Crash

Andy Duffy

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781783199549
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Drama
• Index: Literature

"Everything that happens is created by you."
Confidence is everything in the world of high finance. Confidence in yourself, confidence in the market. Lose that and you lose everything.
Crash is the story of an enigmatic trader attempting to rebuild his life following a tragic event. As he takes the first tentative steps back into the brutal landscape of trading stocks, he feels the pressure begin to build.
In the continuing wake of the financial crisis, Scottish writer Andy Duffy creates a rare and poetic insight into the psychology of a banker's world.
Directed by award-winning Traverse Associate Artist Emma Callander.

There was a crash

The details are a bit hazy

I don’t remember much

No, actually, that’s not true

I don’t remember anything, not really

But you can trick yourself

Tell yourself some story

Your mind does the rest

Embellishing, filling in the blanks

Soon you can’t tell your story from the truth

So it becomes the truth

I know some facts about it, the day it happened

August twenty-third, two thousand and seven

It had been raining all day so the roads must have been wet

It was around eleven when we set off

We’re at a party, but we have to leave

Allison is…being inappropriate, making a fool of herself

There’s a scene

I lose my temper, and I shout at her in front of everyone

I know I shouldn’t get angry, it’s not her fault

…it is her fault

Make some excuse, we leave

Bundle her into the car

When I lean across her to clip her seatbelt in, she kind of falls forward

I ask her if she’s going to be sick

And she says yes

But in the event she’s okay

I don’t think we speak again after that

I start the engine, put the radio on low, and the heating up high

Just hoping she’ll fall asleep

As we head off, her head slumps into her chest

And I know I can relax, and enjoy the drive home

——

It’s a couple of weeks…

(Pause.)

It’s a couple of months before I’m back at work

John says I can ease myself into things

Take it easy for a bit

Not to push it

The markets have been quite volatile

We’re down two per cent on the month, which we’re not happy about, obviously

Below three per cent we close out all trades

It’s mostly high-net-worth people we deal with

‘Sophisticated’ investors

Although we have some smaller accounts

Folk entrusting us with their life savings

It’s all the same ultimately

Numbers on a screen

The price goes up or down, that’s it

I sit in on the morning strategy meeting

There’s been a piece in the FT about the money markets freezing up

Banks lending to other banks

Except now they won’t

No one seems to think it’s a big deal

It doesn’t even make the front page

Mark thinks we should be bailing on our long positions but gets shouted down

John asks for my opinion

The equity markets are going up so we stay long, I say

It makes no sense they’re going up but that’s neither here nor there

I have to speak with a few clients, settle a few nerves

Clients are on your back no matter what

We’re up, say, twenty per cent by May, give back ten, they’re still ahead

They tend not to see it like that

As far as they’re concerned I lost ten percent of their money

So they want to cut my dick off

Seems a bit ungrateful, does to me anyway

We would all be a lot better off if they just let us get on with it

You want to watch your account every second of every day, manage it yourself

But probably they tried that already and they fucked it up

I have to educate people

How this game works

People think the market’s easy, compared to…being a doctor, whatever

The think they know, but they don’t know anything

See, most folk have a psychological flaw which prevents them from making money

They need to feel in control

I see this even with experienced traders sometimes

They want everything to set up just right before they get in

It’s like picking lottery numbers

You pick your birthday, anniversary

Like it makes a difference what numbers you pick, the odds are exactly the same

Point is, you get to choose so you get to feel in control

In the market, you have to realise you’re not in control, and accept it

During my first week back I put a couple of trades on

Then I take them off again

Next week, a few more trades on

Take them off again

I feel a bit…apprehensive

Can’t really focus

Which isn’t a huge surprise, I suppose

I don’t want to be in this place

Maybe you’d think putting yourself into a normal routine would help

Being around other people would help

But you’d be wrong

It feels like other people’s presence is an act of violence

An invasion into my private space

Their constant noise

Not that they’re noisy

Just the sound of them moving, breathing

It’s like someone banging on the front door

I don’t feel safe

If I can’t hide inside here, (Pointing to temple.) then where else is there?

Towards the end of the day I hear a few of the junior traders going down the hall

As they walk by I hear something like, ‘That guy trades like he drives’, something like that, there’s laughter

After the close John comes by the office, asks me how I’m doing

Then he says, an inci...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Chapters