Page 42 of Little Miss Fortune

I tense my abs to suppress a wheeze, but it’s too late. What a ridiculous situation after a ridiculous day.

‘This feels like fate, somehow,’ Toby says to himself.

‘No such thing. It’s all my bad luck. I’ve wasted my good luck on the work task, and it’s returned back. Sorry, Toby. I think it rubbed off on you.’

I turn to him, expecting to see him rolling his eyes or glaring at me with an unimpressed sidelong glance. Instead, he gazes at me the same way the Narrator looks when Marla calls him Tyler in Fight Club.

‘What?’ I dart my eyes around to figure out what has caught his attention.

‘You... You have never called me by my name before.’

‘No. What? I must have done.’

‘Not to me.’

Thank goodness the lights are off in this stuck lift. The red warning flickers hide my blushing really well, just like the plastic card and pen I gave Sashka for her studying.

‘How long you reckon we’ll be here for?’ I ask, breaking the silence.

‘Surely no more than ten minutes.’

‘There were some cyberattacks last week, left Cardiff without power for an hour.’

‘An hour. Geez.’ He looks at his phone. ‘Might miss the opera.’

It is hard to tell whether he is happy or sad about that. He just said it as a fact.

My leg begins to ache, so I let myself sit down on the floor. It’s now been five minutes. I hope they rescue us soon.

‘So... tell me why you chose marketing.’ Toby joins me on the floor.

I think about giving him the same answer I always give, which is ‘I think I am good at it’, but instead say, ‘It didn’t have to be marketing. Any job. I don’t think I’m good enough at anything else to not be good at my job.’

‘You are selling yourself short. What would your ideal job look like?’

‘I do like this one!’

‘You are not on trial. This is off the record.’

I think for a second, wary of revealing too much. ‘Maybe something in film.’

‘Actor?’ A genuine guess.

‘Absolutely not. Writer or director. Now that would be cool.’

‘Why don’t you then?’

‘Time, money, confidence. Not everyone can be as self-assured, free, and rich as you.’

‘Ha ha, yeah. I suppose I have it all.’ Here it is again. That slightly off-tune note, a dead pixel, a lens flair in his eyes. As if also becoming aware of it, he then adds light-heartedly, ‘I am also excellent at fishing.’

‘You have mentioned. I will have to take your word for it. What about you? Why are you in marketing? Seems a bit naff for someone who graduated from Oxford. Surely you dream of power or money.’

I think I bring up his uni a lot. Does it bother me that he might be smarter than me? Something to unpack later.

‘I don’t really have dreams. I did a lot of media coverage of local elections for my dissertation. It was quite fascinating to see how some local newspapers shape the perceptions of the public. And just like you, I was just looking for a job. Any job would’ve been fine.’

Doesn’t change the fact that it could be the power he is after.