Couples' Solitude

The pushy, the crap-stirrer and the traitor meet in the same editorial office

Why is it like a law that each and every office has at least one person no one can stand? Sometimes I almost think they specifically teach it to HR folks to always hire an intriguer into the teams who would keep everyone else in a check-mate. In the first days I thought the producer B. hired M. as the editor-in-chief because he wants to screw her. Later I realized it's not her in his scipe, but Sylvie. I paid a great price for my ignorance. Sylvie is 25, and as bright a mind as a starless night. When she was born, God must have given her body as a consolation prize for her lack of mental abilities: huge breasts, long legs, big, surprised baby-blue eyes, lips fuller and plumper than Angelina Jolie's. And a gaze stupid to infinity. Primitive thoughts, zero creativity, whining to no end. From the first moment I was neglecting the woman as I can't stand stupid girls. I'm not even tickled by her openly out beauties either. She wears such short skirts she can't even sit down without all her junk showing. With Mark, the other editor we've been making bets when will her boobs pop out of her shirts when she bends over for something. Like for other people's ideas. She comes in by 3pm and doesn't do anything, and still she leaves last. As it turned out, together with B. I wasn't especially concerned about her until the producer called me to his office. He wasn't making many extra laps:
- Sylvie has been complaining that you never listen to her ideas.
I almost answered because she has none, but luckily I remained silent.
- You don't let her in, you don't pass any information to her.
Nem bírtam magammal:
- Maybe if she didn't come in for the afternoon only, and showed at least a minimum interest towards the programmes in making.
- Don't be unjust! She can't yet come earlier, she spends her mornings at her old job. That's the only way I could tempt her over. In exchange she's still in when you're all long gone. But that's not important, in a few days it will all resolve. Sylvie is really talented, she has ingenious ideas.
- Pity she never shared a single one with us yet...
- Because you don't pay attention to her. Even yesterday she came to me crying that you treat her like air.
I was thinking of a snappy answer when B. suddenly leaned closer to me:
- Hey, did Mark really have a go on her?
- Nah, no way...
He didn't let me finish the sentence.
- But that's what I heard... and not from her... that he's pushing for her pretty nasty.
- Mark? That's ridiculous. He's just laughing at her... (and I almost added, me too)
- Well that's it, don't you think that he's trying to hide his primal instinct with this extreme reaction?
I protected Mark with teeth and nails. It turned out later that I shouldn't have.
- I don't want conflicts inside the office - he summed up. - There's way enough problems with the shows without weakening yourself from the inside.
I tried to say something, but he didn't let me to.
- I want to ask you not to let the crew members pick on each other.
I didn't understand why he wants me to do it. Why not M.? After all, she's the editor-in-chief, she should be holding the team together. As if he was reading my mind, B. switched to a more intimate tone:
- You know what women are like, they're always jealous of one another. And M. is not an exception either. That's why I turn to you. I want you to be my lengthened arm in the office. Combing together what goes apart. You see, no? And please do me a favor and teach Sylvie a bit. The girl's a real treasure, just she doesn't have enough experience yet.
- Of course, no problem, but could we do it in regular hours? - I tried to turn the request to my favor. - My wife is getting upset that I keep going home so late.
- We will rearrange the tasks: you go on with the shows in the morning and you teach Sylvie in the afternoon. Will that work?
I agreed, at least I agreed to deal with the bitch. Of course I did not agree to be B.'s spy.
From M. I know that B. also talked to Mark. The producer told M. that according to Mark I got hooked on Sylvie. I keep making nasty comments on her clothing to cover it up.
M. reassured me that she has faith in me, but she also warned me she doesn't like it when the employees' emotional life goes across the border with work...

There are sone couples who bring out the worst of each other. If one is up, the other is down. Their energy can never add up, one will always put the other out. Of course this has a good side too. Negative forces can't add up either, making the final, demolishing explosion impossible.

A few days ago I was praying for Peter to find a job. Now for him to work less. He comes home at night, most of the time I can't even wait for him. I have to get up early to tend to the kids, he sleeps in until eight, goes to the gym, goes to work, and everything starts from scratch. If I even mention, how much he does it for anyways, he gets angry. "Why can't anything be good for you?" That's what he yells at me. He complains that he would come earlier, but everyone else stays so late, so he can't take off because then they will work against him all night. I can ask him to arrange his life so he could see his children at least every once in a while, he just shrugs and keeps saying that as soon as the new channel takes off it will be a lot easier. I just keep hearing M. this, M. that more and more. I think they got just a bit too close. Should I be jealous? Maybe. I don't know. I don't feel anything. Just couples' solitude.

Bells of Perils, When They Ring

M. is a little whore who knows exactly for whom to put those legs apart. Not for an inferior.

Like if I was learning again to walk, live, think. I have a job again, where I have to go in day by day, for that you have to get dressed every morning, shave, show your better face, think, communicate, not just spinning in one spot, by yourself, working up your brain for nothing. With M., the editor-in-chief I'm on great terms, we always wink at each other when the owner, B. starts to tell long tales. The situation is still very ductile, I can still be anything, even vice-editor-in-chief. So far they got another two editors, they are both inferior to me in skills. True, one of them is in a rather intimate friendship with the owner, but with joined forces with M. we can easily make his ideas sound ridiculous to the others. My optimistic hopes (VEiC) are based on the fact that I have to write the program structure, as the others are unable to do it. We put our heads together with M. after the others have left, and get a great job done. Sophie asks me about the contract every day, but I don't want to mention it yet. In these days it's not the best to first point at your pocket and then shine yourself. First I want to prove myself, and only send them the bill when they have to realize that they won't get around me, they won't get anywhere without me. And then I can dictate: a little more money that at my previous position, laptop, car, cell phone with a huge bill limit. If we can make that deal, I can talk Sophie into leaving the company. With her knowledge, she could be cherry-picking from the best positions, and we can finally get rid of her pushy boss. I don't even mind if she makes a few bucks less by the end of the month, at least she won't have to feel like she owes something to her boss. I would love to see his evil face when Sophie announces that she's quitting...
The phone just rung. It was M. She said the management didn't approve of our program concept. She asked me to go in immediately so we can make a new concept. I'm not happy, I was kvetching on Sophie all week because she was coming home late. Well, whatever, this one is important now, somehow I'll just talk it out. If a business gets on track... Up to work!

I can't even count how many programs' start I've been around to see. The formula is the same all the time, get an idea for the show, plan the details, make a marketing plan (sometimes you even have to fetch the money yourself), hoping that if the "movie" passes, you can make it. Problem is, maybe one out of ten will be accepted. And the rest of it was for free (in the best case, because it's not too uncommon that they shoot it without you, because Director X or CEO Y didn't believe in you....)
Anymore I won't work for free. But seeemingly Peter is not suspicious enough. Sophie's instincts ring the bells of peril already though:

I thought I arrived home, but still I feel more and more that I was wrong. The house is not my home. We live by each other like strangers. The old coziness is gone. But everything seems to be going fantastic. Peter comes more and more to life every day. His confidence is growing, we even have been to bed. Truth to be told, we were both thinking of something else during the act. Myself, I was thinking of the next day's presentation.
I'm afraid Peter's euphoria won't last long either and will be followed by a horrible crash. John, my boss knows B., the owner of the new channel well. He said he's an uninhibited worm who would sell his own mother for a cent of profit. M. is just a little whore whose whole talent is knowing exactly for whom to put those legs apart. (It's not jealousy talking of me, she only pushes upwards, an inferior can't even come to thought.) We still don't know what position Peter will fill at the channel, and for how much. I try to push him to ask it, but to no avail, he doesn't want to listen. I'm worried. If you let yourself be screwed over, they will screw you over. It's the laws of the wilderness now. And our marriage won's survive another dive. I'm not even sure yet if it did survive the last one.

I'm Not Even Wanted As Unemployed

If he cheated on me, I may even bear that too, but he sinned against his family and that is unforgivable.

I didn't wait until the deadline, I went back to the employment center in a few days. I decided nothing can upset me, if I have to, I will wait for eight hours straight, I'm taking something to read, sandwiches for a day. I had so many papers I couldn't fit them in my briefcase anymore, I had to put them in a separate plastic bag in a giant folder. In about half an hour I even got a seat, that made me almost optimistic. The calling numbers came in a complete mess, I couldn't find a system in it, try as I might. At least one would know how many are ahead, you could just go out for a walk, get a coffee, grab a bite to eat. Time would fly by. But system, no. They call the number ten lower, then twenty higher, then the one right before me. Then 17 after me. And I just sit there waiting, I can't even read, because I look up at every beep of the display. Maybe. But seems that my number is cursed, or just the computer forgot about it. Sophie sends me a comforting text every hour or so, at least that helps.
After three hours and thirty-seven minutes of wait, my time comes. I magically put on my sweetest smile over my worn face, and I step into the shrine of bureaucracy. I sit down at the clerk's desk, I spread out my miles of paperwork, this fact sheet, that application, another certification - she just keeps asking and asking, with no feeling in her voice whatsoever. I select the needed paperwork quickly, I don't want to waste their precious time. She pounces on the corporate papers like an attacking puma. Her experienced eyes point a mistake, she busts the verdict: not eligible. I try to argue, I ask her to show me the law, governmental order, anything. She's just shrugging and changes tone:
- If you really want it, we can put in the application...
A spark of hope shines up.
- ...but it will be rejected anyways.
My brain just explodes. When I was there for the first time I wanted to ask about that point that she doesn't want to accept now. After several hours of waiting I would've deserved at least the answer from the info desk clerk, but all she could say was that all cases are different, the appointed clerk will tell everything. Another several hours of wait gives me forty seconds of answer time.
When I mention this, she just shrugs, she can't do anything, it's the rule. I groan, that I'm not holding her responsible for the rules but for the humiliating and inhumane process of letting me know this.
I curse her. I wish her to be fired too and have to go begging for financial aid, just like I have to. Now all other clerks are watching us too. And me in particular, rather offensively.
Finally the released pressure is not sitting on my brain, I can change tones:
- Ladies, I have a simple favor to ask you! - I raise my voice.

I leave a pause of attention.
- More humanity! People who come here are in trouble, have been hurt, a lot of them have been humiliated. Please treat us like people too!
Air just froze.
- See you later, ladies – I say, storming out of the office.
I hear some groans of disrespect, but I don't react. I grab the door to slam it behind myself, but in the last moment I change my mind and just close it quietly.
At the information desk I stop for a second. It's the same lady staring at me the same stupidly who didn't answer me last time. Anger fills me, I would just love to smash her fat head into the counter.
Then I gather my strength and walk out without even saying goodbye.

Of what happened immediately after this, neither of them ever wrote anything. Sophie told me a lot later what happened.
She was in the middle of a super important meeting when Peter called her. She couldn't take the call, her phone was on silent mode, so she just hung up and tried to secretly write a text message that she will call him back ASAP after the meeting, but her husband's message broke it in half. "I was denied, I'm not even good enough to be unemployed." Roughly that's what it said. Sophie felt that she can't not talk to him. She excused herself out with a lot of awkward sorry's, but she couldn't reach Peter anymore, he turned her cell off. She sent her a text message and went back to the meeting. She was hanging on the edge of her seat, but her peers just couldn't finish their discussion. She got a new text message, but not from Peter but the bank: all their bonds have been freed. Her boss looked rather annoyed, but still she went out once again. Her husband was still not available. She sat back on her place, but in a moment came the next message. All money was withdrawn. Sophie lied that her kid got sick and ran away. She drove like a madman to the bank branch where the money was taken up, but Peter wasn't there anymore. She ran home, but no use, her husband wasn't there either. He just disappeared. She called all the friends and family, but nobody has seen him.

He only got home in the early morning, drunk out of his brain. He lost all the papers, but he did have the money, at least most of it. He spent seventy thousand forints. (translator's note: about 355 USD, roughly a month's minimum wage earnings) Sophie was yelling, but the words didn't even reach Peter's brain, he just collapsed into bed still in his clothes. He never told what he wanted to do with the money. She thought he wanted to take off abroad. That night, Sophie only wrote a single sentence into her diary:

That he makes no money, I will survive, I can bear his jealousy, if he cheated on me, I may even bear that too, but he sinned against his family and that is unforgivable.

The Terror of Fear

Cramp in your stomach, more and more poisonous air around you... Revolt or resign?

A week after being fired we went on a merit vacation. No pun intended. I got it when I was still a great asset to the company, two or three months before I was kicked out. I have the cover letter to the coupon even now: congratulations on your outstanding performance. It was for two, but with a little extra payment we could take the kids too. I could see they didn't understand this whole thing: if their father was such a good employee, why was he fired? The answer, of course, was simple: I got the bonus when our old CEO was still at his place. And when he was stood up from his chair, they used the recession downsizing to get rid of all his men too. But you can't just take back a gift.
After the leave of the CEO the gossip started immediately about a certain list being made by the new guys, listing all who will have to go. I didn't quite believe it yet, but in a few weeks I heard it with my own ears from G. (who was on the winners' side) that there's not only a list but also a lot of backstage haggling about who stays on it, who gets off, who gets on. G. also told me I was on it too.
By then the atmosphere became unbearable. The editorial office was completely split into two camps. The later winners sat down in a corner to discuss things multiple times a day. And the others were just guessing what it can be they talk about. Only the years of routine was keeping the crew together. And the fear. It did matter whom you shared a word with, whom you sat with at lunch. I would never have thought that only a few people in only a few weeks can poison the whole life of the channel. One evening I went home totally upset. Sophie got it immediately, that something must be completely amiss. As I told her what happened that day, I had to realize that I had nothing specific, nothing tangible about it. Just a lot of guesses, hints, unfinished sentences and even more speculations. I decided I would ask my question in front of everyone the next day: What is happening on the unannounced meetings? If they are about the future of the channel, why don't they call the others too? Is there really a death list? If there isn't, what made the atmosphere so bad that everyone would talk about it still? Where did everything go wrong?
Sophie tried to calm me down, she said I shouldn't look for trouble. If I grasped the situation wrong, I will just ridicule myself. And if I am right, what do I win on facing them to it? My argument was that I needed it for my own peace of mind, to see if there is anything to be revealed. Sophie just tried to tell me not to be naive, I can't win anything, but I can lose a lot on yelling. She didn't quite convince me, but I kept quiet. Especially that the next day the corridor gossip was about the new guys having spies on the loser side, who will tell them who said what about them, to whom, when and why, who meets the old ones outside the channel and whom they meet. Of course at first I thought it was an exaggeration too, but when I wanted to ask G. about this and the death list, he asked to meet outside the office, as in the current situation it wouldn't be fortunate. On the agreed day he still didn't call me, if I called him he hung up. Days later, after recording a show he pulled me aside, took a deep breath and just poured it all at me, that he didn't turn up because he was trying to get me off the list, and in that case it wasn't a good idea for us to be seen together. I didn't quite understand what he meant, why can't we talk, since we're good buddies. He thought they don't know that's why he wants to get me off of that list? Or he had to deny me to be able to stick to the winners? I didn't ask anything about it, I rather just kept making myself believe that me, my work is needed, will be needed. I'm not in danger.

Whether or not there was a death list, I don't know. I suspect they have reached their goal just by spreading the gossip of the making of it. As also I was contemplating going on my ownr. Of course it was more just playing with the idea: during a recession you don't just leave a secure job without another one already waiting.

I was fired roughly a week after I talked to G. I've been waiting for his call since then...
So, merit vacation with the kids. They are having a ball, the hotel life, the buffet dinners, the jacuzzi are still all new for them, but my mood still touches theirs too. And also Sophie's. I can see how stressed she is, I am trying to comfort her. But also I'm infinitely desperate, I'm constantly thinking where I went wrong.

Peter decided to write his blog about the story of his firing this weekend. (Many of you have asked where the original blog is, but no use to search anymore, it was taken off. I have the whole thing, but no, I won't publish it all at once, because the timeline and Sophie's reactions are crucial to understanding why everything happened this way. It's not a book where you can just jump ahead, and the very end is still unknown to all.) Sophie didn't like the idea of blogging, she was afraid Peter would burn up bridges in his disappointment:

The "merit trip" was horrible. Peter was unbearably stressed all weekend. He kept yelling at the kids even when they gave him no reasons. He kept just thinking and thinking how he could take revenge on those who, in his opinion, screwed him up. We were sitting in the jacuzzi, I was waiting for him to finally calm down for a second so I can tell him the good news, but he just chased himself deeper and deeper into his fits. And then he came up with the idea of the century: he will write a blog about how he was messed with. Well that was all we needed! Even this way I could barely keep him somewhat calm, how will it go when he will keep himself on edge with the writing? All he will do is to get the whole business on his back. He has no political sense whatsoever, and if I would try and smoothen his words a bit, he will just yell that I've always been way too compromising. I remember how long I was arguing for his most important job being finding a new job at the moment and that he shouldn't run his chances with spreading out the dirty sheets. I thought I won him over. He gave up on the idea and he started to calm me with saying that things will soon turn around. For a moment he was so nice I almost even told him the great news, but then I had a better idea: after the kids go to bed, I will seduce him with a glass or two of champagne - I even made a few hints at that - and tell it just afterwards. And then nothing happened according to plan. Instead of champagne he had a beer (he knows how much I hate when his breath smells like beer when we cuddle up), then he refused my advances "because of the kisd". He said the walls are thin, they would hear us. The walls were exactly the same as at home. And he was just the same distant as at home since he was fired. But it was an old ritual of ours to try out every hotel bed we slept in. In ten years, this one was the first time we didn't.

First Love

What would you do for it?

You would think it's just freak chance that she was the first. After all, this is no more than a chronological order, usually the first one has nothing to do with the true one. Love is the emphasis here, first is just an ordinal, followed by more and more until you find that true one, your mate - if you find it at all.

But it's not like that. The first one will follow you all your life, no matter how it was or how it ended. The first one will take a piece of you along, if you're lucky, it will go nicely gift-wrapped with a ribbon and a bow, if your fate is not that, bitten, ripped out, tearing a big chunk out from the living flesh.

For years I don't even think of Sophie, then she just pops to my mind from something small, a straw tipping out of the glass or a drop of rain rolling down the window glass.
It wasn't an easy break up, we both got our share of injuries, we didn't even talk for long months afterwards. Then one day - you would think it's by chance, but believe it, it's not - we ran into each other at Moscow Square. Maybe if we notice each other earlier than the last moment before literally bumping into each other, maybe if we have some time to prepare ourselves, take a deep breath and decide, everything would've been different: most likely we would've just hung our heads down and get out of each other's sight.
But this way we were just standing there, stammering and stuttering, and of course the old and well-practiced move swept our faces together, a superficial, accidental - but of course! - kiss on the lips, that of course made everything even more difficult. Then slowly we start to chat, question after question, even the fifth tram leaves us. When we freeze through, we continue the talk in a nearby coffee shop.
We were surprisingly honest, and even though I did think of how good the familiar touch would feel - just like in the old times, after a long and nice talk ending up in each other's arms, but somehow it didn't fit into our re-dimensioned, reborn relationship. I just wanted to talk, complain, laugh, play without a mask on.
It was already dark when she realized she had to run, we quickly exchanged phone numbers, agreed that we won't lose sight of each other this time. And then and there we were absolutely serious about it - not so much the next day.

Years passed by. I heard that she got married, from an old girlfriend of hers I heard she was happy.
Then she came to the opening night of my first book.
She waited through the official part, got her copy signed and told me smiling that in one of my heroines, Soph, she recognized herself. I tried to say it was just coincidence, she just flicked her hand. "Nothing is coincidental" - she said with a mysterious face. I get the shivers if I think that she may have sensed it then, what will happen to her, them, us...
Altough I invited her to the banquet, she didn't come. She gave me her number and we agreed to stay in touch.

Another two and a half years passed, so I was absolutely shocked when I heard her voice over the phone. She asked me to meet for a talk. She said she was afraid.
We met four our five times, I'll tell about those later.
I felt she was exaggerating. But if I paid more attention then... (Three cheap, stupid dots - like if it solved anything that I swallow the end of it, like if I could make all of it never happened, all that I messed up so bad.)
I will be honest, in this blog I want to atone, I want to pay honors to the woman who - now I know - was not the first in my life just by freak chance.

The first is always a reference point. Not just for you, also for your later lovers who want to own your past, they want the selfless, giving flame, the flame that was high in you before you first got yourself burnt, so you dared to, you wanted to fly close to the fire, you weren't worried about your personality, you opened up, you melted, you gave. And no one is capable of doing it again spontaneously. Maybe consciously, learning to make yourself believe you do, but if you look deep inside you, it's just acting, miming to give up your stances.
It's hard to tell your partner that you're meeting your first lover. He knows it too, but you know it too, that you're searching for your past, going back to the springs, you want to relive the irreversible past armed with all the knowledge you have since then. Like if you could go back in time and change your fate.
Of course, it's a dead end to think it can succeed.
I don't believe that. That's why I never looked for her. But now she came to me, she asked for my help. And she didn't want to just hang on to me, she didn't want to rewrite the past to redefine herself. She wanted to save her marriage, and I didn't help her in that, but in the meantime we swerved onto dangerous paths where it's easy to lose your way. And maybe we did...

Her girlfriend looked me up a few weeks ago, she told me what happened. She gave me a CD and asked me to write the hell Sophie lived through, because she deserves to be seen as the victim, not the cause of the events.

The disc had a single document on it. My first lover's secret diary. I decided that, no matter how much it hurts, I will make it public. Just as I will publish her husband's blog too, that I found online. Crisis Manager - that's how Peter called himself. Irony of fate:

After two weeks I even started to think of suicide. I can't fulfill my duty of supporting my family, so why live. But I do love Sophie. Do I love Sophie? Everything's value changed. In one moment, you work for a cool company, in the media to top it off, and in the next instance you're on the street. I sent my resume to everyone, and the first answers came in. We are sorry, but it's a recession... I called a few acquaintances in the media business, but all they kept saying was that it's hard times for them too, they fight for their jobs day to day too. And all our friends, when I mentioned it, just thought I wanted to borrow money, so they shook me off quickly. The noose started to tighten, and I was left there alone.

I found no mentions of this period in Sophie's diary. Perhaps then she didn't quite sense how grave the problems are.

Who Would Want Someone Who's Rejected By All?

I think he was ashamed about it with his friends. He told himself nobody likes losers.

The secretary still kept herself to the story: she said the boss takes the employees three by three for a little talk. We went to the old office of the CEO, I had two of the ladies I worked with on my side. The desks, the shelves were all empty, dust everywhere. The editor-in-chief seated us on the sofa.
- Well, you all know about the recession - he started.
I didn't even hear what he said, I was watching one of the colleague ladies, she was fighting back tears. I was sorry for her, because I was firmly sure that I'm only here because of some fatal mistake, they will re-check the list again, and then they will find it out. But my renunciation was there in the pile, too. Meanwhile, the editor-in-chief gave over to the HR representative. She tried to be really sympathetic, but to me she was only the hangman, promptly and immediately executing my capital sentence. The little show's last act was the lawyer, asking us politely to sign the renunciation notice before leaving the room. The other lady tried to argue, to call her lawyer, and I was just staring in front of myself, not believing that this whole thing is happening to me. I'm not even sure if she could finally talk to someone. I thought, what would happen if I ran out of this room, down the corridors, out to the street. There's none of this whole thing, no renunciation, firing, execution. I later heard that some would escape into temporary disability leave so they can extend the whole procedure. I didn't say a word, I just motioned for them to give me the paper and I scratched my name on it. I get my salary for two more months, and then it's over. Ten years' work goes into the trash with a single line of the pen.

- Also, you are exempt of work from now - the HR rep showed us to the door. Which means that the next day we don't even have to come in. The editor-in-chief called us in to his office one by one. He told us the clichés that must be just the same at any given point in this world: you did your job good, but certain external conditions... According to some gossips, he could have saved at least half of the people fired now if his position doesn't weaken in the inner fights. That "if" has been echoing in my head a million times and more since then. If I tried and positioned myself better, if I picked up more hours, if I was more aggressive, if I chose a different profession, if I learned something more tangible, if I'm not born in this country, on this Earth... eh, forget it. I didn't want to show him how it hurts, so I just answered him I already was thinking about going. I saw the relief on his face. I'm sure he wanted to believe it. The survivors just tried to disappear into their monitors, the fired ones were standing in the middle, talking and complaining. I went to my computer, but I couldn't log on anymore, my password was cancelled. I emptied my drawers, tossed my inside papers into a trashcan, my personal matters into a small blue plastic bag. I threw my jacket over my back and I walked out of the editorial office. The clerk who coordinated the "death run" was really nice. I just named it a death run, the last walk around the company, going to each and every department to sign a paper that we have no company property on our hands anymore. Nice little jog, but at least the boss's secretary had some pity on us and offered to just take the signed sheets to each department. Just go back the next day when she has them all collected. Only one thing was left: handing off the picture ID badges. It couldn't wait till the next day, we had to take them immediately to the board of trustees. Not to the reception, where you could just drop it on the counter with a casual smile "thanks, I won't need it any longer". Nope. We got a brand new card to replace it, with a single word on its face:

EXIT ONLY

Peter's blog had not a trace left of the casual tone. Sophie took the first week with an enormous empathy, she tried to calm Peter by saying he should just take the notice time as well-deserved holidays. Don't do anything else than sending his resume everywhere, resting and meeting old friends. But Peter closed up. Sophie lived it like this:

I should have been suspicious when he didn't get out of the house in the first days. He was digging online feverishly for jobs, even though Zsolt, the head-hunter told him clearly that he won't ever find an editorial job online. Only through friends and acquaintances, maybe with a head-hunter company. But Peter just kept saying that secretly he has been looking for a while, and he has seen four or five offers each month that he may have even taken. But it's a recession, and possibilities shrink by the moment.
He was more and more beside himself. He never went anywhere, no matter how I was encouraging him to look up old friends and acquaintances. Then he always just shut my up by saying that he will never go begging for alms. They know he's out of his job, they can call him. I think he was ashamed of it with his friends. He told himself that nobody likes losers, who would want someone who was rejected by someone else - by everyone else. I tried to tell him he's exaggerating - to no avail, and truth to be told, no acquaintances really popped up when it leaked out what happened to him.
Something else has changed then, too. At first I didn't even notice it either that days are passing, one after the other, and he's not making any advances to me.