The Man Living on our Floor Part Eight - Final

"I'm trying to get a better a car". The Man Formerly Living on Our Floor started demanding better working conditions from the get-go. Apparently the vehicle he was given wasn't up to scratch. "Maybe you should wait until you've worked there for a while," I replied. It was, afterall, his first day.

The Man had a bad habit of self-sabotage. The day after his successful interview at the company in Warminster he was back there checking the place out. The new boss returned from lunch to find our scarf-clad Biggles-looking hero at his (the boss's) desk doing something on the computer. "Ah, what are you doing?" The boss asked. "Oh, just checking to see what kind of system you have."

"Ah, maybe you shouldn't have been at your boss's computer before you started working there," I said. "Scratch that, maybe you shouldn't be at your boss's computer at all unless he asks you to be there."

Whenever I gave the Man Formerly Living on Our Floor advice he would give me a slightly startled, "He thinks I did something wrong" look, he would then nod and ignore whatever tip I gave him. Once, however, he thanked me for setting him straight the previous Saturday night. I couldn't remember talking to him though, my recollections of anything after my spot of breakdancing on the nightclub floor are hazy (in my unfortunately vast experience breakdancing usually precedes blackouts). I imagine I did set him straight about a few things though - such as acknowledging the existence of his girlfriend and the need to pay back the Polish guy.

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The Man Formerly Living on Our Floor left his summer jacket and heraldic seals at our place along with a few bits and pieces. Yes, his family seal was sitting on our mantelpiece. You may remember an earlier episode when Moustache Guy (as he was then known) wrote a letter to the hostel manager requesting new rental terms. The manager responded to that letter with a letter turning Moustache Guy into the Man Living on Our Floor. Well, I discovered some time after that not only was the letter unfortunately written in aristocratic parlance but it had been sealed in wax! Sealed with the same abandoned seal sitting beneath the Rothco print in our living room. When I heard this, my palm instinctively connected hard with my forehead.

So for a few weeks things quietened down on the Man Formerly Living on Our Floor front. We saw him on the street (walking not living) occasionally and said g'day as well as, "Don't forget to pick up your stuff". I got a feeling he wasn't so keen on collecting his possessions because it gave him an ongoing reason to come over should need be.

One night we ran into him in a pub somewhere and he shared his excitement about the latest love of his life. "I met a 23 year old Columbian girl. Beautiful. She's the girl I'm going to marry. Her brother is moving to Bath and we're going to get a house together. We've had business discussions as well. I'm going to open a branch of the business in Columbia. Things are going really well."

A few weeks passed without seeing him. Then I rang a couple of days before we left the apartment.

"Hey mate, come over and get your stuff. We move out on Monday."

"I can't. I'm at work (on a Saturday) and out of fuel. I don't get paid till next week so I'm stuck here."

"Okay", that was par for the Man Formerly Living on Our Floor course. "I'll find someone to give it to then."

"That would be fantastic. Hey did I tell you about the Columbian girl I met in London..."

I had trouble finding people. I wanted to give the stuff to Carla but she was ignoring my messages. She only liked to give positive responses, and that's cool. I knew the score. But unfortunately for Carla I ran into her in the street. "He's not just out of fuel he's living in his car," she said. I didn't catch the details but I was a bit mystified how someone earning 750 pounds a week and being paid weekly could be totally out of cash. At least the fact he had the car meant he still had the job. I figured he must be poor at the moment because he did the right thing and paid everyone back. "So he gave Marius (the Polish guy) his money back?" She shook her head. (Palm/forehead). Carla didn't want the stuff.

The day we moved out I dropped off the summer jacket, his book of self-penned poetry and the family seal at the hostel. Maybe one of the young ones would return it sometime.

I'm going to miss the Man Formerly Living on Our Floor.

The End

The Man Living on Our Floor Part Seven

Okay, I kind of screwed up the story a bit by letting it slip that the Man Living on Our Floor scored a plush job. At least it won't make you think I'm a bastard this episode, where we take a step back to the week before he got it.

Part Seven

We asked the Man Living On Our Floor to leave exactly one month after he moved in - a deadline I'd established in my head from the start. Now we weren't being pricks. He had 300 pounds in the bank and, even though he'd lost his night porter position, he still had his Smile job. So he had plenty of money to stay in a hostel until his monthly paycheck came in, which would put him in a decent financial position to get a room somewhere.

He left on the designated day, thanking us sincerely and promising he'd pay us back in a big way when he got a decent job. I said, "Don't worry about it". His track record with paying people back wasn't so crash hot so I thought it better not to expect anything. So, anyway, off he went to check into the YMCA. Or so we thought.

Apparently the Man Formerly Living on Our Floor started spending a ridiculous amount of time at work over the next few days (like hanging out downstairs a few hours before his shift). A couple of people, friends and coworkers, mentioned they were worried about him. I talked to Carla and it turned out that he'd used his money to buy 200 quid's worth of camping equipment and clothing. He intended to save cash by camping, wait for it, in a cemetary next to, wait for it again, his grandmother's grave. The rest he'd mostly spent on tobacco and maybe tea. The Man Formerly Living on Our Floor treated food as a luxury item ranked after tobacco and tea on the need-to-buy list. He figured camping was the cheapest way to live while he looked for the high paying job he was certain he'd get and that we were equally certain he wouldn't.

We went for a beer with our eccentric friend (I know you're supposed to be rich to be eccentric but I'll make an exception) and asked him about where he was living. He was a bit shocked to discover we knew but I think he wanted us to know in the hope we'd ask him back. A lot of his aristocratic shtick is to act clueless when it comes to the mundane parts of life (ie feeding and lodging one's self) in the hope that a serf will take over these tasks so one could concentrate on the important things in life. Like hitting on hot 20 year olds and talking bullocks about the Cumbrian independence movement. But we were never going to take him back because it wouldn't help. He'd never leave if we did.

The worst thing about the whole situation was that the Man Formerly Living on Our Floor could never be bothered putting the tent up. He just slept in doorways after wandering around for much of each night - maybe partaking in his favourite pastime of clubbing with the young ones from the hostel.

So from his headquarters around the corner from where he worked the Man Formerly Living on Our Floor plotted his entrance into the world of high paying IT jobs. We thought he was totally delusional and were genuinely worried about him - to the point where we were planning to find his brother's number and call him in Australia to tell him what was going on. The Man should go live with his mum for a while we thought. He wasn't on his way up he was on his way out.

But before we could enact our plan it happened. One of the many calls taken for him by his secretary (the pregnant 17 year old at the Smile shop), while we were drinking across the road in the Boater, was the agency. They had an interview lined up for him in Warminster. He went along the next day after coming to our place to get cleaned up and, bam, was offered the job. 35000 pounds a year plus a car. And that was that. He was off the street and into the YHA.