A Kind of People by Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti

Author:Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti [Bhatti, Gurpreet Kaur]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781350188785
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
Published: 2020-12-12T00:00:00+00:00

SCENE FOUR

Wednesday. Staff room. MARK sits at a small table finishing a pasty. GARY gets a can of coke from a vending machine. GARY comes to sit. Drinks.

MARK: What are you gonna do?

GARY: Do?

MARK: They think they can treat us like shit. Like nothing.

GARY: Us?

MARK: I’m on your side. Always. Know that.

GARY: I know.

MARK: You got jobs this afternoon?

GARY: Yeah.

MARK: How do you feel?

GARY: I imagined this moment in my head. This moment, right here. I thought it would come, but I didn’t realise it would break me up so bad.

MARK: Gaz, you…you’ll never be broken. You sitting here, stewing, it’s what they want.

VICTORIA enters, goes to the vending machine, gets a diet coke. Silence.

VICTORIA: Can I get anyone anything?

She approaches awkwardly.

VICTORIA: I’m sorry it didn’t work out.

GARY: I’m a better engineer than Des.

VICTORIA: You are a first-rate engineer. And your feedback score is right up there. None of that means you can manage a team.

GARY: He’s never covered the job before, I have.

VICTORIA: It’s our role to have an instinct for the future…

MARK: Instinct…

VICTORIA: …to imagine how each interviewee might perform in a given situation.

GARY: What’s your instinct based on?

VICTORIA: Experience.

GARY: Of what?

VICTORIA: Business, life, people…

GARY: Do you know any other black people?

VICTORIA: (A beat.) Yes.

GARY: I’ve been here ten years. All the managers and team leaders we’ve had, every single one has been white. Why is that?

VICTORIA: It might just be that there are more white people in the field. I…don’t know. (A beat.) If you want any… feedback…

GARY: I don’t want feedback.

VICTORIA: Might help to get some perspective…

GARY: You don’t think I’ve got perspective?

VICTORIA: It’s only a suggestion. I’m sure there’ll be another chance in the future, at a different office. I’ll let you know. (A beat.) Nobody gets the first thing they go for.

MARK: Did you?

VICTORIA: You did your best Gary. That’s all you can ask of yourself. And you can carry on with your jobs now. I mean nothing’s really changed.

GARY: Everything’s changed.

VICTORIA: What?

GARY: This shit. Your shit…

VICTORIA: There’s no need for bad language.

MARK: (Amused.) Language.

GARY: …And now you come down here pretending you’re gonna drink that diet coke.

VICTORIA: You’re bound to feel…disappointed.

GARY: They said it was Des and it is. Just like we both knew it would be.

VICTORIA: Nobody knew.

GARY: Then I’m an astrologer, seeing the future. Why can’t you speak the truth?

VICTORIA: Truth?

GARY: The thing you don’t say but you know is there.

VICTORIA: I don’t…

GARY: I’d like to know what you really feel when you look at me.

VICTORIA: My role is to be impartial, my feelings are not relevant.

GARY: But they affect your choices.

VICTORIA: Not in my professional life. People should be judged by their actions.

GARY: You mean the way you acted on Mark’s birthday?

VICTORIA: I was drunk!

GARY: (Angry.) Speak the truth! You liar.

She goes to leave, MARK gets in her way.

VICTORIA: What are you doing?

MARK: What are you doing? Gary’s got a right to have his say.

VICTORIA: It’s nothing to do with you Mark.

MARK: This man is my blood. Tell her Gaz.

GARY: (To VICTORIA.

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