by A J Waines
I led her through recollections of being outside in the open; a walk she and Richard had taken down to Ullswater shortly after they arrived, a scurry to the local Post Office with Stephanie during a break in rehearsals – but no particular bridges seemed to jump out at her. We trawled back over the same scenes again and again, but Rosie kept shaking her head.
She left once her time was up, dragging her limbs, wishing me a half-hearted Merry Christmas.
I held open the door and watched her go down the stairs, waiting as I always did for the front latch to click so that I’d know she’d gone.
An hour or so later, I was halfway through a plateful of ratatouille when the phone rang. I picked it up before remembering that my whistle had disappeared. Sure enough, I heard the unnerving silence again, so I put down the receiver straight away.
I couldn’t face the rest of my meal after that. Instead I spoke to my phone provider and reported the mystery calls. Although on several occasions the numbers had been withheld, when they’d shown up I’d made a note of them, so I had a list to reel off. All had the London area code. The man I spoke to said they could have come from public phone boxes. Great – it could be anyone.
I didn’t want to change my number, nor did I want to block all withheld callers. Calls from Miranda’s Project were often withheld and I didn’t want to prevent those getting through. If I felt it was harassment or malicious, I should contact the police, the guy said, but as someone who dealt with the fallout from real traumas every day, I felt like I’d be wasting their time. I decided to wait and see.
I picked up the payment of forty-five pounds Rosie had left me on the ledge inside my front door. It was stuffed inside a plastic bag; a bundle of five-pound notes and pound coins, with two pounds’ worth in loose change. It looked pitiful, like she’d raided her money box to pay for her time with me.
Something made me think of the talk at King’s I’d been to several weeks ago. I remembered ‘Kitty’s’ voice and almost without thinking, I found myself calling Minette’s number.
‘I hope it’s okay to call after hours,’ I said.
Minette chuckled and said she could hardly tell what out of hours meant any more. ‘I hope you’re calling to fix up a lunch date,’ she said.
‘I’d love to…although actually, I’m calling about something else.’ My fingers tightened around the phone. ‘After your talk, I didn’t mention that I recognised a patient in one of the recordings: someone you called “Kitty”.’
‘I see.’
‘In fact, I’m working with her at the moment.’
‘Quite a handful, I’d imagine,’ she said, ‘if I’m thinking of the right patient.’
I cleared my throat. ‘You could say that.’ I chewed my lip. ‘You said she’d been seeing a therapist called Erica Mandale, who’d died suddenly?’
‘Yeah…that’s right.’
‘And “Kitty” was seeing Erica through the NHS, not privately, is that right?’
‘Hold on, let me find my lecture notes.’ There was the clomp of footsteps followed by tapping at a keyboard. ‘Here it is,’ she said, ‘I’ve only got sketchy notes about her. Let me see…the sessions were at Guy’s, for around eighteen months…no wait a minute,’ she took a breath. ‘The last five appointments were at Erica’s home in Chelsea.’
I swallowed hard. ‘Do you know why they were moved from the hospital to her house?’
‘I’m not sure. I can’t check, I’m afraid. Erica’s full records are logged in the hospital system.’
‘“Kitty” is a very intense patient showing symptoms of a histrionic personality disorder,’ I said.
‘Ooh – tricky,’ she said. ‘Anxious about being ignored and needing to be the centre of attention, no doubt.’
‘Exactly. She comes across as demanding, pushing the boundaries. I’ve been seeing her for ten weeks now and I wondered what sort of progress Erica had made with her in a year and a half. Do you know how much of her childhood was covered?’
‘I don’t know, really. I only had a few recordings from their work together. You’d have to get access to her original records.’
‘I was hoping her experience with Erica could enlighten me. I’m stumbling around in the dark with her to be honest. Something doesn’t feel quite right. She’s had a tragic life and I want to do the best I can for her, but I’ve felt uneasy right from the start.’
‘Sounds like an issue for supervision, Sam.’
‘Mmm…’ I muttered.
I hated supervision. Dr Rosen had been allocated to me over a year ago and we didn’t suit each other one bit. He was all sharp angles and corners, keen to play everything by the book, whereas I wanted to bend the rules when it was in the best interests of the patient. I’d put in a request for a replacement, but no one else was available for the time being. As things stood, I turned up to as few meetings with him as I could get away with.
I thanked her and we had a brief chat about plans for Christmas, before fixing a date for lunch in the New Year.
‘By the way,’ I said, just before I rang off. ‘How would I go about getting hold of Erica’s notes?’
‘You’d need the go-ahead from the senior psychiatrist at Guy’s, Professor Radley Dean. I can give you his details, but he’s in America at the moment.’
‘And Erica died, you said?’
‘Yes, a heart attack, just like that – out of the blue. Her husband found her at the bottom of the stairs. Such a terrible tragedy.’
Chapter 27
Sam
The two weeks of demob-happy days over Christmas came and went. I took a stroll through a frosty Hyde Park with my uni friend, Ronnie, discussing the latest TV adaptation of a bestselling psychological thriller. I told him the scenes with the therapist were all wrong.
‘She’d get struck off for going out for dinner with her patient,’ I’d told him. ‘She’s asking for trouble.’
‘Only if she gets found out,’ he’d said.
I shared chip butties in Covent Garden with Gemma, an old school pal from Kent, saw a film at Leicester Square, visited Tate Modern…
I even managed to drag Hannah away from online properties searches for cocktails at a posh hotel bar in Covent Garden.
We took seats on the velvet sofa in front of the open fire, crackling with glittery pine cones that had been thrown into the flames. Sparkling fairy lights coiled around the edges of a broad antique mirror on the mantelpiece and sunken candles dribbled wax on to the hearth. It was a perfect festive setting: I always love the coziness of winter.
‘This will be my last Christmas in London,’ Hannah said, flattening my mood in an instant, as she draped her coat over the arm of a passing waiter. ‘I can hardly believe it.’
In spite of the flames spitting in the hearth, a deep chill swept through me. ‘Well, you should be thoroughly ashamed of yourself,’ I said, only half-joking. ‘Leaving your best mate all alone.’
A day later, I met up with Debbie and Bernie from St Luke’s and we went ice-skating in Bayswater.
I knew something was different about Debbie as soon as she joined us at the boot-hire desk.
‘Can’t skate,’ she said.
‘Tell me something new,’ I smirked.
‘No, I mean I can’t skate. I’ll sit and watch.’
I looked her up and down with concern. ‘Are you injured?’
‘No.’ She bit her lip looking sheepish. ‘I didn’t want to say anything until I was sure, but…’
‘You’re not..?’ I whispered, open-mouthed.
She pressed her hand on her belly. ‘I didn’t know if I was feeling nauseous because of the drugs, but we did a test and—’ She burst into tears. ‘Oh…sorry, I’m all mushy and hormonal.’
I wrapped her in my arms almost smothering her with my thick scarf. ‘That’s amazing. Brilliant. I’m so pleased.’
‘I’m probably being overcautious by staying off the ice,’ she sniffed, ‘but I know I’ll fall over and I’m not taking any risks.
’
‘Of course,’ I assured her. I knew how much this meant to her.
She unzipped her anorak, looking hot and overwhelmed. ‘Don’t tell anyone yet,’ she whispered as Bernie came back from the men’s desk swinging his skates.
I was delighted for her, but I couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for myself. People closest to me were taking life-changing steps and I was being left behind. For a brief moment I thought about Rosie. Her entire life consisted of people walking away from her, one after the other.
I called Miranda to try to make peace and find out what she was doing on Christmas Day. True to form, she was vague, but it looked like she wouldn’t be joining Dad and me in Kent this year.
‘I’m going to Eastbourne,’ she said. ‘Some friends are having a big bash.’ I waited, but there was no invitation for me to tag along. Maybe she’d be with her nameless boyfriend. I wished her well and said I’d put her present in the post.
I went to see Mrs Willow in the adjacent flat on Christmas Eve. She’d invited me, and I knew she wouldn’t have many visitors over the holidays. I remembered from an earlier Christmas that her husband had died on Boxing Day, in the 1990’s. We shared vinegary wine, pulled a limp cracker and I gave her what was possibly her only Christmas present – an enamel pill box I’d bought from Miranda’s Arts Project. She insisted on opening it there and then, held it to her bosom, and almost wept with gratitude.
On the twenty-fifth itself, I went over to Dad’s, played Scrabble and watched him fall asleep in front of the Queen’s speech. Before he’d retired, Dad had been a first-rate barrister. I’d seen him in action in court and he was formidable. He was so sure of himself when it came to the law, but with Mum he’d always been hopeless: tentative and passive. It was hard to believe those two sides could belong to one person.
At least spending Christmas with Mum wasn’t an option anymore. My parents had been drifting apart for years: Mum always so demanding and Dad going out of his way to try to please her. When she retired as a professor of architecture, they were forced to spend too much time together and their relationship went through what Dad called a ‘bad patch’ and Mum called ‘the end of the line’. Then, last year, Miranda’s terrible revelation blew the family apart and Moira Willerby was out of our lives forever.
But I didn’t want to think about that now; it was part of another chapter in my life altogether. Suffice to say that Dad swiftly moved out of their beautiful detached house into a pokey flat on the outskirts of Canterbury. As far as I know, Mum is still in the house on her own. We left her to it. None of us wanted to go back to that place now its history had been sullied. I hadn’t seen my mother since – she knew the kind of reception she’d get if she ever rang my doorbell. Not that I would ever have invited her to my place for Christmas previously – we’d never had that kind of relationship.
Towards the end of the festive season came the day I’d been dreading. I’d been doing well until then, but I knew the anniversary of Joanne’s suicide was going to be tough. When it came, I blundered my way through it by arranging lunch and dinner with different sets of close friends. I’d coped with suicides before, of course – in my line of work it comes with the territory – but it had never felt like this before. There’d been a dreadful spate of suicides at St Luke’s eighteen months ago, when I was dragged into a harrowing situation involving the London Underground. But Joanne’s suicide came months after that and it was different – it had been my fault.
On the morning of December 28th, I had another silent call and after repeatedly demanding that the caller reveal themselves, I blew the whistle I kept in my bag as hard as I could and put down the phone. I half expected Mrs Willow to come hammering on my door to see what was going on, but nothing happened.
It was then that I began to wonder whether it really was Bruce who was pestering me. Maybe it was someone with a connection to Joanne. Except, why wait so long after her death? Maybe the anniversary had triggered it. It could be a family member intent on punishing me for what happened. Except, they didn’t need to as I was making a mighty fine job of punishing myself. Barely a day went past when I didn’t think of her or taunt myself about the way I’d let her down.
I’d thought about sending a card to Joanne’s parents, but what could I write inside? Sorry, again, that I didn’t respond to your daughter’s cry for help. Sorry, I failed you all and ruined your lives forever. In the end, I decided that a message from me was probably the last thing Mr and Mrs Bellings would want.
That evening, alone after cramming the day full of other people’s laughter, the tears finally came. I stood in front of the bathroom mirror with my toothbrush and dredged it all up, every sickening moment of it. I’d followed the correct procedure, done everything by the book, taken all the correct steps. But I’d failed in one simple way. I hadn’t done the one thing Joanne had asked me, no – begged me – to do.
I knew the worst as soon as she didn’t turn up for her session the next morning. Her landlady let me into her room and there she was, her limp body hanging from the hook on the back of the door, her face still wet with tears. There was a note on the floor with my name on it.
When I bent down to pick it up, Joanne’s toe twitched, I was convinced of it. I helped the terrified landlady lay her body down on the carpet, desperately hoping she was still alive, but all the signs of death were already there. I took her pulse with trembling fingers, knowing she was too cold and finally, I let her hand go.
Of course, everyone at work told me it wasn’t my fault. Suicides happen in psychotherapy. You did the right thing. She would have found a way, eventually. She was ill. But I didn’t believe them. In my view, Joanne could have recovered and moved on, if I’d just been there for her.
I closed my eyes and saw again the three piercing words she’d left for me in the note. A simple accusation in a sea of white paper. You didn’t listen.
You’re right, Joanne. I didn’t listen. You had no one else and I didn’t respond. And I should have done.
I climbed into bed feeling just as wretched as I had the moment I found her. I didn’t even try to stop the cascade of images flooding into my mind. I let them come one after another, partly to honour her memory, partly to castigate myself. Joanne’s bare toes swinging only inches away from the rug. Her slippers on the floor where they’d flopped off and the shiny green noose of washing line cutting into her throat. As I lay there, her presence felt so close I could almost reach out and touch her.
Chapter 28
Sam
A raucous party on New Year’s Eve gave me a hangover with the magnitude of a head-on collision on a motorway. After that, the New Year limped in with a whimper. I spent most of the time under my duvet reading historical novels, emerging only to eat and take a shower. It was exactly what I needed. By the time I went back to work I was ready to face the world again.
When Miranda invited me out for supper on my first day back at work, I jumped at the chance. Perhaps her New Year’s resolution was be kinder to Sam.
I dashed home from St Luke’s to change first, so she’d know I was making an effort for her. I was behind with my laundry, but convinced I had a fresh bra in my underwear drawer. A special one, red with lace edging. I couldn’t find it anywhere. I searched through the dirty laundry basket and checked I hadn’t left it in the washing machine, but it had gone AWOL. I wore a tight-fitting camisole instead.
My comb also seemed to have disappeared since I’d last washed my hair. I checked the bathroom cabinet, my handbag, my dressing table and down the edge of the sofa and couldn’t find that either. It was starting to feel like I was losing my marbles.
As I pulled on my coat, the phone rang. I let it ring, chilling the space around me, and left.
Miranda had booked a Greek place in Camden she’d raved about recently. The music and boisterous warmth of Dimitris’ immediately felt like another world. Apart from the low swinging lanterns that nearly took my eye out when I walked in, I loved the décor.
Dimitri himself gave us a showy welcome, leading us to a table with a red-checked cloth and a prime view of a lobster tank. On further inspection, I found that more unnerving than appetising.
‘Don’t be so wet,’ said Miranda, finally agreeing to swap places so I had my back to it. I could still hear intermittent scratching and gurgling sounds and wasn’t sure if that was worse than being able to see what was going on.
I ordered vegetarian to be on the safe side – a traditional feta cheese salad, while Miranda had squid with various seafood delicacies I didn’t attempt to identify.
‘Good Christmas?’ she asked.
‘I saw Dad. We managed to burn the stuffing and the pudding boiled dry,’ I told her, ‘but apart from that you could call it a success.’
‘He rang and said he’d had a lovely time with you,’ she said, taking small sips of mineral water. ‘He brought up that time I was eleven and you must have been nine, d’you remember? We did that terrible carol concert for the neighbours.’
‘You played the recorder – very badly,’ I added.
‘And you were on the tambourine, trying to sing,’ she sniggered. ‘Mr Snape’s little kid…Boris, was he called?...threw mince pies at us.’
It was so good to hear her laugh. She hadn’t been so relaxed with me in a long time.
‘Dad said he liked the cufflinks,’ she said. ‘He said something about setting fire to his paper hat after lunch…’
‘Those Cuban cigars were a complete liability,’ I said, throwing my eyes up. ‘I don’t know who thought they’d be a good idea.’
She dropped her eyes. ‘I only got a few to tide him over…’
I groaned inwardly, but the moment passed without her getting cranky with me.
She raised her glass for a toast. ‘To selling lots more paintings this year and the perfect man for you,’ she said. I tapped my glass against hers, willing the perfect man to put in an appearance before cobwebs finally smothered my heart.