UniteDead Kingdom. Stuart Irving Irving
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or soared in the wrong directions. He was long Euribor which plummeted fifty-five ticks, short the US ten-Year which shot up a point and a half, long Eurostoxx which dumped two hundred and forty points and long the dollar-yen which crashed over three percent.
Fucking bullshit markets! But Zan was well aware that ultimately, predictably, it all boiled down to one number. The number that made all comments, all opinions and all analysis irrelevant in comparison. That number was flashing red. Zan looked at it again. A strange noise escaped him: it sounded like a yelp and an insane laugh rolled into one. Things now felt like they were properly … unravelling.
Is this how madness begins?
He looked at the number again, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead. His cheeks were still damp with tears from earlier. Earlier? When, earlier? How long have I been losing my shit here? He tried to remember what had happened in the last hour, but it was like grabbing smoke. He refocused instead on his PnL. He let the number swim in front of his eyes and then it gradually came into focus. He swiped the air to move the left hand window out the way and bring the number into view. Muscle memory from the movement needed to reveal part of the number told him the loss was at least ten figures.
FUCK ME! Have I really lost multiple billions all on my own? How is a multi-billion pound loss in one nightmare lunchtime by four different positions even possible?! The whole prop trading desk was never down more than three billion for the entire YEAR. ShitshitSHIT! He refocused. The full PnL figure was set up on his screen to be deliberately hidden by another window (‘never trade the PnL!’ he’d tell his minions cheerfully). He swallowed painfully and moved the covering window to the side to see the full scale of the damage, like a cancer surgeon peeling back the skin on the biggest tumour he’d ever seen. There was a
[dagger]
negative sign at the start (obviously! his mind screeched sarcastically) and the whole PnL number was a
[blood]
red colour like freshly sprayed
[arterial blood]
paint.
Swings and fucking roundabouts his mind gibbered again.
“Oh. God. No.” Goosebumps rushed up and down his back.
“Oh God no.” he started to cry but immediately stopped. Then he was a bit sick in his mouth.
“Whoops, I better brush my teeth before I meet Angela!” he said out loud in a crazed falsetto. He peered at his screen again; his PnL wasn’t a high ten figures like he thought.
Brilliant, now I can’t even read! The window had shifted to compensate for the increased number of digits. After the third comma he carefully counted … one … then two more numbers … then three (vomit, again, dancing in his windpipe). That meant
[it wasn’t a dream he left during the night]
… what did it mean? He felt dizzy now and alternated between giggling/crying. He was mystified that this maelstrom of emotion could come from him. It had to be someone else, someone who sounded utterly terrified and not at all sane …
Pause.
Breathe.
Slow down, man.
He looked at the PnL figure again, but couldn't comprehend what he was seeing.
Twelve. Figures.
With a little minus-sign dagger piercing the number's back! he thought. Twelve figures. A twelve figure loss. His throat clicked painfully as he tried to swallow. The first digit swam into focus, an ugly red two. Shaped like a swan, but spitting acid.
What!? he thought. Where did that come from?
So the first number was a
[swan a spitting swan a spitting swan]
two then a five. Then another two. The other nine numbers were practically inconsequential. Twelve numbers appearing on-screen to make him spew, shit and cry all at the same time. Just like Angela's phone number!
So there it was: a two hundred and fifty-two billion pound chasm.
“Two-five-two, how are you?” he sang out loud, his voice breaking. That’s an awful lot of swans! Bile rose high in his throat and he heard someone in the room sobbing loudly in desperate anguish. It was him.
Groggily, he heard the sound of hurried footsteps, growing louder. The door to his corner trading floor office was thumped open and two stern-faced security guards strode through. To Zan, it may as well have been happening in a distant galaxy, right up until a big heavy hand grabbed his right shoulder and brought everything sharply back into focus. Zan squeezed his eyes tight and urged himself back from the abyss. Cagily, he opened them and looked up to see the hand's owner towering over him.
“Hi Geoff, how's the family?” Zan asked, his voice quivering.
“Peachy … erm I’m sorry Mr. McMaster, but you’ll have to step away from the desk and come with us.” said Geoff.
All Zan could say was “—ng.” his voice too cloying and thick to articulate. Before he knew what was happening four hands had grabbed his arms and he was lifted up out of the chair. Zan was slightly built and the meltdown had drained what meagre strength he had so he didn’t even try to resist. As he was lifted up he looked down. His feet barely touched the deep Persian carpet. He'd spent many an hour massaging that sumptuous carpet between his bare toes, come win or loss. Now it just seemed a rather garish, needlessly expensive red carpet. He left the room flanked by Geoff and the other security guard
[Derek or was it Desmond Derek or Desmond he knew this … WHICH ONE IS IT?!]
He looked up at Derek/Desmond and grinned like a maniac.
As he swished through the main trading floor, he saw the open mouths of the army of quants, sales and traders. A stunned silence rippled across the whole floor as Zan was dragged through the middle of them towards the executive lifts. Some had been his protégés, most admirers at a distance, and all had shared gossip of Zan’s legendary acumen and trading size.
They look somewhat concerned! he thought and then giggled. Things started to swim out of focus as he was dragged into the glass lift. The last thing he remembered seeing as he accelerated upwards was a glimpse through the window at a strange overdressed old woman sitting outside. She sat on a bench by the pool in the Japanese garden, wearing an old-fashioned white dress-suit festooned with brooches. She was ripping bits of bread from a loaf and feeding a swan.
More swans: far too many swans for a Tuesday! he thought hazily, finally passing out as the brightness of the penthouse floor engulfed him …
Chapter 2: Exit Interview
Some swirling colours, the sound of someone shouting. More shouting, quite close. Was he in school? Was he in trouble?
“Wake up. Yoo-hoo! Wake up, Zan, you little piece of SHIT!” It was a vaguely familiar voice from school, wasn’t it? He felt groggy.
He realised who it was and that he certainly wasn't in school. He felt it in his stomach, like he’d been recently punched. The appalling trading loss he’d suffered and the abject misery he'd just inflicted on himself and potentially everyone … these things were nauseatingly real. The room swirled into focus. He was in Ed's room. Ed; the man, the myth, the legend. The bank's glorious, notorious leader. He orchestrated his work-force from the room Zan now sat crumpled in. In front of the same mahogany desk he’d sat the previous year to get his bonus number. Probably the last time he felt truly happy.
Actually, scratch that, he thought. Not happy, that doesn’t quiet capture it … vilified. It felt great knowing I was simply … better. Better than others. Specifically, my colleagues and, let’s be honest here sports fans, better than my friends.
He became aware of a looming presence sitting on the edge of the desk. Zan looked up; it was Sir Ed himself. It was said that, when presented with a leaving card for a self-styled master-of-the-universe