Dear Anybody

by Rosa Temple

  The tap, tap, tap, continues and I call for Beth to come in. She’s carrying a large shoe box and when she places it onto my desk I can see it is half full with opened envelopes. The name Dear Vicky and the magazine address is written in tidy, whirling black ink on each envelope. I pick up a pile batched together in an elastic band and see that the addresses are identically placed in the same position on the envelope. Each sweep and slope of the lettering, including size, is identical. It’s as if the addresses were printed by a machine rather than written in freehand by an actual person.

  ‘More problems?’ I ask.

  Beth nods apologetically when she sees my face drop.

  ‘Sorry, but people will be expecting a Dear Vicky page this month. We didn’t have an editor last month. We took a vote and decided it was a bit dishonourable to try to fill the Dear Vicky shoes ourselves, so we didn’t run the page.’

  ‘I see. So how many letters do we normally have to print each month?’

  ‘Four or five. It’s up to you really. That’s as many as we get in a month anyway.’

  ‘Really? So why is this box so full of letters? Why didn’t this person just email like everyone else?’

  ‘We do get the odd one posted in but the author of these writes so beautifully we tend to keep them. The ones on the top are the most recent but if you read back, you’ll get a sense of who this person is, I think.’

  I take them out of the box and pull a few letters out of their envelopes. They are all signed by someone calling themselves, ‘L.’

  ‘What is this?’ I say. It seems the author has been sending letters, at least one a week, for some time now. ‘Who?’ I ask looking up at Beth.

  ‘No one knows who L is. We can’t tell if it’s a man or a woman,’ Beth says. She heaves a sigh and pulls over the chair from under the window to take a seat beside my desk. ‘There has been a bit of a dispute about the sex of the writer but whoever it is, this L writes a beautiful letter. So deep and such a sad life.’

  ‘And do I have to feature one of L’s letters each month? I mean he or she seems to have more problems than most.’

  I choose one, randomly. One that goes back a year.

  Dear Vicky

  This morning was tougher than most. I felt as if someone had reached inside me and grabbed hold of my heart, squeezing so hard I could have cried out. So much pain. I don’t know if I can survive the day. I don’t know if I can keep a brave face on today of all days. It’s the anniversary, you see? The anniversary of the day that meant I was never going to be the same again.

  I got a call from a friend. He tried to cheer me up because he knew how I’d be, but his efforts were wasted. I don’t want to stay under the covers anymore. I just need to carry on as if everything is normal. People expect that of me, as if I don’t have a right to be sad anymore. As if there is an expiry date on sadness. Melancholy. Despair. Yes, despair, that’s the word. Complete and utter despair is what I feel. If you passed me on the street you wouldn’t know it was there, the despair. I can camouflage it quite well but sometimes it seeps through. When that happens and someone asks if everything is all right, I just say I have a headache or had a bad night or something. Either way, I still feel despair. Does despair mean desperate? Maybe it does because I do feel desperate at times. Desperate to be able to move on. Not to forget. I could never do that. But I want to learn how to stop feeling the despair so bloody deeply.

  Another day beckons. I have to get on with it. Don’t I?

  L

  I look on the back of the page, it’s blank and there’s nothing else in the envelope or on it that will give me any clues about who this person might be. I can’t tell if it’s the woman in the dry cleaners, or the guy who rides his horse past Carey’s house first thing in the morning. Is it the man who walks his collie at the same time I get to work?

  ‘You won’t find anything that gives the writer away, Sydney. We’ve all tried,’ Beth says. ‘Whoever L is, he or she doesn’t post the letter in Bridley. They move around to different towns and sometimes a different county. Just to throw us off the scent I suppose. And it’s working. But we know L is at least near Bridley because he or she talks about it so vividly.’

  ‘So no one knows who L is? That’s weird don’t you think? Has anyone ever tried reaching out to L by running some sort of feature on loneliness or heartbreak? Something? I think this L person needs to do more than write letters to a magazine. It sounds like they need help. I mean psychiatric. I can’t be responsible for a suicide. Not as the new editor. People will blame me.’

  ‘You don’t mean that.’

  I look at the L letters and decide I’ll go through them all, make sure they’re in chronological date order and read them from the beginning. I need to get to know L and assess whether I’m dealing with a suicidal person or not. I have to tread gently with this person’s emotions and not say a wrong word.

  ‘Okay, Beth, leave it with me and I’ll sort out some replies to this month’s unfortunates. I’ll pick an L letter, the latest one I suppose, and write a reply. But I must read them all and get to know L better. That way I can offer some proper advice and do what I can to help.’

  I hadn’t started any replies to any of the emails. I kept chickening out, toying with the idea of running them past Carey first because she seemed to have all the answers. But the letters are supposed to be private so I couldn’t betray anyone.

  ‘That’s the spirit, Sydney. I knew you could do this. I’ll get you some tea and biscuits. You’re going to need them once you start reading.’

  ‘That bad?’ I ask as Beth walks to the door.

  ‘Worse,’ she says and lets the door close softly behind her.

  I begin the task by getting the letters into order, determined to be to L what Carey has been to me. A shoulder to cry on and a great giver of advice about how to ease a broken heart. I want to be the one who makes sure L never has to write a letter like the one I just read ever again. If it took the entire three months of my employment at Bridley Green, I would fix L.

  Chapter 14

  I had been wearing my designer glasses for most of the day. They have large, heavy frames and kept slipping down my nose. I kept pushing them back up and sniffing. With every sniff a tear ran down my face and I would reach for the tissue box and wipe the tear away. The tea Beth brought in turned cold and I was fixed to my chair for hours, deep in thought about the mysterious L. I decided L was a ‘she’. Maybe that was being narrow minded, but the sensitivity in her letters just screamed oestrogen. L is obviously an eloquent woman, I had to get a dictionary out three times. She’s a highly intelligent and sensitive person.

  ‘You’re the last one here, Sydney.’ Beth comes into my office with her bag across her shoulder. ‘So, you better grab these.’ Jangling a set of keys she holds them out to me across the desk.

  ‘What are these?’ I pull off my glasses and reach for them.

  ‘The keys to the building. Front door, back door, windows. They belonged to the last editor. They should be yours now.’

  I switch the keys from hand to hand before putting them into the top drawer of the desk. It’s a little unnerving to be holding the keys of a person who has died. Thoughts of the ghost’s rattling chains in The Christmas Carol come rushing to me and I shiver when I hear Beth closing the main office door and her creaky bicycle chain as she pedals for home. Beth said something about not staying here too late which I don’t plan to do but my mind goes back to the profile I’ve been building up about L.

  L, the Bridley Lonely Heart, will be my project, I decide. She’ll be the thing that takes my mind off all my problems. If I’m consumed by her misery I might not have to drink so much and wallow in my own.

  I look at L’s most recent letter again, glasses back on because my eyes are so tired. L’s beautiful handwriting is a blur without them.

  Dear Vicky

  Being away from here made me homesick. Can you believe it? Nowhere has seemed like home for a long time. The anniv
ersary is looming and I’m feeling the gloom. I’m anxious, too, because I don’t know how I will handle it. Some people, old friends of mine, want to descend on me and take me out of myself. Their words. I hate the thought of that. How can I make them leave me alone? But on the other hand, can I survive the anniversary on my own? Should I let them come or be on my own, Vicky? What should I do?

  L

  That had to be the billion-dollar question. One I’d asked myself a thousand times since the summer. Rob never stopped trying to see me, talk to me, persuade me to go back to the flat and forgive him. What should I do? The question just drove me mad. In the end my answer was to do nothing. Maybe I thought it would all go away if I didn’t see Rob and have to talk to him about what he did.

  I sit and stare at L’s letter until the words are jumbling in front of my eyes. I rub the lenses of my glasses with the edge of my top and put them back on only to see I’ve created a smudgy line across my vision. I search the depths of my mind for an answer for L, trying to summon my Chi in case it brings me some sort of revelation that will help her.

  Feeling lightheaded from sitting with my eyes closed, chanting ‘Ohm’ for several minutes, I open a blank screen on the computer and start to write a reply.

  Dear L

  I can relate to the struggles you are going through. Indecision can affect so many things and never bring us closer to what we should do or what we think we should do. My answer to you is this. Anniversaries are supposed to be a time for celebrations. For remembering and for ending one chapter before making way for the new one. The anniversary for you is a time to remember something very painful in your life. It marks the end of a chapter, but it is within you to decide how the next chapter of your story goes. You can choose to re-live the last chapter or to start on a fresh page with a different set of events for yourself. I’m not asking you to forget the reason why you have this anniversary because that would be wrong of me. I’m guessing that whatever the anniversary means to you, it is making moving on difficult? That being the case, why not pick out the good memories surrounding what the anniversary represents. Relive the good memories on your anniversary. Talk about them or write them down. Make it a day to celebrate the good things and allow them to strengthen your heart and not weaken it.

  If the people you are trying to avoid do visit you, it will be an opportunity to remember the good things. Share and talk. We were never meant to be alone and on a special day I don’t think you should be either.

  Have your friends come and see you. Have some fun on that day and celebrate all the things that made your heart sing. Let your heart sing on that day and the next day. Re-write the year ahead with the view to making happy memories once again. It might be hard to imagine they can happen but trust that they will.

  Good luck, L, and remember, have a happy anniversary, not a sad one.

  Best wishes

  Vicky

  I read Vicky’s response and edit it a few times until I’m happy I’ve helped L and that my response is not about to send her running for the nearest cliff to jump off. I decide to pick four random letters from the Dear Vicky emails and answer those too. I save the document and pat myself on the shoulder for what I think is a job well done.

  As soon as the computer shuts down, so does my brain. I stretch, yawn and hope that by the time I get home, Carey will have whipped up some lavish meal. I contemplate calling her to ask if I should pick something up but Carey works at odd hours. She might be in her studio one day, on location the next or locked away in her dark room with the ‘Do Not Enter’ sign on the door. I decide to just fend for myself. Carey is so chilled. We’ve never discussed anything as mundane as who’s cooking. Mostly I’ve had microwave meals, a couple of times Carey and I shared a takeaway. Chinese, as it’s the only nearby restaurant that delivers. The chef is not Chinese and we suspect the food comes from the freezer aisle in Morrison’s. Carey has become my idol in a short space of time. I admire her independence, the fact that she runs her own business, not to mention her fabulous clothes and gorgeous house.

  I pledge to grow up and be just like Carey one day.

  As I leave the building, having checked everything is switched off and bolted shut, I’m about to lock the front door when I hear someone calling out to me from the darkness outside.

  ‘Cooee, Sydney! I say, Sydney. It’s me. Over here.’

  It’s too dark to make anything out with no streetlights nearby. All I can see is the outline of trees and hear the rustling of bushes. I need the torch on my phone. I put the keys in my bag, hands a little shaky and call, ‘Hello? Is anyone there?’

  The rustling continues and I go into panic mode thinking it’s the ghost of the last editor, telling me I’ve made a lousy job of answering the problem page.

  ‘Sydney?’

  Swallowing hard, I fumble to find the torch on my phone and shine it at the approaching ghost only to see the figure of my boss, Alexandra Phillips. She’s fighting off the hedge she’s just stumbled through, shielding her face from the glare. I can tell straight away she’s off her face with drink.

  ‘Alexandra what were you doing in those bushes?’

  ‘Thought it was a shortcut to the building. Saw the light and hoped it was you still at work. Just wondered if you wanted to come out for a drink. No, I’ll buy you dinner. Love to catch up on what’s been happening and see if you’re settling in okay.’

  I want to tell Alexandra that maybe we should wait until the morning. She could come in when she’s sober and we could discuss things then. But watching her pick leaves from her hair and brushing spider webs from the front of her coat I decide otherwise.

  ‘It’s lovely to see you, Alexandra. I suppose I am ready for something to eat.’

  She grabs my hand. Hers is cool, thin and soft.

  ‘I know just the place,’ Alexandra says. ‘Can we take your car?’

  ‘I don’t have one. Maybe we could call a taxi?’ I say thinking we could go back to the office and call one.

  ‘Good idea.’ I watch Alexandra swaying as if she is feather light and a breeze is blowing her from side to side. After rummaging in her handbag she pulls her mobile out of her pocket and I wonder how she managed to find herself out here in the state she’s in. I spot her pink trainers and the fluorescent, yellow leggings she has on under a faux fur coat. Was she intending a brisk walk, deciding last minute that a fur coat might be more appropriate if she came across a country pub? I’m more confused as she forces her mobile phone towards my nose.

  ‘I didn’t bring my glasses,’ she says. ‘Look for Alastair Swain on this thing, will you? He’s a taxi driver of sorts.’

  Of sorts?

  ‘Found the number,’ I say and wait as Alexandra barks out instructions about where we are and to hurry it up.

  Alastair Swain arrives five minutes later in a four by four. There is a tiny goat asleep on the passenger seat. I don’t ask why. Instead I bundle Alexandra into the back and jump in. She asks Alastair to drop us at Frankie’s. My heart sinks because I think of my drunken episode at Happy Hour and I have no desire to get drunk with Alexandra again or, worse, stay sober and watch as she becomes more intoxicated. Still, I feel I need to show willing, she is my new boss after all, so I say nothing, cross my fingers and hope for the best.

  When Alistair stops on the hill outside Frankie’s I peel Alexandra’s head off my shoulder and she wakes with a start. She passed out the second Alastair pulled away and snored into my ear for the short journey into the village centre.

  ‘We’re here, Alexandra,’ I say pretending I didn’t know she was asleep. ‘Are you sure you want to do this now?’ I want to add, because you look and smell as if you’ve had a skin full. But then I ask myself who am I to judge her?

  ‘I’m starving,’ she replies with a vodka yawn. ‘Don’t know about you. Alastair, put that on my account would you and be on standby for the journey home.’

  ‘Right you are, Mrs P.’

  Alastair pulls off, with a tip of
an invisible hat, a bleating goat in his Jeep. I look at Alexandra staggering to the door of Frankie’s and I know I’m in for a very colourful evening.

  Chapter 15

  It’s like a dark comedy in which I’m the co-star, Alexandra taking centre stage. She knows everyone at the bar at Frankie’s, nodding and waving at them all. They stare at me, trailing behind Alexandra as she bundles her way to the restaurant. I notice on the way in that people have a lot of time for her but I’m sure I notice a few sniggers behind her back. I also notice that the long plait she wore down her back the first time we met is now an enormous birds’ nest of a bun that looks as if it might fall off. One more nod of the head and I’ll have to catch it.

  ‘For two?’ Ruthie asks as Alexandra presents herself to the restaurant.

  ‘Is my table free?’ Alexandra asks. Without waiting for a reply, she makes her way to a table in the corner by the window. ‘And tell Andy he must come and have an aperitif with us.’

  Ruthie raises her already elevated eyebrows at me and I pull a face, changing it, quickly, into a weak smile as I don’t want to appear ungrateful to my boss for taking me out for a meal.

  Chef Andy comes out of the kitchen wiping his chubby hands on his apron before pulling off his hat. He makes eye contact with me and the penny drops. This is the heads up I think he was trying to give me about my editor in chief. She’s a complete lush. But what Andy doesn’t know, if he didn’t catch my act at Happy Hour that first evening, is that so am I. I listen as Alexandra slurs her way through the entire menu, stopping at certain dishes and ordering two of everything for us. She orders more dishes than is humanly possible for two people to eat. I love my food but not even I can handle the volume. No matter how much I protest, Alexandra insists I must try it all.