by Sue Walker
Title:
The Reunion
Author:
Sue Walker
Year:
2004
Synopsis:
“Innes? Innes, it’s Isabella. Isabella Velasco…” A simple message on an answer machine. But one that made Innes Haldane’s blood run cold. Isabella Velasco was a name from a past that Innes had tried hard to forget. For in 1977 both had spent a fateful year at the Unit, an experimental home for dysfunctional teenagers in Edinburgh. Now, after almost three decades, Isabella is trying to make contact. But before she can reach her, Innes learns that Isabella has committed suicide. And shock quickly turns to fear when she hears that another former patient has also recently killed himself. Has some dark event from 1977 finally come back to haunt them all?
November 8th
Greetings!
Well, here we are again. One more bloody year on. What can I say? Hey, life’s great, man! And all that. No doubt our little missives are all crossing in the post.
Yes, I’m still living where I was last year. Yes, with the same person. And yes, in the same job. Thank you very much. Does my life sound boring? Tis not, though. Never boring.
I do sometimes wish one of you’d give me some interesting, nay, startling, news one time. But, on second thoughts, that’s not such a great idea. Then we’d be forced to meet. No, not such a great idea. We’d be forced to talk. And you know about what! Then some of us would get depressed, some hysterical, some, oh, well, it’s not going to happen.
One day we really should wean ourselves off this dreary routine.
Adieu, until (I suppose) next year.
A
XX
§
Nov. 8
Dear All,
I have nothing exceptional to report. I trust you do not either. After all this time I’ve a good idea what to expect of you. In this—how can I put it—in this strange ‘family’ of ours there’s not much that can’t he accurately guessed at, even though we don’t actually see each other. My life is much the same—undeservedly joyful, at times. But when I forget myself and allow myself to be too happy, I just think of this day when I have to write to you and why I have to do so.
That sobers me up.
All contact details remain the same.
Goodbye, for now.
S
§
All same. You know where I am.
D.
8/11
§
Greetings!
Well, for someone normally of such few words, you’ve certainty excelled yourself.
What a bloody turn-up for the books! I shouldn’t have tempted fate last year. Saying I wanted something exciting to happen. But we’re doing the right thing. Got to keep control, keep things in perspective. There’s one hell of a lot at stake.
Remember what I said—let’s keep a lid on it.
A
DROWNINGS
2004 and 1977
File note from Dr Adrian Laurie, Consultant and Medical Director, APU
14 July 1977
RE: Patient, Innes Haldane (d.o.b. 3.4.62)
Yesterday the staff admitted new patient Innes Haldane. At today’s case conference all the staff were relieved to see that she had been admitted, since the patient’s mother was resisting right up until the last minute, despite our best efforts with Mrs Haldane during family sessions.
Innes is exhibiting classic signs of depression, coupled with the acting out that led to her admission: extensive truancy, shoplifting, a highly disruptive manner when she has attended school and sexually self-destructive behaviour. The final episode, when she picked up two strangers on a bus and took them home to have sex in her parents’ bed, was probably the deciding factor for her resistant mother.
It is, of course, Mrs Haldane’s own mental problems and her domineering behaviour over her daughter and husband, combined with her jealousy of her own daughter, which have led to Innes’s condition. Again, it has classic elements. A loving father who clearly adores his daughter but who is also a weak husband. A frustrated wife and mother who feels life has not dealt her a good hand. Innes’s blossoming into an attractive adolescent woman has been the final straw. Mrs Haldane’s attempts to undermine her daughter throughout childhood have had their effect on the patient’s self-esteem, to a considerable degree. Innes’s acting out is a way of saying that she cannot and will not take any more. The sexual episode is undoubtedly her—albeit unconsciously—saying, “I’m here, I’m young, I’m sexually attractive. You, Mother, are ageing. I have my life ahead of me and a father who loves me. Compete with that!”
I suggest initial work on talking about her relationship with both parents, and work on building up her self-esteem. The latter may be problematic, given the ego issues of some of the other patients in the Unit at present. However, I believe this challenge for Innes will be one that will help her.
That apart, we know Innes to be a tremendously likeable young woman, and that she will probably be popular with many in the Unit, staff and patients alike. I note from the Night Staff Log that last night she spent her first evening with Isabella. If that develops into a friendship, then I think it will be beneficial for both patients. However, Innes’s admission and popularity will not go down well with some patients. All staff need to be on the lookout for any friction.
Copy to: Daily Nursing Log
Copy to: patient file, I. Haldane
ONE
Half seven. Early home for a Monday night. Keys and shopping were dumped at the kitchen door, and she wandered over to open the living-room windows. Let some of the precious, hint-of-spring air from Primrose Hill wash into her home. The answering machine blinked once. She hit the message button and turned up the volume, heading back to the kitchen for a well-earned, ice-cold glass of white from the fridge.
The hesitant, familiarly deep voice boomed throughout the house.
“Innes? Innes, it’s Isabella. Isabella Velasco. I…I…Don’t ask me how I got hold of you…I…we live quite close, you know, would you believe? God, you sound just the same. Just the same! Look…please don’t be angry…I need to talk to you…see you. Can you call me as soon as you can? My number is seven fi—”
She smashed a bleeding hand on the stop button and threw herself into the window seat, blind now to the beauty of the evening outside, watching instead the blood dripping its way on to the rug beneath her. She staggered to the kitchen for a tea-towel to act as bandage, ignoring the broken glass on the floor, the overturned wine bottle by the sink.
Back at the phone, she put trembling fingers to the message button. And played the tape back. Six times.
To make sure that she wasn’t in a nightmare.
TWO
She’d always preferred the suited, smart, self-contained, corporate cases to the individual, down-at-heel, outwardly sad ones. Like the man sitting before her this morning.
“So, if you’ll just hand over all your credit cards, the cheque books and your debit card, and sign here.”
She watched as he took his great rough paw—a builder’s hand and irreplaceable tool of his (former) trade—and signed his financial affairs over to her, for at least the next three years. Not for the first time did she scent the mixture of a Dutch-courage-stiff-whisky and too many cigarettes for eleven in the morning. The man’s hand shook slightly. It had to be the worst day of his life. And she wasn’t enjoying it much either. It had been some time since she’d had to deal with a ‘client’ face to face. She eschewed, indeed forbade, in her hearing her junior staff using their preferred ‘punter’ for those sorry souls who found themselves in this building. It was disrespectful, she told them.
She decided to close the interview with this particular sorry soul. “All you need to
know about your bankruptcy and dealings with the Official Receiver’s Office is in this leaflet. We have a lot of staff long-term sick at present, so I’ll be handling your affairs for the time being, although that will change when my assistants get back. Any queries in the next few weeks, my number’s written at the top there. Next to my name. Innes Haldane.”
She gathered papers and stood up, directing the man from the interview room towards the lifts, nodding at his mumbled thanks.
Back in the privacy of her office, she poured herself a cup of over-stewed coffee, allowing herself a couple of minutes to glance at the mayhem that was mid-morning Bloomsbury, five floors below. Buses and cars nose-to-tail. Tourist hordes heading for the nearby British Museum, in much the same formation as the traffic. The never-ending hum of pneumatic drills, buzzing up their vibrations from street level. Perfect! She had the beginnings of a killer headache already.
She turned away and sat down heavily at her desk, surveying the lists of tasks for the overworked day ahead. She ran tentative fingertips over the two-week-old scar on her left hand. The wine glass had cut deep. Funny she’d never felt any pain until hours later.
She shoved the memory from her mind—she was good at that—and turned to her diary. She was beginning to heartily despise this job. True, it wasn’t to be sniffed at. Dealing with the debtors of the world in the ordered, usually distant way that was incumbent on a senior member of the Official Receiver’s Office was structured, clinical and, at her level, very well paid. Though the junior-staff absences meant she’d be having quite a few face-to-face encounters with clients. Too close for comfort perhaps. During this past year or so she’d already forced herself to admit that she was becoming less and less able to cope with the ‘people side’ of her job. And that was maybe why she enjoyed her seniority. The more paper-pushing and remote decision-making, the better.
Three hours later she allowed herself a stroll to the British Museum courtyard, taking one of the last vacant benches, warmed by the sunshine. She pulled her sushi box and a copy of the latest Ham & High from her bag, checking her watch and generously allotting herself precisely twenty-five minutes for lunch.
A scan-read of the local paper was all she usually made time for, but today, for some unknown reason, she found herself lingering on the news section. On the third reading, she was sure there was no mistake.
Swimming-pool death—Inquest date set
The body of a woman was found floating in the swimming pool of the Belsize Sports Centre last Tuesday evening. Staff were alerted by a young mother who had attended her regular women-only swimming lessons.
The dead woman has been named as 42-year-old Isabella Velasco, of 12 Belsize Park Square, a Scots-born, leading dental surgeon working in various practices across London and a university departmental head. Both her wrists had been cut and there had been a significant loss of blood. The pool is now closed for the foreseeable future, as police and sports centre staff examine the area.
A police spokeswoman refused to confirm reports of suicide but stated: “We are not looking for anyone else in relation to this incident.”
An inquest is to be held at St Pancras Coroner’s Court on Friday morning.
She was having trouble keeping her breath even and steady, and stood up, only to teeter back down, her head light and dizzy. She pulled out her mobile, punching in the preprogrammed number for her secretary.
“Emma? I…I’m going home. I feel…I think I’m coming down with something. Cancel all the meetings, will you? No! No calls whatsoever at home for the rest of today.”
She moved cautiously through the museum crowds and headed for the taxi rank by the front gates. Within a minute she was cocooned in a cab and heading home.
To think about the woman she had never called back.
THREE
Any journey past the arches at King’s Cross was guaranteed to be dreary. Those sinister, darkened caverns, immortalized in countless grim TV thrillers were, in reality, as uninviting as they were portrayed. No matter the weather. And today? On foot in London, March rain? Her mood was well in keeping with this gloomy morning of damp chill. She’d had two days to think about coming here since reading the devastating news in the paper. Forty-eight anxiety-filled hours of little sleep and much obsessive thinking. And still she wasn’t sure that she had made the right decision.
But curiosity had won out over nervousness and, as quietly as possible, she took a seat at the back of the room, praying no one would take any notice of her late arrival or wonder at her reasons for being there. Verdict: suicide. The usual suspects had given evidence, including an insufferably patronizing GP who had recently prescribed ‘the deceased’ (never ‘my patient’) paroxetine for panic attacks—“It’s a member of the Prozac family, you know. Very effective usually”—and suggested that ‘the deceased’ take time off. A suggestion apparently ignored, since subsequent evidence had made it clear that Isabella Velasco had continued her various practices and lecturing in dentistry. That had made Innes smile. Like herself, Isabella had grown into a workaholic.
She gazed at the sombre suits and faces of the assembled court, her mind numbly trying to take in the proceedings. Forcing herself to concentrate, she momentarily tuned in as an eager young police detective addressed the coroner, referring frequently to his notes. “Yes, sir, I made extensive inquiries into Professor Velasco’s background, both personal and professional…” She tuned out again, sparing herself the catalogue of people spoken to, lectures given by Isabella in the past months, etc.
She looked down into her lap, where both hands lay palm upwards. The wineglass scar was fading now. She dug a fingernail in it. Testing. Just a bit of tenderness left. She moved her fingers to her wrist. Her pulse was racing. Like she’d run a mile. She did her breathing exercises. Breathe in and hold for eight seconds. Exhale for eight seconds. She’d learned how to do this unobtrusively, anywhere. On the bus, in the theatre, even in meetings. Short of openly using a paper bag to breathe and re-breathe into—something she found herself occasionally having to do in the women’s toilets at work—she knew that this was the most publicly acceptable way to avoid her hyperventilation panic attacks.
Isabella had suffered from panic attacks too. That haughty, uncaring GP had said as much. Isabella had been on medication for them. As had she herself. Funny, sad parallels. Not surprising, given their shared paths in early life…no! She’d tried not to think about all that for so long. For much longer than the few weeks since Isabella’s wretched phone call. Jesus! How that had just about killed her! She’d never believed it possible. That voice from the past. Or had she really been so surprised? Somehow, hadn’t it been just the dreaded outcome that she’d expected? How can you hide from the past for ever? Particularly that sort of a past. You can try to hide it from yourself. From your loved ones—if you have any, that is. Then what d’you get? Panic attacks. Failed marriage. Failed relationships, full stop. Failed life. No, that was going too far. Much too far.
She’d lied to her therapist for the best part of the last eight years about that part of her past. But it was adolescence, wasn’t it? It was a normal, ‘off the rails’ episode, surely? Why hide it? No, that was self-deluding nonsense. Lies. All lies. To herself. To everyone. And here she was. Sitting in shame. And in fear, fear of discovery. At the inquest into the death of someone she’d…she’d what? Shared so much with? Been true friends with? Been ill with…She nudged the memory away, drifting back into the young detective’s orbit. What he was saying took her breath away.
“Yes indeed, sir. We did find some initially interesting evidence in Professor Velasco’s personal life. A new acquaintance. A Mr Danny Rintoul, of Calanais on the Isle of Lewis, in the Western Isles of Scotland. I gleaned evidence from her credit-card records that she had paid numerous and lengthy visits to the Hebrides since last year. I found details of Mr Rintoul in Professor Velasco’s address book and in her personal organizer, and there was evidence of frequent telephone communication between them.
However, it seems that Mr Rintoul died, drowned off the coast of the Scottish mainland at the beginning of the year. Although an inquest delivered a suicide verdict in his case, I have no reason to believe the events are linked. I also have no evidence to offer as to how Professor Velasco and Mr Rintoul met or knew each other, since no friends or acquaintances of Mr Rintoul ever recall meeting Professor Velasco…”
She thanked the gods that she’d chosen to sit on an aisle seat at the back of the court—an unconsciously executed precaution against exactly this sort of eventuality. She followed the ladies’ signs and fell into the last cubicle. Although all three were vacant, she always preferred the added security of the end one. Fumbling in her jacket pocket, she pulled out the paper bag, scrunched the neck of it between hooked thumb and index finger, and blew into it. In and out. In and out. Five times. Then relax and repeat. She leaned back, the cistern ice-cold on her neck.
Danny! Danny Rintoul! Isabella had been meeting him! But the witness said he was a ‘new’ acquaintance. How was that? Had Isabella tried to get in touch widi him recently too? Why? Why Danny? Dear Danny Rintoul. Dead too. Drowned too.
She closed her eyes, the paper bag crumpled, forgotten, in her lap, and pictured again that first day. The place lay beyond the comfortable suburbs of the western outskirts of Edinburgh. It was a Sunday. July, 1977. In the middle of that feverishly hot summer…
FOUR
The sun was in the way. So searing and bright. She couldn’t make it out. Were there four of them? Or five? More perhaps. It was one of those moments that she knew she’d remember for ever. Maybe even a burnt-in memory that would come out in dementia.
She often thought about those special moments, moments that had their own inexplicable atmosphere. Sometimes very pedestrian ones. But ones that would haunt her in later life. Did everyone think that way? About when they were senile? Or just her? Was it a mark of the black depression that had enveloped her for longer than she could remember? Fifteen years old and worrying about when she would be like the sad geriatrics in the ward down the road in the main hospital. It wasn’t normal, by any stretch. She’d visited those same geriatrics as part of a school project one term. It was either voluntary service at the Edinburgh Royal Western Hospital (for mad folk though that wasn’t part of its grand tide, rather it was known as just the ‘Royal Western’) or it was duty on the detested hockey field. Hardly a difficult decision.