The layoff

My feet dangle off the edge of the jetty, the water is calm today and gently swells against the barnacle crusted concrete.  The tide is going out I think, watching as the receding water exposes the tops of the boulders and slabs of rock that protect the jetty from erosion. Tiny crabs scuttle into crevices and cracks to evade being seen by the vigilant gulls that wheel above, screeching their plaintiff cries. 

It’s not yet noon and it’s monday, a day and time that I would usually be in the office. I do enjoy this, the peace and perspective of it all.  But I love my job too… loved my job, that is.

As of this last Friday I am a free agent.  Not by my choosing of course, myself and about five hundred others across the company got the short goodbye.

I knew something was up when my new manager sent me an official meeting request.  He never did that, and he never responded to Email.  I just assumed he didn’t know how to use it.

Our first meeting he informed me that he was a hammer.

I wish I could have said what I was thinking at that moment, and I regret it now but it makes me smile in spite of it all.  I would have asked in response – “So, you’re a tool then?”

I can almost see his blotchy pink face turn red in embarrassment as I play this scenario out again.  

Ten minutes before the meeting and there’s a knock at my cube, it was my manager who looked as nervous as I should have felt but I didn’t.  I knew exactly what was happening and I let him lead me to the room where I was sure there was paperwork to sign.  I just accepted it, knowing the decision was already made.  

In the present, I stare off past some rocks to see a couple of otters enjoying a late breakfast. I can see them bashing shellfish against stones on their tummies. 

Just floating out there beyond the breakers amidst the tops of a kelp forest eating clams, what a life!

Waiting for us in the conference room was my director, and I wondered if this was a courtesy or a precaution.  I smiled when I saw the open box of tissues, and sat within reach of them, taking the not so subtle hint.

It was the director who did the explaining, but at the same time not offering much.  Just what HR had scripted for him probably, but this man was and is someone I respect and he seemed just as annoyed with the procedure as I was. I was stitching the scattered threads of truth to complete the actual reason. High level people in the company made promises they couldn’t keep and as such had to cut a percentage of the workforce to appease the shareholders.  

Then there’s the paperwork. But I didn’t have a pen.

The middle manager holds one out across the wide desk.  I notice his hands are trembling, and realize that he knows who should actually be signing these papers, the one truly expendable person in the room.  

I was given seven months severance and benefits until the end of the year.

Absently I am chewing on my right thumbnail, it’s not a habit really, it’s just that it was uneven and jagged, prone to getting caught on things.  A minor annoyance.

A sharp pain informs me that I had taken off too much and now there is a large sliver of thumbnail hanging right at the point where it curves into the skin.

I grip the loose bit between my left thumb and forefinger and yank.  Best to do this kind of thing quickly,  the pain is momentary, and I am pleased to see that there is no blood, just a pink swath of skin unaccustomed to open air.

I realize that I would prefer to have been fired instead of laid off.  Because being fired involves willful discriminate actions or inactions.  Something the one being fired can be held accountable for.  A layoff typically has nothing to do with them, or their work ethic and contribution.  Like being hit by a drunk driver on the road.  Like paying for someone else’s mistakes. Collateral damage. 

I can only guess as to the source of this kind of glorification.

I hold the  chunk of nail to the ash colored sky before flicking it into the water, it doesn’t go far and floats for a second or two before sinking into the gray green soup.

I should be updating my resume, networking on various social sites, and thinking about next steps.

But I really don’t want to.  I’m tired of the whole process.  I’d rather be an otter.

I glance back to where I saw them but they have gone.

The ever present keening of the seagulls is gone as well.

Only the distant chorus of the waves breaking at the shoreline is heard.

As if this particular part of the world has sensed some kind of a predator and is holding very still.

The waves are no longer crashing because the water is rising, either the tide is coming back in or something very big has just entered the cove beneath the surface.  

I look down to see the rising water and right between my dangling shoes a pale face resolves in the murk.  It’s a woman, her skin white with icy undertones surfaces with the rising water, her dark hair covers one half of her features like a wet towel but forming to the shape of what looks skeletal and sunken in contrast to the uncovered side.

I scoot back away from the edge and stand in preparation for any further surprises and sure enough, her eye opens and fixes right on me.

The iris is so dark that it appears to be a huge dilated pupil and I see my terrified face in this black mirror.  She smiles at my shocked expression but says nothing.  

In a hand that looks more like bone shrink wrapped with charred skin is my fingernail, the fingers close around it and she brings the fist to her collarbones and nods in thanks.

The water behind her is pierced by three lances of white material that unfurl ephemeral sails as they hit the air.  It is a ship, and as the dragonesque  figure head rises to snarl at me I am close enough to see that it is composed of countless nails like the one I had so recently flicked into the water. She places my contribution into a protruding fang of the dragon and suddenly, very far away a deep drone sounds, words without form coalesce in my mind, words evocative of doom, and destruction not in any language that I understand.

She smiles in satisfaction at this, as if some long laid out plan is coming to fruition.  

She scales the side of the massive ship with ease and is looking down at me from the prow as it continues to ascend till the hull is floating over the surface of the water.  Another blast from that cosmic horn shakes the very concrete I’m standing on and in the distance I see a vast plume of water erupt to reveal a gargantuan form of scales as big as buses. Its head eclipses the sun and for a moment it is dark, the ground trembles at even its slightest movements. What follows is a bellow from a titanic maw and it thunders back into the water sending a tidal wave in every direction.  The water recedes rapidly as if the ocean is being drained, the sea life not sucked away scuttles, flops and skitters about exposed in the open atmosphere.

I know I’ve got about two minutes before the wave hits land, and all I can think of is how small I am.  It’s all just a matter of magnitude, this is just another layoff on a much grander scale.  

A song breaks out on the ship of nails, deep voices from enormous throats thrum out a dirge that is both stirring and dreadful to hear.  Oars emerge from its sides and they move in unison, in rhythm to the war chant.  I don’t know where this ship is sailing to but its purpose is surely battle, I think.  A war not meant for us mere mortals, only the dispassionate consequence in the wake of its fury. 

The woman’s expression changes to something I can only read as pity as the ship heads off towards the horizon, sails full of nonexistent winds. Oars paddling invisible tides. 

I guess the world ends for someone every day.

Today it’s all of us.