Eyes of the Blind

by Alex Tresillian

  “Oh no.” Simon groaned.

  Her head light from champagne and buzzing with Tchaikovsky, Miranda sat enjoying the seclusion of a toilet cubicle in the interval of The Nutcracker, having persuaded Daniel, eventually, that she was capable of finding the Ladies unaided. She was reflecting on Dr. Clarke’s injunction before she left hospital the first time, namely that she should avoid putting herself in any situations where she might be liable to infection. And here she now was, one of an audience of goodness knows how many, carrying goodness knows what germs, and hiding out in a public lavatory, which, if everything her mother had told her since she was a small girl was true, was a kind of holiday camp for bacteria. And yet nobody had raised this point when the invitation was given, not Daniel Sullivan, not Faith, not even Niall. Shouldn’t she be wearing some kind of surgical mask impregnated with disinfectant? Which would, admittedly, rather detract from the effect of her dress, hair and the make-up she had painstakingly applied with Faith’s help (“Not that I’m any kind of expert,” Faith had commented). But what if her currently compromised immune system were to be confronted with something it couldn’t deal with? Something beyond its recuperative powers. She would feel a real fool, and she might be risking her sighted future. Belatedly, pointlessly, she held a hand over her mouth and nose.

  She was enjoying the privacy of the cubicle, being away from any requirement to listen or make conversation. Since the operation her life seemed to be an endless sequence of questions requiring answers, and the answers that she gave were never quite the right ones, which meant more questions. Solitude brought the only true peace, bathrooms pretty much the only sanctuary.

  She listened to the conversations of the women outside her door, criticising the costumes, criticising the dancing. She was surprised. She had found the dancing flawless, impressive, athletic, and wondered what it was that these more discerning eyes were looking for. There were also more personal conversations about partners who were there or not there with them, about other women in the audience, but these were uninteresting, except for the way that they illustrated what a visual place the world was, and how much people were judged for the way they looked. So new, so different. Literally, an eye-opener.

  The bell rang, summoning people back to their seats. Miranda stood up. She could look forward to the second half with an empty bladder. She paused briefly at the mirror after washing her hands. It was very hard not to be drawn to mirrors. There she was: the bruising around her eyes had almost completely subsided. Faith had said, “‘Eyes put in with the coal-man’s finger,’ as my grandmother used to say about dark-ringed eyes. Some would call it a very sexy look.” Miranda found it hard to think that a dirty finger could be sexy, but she looked long and hard at her face, hoping it was attractive. Then another bell rang, forcing her out of self-contemplation, and she walked out into the confusion of audience members moving swiftly and seemingly in all directions. She tried to get her bearings: she had been so adamant that she would have no difficulty finding and returning from the Ladies; had scorned Daniel’s offered assistance. Now she looked round her and was baffled. Anger at her own carelessness and incompetence surged inside her, bringing tears to the corner of her eyes. She hadn’t even memorised their box number, so couldn’t ask for directions like some pathetic helpless fawn.

  And then she saw Daniel approaching, avuncular arm outstretched.

  “Was starting to think you’d got lost,” he said, and she had to smile and bite her lip to conceal the surge of rage that threatened to overwhelm her. Rage because she was so relieved to see him, rage because she had allowed herself to get into a position where it was a relief to be found, rage because it had occurred to him that she might get lost and need looking for, rage because she had let herself down and felt that she had somehow broken her promise to Niall that she would remain on her guard, because in this moment of relief she had completely exposed her vulnerability.

  Daniel took her arm and she allowed herself to be led meekly back to the box, where another bottle of champagne awaited her.

  “Thought you’d be ready for another drink,” Daniel said, raising his glass. “To arts and culture,” he said, “and many more pleasant evenings such as this.”

  Miranda smiled weakly and drank.

  “Simon’s got a job,” Niall said to Faith as they sat drinking raspberry tea and instant decaffeinated coffee respectively, awaiting Miranda’s return.

  “Brilliant,” Faith replied.

  “With a new blind charity – Victory.”

  “Oh – Victory.”

  “You know about it?”

  “Yes,” Faith confessed. “They invited me to be one of their trustees. I declined.”

  “Because?”

  “Variety of reasons. I have quite enough going on in my life without it. Computers really aren’t my thing. And Vivien Loosemore is their patron. You know I never really had a great deal of time for her.”

  “That’s interesting.”

  “Is it?”

  “Yes,” Niall said non-committally, his mind in overdrive. Vivien Loosemore. She had seemed a peripheral player at best, but now her name kept cropping up. She was moving into the frame. And she was an easy target. If he could get all the background on her, find a way to confront her, she would inevitably blunder again, and this time he wouldn’t let her off the hook. He reflected on the narrow confines of the world of disabled charities, which saw people of profoundly limited capabilities hoovering up all the top jobs. Luck, accident and happenstance had seen Loosemore, a lower-division private school principal, stumble into the role of Head at the old alma mater. There the consequences of her own ineptitude had successfully been attributed to others’ failings, and she had become a pillar of the establishment, treasured by BAB and sought after for the letterheads of fledgling charities. It was a small pond full of amateur, incompetent, self-important and self-satisfied fish, the disabled charity world.

  He pressed his watch and it reported 11.12 pm.

  “Shouldn’t she be back by now?” he asked.

  “Certainly the Nutcracker isn’t long,” Faith reflected.

  “Bastard’s spirited her away for a curry,” Niall said.

  “I don’t see Daniel as a vindaloo man,” Faith said, smiling. “I would say a wine bar’s more likely.”

  “You’re supposed to be looking after her.”

  “I am. She’ll be fine. Daniel wouldn’t dare try anything. He’s got too much to lose.”

  “I can’t stand the man,” Niall seethed.

  “Do I detect a hint of jealousy?” Faith asked.

  “You’re joking,” Niall snapped, too quickly. “I just want her to be safe.”

  “Of course.”

  They heard a car pull up outside. Then nothing for a minute and a half. Then a car door opening and closing. Footsteps on the path. And the doorbell. Hugo leapt into action and was first to the door, with Faith some way behind.

  “How was it?” she asked, as she let Miranda in.

  “Amazing,” Miranda said, but with a detectable lack of conviction. “I’ve had far too much to drink.”

  “Come in and sit down,” Faith said solicitously, trying to feed the pair of them around Hugo, who was enthusiastically obstructing the hall corridor.

  “I think I need to go to bed,” Miranda said.

  “I’ll help you up,” Faith said.

  “Sullivan try anything?” Niall called from the lounge.

  “Ignore him,” Faith said. Miranda did. For the past hour she had been trying to say as little as possible. Words seemed to rearrange themselves and their components inside her mouth, emerging scrambled and devoid of meaning.

  “G’night,” Niall called out through clenched teeth.

  In her room at the top of the house Miranda lay down on the bed and closed her eyes. Relief flooded through her. The second half of the ballet had become an ordeal: she had tried to focus on the dancing, but her eyes were losing responsiveness and Daniel kept breaking her concent
ration to force more champagne on her, which she had – in the end – quite forcibly refused. Daniel had borne it with a shrug, but she could tell that he wasn’t happy about it. She was disappointed that the narrative of the ballet seemed to dry up, just to be replaced by a sequence of dances: all perfectly pleasing on the eye, but no longer telling a story. But more disappointing was the growing conviction that Daniel’s intentions were to get her drunk and then presumably seduce her. It was exactly as Niall had foreseen, and she felt her own naivety in having believed otherwise. Guiding her through the crowds at the end of the performance Daniel had put his arm round her in a proprietary way which she knew she was meant to interpret as protective; he had led her down a series of side-streets to get to his car, when she had assumed they would be taking a taxi, not least because Daniel had drunk at least a bottle of champagne.

  “Should you drive after drinking that much?” she had asked.

  “Darling, I drive better after a bottle of champagne,” had been his response.

  She hadn’t enjoyed his driving, or his repeated attempts to put his hand on her leg. Then he had started asking probing questions about Niall, but not questions such as a jealous admirer might ask – nothing about their relationship or what she thought about him. Rather they were questions about how she had met him, the sort of things they talked about, whether Niall had asked her questions about her operation or her medication. She couldn’t help wondering whether her father hadn’t set up the whole evening as a pretext for the interrogation, offering anything that Daniel was able to get from her in the physical line as bait: she had never felt close to her father, but since her operation he seemed to have become a total stranger, someone of whom she knew nothing but could believe anything.

  Daniel had been irritated by the vagueness of her answers. She heard the self-control in his stale treacle pudding voice stretched to breaking point. She had been incredibly relieved when they had turned into Faith’s road and pulled up outside the house. At that point Daniel had seemed to decide to cut his losses and rebuild broken bridges in the hope of securing a rematch. She responded non-committally and – she hoped – politely, although she was aware by this time that her sentences were only partly her own. She left unspoken her decision that she would never accept any invitation from him again.

  Sitting angrily on his own bed Niall imagined the worst. Daniel kissing Miranda, Daniel fondling her breasts telling her that they were like two choice fruits brimming with juice demanding to be sucked, Daniel running his hand up her inner thigh telling her these were experiences and sensations she needed to catch up on, even though they had nothing to do with sight.

  But why did he care? What was Miranda Leman to him? A friend, a responsibility. How could he shoulder his responsibility if she kept gadding off with lecherous older men who could impress her with the size of their cars and wallets? She had ignored his advice, let him down. And Lindsey had ignored him, because she knew she wasn’t going to listen to his advice. Women knew exactly how to piss you off and make you feel redundant.

  It was nearly a quarter to midnight. So what? He rang Lindsey’s number. She took a long time to answer and when she did it was obvious she’d been asleep.

  “Hello?” she said, confused.

  “Merry Christmas!” Niall said.

  “Niall? Are you drunk?”

  “Far from it. No festive Yuletide cheer for yours truly. How’s it going? What are you up to?”

  “Well, I’m up to nothing. I’m lying in bed. I was asleep, and then some idiot phoned me.”

  “Good job they did. Life’s too short and precious to waste time sleeping.”

  “Mine’s not,” Lindsey said darkly.

  “I just heard from Simon that you’d got a new job and I wanted to congratulate you.”

  “Thanks. But what you really want to do is give me grief over the fact that I didn’t fight BAB all the way to the disciplinary.”

  “I don’t actually. You made the right call.”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “I do. We took legal advice. You acted on it.”

  “OK. I’m surprised. I’m suspicious. But thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  “And you’ve got in on the ground floor of a new charity venture. Sounds great.”

  “It is. Don’t come to the office!”

  “Lindsey!” Niall complained. “It wasn’t my fault that BAB decided to kick you out.”

  “Funny. I thought you thought it was.”

  “Look. Can we let bygones be bygones?”

  “We always have.”

  “Do you see much of Vivien Loosemore in your new job?”

  “Nothing at all. There’s no story, no nothing. You stay in Shropshire and I’ll stay here.”

  “And a Happy New Year to you too. Actually I’m in London.”

  “Staying with Simon again? I’m amazed.”

  “No. Frying other fish this time.”

  “Oh, OK. Erica will be pleased.”

  “Right.”

  “So if that’s it, I’ll bid you good night.”

  “Where is Victory’s office?”

  “No, Niall. Please. Just leave me alone.”

  “OK.”

  “Happy New Year. I hope things work out for you.”

  “Yeah, thanks. You too.”

  “Goodnight.”

  “Goodnight.”

  Lindsey’s boyfriend stirred in the bed beside her.

  “Who the Hell was that?” he asked.

  “Just my ex ringing to congratulate me on my new job and trying to hook up with me again.”

  “Niall Burnet?”

  “Well remembered. Are you jealous?”

  “Where is he?”

  “In London. You are jealous.”

  “Should I be?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  TWELVE

  The director and presenters of early evening chat show This Is Now were having a council of war. All three had serious concerns following the rehearsal for the January 29th edition of the programme. The one-time blind girl with the new eyes had said practically nothing, there was clearly some difficult chemistry between her and her parents, and the production team’s third choice of ‘professional’ – after the surgeon, who was abroad, and the doctor in charge of the girl’s aftercare, who had point-blank refused – had turned out to be an absolute nightmare, so keen to jump at his five minutes of fame that he had trampled all over everyone, including the presenters, in his attempt to ensure his place in the spotlight.

  “This is in danger of being right up there with Parkinson’s interview of Meg Ryan,” the director, Lucy Sturmey, said. The reference was lost on both her presenters, who were too young to remember it and would have struggled to identify the Barnsley broadcaster in a celebrity line-up.

  “She was so monosyllabic I was almost glad when the goon from the charity got going,” Melissa McEvoy, the show’s Scottish female presenter said.

  “I wasn’t,” Sturmey said decisively. “We need to start with her, away from all distractions and with no-one to speak for her. Not Mum, especially not Dad, not the journalist, no-one. You’ll have her on her own for three minutes, then we’ll go to the VT of Derek’s tour of British swimming pools, then we’ll come back and we’ll have Mum and the charity man with her.”

  “Don’t you think a rant from Dad might be good for the ratings?” Jon Allen, the other presenter, offered.

  “You could walk up into the audience to ask him for a comment,” Melissa suggested.

  “What I really want is for you two to make something of the girl,” Sturmey said. “She’s the story. Probe. Do boys look better than they sound? Get an answer. Which boy is she talking about? I don’t want politics, I want human interest. Once upon a time she couldn’t see. Now she can. She’s a living, walking miracle. But keep off the operation because we’re running this without the fucking surgeon, only don’t ask me why. Keep away from the science because if you go there our audience are
going to be thinking why the fuck haven’t they got someone on who can answer the science questions. Keep it light, keep it personal, but get her to talk. It’s your job.”

  “Trust us,” Jon said. “We won’t let you down.”

  “You did this afternoon,” Sturmey said.

  Miranda was in make-up, being made to feel special by a young man who had introduced himself as Adam.

  “Your skin is just amazing,” he said. “I know I keep saying it but, really, I don’t think you realise how amazing it is.”

  “I don’t,” Miranda said.

  “Then look! Look girl! Use your eyes!” And he winked at her to show that he knew that using her eyes was a very novel experience. The trouble was that in the weeks since New Year, despite all the care she had taken with her medication, despite living a very simple life, Miranda was very aware that her eye-sight had deteriorated. Subtly at first, so that she had put it down to tiredness, but the blurring was increasing, and she had had two moments when she hadn’t been able to see at all. Unable to bear the thought that she might be rejecting the eyes again, she had kept quiet about it, hoping with each new day that it would turn out to have been a blip, but she had now reached the point where it could no longer be ignored, and she had promised herself that she would tell Faith as soon as the dreaded television interview was over.

  She had become very attached to Faith in the time since her trip to the ballet. Things had been awkward between her and Niall, and, although she hated it, she didn’t know how to make it right between them again, so she had gravitated to Faith and found her very kind and understanding. When Daniel had called at the house proffering further invitations Faith had gone to the door and rejected them on her behalf, giving the excuse that she had been knocked out by the exertions of the ballet trip and really needed to rest and recuperate indoors. Daniel had offered to come in and ‘brighten up her day’, but Faith had told him that their days were bright enough.

  When her agent had got in touch about the This Is Now interview her first instinct had been to make some health-related excuse and get out of it, but Faith had persuaded her that this was something that couldn’t and shouldn’t be avoided, and the sooner she allowed herself to become public property, the sooner the public would be finished with her, if that was what she wanted. Niall had snarled about the interview, but he had done little other than snarl at her since Christmas; however, she was adamant that she wanted him to be in the audience on the day, and, with input from Faith, he had eventually been persuaded to attend.