From a Safe Distance (22 page)

‘I've only been here a couple of months.' Debbie smiled. ‘How are you?'

‘Fine. You?'

‘I'm OK now, but I've had ME, so I wasn't able to work for ages. But my dad knew someone who knew someone, as they say, and now I'm here.'

‘Sorry to hear that. I mean, that you were ill.' I decided not to go into my history. ‘Hey, d'you remember the Italian job? Four weeks round Italy with Theresa Jenkins!'

‘That's right!' Debbie's eyes lit up. ‘We were sick of her moaning about everything, weren't we? I'd just graduated, but you had to go back and be with her for another year! I do remember, yes.'

‘Her bra and her chocolate got stolen in the Florence Youth Hostel!' I laughed again. But we were getting cold. ‘Which house are you working on?'

‘I don't work on the houses. I'm based here.' She pointed to the admin block behind us.

At that moment I realised she was smartly dressed, as I had been as a teacher. Care assistants, on the other hand, wore serviceable, casual clothes that were easily washed. The difference in our status was emphatic.

‘Oh. Well if you ever want a chat, I'm in Grove House.' With that we parted.

She had a proper graduate role. And it became clear from her manner that Debbie would not want to meet me socially from now on. How was I ever going to climb back to where I thought I should be?

March came in like a lion, so Mum believed it would go out like a lamb. I approached the spring with my usual dread. Not that the white door opened every time, but this is when it was most likely. A different door, the one to Max's office, stood open instead. He smiled.

‘Last time we met, you gave me a couple of your poems,' he began. ‘I liked them. Can I keep them?'

‘Yes. Remind me which ones they were.' We sat down.

‘One about your brother and … one about a doctor.'

I felt strangely nervous, exposed. ‘Oh, yes; keep them.' I had given birth to them and they had to make their own way
in the world. But we were no more than doctor and patient now, weren't we? So I had the uncomfortable feeling that perhaps I shouldn't have let my guard down by showing him the poems.

He asked me how work was going of course. I said I tried really hard not to let it get me down, but I wished something good would happen for a change. Sandra, I said, found fault all the time, complete with long-suffering expression and upward-looking eyes. Max smiled. I said I could imagine her talking about me in meetings. I wasn't being paranoid; I knew they tried to undermine me whenever they could. While I might not have overheard anything, yet, I could feel a kind of poisonous vapour hanging in the air sometimes when I went in the office.

‘Vee, er … they are concerned about your work.' Max coughed.

‘What do you mean?' My heart thumped in horror.

‘Well, they've sent me a list of questions about how your illness affects you. Don't be alarmed. I won't send any answers until you've seen them.'

I felt undermined. I wasn't sure how to react. I knew Max was on my side, but there was still something sinister in this.

He changed the subject. ‘What about a new job, Vee? Perhaps it's time to move on.'

‘I've already talked to Bella about that, and in fact I've got an interview next week.'

‘Well done! What's it for?'

‘A housemistress in a girls' boarding school.'

‘Far from here?'

‘Quite a way. The other side of London.'

‘Well, I wish you luck. I suppose you might even get the chance to do some teaching again one day.'

‘You never know. But Max –' I blurted it out before I was ready, ‘– I'm writing a book!'

‘Wow! That's a major undertaking! When do you get time?'

‘After shifts and on days off.'

‘What's it about?'

‘Oh, it's to do with someone who gets ill and loses her job … '

‘An autobiography?'

‘Not quite, as I've made a lot of it up. Most of it, actually. In fact it's … Max? Would you mind reading it? I mean, when it's finished.'

‘I'd love to.' He smiled and I saw again the clarity of his eyes. For a second I was back at Diane's, at the party. He picked up my notes from the desk next to him.

‘Now … Vee.' He turned the pages and found what he was looking for. He said my latest blood test showed my lithium level was a
bit
higher than he'd like, so he wanted me to reduce my dose by 200mg. Then I was to have another test in a month's time; he would write out a blood sample form out for me now. There was a pause while he hunted one down.

‘I met your wife.'

‘Oh, did you? There you are. Are you happy with keeping the rest of your meds the same?'

‘Yes, especially at the moment.'

‘Oh, spring, yes. Look Vee, we were … friends once. I don't like to see you in trouble. Work is hard for you at the moment and I want to stress that if there's any way I can help – .'

‘– I'll bear it in mind, Max. Thanks.'

A week later, he sent me the questions he'd mentioned along with his answers, and I went through them with Bella. As one might expect, it was evident that whoever had compiled the questions had not the faintest idea about mental illness, and certainly did not see me as a individual with the same needs and hopes as anyone else. Equally manifest in his responses was Max's professional approach, which we both knew disguised his true feelings – about Squaremile's practices I mean, of course.

The day after I saw Max, I was alone on duty with Sandra and I would rather have been anywhere else on earth. After
the medication round, during which she treated me like a Starter Grade, I heard a heavy thump and a cry in the passage near the office. It was Florence, one of our larger ladies, who had fallen out of her wheelchair.

‘I'll go and get the hoist, then, shall I?' I knew Grove shared one with Birch, and I had used one every day in Forest.

‘No, don't bother. We can lift her.'

I couldn't believe my ears. On the Moving and Handling course I had attended, they said that to avoid the risk of back injury, lifting someone manually should only ever be attempted in an emergency, such as a fire. I knew all about that. And House Managers were supposed to set a good example, weren't they? Not for the first time, I was in a difficult position: if I fetched the hoist I would be going against Sandra's instructions, and if I helped her lift Florence, I would be going against good practice. I had to go against my better judgement in the end and we hauled the poor lady back into her chair in a most undignified way.

The important thing about this episode is that we were alone. This meant that Sandra could report that I couldn't be bothered to get the hoist because it was raining, or some other excuse. Alternatively, she could say that it had been
my
idea to lift the resident. I had no witness to the incident, nobody to back me up, so once again, I had to keep quiet. If nobody has any faith in you and your judgement isn't trusted, life is hardly worth living. The irony is that Squaremile wanted to be in the vanguard of good practice, with its recently granted “Investor in People” status. In that connection, I couldn't help thinking that once every organisation had achieved this award, it would become meaningless.

I travelled to the boarding school for my interview by bus and train, trying to clear my thoughts of the Sandra clutter. Whatever she decided to say or do was out of my hands. The
world would keep on turning if I was sacked, wouldn't it? What could she do that was any worse than sacking me? At the same time, though, I knew that my confidence had suffered, and that was relevant right now.

March did go out like a lamb, as Mum had predicted. The sun was warm on my arm in the train. The interview went very well. It was refreshing to be back in a school environment: the old buildings, the spacious grounds and the trees, now coming into leaf, reminded me of Castlebrough. The Head of Boarding, Lesley Wallace, was a pleasant woman of about my age. To my surprise, she offered me the job then and there.

I was also invited to spend the following weekend at the school, to see how the house worked and meet the girls. I decided to wait until after that visit before I made any kind of announcement to my family, but I did tell Sandra that it was “likely” I'd got the job. Meanwhile, I was walking on air, feeling that Sandra could do no more harm. I felt protected by thoughts of a better future. For a while, in fact, she didn't have much to say to me at all; she probably didn't want to waste any more time on someone who was leaving.

But then my mood changed as it dawned on me that I had not mentioned a certain “little problem” at the interview. I knew I had to. So during the weekend visit, I asked for a private word with Lesley Wallace.

‘The thing is … I get depressed sometimes.'

‘I see,' she said, an almost imperceptible cloud passing over her face. ‘I'll be in touch tomorrow. I've got your work number.'

I had seen that cloud before, at the infrequent interviews in those two years in West Pluting, and I remembered the trials of the kitchen table. I was pretty sure I knew what was coming. On Monday, the phone rang in Grove office.

‘Hello, is that Miss Gates?'

‘Speaking.'

‘Oh, it's Lesley Wallace here.'

‘Oh, yes.'

‘I'm afraid I've got some bad news. We cannot offer you
the post of housemistress after all, in the light of what you told me.'

Although I had feared the worst, I still felt as if I'd been kicked in the head. I was trapped at Squaremile; my momentary elation had evaporated, my hopes of a triumphant escape were dashed. I felt as if I had swallowed a cold stone. Sandra asked me what was wrong; I told her.

‘Pha! You must be used to bloody disappointments by now! And there'll be some more coming if I have anything to do with it!'

Max was feeling much stronger after two weeks' rest with Helen as his nurse. She, on the other hand, was looking very tired. She fell asleep as soon as her head touched the pillow these days, regardless of any noise from Jackson. Simon was keeping out of the way, burying himself in work or, at least Helen hoped, busy searching for alternative accommodation.

Meanwhile, Max had been allowed to go back to his once a week job at Squaremile. He could not help wondering if some of the problems the residents presented with had been caused by the conditions in which they lived. For the moment, he wanted to have a proper look at Vee's diary, rather than read on in the book; he hoped he might gain a more gritty image of the atmosphere at the Centre. The diary was still where he'd hidden it, behind the monitor. But first he felt like going for his favourite walk to clear his mind.

The cul-de-sac was a peaceful place: most of the children did their growing up at one private school or another. Today he was glad of his anniversary jacket. A robin landed on the gatepost at the back, its wistful song cutting through the cold air. As he approached, it bobbed, then flew away. The latch was almost frozen to the wood; he soon put his hands in his pockets, missing his gloves. The lane skirted two fields in a dip to his left. The animals he had seen here were now in their winter quarters. To the right was a row of hawthorns, the boundary of his neighbour's garden. A few lumps of old snow lingered in places. He breathed in the fresh air, not daring to think about the condition of his heart, but there was no pain. He got to the second field; behind both fields
was woodland, which swept in a great arc round the far end and swallowed up the footpath. He walked about a mile, nearly to the edge of the wood, as far as the blackthorn bushes.

Back home he made a coffee (Helen had insisted they buy decaffeinated from now on) and headed up to the attic. He rubbed his hands and held the cup to warm them, then immersed himself in the diary. A short while later, he wrote:

“Evidence of Vee's fragility towards the end of her life could be found in her writing and was always linked with her treatment at work. She stopped work on her novel in June or July, but the diary went on until the beginning of September. Following her stay in Porteblanche from March to May of the previous year, she had been coping quite well for some time. As the months went by and the stress increased, however, she knew she would have to get out of Squaremile. I gave her a reference, but she experienced a series of rejections. Her diary goes into detail: