention to my catwalk or even my presents as I walk along the rows of desks.
The squares of corporate baby-blue felt build little nests, each filled with a perfectly dressed business person, typing away on their computer or chatting on the phone – a Bluetooth headset attached to one ear, casually laid back in the chair, a pen twirling around index and middle finger, to keep the hands busy, rather than to take notes.
I wonder if they expect a camera team to take some shots from this model business environment. It looks like a catalogue. From the corporate coffee mugs and notebooks on the table to the polished shoes matching the shiny cuff links.
I am tempted to pick up one of the notebooks to see if it is really in use or I’ll find it’s pages blank, like the books on the shelves in IKEA which should give you the impression, that someone put it on the bedside table after a late cup of tea that obviously never happened.
Alarmed by this suspicious perfection, I watch the colleagues meet on the junctions between this maze of desks, greeting each other with a smile and stop for some small talk. Networking. Socialising. A slight shiver creps down my spine and I fail to imagine us on the sixteenth floor speaking so many words on a topic like the weather.
They even look different. An occasional jacket hung over the back of a chair seems to be considered as casual already. High heels for the girls, trimmed beards for the guys. Is that actually a requirement for the interview?
Not that we didn’t have the same dress code in my office, but we just collectively refuse to comply to it, as no one ever accidentally or intentionally stumbles into our office – nor are we leaving it often, to be fair.
So this is the glorious second floor – perfect environment, perfect people, diligent, smart, efficient. The accountants working here, seem to have nothing in common with my lovely IT bunch.
I try to grasp a glimpse at the monitors. A guy to my left scans an excel spreadsheet with an intense gaze. Rows and rows of digits as a vague reflection in his glasses. But while the numbers immediately start dancing in front of my eyes, he seems caught up like in an exciting thriller.
A bunch of girls stands around the water tap in the fancy break out area chatting and giggling like teenagers on the playground. When I walk past them, they stop their conversation and stare at me like an alien crossing there sacred territory. The one with the back to me even turns around and examines me with a raised eyebrow from my ponytail to my ballerinas.
I felt really good today when I took my marine blue blouse with white polka dots from my wardrobe, but – with a look at their suits, perfectly manicured fingernails, and tidy hair knots – I feel like going to a gala in track pants. The arrogant look on their perfectly styled faces makes my steps unwillingly faster.
Caught by the sudden impression that I have to escape, I rush along the felt squares. Slowly I realise what disturbs me in this shiny brave new world — the absence of any kind of sole. The people here don’t seem to have a personality but the business side to them.
Finally, I spot Holly, a patch of hope in this lifeless environment. There are colourful pictures pinned to the plushy, blue frame of her workspace, showing her hugging her daughter or hugging her cat — from my limited knowledge about Holly both makes perfect sense — and a Chinese cat waving at me with its hypnotic paw.
“Hi, Holly,” I greet her and immediately smile when she waves even more cheerful than the golden cat.
“Oh Nicky, my dear! How are you! Settling in well!” Her questions come across in her usual excited manner.
“I think, I do, indeed,” I say hesitantly.
“You will see, the boys are harmless,” Holly laughs heartily, “But you didn’t come here to visit me!”
“Well, we have some trouble with our time sheets.” And I show her where HR screwed up our project codes when they set up the next quarter.
Holly frowns, “Classic! I can sort that out. But you didn’t have to come all the way down to ask me that! Just drop me a line, next time.”
“No hassle at all,” I smile joyful, “I was curious to see the other floors, I still have a lot to explore here.” Although I saw enough of this floor, I add in my thoughts.
“Of course! Always be nosy around here, otherwise, you’ll not find out a lot!” Holly’s smile widens, “In this case, let me introduce you to some of the guys here!”
She jumps from her chair leaving it spinning behind and directs me through the desk forest.
“This are Shaun, Angela, and Flora!” She announces, “Guys, may I introduce you to Nicky! She just joined last week!
“Hi, Nicky,” Angela waves. “Pleasure to meet you.”
“Which department are you in?”, asks Flora.
Excited I shake their hands: “I am in the IT department. I am a programmer.”
The entire room falls silent.
“Well, not like, erm, a real programmer. Front-End developer, really,” I try to explain but that is not helpful at all.
“You know, web design — making a website look pretty,” I chuckle awkwardly into the clueless silence.
The relief on their faces shows me they understand — a bit at least. I suppress the need to roll my eyes. No more questions your honour.
“And what about yourself, Flora? You do the same as Holly?” I change the subject and wonder what Holly actually does.
“Not exactly, I am in tax”, Flora shakes her head, “but Shaun and Angela are accountants.”
Aha.
So, I guess, that is what Holly does? I feel rude to ask: what does that actually mean. Probably I am supposed to know, if not as a new joiner, then it’s common knowledge.
“That sounds interesting,” I say with as much enthusiasm as I can put into my voice. I really don’t know what else to say, without giving away how little I know.
Thankfully they are convinced about my honesty and Shaun picks up: “Indeed. We are just about to finish a huge investigation. Obviously, I can’t tell any details, but soon enough you’ll find it all over the news. Long story short we discovered a minor irregularity on a routine scan of one of our vendors and suddenly we are ankle deep in the dirt when we look under the carpet. It’s fascinating to follow the money, follow the data and eventually find all their skeletons in the cupboards!”
I wonder how fascinating it can be, to compare expense bills with bank accounts and what kind of fraud they actually discovered to report it to the officials. Surely most of the time the most exciting finding is an employee claiming the Jack Daniel’s from the mini bar together with the expenses of his business trip.
I just realise that I was not listening at all, while Shaun chatters on about life on the lower floors and at least get a bad conscience.
Not that I was not interested! Nor that I didn’t value their abilities. Probably I just can’t fully understand how someone can look at an excel spreadsheet for an entire day and yet tell me, they love their job.
They try to explain what they do without saying what they are actually doing — to make a fairly boring thing sound interesting but most important because they are so deep in their topic that they can’t imagine anyone not picking up immediately. I try to stay focused this time, but soon my brain wonders off again.
They are not aware, that they are confusing me, with every word they add and I consider it might sound the same for them when I explain how CSS affects the DOM. I conclude to be more patient and forgiving in the future when I talk about my subject.
“Your day seems to be the complete opposite to ours on the sixteenth floor,” I laugh in the attempt to shortcut the conversation.
“We have a sixteenth floor?” Shaun asks with genuine confusion and I can’t help but laugh.
“Maybe you should visit us up there sometime,” I offer and say goodbye.
It seems we all have more in common than it might look like — at least the arrogance to be alone in this wide world. Not to bad to visit the frontiers from time to time to remind ourselves there is more out there. And I understand they do a great job here, although I’ll leave to them what’s so great about it — however, with new confidence in my steps I walk back to the lift and up to the non-existent sixteenth floor.
To G. — Who happens to be an accountant, but is pretty cool and a good friend!
Leave a clap for me, if you liked it :)
