by B M Carroll
‘I tried, Mum, I really tried. How long has it been? Have I lost the chance to get my technology back? I’m sorry. I said I could do it. Has it been an hour? How long did I last?’
Questions and statements of self-disgust come out in such a torrent there is no opportunity for me to answer. My phone is next to me on the couch. Without really knowing what I’m doing, or why, I pick it up, go to the camera icon and hit the record button.
‘I’m stupid for not falling asleep. Stupid. I hate myself …’ She doesn’t register the phone at first. When she does, she becomes even more hysterical. ‘What are you doing? Are you recording me? Why are you doing that?’
The phone is capturing it all, the monster that my beautiful daughter transforms into every night.
‘I’m doing it because I don’t know what else to do,’ I say, tears streaming down my face.
26
Hannah
This week alone, I have the water bill, the phone bill and my car registration. It’s obvious that something will have to be deferred until next week, or the week after that, or – ideally – permanently. Which one, is the million-dollar question. We need water, obviously. The phone is an absolute necessity: I need to be contactable by Mum and the boys while I’m at work. The car? I guess we could hitch rides to soccer games and wherever else we need to go, or get the bus more often, or maybe I could talk to Mum about borrowing her car at weekends.
On the bright side, Sophie has agreed to review my pay. She surprised me, actually. I didn’t feel optimistic asking the question, having already convinced myself it would be an outright no (for two reasons: I haven’t been in the company the requisite time for a pay review, and because the extra work should ease off when we find a replacement for Jane). But the fact that Sophie didn’t turn me down there and then makes me think she’ll give it a really good shot.
I open the front door to the usual scenario: bags and boots in the hallway, preventing the door from opening fully, two less than clean children plonked in front of the TV, my loyal mother – whose car I was mentally pilfering only minutes ago – out of sight in the kitchen.
‘Helloooo. Nice to see you put your things away, boys. How was your day? How did training go?’
‘Good.’
As usual, Finn is the one who responds, but Callum is who I want to hear from today. Were there any repercussions from Saturday?
‘Callum?’
‘It was fine.’
‘Did you behave yourself?’
‘Yes … Davy said I played really well.’
I hadn’t been sure whether sitting out Saturday’s game would make Callum sulky and uncooperative at training today, or have the opposite effect and motivate him to try extra hard. That’s the problem with Callum: it could go either way. From what he’s telling me, it’s all good, but I’ll still double-check with Mum.
I make my way into the cramped kitchen, where she’s in the process of making bolognese, our usual Wednesday-night fare. ‘Mmm … that smells lovely.’
She throws me a tired smile over her shoulder. ‘I’m still twenty minutes away. We were late getting back from soccer.’
‘Speaking of soccer, how did it go?’
She turns, spatula in hand. ‘As a matter of fact, I’ve never seen Callum so well behaved. He did exactly as he was told, straight away, no mucking about.’
Mum received an abridged version of Saturday’s events, a version that left out my own embarrassing outburst. What a relief that everything went smoothly today. One less thing for me to worry about.
‘I’m thinking of getting rid of the car,’ I say, testing the waters.
She gives me a hard stare. ‘I’m not sure that’s a wise move, Hannah.’
‘It sits there for most of the week, while I’m at work.’
‘You use it a lot at the weekends,’ she points out, quite correctly.
‘I do … but maybe I could be more creative about how we transport ourselves around.’
Even as I’m saying this, I’m mentally trying to fathom how we’d get to our soccer games on Saturday mornings, as they can be anywhere in the area. Wheedle lifts from the other parents? Become one of those annoying people who are always asking for help, so much so that people start to vet their incoming calls? The only alternative is to ask Mum if we can share her car. No, it’s too much. Besides, she has walking club on Saturday mornings, and other commitments with her friends over the weekend. It wouldn’t be fair.
‘I don’t know what else to do,’ I say, and it’s true. I’m running out of ideas on how to keep my family afloat on my meagre salary. I summon a smile. ‘I’ve asked my boss for a pay rise, and she didn’t tell me to get lost. So there’s some hope.’
Maybe the pay rise will be enough to cover the insurance, the registration, the petrol and all the other costs that come with the car. I didn’t mention a specific amount to Sophie. Was that a mistake? She might come back with a nominal increase, a token gesture that would make no real difference. Even if she comes back with something more substantial, it’s not as if I’ll get it all in one go. It will trickle in, month by month, when what I really need is one big cash injection.
While Mum finishes preparing dinner I start to bring in the washing from the balcony. It has been left out too long. Some of the T-shirts are so dry the cotton has gone hard.
‘Oi!’ someone calls at me from down below.
I look over the balustrade, the washing clutched against my chest. There’s a man down there, frowning up at me. He’s one of those obsessively neat older men, shirt tucked into his shorts, socks pulled up straight to his knees.
‘That’s not allowed,’ he declares.
‘What’s not allowed?’ I ask, pretending innocence.
‘Hanging your washing out on the balcony like that. It’s unsightly.’
‘Oh, go and get a life,’ I mutter, and move away from the balustrade, quickly unpegging the rest of the clothes from the drying rack.
‘It’s against the rules,’ he rants on, the self-righteousness in his voice carrying to the back of the balcony, where I am practically hiding. ‘Haven’t you read the by-laws?’
I continue to ignore him, pretending I don’t care, but my heart is beating wildly by the time I get inside.
‘Your phone has been ringing, Mum.’ Callum hands it to me as I dump the washing, unfolded, in the basket. ‘I didn’t answer in case it was work.’
It is work: Sophie. Who else would phone at this hour of the evening, when everyone else is sitting down having dinner, talking about their day and winding down? I’ll call her back later, after we’ve eaten. No, I’ll call her straight away – she is reviewing my pay, after all. I usually step out on the balcony to make my phone calls, but I’m scared that Mr Fastidious is still out there ranting about by-laws, so I signal to the boys to keep the noise down and shut myself in my bedroom.
‘Hi, Sophie. You were looking for me?’
‘Yes. Sorry, I know it’s dinner time. I’m just wondering if you’ve finished the packs for tomorrow’s meeting.’
‘No, I was planning on finishing them in the morning. The meeting isn’t until eleven, right?’
‘I’ll need some time for review, then they’ll need to be printed and bound. I don’t think there’ll be enough time.’ She pauses. ‘Unless you can get in here really early?’
Before-school care doesn’t open until seven thirty. The earliest I can get to the office is an hour later, my usual arrival time.
Swallowing a sigh, I give her what she wants. ‘I’ll work on them later tonight, when the kids are in bed. I’ll send through a copy when I’m done.’
This is the price of the pay review: having to say yes to her all the time. Not that I’ve said no very often.
Mum goes home after dinner. I switch off the TV and demand that homework is done, and bedtime – for once – is adhered to.
‘Hurry up, boys. I have some work to do tonight and I can’t concentrate until you’re both in bed and fast asle
ep.’
‘Why do you have to work at night?’ Finn asks, quite reasonably.
‘Are we going to sell our car?’ Callum obviously overheard some of my conversation with Mum.
The answer to both questions is the same: money. I don’t tell them this, avoiding their questions as artfully as they sometimes avoid mine.
Finally they’re in bed, the flat is quiet, and I sit on the couch with my laptop on my knees, the closest I’ll come to relaxing today. It takes an hour to finish off the information pack. The hardest part? Knowing that it could have waited until the morning, and that I could have spent that hour with the boys instead of rushing them off to bed.
Once I’ve emailed the pack to Sophie, I log on to my bank account and spend an inordinate amount of time staring at the balance, hoping for inspiration. In the end I don’t pay any of the bills. I can’t choose between the water, the phone and the car. If I make a payment now, I could regret it tomorrow, when it’s too late to change my mind.
It’s when I’m turning out the lights that I see it, the envelope in the hallway, lying among the boots and socks that never got cleared away in the end.
Notice of Contravention of a Body Corporate By-law.
Flipping heck!
I open it, my eyes skimming the contents before I place it on top of the pile of bills. It’s annoying and inconvenient, but at least it isn’t something that needs to be paid.
27
Sophie
I am not a bully! I cannot believe this. Jane walked out of here. For God’s sake, she told me, ‘Fuck you.’ And now she’s trying to pretend that she was forced into it, that she was being harassed and bullied, and she snapped that day because of the pressure. Come on!
‘I’m shocked,’ I say to Alyssa. ‘Actually, words fail me.’
The unfair-dismissal claim is still in my hand. I would like to read it again, more slowly and with a highlighter, so that I can illuminate all the inaccuracies and exaggerations and misunderstandings.
The funeral. OK, that was a mistake. Of course I wouldn’t have called her if I had remembered – I am not that heartless or unsympathetic. There was a board meeting, and I needed to know where to find something, and Jane was the custodian of that particular information, and I forgot about the funeral. It’s as simple as that. I know she told me about it, but that was a few days before and things move fast in our office. Sometimes it’s hard to remember where everyone is, where they’re up to in their work, so I phone them. Yes, I’m the first to admit I use the phone a lot, but I don’t harass people, as she claims. I like to talk to people. In fact, I find conversing much more effective than email or texts: it’s my preferred communication method, nothing more.
‘Can you explain what happened with the leadership programme?’ Alyssa asks, her pen poised to take notes. ‘Why Jane was taken off the programme after being included on the initial list?’
For God’s sake, she’s dredging up ancient history now. When was the leadership programme? Two or three years ago? Twelve high-achievers, including Jane, were to be coached and mentored and have their careers fast-tracked. They all attended the kick-off, a two-day event in a swanky hotel in the city. Then the budget got squeezed and there were casualties, simple as that.
‘There were only enough funds for ten people, so two had to go. The executive board made the decision on who would be dropped from the programme. I was the messenger, nothing more.’
‘Jane says here that the decision was to do with her age?’
‘It was … The other candidates were significantly younger than her, at earlier stages in their career.’
‘And that isn’t being ageist?’
For fuck’s sake, Alyssa should know this stuff. ‘It’s a fact that Jane’s in her mid-forties and her career doesn’t have the same runway as someone in their mid-twenties.’
Unfortunately, age does matter when it comes to career planning, and I was honest with Jane about that. HR avoided giving her a direct reason. Our department head was apologetic but vague. Everyone else sidestepped the issue, everyone except me, and look what thanks I get in return: being accused of age discrimination – along with bullying and harassment. Besides the fact that Jane’s recent behaviour proves she should not have been on that list of potential leaders in the first place.
‘Do you feel there’s any basis to what she said about the lack of support for her family life?’ Alyssa asks more delicately.
‘No, I don’t. Yes, I phoned her after hours and sometimes on weekends, but I feel that was balanced out by all the days she was late into work, or had to leave early … In fact, I kept a record of all the time she took off for her children, all the school assemblies, the sports days and the sicknesses. There were a lot of sicknesses …’
Alyssa raises one of her thinly plucked eyebrows. ‘You kept a record?’
‘Yes. Because it felt like a lot of time to me. But you’re welcome to look at my notes and come to your own conclusion.’
It’s obvious that, while I was keeping tally of the time Jane took off work, she was keeping a different count: all the times she wanted to be there for her children but wasn’t. I get that she’s the mother of three school-age children. Of course there are occasions when her children will need her, and when she may not be able to work as a result. But Jane being Jane, she took undue advantage.
There’s something about situations like this – when there’s a commission involved, and possibly lawyers too – that puts everyone on the back foot, on the defensive, as though we’re all guilty, no matter how preposterous the allegations are. But just because she made a complaint doesn’t make it true. Just because something is put in writing doesn’t mean it’s not pure fabrication.
‘What happens now?’ I ask, massaging the back of my neck, trying to relieve the build-up of tension there. The irony is that I arrived in work this morning feeling refreshed and more energetic than I’ve been for ages. Aidan and I had a quiet, restorative weekend together, and on Tuesday I was careful not to overdo things from home. But all that feel-good and energy has been singularly wiped out by this.
‘Well, it’s clear that you dispute some of the facts, so we need to document your version of events.’
‘And then?’
Alyssa shrugs. ‘Disputed facts usually lead to a conference or a hearing …’
Hopefully the hearing will show Jane for who she truly is: lazy, belligerent and spiteful.
‘Could she get her job back?’
‘If the commissioner finds that the dismissal was unfair or harsh, yes. But not if we can prove there is a lack of confidence and trust.’
‘There is a lack of confidence and trust,’ I say tersely. ‘Would we have to pay compensation in that event?’
‘Possibly. Let’s dispute the facts and take it from there.’
Alyssa looks every bit as weary as I feel. It’s obvious that dealing with these sorts of legal issues is not her favourite part of the job.
I stand up too quickly, and pain – hot and angry – cripples my chest. ‘Argh.’
‘Are you all right?’ Alyssa is alarmed.
Gripping the edge of the desk, I straighten myself slowly, take a cautious breath. ‘I’m OK, I’m OK … It’s just sometimes I need to be more careful about how I move …’
‘Shall I help you back to your office?’
‘No, it’s passed, I’m fine now … Listen, before I go, can I have Hannah Evans’ file?’
‘Sure … Performance review?’
‘Pay review.’
One of those thin eyebrows moves upwards again. ‘Isn’t it a bit early for that?’
‘Yes, but she’s been doing a good job.’
Back in my office I sit for a while, trying to recover from another wave of pain, which seems to have come of its own accord and not as result of any careless movements I’ve made. To be honest, I don’t feel very well. It’s the stress, I suppose. The humiliation. The unfairness. Even though I did nothing wrong, I still stand accu
sed.
I am not a bully.
I am exacting. I have high standards and expect the same from everyone else. What’s the crime in that? How many pay increases did I give Jane over the years? How many bonuses and awards? Did she ever stop to think of those? Of how generous I’ve been? People like her never appreciate what they’ve been given. Their hard-done-by attitude blinds them to reality.
Sighing heavily, I open Hannah’s file. She’s only been with us five months: company policy is that a year’s service is required for a general pay review. I’ll have to see if I can upgrade her role, get her into a different pay band, and review her salary that way. As my eyes are scanning through her résumé, to see if her experience and qualifications qualify for the next pay band, I see it: St Brigid’s. Under the education heading.
Hannah went to the same school as me? Now that I think of it, she did look vaguely familiar on my first day back at the office. Fourteen years ago, and the fact that she was in the year below me, that’s my excuse for not being able to place her. But what’s hers? I was school captain and dux of my year, for fuck’s sake. Everyone knew my name. She must have known me. She must. So why on earth hasn’t she said anything?
My head feels heavy. I can’t seem to think straight. It’s extremely odd that Hannah didn’t mention she’d gone to St Brigid’s too.
Is she hiding something?
No, of course she isn’t.
But why not say something? Why miss the chance to have the rapport of being old girls from the same school?
Too shy. Too socially awkward. That’s the reason why. Now stop thinking about it.
Thinking about anything is becoming impossible. My head feels weighed down. The black print on Hannah’s résumé is bleeding into the white background: my vision is going.
No, no. Not here.
Cold sweat prickles across my skin.
No. Not here. Not now.
My breath thunders in my ears as I try to gulp back some air.
Come on, Sophie. Not here. Come on.