Chapter 8
HEATHER
Heather is mollified by a stream of communication from Georgia in the first week of term in response to several of her snippets of sage advice: which meals to cook; how to fall asleep if there is a party going on upstairs; the quickest route to the Mathematics building; the best way to clean a grill pan.
There are also rather terse replies to Heather’s broader questions: “ Are you settling in okay? Making friends? How’s Brianna doing? Does she need anything?”
‘Let me know if you need help when your dad’s away. Anything at all,’ she’d said to Brianna when they left the brunch table last week. Scott had tutted, Georgia sighed and Brianna – well, Brianna seemed quite touched.
‘Aw. Thanks, Heather, I will,’ she said.
Heather had got a hug out of her as well, so she must have meant it.
As a result, Heather feels it’s perfectly justifiable for her to ask after Brianna when her dad’s on his ab-crushing, bicep-developing, thrill-seeking holiday – even if she can feel Georgia’s disdain from sixty miles away.
The second week is a different case altogether.
Georgia goes silent. Heather’s unfettered mind oscillates from one imagined crisis to the next: Georgia struggling after unprotected sex (God forbid); depressed; finding lectures too demanding; sickening alone with food poisoning, or a rash, or a temperature, and no-one has thought to check on her.
By the fifth day of no communication, Heather doesn’t sleep a wink.
She dreams of marauding insects nibbling away at Georgia’s dead body and wakes, startled at three am, finding she has no choice other than to Google: “Can cockroaches eat dead bodies?” (Answer: Yes) and “Can bed bugs kill you?” (Answer: No).
Stressed and sleep deprived, she seeks advice in the online parents' forum in the morning. There’s a chance Scott-Bloody-Reynolds will see her post and laugh her out of town (she can picture it right now), so she posts anonymously.
She takes a few moments to mull over their suggestions before deciding to call the Hall Wellbeing Team and asking for a Welfare Check.
Heather expected a Welfare Check to entail a gentle tap on the door, but after raising the alarm, she was informed that the team descended on the student flat like a Black Ops squad on a drugs bust and didn’t leave until someone in authority eyeballed her daughter and deemed her perfectly healthy and entirely sane.
She’d just muted her mother.
Someone gave Heather an update within twenty minutes of the visit. So, she had no choice other than to wait for communication from Georgia.
When a message from Georgia does, finally, arrive it doesn’t offer apologies or explanations; instead, it’s an accusatory: “Muuum! What the actual????”
Heather calls her, and their interaction remains terse for the first few minutes, but by the time Georgia has recounted a few good nights out and a chronological list of new friends made, she softens into the conversation.
They chat for a full hour. By the end of the phone call, Heather’s confidence in the world is replenished and her sense of goodwill restored.
She returns to the parents forum to say thanks (and de-escalate the situation, truth be told) when a new post catches her eye:
Hi Guys. Suggestions, please. I’m really worried about my son, Trey.
Over from Baltimore. Finding social stuff makes him nervous.
All his flatmates are from overseas and seem to stay in their rooms. He’s trying to join societies to make friends (Genealogy tonight at 8pm, I’m told), but I think the situation in his accommodation has brought him down.
Wasn’t Trey the name of the young lad Georgia said was sick on the first day? And here’s his poor mum picking up that all is not right from afar. It’s more than Heather can bear, so after a quick message to Georgia to check, she decides to respond.
My daughter Georgia and her friend Brianna are going to Genealogy tonight. If you DM me, I can ask them to look out for him. They’re pretty inclusive. I’m sure they’ll be happy to take him under their wing.
She doesn’t have long to wait. The relief from Trey’s mum is something Heather feels almost viscerally across the ocean.