Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine

‘That’s brilliant, Eleanor,’ he said, smiling. ‘What’s stopping you?’

I had a nibble of my scone – it was unexpectedly delicious, much nicer than the ones you get in Tesco. I never thought I’d find myself thinking that about anything.

‘Well,’ I said, ‘on the plus side, I would get paid more money. Not a huge amount more, but still … enough to allow me to upgrade on certain items. On the other hand, it would entail more work and more responsibility. And the office is largely staffed by shirkers and idiots, Raymond. Managing them and their workloads would be quite a challenge, I can assure you.’

He snorted with laughter, then coughed – it appeared that his cola had gone down the wrong way.

‘I see your point,’ he said. ‘What it boils down to is, is the extra money worth the extra hassle?’

‘Quite,’ I said, ‘you’ve summarized my dilemma very neatly.’

He paused, chomped some more.

‘What’s your game plan, Eleanor?’ he asked.

I had no idea what he meant, which must have been evident from my facial expression.

‘What I mean is, do you plan to stay in office administration long term? If you do, it could be good – a new title and salary. When you come to take the next step, you’ll be in a much better position.’

‘What do you mean, “next step”?’ I said. The man was incapable of speaking in plain English.

‘When you apply for another job, with another company, I mean,’ he explained, waving his fork around. I shrank back, fearful that some microspots of spittle might reach me.

‘Well, you don’t want to work at By Design for ever, do you?’ he said. ‘You’re, what, twenty-six, twenty-seven?’

‘I recently turned thirty Raymond,’ I said, surprisingly pleased.

‘Really?’ he said. ‘Well, you’re not planning to spend the rest of your life doing Bob’s books, are you?’

I shrugged; I genuinely hadn’t given it a moment’s thought.

‘I suppose so,’ I said. ‘What else would I do?’

‘Eleanor!’ he said, shocked for some reason. ‘You’re bright, you’re conscientious, you’re … very well organized,’ he said. ‘There are lots of other jobs you could do.’

‘Really?’ I said, dubious.

‘Sure!’ he said, nodding vigorously. ‘I mean, you’re numerate, right? You’re well spoken. Do you know any other languages?’

I nodded. ‘I have a very good grasp of Latin, actually,’ I said.

He pursed his whiskery little mouth. ‘Hmm,’ he said, gesturing to the waiter, who came over and cleared our table. He returned with two coffees and an unrequested saucer of chocolate truffles.

‘Enjoy, guys!’ he said, placing the dish with a flourish.

I shook my head, not believing that anyone would actually say such a thing.

Raymond returned to his theme.

‘There are lots of places that would be looking to hire an experienced office manager, Eleanor,’ he said. ‘Not just graphic design – it could be a GP practice, or an IT company or, well … loads of places!’ He shoved a truffle in his mouth. ‘Do you want to stay in Glasgow? You could move to Edinburgh, or London or … well, the world’s your oyster really, isn’t it?’

‘Is it?’ I said. Again, it had never crossed my mind to move cities, live somewhere else. Bath, with its fabulous Roman remains, York, London … it was all a bit too much.

‘It occurs to me that there are many things in life that I’ve never considered doing, Raymond. I suppose I hadn’t realized that I had any control over them. That sounds ridiculous, I know,’ I said.

He looked very serious, and leaned forward.

‘Eleanor, it can’t have been easy for you. You don’t have any brothers or sisters, your dad’s never been around, and you said that you have quite a … difficult relationship with your mum?’

I nodded.

‘Are you seeing anyone at the moment?’ he asked.

‘Yes,’ I said.

He looked expectant; bizarrely, he seemed to require a more detailed response than this. I sighed, shook my head. I spoke as slowly and clearly as I could.

‘I’m seeing you right now, Raymond. You’re sitting right in front of me.’

He snorted with laughter.

‘You know fine well what I mean, Eleanor.’ It became apparent that I didn’t.

‘Have you got a boyfriend?’ he said, patiently.

I hesitated. ‘No. Well … there is someone. But no, I suppose the factually correct answer at this point in time is no, for the time being, at least.’

‘So you have a lot to deal with on your own,’ he said, not as a question but as a statement of fact. ‘You shouldn’t give yourself a hard time for not having a ten-year career plan.’

‘Do you have a ten-year career plan?’ I asked. It seemed unlikely.

‘Nah,’ he said, smiling. ‘Does anybody? Anybody normal, I mean?’

I shrugged. ‘I’m not really sure I know any normal people,’ I said.

‘None taken, Eleanor,’ he said, laughing.

I pondered this, then realized what he meant.

‘I didn’t mean any offence, Raymond,’ I said. ‘Sorry.’

‘Don’t be daft,’ he said, gesturing for the bill. ‘So, when do you have to decide about the job? I think you should take it, for what it’s worth,’ he said. ‘Nothing ventured, eh? Plus, I’m sure you’d make a great office manager.’