Stranger Still

by Marilyn Messik

  The other was Lucy, eleven, who’d stopped talking. She’d been referred by a school counsellor and challenged Jane’s professional detachment because at the time she was the same age as Emma. It took a session or two for Lucy to understand she was in a place of safety and confidentiality. Once she did, the story poured out in one brief, hoarse and traumatic catharsis. Her mother had remarried a few months back; and because the child didn’t have the words to name what it was her stepfather was doing to her, she’d stopped using words altogether.

  Almost immediately after that session, as Jane was putting into action the next urgent professional steps; Lucy’s mother phoned. Lucy, she said, would not be returning, these sessions were doing more harm than good. The level of angry bitterness, buried amidst the bile with which this message was delivered, told its own horror story. The woman knew. The family refused any further contact and moved abroad shortly after. Lucy was the patient Jane felt she’d failed, but I was pretty certain Lucy wasn’t who I was looking for.

  I stood up, “Look, I’ve been stuck in this office all day and Katerina needs a walk.” Kat, curled and comfortable, looked up aghast, she enjoyed walking about as much as I did, and really only consented to venture outside for calls of nature, and the briefer the better, but this was no time for sensibilities. “Let’s get some fresh air while we talk,” I said. Jane looked as disconcerted as Katerina and gathered gloves, handbag and jacket with tight lips. She wasn’t disappointed she told herself. She’d expected nothing much and nothing much was what she’d got; what a waste of time. On the other hand, once out of the office, it would be less awkward to suddenly remember an appointment, bid a swift farewell with a thanks-for-nothing subtext and beat a rapid retreat.

  “We’re going for a walk,” I said to Brenda’s startled face, as our party passed through the outer office, I didn’t pause for explanation. I had a hunch and over time, I’ve learnt to act on them because they get results – not always positive, I should add – but instinct suggested what I had in mind might be the only way right now.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  As I and my two companions, each as reluctant as the other, strolled down Brent Street, Jane and I were wrapped in her thoughts, and she was giving me the answers to most of the questions I wanted to ask, at the same time as working out when would be the best time to discover she had to dash.

  Throughout her training, it had been drummed into her that she wouldn’t be able to help everybody; nothing should be considered a failure but rather a learning experience; and she should never cross the line between caring and really caring. But as is often the case, how she was supposed to feel and how she felt, were sometimes not even within shouting distance of each other. The couple of cases she’d highlighted would always bring up guilt and questions - but they took us no further forward with her current crisis.

  “Hendon Park’s just down the road here,” I said.

  “Is that a good idea,” she said, “won’t the dog roll in disgusting things?”

  I had to laugh, “Trust me, I’m more likely to roll in something than she is, this is one extremely fastidious dog.” We entered the park, following the path past the tennis courts and I thought I should test a theory. Bit mean but necessary. Sure enough, Jane swore softly and did a sideways skitter away and around something that wasn’t there.

  “Sorry,” she said.

  “What was it?”

  “Not sure, something squashed, with maggots, eugh; almost trod in it!” she shuddered, and then looked at me with resignation. “You didn’t see it did you?” I shook my head, feeling guilty; I had though confirmed she was exceptionally receptive.

  We walked on a little more and I didn’t miss her glance back to see how far in we were, so she could make reasonable get-away plans.

  “Look,” I said, “I’m not sure exactly what’s going on, but I might be able to stop it for you.” I nodded towards a bench we were approaching and as we sat, I bent to unclip the lead, “Off you go, have a run.” Kat gave me the sort of look I’d give anyone who suggested that to me, turned on the spot a couple of times and settled neatly by my feet. I turned to the woman by my side, she was holding her tired face in her hand; the sun mercilessly lighting every line and shadow.

  “Do you use hypnotherapy in your practice?”

  “I do,” she said.

  “D’you trust me enough to let me try something similar?”

  “What - here?”

  “It won’t take long.”

  She shrugged, too worn out to disagree and I reached for her reluctant hand. I was about to pull the wool over the eyes of an expert and felt a prop or two wouldn’t have gone amiss. In the absence of such, I’d just have to hold her hand.

  “Relax,” I said, ‘fat chance’ whipped through her head, but she had the grace to not let it show. “Close your eyes, so you’re focusing on the sunlight filtering through your eyelids. Feel the warmth on your face, hear the noises around you; breeze in the trees, birds, children, dogs – now let them go, let them fade gently, hear only my voice, feel only the pressure of my hand on yours.

  I paused for breath, in truth I was feeling rather relaxed myself, which obviously wasn’t the point. I’d read about the BBC filming Peter Casson at the Alexandra Palace back in the 50’s. Putting the volunteers under, he inadvertently mesmerised a couple of cameramen as well as three technicians in the control booth. The BBC, ever caring of the well-being of the nation and its own reputation, dropped the project faster than a hot potato. I pulled my attention back and slipped into her head to briefly black her out. I was going to use something Sam had shown me once, although it was on one of those occasions which came under the heading of dicey - so I hoped I’d paid enough attention to remember correctly.

  I visualised shimmering copper threads – they felt like effective barrier material - and I wove those swiftly and carefully into a virtual skull cap inside her head. As I did, as I was in there, I felt something fleetingly familiar, but I had limited time and lacked Sam’s abilities. He’d have been able to map her brain and pinpoint precise placement of the protection, I had to opt for a clumsier all-over method, I had to be quick and I couldn’t make a mistake.

  When I had it where I was pretty certain I wanted it, where I thought it would work best, I was gripped by sudden panic. What if I was wrong? What if the images were being generated by her own brain besieged from a malignancy within, not as I was assuming, from somewhere else? I froze as I thought this through. If I was right, the measures I’d taken should stop the insects. If I was wrong and they continued, then that would be the time to head for a genuinely qualified medical person – and quickly! I examined this logic and my conscience for flaws, found few and withdrew my now extremely sweaty hand from hers, wiped it on my skirt, took a breath and woke her, counting down and clapping my hands sharply, to make everything feel kosher.

  When she opened her eyes, the scepticism shone clear. She thought I was a complete and utter nutter, a waste of time and energy. She was cross with Susan for even mentioning me, even crosser with herself for coming. For her to make such an obviously stupid decision, proved beyond doubt, that she was in an even worse way than she’d previously thought. But she was courteous and thanked me as we walked away from the bench. Said she’d let me know how things went, said please invoice her for the time spent, apologised for having to dash now but had to be somewhere. We shook hands formally and I was amused at how swiftly she’d initiated that shake, just in case I was heading in for a hug. She felt I was well-intentioned and had tried my best, but I was certainly not going on her people-to-keep-in-touch-with list. She, on the other hand, was definitely going on mine; I needed to know how things went.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Office life meanwhile chugged along, not always smoothly but generally I felt, in the right direction. Our small team meshed well, although you’d be hard put to imagine a group of women more disparate. Brenda at the helm was ably assisted or as Brenda preferred to put it, inter
fered with by Aunt Kitty. Trudie was getting happily hippier by the minute, and always looked as if she was going to San Francisco, although beneath the flower power she really wasn’t unconventional at all. I knew for a fact, the only trips she ever took were on the stairs and the only pot she used was for her delicious vegetable soup which she often brought in for each of us because she said she had to find a use for all the flipping vacuum flasks, accumulated through years of school trips. She was mid-forties but looked ridiculously young, not much more than a teenager herself. That, combined with fey and flowery invariably led people to underestimate her, but she had a quirkily swift and sharp mind and an instinctive ability to spot new business opportunities.

  Ruby, black business-suited, brisk and impeccably manicured - she’d spent a long time with damp, leaf-stained hands and wasn’t going there again - was a great front-woman, conveying the impression she’d just hurried out of one board meeting, was on her way to another and ate troublesome clients for breakfast. Truth was, whilst she was indeed excellent at meeting and greeting, she’d worked through years of customer contact in the shop and now was never happier than when left alone with her typewriter and an overflowing tray of manuscripts to be transcribed and transformed from handwritten and unreadable to pristine and presentable. She was building a devoted following of research scientists from the National Institute for Medical Research in Mill Hill, who could never, for the life of them, read back their own notes and were beyond relieved to have found someone who could.

  Auntie Kitty, energy only a trifle diminished after the unexpected encounter with the knife-wielding lunatic, oversaw the bookkeeping and, even more importantly, the credit control in a style best described as Mafia Boss. She was also the one best suited to handle our somewhat temperamental alteration ladies who invariably shrieked ‘No. No. No. Not possible!’ to any suggested deadline, whereupon there would ensue a fiercely hissed exchange of views between them and Kitty, with a fair amount of fee haggling, before matters were settled to mutual satisfaction.

  Our Brenda, as we’d all come to call her; sailing magisterially broad beamed, broad bosomed and bossy between our three office rooms, had never been within shouting distance of a management training course but was a natural, a paradigm of perfection when it came to getting everything that needed doing, done by the person best suited to do it, in optimum time with minimal hassle and cordial relationships maintained throughout.

  Our odd combination worked well. There were clients who loved Ruby but would have run shrieking from Trudie; others who’d have died of fright faced with Ruby’s cutting-edge efficiency. Brenda proved herself time and again to be adept and unrivalled at handling our very young charges as smoothly as those at the other end of the age scale. She dealt out a blend of affectionate discipline, backed by a no-nonsense glint in the eye. ‘Boundaries!’ she was fond of saying, ‘that way everyone knows where they are.’ She could smell ‘playing up’ from a mile away, but always recognised genuine distress or confusion and knew when a schedule needed tearing up in favour of a bit of time and a listening ear. Our team of intelligent, motivated women, each recognised and respected the same qualities in the others, resulting in great working relationships, genuine affection and for me, the feeling of being supported by a well-upholstered army.

  I was, as promised, keeping an eye on Joy – I think we all were.

  She was a little more subdued than she’d been, but there was no doubt in my mind – or in hers, because I checked – that she was idyllically happy. She’d taken to wearing an Alice band to hold back her now much longer hair. She’d also eliminated her fringe; Trevor said it suited her better without. I didn’t think it did and the toothed plastic of the band, pulling hair hard back from her forehead, made her look both younger and more vulnerable, but that was just my opinion. She’d changed her signature red lipstick for a paler shade. Trevor, she told me, loved her new look, said it was far more modern and the other lipstick made her look a bit like a nineteen-forties film-star.

  She loved it, she confided, that he took such an interest in her appearance, even went clothes shopping with her which meant she ended up spending far more than she’d ever have done on her own. I told her David also had a great fashion sense - he could sense whenever we veered near any shop where he might be required to sit and wait while I tried something on, and had developed the ability to change direction faster than you could say, ‘it won’t take long.’ We laughed and I collected the mail I’d come down for. As I moved away, I was caught in the genuine warmth of her affection and appreciation of Trevor.

  Her notebook was still much in evidence and she was industrious in recording the ins and outs of her day, but she didn’t feel it was any kind of imposition. I’d made sure I was in reception on several occasions when Trevor came to pick her up. He and Joy were clearly delighted to be back in each other’s company, but he took time to greet me warmly, ask after David and have a brief chat about business, his and mine. I had no compunction in mentally checking him out, but there could be no doubt his feelings were absolutely genuine; in Joy, he felt he’d found his perfect woman. As he helped her on with her coat, insisted on carrying her shopping bag and announced no cooking for her tonight, he’d booked a surprise table; I could only hear and feel good things in his head. As they left, he had a protective arm round her shoulders and I thought, if this was a cartoon, they’d have walked down the street, framed in a big pink heart.

  * * * *

  A much-needed coat of paint was due to be applied downstairs in the travel agency, because Hilary said the place was becoming off-putting. How the heck, she demanded, could Martin expect clients to imagine and book their five-star luxury holiday if they were sitting in two-star shabbiness? Martin had reluctantly agreed, but when I seized the moment to say we needed to make sure all the offices downstairs and up, were well-maintained, he was predictably as far from keen as he could be. So I had a word with Hilary.

  The next thing I heard was that Martin definitely felt upstairs could do with a freshen-up too. Hilary was a shining example of a woman who knew her own mind, and conviction combined with non-negotiable determination usually wins the day. Thus, it came to pass that normal chaos was augmented by masses of dust sheets, tools, pots of paint, mugs of tea and ladders over which we and clients had to climb. The project was in the tender charge of Mr Pegneddy, who’d come to us highly recommended by my Mother-in-law, apparently he’d been ‘doing them’ for years. I thought if he was good enough for Laura, whose house looked permanently staged for an Ideal Home photo shoot, he was almost certainly up to our standards, and he’d since also done jobs for a couple of our clients who were delighted.

  When he originally came to meet me at the office, he wasn’t the artistic Italian artisan I’d been expecting, but a bow-legged, elderly chap who didn’t look as if he’d have the strength to partner a paintbrush, let alone a roller. He was shiny-topped bald but with an incongruously lush grey ponytail gathered at the back. He chuckled wheezily and nudged his companion when I greeted him by name.

  “Got it wrong love, everyone does. I’m Mr Peg see, this ’ere’s Eddy.” Eddy, as tall and silent as Mr Peg was small and chatty, ducked his head in awkward acknowledgement, “Daft as a bucket of brushes he is, don’t say much neither,” Mr Peg gave him a fond shove with a shoulder that just about came up to Eddy’s elbow, “but best bloody worker I’ve ever ‘ad. Fifteen years we been together, Mr Peg ‘n Eddy see?”

  Whilst I had things running smoothly in the office, I was aware a little more effort needed to be put in on the home front. David had been wonderfully accepting of most of my idiosyncrasies but as we all know, going out together is one thing, living together quite another.

  At home, with my parents and Dawn, there wasn’t really a line between what was normal and what didn’t come under that heading at all and nobody batted much of an eyelid at anything that went on. Obviously that was a completely reversed when I was out and about, but married life fell betwixt and b
etween and I didn’t want to repeat the fright I’d given David the first time I needed the carving knife for the roast chicken. Yes, it did whip across the room at speed and indeed it did pass him at nose height, but honestly it wasn’t as close a shave as he made out. We laughed about it afterwards, although I felt he wasn’t quite as amused as he could have been, and I promised to be a little more circumspect in the future.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  My new touchy-feely ability that had developed whilst I wasn’t looking was a bit of a nuisance and I can’t say I was thrilled; it felt way too woo-woo for my liking, but as with anything, once you stop being surprised, you have to adjust. Initially, I was unexpectedly swamped with a bucket-full of emotion-laden information several times a day, without any kind of warning, but then I found it seemed to work like static electricity and I got used to treating unknown objects with the same caution you use on a metal doorknob when you’ve just walked across a nylon carpet – that swift fingertip touch to get any shock out of the way before proceeding. I don’t think anyone noticed or if they did, they didn’t say anything, and it wasn’t as if all objects were a problem, most weren’t. It did put paid though to enjoyable meanderings around the antique market in Hampstead. Perhaps not surprisingly, the majority of items there carried emotional history, usually several histories, and these were never neatly layered, more of a mish-mush of sensation. Finding I could look, but best not touch took a lot of the pleasure away. On the plus side it meant I didn’t spend as much and retired a lot earlier for hot chocolate at the Coffee Cup across the road, an establishment that had been going for so long their crockery was probably older than most of the goodies in the antique market.

  * * * *