Chapter twenty-three
After Eddie’s update in the office, I’d emailed Allen to see how he was, and he’d invited me to drop in the following week for a cup of tea ‘and a debrief’.
Devora showed me through to the conservatory, where Allen was using his recuperative ‘down time’ to record short instructional reels for his new social media account.
If anyone was a model for the power of Making a Change, it was Allen.
He asked me how things were going at work, and I told him: the email with my new job description had come through the previous night, but I’d made my decision before I even opened the attachment.
It boiled down to old job, worse boss, or worse job, lower pay.
But it wouldn’t have mattered if Christian had offered me his job, at treble pay: it was time to find something new.
‘I think you’re making the right decision,’ said Allen when I’d got to the end of the whole sorry saga.
He was wearing a polo shirt with the logo of his new business on the breast pocket, and a pair of trousers that had been adjusted to accommodate the huge medical boot on his foot.
‘Write your resignation letter, get on the interweb, and look for another job. And for God’s sake, Beth, book a holiday. ’
He said it so sincerely I didn’t correct the ‘interweb’. ‘You don’t think I’m overreacting?’
‘What? No! Sod ’em. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in the last month it’s that there’s no time to waste. You’ll have no trouble finding another job with your ability and experience. The important thing is to find one you enjoy.’
I couldn’t disagree with that. When it came to Jacobs’, I could see now that I’d got stuck in the same kind of wishful thinking spiral I’d been in with Fraser, hoping that I’d wake up one morning and work would be inspiring and challenging again.
But what did I think would change, if I didn’t make some changes myself?
That was the theory, anyway. The reality was that the thought of interviews and networking and having to find smart outside clothes to wear to meet strangers gave me instant pit sweat.
Allen sensed my wobble. ‘Or don’t be an accountant!
Do something else! Retrain as a pastry chef if you want!
’ He waved a biscuit at me; I’d persuaded Pam to give me her gingersnap recipe and had baked him a tinful.
‘You’re not indentured to Jacobs’ for life.
You don’t have to wait for Christian to give you a sock so you can leave.
What other things would you like to do?’
‘That’s the problem,’ I said. ‘I’m not sure.’
I’d been scrolling through career change websites, trying to find something that fitted my transferable skills, and though I had more options than I’d initially thought (including retraining as a dog groomer; keeping Tomsk’s odour at a low hum had really honed my shampooing skills) so far nothing was leaping out at me.
‘You could always retrain as a BSL signer?’ Allen suggested, with a few careful hand gestures which I assumed translated to the same words. ‘I’d give you a job any day of the week.’
‘That’s very kind,’ I said, and to show him I’d read the links he’d sent me, I put my fingertips on my chin, and made a ‘thank you’ sign.
Allen beamed and made the same gesture back. And some more that I didn’t understand but hoped were positive.
I checked my phone throughout the day in case of an update from Lewis, but there’d been nothing since I’d left him at the hospital with the doctor delivering the sad news: Hugh had died, without regaining consciousness.
All afternoon I lay on my sofa with Tomsk, failing to make a new job visualisation collage and instead willing the universe to make Linda’s operation go smoothly.
And for Hugh and Kay’s son Jonathan to be there, looking after Kay.
And for someone to be taking care of poor Bill, alone and silent without his Linda.
Most of all, I hoped Lewis wasn’t blaming himself for what had happened.
No text came. There was no reason for Lewis to update me.
I couldn’t stop thinking about the weight of the world on his shoulders outside the ICU.
I couldn’t concentrate on anything. I jumped when Martine rang me at ten o’clock to tell me five facts about Bath, and I realised that (a) it was ten o’clock, and (b) I hadn’t thought about Fraser and his brand-new family all day.
Needless to say, that was something I didn’t feel able to discuss with Martine, which made our conversation shorter than normal, and I resented Fraser for that too.
The next morning, I decided I had to do something to help, and loaded Tomsk in the car straight after our morning walk.
‘Come on, Tomsk, we’re going to see if we can comfort an old man,’ I said, and he gave me a look through his fringe that said, ‘I know what you’re up to, but whatever.’
I could feel the sadness in Rosemount the moment we stepped through the door.
Instead of the lounge-music strings that had been floating in the corridors on my last visit there was mournful classical music instead.
Pam was stationed on the reception desk instead of Wendy, and she was braced like someone manning the last machine gun.
When she saw it was me, she relaxed, but only slightly. Her eyes, red-rimmed and without their usual mascara, kept darting to the front doors, or to the stairs, as if she was expecting residents to escape, or some officials to arrive.
‘It’s been so stressful,’ she confessed.
‘Lewis has been in meetings since eight this morning. Norris Schofield’s family arrived to remove him at lunchtime, we’ve had total strangers phoning up asking how many residents died, and are we ashamed of ourselves .
. .’ She blinked fast. ‘I didn’t know people could be so cruel! ’
‘What do you mean?’
She got her phone out of her cardigan pocket, winced, and handed it to me.
Ellie, appointed social media strategist by Lewis, had created an account to ‘showcase Rosemount’s happy community’ – table gardening, Story of My Life vignettes, teatime, etc – but someone called @LonghamptonDad had posted, Happy to PLAY GAMES while your residents are LITERALLY DYING!
DISCUSTING! U should be ASHAMED! and others had agreed and liked and added more weird accusations about old people being run over by bicycles ridden by laughing staff.
I handed the phone back, feeling hot and cold.
No one had mentioned a fat woman on the tandem with the manager but if they’d noticed Lewis on a bike they could hardly have missed me.
‘It was so sad what happened to Hugh, and Linda, but what else could Lewis have done? If he’d been in the house he could hardly have reacted much faster than he did. ’
Pam looked ashen.
‘Pam?’
Her eyes darted to the door and back again.
‘I’m so worried, Beth. We’re going to get closed down, aren’t we?
I’ve had people calling saying they’re from the BBC, wanting a statement.
Lewis says I’ve to refer them to him, but like I said, he’s been in meetings with his boss, and then obviously Hugh’s family arrived, so he’s been dealing with them, and because Linda doesn’t have any family, he’s been advocating for her with the hospital, as well as trying to make sure Bill’s OK, and . . .’
I seized the opportunity. ‘That’s what I’ve come for. I thought maybe I could sit with Bill, for some company?’ I indicated my hairy companion. ‘He seems to relax with Tomsk.’
‘Oh, would you? We’re so worried about the poor man.
’ Pam seemed relieved. ‘You know what Bill’s like, bless him – it’s hard to tell if it’s sunk in.
We’ve explained that Linda’s in hospital but it didn’t seem right to make any promises about when she’d be back.
’ She covered her mouth with her hand and squeezed tears away.
Tomsk shifted next to me, as if bracing for the next hour or so.
‘Come on,’ I said. ‘This dog’s had intensive training in therapeutic silences.’
I could tell straight away that Bill was upset, not because he said anything to that effect, but because he barely noticed us come in.
‘Beth’s here to keep you company for a little while,’ said Pam, putting a tea tray down on the teak G-Plan side table with the fancy tiled top (‘A wedding present from my Auntie Win, you thought she had a look of Joan Crawford, didn’t you, Bill?
’) It was eerie, not having Linda’s constant narration, and her voice played in my head anyway.
Bill turned towards me; I wondered if he expected to see Linda too, since I only appeared to hear her reminiscing, but seeing I was alone, his eyes dropped to the carpet again with such a despondency that I could almost feel the pity ricocheting between me and Pam.
‘I’ll pop back in half an hour,’ she whispered to me. ‘That OK?’
I nodded. Half an hour would be a long time without Linda’s monologues about the Billy Cotton Band Show and party telephone lines, but if it would make Bill feel less alone it was the least I could do.
Tomsk let out a sigh and lay down next to Bill’s slippers.
I listened to Pam’s quick feet retreating down the corridor, and the silence in the room reasserted itself.
I swallowed, and racked my brains. This was hard, but I was here now.
‘I was so sorry to hear about Linda’s accident,’ I said, to get it out of the way. ‘She’s in good hands, though. They’re taking good care of her.’
According to Pam, the operation on her hip had gone ‘as well as they hoped’ but the doctors were monitoring her for a few days.
Bill carried on staring out of the window, touching his arthritic first finger to his thumb, then his second, then his first again, over and over.
I looked around the room, searching for inspiration, then gave up. This frightened old man didn’t want some stranger wittering on about the weather, or the football; he just wanted to hear about his wife, and that she’d be OK. That she was coming home.
I couldn’t promise that, though. I wanted to, but I couldn’t.