“It’s pronounced /shi-vawn/, you know,”
Ericha said pedantically standing next to our dinner table with a hot plate of fresh fnords and a side of Mrs Knowitall. She had overheard the scrawny old Ohennassy mention Siobhan O’Rion’s name, our great first world leader, in a reference to last year’s upheavals at the bridge when the then new Captain decided it was time for us to set a new unscheduled course. Claud thought differently about it and decided to shut the systems down entirely. He demanded penance. It wasn’t until the Captain had formally apologised to him and repented that lights went on again and everything started bleeping and flashing like there was no tomorrow causing some of the crew to think there was an alien attack, which made them jump ship in our only lifeboat. It has not been replaced as of yet but has been on order for some time now.
Our latest team member’s statement was a clear full-frontal attack on our ship’s biggest oddball with his peculiar ways of ignoring the dress codes and a preference of pronouncing every word the way it is written when he deems it necessary. He now deemed it necessary. We have always known him to be somewhat of an oddball, but he is our oddball and she does not get to provoke him in any way seeing that she has only been in our department since the end of last month. She has to prove herself worthy of our friendship, therefore she has not earned or been granted the unofficial right of such a provocative move towards our esteemed weirdo. Ever since this self-righteous brat has stepped out of the transpod and set foot on board Claudius One, she has been acting like she has been part of the in-crowd since forever. A genuine, old-fashioned Rachel, that woman is.
As I am entering this into my BBC, I can already hear her high-pitched voice, scratching like fingernails on a blackboard, in the back of my head with her three chins wobbling like a Bobfish as she’s going, ‘It’s Karen! Do your research, bud.’ The jokes on her, my name’s not Bud. This merely goes to prove how much of a Rachel she really is.
To be fair, she is not totally wrong, though not fully right either. This was pointed out to her matter-of-factly by my good friend and colleague Osmanthus, the giant one. He beat me to it when he replied in his most solemn tenor voice,
‘It’s just John. Stop making it sound more pretentious than it really is. His name was John. Named after toilets. Born in what was formerly known as the Independent States of America and there wasn’t an Irish bone in his entire body. Except for that one time he nearly choked to death on a piece of Crubeens’
I love how he often casually slips in some trivia in his sharp replies. Before Ericha could butt in and start her endless sermon on our great first world leader, Brancho – not known for relentless witticisms – chimed in,
‘Are you trying to tell me that it is not Shaun? Have I been wrong about this since just now?’
‘You won’t have been wrong for long, Brancho, so long as you stop spelling it as Shaun and start using the correct spelling.”
The look on Ohennassy’s face as he defiantly, yet casually, made this remark staring at Ericha from over his glasses that had been placed on the tip of his nose the moment before his reply. He was enjoying this petite battle of humour against arrogance while slurping his unidentified broth out of a dented metal cup.
Ericha, slightly fuming and frothing at the mouth, trying to pull up her abundant sagging flesh with one hand as if adjusting low-hanging jeans, asked the question we all knew was coming,
‘So, what is the correct spelling of Shaun, Mr Ohennassy? Do enlighten me and the rest of the table.’
‘It is spelled s-h-i-v-a-w-n, but the i and v are silent.’
He put down his cup with a smirk and a sharp pang, adding one inconspicuous more dent to it, to emphasize the end of this debate as far as he was concerned. A low, booming voice from the other end of our table, preceded by a loud, deep breath and the words ‘For Claud’s sake!’, made everyone freeze mid laughter.
‘Next thing you know, you’ll be trying to convince us that it’s pronounced /oh-rye-on/ instead of /oh-ree-on/ and then where will we be, Ericha!?’
The laughter ensued as Ericha sat down next to me knowing she’d been beat. Humour has proved victorious once again. Silently, she munched away at her now lukewarm fnords desperately trying to hide the seed of doubt we had planted in her mind about the knowledge that she thought she had and was in fact right about. To a certain extent.
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