Uncertain of the best route to Cooma, Natalie rang the local police. She was assured the shortest route, along a gravel road, was still passable despite the recent rain. However, after starting along the road, Natalie quickly discovered it deteriorated into a sloppy mess. She found the car wheels locked into ruts made by other vehicles as if she were steering along railway lines. There was no place to turn around. She had to continue along the incredibly slippery road. Her concentration lapsed for a second and she lost control. The car headed straight for a guidepost. She managed to pull it back just in time, shaking with the ordeal. She glanced at Chris, who was still happily cutting up boxes, quite oblivious to the torment she was experiencing. It was her nightmare revisited, only in reverse, as if the tape were playing backwards, first the pine forest, then the mountain with the eucalypts. The car crawled along mile after mile through the mud. We’re so far from anywhere. What if we get bogged? The one thing that kept her going was the knowledge the dream had a beginning, so the road must have an end. Finally, she recognised the farm country where the dream had started, as she crossed the shire boundary and the road improved. We’ve made it.
Beside the road, woolly brown and white cattle chewed contentedly on their cud in lush, green pastures, sprinkled with purple and yellow flowers. A gurgling brook rushed down the hill over rocks, creating a series of small cascades. Natalie stopped the car and got out, stretching her stiff arms and legs. She breathed in the fresh, country air, feeling the warmth of the sun on her skin. Cattle raised their heads to gaze at her curiously. I bet we’re the first people you’ve seen in a while. The shriek of birds pierced the silence as sulphur-crested cockatoos flew across the sky. What a perfect place for a picnic! They carried Sao biscuits, tinned ham and tomatoes across the meadow. Natalie sunk to the ground to eat, resting her back against a fallen log. Chris grabbed what he wanted and charged across the field to the stream. Natalie rested for a while before packing away the picnic things and going in search of him. She scrambled through long grass over rocks and boulders to discover Chris conducting boat races down white-water cascades, using small twigs he’d collected. “Which one do you want?”
Natalie took one of the proffered twigs and held it over the water beside Chris’s. He raised his spare arm in the air and shouted “Ready, set, go,” dropping his arm simultaneously. He followed his boat down the hill, urging it on. Natalie was soon caught up in the game, watching nervously as her boat swirled around in a whirlpool. It disappeared and then came to the surface to continue the chase. I might have lost that race, but I’ll win the next. They traipsed further up the hill, finding an even more challenging course. Natalie raced after her boat, laughing and barracking loudly, the ordeal of the drive forgotten.
The rest of the drive, through Cooma to Adaminaby, was, fortunately, uneventful. “Mum, look at the snow.” Small clumps of it were scattered across the isolated camping ground. It was already getting dark and the air was nippy when they got out of the car. Natalie just had time to admire the magnificent view overlooking Lake Eucumbene before Chris dragged her away to make a snowman. On top of the hill, it was visible from the car, gazing across the lake.
It was an early start next morning for the drive to Mount Selwyn through picturesque, snow-covered countryside. Natalie was mesmerised by the eerie silence of their surroundings. All was still, except for the occasional movement of a rabbit or a wallaby. The atmosphere at the snowfields was vastly different. Cars were everywhere. They finally found a park and entered the ski centre where raucous groups of people jostled each other to hire gear or buy ski-lift tickets. While they waited in line, Natalie gazed through the huge window at skiers, in brightly coloured jackets, moving up and down the slopes. She caught her breath. That’ll be us soon. I hope skiing’s not too difficult.
Natalie enrolled them both for a lesson. This is wonderful. It’s not nearly as hard as it looks. Of course, Chris had no trouble at all, soon flying down the hill, weaving and manoeuvring amongst other skiers. In the afternoon they moved onto the toboggan field for fun of a different kind. Sometimes riding the toboggan together, sometimes taking it in turns, they challenged themselves to steeper and steeper sections until finally, Natalie and then Chris dropped with exhaustion.
With their poor, weary bodies deserving some comfort, Natalie hired an on-site van at Wee Jasper Caravan Park for the night. She put on a cassette of lively music and, despite their fatigue, the two of them were soon dancing around the van, singing along.
The next morning the Hume and Hovell track beckoned. They were explorers on their expedition. “Watch out,” called Chris as Natalie dodged a spear from a stalking Aborigine. Though she found herself struggling for breath on some of the steep sections, Chris continued to run ahead, shooting tigers with a rifle created from a stick. She was disappointed, on finally reaching the summit, to discover the view hidden behind pine trees. Chris, however, was thrilled to find just enough snow to make a snowman.
A quiet sadness hung over the car as they made their return home. This has been such a special time!
Chapter 30
Natalie drew up at Crystal Gardens. I wonder what’s in store today. The whirring sound of a wheelchair was followed by the appearance of William. For once he was on his own, without the backup of his henchmen. “How was your holiday?”
“Lovely thanks. How have things been here?”
“Some residents aren’t coping too well. The move to the units has got them rattled, especially the way staff members are carrying on. I’ve been doing my best to support everyone but I thought you might be able to help.”
This is a change of tune. “I’ll do my best.”
“OK if we come up to your office in half an hour?”
“That’s fine.”
A short time later, William arrived at the office with Derek, Sam and Ron. They just managed to squeeze into the room. “Can you close the door?” asked William. “You never know who might be listening around the corner.” Natalie did as she was bid.
Ron launched straight in, as usual, with an emotional tirade. “We need to tell you how awful it is living here at Crystal Gardens. Loneliness and fear are destroying me. I feel like I have so much to give, so much feeling inside me for people, but no one to love. I’m terrified of being totally rejected and locked away in a corner somewhere with no one to care for me.”
Derek continued, “I feel the same way about having a lot to give but no one to give it to. Even if I did find someone, I know I couldn’t make love to them.”
The others nodded. Sam joined in. “I’m frightened my relationship with Noelene will snap at any moment. Sometimes I sit there wondering if I only spend time with her because I’m lonely or whether there’s something meaningful between us. I guess I don’t really know what a relationship’s all about. I can never relax with her because, when we’re together, a staff member comes by every few minutes to check on us. Then, when I see beautiful women on television my mind goes off into a fantasy world. It makes me feel guilty.”
“When you start to fantasize, you find the mind can play some strange tricks,” said William. “You do the things you can’t do, like running, swimming and travelling all over the world, going to the places you want to go, doing the things you want to do. You’re the man you think you should have been. Then things begin to go crazy in your head. Sometimes I think about my body. I start with my feet and my mind moves up seeking out any kind of pain that might be there. When I find some, I concentrate on that point and worry there’s something really wrong with me. Then I start to think I’m going to die and wonder if there’s anything I can do to stop it.”
Ron began to throw his arms and head about. “When I’m lonely, I think of suicide. I remember all the people who used to live in Crystal Gardens. They showed me how to die and I want to die too so I can be with the people I loved. They made me feel important because they needed me to help them with things. I feel like nothing without them. I don’t know from one day to the next if
someone’s going to die. I want to get out of Crystal Gardens but I can’t separate myself from the people of the past. When I get really depressed I keep thinking about killing myself. Death plays on my mind every single day of my life. Then I try to do away with myself.” He lifted his shirt and showed her the scars across his belly from recent suicide attempts.
As Natalie listened to the outpouring of emotion she found herself drawn into their world, to this strange preoccupation with death.
Derek fidgeted with his chair. “It’s the tension of living here at Crystal Gardens that makes us think about dying. The way the staff treat us, denying us privacy and dignity, you start to feel you have no control over yourself and your surroundings any more. They make you feel inferior and powerless. There’s no escape from the constant bullying and arguments that result. The stress is just incredible. We never get a chance to recuperate and catch our breath like workers do when they go home to their families.”
Natalie had offered to get involved. Now she’d been shown the real Crystal Gardens. Residents shared pain and loneliness and the perceived futility of existence. People were trapped at Crystal Gardens, not just by their disability, but by their mutual sense of loss for those they’d once shared their lives with.
William interrupted Natalie’s thoughts. “Crystal Gardens weaves a spell around those who become part of it and once you find yourself in its clutches there’s no escape. The souls of the dead reach out and take hold of you, calling you to join them. The only way out of Crystal Gardens is a one-way trip in a wooden box.”
“Do you think things will be better when you move to the new units and have your own rooms?” asked Natalie.
William answered. “The thing that worries me most when we move is being left alone at night with no one to hear my call. It can get very painful if someone doesn’t come to turn me during the night. I’ve experienced it a few times before when no one’s come. The bed-clothes become heavier, weighing down your helpless body as if to suffocate you. Each minute is an eternity, wondering if anyone will come. The helplessness is like being buried alive in a coffin. Sheer panic is the only feeling and once you know that panic, the fear of it can make going to bed at night one long nightmare. That’s why we stay up so late at night until exhaustion overtakes us. When we move into the units we’ll have to rely on a buzzer to call for help. There’ll be no way of knowing if anyone has heard us. The staff could disappear for a couple of hours and we wouldn’t know.”
Natalie tried to imagine what it must be like to be unable to move and be totally dependent on people you didn’t like or trust. She was struggling to grasp it when Sam added his thoughts. “It’s like being laid out in the desert, tied down so you can’t move, with no one about for hundreds of miles. I know about panic states. I’d rather sleep all day and be awake all night than experience that.”
Chris nodded. “I feel as helpless as a vegetable. The bed covers weigh down on me, trapping me and every minute feels like ten. Then I start to think I’m going to choke to death.”
William smiled for a moment. “I remember when I could feel grass beneath my feet, follow bush tracks to new adventures, watching animals and birds when I could swim and feel the water around my body. My mind still wants to reach out and discover, but I can’t, and my frustration builds up inside me until I explode.”
Natalie was stunned by all she’d heard. She felt a new sense of intimacy toward these people who’d opened their hearts and souls to her in a way she’d never imagined. She desperately wanted to help them. “Let me talk to Matron about the buzzers. If only you can share with her the way you’ve done with me, I’m sure she’ll understand. Will you try?”
“She doesn’t listen to us, and besides we don’t trust her,” replied William.
“Can’t you give it one last try?”
After considerable humming and hawing, agreement was reached she ring Matron and invite her to join them. It didn’t take long for her to arrive. She perched herself on the side of the desk where she was slightly elevated from the rest. The residents were initially slow in opening up but as Matron listened quietly, they became more forthcoming about their fears of being left alone at night.
“Perhaps I can make the move a bit easier,” she suggested. “Instead of moving everyone over at once, I can move one unit across at a time to enable night staff to be present in the unit until you feel more comfortable. And I’ll talk to head office about changing the buzzers to an intercom system so you can actually talk to staff and hear them speak to you.”
Relief was visible on everyone’s faces. They began to chat about decorating their rooms and joked with each other about outlandish possibilities. Matron joined in the camaraderie. “I have one more suggestion,” she added. “Perhaps you could run some relaxation classes, Natalie?” Everyone nodded.
Chapter 31
The warmth of the sun, the new buds on the old oak tree and the familiar fragrance of frangipani welcomed Natalie to work. The new co-operation and cohesion at Crystal Gardens had made life more comfortable for everyone. Attendance at her two relaxation groups had been good and chatter about the upcoming move was positive. The buzzing of a wheelchair caught her attention. She looked up the path to see Derek approaching, his head bobbing slightly. The expression on his face immediately dimmed her spirits. On reaching her, he struggled to speak. Then he blurted out, “We’re being moved.”
“Who’s being moved?”
“William, Sam and I are being moved to one of the community cottages. Matron told us last night. She won’t let us stay here any longer.”
As Natalie looked at Derek, too stunned for words, the other two appeared. She saw the shattered looks on their faces. “None of the cottages are vacant.”
William explained. “The four school-girls living in the cottage on the hill are being moved out to make way for us. They’re being split up. Rosemary and one of the other girls are coming here to live. The other two are going elsewhere. I’m really worried about Rosemary. That cottage has been her home for the last four years and she’s got no family to support her.”
Natalie shook her head. “I’ll go up there and talk to her.” She knew Rosemary had been a ward of the state since the break-up of her family some years before. At fifteen, her twisted, little body was a stark contrast to her pretty face with its rose-coloured cheeks and bright, brown eyes that always seemed full of life. With a positive disposition and ready smile, she was an A-grade student, with an ambition to become a social worker.
Natalie drove up the hill to the cottage. Fortunately, Rosemary answered her knock and invited her into her room. Natalie looked around as she made her way along the corridor. With bright carpet and pleasant decorations, it was just like any other home. Natalie sat down on the bed. Rosemary was flat and despondent. Tears began to roll down her face. “I’m being moved to Crystal Gardens in two days’ time. I’m losing my home and my family. My best friend, who’s like a sister to me, is being taken away from me and I won’t see the staff I love any more. They understand my needs and how to look after me. Now I’ll have no one.”
Natalie put her arms around Rosemary’s scrawny, disfigured shoulders. “I’m trying to understand how this has happened. Were your guardian and the parents of the other girls consulted?”
“They weren’t even informed about it. I think I know why we’re being moved though. Matron wants me at the institution where she can keep an eye on me because, when she wouldn’t reply to my phone calls, I wrote a letter to my guardian complaining about the care here. We had new, temporary staff that hadn’t been trained properly. I went for a week without the dressings on my pressure sores being changed and we weren’t getting enough to eat because the staff didn’t know the procedures for getting in food.”
Rosemary showed Natalie a copy of the letter she’d written. It was a pleading letter, written from the heart, by a desperate and helpless young girl. Rosemary continued. “They won’t even let me take my personal belongings with me. Th
ey’re going to pack away my doona, my wall pendants and my dolls. They don’t care about me. I have no say in my life at all.” She looked up at Natalie from her doe-like eyes. “I’ve lost all hope for the future. I’ve got nothing left to live for.”
Natalie was frightened by the change she saw in Rosemary. She returned to Crystal Gardens and went straight to Matron’s office. “How could you make a decision to move residents around without consulting anyone? Especially, after all the effort we’ve made to plan together? Have you any idea the distress you’ve caused?”
“You have no right to raise this issue with me after what you did last week.”
“What did I do?”
“I know you wrote a letter about starving children and gangrene.”
“I had nothing to do with any such letter.”
“You’re totally untrustworthy. How many times have you been to the cottage in the last week?”
“I haven’t been there until today.”
“You’re nothing but a liar. Are you prepared to go to the cottage on a regular basis, listen to the residents and report back to me what they say?”
“Certainly not.”
“You’re totally unprofessional. I’m not prepared to work with you any longer. Get out of my office and don’t darken my doorway again.”
Natalie left without further prompting. Her behaviour is ridiculous. But she holds all the power and is using it to harm others.
She found the three men waiting for her outside her office. Natalie opened the door and stomped inside. “Come in.” When they were all inside and the door was closed she told them what had happened. “I didn’t realise until now the seriousness of what’s going on here. We’ve got a real battle on our hands. You can rely on my total support from now on, whatever the consequences.” As soon as the others left she sent off a memorandum to the Chief Executive Officer. There was no reply.
Parallel Lives Page 16