The Shift of Numbers (2 page)

Before long the words of the ‘respected’ scientist reverberated around every shop in the land and everyone wanted carrots. It worked a little to
o
well and the demand for carrots outstripped
what both of them could produce;
consequently
,
the price of carrots went through the roof. Bill and John both needed to expand their farms in order to grow more carrots to meet demand but they needed a lot of money to do this, as land is expensive.

Bill decided to sell shares in his farm to raise the money for the land. He created the Carrot Corporation™ and sold 49 percent of his company in 3,920,000 shares of 1 pound each. The demand for carrots was so high that most dabblers in the markets saw this as a sure thing and all the shares sold quickly. Joan even got caught up in the fever of making money and re-mortgaged her house to buy shares in Carrot Corporation™.

John, never 1 for too much hard work, decided not to expand his farm and instead sold it to another would-be farmer for a large sum of money. He married a woman he met on the
internet
and moved to foreign lands.

After getting the investment money from his shares
,
Bill purchased a large plot of land next to his farm and hired an additional 12 people to help him grow carrots. After some time
,
the farm was producing a huge amount of carrots and Bill was able to meet the demand of the consumers with the share price rocketing from 1 pound to the
now current price of 192p
. If you wanted to
buy carrots, fortunately they we
re now back to the
ir
normal price and ordinary uninspiring app
earance, although most people did
now like to buy
more of them, just in case it was true what they said
. Also - for the moment at least
-
Bill
’s wife wa
s very happy
with the amount of money that wa
s now available to her and
the amount of time her husband was away in the fields. She wa
s even trying to talk Bill into renewing their wedding vows overseas.

*

Richard pulled his car, or as he put it his ‘ride’ into the valet parking lot and handed over the keys along with an unnecessarily large gratuity. As was his custom, he added the words, “Take care of her,” in a firm but gentle voice, keeping hold of the keys until the valet replied in the affirmative. He was adamant his morning ritual guaranteed her scratch-free survival, ‘her’ being his oversize metallic slice of decadence, his shiny, chromed and air-conditioned leather clad mistress. He exited the car park into the morning drizzle. The light specks of water landing on his spectacles immediately destroyed his good mood and reminded him where he was heading. As he walked, the light began refracting over each of the droplets creating a myriad of unwanted colours and distortions in front of him. With a sigh, he removed his spectacles and wiped them with an expensive monogramm
ed silk handkerchief
and the world blurred out of focus. He had tried contact lenses (until repeated corneal infections had forced him to rethink) and toyed with the idea of laser surgery. The thought of lasers cutting, penetrating his eye, while they were held open by metal contraptions made him physically shudder. The only way he could go through with it would be if he were kidnapped and drugged, something he had more than once considered organising.

Without thinking
,
he sneezed into his handkerchief before atte
mpting to cross the road, realis
ing angrily that he had spoiled the only item on his person that could wipe his glasses. He peered left then right through the growing blur, just like the TV adverts had instructed him as a child, when he caught sight of a group of what his peer group would describe as ‘youths’ across the road from him. One of the young lads shouted something incomprehensib
le to another, which was follow
ed quickly by a deafening bang. As the street stopped to look, what looked like pieces of a schoolbag and torn paper rained down like a ticker tape parade in honour of
stupidity.
What Richard and most of the speechless throng had noticed with interest though - after quickly dismissing the loud ba
ng as a prank - was a tall grey-
haired gentleman outside 1 of the shops who had been rugby tackled to the ground. As Richard watched with curiosity, the tackler lifted the gentleman up, turned and jogged away. Within a minute
,
bystander apathy had kicked in again and everyone started going about their
daily business,
most likely thinking of ways to make the story ‘you’ll never guess what happened to me on the way to work’ more interesting for their work colleagues. Richard, shaking his head
,
crossed the road and made his way to the greengrocer
’
s via a coffee shop, noting in the window a special offer on carrots.

Richard works on the stock exchange. He went to university for five y
ears of his life and his parent
s re-mortgaged their house to allow him to do this. His job consists of receiving phone calls from his clients, who then tell him ho
w much stock they want to buy or
sell. He then goes out onto the trading floor and buys or sells these stocks for the best price he can.
Richard’s
parents live next to Joan and her husband Pete and he has known them all his life, so Richard was more than happy to help out Joan in purchasing 150,000 pounds
’
worth of shares in the Carrot Corporation™, as he saw the company as a solid investment. He also liked the fact he got 1 per cent of the value of every trade he facilitated. So he got his hands on 15 hundred pound
s
of Joan and Pete
’s
carefully saved money.

*

Michael, after standing up and noticing all eyes were on him, checked his watch conspicuously and walked on d
own the street, m
aking his way into his usual array of shops, ending in the greengrocer
’
s. In front of him, in the queue
,
a ‘business type’ was animatedly
chatting with the storekeeper. D
rawing closer
,
Michael overheard the exchange.

“W
hat do you mean? All of them!” e
xclaimed the apron-clad man behind the counter.

“I
want all the carrots you have. I
t’s quite a simple request really.”

“
Okay
,
okay
. Whatever you want. Never heard the like of it, that’s all.” The man, shaking his head, started emptying the remaining carr
ots off the display cabinets
into carrier bags.

“Erm…would it be possible for me to have a few?” interjected Michael politely. 

“I need these I’m afraid,” r
eplied the business type turning towards Michael and fixing him with a look of recognition. “Were you on the street earlier when those kids let off that firework?” he said
,
quizzically.

“I didn’t hear anything, so no
..
.”

“Could have sworn it was you… Ah well…” Turning his head with a raised eyebrow he opened his wallet
,
placing a card on the surface next to the till.

“Don’t do cards
, mate,” said the shopkeeper. W
hile the 2 m
en discussed this point in ever-
increasing detail
,
Michael glanced around the shop, taking care to
notice reflections in the
many
mirrored
surfaces. He spotted 1, and then another, standing by the door with a pineapple in his hand. They were supposed to be secret, but he had known about his body
guards/watchers for some time. O
nly this morning did he realise just how seriously they took their job.

“Well I’m NEVER coming in here again
,” s
houted the man loudly before sneezing into a posh looking hankie and exiting the store. Michael watched him leave
,
then
ordered his groceries.

“Credit cards… never trusted ’e
m.”

“Me neither, me neither
,” r
eplied Michael with a chuckle, removing a creaseless 5-pound note from a large wallet.

“The slave begins by demanding justice and ends by wanting to wear a crown.”

Albert Camus

Gordon didn’t notice the smell of fried food etched into his nostrils, he was so used to it. He tried not to let a look of disgust or the absolute boredom he felt show on his face when he cheerily said, “
Who’s
next, please?” or “Yes, mate, what can I get for you?” Standing behind the counter, he imagined that it was impossible for others to understand the soul-destroying numbness that comes from a job of this type
.

“Who's next
, please?” A
fat man, jowls dripping with congealed bacon bits and ketchup, stumbling under the weight of his hardening arteries
,
walked slowly to the counter
,
grinning happily, his fatty drug injection already taken this morning. The counter he
had wiped only seconds earlier wa
s subjected to the fat man
’
s greasy hand put
ting all his money down on it, s
eparating coins from used shreds of tissue with stubby hairy fingers.

The contempt was hard to c
onceal, as was the rising level
of bile.

“I want another cup of that shite you call tea in
this place,
” he exclaimed
,
pushing the coins along the counter
,
leaving a trail of something. A muffled snigger came from the other people in the queue.

The only reason they should b
e laughing, thought Gordon, was if it were half-price to join Weight W
atchers. Even then they wouldn’t have let them through the door without soaking them all in bleach first. He thought of accidentally tipping over
the tea urn on the counter. That would teach them.

“That’s 45p
, please.
”
Smile
,
look at the floor
.

“Keep the change young
’un.” s
aid the chubby grin as Gordon counted out exactly 45 pence in filthy change.

“Cheers...Who’s next please?” h
e said
as he handed over a mug of luke
warm brown liquid. The man scooped in 3 or 4 sugars, spilling most of it on the counter before moving to a nearby table.

Another fat m
an changed places with the first
one
as
the drink from the previous night that helped numb the pain of this tedious life started to get its revenge. Sharp familiar twinges in the stomach brought life back into focus, along with the reality that this was going to be over soon,
in
only 6 more hours.
That’s how he spent his t
ime, serving customers, punters,
other human beings he had no interest
in
or desire to please. But it was understood, he thought, that all those customers knew he hated working in this job. But then he supposed, why on earth would he do it...

It started as a
stop-
gap
, a filler, something before
doing
something else. He didn’t know what the other something was, but he figured it would come to him. In the meantime, put the hours in and get a bit of cash.

But it disintegrated, that knowledge that he could do anything, replaced by nothing more than fear. It was a vicious ci
rcle. The job creating low self-
esteem, feelings of helplessness, then contempt, all followed by a de
ssert of high cholesterol fear, f
ear of not being able to move on
, brought about by the low self-
esteem, repeat, repeat, repeat.

All Gordon wanted to do
when he was
a
little boy was retire, no police chases or
trips to the moon, just retire
, as soon as possible. He watched his grandparents do what they wanted to do, whenever they wanted and it seemed like a dream lifestyle. All the while
,
his parents struggled to make ends meet in jobs that quite clearly chipped away at the
ir
sanity. It wasn’t that he had a difficult upbringing in the slightest, just that from a very early age he had subconsciously grown to despise working. If the opportunity was there to do nothing, then why on earth - he thought - do anything
at all, especially if there was
no joy in it.

Gordon worked
in a café just down the road from
the Carrot Corporation™. He had
w
orked there for 4 years and did
n’t like to talk abo
ut what he earned. His job had
suddenly b
ecome a lot harder as now he had
to wash up
12
more cups and plates and
24
more knives and forks every b
reakfast and lunchtime. He hated carrots and had
never eaten on
e in his life and his eyesight wa
s perfectly fine. He was getting very annoyed with the amount of work he was now expected to do and the way his boss
,
Ted,
didn’t seem to want to pay him any more money for this extra work.

These feelings were mirrored up the road by the majority of Bill’s new workers who, at first, were glad to be in gainful employment, but had become disillusioned with the amount of extra hard labour that Bill expected of them, and wanted more money. Their discontent had quickly spread through the original workforce like a grumpy plague and, after several weeks, the mood on the farm was at breaking point.

That night, after declaring: “
I’m off to the pub, you lock up,” Gordon’s boss had gone
. This left Gordon alone with a veritable mountain of washing up and a very muddy floor to mop. Gordon had never been this angry in his life and after much debate with himself, he acted. Not one plate in the café was left
unbroken, nor one fork unbent. H
e left
,
vowing never to return.

*

Bill a
woke to the sounds of silence. “M
ust be early
,”
he thought and closed his eyes. Some time later
,
he was
frantically
shaken awake by the expensively adorned hand of his wife who informed him that he needed to go down to the
fields sharpish. Throwing on his clothes, Bill made his way outside into the cool morning air and began searching for his workforce. He was by the barn when he spotted them in a neighbouring field. The majority of them
had buried th
emselves waist deep in the earth
and had painted their faces orange. The remaining worker
s
,
including the foreman were
sho
velling earth around them, securing them snugly in the ground.
Bill
strode over to them with a
puzzled look
on
his
sleepy face
.

“What’s going on here? Have you gone mad?” exclaimed Bill.

Upon hearing this, the foreman jumped into a hole up to his waist like t
he others and shouted, “S
trike, strike, strike
!” as
loud as he could. The workers and the foreman all put their hands by their sides and starte
d swaying in unison, shouting “S
trike
!
” over and over again. Bill scratched his head and walked back to the house.

The note was a
ttached to his door by 4 sturdy-
looking nails and simply said, “We ar
e on strike from this day forth
until an hourly rate more suitable to our working conditions is agreed upon and breakfasts
are again provided.” Bill
read and
re-read
the note, all the whi
le slowly shaking his head. He
jumped in
to
his new 5-speed tractor and drove down to the café. Upon arrival,
he was greeted b
y the owner sweeping broken crockery out of the door
.

“I thought we h
ad a deal with the breakfasts. W
hat’s going on? Why
are you not serving my lads?” d
emanded Bill.

“Nothing of the kind
,
” said the owner in his most reasonable tones
. “It’s that bloody lad. H
e broke all my crockery. I can’t get any more till this evening. I will be opening tomorrow at 7 o’clock, on the dot. I hope you won’t cancel the deal with the breakfasts
.
”

Bill appeared slightly less angry and asked the café owner what had happened earlier in the morning. The owner recalled the events to Bill and told him that all the workers had turned up just after 7 for their free breakfast and
,
when he informed them that he was closed for the morning, they started ranting and raving.

“They were all talking at once,” he told Bill
.
“All I kept hearing was that they were entitled to a free breakfast and that it was the last stra
w. Then they left, but not before
stealing 3 tubs of my orange paint.”

“
So you will be open tomorrow?” a
sked Bill, staring intently at the owner, daring him to say no.

“Tomorrow as normal,” c
ame the reply.

Bill jumped back into his tractor and headed back up to the farm.

“That paint was expensive,” shouted the café owner up the road after
him
.

*

Richard was having a bad day. He was perusing a cookbook in an attempt to find some carrot
-
related recipes when his phone rang, and didn’t stop ringing all morning. The str
ike at Carrot Corporation™ was a
ffecting the share price and lots of angry people were phoning him to complain about his lack of foresight in predicting it and to try and sell the
ir
shares
before the price dropped any fu
rther. Carrot Corporation™ shares currently sold for
112p
.

*

Joan was also having a bad day as she had heard the news of Carrot Corporation™ on the local radio show. After much discussion with Pete
,
and several cups of tea
,
she decided to get Pete to call her stockbroker
,
Richard.

“Hello
. Shure Stock. Richard speaking. H
ow may I help you?” said a deflated voice.

“Hello. Is that Richard? I
t
’
s Pete, Joan’s husband
.
”

“Hello
, Pete. H
ow may I help you?”

“Well, it
’s Joan. S
he’s worried about her shares. What’s happening? What should we do?”

“Well
,
Pete, I have been looking very seriously at the goings on a
t
Carrot Corporation™ today. You must believe m
e that this is a very minor set
back. Both you and Joan stand to make a lot of mon
ey if you just hang in there,” c
ame the well-rehearsed reply.

“Bu
t the share price is going down.
”

“Have you ever traded before
,
Pete?”

“Well no, but...”

“Well I have Pete…” interrupted Richard “…in fact I have been trading in stocks and share
s
for almost 12 years. All we are experiencing is a minor dip on an otherwise pentatonicly
transverse upward curve. I’ve been over the figures with several of my collea
gues and computed the results. I
t’s on an upward spike.”

“So it’s on the up?”

Richard didn’t need to see Pete to know that he was scratching his head.
“In a manner of speaking… yes
,
it is
,
my friend. The strike will end soon and the stock p
rice will rise again. You and Jo
an will both be very rich. I would only give the best advice to friends of my parents. Was there anything else
,
Pete?”

“Well…no.
I suppose everything will be
okay
.”

This was
Richard’s
last phone call before the stock market closed for the day. He h
ad a full evening planned too. H
e was trying out a new c
arrot risotto and he had just bought a juicer
to make carrot milkshakes with.
Richard’s
fiancé
e
was getting a little concerned with his
new
-
found
obsession with all things carrot. It seemed to her that in the
last 2 weeks Richard
hadn’t had 1 meal that didn’t contain at least 90% carrot.