Game Over

As usual Paul’s alarm sounded at 4.45am for him to get up for work on Friday 2nd October. He always gets up this early even though his shift doesn’t officially start until 7am. The lads get in a bit earlier for each other so that they can get home sooner. Paul also has a 50 minute journey to work so leaves the house about 5.15am.
I went off to work as normal for a 7.45am start. At lunchtime Paul text me to say that SSI had been put into liquidation. Having bumped into a good friend in Sainsbury’s the previous evening I was prepared for this announcement, however not quite so soon. My friend knew someone working in the finance department at SSI and from what she told me the news was never going to be good. Again I took myself off to call Paul in private. Despite the news of liquidation he remained incredibly upbeat. He was sure things were going to be OK. They had been told to continue coming to work, that the government were going to help with pay, redundancies and retraining. I, however, had my reservations. In contrast to Paul’s optimism I felt that things were probably not going to go the way we hoped. Just before 5pm Paul called me again. I was just dropping Monica off at my mam’s so I could take Honor to her swimming lesson. I answered the phone and all Paul said was, “game over”. In a nutshell all the workers on site had been told to clear out their lockers and leave the site. The end was more abrupt than the lads could have imagined. I think “shell-shocked” might be the most appropriate term to use to describe how Paul felt. Gutted, disappointed, emotional and stunned are others. To date Paul has received no formal notification to say he has been made redundant. We are, at this time, in limbo. Where do we go from here?