One by One

The scent of it is as real as Topher’s expensive bespoke cologne, the same brand I used to have to order in from a little Paris perfumery in the rue des Capucines, stammering through his order in my bad schoolgirl French. I can smell it now, though he is over on the other side of the room.

I get a sudden wave of anxiety.

I think I might throw up.

“Tiger,” Eva says, when everyone has found a place to sit. “Would you lead us through a short meditation?”

“Sure!” Tiger says. Her voice is slightly husky. I think she always sounds like that, but it makes me want to clear my own throat. I resist the urge to cough as she looks around the group. “Make yourselves comfortable everyone—whatever that means to you. That could be sitting, leaning, standing, embracing.”

I can’t stop myself from shuddering at the last word, but my reaction is better than the snort of derision I hear from Carl. Eva shoots him a look that could kill, and he covers it by shifting on his floor cushion. The filling inside squeaks and hisses as it resettles.

Tiger closes her eyes.

“Shut your eyes,” she whispers, “and take a moment, everyone, to center yourselves.”

There is silence in the room now. I shut my eyes, but it doesn’t help the feeling of being trapped, in fact if anything it worsens it. I can feel the warmth of Inigo’s shoulder to my left and Rik’s thigh pressing against mine to the right. They can’t help touching me—the sofa is too small for three—but it doesn’t make me feel any less tense. I am sweating. My palms are sticky. My whole body is rigid with discomfort. I do not want to be here. I do not want to be here.

“Take a moment to thank yourself,” Tiger says, her voice low and soft. “Thank your body for bringing you here, your bones for carrying you, your muscles for supporting you, your mind for freeing you.”

I don’t want to thank anyone for this. I want to get out. There is another rustle as Carl shifts uncomfortably, and suddenly I can’t cope with the claustrophobia anymore. I open my eyes a crack, trying to dispel some of the discomfort. I am about to shut them again when I see I’m not the only one peeking. Opposite me, Topher’s eyes open for a moment. He scans the room, trying to figure out what the hell is going on. Our eyes meet. I see you. He raises a single eyebrow. I shut my eyes quickly.

“Take a moment to thank the universe,” Tiger-Blue continues. “For the gift that is your being; for the gift that is your being here; for the gift that is this place, the majesty of the mountains shared with us for just a few days.”

Beside me I can hear Inigo’s breathing. It is fast and shallow. When I glance over it looks like his teeth are gritted, and a muscle is jumping in his cheek. He is hating this as much as me, and clearly he did not know this was happening any more than Topher did. I know from my own PA days how Topher reacts to being out of the loop. Someone is going to get both barrels later. I feel sympathy for Inigo, but my main emotion is relief that it is not going to be me.

“And take a moment to thank Snoop,” Tiger intones. “That thing that we are, and that is bigger than all of us. For all that we are—for all that we have—for bringing people into contact, and music into our lives. For the simple miracles it makes happen every day.”

Thank God I don’t work for Snoop anymore is all I can think.

I don’t know if she is finished or not, but there is a short silence. I can feel a pulse beating in my throat. Just when it has stretched out to something almost unbearable, Eva speaks.

“Thank you Tiger-Blue, that was beautiful. And it brings me to what I wanted to say, which is thank you all for coming here, and for all that you’ve done for me, for Topher, for Snoop, and for music. Thank you for the music.”

“Hear, hear,” Topher says. Eyes snap open around the room, and he raises his glass so that we all have to drink, whether we want to or not. I sip my water.

“Now, you’ll forgive me for springing this on you, but I couldn’t let the week begin without a little celebration of our triumphs, of what you’ve achieved over the last four years,” Eva says. She does not look at me when she says it, but it is impossible for me not to realize I am the odd one out here. I am the only person not currently employed by the company.

“Ani?” Eva says. And Ani nods and presses something on the laptop balanced on her knees. There is a crackle from the speakers. Music begins to blast out, uncomfortably loud. Moving images begin to light up the wall opposite.

I should be watching the film—but I can’t concentrate. The music is too loud. It is making my skull hurt. The images are too bright. They are zipping past too quickly. There is a kind of desperate, hectic intensity. My headache, which had been slowly fading, is back and pulsing in my temples. It feels as if a band is tightening around my forehead.

Figures and graphs flicker across the screen—profit and loss, users’ profiles, expansion rates competitors. I press my fingers to my eye sockets, shutting out the flashing images, but I can’t shut out the thumping music as it segues from one song to another in a frenetic sample of Snoop’s greatest hits.

Eva is talking over the music. She is speaking about social media reach and key influencers. The rest of the group is silent. I can feel Topher’s simmering resentment from the other side of the room, even with my eyes closed.

And then the music cuts out. I feel a weight lifted off my shoulders, like someone has stopped screaming in my ears. I open my eyes. There is a single chart on the projector, overlaying the Snoop logo. It is full of figures. Eva is taking us through each set, explaining what they mean. Percentages, projections, ongoing costs—and then I hear it. The word we have all been dancing around for almost twelve hours.

Buyout.

I feel the band around my scalp squeeze unbearably tight. I am not ready for this.

She is talking about the offer. She is explaining what it could mean in terms of company expansion, employee opportunities—but she is barely halfway down the second table of figures when Topher interrupts.

“No, no, just fucking no, Eva.”

“I beg your pardon?”

He stands up. His face obscures part of the projection so that his profile is beamed black and sharp onto the wall and the figures overlay his face like some sort of grotesque tattoo.

“This is half the story, and you know it. Where would we be if we’d given up our IP to Spotify like they wanted back at the beginning? Nowhere, that’s where. We’d be some other tin-pot little streaming app no one’s heard of and—”

“Topher, this is completely different.” Eva is standing in the shadow, away from the projector beam. Her voice sounds pissed off, but also as if she is trying her best to sound reasonable. “You know it is.”

“Different how? I’m not going to end up like fucking Friendster.”

“If we try for another funding round we’re more likely to end up like Boo.com at this rate,” Eva snaps back. Then she takes a deep breath. I can see that she’s trying to rein in her anger. “Look, Toph, you have some valid points, but I don’t think now is the time or place—”

“Not the time or place?” He is crackling with anger.

I feel sick. I have a violent flashback to my childhood, my father standing over my mother, his voice raised. I squeeze my eyes tighter shut. I feel myself begin to shake.