Zack had watched enough war movies and action shows to understand, at least indirectly, the disorientation that people experience after a bomb goes off. Cory’s news wasn’t a physical bomb, but Zack still had that high ringing tinnitus in his ears. People seemed to move in slow motion as they reacted to the news, some shouting and freaking out, while others just stared off into the distance, catatonic.
The branch was closing.
He wouldn’t have a job in a month.
Zack felt strangely euphoric, like the news was un-real. It was the disbelief that Zack associated with the rug being pulled out from underneath him. Zack recalled a time some kids set up an imaginary date for an unpopular kid as a practical joke and told everyone to come and see the kid’s humiliation. Zack went, because he thought it would be funny, but the image of confusion painted over the boy’s face had haunted him. He always stood up to bullies after that.
He felt as confused now by the news from Cory as that boy had been when his entire world changed.
Cory’s rough grip shook him out of his vacant fog. “Zack and I will be here for you if you need anything during this difficult transition.”
Zack peered over at Cory. He was reading from a fucking company script. Zack pushed Cory off of him and stepped over to the other employees.
Cory held his hands out and looked at Zack. “Zack. Come on.”
Zack just shook his head. “We are all just…done? Let go?”
Cory folded the script and stuffed it in his back pocket. “I’m sorry, Zack. It’s totally out of my control.”
It still hadn’t completely sunk in. “Can I at least get a reference? I’ve got to find another job.”
Cory tutted. “No can do, bud. I’m sorry. Employees that are under investigation at the time of their employment ending aren’t eligible for a reference.”
Zack looked around, incredulous. Was anyone else hearing this? Everyone else was busy voicing their own fears and concerns to other colleagues. Some of them had just left.
His eyes focused back in on Cory. All of the hard work that he had poured into True North Canadian, and he was just dismissed with some ‘sorry, company policy’ bullshit? “Are you serious?” He asked.
Cory licked his lips, his eyes darting to the safety of his office. “I’ve got to go finalize my plans for that conference I’ve got to go to. Nothing else has changed, you’ll still be the boss when I’m away, alright?”
Zack let his facial expression flatten. “Yeah. Sure.”
Cory turned and walked away. Zack pulled on his coat, grabbed his backpack and looked around the beige and blue of the branch. The place he had come to, almost daily, for the past couple of years.
There was nothing else for him here. It suddenly seemed like a different place, the last breaths of life rattling out of it.
The hallway that led to the rare foreign currency room caught his eye. The memory of the sweet, musty smell of old banking boxes filled with antiques and the image of clear bags filled with colourful foreign money came to the surface in his mind.
Zack played with the loose thread that had unraveled on the sleeve of his coat. Maybe he—
“That’s pretty fucked up, hey?” Sydney growled at his side. Zack didn’t even notice her approach.
“Yep. A rough way to end it.”
Sydney huffed. “I’ve worked at this place for almost a decade. I took every chance to better myself that they offered. My…my dad….he. I needed to make some money to help at home. It’s just him and I, you know, and he ended up with throat cancer,” she let out a dry, bitter laugh, “all of those years on the road with the Hip. It was a great career for him, but he doesn’t have any benefits. No way to pay for the drugs and radiation, so it fell to me.”
Zack put an arm around her shoulders and patted her back. “I’m sorry.”
Sydney shook her head, her dark curls swaying in front of her face. “Yeah. Thanks. I just thought I was doing the right thing, you know? The banking industry is supposed to be stable. And now I’m getting into IT. How could they just drop me like I’m nothing?”
Zack wasn’t sure what to say, so he just tightened his lips together and nodded.
“I’m just….like, fuck you, True North. What did I do to deserve this?”
Zack eyed the foreign currency room. “Someone should teach them a lesson.”
Sydney laughed. “What could one person do against all of that corporate greed and coldhearted capitalism?”
Zack shrugged, but his gaze never left the foreign currency room.
Sydney looked around. Everyone had shuffled out of the branch and headlights in the parking lot shone into the building as cars left the parking lot. “I should go.”
Cory peeked through the Venetian blinds from his office, obviously biding his time until everyone had gone home. He was leaving on his conference trip in a couple of days. Zack felt like flipping him the bird.
“Lemme walk you out,” Zack said, and offered a hand.
Sydney smiled and her hand fit into his. They made their way out of the branch, walking slowly until they stood near her car. “Thanks for listening to me,” she said.
Zack felt the tug of a smile at the corner of his mouth. “Sure. I’ve got your back.”
Sydney took his hand and stood on her tiptoes to give Zack a hug. Zack squeezed her. “Thank you for being such a great friend,” he said.
Sydney slid into the driver’s seat of her car. “You’re welcome.”
When Zack turned the knob to his apartment, the anger and despair came flooding back. It was later than he usually got home, and the daylight was already waning, giving his apartment an eerie melancholic tinge. He slumped into his couch and opened up his laptop, which he’d charged at work.
His browser displayed the disconnected to the internet error.
Zack sighed a dramatic sigh and hopped up to the table where the final notice letters lay splayed out. He tore open the bill and saw that his internet had been cut off.
He had to pay his rent in two weeks, and was already in a lot of financial trouble. He might have to move back home or spend some time on the street.
For some reason, that tickled his funny bone and Zack chuckled as he fell back into his bed. With no electricity, food, or any light, Zack didn’t have anything else to do other than go to sleep. At least he could escape from his life for a while.
But it wouldn’t come. Zack tossed and turned for a while, until he accepted that sleep wasn’t coming.
There was a coffee shop not far from his apartment that was open late. Zack checked the time on his phone: 8:45. He sighed and made himself presentable and packed up his laptop. He stuffed it into his backpack, shoved his feet into his worn out shoes and tramped down the hill.
Swing Street was a staple in his small city, the first spot that locals would entertain the idea of coffee from. It featured a huge, paper mâché style person holding a coffee mug with wild and erratic whorls of steam instead of an actual sign. Zack tromped through a park that was close by and slowed when he came to the shop’s entrance.
Inside, the lone barista was busy washing dishes and the comfy sofas and chairs for patrons were largely vacant. Zack opened the door quietly, so he didn’t disturb the bell that jangled when new customers entered, and he quickly slipped into an empty love seat close to the door. There was a plastic bin under a nearby table with a used plate and mug, so Zack snuck over and grabbed them. He placed them on his table and even scrunched up a napkin and placed it on the plate, to make his visit look more authentic.
Zack flung his laptop open and pulled up the web browser. The coffee shop changed their Wi-Fi password, so Zack flagged the barista when she was walking around.
“Hey, what is the new Wi-Fi password?” He asked.
The girl looked at him for a moment. Her eyes darted to the empty mug and the plate with the crumpled napkin. “That’s dishonest, you know.”
Zack didn’t care. “Please?”
The girl rolled her eyes. “Whatever. It’s ‘Swingcoffee2025.’ No spaces, with a capital S.” She pointed at the dishes, “are you going to actually order anything?”
“I’m good,” Zack said. His eyes were already on the screen as he typed in the Wi-Fi password and turned on the free VPN he had installed, making his IP address somewhere in Dallas.
The girl collected the dishes and took them to the kitchen, but before she left she said, “That lying will catch up with you. Dick.”
Zack waved her away. He pulled out his phone and looked at the photo that he had taken of the SecurBag in the foreign currency room.
He already had found one online. It was a match, and for $115.99, Zack could do something about the evil True North Canadian Bank that had so coldly fucked his life over.
Zack glanced around the coffee shop. He had the feeling he was being observed, but he knew it was mostly because he was teetering on the edge of doing something he shouldn’t.
Zack went into his online bank, and transferred the minimum payment from his checking account, which was deep into overdraft, onto his credit card. He swapped back to the SecurBag website.
“Come on, come on.” He murmured.
He filled in all of his information and input his credit card details into the website and then moved his mouse over to the green purchase button.
He gulped. These were the last dollars and cents that he had left. He sat back, suddenly aware that the moral boundary that he had been trying so hard not to cross was almost already behind him.
He had tried to do things the honest way, and look where that got him: broke, unemployed, and disgraced. He was a loser. Thanks to Canada’s first choice bank - True North Canadian.
Zack wiped clammy palms on his rumpled sweater and let out a massive sigh. He moved a shaky hand back to the trackpad of the laptop.
He was destined for greatness. Zack knew that he was meant to be more than just a small town loser, and he was going to do something about it. Starting with demonstrating to all of those people who had led him on, like Cory. It was too hard to make it as an honest Canadian these days, so he had to make it another way.
He tapped the green button.
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