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“You can have a slice of this,” I tell him. “But it won’t be as good.”
“Why?” He’s already levering a wedge out with a spatula. “Are you a terrible cook?”
“No, I mean like, because of the emotions and that.” Then I realise he’s smirking. And that in the labyrinthine pits of Jonathan Forest’s brain this is what counts as a joke. “You’re not funny.”
He sits down next to me. “I’m well aware.”
And that makes me feel bad because I think this is him trying. And actually trying. Not just trying not to get sued. “Well maybe you’re a bit funny. Sometimes.”
“No,” Jonathan says, “you were right the first time.”
At some point we’re going to have address the elephant in the room and, by elephant, I mean gigantic fucking binder. “So,” I ask, “what’s with the gigantic fucking binder?”
“I thought about what you said. About the Christmas party. And if you’re still interested in helping organise it then… Well.” He slides the improbably vast bundle of documents towards me. “Here.”
While Jonathan makes a start on his “bubble and squeak”, I take a look at what he’s given me. It’s a lot more…just generally a lot more than I would have expected for planning a work do. Honestly, it’s a lot more than I’d have expected for planning the Normandy Landings.
I close the folder again. “What…is this?”
“Venue listings, costings, regulations, risk assessments, the usual.”
“This is not usual,” I tell him. “This is the opposite of usual. This is unusual.”
Jonathan looks up from his already half-empty plate, and the look he’s giving me is not an encouraging one. “I knew this was a bad idea.”
He reaches out and starts to pull the binder back. I try to stop him and we sort of have the world’s most bureaucratic tug o’ war in the middle of the kitchen table.
“Come on.” I dig in slightly harder on the folder. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to cast nasturtiums on your…on your big book of parties.”
“It’s not a big book of parties,” Jonathan growl, still not letting go. “I’m not six years old. It’s a collection of information that’s important for legal and tax purposes.”
I don’t let go either. “You’re the real spirit of Christmas you, aren’t you? I can just imagine yez as a kid running downstairs in your jammies ripping open your presents and then sayingmam, mam is it tax deductible?”
“It’s not the same thing, Samwise.”
I’ve told him not to call me that. And I’m just joshing—at least, I started out just joshing, though if I’m honest bringing up his family was a bit low of me and I’d not have, only he was beginning to get under my skin with all his penny-pinching-branch-closing bullshit. “It’s Sam,” I remind him, “and I know it’s not the same thing but it’s still Christmas. It’s meant to be fun.”
Jonathan Forest stares me right in the eye. His bubble and squeak is getting cold but I don’t think he cares about that. “I guarantee you that every moment of fun you’ve had in your entire life was made possible by somebody else’s hard work.”
If he’d been less of an arse about it, I might have admitted he had a point. But he wasn’t, so I don’t. “Okay, that’s true sometimes, but it’s not true all the time. Yez can be spontaneous. Have you never, I don’t know, been walking along a beach and decided to run into the sea just to see what it feels like?”
“And you think the beach stays usable, safe, and not covered in raw sewage, entirely by itself?”
I sigh again. “You’re being really unhelpful.”
“You offered to do something for me. I tried to give you the resources you’ll need to do it, and you threw them back in my face.”
That’s certainlya wayto frame our most recent interaction. I don’t think it is the best way, or even a fair way. “No, I just expressed mild surprise that when I saidhey, d’you want us to give you a hand with your party, you thought that meanthey, d’you want us to read through a stack of paperwork thicker than the Bible.”
“So whatwasyour plan?” Jonathan sits back, folding his arms. “Take everyone down the pub?”
“And what’d be wrong with that?”
“Because I employ a hundred and fifty people. You can’t just say,everybody, show up at the Dog and Duck around ten. First pint’s on me.”
I’m beginning to think I’ve bitten off more than I can chew here. It’s certainly putting Jonathan’s history of throwing terrible parties into perspective. I always assumed he just hated fun. “No, but you can make it feel less, y’know, corporate.”
“And how would I do that? We’re talking about a work event hosted by the man who owns the company.”
