You and me both!! But let’s face it, we might be sitting on our arses when we do the actual writing, but man, the agonising and social exclusion and lonely lonely research and all of the other carp (that’s not a typo) that goes with writing kind of sucks sometimes!
Short Story / The Secret of My Success
The Secret of My Success
“Mr. Smith, your next appointment is here.” Bill only had time to glance at his watch and straighten his hair before the door opened and two strangers entered. The one with the camera started silently setting up bits and pieces of equipment, while the other, a young woman with curly blonde hair and a big grin sat down opposite him.
“Good afternoon Mr. Smith, thank you for agreeing to this interview. Our readers will be delighted to learn more about you.”
“I’m sorry, you are?” Bill was puzzled. He smiled at the woman.
“We’re here from Reuters, Mr. Smith, we’re here to write an article about you for our magazine. About you, your life, your work, you know, what with your having won your award recently.”
“What award?” Bill asked, slightly confused.
“Wha? Oh, I see, yes, very funny, you nearly had me there. What award indeed. Of course the winner of the Forbes CEO of the Year Award would need a sense of humour,” here the blond grinned again and got out a small tape recorder, which she placed on the desk between herself and Bill. Bill stared at the device, then back at her. “Right Mr. Smith, I’m Jilly by the way, can we start by going through your background? Where did you attend school?”
“Um, let’s see. Slough grammar,” Bill replied.
“Ah, Eton, yes, excellent”
“No, Slough grammar. It’s down the road from Eton.”
“Right, good, good, excellent, humble beginnings and all that. Wonderful story. And next?”
“What do you mean, next?”
“Well, where did you go to university?”
“I didn’t,” Bill replied, wondering where all this was leading.
“You’re telling us that you only attended grammar school. That’s it? Well, that certainly is a twist for our readers. Okay, what about your first job? Can you tell us about that?”
“Oh, that’s easy. I washed windows for my Uncle John’s company. Uncle John ran the company you see, and hired me as a favour to my dad.” Bill smiled.
Jilly looked puzzled and said “but you mean as a part-time job, right? Earn a few shillings while you trained in banking?”
“What? Banking? Nah, Uncle John hired me because I couldn’t get any other work. Told me I wasn’t smart enough to do much of anything except sit on my arse or wash windows. Said you don’t earn any money sitting on your arse, so he gave me a job.”
“Let me get this straight. You have no formal education, and no business experience to speak of. How, may I ask, did you get to be CEO of a top 5 banking firm?”
“Welll, to tell the truth, I’m not too sure. One day I showed up on a job, like Uncle John told me to, the next thing I knew I was sitting at a desk. Every few years they’d move me to a different desk until now, 35 years later, I sit here, people give me papers and I sign them. Uncle John was wrong, you can earn your keep sitting on your arse.”
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Kym reviewed Version 1 -
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I’m totally underwhelmed by this. You set thing up nicely, but if that’s all you’ve got for a punchline I think you better stick to drama.
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gbryananderson reviewed Version 1 -
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Nice beginning. Some basic elements did to be developed, main thing is climax and resolution.
There needs to be some development in Bill’s personality or action concluding at the end. We learn a lot about Bill, which is very good, but overall nothing has changed from the start of the story to the end.
You did a great job with dialouge.
One setting is good as is amount of characters.
POV works.
Gustible reviewed Version 1 -
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You manage the dialogue very well, and the story reads easily.
The ending is not entirely unexpected, and I admit that I was a little bit disappointed, hoping for an unexpected twist.
Basically my comment is that the quality of your writing in this story, is better than the story-line. The humor falls a bit flat.
bullgooseloon reviewed Version 1 -
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Very much like the book Peter Sellers’ made a movie out of, “Being There”, I think. I like how you keep us waiting for the answer, like a Jeffrey Archer short. It might come off as just a long joke? Or is that what you wanted?
Cameron reviewed Version 1 -
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I don’t have much to say about this piece. It is clever, but it does kind of seem like more like a joke than a story.
I’m kind of curious what you are intending for this piece. Is this part of a larger story? Or is it merely meant as a character sketch? While I think it’s clever it doesn’t seem to have a lot of meat to the story.
We only get the slightest sense of character from the dialogue. The reporter seems more like a random question asking machine, and the main character is vaguely developed, but not much more than that.
But I’m assuming you mean this as a piece of humor, so I’m not going to waste any more of your credits. Anyways any questions or comments please feel free to ask.
zahir reviewed Version 1 -
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Cute moral—but don’t tell my brother-in-law that!
I think it is unrealistic, though, that the recipient of such an award would be unaware of his having done so. I kept thinking that this news crew was actually there to talk to his brother or something, because I couldn’t believe that they’d know before he did.
What happened to Uncle John? I’m assuming he was the original CEO, or some higher-up. Obviously Mr. Smith got his position by default. Did Uncle John die?
This is a cute story, but it seems unfinished and a bit far-fetched.
easywriter57 reviewed Version 1 -
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You would think this would be a “North American” story but apparently not. Shillings gave it away. There isn’t a second part of the story where the reporters change what is said in the interview, though. Too bad! I really enjoyed reading this…and I am hoping like a lot of other writers here that I can start making money sitting on MY arse!
ducatigav reviewed Version 1 -
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Hi There
Good use of words, the conversation dialogue moved along quickly with no confusion who was who. The piece kept me interested, I know it’s only a short story, but you still need to hook the reader which you did. A good twist at the end too witty and original.
Cheers
Gav
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