By Vanessa Chng

Eight men had applied for the role, including Kai.

It was almost midnight, and they were in the industrial east of the city for a job interview. Kai figured they had all seen the same posting online.

Hiring: Executive Assistant
Great pay. No experience needed. ALL welcome.
Come be part of our dream team.

He hadn't expected it to be a group interview. None of the candidates did either, he guessed. The interview panel was a party of two – a man and woman, whose name plates had been set up on the table. They were: a silver-haired Manager and a Human Resources flashing a yellow-toothed smile. The two interviewers sat, shoulder to shoulder on one side of the conference table, nodding at the candidates as they walked in.

Manager and Human Resources looked uncannily alike. Both had noses so large, they colonised a third of their faces. They were siblings, maybe. Or twins. Or a husband and wife who had been together long enough that their faces had taken on each other's features.

The eight candidates sat along the other side of the conference table, still sweating and panting from their hike 12 floors up. The building's lifts were under maintenance, so the men had climbed the stairs up to the interview room. With its flickering lights and air conditioners heaving more hot than cool air, Kai thought the entire building might as well be under maintenance. He patted his temples with a handkerchief.

Manager said, "Tell us about yourself, starting with this gentleman over here."

The first candidate cleared his throat. "I have 15 years of project management under my belt and was most recently a UI/UX designer."

Another candidate was 80 years old. "I've done it all," coughed the old man. "Was in the army. Toiled at the shipyard. Played at jazz bars. Now I'm seeking my next career challenge. My dream job is one where I never stop learning."

A pink-haired boy fresh out of university said, "I'm a writer. My biggest weakness is that I'm too much of a team player."

It was Kai's turn. He said, "There is, within me, a deep, incurable melancholy. I think human beings are fundamentally unknowable to ourselves and each other. I've been eating instant ramen every day for a year. I only masturbate to Latinas. I was fired from my last workplace for sleeping on the job."

The company called Kai at four in the morning.

He was in his apartment, cooking instant ramen on the stove. Human Resources was on the other end of the line. She had been quiet throughout the interview before, only sitting so close to Manager as if her body were glued to his, nodding along and smiling with her yellow teeth as the candidates talked. Now, she spoke over the phone. Her voice was coarser than Manager's.

"Before we get any employees on board, we like to get to know them better. I'm going to ask you a few questions about yourself."

"Go ahead."

"Did you have a traumatic childhood?"

"I'd say it was more lonely than traumatic."

She paused, as if to take notes. "Next question: You mentioned you were fired from your previous workplace for sleeping on the job. Can you confirm this again?"

"Yes, that happened."

"Could you elaborate?"

"I was taking naps during office hours. Dozing off at meetings."

"In your application form, you indicated that you have no next-of-kin or emergency contact person. Is this correct?"

"I have – or had – a father. But he's not really –"

"Yes or no?"

"Yes."

"Yes, you have no next-of-kin; or yes, you have a father?"

"I have no next-of-kin."

"Lastly, what are your measurements?"

"I'm not sure."

"Well, you're no skinny minnie, are you."

"No."

"That wasn't a question. Thank you for sharing more about yourself, Kai. Now, we know each other much better. You have ten minutes," she said.

Ten minutes to confirm if he'd take the job. In the meantime, he was free to ask any questions he had – anything, except what the position entailed.

"It's a one-month contract," she said. "You'll live in the office for the entire duration."

"How's the pay?"

"Whatever you made in a year at your previous job, you can make that in a month with us."

"Is this some kind of a scam?"

"No."

"How's the work-life balance?"

"Balance is a state of mind."

"And the career progression?"

"There isn't any."

"I'll take it."

"Please hold."

The line went quiet. No hold music came on. Kai stood by the stove, phone against his ear. Red soup bubbled in the pot. Yellow noodles swirled in the broth, growing thicker by the second, puffing up into fat waxy tubes.

Aside from an old schoolmate-turned-insurance agent who had dialed him up to suggest they get coffee some time, and a police officer who had called to tell him that his bank account had been hacked into, and that the safest thing to do was to transfer everything in the account to the police – Human Resources was the first person Kai had really talked to in a year.

He tried to picture where she was calling from: her own apartment. A tiny studio where the kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom bled into each other. He closed his eyes. Through the dark and the dead air on the line, he thought he heard her breathing. He imagined her, after their call, standing in front of a bathroom mirror, winding a string of floss through her cheese-coloured teeth.

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