The Job Interview: Part 1

Dave slammed the door behind him as he left his house. He had not intended to, but he was not in full control of himself this morning; no sleep and copious amounts of coffee had left him feeling slightly wired.

Try as he might he could not sleep the night before a job interview. It was not even a job that he particularly wanted; working in an electronics store was not his dream career. However, Dave was not in a position to be picky, so he had resolved to at least make an effort to get the job.

The interview itself would take place at the job centre, which was a twenty minute walk from his home. Normally Dave did not mind the walk, but today the weather was poor; a fine drizzle permeated the air. Muttering under his breath, he decided to get the walk over with as quickly as possible and crossed the road, heading for the park entrance. Going through the park would save him five minutes, which was definitely well worth it in this weather.

Even though it was only across the road from him, Dave had never been into St Stephen's Park in the two years he had lived opposite it. He had no particular reason for avoiding it, just something about it gave him the creeps. Despite his unease, he strode purposefully through the open iron gates.

St Stephen's Park looked like a typical park; there were lots of trees and bushes and neat pathways that wound their way through them. To Dave's eyes it was just a blur of green. He was not sure if it was his lack of interest in all things nature, or something to do with the fact that one of his eyes was now starting to twitch. How much coffee is too much? He did not think that there was such a thing, but he was not a scientist so could not be certain.

As he was walking along the twisting paths, he noticed that there were no other people around. That's weird, he thought. It was just after half past eight in the morning, he expected at least a few other people to be walking about on their way to work. Dave was just about to check his watch to make sure he had not got up late when he was interrupted by an angry voice.

“What are you doing here?” it said, with an Italian-American accent.

Momentarily taken aback, Dave spun around looking for the source of the voice.

“Over here, dummy”

Incredulous, Dave located the source of the voice. Sat on the ground at the base of a tree was a grey squirrel, its gaze firmly locked on Dave.

“You talking to me?” Dave asked.

“Oh, wise guy eh?”

“Erm, what?” Dave stammered.

“Don't think I don't know you're making a movie reference there, buster.”

Dave was confused. Firstly, he did not remember taking any hallucinogens, and secondly, what movie reference did the squirrel think he was trying to make? The confusion on his face must have been plain.

“My name is not Travis Bickle, and I am not a taxi driver.” said the squirrel.

“I don't know what you're talking about” said Dave, at this point completely lost.

The squirrel's whiskers twitched in irritation.

“You've never seen Taxi Driver...oh never mind! Back to my earlier question, what are you doing here?” it asked.

“Erm, walking through the park?” Dave ventured.

The squirrel shook his head.

“Walking through the park” it mimicked, but with a higher, whinier voice than Dave had used.

Dave looked around to see if anyone else was seeing what he was seeing; not a person was in sight.

“So what makes you think you can walk through our park?” the squirrel asked.

“Oh, erm, whose park is it exactly? I thought this was a public park?”

The squirrel puffed his cheeks.

“It belongs to the squirrels. It is definitely NOT a public park.”

The squirrel sighed.

“I can see I'm going to have to teach you humans a lesson. This is our park and you do not come through it. Now what would be suitable, mild dismemberment, hmm...”

The squirrel was talking to itself. By now Dave was quite scared, not just for his physical well-being, but also for his mental stability. The fact that he was having a conversation with a squirrel was quite weird, but that it wanted to inflict harm upon him made him question what kind of subconscious thoughts he had that made him conjure a violent squirrel to fulfill them.

The squirrel seemed lost in thought. Seizing the opportunity, Dave made a run for it.

“Oi! Get back here!” the squirrel shouted after him.

Dave was in full flight, running blindly along the twisting pathways. As he ran, the bushes surrounding the path increased in density to the point where it seemed like he was running through a maze. Or a trap.

After running for what felt like an eternity (but was in reality less than a minute), Dave reached a dead-end. A particularly thick bush barred his way. Turning around, he saw that the squirrel had pursued him, now accompanied by over a dozen of his fellow squirrels. Now cornered, Dave spoke.

“I'm sorry for coming through your park, it won't happen again, I promise.”

The squirrel he spoke to before stepped forward.

“It's too late for apologies. Now don't worry, we're not going to do anything too serious. I've observed humans for a long time now and I've seen that it is possible for you to move around without the aid of both legs, so we're just going to chop off one of them. That's not too bad is it?”

While the squirrel was talking, Dave was calculating the odds of taking on that many squirrels.

“Since it's your first offence, and taking into account that you didn't know the park was owned by us, we're even going to let you choose which leg we take. Can't say fairer than that, can you?”

The squirrel then attempted what is thought must have been a smile, but to Dave it just looked like it was baring its teeth. Dave's fight or flight mechanism kicked in. He inevitably went for the latter.

Dave ran at the squirrels, hoping to scatter them in his wake. The plan met with some success, but two of them latched onto his legs and started biting and scratching. Not wanting to waste time trying to remove them, Dave sprinted on.

He could feel them drawing blood. Gritting his teeth through the pain, Dave skidded around the next corner and was greeted by a beautiful sight; the other park entrance. Running for all he was worth, he ran gratefully through the entrance onto the pavement.

The two squirrels were still attached to him, and had not ceased their furious assault upon his legs. Shaking them, he managed to dislodge the first one, which was sent flying back into the park. The second one was more tenacious. Dave was now spinning around like a madman trying to remove the angry rodent, and eventually met with success, sending it tumbling onto the road. The squirrel stood up and turned to look at Dave. Before it could launch itself at him again, it was crushed by the wheel of an oncoming car.

A cry of outrage invaded his ears. The other squirrel he had removed (now joined by its fellow squirrels) was shouting curses at Dave. The tirade continued for several moments, then it calmed down briefly.

“Curse you, human! You killed Piddle, we'll make you pay for that! When our retribution comes we'll take more than a leg.”

Dave was momentarily confused. Why did they not just attack him now? Then he noticed where they were stood. Not a single one of them had crossed the threshold between the park and the street. Dave smiled.

“Well, I'm never going to come through the park again, so how exactly will you enact your retribution?”

As Dave was walking away, the lead squirrel spoke again.

“One day you will make a mistake, and on that day we will get you.”

Dave crossed the road and looked back at the park. There was no sign of the squirrels.