A Little Hungarian Comedy of Hostages

The scariest part is that he doesn't even realize what he just did.

„Crisis Manager”:
Finally I stood up for myself. Since I decided to take things to a breaking point, I was only waiting for the opportune moment to arise. And it came this morning. B. arrived late and told his secretary not to connect anyone in to him, even left his cell phone with her, then he marched to his office. No more was needed, I marched after him. The secretary tried to stop me, but I just raised my brows and said that the producer has a meeting with me, it's super important so don't let anyone in, no matter what happens.
I rushed in on B. without so much as knocking. He rose his head in confuse, and told me to come back later.
- No delays possible – I said and tossed myself into one of the leather armchairs without him ever offering me a seat. I shot the question at him, what's up with my contract. He asked for some more patience, but I yelled that it ran out already. Tell me right here, right now, how much do I work for.
- Listen, I would be the happiest if we could deal with it already, but the budget...
- I don't care the very least about the budget – I interrupted. - I want to see my contract now, immediately.
So I could give some pressure to it, I started to kick the glass coffee table.
His head turned red, his lips were shaking. He was scared for the sheet glass. He rose from his table and leaned over me:
- Your contract is in the works, I will let you know as soon as it's done. And now please go back, let me do my work. You too would have some this and that to correct on your shows...
I stood up too and pulled myself out. I'm about a foot taller than him.
- And now I won't go anywhere until you sign my contract – I rose my voice.
He got frightened, I could see it. He tried to feed me more of the BS about him trying to get it done faster and he tried to sneak sideways towards the door. With a quick move I moved by him, locked the door and took the key.
- Now you went too far! - he hissed. - You open that door, right now.
- No – I said, and I added that I won't leave until he paid my work so far.
- This will have some grave consequences – he threatened me, and ran to his desk. He picked up the phone, but by then I was there too and I pushed the button. So he said he will scream. I started laughing, and reminded him that I'm a complete nervous wreck from being broke, and I may not be held accountable for all my reactions. If he screams, I may panic and attack him.
- Are you... threatening me? - he asked me in a tiny voice.
- No, I'm just reminding you of the fact that I'm not completely in control of my deeds. I may even just jump out of this window here or I knock myself out.
I even asked him if he has seen Fight Club. He hasn't, but he panicked totally.
- You're not normal – he kept saying.
I answered what wasn't normal was to work here without a contract, for free, 24/7.
- Nobody will ever even talk to you from the business, I'll kill your reputation! - he spattered.
(I think I heard Sophie come home, I'll tell her the big news. I'll continue later.)

Sophie only added a short and shaken entry to her diary about this:

I'm starting to be seriously scared of this man. Christ. What happens if B. sues him? Will he get in jail? And then what will happen to us? To the kids? The scariest part is that he doesn't even realize what he just did. How proud he was to announce it... And the consequences? He says there won't be any, B. will keep his trap shut. And what if he won't?

Laws of Wolves

Life is nothing short of a treasure trove of unforeseen dues

Since the last meeting, air thinned up around me. I fight my hampered respiration and I find it harder and harder to make myself go in to work. My only comfort is that at home the situation improved a lot: Sophie is nowhere near as fiendish to me as she was. The big fights are gone, there's no yelling, and even though the old coziness didn't quite build back up yet, at least there are no lightnings anymore, and the beneficial effects are already visible on the kids. Even though our finances are not just not better but getting worse and worse. I still haven't gotten a cent from the TV. Sophie's check runs out around the twentieth of any given month. But bills and payment notices are coming constantly. Every weekend we put up a priority list. First is school, lunch, extracurricular classes. Then come the bills that if we don't pay, we get something turned off: electricity, gas, phone service. Then pay the mortgage. If we still have some money left, we go grocery shopping, if not, we eat whatever is in the freezer. Any other dues are postponed to unknown date. I now have a great experience in asking for late payment. When I was writing the first of these letters, I was sweating over it for hours, re- and re-wording it until I felt it to be appealing enough, but not too self-humiliating. Now I can toss one together in a few minutes. I don't have to twist my brains for too long until I can find an excuse, life is nothing short of a treasure trove of unforeseen dues. Brake pads into the car, parking violation, late fees, dentist, kids' shoes, repairing the washer.
No matter for the strict budget, at the end of the month we always have to touch the savings that are running out quickly. Maybe we have two months left... then bankruptcy. I promised Sophie that if we really need to, I will borrow from my parents. But I really don't want to see that moment, it would be so humiliating. Pumping the elders when you're an adult man, nothing but admitting you made nothing out of yourself. I made nothing out of myself? I don't want to ask myself the question. Not now. Because then I would have to take the final consequence: a nice little life insurance and a well-staged accident at the right moment... Christ, did I really get here? Before I get all teary-eyed (I imagine myself laying on the road as Sophie runs to me weeping just to be able to whisper in my ear that she has always loved me), the Kuruc blood screams loud in me (the channel is under Austrian ownership) and I decide to get myself into B.'s office and not come out until he signs my contract and transfers the money to my account.

Peter signed the previous entries as Complaints From An Unemployed. The following ones were signed as "Crisis Manager", like this, in quotation marks. He did what he promised to do and went in to the producer, but of that, some later. That's when Sophie called me again. She was very upset. No matter how I asked her, she said it's not a topic to be discussed over the phone. I tried to joke and ask if she seriously thinks that anyone cares what we are talking about, just the two of us, but she shut me up that it's bloody important now, it's about lives on stake. As a crime story writer, I obviously jumped on the topic, but it was a letdown. And not because Sophie was telling long tales with the lives on stake. So much not, that she never even wrote it to her diary, what she told me...