I arrived in the foyer of the bank, which had recently received a makeover. It was all open-plan and seemed rather sparse, with just singular counters dotted around. There wasn’t much in the way of signage so I hovered at one of the pods waiting for a little old lady to finish being served. She was slightly deaf so I couldn’t help but overhear all her balances (she was wearing a tatty old coat and her shoes were worn through but she had over fifty thousand pounds in one account!). She seemed to want to increase her standing order to the Cat Protection League but the young man who was serving her thought she’d be better off taking out some sort of funeral plan. She eventually signed the forms he gave her and left, looking bewildered.
“Yes mate?” I was a bit surprised to be addressed in this way by someone who worked in a bank, but perhaps it was all part of the relaxed image  they were trying to create. I told him I needed an overdraft to get me through to payday.
“Well, you’re at the wrong counter my friend, but no probs, it’s cool. I’m Dazza,” he stuck out a sovereign-ringed hand, which I shook, noticing he had a scorpion tattooed on his wrist. “Let’s get you sorted, then.” He led the way to a glass-fronted side room and tapped my account details into a computer. 
“I just need to borrow about twenty pounds for a couple of weeks,” I explained. “I had to give my mum extra for a sudden increase in council tax-”
“Yep, yep,” Dazza loosened his purple tie and tapped away intently. “Right. It says you can have an £800 overdraft. I’ll load it on. You got a credit card?”
“Er, no, you see, I’m usually very careful not to spend more than I earn-”
“You gotta ‘av a credit card, mate! What if you book a holiday and the company goes bust? You won’t get any money back if you didn’t book with a credit card.”
I didn’t know that. It was a good point, although I wasn’t planning on taking a holiday anytime soon; Myra and I had gone camping in Somerset last year but after two days spent bailing buckets of rainwater out of the tent, Myra insisted we came home. She hadn’t even slept in the tent – she spent the two nights under the hand-dryer in the Ladies.
Dazza cracked his knuckles. “You got any personal accident insurance?”
“Well, I work in an insurance call centre, Perypils-”
“Cos if you walk out of ‘ere and go straight under a bus, I’d never forgive myself.”
“But, I don’t have any children or anything-”
“Don’t matter mate! What if you lost a limb? An arm, say, in a freak chain saw accident. You wouldn’t be able to work very easily then, would you?”
“But I live at home, with my mum. I don’t have a mortgage-”
“What if you lost your hearing? You couldn’t carry on working in a call centre, could you? You might never work again. You don’t want to live at home with your dear old ma for the rest of your life, do you?”
He was right, of course; I would like my own place some day and when I became a star of the theatre I’d probably have an apartment in the West End, which would cost a small fortune. What a good thing I came into the bank today! I’d been walking around completely unprotected all this time. Dazza was starting to write on some forms and I glanced at my watch. I daren’t be late back, Kate was sure to spot me. Dazza noticed my concern. “Tell you what mate, as you’re in a hurry, just sign here, here, here and here and I can fill in the rest later. Alright?”
He was very considerate and obviously cared a great deal about his customers. I suspected he was very successful in his chosen career; he must be, if he was able to afford that chunky gold identity bracelet. Perhaps I should get one. Would Lucy think it was edgy? Damn; it might just have swung the Danny Zuko audition. 
Dazza took me to the till so I could take some money out. I only needed £20 but in the end I took £40 so I could take Myra to the cinema; Saw 7(3D) was being re-shown. She loved the Saw films. I found the gore too difficult
to watch and would probably spend most of the movie gazing fixedly into the popcorn box, but it was certain to cheer Myra up. I took my cash and left the bank, walking out past a long queue of angry-looking customers waiting at  Dazza’s counter. Oops - he’d probably spent too long with
me.

I was dreading having to tell everyone at work I’d been unsuccessful for the role of Danny Zuko. They were always so supportive of my singing and I felt as if I’d let them all down. I thought I’d tell Jess first, but as soon as she came in she said “Tough tits, Foggy, better luck next time.” Facebook - of course! I hadn’t looked at it for almost a whole day. Jess told me that someone had posted my performance of Summer Nights on there last night, which was really kind of them. I was desperate to have a look but there were calls queuing and Kate was on the prowl. As I answered a call, I saw her scoop something up from George’s desk and hurl it into the food waste bin. I couldn’t see what it was but it made quite a clunk. Kate was always tidying up the department.
     My customer wanted a quote for his Datsun so I started to go through all the usual questions with him as I
 watched George and Lucy came back from their morning meeting. At first I thought she’d been crying again as her eyes were all watery but then I realised she was laughing – it was great to see her looking so happy!  George seemed to be doing an impression of a chicken; he was flapping his arms and strutting about, obviously doing his best to cheer Lucy up. I thought I heard him sing “tell me more, tell me more!” but it was a bit difficult to hear properly as my customer had raised his voice.“Why do you want to know if I’ve
got any speeding convictions? What’s that got to do with anything?”
     “Well, your premium will be higher if you’ve got points on your driving licence.” I thought everyone knew
  that. 
     “My driving licence?” There was a short silence. “I said I wanted a quote for my DASCHUND you cloth-eared moron!  What the f-“
     I winced as he launched into a volley of obscenities. Honestly, there was no need for that. I looked around at
  the team and they all seemed to be laughing along with George and Lucy; trust me to miss out on all the fun! George stopped larking about when he reached his desk; his face fell and he suddenly looked very serious. “Where’s my phone?”
     It was lunchtime before I managed to log into Facebook. Oh my God! My performances had received two 
hundred and seventeen likes! That was amazing; thank goodness for friends – I felt enormously cheered after the disappointment of losing out on the Danny Zuko role. I scrolled down the list to see if Lucy had liked it – she had! What a sweet girl. There were forty-three comments too, but I didn’t have time to read them all, as I needed to get to the bank to arrange an overdraft. I’d save the pleasure of reading everyone’s comments until I got home but I had a quick peek at the first one. It was from my mate Barry Lund and he’d written “I feel like
chicken tonight!” That was odd, but then he’d probably been at the white spirit again.

           
I was sitting in Den’s late night diner, passing paper napkins to Myra. I didn’t have any handkies and the toilets had run out of loo roll. At least she had stopped hyper-ventilating now; at one point I was fearful I’d have to give her the kiss of life, like I’d had to once when we were watching television and her mother had suddenly appeared on Babestation. The diner was empty; all the other customers had left when she’d started stabbing her fork into the squeezy tomato-shaped ketchup bottle.
     The auditions were over. I thought mine had gone pretty well, despite tripping up the steps to the stage and wrenching my back. This had caused a certain stiffness in my Greased Lightnin’ movements but that didn’t matter. I could tell I was one of the favourites for the lead role because I could sense a surge of interest in the hall when I took to the stage and several people even started to film me on their mobiles.
     I was word-perfect! I didn’t even stumble over ‘You know that ain’t no shit we’ll be getting lots of tit” which I always felt embarrassed singing. I couldn’t bring myself to simulate the groping hands like some of the others did but I managed the hip thrusts as best I could with my bad back. The Summer Nights duet was a little more challenging but I really thought we’d pulled it off. I went wrong a couple of times but that was only because Myra got too close to me causing a temporary ringing in both my ears and I lost where we were. I know the massive last note was an absolute triumph because when I finally lowered my arm and looked down, I saw lots of delighted faces. 
     Myra was easily the best Sandy; I’m pretty sure no one else heard her say “you mother-f*cking piece of shit” when she thought the microphone had stopped working during Hopelessly Devoted. At the end of the evening, we all crowded eagerly around Tom the director to see who had been awarded the lead parts. I was utterly flabbergasted when he gave the role of Danny Zuko to Frankie Trevino - he’d only joined the group last month! More bad news followed when Tom gave the part of Sandy to Liz Tyler, or Thin Lizzie as she was known. Her voice was nowhere near as strong as Myra’s! We had to smile bravely and applaud, although I could see Myra’s left eye twitching, a sure sign that she was upset.
     As Tom was wrapping up and preparing to give Thin Lizzie a lift home, he handed out sheets of paper that
detailed the other parts. I was to play Doody and Myra had been given the role of Jan. As we couldn’t recall these two characters from the film, Myra Googled them on her iPhone. Doody was described as ‘small and boyish, always idolising the cooler boys’ whilst Jan was a ‘chubby compulsive over-eater, loud, brash and pushy’. 
     Myra went into meltdown at that point. I managed to get her to Den’s Diner, but not even her favourite twice-fried crispy doughnuts could pacify her. I tried to be positive and said I thought our duet had been great but she yelled “Great? What was so bleeding great about it? You were shuffling round like you’d shit yourself!” I tried to explain that
    I’d strained my back but she shouted over me “And why did you sing “she swam by me, she’s got the crabs?” That’s not the sodding line, is it? Sandy’s supposed to be the vestal virgin not a pox-ridden old slag!” I knew she just lashing out because she was disappointed. I didn’t blame her; she really should have got the part, although I thought her calling Liz “a scrawny titless rash of wind” was a little harsh. Just as she was calming down, I told her I didn’t have sufficient money to get the curry sauce to go with her cheesy chips and she started wailing again. This time, it was the squeezy mustard bottle that got it.

I couldn’t concentrate on my calls today; all I could think about was tonight’s audition. One customer became extremely upset with me after asking for a quote to insure his toy poodle. I told him we only covered real animals but he simply wouldn’t accept it. He asked to speak to a manager but George wasn’t around – he’d taken Lucy into the meeting room because she still looked upset. Jess said she would pretend to be a manager and took the call from me, but she accidentally pressed the Release button and said “Oops! Cut the bugger off.” We both put our turrets into ‘aftercall’ so if he phoned straight back, someone else would get him. 
      I ran through the lyrics in my head, humming the tunes quietly to myself. I’d practised Summer Nights as much as I could last night in my room and my throat felt a bit raw from repeated “Na-hites!” It was a very difficult note to hit. Even Myra had struggled; I recalled my goldfish vibrating each time she’d attempted it. When I’d gone downstairs to get a glass of water, My Ryder from next door was sitting in the kitchen. Mum said he’d come round to say how much he was enjoying my singing, which was very nice of him. He suggested it would be good for my lung capacity if I sang as loudly as I could non-stop for twenty minutes so I went back to my room and did just that. I think they must have really loved it because I’m sure I heard them joining in after the "well-a well-as" with a loud "huh!". 
     Lucy returned from her meeting with George and I gave her a big supportive smile. She was clearly very touched as her face crumpled and she fled toward the toilets in tears. It was typical of her kind nature not to mention my text message; she must know I’d feel embarrassed by the kiss. George came over and placed an envelope on my desk. “There’s your invite, Foggy.” How exciting! I said “Oh great! Are you having a birthday party?” He looked at me very strangely and said “No. You’re having a disciplinary hearing.” I opened the letter and saw the hearing was in one week’s time. My head felt all swimmy and my mouth went dry. I couldn’t worry about this now; I had to concentrate on tonight. I’d worry about it tomorrow. 

                    

Mum was in the kitchen flicking through the Next Directory and listening to her Human League playlist. She looked very nice; she'd done something different with her hair and she had a smart red jacket on that I hadn't seen before. It was great that she always managed to look good even though she never had any money to spend on herself. I asked her what was for tea but she said she'd been too busy to go shopping. Just as well, really, my stomach was still churning. I've no idea what had caused it to react in such an explosive way. Nerves, perhaps – it was the auditions tomorrow, after all. I’m sure John Travolta suffered much the same way before he had to kiss Olivia Newton John. I tweeted Katy Perry to see if she had any suggestions for combating nerves. She hadn’t replied to any of my last 387 tweets but this could finally be the one!
 I asked Mum if, when she did go to the shops, she could get me some more of the fizzy yoghurt I'd had last week. I'd never had anything like it before; it was really tangy and zingy. She looked confused and said she hadn't bought any yoghurt for months. Crafty Mum! No wonder I'd found it hidden away right at the back of the fridge - she wanted it all for herself! I gave her a knowing smile and went to change into my green jumper with the leather elbow patches, to get me into a Greased Lightnin' mood. Still nothing from Lucy. I expect her phone is out of credit. I'd offer to lend her some money but after giving mum the extra house-keeping and forking out on all that aloe vera ultra soft Andrex, I only had £8.13 to last me through the month. And I needed that for a Clearasil emergancy.

    George came over to my desk before I could take another call. Here we go. I braced myself as he pulled up a chair. I saw his left eye was very swollen and there was a dark, purplish bruise just above his cheek bone. He said he'd done it playing football. It was a bit difficult to hear him because he put his hand over his nose, so he sounded a little muffled. Perhaps he thought he was going to sneeze. He said "Bad news, Foggy. Your absence rate is over six percent now, so you'll have to attend a formal meeting. You don't need to worry about it. Well, not much, anyway. I don't think they kick you out just for six percent, but you never know." When I asked him if he was sure about his sums, he replied "Kate worked it out. The meeting will be with her." He looked very weary. "What was wrong with you, anyway? Got the shits?"
     Jess had a go at me when George had gone. She told me I should have said I was off with anxiety or depression, because "they can't touch you if you've got mental 'elf issues." I said I'd remember that for the
formal meeting. No reply from Lucy yet. My stomach was churning again.
     It was my last evening to practice before the SADS Grease auditions tomorrow night. My Summer Nights rehearsal with Myra had not gone well. I'd got a little confused with all the constant switching of lyrics in the duet. When I'd accidently sung "Met a boy cute as can be"  Myra had exploded: "Since when was the leader of the T Birds fucking gay? It's called Grease, not Vaseline!" Her anger got me all nervous and I did too many shoo-bop bops. We eventually decided we'd practise on our own.

Kate was stood over me. I tried to concentrate on what my customer was saying, hide my phone and clench my buttocks all at the same time - my bowels were suddenly very insistent again. Kate leant over my desk and
 whipped my Katy Perry picture off the blue sound board in front of me. She slapped it down on my desk. I did a double-take. Someone had, very crudely, drawn a picture of a little man trying to climb out of Katy's bikini bottoms, along with a speech bubble saying "Help Me! I'm drowning!" How could someone deface Katy in such a way? I tried to shrug at Kate to show her I knew nothing about this monstrous act but she shot me an icy look and strode off in George's direction. 
Gosh, I really was in trouble now. Plus, I had to get to the loo. How could there be anything left to come out? How? What should I do; cut the customer off or ask them to wait? I couldn't hold on much longer. As my bowels gave another lurch, I punched the Hold button and speed-minced to the toilets, trying not to attract attention. Martin, one of the other team managers, was in the toilets, head tilted right back as he applied some nasal
drops. I muttered "Sorry" as I shot into a cubicle and ripped my trousers down. The noise was unbelievable. It reverberrated around the cubicle and went on forever. How had that come out of me? It was truly shocking. I heard Martin quietly leaving the toilets - how awful that he'd had to hear that. What a time for him to have cleared his nasal passage. I made sure to breathe through my mouth as I pulled my trousers up and then slunk back to my desk, praying the odour hadn't followed me out. I put my headset back on, but the customer had hung up. Oh well. There was no reply from Lucy.


  

Monday - back at work. Disastrous few days. I took my sickness allowance days on Wednesday and Thursday, so I phoned in and told George I had an upset stomach. Then, in the early hours of Friday morning, I  woke up feeling very queasy. I stumbled to the bathroom and then, oh my God, all hell let loose. I was firing out of both ends. I couldn't reach the sink whilst I was sat on the toilet so I had to retch into the toilet brush holder. I spent the rest of the night crawling backwards and forwards to the bathroom and I was completely drained by morning. The weekend was a horrid blur of nausea and nervous farting. 
I still felt as weak as a kitten but I had to come into work as I was so worried that I'd gone over the 5% sickness allowance. Jess worked it out for me again and confirmed that I was over 6% now. She said not to worry because George often didn't bother to work out the percentage and when he did, he usually got it wrong. I watched George nervously, but he had his head down -he must be really busy. Lucy wasn't in today, so that was probably why.
Jess thought Lucy might still be upset after Friday's team meeting. The vote had, amazingly, been 15 "Unfairs" and 3 "Couldn't Give A Shits". I said "But I voted Fair!” When I asked Cathy why she hadn't registered my vote, she said she'd thought I'd just been doing facial exercises, in an attempt to get rid of my jowels.
I hated to think of Lucy being upset. I got her number from Jess's phone and texted her to say I hoped she was ok and to let her know that I had voted "Fair". I added a whole row of smiley faces. Should I put an "x" right at the end? I added it, then deleted it, then added it again. It was a bit difficult to concentrate as I was trying to read out a legal disclaimer paragraph to a customer at the same time. I decided to skip the complicated bits. 
I panicked when I saw Kate, our manager, walking towards me. I tried to turn my phone off, but hit the Send button instead. I'd sent a kiss to Lucy! Whatever would she think?

I had to walk almost the whole way home as the chain came off my bike again and I couldn't get it back on. My bike really needed a service and I was trying to save up for it. When I finally made it home, I found Mum in floods of tears in the kitchen, clutching a piece of paper. She sobbed "The bastards have got us this time, Morto!" Apparently, our council tax has doubled! Just like that! I was dumbfounded. I thought the council only
amended payments at the beginning of the year, but Mum was too upset to show me their letter, and shredded it into pieces in her distress. I made her a cup of tea, patted her hand and told her there was nothing else for it - I would just have to up my house-keeping money again. She wailed "But you need your own life, son! You and Myra should have a place of your own, you should be thinking about raising a family, I don't want to be an old Granny; I mean, I'm going to be forty two next month, for Christ's sake." 
I knew there was no chance of her becoming a Grandmother anytime soon. On the occasions Myra drank enough cider to insist I have sex with her, she would always make me wear two condoms. The inner tube on my bicycle probably had more feeling in it. She complained that I took too long and she'd usually fallen asleep long before I'd finished.
Money-wise, I take home £801.92 a month and after I've paid Mum the house-keeping and covered the loan
payment for the solar panels (I agreed I should pay for them because my bedroom is in the loft so I get the most benefit), I have thirty seven pounds a week to spend on myself. So I am quite lucky, really. But I probably wouldn't be able to bid for that faux leather vintage retro biker jacket I'd seen on eBay now. Shame - it would have been perfect for the Danny Zuko audition. My forest green jumper had a bit of leather on it, on the elbows, so that would do. At least Mum had stopped crying now and even cheered up enough to put the oven on for the crispy pancakes - chicken curry flavour. Yay! Life is good again!

I didn't see much of Lucy today as she and George had to go off to a room together to discuss the teams' quality figures. There was a lot of chatting going on whilst they were away and one of the other team managers, Cynthia, kept looking over. She's a bit scary; her eyes are very close together and Jess tells me not to look into them in case I get hypnotised and she interferes with me whilst I'm under. Cynthia doesn't seem to walk like other people do - she sort of slides up the office as if she's on casters, looking at everyone through her goggling, all-seeing eyes. I kept my head down and tucked my mobile out of sight, behind my wheelie bin desk tidy. 
I received an email from Cathy, who sits next to Nick, asking me to vote on whether I agreed with Lucy being George's deputy. She said in the email that the team had not been consulted and nobody else had been given the opportunity to apply. There were three voting buttons: Fair, Not Fair and Couldn't Give A Shit. Cathy said that she was going to re-arrange the team meeting for Friday so we could discuss the results. I was pleased as I'd be back from my sickness leave by Friday. I saw Jess vote for "Not Fair", which surprised me, as she's such a good friend of Lucy's. 
Fortunately, I was able to give the decision plenty of thought because I didn't need to listen to what my customer was saying. He had launched into a very long story about why he'd come to have so much cash in the house when he'd been burgled, but only the Claims team needed to know that sort of information. I didn't. I tried to vote "Fair" but for some reason, the voting button didn't work, so I just mouthed "Fair" at Cathy when she looked over at me. I didn't see her write it down but I expect she would when she'd finished reading the BBC News. 
When I realised my customer had stopped speaking, I told him I had to transfer him to the claims department and confirmed he'd need to repeat it all to them. He said "You're a total brick," which was really nice of him. It makes the job worthwhile when someone appreciates your efforts.