The Yes Man
Picture a street. Not a particularly remarkable street lined with veteran oaks, nor a busy high street, nor a winding Victorian back alley, a dingy estate road or a broad suburban crescent flanked by tall gates with even taller walls. Just a normal street in a normal town. A boring one, but not boring enough that its boring nature gives it some degree of noteworthy character. Just a regular old street of median mundanity. If you're thinking about any features of note then stop it. Whatever decoration you've added with your imagination can be stripped right off again, and it can be thrown in the bin with your notions of it being fancy or pretty or any of the rest of it. It's just a road that doesn't stand out from any other. Any defining feature is too much. It's just a road.
With it loosely established that this road in and of itself might not be the player of interest in this scenario, or any other for that matter, you're now ready to make an addition to the scene, something that makes it worth the time and effort of laying out this unremarkable landscape in the first place. We'll be adding a person, a man walking with an urgency that can only be rendered possible by guilt, making great haste along one of the two pavements with which this road, this uninteresting and otherwise inconsequential road, is adorned on either side. Picture his backpack wobbling from one side to the other as his back and shoulders move. Imagine his legs swinging faster than looks comfortable, and his shoes leaving transient impressions of themselves in the water that had, quite soon before, fallen as rain onto the path. Imagine the look of placid determination on his face, as he tries to convince anyone who might be looking, which is no-one except you via the mind's eye, that his rush is fine, and he's not in distress, and no-one should give it a second thought. The road and his desired perception of his rush, in that regard, are quite similar.
Why on Earth could this man be using this particular road, which it once again bears reiterating holds no sway over the hearts, minds or actions of any stakeholders, with such an elevated sense of need and purpose? It offers nothing. It takes him nowhere of note. The history books will not call it out by name; only a local map or letters addressed to the houses which sit, uninspired, along its average length will bother to record what it is called. It could not, by any stretch of the imagination, be the road itself which is spurring the man, who will now be named as Jacob Bocaj, to move with much-recorded haste. It has to be something else entirely.
A deeper examination of the man, then, is a logical next step towards unravelling the mystery you've made for yourself by picturing these things. He's known to have a backpack, and backpacks are common vessels for the transport of those items which one might need when they get to their destination. It's therefore a sensible starting place to have a good rummage, narratively speaking, through the contents jostling around within the confines of the fabric. At the bottom, just where it shouldn't be if any planning has been performed for the bag-packing process, is a cling-film wrapped sandwich. This is a tremendous example of the outside form and appearance not defining how we name what lies inside; we are able to describe it in confidence and certainty as a sandwich, despite how thoroughly crushed and disfigured the bread and cheese have been, resembling long-abandoned play-dough more than a lunch item.
The sandwiches’ flattened and mangled condition is due in no small part to the metal flask which has been bouncing up and down on top of them. The tupperware container of cucumber slices, which has also been migrating this way and that around its lunchtime companions, has played the part of an anvil with tremendous success, helping to both squeeze the sandwich into a single-layered chimera of its erstwhile constituents, and to provide an angled hard-edge for various folding, bending and contorting operations to be enabled. The packet of salt and vinegar crisps has fared little better than its bready companion, and although not burst open, its potato-derived cargo shares more aesthetic commonality with sand than the image on the front of the bag.
Not all of these crimes against lunch integrity can be attributed to the metal flask and tupperware duo, however. They were ably assisted, or possibly manipulated into misdeeds, by a heavy and uncompromising laptop. Although fashionably rounded, its corners still manage to deliver pointed strikes to vulnerable pressure points of bread and bag alike. It engages in regular, audible skirmishes with the metal flask, their conflict ringing out like the tolling of a dented bell or the weak striking of a rusted hammer, but neither one comes away with any great victory or defeat.
Winding around all combatants and victims, seeking to choke them out and irrevocably organise itself into something like a dense tapestry, is the laptop's charger. Although inextricably linked through functionality and symbiosis, the laptop unable to function without the charger and the charger without purpose unless the laptop is nearby, they do not collude towards common goals within the world of the bag. Oftentimes, the thick wire deflects a sturdy blow that would otherwise rupture a crust, thus actively resisting the work of the laptop. But occasionally, very occasionally, the slow curling and constricting efforts of the charger manage to capture the squishy and malleable sandwich in the embrace of an insulated tendril, and give it a thorough and sensible crushing. The vicious pins of the plug sometimes probe at the confines of the bag, or seek to push themselves into the back of the man, uncaring as to whether these attacks help or hinder his progress, but the charger’s overall motive, if there indeed is one, remains unknown to all but itself.
By mercy or by serendipity, Jacob's back is free from plug-based assault in this particular instance. From your account of what lies within his backpack, it is reasonable and sensible to assume that his somewhat expeditious journey along the road, both important enough for a hurried walk but not important enough to justify a run, is related to his employment in some manner. Another piece of evidence for this is the bright red lanyard that dangles from his neck, with an ID card bouncing around on the end. Like all neck-bound forms of identification, its presence is vital for trust, since it allows any suspicious party to check that the wearer has access to a printer which can write on cards. Although Jacob's identity would never be relied upon in the absence of this pendant of documentation, the details held thereon are doomed never to be checked; such is the great tradition of the lanyard paradox.
The lanyard itself is not plain, but printed with 'Yessman Ltd: Outreach Specialist', alongside the Yessman logo of a big thumbs up, complete with resolutely and tightly closed eyes. Jacob Bocaj is, it can be accurately assumed, an Outreach Specialist with Yessman Ltd, a company whose motto and driving philosophy are openly communicated as 'You worry about the details, and let us say "yes"!'. The many complaints arising about the density of punctuation at the end of this motto serve to drown out the far more relevant complaints about the enormous potential for damage to be done by saying yes to everything. When asked if this was accidental or deliberate, a company spokesperson simply replied with 'yes'.
It would be unfair to judge any individual solely by their occupation, even someone like Jacob Bocaj about whom we know very little else, save for his poor back packing practices and his decision to walk along a road which in no way stands out among its peers. It is the opposite of outstanding, and there may be a temptation to describe Jacob in the same way at this stage, but labelling and disregarding the man should be postponed, at least until full details are available.
It can be readily imagined that Jacob continues his active journey along the road of no repute, ill or otherwise. Every few tens of paces he checks his watch, just in case he read it wrongly the previous dozen times, or his perception of the passage of time should have become unreliable. In none of his checks do either of these possibilities transpire to be the case, but he keeps going regardless, being ever the optimist or ever the idiot. Again, judgement at this stage would surely be premature.
The target of Jacob's walk, unsurprisingly, is not on the road along which he travels, in alignment with the heavily laboured point that this road, among all roads, is nothing of which to speak, call out or otherwise draw attention. The only reason it is being rendered into your mind is because it is where Jacob happens to be. It is arguable that the narrative could have begun at a later stage of Jacob's journey, such that any mention of the road could have been avoided, but that would be to attribute any importance to the road at all; if it's worth avoiding, then there must be something special about it to warrant such avoidance, and that is an unacceptable level of exceptional treatment for such a distinctly commonplace kind of road. No, the target of Jacob's journey, his destination at the end of the accelerated and now slightly sweaty walk, is the house of one Mr. Phillip Goskin.
Mr Philip Goskin is yet to be in the proximity of Jacob Bocaj, and thus there is no need to picture him just yet, but it is appropriate to address the reason for Jacob's descent upon his residential address on Pearson Drive, a small street just off the road of no defining features.
Mr Goskin, as would be evident from an inspection of the documents residing on Jacob's laptop, is receiving a visit from a representative of Yessman Ltd., the aforementioned Jacob, at his own request. Philip himself would call it more of a demand than a request, such is the nature of his motivation, but the internal documentation and the portal through which it was submitted to Yessman Ltd. refer to it as a request. They don't deal in demands, because saying yes to a demand does less to make one sound amenable than saying yes to a request.
In the body of the form, wherein resides the 'Reason for Request' field, it can be observed that Mr Goskin wished to speak to a representative of Yessman Ltd. in relation to certain incidents which had occurred some four days prior to its submission, which is four weeks previous to the events being described. He has declined to elaborate on those circumstances, instead wishing for the representative to witness them first hand and react accordingly. This is the sort of message that gets one of two diametrically opposed responses, those being immediate dismissal and deletion by the customer service representative (in the case of Yessman Ltd., this representative is a rainbow macaw due to a complicated legal battle with the local zoo) or frenzied and zealous obeisance to avoid a protracted legal battle, which might otherwise result in the mandate to hire a tropical bird. For a company like Yessman Ltd., which cannot refuse a chance to agree to something and is convinced that lightning will strike twice, there could only be one possible outcome.
Jacob's clockwork watch checking continues tirelessly. It grows more distressing each time, because the time it shows is round and about quarter to ten, and Jacob is due at Mr Goskin's house at half past nine. No amount of swift walking will reverse the clock by a quarter of an hour, and this is knowledge that you can take to be readily available to Jacob as he finally rounds the corner from somewhere not at all worth mentioning, and onto Pearson Drive.
Pearson Drive itself bears at least some description, seeing as it contains the home of Philip Goskin and could therefore be considered a place of interest. It should be borne in mind, however, that this interest is entirely contextual, since neither Pearson Drive nor Philip Goskin would, under normal circumstances, be worthy of an extensive narrative. Their inclusion in your gradually growing mental picture is not because they possess intrinsic or inherent properties which render them worthy of your time, but because they are necessary elements to fully flesh out the story being related.
Give yourself the gift of picturing a straight road, its tarmac dark and largely intact, with white painted markings in the centre to advise drivers, cyclists and the more adventurous pedestrians whereabouts they should be when attempting to make forward progress. A dashed line of verges runs along each pavement, and those verges themselves are variously populated with trees, bushes, electrical junction boxes, discarded furniture or long-forgotten bin bags. Residential structures covering a broad array of sizes, qualities and states of disrepair keep an ever-lasting watch over those verges, bin bags and road markings, and provide an effective containment method for the residents who call Pearson Drive home.
Only one of those residential containers is allocated, owned or occupied by the Philip Goskin of interest to Jacob Bocaj. It would be folly to disregard the possibility that other Philip Goskins, or Philips Goskin if you prefer, might live in any other houses on or off of Pearson Drive out of hand, but rest assured that the roll of the dice and the fall of the coin in this instance have rendered Pearson Drive a single Philip Goskin road. There happen to be no others. It is not, therefore, going to be the case that Jacob Bocaj arrives at the Pearson Drive address of the incorrect P. Goskin, nor will it come to pass that an impostor Goskin, potentially described as an imposkin in the pursuit of syllabic easing, has provided their address in the true Goskin's stead.
These assurances are, of course, unavailable to Jacob. However, such is his confidence in Philip's capability to enter his own address in an online form, and so much faith does he have in humanity that no-one would try to deceive him in matters as critical as a home visit from a representative of Yessman Ltd., that he hasn't even considered that either circumstance might come to pass. He also does not have time to worry about things like that, late as he is to his mysterious appointment. Instead, you can picture his attentions being handed wholesale to the pursuit of furtive glances at the doors he sees to his left and right, as he seeks to compare the house numbers written thereon to the target of his search. He makes many discoveries in this endeavour, from the allocation of even and odd numbers per side of the road being distinctly in his favour, to the rising allocations of those numbers as he continues his travel. His abilities to count and to estimate the relative sizes of numbers notwithstanding, he still feels the need to look at every house as he walks, just in case Mr Goskin's address should have ensconced itself out of sequence for reasons of either malice or ignorance.
Despite the innocence and legitimacy of these observations about his general area, the daytime residents of Pearson Drive with nothing better to do are displeased about this development. From their presumed positions of invisibility, standing half a metre or so away from their front windows with curtains fully open, they use their active imaginations, and fierce loyalty to the concept of the neighbourhood watch, to fuel a deeply held assertion that Jacob can only be planning a spree of violence and misdeeds. Placing enough stock in his observational skills that he can fully assess the vulnerabilities of a building from a sub-second glance towards its door, but not enough that he'll see the frowning spy behind a pane of glass, they manically form descriptions of the perpetrator to share on their local area social media groups. Terms like 'suspicious-looking', 'has a head, probably full of bad ideas and worse intentions' and 'gave me the creeps, like a door-to-door salesman made of spiders and ash' can be imagined to pop into the collective consciousness of the area. None of them can rest easily until the definite threat of the briskly walking stranger has passed out of the zone they so zealously surveil, and has moved on to a more acceptably burglable property like next door.
As with so many other aspects of Pearson Drive and his journey in general, Jacob labours in perfect ignorance of the crimes being hypothetically attributed to him. Instead he pushes on until he at last spots the house number he seeks. For the purpose of narrative completeness it can be taken that the house number is 103, but with fervour second only to the total irrelevance of the previously walked road, it must be asserted that the value of this number is not an object of concern or interest by its own inherent virtues, and can be as easily and healthily disregarded as the details of a totally different story. It will not have a bearing on future events. Waste no more time in its consideration.
See now the bearing of Jacob Bocaj undergo a distinct shift. The time for hurrying, the first step of damage mitigation, has come to an end, and he instead performs a number of small corrections to his appearance. Creases are quickly smoothed out of his shirt, along with some tucking of errant hems, and he straightens his backpack. On goes his game face, the demure and neutrally welcoming expression of professionalism, and he raises his head up to correct what remains of his posture. Naturally, he is trying to make a good impression on behalf of Yessman Ltd, or as good of an impression as he can make while running late. It would, of course, make a total mockery of his minor dress fixes for Mr Goskin to have watched it happen through the window, like one of the many neighbourhood watchers. Thankfully for Jacob this was not the case. Mr Goskin was not spending his additional pre-meeting time engaged in window gazing or front-path monitoring, removing a potential thorn from Jacob and Yessman Ltd's side right from the get-go.
Not looking this gift horse in the mouth, or anywhere else for that matter, Jacob proceeds with all horse-blindness up the paved path towards the front door of number 103 Pearson Drive. To his right there is a small patch of lawn, given equally to grass, clovers, dandelions and the collected leavings of most of the neighbourhood's feline residents. To his left, less disquietingly, there is a flower bed which appears to be well-tended. The geographic divide on display within the realm of this single front garden is stark, and suggests damning things about Mr Goskin's capacity for valuing each member of his outer household equally, but yet again it fails to become any of Jacob's concern. He is now a being of total commitment and complete focus, embodying every aspect of a corporate facade and all the virtues of Yessman Ltd. If anyone has been inconvenienced then he will be apologetic for it, without offering any evidence of actually feeling remorse, admitting wrongdoing or providing any evidence that their ways will be changed. If someone is pleased then he will take total responsibility for everything that has been accomplished, claiming with utter certainty that it was exactly as planned and totally intentional. His jokes will be soulless but harmless if he is forced to make any, his pleasantries will inoffensive, and his manner will be unflappably welcoming without being at all helpful. He is a veteran of his trade, if not a veteran of years, and even his press of a doorbell, a respectful single-second affair, has the edge of a board-approved, think-tank honed outreach action. It's artistry for the worst gallery in any known civilisation.
Jacob's face, until recently a solemn mask of emotionless time pressure, is now rigid with the joyless smile of an official representative. He waits unmoving and unblinking, like a crocodile without teeth at the edge of an unfamiliar watering hole. Soon the antelope will open the door for him, and he'll erupt quietly from the water, accept a mediocre cup of tea if such a beverage is to be offered, and then listen politely while the as-yet mysterious complaint is raised. Many people in Jacob's position choose to undergo a sort of detachment, a mental compartmentalisation to keep their conscious thoughts isolated from the banal fury of the public potentially scorned. Jacob has not yet acquired this skill, but he is beginning to tell himself that he doesn't have to personally care if Yessman Ltd also refuses to take any serious interest. This move is the healthiest thing he can do for himself, given the circumstances.
The door he faces, as with most of its kind, cannot stand up to the passive smile for long, and yields under the assistance of the house's resident. Under normal circumstances, this is the point at which Jacob would have spoken. He'd have given a polite and professional greeting, perhaps 'hello' or 'good morning' or 'how do you do', introduced himself, and then asked how their day was going. It isn't a rigidly structured script, and different representatives have their own flavours, but it gives him the appearance of speaking like a real human when he is, in fact, an emotionally checked-out vessel for corporate interests.
At the door of 103 Pearson Drive, presented with his first glimpse of Philip Goskin, Jacob Bocaj can be pictured to find himself quite unable to easily slip into his script. His mouth does manage to open though, so bring to your mind an image of what some typical, healthy teeth might look like. Jacob's tongue warrants no special attention, and nor do his gums, so labour not on those details. The silent opening of his mouth coincides with a non-committal offer of a handshake, his arm rocketing upwards reflexively but stopping short of the horizontal mark to which it normally aspires. Not even Jacob's desire to repair the reputational damage he's already done, that caused by his late and slightly sweaty arrival, can overcome the natural gut reaction that he is experiencing.
"Uh... Hello. Mr Goskin?" Mr Bocaj eventually manages. A question such as that would normally be effectively rhetorical, having been invited to that address at that time by the person he was intending to meet. In this instance it was wholly earnest.
"Yes. I'm Mr Goskin. I presume you're from Yessman, are you?" Mr Goskin replies, his tone terse and unimpressed. A physical description of Philip Goskin shall be left aside for the moment, a decision taken for narrative effect rather than disinterest. It should be abundantly clear by this stage that even those elements of the story which hold no interest or relevance will receive a cursory or perfunctory description; a certain road of the utmost mediocrity serves as a tangible example of this.
"Uh..." replies Jacob. It isn't a helpful reply, nor a particularly dignified one. The question posed by Mr Goskin is not something which should require significant thought or consideration; Jacob either is or is not from Yessman Ltd., and that knowledge should be readily available to him. For the avoidance of doubt, in case there had been any room left for it, Jacob is indeed from Yessman Ltd. "Uh, yes. Yes, I am, sorry. I'm Jacob Bocaj. I apologise for being so late, Mr Goskin, and I hope that you're... er... having a good day." he says, confirming the reassurances recently made, and making a sterling effort to get himself back on track.
"I am not having a very good day, no, and I think you might be able to clearly see why that is. And why I didn't feel it possible to better explain my complaint on your blasted online form." Mr Goskin rebuffs, not one to be drawn in by the insincere pleasantries that Yessman Ltd. has trained Jacob to spout. Much to the hidden satisfaction of Philip Goskin, Jacob relents to a short, sheepish nod. He can perfectly understand the logic that Mr Goskin has applied in pursing the actions he's taken.
The time has now come to describe Mr Goskin, as Jacob sees him unveiled at the door of 103 Pearson Drive. It can be readily surmised that this is the crux of the story, the whole motivator for describing the events which have occurred up to this point. It is left as an exercise for the reader to determine whether or not the efforts taken in both writing and reading those words was, in any way, worth it.
Starting at the lowest point and working upwards, Mr Goskin has a pair of feet. This is generally a positive thing, and not something about which the aforementioned Philip would see fit to complain to Yessman Ltd., unless they had previously promised him a third or fourth. For the record, they had promised no such thing. Above the feet, as the rest of Mr Goskin resides, is where the problems begin to set in. A more typical trousered leg would be narrow when compared to the door frame. Its edges would be tapered to the curve approximated by an ironed piece of fabric, and one could be forgiven for describing the overall shape as roughly cylindrical. Perhaps, for an athlete or similar, the topmost shape could be called conical, where there is a lot of thigh to manage.
Not so for Mr Goskin.
The Goskin thighs are no broader than the Goskin knees or calves, but that is only because all of those constituent parts are as broad and flat as the pavements along which Jacob has so recently and expeditiously walked. Tracksuit bottoms are stretched well beyond their zone of comfort, and past even their zone of extreme discomfort, finding themselves in what one might reasonably label the zone of credible grounds for legal action on the basis of cruelty to clothing. Sharp, straight edges of what appear to be concrete press and strain at the fabric from within, discolouring it, pulling the threads apart, and holding it right at the point of snapping.
The situation above the elongated leggings is little better. Philip Goskin's torso is a single, vast rectangle hidden inexpertly within the confines of an oversized jumper which, despite its excess of dimensions for a human, is still inadequate for the purpose of containing the Goskin torso with any dignity or decorum. Its sleeves fare much the same as the trousers, with cylindrically-intended fabric tubes being irresponsibly applied to broad cuboids. Somehow, the presence of two perfectly normal human hands emerging from the ends of those sleeves only serves to make the image worse.
Atop the wide Goskin, in the usual position if not of the usual shape, is the head. Its shape, much like those of the body parts below, is that of the paving slab, and its concrete colouring does nothing to dissuade the observer from that comparison. Further to that, in fact, it's worthwhile confirming that it is indeed made from concrete, and it teeters atop the unusually broad and right-angled shoulders like a sail of a ship made from wholly inappropriate materials. The slight protrusion of a chin is just about visible, with an aperture for the mouth that's disquietingly surrounded by cracks and crumbling edges. A nose that dares to tend towards the colour of flesh pushes forwards beyond even the plane of the chin, and upon it rests a pair of spectacles whose arms have been unfairly splayed, with no more sinister purpose than allowing the lens-to-eye distance to be in a useful range. There is no hair to be seen, and only two roughly-hewn funnels allow sound to be piped to the Goskin ears, deep within the concrete.
Mr Philip Goskin himself can be imagined to best summarise his circumstances to the visiting Jacob.
"I, by no fault of my own and by every fault of Yessman, have been paved!" Philip says.
Although the specific details of the Goskin case are decidedly unusual, Jacob Bocaj is able to take some degree of comfort in the familiar narrative and sentiment of the complaint; an innocent member of the public has been wronged by Yessman Ltd., who are claimed to shoulder the full weight of liability for whatever went wrong. It is precisely this type of customer complaint about which Yessman cares most. They are ships carrying the dangerous cargo of mistrust and reputational damage, and Jacob has been trained to thoroughly scuttle their hulls whenever possible, to avoid their manifests falling into the public eye.
"Yes, I can definitely see that you're of the paved persuasion." Jacob says with as much of a smile as he dares, snapping into his Yessman Ltd. persona. "Would it be agreeable to you if I were to come in and discuss your complaint further, Mr Goskin? I'd like to think that we can clarify the circumstances and demonstrate that Yessman has behaved with your interests, and I mean specifically your interests, Mr Goskin, at heart."
"I highly doubt that, when you maliciously and carelessly paved me!" Mr Goskin snaps, in the figurative sense of speech rather than the literal sense of his concrete ceasing to be in single parts. Regardless, he steps to one side, hinging like a door so as not to block the entire hallway with his aggregate-heavy body, to allow Jacob in.
"Yes, you do doubt that, and of that I have no doubt." Jacob says. You would do well to picture the barely-hidden smugness he's been trained to wear, giving any complainant the subtle impression that their concerns have already been dismissed and disproven out of hand. It is the part of his 'customer confidence suppression' training that Jacob had found most engaging, and he conducts it expertly. "And I am pleased to announce that no actions can be both malicious and careless, since malice requires a level of care to ensure that a harmful outcome is achieved, so you must be mistaken in your assertions about Yessman Ltd. It's sounding to me, wonderfully, that Yessman must have been looking after your needs, and that this is a simple misunderstanding with a good-faith misattribution of intent."
Even while saying this, Jacob politely removes his shoes and places them neatly at the bottom of the shoe rack. It will take a devastating toll on his socks, since the carpet of the hallway is utterly littered with small fragments of concrete that have fallen from Mr Goskin.
"I fail to see how paving a member of the public can be in their interest, Mr Bocaj."
"Yes, you do. But that's perfectly alright! No-one, even Yessman Ltd., is obligated to know everything about every situation that could be conceivably imagined." smiles Jacob. He stands, now shoeless, underneath a tasteless set of wall lamps, mixing floral patterns with art deco panels and gothic spires. He makes a mental note of this while surreptitiously photographing the concrete dust on the carpet using his phone; evidence of Mr Goskin's unhealthy fascination with the construction material in question is of great value to Yessman Ltd.
"You cheeky git. Go on, go and sit down in the living room. It's hard for me to stand for too long because your lot has encased me in rock." growls Philip. More dust and tiny pieces of stone fall as he speaks, to one day find a new home in the vacuum cleaner’s dust cup.
Doing as he is told, which is a key part of his suitability for his role, Jacob steps into the living room of Philip Goskin's home, and takes a seat on the armchair by the window. Another quick photograph is taken of the sofa, which has a set of long, straight indentations, such as one might form by resting huge concrete paving slabs on the cushions. He feels safe in doing this, because Mr Goskin seems to be incapable of moving quickly. The loud shuffling of highly load-bearing feet through the thick carpet tells Jacob all he needs to know about whether or not he is being observed.
His photography done, Jacob takes the laptop out of his bag, and spares but a solitary glance for his punished and abused lunch. His face contorts with regret for just a moment, before the professional glaze reasserts itself. Be assured that his superficial attention to Mr Goskin is backed up by a thorough internal monologue mourning the loss of his sandwich integrity. Details of such a monologue are not considered to serve the story of the moment, and will thus be left to the imagination.
"Yes, I have taken a set. Would you be willing to outline the events as you perceived them, Mr Goskin, so that I might be able to construct an accurate picture for my colleagues?" he asks, getting to the core of the business at hand. Open on his laptop is the 'Complaint Dismissal Notebook', which helps him to organise his thoughts on how to spin, dismiss, belittle, gaslight and otherwise refute any claim made by any complainant. The introduction of this notebook was noted to have reduced compensation paid to genuinely injured parties by over fifty percent, much to the joy of the Yessman shareholders and the detriment of justice.
"My perception of events is better known as how they actually happened, Mr Bocaj. The pavement repair crew, employed by Yessman Ltd., was there to repair the damage done by the previous pavement repair crew, also employed by Yessman Ltd. They were to break up the cracked slabs and replace them, so that I didn't trip every time I tried to walk out of my home." Mr Goskin explains, angrily, as he sits himself down on the sofa. Due to the rigidity of his concrete clothing, which Mr Bocaj is currently writing up as a personal choice by Philip, this process takes some time and is rather limited. The grinding of slab on slab underneath his tracksuit signals the point at which further bending in the middle becomes impossible.
"Yes, that sounds accurate compared to our records." interrupts Jacob, keen to be able to genuinely agree with something before the slanderous accusations from Mr Goskin start. "Yessman Ltd. has despatched at least two crews to repair this pavement alone, and many more to deal with problems in other parts of this neighbourhood. It's evidence of how much we care about the communities which fall underneath the umbrella of our remit's jurisdiction."
"It's hard to see how doing a series of bad jobs that require more of your highly-priced time can be called care about the community, Mr Bocaj." Goskin grumbles. Jacob nods, in agreement that Philip finds it hard to see. "But the point I was trying to make, before I was interrupted, is that I was left in a paved and incapacitated state by the Yessman Ltd. road crew."
This is precisely the moment for which Jacob Bocaj has been waiting, a direct attack against Yessman Ltd., their intentions, and their duty of care. Although they are physically sat in a living room which is as bereft of taste and quality as a wine made from Styrofoam, Jacob begins to see something rather different. Gone is the floral patterned carpet, and absent are the magnolia walls. The three-piece-suite is invisible to him, as it should be to anyone with a modicum of taste, but that’s besides the major point. Jacob Bocaj does not see the living room of 103 Pearson Drive any longer, but an endless plane of frozen starlight stretching to eternity in every direction. He stands tall, hundreds of metres tall, gripping a scimitar made from the purest molten iron and time. This is very much different from the Jacob you should have been picturing up to now, as is the Philip Goskin of Jacob’s mind’s eye. This angry man is still encased in concrete, but he clutches a flaming sword in his clawed hands, bone puncturing through the skin and rising outwards at every knuckle. Their great combat has begun, and he fights for the very future of Yessman Ltd.
"Yes! You probably were, sir." Jacob says. This might be a surprise to you, for much the same reason that is surprises Mr Goskin. He gasps to give evidence of this, because it's as impossible for him to raise his eyebrows as it would be for Jacob to see them rise, even if he’d been mentally present in the room.
"Oh. Well, that's a bad thing. They shouldn't have done it. They can't go around paving people!"
"Yes, they can't."
It takes Philip a moment to parse that response. It’s a feint by the blade of molten iron, which swings around the flaming defence of Goskin and slashes a streak in his emerald torso.
"This conversation is taking a very different course to the one I expected." Mr Goskin says, and that’s despite knowing nothing about the extra-dimensional battle ongoing in the mind of Jacob Bocaj.
"Yes, I suppose it is. Our road crews are not permitted to pave anything or anyone that is not explicitly called out on the oppression form with which we supply them. The key question we need to answer, and the one on which I'm sure we'll find common ground, Mr Goskin, is whether or not you were paved and incapacitated before they left you."
Mr Goskin's expression becomes stony at this point, the figurative layer now matching the literal one. The imagined one lunges forwards with a fiery stab.
"Of course not!"
"Yes, good. That's great news. You were not paved and incapacitated before they left you, and therefore you were paved and incapacitated by parties other than the Yessman Ltd. road crew at some stage after they left their site of work." Jacob’s golden fist slaps the weapon away and crunches into the concrete thorax of the apparently insectoid opponent he’s imagining.
"Wha-… no! No, you fool!" complains the real Mr Goskin. He can be pictured in an attempt to throw his hands in the air, only to find himself somewhat unable to on account of the extreme masses with which he's currently working. "I was neither paved nor incapacitated when the road crew arrived, and then they just paved right over me and left me incapacitated."
"Yes, we agree on how you were left, sir. You just said you weren't either paved or incapacitated before they left, and now you claim that you were neither thing when the crew arrived, and then you were at some point in the middle. So it seems to me like a paving incident occurred at some stage, and then you were left unpaved and healthily capacitated by the crew. There's no problem, because the situation was resolved straight away."
The molten sword severs a leathery wing. It’s unclear why the Goskin beast would need to fly around an infinite void, and it’s unlikely that the question will ever be answered.
"What are you talking about? Look at me! I'm paved!"
"Yes, you are. That might well have happened at some point after the events we're discussing, contradicting nothing you've said and fitting with all the evidence we've been able to gather. It's wonderful when we're able to reach common ground and avoid a confrontation."
By all rights, a severed body part should make for a killing blow, or at least a combat-winning blow. Picture the real Jacob smirking.
"Listen up, your crew left me like this. I was not paved when they arrived, and I was when they left. They paved me. It is that simple."
The smirk fades, and the imagined Jacob feels the horned skull of Goskin tear up through four out of five of his countless legs.
"Yes, Mr Goskin, I see that it is that simple. I'll note down all the accounts you've given so that a simple narrative can be extracted from them. Where were you when this paving happened, may I ask?" he says. Spinning this is still possible, he tells himself. In his mind he prepares to counter-strike.
"I was on the bit of the pavement to be repaired, of course. Where else would I have been in order to get paved?" complained Mr Goskin. It was just the opening for which both Jacobs had been waiting.
"Yes, it is hard to see where else you would be. So I think it's fair to say that you were within the confines of the work area? Inside the orange barriers which delineate the work area from the non-work area, which is to say, the rest of the road?"
The molten sword rises up, hovering above the spine of the Goskin beast. The imagined Jacob’s backpack is pulled taut, and his hyper-planar sandwich is mashed by his eldritch flask.
"Well, yes. Of course I was."
"Yes, good. Then you were in contravention of the signage always appended to the barriers, which clearly states that unauthorised personnel, of whom you were one by virtue of not being among the road crew, are not permitted to enter. It seems that any paving was willingly entered into by yourself by entering the work area."
Through the body goes the sword. Surely, Jacob thinks, the battle is done.
"I did no such thing! They built it around me!"
"Yes, you didn't? How did they come to construct the work area around you?" Jacob asks, shocked. A gout of acidic blood pours from the Goskin beast’s wound and corrodes his noble face.
"Well... because I didn't want to move from where I was. I was in the middle of something." replies Philip, sounding a little less assertive than previously.
"Yes, that sounds understandable. Of what were you in the middle?" Jacob asks, regaining his composure.
“I don’t really want to say.”
Maybe the spinal stab did something after all.
“Yes, you don’t, but if you fail to provide details then we will be forced to assume that we are correct in everything we say.” Jacob informs him, quoting verbatim from the company FAQ.
“That’s unenforceable!”
“Yes, our lawyers told us that, but it’s worked out in our favour every time anyway.”
The beast coughs up a gout of galactic phlegm.
"A nap." Mr Goskin admits.
"On the pavement? Excuse me…, I meant, yes, on the pavement?"
"What's the matter with that? It's public land and I pay my taxes, so I can sleep there if I like." Goskin tries, sounding as if he’s trying to convince himself as much as Jacob. The beast struggles to stand up.
"Yes, you presumably do and you presumably can." says Jacob, making notes to the contrary while his imaginary avatar swirls its blade. "I think I have a clear picture of events, Mr Goskin. You were taking a nap on the pavement when the crew arrived. They attempted to move you and you refused, so they worked around you and you gave consent to be embedded into the pavement to provide a better quality of nap. They then left you as you wished to be, still asleep, with another job well done."
The molten blade swings down again.
"I hardly think that's an accurate reflection of events." argues Philip Goskin. The beast’s flaming sword deflects the blow.
"Yes, you don't, but you are still paved to this day."
A golden fist into an oozing shoulder.
"I was told not to change anything until my complaint was processed, otherwise it might affect the outcome!"
A barbed claw rakes a golden cheek.
"Yes, and so did not changing anything. I see that you have made no attempt to remove the concrete in the four weeks since the incident, and am forced to take that into consideration."
"I had no choice but to make do."
"Yes, and you made do very well. It clearly hasn't inhibited your lifestyle severely."
"It's been a real pain in... Well, everywhere. And there's concrete dust all over the house."
Blows are traded. Bodies fall to the ground dramatically and then recover in the nick of time. It’s like every Saturday morning cartoon that Jacob has ever watched rolled into one. Picture his childish grin which leaks out, despite himself, as he debates with Mr Goskin. The latter is incapable of smiling, even if he’d wanted to.
"Yes, I've seen that. It speaks to how much you love concrete. There's all sorts of evidence of that."
See now, as Jacob does, the blazing sword of his nemesis drop, lowered meekly to the side of its wielder, who in this case is very wide and flat.
"What on earth do you mean by that?"
"Yes, on the earth there's concrete, mostly on the pathway up to your front door. There's concrete dust all around your home as you yourself have pointed out, you were lying down on the concrete pavement waiting to be paved yourself, you've lived as a paving slab for a whole month, and you've not even made the slightest attempt to remove it since I arrived here and saw your condition. Surely you would want it off as soon as possible, unless you secretly love being a paved man."
See dust blow over the sacred battleground between them, its panchromatic icefields ceasing to drift with the stasis of the combatants. A little concrete dust falls down as Philip Goskin's face twitches.
"You even have clothing that is able to stretch over a whole pavement's worth of slabs, Mr Goskin. The signs are all there."
The molten sword carves out one more time. It's the killing blow. Mr Goskin is felled like a three-leaf clover under a lawnmower blade. The imaginary battlefield dissipates.
"I suppose I do have a little bit of an affinity with it." Mr Goskin admits gingerly, fiddling with his fingers. Jacob smiles.
"Yes, you do. And in that case, Yessman Ltd. has helped you to achieve your dreams, thereby showing how much it cares for its community, and how well it knows everyone within it."
Mr Goskin sighs. It's a heavy sigh, heavier even than the paving slabs encasing his legs, because it carries every scrap of resentment and fury that he'd been harbouring for the previous four weeks. With his lungs clear, he is able now to breathe in a great gulp of acceptance at his true nature. This doesn't have much of a visual element to add to one's mental tapestry, but perhaps a mental annotation or footnote can be appended somewhere in the margins.
"Yes. They have." he agrees. "I suppose I should thank you for your time."
"Yes, you might suppose that, but it's unnecessary." Jacob replies, in perfect accordance with his training to reject gratitude for cheating victims out of their compensation. "I wish you the very best of luck in your new lifestyle, Mr Goskin. And if you should ever find yourself cracked and in danger of being a trip hazard then Yessman Ltd. can despatch a road repair crew free of charge in the first instance." he smiles, dropping a business card onto Philip's coffee table. The hooks are in, and outreach has been reached out.
See now a montage of Jacob and Philip saying their goodbyes. Mr Bocaj walks back out of 103 Pearson Drive, and turns back towards the road that, to this day, warrants absolutely no notice from anyone. In his backpack, the sandwich takes another hit for the team, and Yessman Ltd. is saved again.
With it loosely established that this road in and of itself might not be the player of interest in this scenario, or any other for that matter, you're now ready to make an addition to the scene, something that makes it worth the time and effort of laying out this unremarkable landscape in the first place. We'll be adding a person, a man walking with an urgency that can only be rendered possible by guilt, making great haste along one of the two pavements with which this road, this uninteresting and otherwise inconsequential road, is adorned on either side. Picture his backpack wobbling from one side to the other as his back and shoulders move. Imagine his legs swinging faster than looks comfortable, and his shoes leaving transient impressions of themselves in the water that had, quite soon before, fallen as rain onto the path. Imagine the look of placid determination on his face, as he tries to convince anyone who might be looking, which is no-one except you via the mind's eye, that his rush is fine, and he's not in distress, and no-one should give it a second thought. The road and his desired perception of his rush, in that regard, are quite similar.
Why on Earth could this man be using this particular road, which it once again bears reiterating holds no sway over the hearts, minds or actions of any stakeholders, with such an elevated sense of need and purpose? It offers nothing. It takes him nowhere of note. The history books will not call it out by name; only a local map or letters addressed to the houses which sit, uninspired, along its average length will bother to record what it is called. It could not, by any stretch of the imagination, be the road itself which is spurring the man, who will now be named as Jacob Bocaj, to move with much-recorded haste. It has to be something else entirely.
A deeper examination of the man, then, is a logical next step towards unravelling the mystery you've made for yourself by picturing these things. He's known to have a backpack, and backpacks are common vessels for the transport of those items which one might need when they get to their destination. It's therefore a sensible starting place to have a good rummage, narratively speaking, through the contents jostling around within the confines of the fabric. At the bottom, just where it shouldn't be if any planning has been performed for the bag-packing process, is a cling-film wrapped sandwich. This is a tremendous example of the outside form and appearance not defining how we name what lies inside; we are able to describe it in confidence and certainty as a sandwich, despite how thoroughly crushed and disfigured the bread and cheese have been, resembling long-abandoned play-dough more than a lunch item.
The sandwiches’ flattened and mangled condition is due in no small part to the metal flask which has been bouncing up and down on top of them. The tupperware container of cucumber slices, which has also been migrating this way and that around its lunchtime companions, has played the part of an anvil with tremendous success, helping to both squeeze the sandwich into a single-layered chimera of its erstwhile constituents, and to provide an angled hard-edge for various folding, bending and contorting operations to be enabled. The packet of salt and vinegar crisps has fared little better than its bready companion, and although not burst open, its potato-derived cargo shares more aesthetic commonality with sand than the image on the front of the bag.
Not all of these crimes against lunch integrity can be attributed to the metal flask and tupperware duo, however. They were ably assisted, or possibly manipulated into misdeeds, by a heavy and uncompromising laptop. Although fashionably rounded, its corners still manage to deliver pointed strikes to vulnerable pressure points of bread and bag alike. It engages in regular, audible skirmishes with the metal flask, their conflict ringing out like the tolling of a dented bell or the weak striking of a rusted hammer, but neither one comes away with any great victory or defeat.
Winding around all combatants and victims, seeking to choke them out and irrevocably organise itself into something like a dense tapestry, is the laptop's charger. Although inextricably linked through functionality and symbiosis, the laptop unable to function without the charger and the charger without purpose unless the laptop is nearby, they do not collude towards common goals within the world of the bag. Oftentimes, the thick wire deflects a sturdy blow that would otherwise rupture a crust, thus actively resisting the work of the laptop. But occasionally, very occasionally, the slow curling and constricting efforts of the charger manage to capture the squishy and malleable sandwich in the embrace of an insulated tendril, and give it a thorough and sensible crushing. The vicious pins of the plug sometimes probe at the confines of the bag, or seek to push themselves into the back of the man, uncaring as to whether these attacks help or hinder his progress, but the charger’s overall motive, if there indeed is one, remains unknown to all but itself.
By mercy or by serendipity, Jacob's back is free from plug-based assault in this particular instance. From your account of what lies within his backpack, it is reasonable and sensible to assume that his somewhat expeditious journey along the road, both important enough for a hurried walk but not important enough to justify a run, is related to his employment in some manner. Another piece of evidence for this is the bright red lanyard that dangles from his neck, with an ID card bouncing around on the end. Like all neck-bound forms of identification, its presence is vital for trust, since it allows any suspicious party to check that the wearer has access to a printer which can write on cards. Although Jacob's identity would never be relied upon in the absence of this pendant of documentation, the details held thereon are doomed never to be checked; such is the great tradition of the lanyard paradox.
The lanyard itself is not plain, but printed with 'Yessman Ltd: Outreach Specialist', alongside the Yessman logo of a big thumbs up, complete with resolutely and tightly closed eyes. Jacob Bocaj is, it can be accurately assumed, an Outreach Specialist with Yessman Ltd, a company whose motto and driving philosophy are openly communicated as 'You worry about the details, and let us say "yes"!'. The many complaints arising about the density of punctuation at the end of this motto serve to drown out the far more relevant complaints about the enormous potential for damage to be done by saying yes to everything. When asked if this was accidental or deliberate, a company spokesperson simply replied with 'yes'.
It would be unfair to judge any individual solely by their occupation, even someone like Jacob Bocaj about whom we know very little else, save for his poor back packing practices and his decision to walk along a road which in no way stands out among its peers. It is the opposite of outstanding, and there may be a temptation to describe Jacob in the same way at this stage, but labelling and disregarding the man should be postponed, at least until full details are available.
It can be readily imagined that Jacob continues his active journey along the road of no repute, ill or otherwise. Every few tens of paces he checks his watch, just in case he read it wrongly the previous dozen times, or his perception of the passage of time should have become unreliable. In none of his checks do either of these possibilities transpire to be the case, but he keeps going regardless, being ever the optimist or ever the idiot. Again, judgement at this stage would surely be premature.
The target of Jacob's walk, unsurprisingly, is not on the road along which he travels, in alignment with the heavily laboured point that this road, among all roads, is nothing of which to speak, call out or otherwise draw attention. The only reason it is being rendered into your mind is because it is where Jacob happens to be. It is arguable that the narrative could have begun at a later stage of Jacob's journey, such that any mention of the road could have been avoided, but that would be to attribute any importance to the road at all; if it's worth avoiding, then there must be something special about it to warrant such avoidance, and that is an unacceptable level of exceptional treatment for such a distinctly commonplace kind of road. No, the target of Jacob's journey, his destination at the end of the accelerated and now slightly sweaty walk, is the house of one Mr. Phillip Goskin.
Mr Philip Goskin is yet to be in the proximity of Jacob Bocaj, and thus there is no need to picture him just yet, but it is appropriate to address the reason for Jacob's descent upon his residential address on Pearson Drive, a small street just off the road of no defining features.
Mr Goskin, as would be evident from an inspection of the documents residing on Jacob's laptop, is receiving a visit from a representative of Yessman Ltd., the aforementioned Jacob, at his own request. Philip himself would call it more of a demand than a request, such is the nature of his motivation, but the internal documentation and the portal through which it was submitted to Yessman Ltd. refer to it as a request. They don't deal in demands, because saying yes to a demand does less to make one sound amenable than saying yes to a request.
In the body of the form, wherein resides the 'Reason for Request' field, it can be observed that Mr Goskin wished to speak to a representative of Yessman Ltd. in relation to certain incidents which had occurred some four days prior to its submission, which is four weeks previous to the events being described. He has declined to elaborate on those circumstances, instead wishing for the representative to witness them first hand and react accordingly. This is the sort of message that gets one of two diametrically opposed responses, those being immediate dismissal and deletion by the customer service representative (in the case of Yessman Ltd., this representative is a rainbow macaw due to a complicated legal battle with the local zoo) or frenzied and zealous obeisance to avoid a protracted legal battle, which might otherwise result in the mandate to hire a tropical bird. For a company like Yessman Ltd., which cannot refuse a chance to agree to something and is convinced that lightning will strike twice, there could only be one possible outcome.
Jacob's clockwork watch checking continues tirelessly. It grows more distressing each time, because the time it shows is round and about quarter to ten, and Jacob is due at Mr Goskin's house at half past nine. No amount of swift walking will reverse the clock by a quarter of an hour, and this is knowledge that you can take to be readily available to Jacob as he finally rounds the corner from somewhere not at all worth mentioning, and onto Pearson Drive.
Pearson Drive itself bears at least some description, seeing as it contains the home of Philip Goskin and could therefore be considered a place of interest. It should be borne in mind, however, that this interest is entirely contextual, since neither Pearson Drive nor Philip Goskin would, under normal circumstances, be worthy of an extensive narrative. Their inclusion in your gradually growing mental picture is not because they possess intrinsic or inherent properties which render them worthy of your time, but because they are necessary elements to fully flesh out the story being related.
Give yourself the gift of picturing a straight road, its tarmac dark and largely intact, with white painted markings in the centre to advise drivers, cyclists and the more adventurous pedestrians whereabouts they should be when attempting to make forward progress. A dashed line of verges runs along each pavement, and those verges themselves are variously populated with trees, bushes, electrical junction boxes, discarded furniture or long-forgotten bin bags. Residential structures covering a broad array of sizes, qualities and states of disrepair keep an ever-lasting watch over those verges, bin bags and road markings, and provide an effective containment method for the residents who call Pearson Drive home.
Only one of those residential containers is allocated, owned or occupied by the Philip Goskin of interest to Jacob Bocaj. It would be folly to disregard the possibility that other Philip Goskins, or Philips Goskin if you prefer, might live in any other houses on or off of Pearson Drive out of hand, but rest assured that the roll of the dice and the fall of the coin in this instance have rendered Pearson Drive a single Philip Goskin road. There happen to be no others. It is not, therefore, going to be the case that Jacob Bocaj arrives at the Pearson Drive address of the incorrect P. Goskin, nor will it come to pass that an impostor Goskin, potentially described as an imposkin in the pursuit of syllabic easing, has provided their address in the true Goskin's stead.
These assurances are, of course, unavailable to Jacob. However, such is his confidence in Philip's capability to enter his own address in an online form, and so much faith does he have in humanity that no-one would try to deceive him in matters as critical as a home visit from a representative of Yessman Ltd., that he hasn't even considered that either circumstance might come to pass. He also does not have time to worry about things like that, late as he is to his mysterious appointment. Instead, you can picture his attentions being handed wholesale to the pursuit of furtive glances at the doors he sees to his left and right, as he seeks to compare the house numbers written thereon to the target of his search. He makes many discoveries in this endeavour, from the allocation of even and odd numbers per side of the road being distinctly in his favour, to the rising allocations of those numbers as he continues his travel. His abilities to count and to estimate the relative sizes of numbers notwithstanding, he still feels the need to look at every house as he walks, just in case Mr Goskin's address should have ensconced itself out of sequence for reasons of either malice or ignorance.
Despite the innocence and legitimacy of these observations about his general area, the daytime residents of Pearson Drive with nothing better to do are displeased about this development. From their presumed positions of invisibility, standing half a metre or so away from their front windows with curtains fully open, they use their active imaginations, and fierce loyalty to the concept of the neighbourhood watch, to fuel a deeply held assertion that Jacob can only be planning a spree of violence and misdeeds. Placing enough stock in his observational skills that he can fully assess the vulnerabilities of a building from a sub-second glance towards its door, but not enough that he'll see the frowning spy behind a pane of glass, they manically form descriptions of the perpetrator to share on their local area social media groups. Terms like 'suspicious-looking', 'has a head, probably full of bad ideas and worse intentions' and 'gave me the creeps, like a door-to-door salesman made of spiders and ash' can be imagined to pop into the collective consciousness of the area. None of them can rest easily until the definite threat of the briskly walking stranger has passed out of the zone they so zealously surveil, and has moved on to a more acceptably burglable property like next door.
As with so many other aspects of Pearson Drive and his journey in general, Jacob labours in perfect ignorance of the crimes being hypothetically attributed to him. Instead he pushes on until he at last spots the house number he seeks. For the purpose of narrative completeness it can be taken that the house number is 103, but with fervour second only to the total irrelevance of the previously walked road, it must be asserted that the value of this number is not an object of concern or interest by its own inherent virtues, and can be as easily and healthily disregarded as the details of a totally different story. It will not have a bearing on future events. Waste no more time in its consideration.
See now the bearing of Jacob Bocaj undergo a distinct shift. The time for hurrying, the first step of damage mitigation, has come to an end, and he instead performs a number of small corrections to his appearance. Creases are quickly smoothed out of his shirt, along with some tucking of errant hems, and he straightens his backpack. On goes his game face, the demure and neutrally welcoming expression of professionalism, and he raises his head up to correct what remains of his posture. Naturally, he is trying to make a good impression on behalf of Yessman Ltd, or as good of an impression as he can make while running late. It would, of course, make a total mockery of his minor dress fixes for Mr Goskin to have watched it happen through the window, like one of the many neighbourhood watchers. Thankfully for Jacob this was not the case. Mr Goskin was not spending his additional pre-meeting time engaged in window gazing or front-path monitoring, removing a potential thorn from Jacob and Yessman Ltd's side right from the get-go.
Not looking this gift horse in the mouth, or anywhere else for that matter, Jacob proceeds with all horse-blindness up the paved path towards the front door of number 103 Pearson Drive. To his right there is a small patch of lawn, given equally to grass, clovers, dandelions and the collected leavings of most of the neighbourhood's feline residents. To his left, less disquietingly, there is a flower bed which appears to be well-tended. The geographic divide on display within the realm of this single front garden is stark, and suggests damning things about Mr Goskin's capacity for valuing each member of his outer household equally, but yet again it fails to become any of Jacob's concern. He is now a being of total commitment and complete focus, embodying every aspect of a corporate facade and all the virtues of Yessman Ltd. If anyone has been inconvenienced then he will be apologetic for it, without offering any evidence of actually feeling remorse, admitting wrongdoing or providing any evidence that their ways will be changed. If someone is pleased then he will take total responsibility for everything that has been accomplished, claiming with utter certainty that it was exactly as planned and totally intentional. His jokes will be soulless but harmless if he is forced to make any, his pleasantries will inoffensive, and his manner will be unflappably welcoming without being at all helpful. He is a veteran of his trade, if not a veteran of years, and even his press of a doorbell, a respectful single-second affair, has the edge of a board-approved, think-tank honed outreach action. It's artistry for the worst gallery in any known civilisation.
Jacob's face, until recently a solemn mask of emotionless time pressure, is now rigid with the joyless smile of an official representative. He waits unmoving and unblinking, like a crocodile without teeth at the edge of an unfamiliar watering hole. Soon the antelope will open the door for him, and he'll erupt quietly from the water, accept a mediocre cup of tea if such a beverage is to be offered, and then listen politely while the as-yet mysterious complaint is raised. Many people in Jacob's position choose to undergo a sort of detachment, a mental compartmentalisation to keep their conscious thoughts isolated from the banal fury of the public potentially scorned. Jacob has not yet acquired this skill, but he is beginning to tell himself that he doesn't have to personally care if Yessman Ltd also refuses to take any serious interest. This move is the healthiest thing he can do for himself, given the circumstances.
The door he faces, as with most of its kind, cannot stand up to the passive smile for long, and yields under the assistance of the house's resident. Under normal circumstances, this is the point at which Jacob would have spoken. He'd have given a polite and professional greeting, perhaps 'hello' or 'good morning' or 'how do you do', introduced himself, and then asked how their day was going. It isn't a rigidly structured script, and different representatives have their own flavours, but it gives him the appearance of speaking like a real human when he is, in fact, an emotionally checked-out vessel for corporate interests.
At the door of 103 Pearson Drive, presented with his first glimpse of Philip Goskin, Jacob Bocaj can be pictured to find himself quite unable to easily slip into his script. His mouth does manage to open though, so bring to your mind an image of what some typical, healthy teeth might look like. Jacob's tongue warrants no special attention, and nor do his gums, so labour not on those details. The silent opening of his mouth coincides with a non-committal offer of a handshake, his arm rocketing upwards reflexively but stopping short of the horizontal mark to which it normally aspires. Not even Jacob's desire to repair the reputational damage he's already done, that caused by his late and slightly sweaty arrival, can overcome the natural gut reaction that he is experiencing.
"Uh... Hello. Mr Goskin?" Mr Bocaj eventually manages. A question such as that would normally be effectively rhetorical, having been invited to that address at that time by the person he was intending to meet. In this instance it was wholly earnest.
"Yes. I'm Mr Goskin. I presume you're from Yessman, are you?" Mr Goskin replies, his tone terse and unimpressed. A physical description of Philip Goskin shall be left aside for the moment, a decision taken for narrative effect rather than disinterest. It should be abundantly clear by this stage that even those elements of the story which hold no interest or relevance will receive a cursory or perfunctory description; a certain road of the utmost mediocrity serves as a tangible example of this.
"Uh..." replies Jacob. It isn't a helpful reply, nor a particularly dignified one. The question posed by Mr Goskin is not something which should require significant thought or consideration; Jacob either is or is not from Yessman Ltd., and that knowledge should be readily available to him. For the avoidance of doubt, in case there had been any room left for it, Jacob is indeed from Yessman Ltd. "Uh, yes. Yes, I am, sorry. I'm Jacob Bocaj. I apologise for being so late, Mr Goskin, and I hope that you're... er... having a good day." he says, confirming the reassurances recently made, and making a sterling effort to get himself back on track.
"I am not having a very good day, no, and I think you might be able to clearly see why that is. And why I didn't feel it possible to better explain my complaint on your blasted online form." Mr Goskin rebuffs, not one to be drawn in by the insincere pleasantries that Yessman Ltd. has trained Jacob to spout. Much to the hidden satisfaction of Philip Goskin, Jacob relents to a short, sheepish nod. He can perfectly understand the logic that Mr Goskin has applied in pursing the actions he's taken.
The time has now come to describe Mr Goskin, as Jacob sees him unveiled at the door of 103 Pearson Drive. It can be readily surmised that this is the crux of the story, the whole motivator for describing the events which have occurred up to this point. It is left as an exercise for the reader to determine whether or not the efforts taken in both writing and reading those words was, in any way, worth it.
Starting at the lowest point and working upwards, Mr Goskin has a pair of feet. This is generally a positive thing, and not something about which the aforementioned Philip would see fit to complain to Yessman Ltd., unless they had previously promised him a third or fourth. For the record, they had promised no such thing. Above the feet, as the rest of Mr Goskin resides, is where the problems begin to set in. A more typical trousered leg would be narrow when compared to the door frame. Its edges would be tapered to the curve approximated by an ironed piece of fabric, and one could be forgiven for describing the overall shape as roughly cylindrical. Perhaps, for an athlete or similar, the topmost shape could be called conical, where there is a lot of thigh to manage.
Not so for Mr Goskin.
The Goskin thighs are no broader than the Goskin knees or calves, but that is only because all of those constituent parts are as broad and flat as the pavements along which Jacob has so recently and expeditiously walked. Tracksuit bottoms are stretched well beyond their zone of comfort, and past even their zone of extreme discomfort, finding themselves in what one might reasonably label the zone of credible grounds for legal action on the basis of cruelty to clothing. Sharp, straight edges of what appear to be concrete press and strain at the fabric from within, discolouring it, pulling the threads apart, and holding it right at the point of snapping.
The situation above the elongated leggings is little better. Philip Goskin's torso is a single, vast rectangle hidden inexpertly within the confines of an oversized jumper which, despite its excess of dimensions for a human, is still inadequate for the purpose of containing the Goskin torso with any dignity or decorum. Its sleeves fare much the same as the trousers, with cylindrically-intended fabric tubes being irresponsibly applied to broad cuboids. Somehow, the presence of two perfectly normal human hands emerging from the ends of those sleeves only serves to make the image worse.
Atop the wide Goskin, in the usual position if not of the usual shape, is the head. Its shape, much like those of the body parts below, is that of the paving slab, and its concrete colouring does nothing to dissuade the observer from that comparison. Further to that, in fact, it's worthwhile confirming that it is indeed made from concrete, and it teeters atop the unusually broad and right-angled shoulders like a sail of a ship made from wholly inappropriate materials. The slight protrusion of a chin is just about visible, with an aperture for the mouth that's disquietingly surrounded by cracks and crumbling edges. A nose that dares to tend towards the colour of flesh pushes forwards beyond even the plane of the chin, and upon it rests a pair of spectacles whose arms have been unfairly splayed, with no more sinister purpose than allowing the lens-to-eye distance to be in a useful range. There is no hair to be seen, and only two roughly-hewn funnels allow sound to be piped to the Goskin ears, deep within the concrete.
Mr Philip Goskin himself can be imagined to best summarise his circumstances to the visiting Jacob.
"I, by no fault of my own and by every fault of Yessman, have been paved!" Philip says.
Although the specific details of the Goskin case are decidedly unusual, Jacob Bocaj is able to take some degree of comfort in the familiar narrative and sentiment of the complaint; an innocent member of the public has been wronged by Yessman Ltd., who are claimed to shoulder the full weight of liability for whatever went wrong. It is precisely this type of customer complaint about which Yessman cares most. They are ships carrying the dangerous cargo of mistrust and reputational damage, and Jacob has been trained to thoroughly scuttle their hulls whenever possible, to avoid their manifests falling into the public eye.
"Yes, I can definitely see that you're of the paved persuasion." Jacob says with as much of a smile as he dares, snapping into his Yessman Ltd. persona. "Would it be agreeable to you if I were to come in and discuss your complaint further, Mr Goskin? I'd like to think that we can clarify the circumstances and demonstrate that Yessman has behaved with your interests, and I mean specifically your interests, Mr Goskin, at heart."
"I highly doubt that, when you maliciously and carelessly paved me!" Mr Goskin snaps, in the figurative sense of speech rather than the literal sense of his concrete ceasing to be in single parts. Regardless, he steps to one side, hinging like a door so as not to block the entire hallway with his aggregate-heavy body, to allow Jacob in.
"Yes, you do doubt that, and of that I have no doubt." Jacob says. You would do well to picture the barely-hidden smugness he's been trained to wear, giving any complainant the subtle impression that their concerns have already been dismissed and disproven out of hand. It is the part of his 'customer confidence suppression' training that Jacob had found most engaging, and he conducts it expertly. "And I am pleased to announce that no actions can be both malicious and careless, since malice requires a level of care to ensure that a harmful outcome is achieved, so you must be mistaken in your assertions about Yessman Ltd. It's sounding to me, wonderfully, that Yessman must have been looking after your needs, and that this is a simple misunderstanding with a good-faith misattribution of intent."
Even while saying this, Jacob politely removes his shoes and places them neatly at the bottom of the shoe rack. It will take a devastating toll on his socks, since the carpet of the hallway is utterly littered with small fragments of concrete that have fallen from Mr Goskin.
"I fail to see how paving a member of the public can be in their interest, Mr Bocaj."
"Yes, you do. But that's perfectly alright! No-one, even Yessman Ltd., is obligated to know everything about every situation that could be conceivably imagined." smiles Jacob. He stands, now shoeless, underneath a tasteless set of wall lamps, mixing floral patterns with art deco panels and gothic spires. He makes a mental note of this while surreptitiously photographing the concrete dust on the carpet using his phone; evidence of Mr Goskin's unhealthy fascination with the construction material in question is of great value to Yessman Ltd.
"You cheeky git. Go on, go and sit down in the living room. It's hard for me to stand for too long because your lot has encased me in rock." growls Philip. More dust and tiny pieces of stone fall as he speaks, to one day find a new home in the vacuum cleaner’s dust cup.
Doing as he is told, which is a key part of his suitability for his role, Jacob steps into the living room of Philip Goskin's home, and takes a seat on the armchair by the window. Another quick photograph is taken of the sofa, which has a set of long, straight indentations, such as one might form by resting huge concrete paving slabs on the cushions. He feels safe in doing this, because Mr Goskin seems to be incapable of moving quickly. The loud shuffling of highly load-bearing feet through the thick carpet tells Jacob all he needs to know about whether or not he is being observed.
His photography done, Jacob takes the laptop out of his bag, and spares but a solitary glance for his punished and abused lunch. His face contorts with regret for just a moment, before the professional glaze reasserts itself. Be assured that his superficial attention to Mr Goskin is backed up by a thorough internal monologue mourning the loss of his sandwich integrity. Details of such a monologue are not considered to serve the story of the moment, and will thus be left to the imagination.
"Yes, I have taken a set. Would you be willing to outline the events as you perceived them, Mr Goskin, so that I might be able to construct an accurate picture for my colleagues?" he asks, getting to the core of the business at hand. Open on his laptop is the 'Complaint Dismissal Notebook', which helps him to organise his thoughts on how to spin, dismiss, belittle, gaslight and otherwise refute any claim made by any complainant. The introduction of this notebook was noted to have reduced compensation paid to genuinely injured parties by over fifty percent, much to the joy of the Yessman shareholders and the detriment of justice.
"My perception of events is better known as how they actually happened, Mr Bocaj. The pavement repair crew, employed by Yessman Ltd., was there to repair the damage done by the previous pavement repair crew, also employed by Yessman Ltd. They were to break up the cracked slabs and replace them, so that I didn't trip every time I tried to walk out of my home." Mr Goskin explains, angrily, as he sits himself down on the sofa. Due to the rigidity of his concrete clothing, which Mr Bocaj is currently writing up as a personal choice by Philip, this process takes some time and is rather limited. The grinding of slab on slab underneath his tracksuit signals the point at which further bending in the middle becomes impossible.
"Yes, that sounds accurate compared to our records." interrupts Jacob, keen to be able to genuinely agree with something before the slanderous accusations from Mr Goskin start. "Yessman Ltd. has despatched at least two crews to repair this pavement alone, and many more to deal with problems in other parts of this neighbourhood. It's evidence of how much we care about the communities which fall underneath the umbrella of our remit's jurisdiction."
"It's hard to see how doing a series of bad jobs that require more of your highly-priced time can be called care about the community, Mr Bocaj." Goskin grumbles. Jacob nods, in agreement that Philip finds it hard to see. "But the point I was trying to make, before I was interrupted, is that I was left in a paved and incapacitated state by the Yessman Ltd. road crew."
This is precisely the moment for which Jacob Bocaj has been waiting, a direct attack against Yessman Ltd., their intentions, and their duty of care. Although they are physically sat in a living room which is as bereft of taste and quality as a wine made from Styrofoam, Jacob begins to see something rather different. Gone is the floral patterned carpet, and absent are the magnolia walls. The three-piece-suite is invisible to him, as it should be to anyone with a modicum of taste, but that’s besides the major point. Jacob Bocaj does not see the living room of 103 Pearson Drive any longer, but an endless plane of frozen starlight stretching to eternity in every direction. He stands tall, hundreds of metres tall, gripping a scimitar made from the purest molten iron and time. This is very much different from the Jacob you should have been picturing up to now, as is the Philip Goskin of Jacob’s mind’s eye. This angry man is still encased in concrete, but he clutches a flaming sword in his clawed hands, bone puncturing through the skin and rising outwards at every knuckle. Their great combat has begun, and he fights for the very future of Yessman Ltd.
"Yes! You probably were, sir." Jacob says. This might be a surprise to you, for much the same reason that is surprises Mr Goskin. He gasps to give evidence of this, because it's as impossible for him to raise his eyebrows as it would be for Jacob to see them rise, even if he’d been mentally present in the room.
"Oh. Well, that's a bad thing. They shouldn't have done it. They can't go around paving people!"
"Yes, they can't."
It takes Philip a moment to parse that response. It’s a feint by the blade of molten iron, which swings around the flaming defence of Goskin and slashes a streak in his emerald torso.
"This conversation is taking a very different course to the one I expected." Mr Goskin says, and that’s despite knowing nothing about the extra-dimensional battle ongoing in the mind of Jacob Bocaj.
"Yes, I suppose it is. Our road crews are not permitted to pave anything or anyone that is not explicitly called out on the oppression form with which we supply them. The key question we need to answer, and the one on which I'm sure we'll find common ground, Mr Goskin, is whether or not you were paved and incapacitated before they left you."
Mr Goskin's expression becomes stony at this point, the figurative layer now matching the literal one. The imagined one lunges forwards with a fiery stab.
"Of course not!"
"Yes, good. That's great news. You were not paved and incapacitated before they left you, and therefore you were paved and incapacitated by parties other than the Yessman Ltd. road crew at some stage after they left their site of work." Jacob’s golden fist slaps the weapon away and crunches into the concrete thorax of the apparently insectoid opponent he’s imagining.
"Wha-… no! No, you fool!" complains the real Mr Goskin. He can be pictured in an attempt to throw his hands in the air, only to find himself somewhat unable to on account of the extreme masses with which he's currently working. "I was neither paved nor incapacitated when the road crew arrived, and then they just paved right over me and left me incapacitated."
"Yes, we agree on how you were left, sir. You just said you weren't either paved or incapacitated before they left, and now you claim that you were neither thing when the crew arrived, and then you were at some point in the middle. So it seems to me like a paving incident occurred at some stage, and then you were left unpaved and healthily capacitated by the crew. There's no problem, because the situation was resolved straight away."
The molten sword severs a leathery wing. It’s unclear why the Goskin beast would need to fly around an infinite void, and it’s unlikely that the question will ever be answered.
"What are you talking about? Look at me! I'm paved!"
"Yes, you are. That might well have happened at some point after the events we're discussing, contradicting nothing you've said and fitting with all the evidence we've been able to gather. It's wonderful when we're able to reach common ground and avoid a confrontation."
By all rights, a severed body part should make for a killing blow, or at least a combat-winning blow. Picture the real Jacob smirking.
"Listen up, your crew left me like this. I was not paved when they arrived, and I was when they left. They paved me. It is that simple."
The smirk fades, and the imagined Jacob feels the horned skull of Goskin tear up through four out of five of his countless legs.
"Yes, Mr Goskin, I see that it is that simple. I'll note down all the accounts you've given so that a simple narrative can be extracted from them. Where were you when this paving happened, may I ask?" he says. Spinning this is still possible, he tells himself. In his mind he prepares to counter-strike.
"I was on the bit of the pavement to be repaired, of course. Where else would I have been in order to get paved?" complained Mr Goskin. It was just the opening for which both Jacobs had been waiting.
"Yes, it is hard to see where else you would be. So I think it's fair to say that you were within the confines of the work area? Inside the orange barriers which delineate the work area from the non-work area, which is to say, the rest of the road?"
The molten sword rises up, hovering above the spine of the Goskin beast. The imagined Jacob’s backpack is pulled taut, and his hyper-planar sandwich is mashed by his eldritch flask.
"Well, yes. Of course I was."
"Yes, good. Then you were in contravention of the signage always appended to the barriers, which clearly states that unauthorised personnel, of whom you were one by virtue of not being among the road crew, are not permitted to enter. It seems that any paving was willingly entered into by yourself by entering the work area."
Through the body goes the sword. Surely, Jacob thinks, the battle is done.
"I did no such thing! They built it around me!"
"Yes, you didn't? How did they come to construct the work area around you?" Jacob asks, shocked. A gout of acidic blood pours from the Goskin beast’s wound and corrodes his noble face.
"Well... because I didn't want to move from where I was. I was in the middle of something." replies Philip, sounding a little less assertive than previously.
"Yes, that sounds understandable. Of what were you in the middle?" Jacob asks, regaining his composure.
“I don’t really want to say.”
Maybe the spinal stab did something after all.
“Yes, you don’t, but if you fail to provide details then we will be forced to assume that we are correct in everything we say.” Jacob informs him, quoting verbatim from the company FAQ.
“That’s unenforceable!”
“Yes, our lawyers told us that, but it’s worked out in our favour every time anyway.”
The beast coughs up a gout of galactic phlegm.
"A nap." Mr Goskin admits.
"On the pavement? Excuse me…, I meant, yes, on the pavement?"
"What's the matter with that? It's public land and I pay my taxes, so I can sleep there if I like." Goskin tries, sounding as if he’s trying to convince himself as much as Jacob. The beast struggles to stand up.
"Yes, you presumably do and you presumably can." says Jacob, making notes to the contrary while his imaginary avatar swirls its blade. "I think I have a clear picture of events, Mr Goskin. You were taking a nap on the pavement when the crew arrived. They attempted to move you and you refused, so they worked around you and you gave consent to be embedded into the pavement to provide a better quality of nap. They then left you as you wished to be, still asleep, with another job well done."
The molten blade swings down again.
"I hardly think that's an accurate reflection of events." argues Philip Goskin. The beast’s flaming sword deflects the blow.
"Yes, you don't, but you are still paved to this day."
A golden fist into an oozing shoulder.
"I was told not to change anything until my complaint was processed, otherwise it might affect the outcome!"
A barbed claw rakes a golden cheek.
"Yes, and so did not changing anything. I see that you have made no attempt to remove the concrete in the four weeks since the incident, and am forced to take that into consideration."
"I had no choice but to make do."
"Yes, and you made do very well. It clearly hasn't inhibited your lifestyle severely."
"It's been a real pain in... Well, everywhere. And there's concrete dust all over the house."
Blows are traded. Bodies fall to the ground dramatically and then recover in the nick of time. It’s like every Saturday morning cartoon that Jacob has ever watched rolled into one. Picture his childish grin which leaks out, despite himself, as he debates with Mr Goskin. The latter is incapable of smiling, even if he’d wanted to.
"Yes, I've seen that. It speaks to how much you love concrete. There's all sorts of evidence of that."
See now, as Jacob does, the blazing sword of his nemesis drop, lowered meekly to the side of its wielder, who in this case is very wide and flat.
"What on earth do you mean by that?"
"Yes, on the earth there's concrete, mostly on the pathway up to your front door. There's concrete dust all around your home as you yourself have pointed out, you were lying down on the concrete pavement waiting to be paved yourself, you've lived as a paving slab for a whole month, and you've not even made the slightest attempt to remove it since I arrived here and saw your condition. Surely you would want it off as soon as possible, unless you secretly love being a paved man."
See dust blow over the sacred battleground between them, its panchromatic icefields ceasing to drift with the stasis of the combatants. A little concrete dust falls down as Philip Goskin's face twitches.
"You even have clothing that is able to stretch over a whole pavement's worth of slabs, Mr Goskin. The signs are all there."
The molten sword carves out one more time. It's the killing blow. Mr Goskin is felled like a three-leaf clover under a lawnmower blade. The imaginary battlefield dissipates.
"I suppose I do have a little bit of an affinity with it." Mr Goskin admits gingerly, fiddling with his fingers. Jacob smiles.
"Yes, you do. And in that case, Yessman Ltd. has helped you to achieve your dreams, thereby showing how much it cares for its community, and how well it knows everyone within it."
Mr Goskin sighs. It's a heavy sigh, heavier even than the paving slabs encasing his legs, because it carries every scrap of resentment and fury that he'd been harbouring for the previous four weeks. With his lungs clear, he is able now to breathe in a great gulp of acceptance at his true nature. This doesn't have much of a visual element to add to one's mental tapestry, but perhaps a mental annotation or footnote can be appended somewhere in the margins.
"Yes. They have." he agrees. "I suppose I should thank you for your time."
"Yes, you might suppose that, but it's unnecessary." Jacob replies, in perfect accordance with his training to reject gratitude for cheating victims out of their compensation. "I wish you the very best of luck in your new lifestyle, Mr Goskin. And if you should ever find yourself cracked and in danger of being a trip hazard then Yessman Ltd. can despatch a road repair crew free of charge in the first instance." he smiles, dropping a business card onto Philip's coffee table. The hooks are in, and outreach has been reached out.
See now a montage of Jacob and Philip saying their goodbyes. Mr Bocaj walks back out of 103 Pearson Drive, and turns back towards the road that, to this day, warrants absolutely no notice from anyone. In his backpack, the sandwich takes another hit for the team, and Yessman Ltd. is saved again.