As George drove to her office, in her usual way, she was turning over the implications of what had happened to her. How could such an intensity of experience be constrained within the linear restrictions of time? It felt as if she had started living a second life as she reflected on how completely and passionately she'd fallen if love with Alice. She now realized what had been creeping up on her as she dealt with the practicalities of Sally Anne's case. She was acutely aware that she'd gone into this life changing experience as one person and, inwardly, had emerged as another except that all the externals remained the same.
George smiled warmly to herself at the memories of the most fantastic couple of days. She recalled how she had worked so hard for Sally Anne's trial and she had achieved a crushing triumph, which was up to anything Jo had delivered. She could understand what John had said over the years that achieving justice was a highly spiritual experience and she had scoffed at his words, closed her ears. Now she wasn't ashamed to admit that she could see what he had been driving at. She had felt profoundly centred by the experience and she hadn't been a theatrical actor playing a part. Her performance was that supreme expression of herself, given the legally forensic form of exposition. It was certainly a result by any standard. It had propelled her onwards to be so totally open to experiencing the party at Chix, being open and aware of Alice, making that magical connection and the night of passionate lovemaking that had ensued. Thursday off work with Alice had been like nothing on earth. They had both lived at the emotional height of human existence but on the Friday, both women had to return to work. At the back of her mind, George had known all along that there would be the inevitable comedown after the glorious time she had spent over the last day or so. She would be back to the reality of her work and the life that surrounded it. As soon as Alice was headed off to her place of work and her to hers, George felt that ache of being separated and longing to be reunited, as soon as it was possible. It was as if she had fallen in love for the first time in her life. George knew that something had changed irretrievably in her life and she had to follow it wherever it led. The way she drove alone showed an indication that undoubtedly there was a different George, as she was now calm and leisurely in her driving rather than angry and frantic.As George pulled up outside her office and sat in her car, she looked around at her surroundings. Her neatly appointed office, within a stones throw of the Oxford Street shops was as it had always been. She focused closer in the clothes that she wore. Her 'power dressing' suit looked the same as it always did and so did her shirt. It was she who had changed. Besides the massive change in her sexuality, she had definitely joined the ranks of the rebels and that was change enough. On the other hand, she had that peculiar feeling that she had changed profoundly inside but everyone else would see the same old George. It made her nervous and she seriously questioned whether she would manage to hold together the various pieces of 'George as perceived.' In herself, she was totally certain of herself. She had fallen in love with Alice and the most important goal of her life was not to let her slip through her fingers. She now felt that she had the emotional wherewithal not to make that mistake. She simply had to orientate the rest of her life round it.
As she looked down the street on that fine August day, the bright warm sunlight made everything look sharp, new minted or was it her heightened sensitivities? Whatever it was, this really did feel like the very start of the rest of her life and she felt good inside. Lingering longer than she was used to, she prepared herself to spend the best part of the day in the office clearing up two days of accumulated files that would be sitting in her in tray. Her high heels clicked their way up the open plan staircase and her long suffering secretary who had become hardened to George's imperious nature was present. Although, 'truth be told', the woman had been surprised to see a more pleasant side of George when Claire Walker conferred with her on a case."Good morning, Barbara," George greeted her as she swung into her office with a broad smile on her face." There weren't too many problems while I was off?"
"I took a few phone calls from your clients but nothing pressing … sorted out the routine correspondence. What I couldn't handle I left for you," Barbara said nervously, unaccustomed to such pleasantry.
"Excellent," beamed George." This will keep me nicely occupied. I could do with something quietly relaxing after the excitement of the past few days."
"I understand from the papers that the Sally Anne Howe case was a total success. You'll be sure to get other cases like that coming your way."
"Yes……yes, it did go well," George replied, a faraway look in her eyes as she spoke slowly in a peculiarly distanced fashion before becoming more animated in her manner. "Yes, I went with Sally and Trisha to celebrate at a club afterwards and had a wonderful time of it."
"I'm very pleased for you George.""Yes, so am I…. Oh, Barbara, if you get any really personal calls asking specifically for me, don't hesitate in putting them through. Now, before I start the day, what say we share a cup of tea to start the day?"
"Sounds wonderful…I'll make it," Barbara said quickly, nipping to the small kitchen area while she put her puzzled thoughts together. Finally, she gave up and concluded that if it meant that her boss wouldn't throw tantrums and her obnoxious boyfriend wouldn't patronize her and demand George's attention with a click of his fingers, life was looking up. She produced a tray with two cups of tea, a small milk jug and a teapot a little nervously, knowing how fussy George could be and was pleasantly surprised when George pronounced her first sip as excellent and chattered pleasantly to her.
When both had resumed their work later on, both were working quietly for a few hours when the phone rang. Barbara took the switchboard and intoned her usual greeting.
"Can I speak to George Channing, please?" a pleasant female voice called
"Who shall I say is calling?" Barbara enquired in her normal telephone manner.
"Oh yes," came the hesitant voice, taken off guard by the question." Tell her that it's Alice. She'll know who I am."
Barbara put the call on hold and spoke to George, expecting a petulant answer if she was lucky, angry if she wasn't.
"Definitely put the call through, Barbara," George spoke eagerly, the words pouring out in a stream." Make sure you don't lose the call. I've been kind of expecting it."
Barbara did as she was told and, again to her surprise, George's voice did not carry through the thin walls. More to the point, the call was unusually long by her standards. Eventually when she finished the call, George made one outward call and half an hour later, popped her head round to Barbara.
"I've cleared everything up, Barbara and there aren't any cases that will need my presence right now. I'm popping out to see my father. If you receive any phone calls, please will you take any messages? On Monday, I'm expecting Claire Walker first thing to call in about the Partridge compensation claim. Is that clear?" George said crisply, in a pleasant tone of voice.
"Are you expecting anyone in particular, George?" Barbara asked.
"Well, someone may call, you know, " George said, her manner, as close to being school-girlish as it would ever be. Barbara could swear that her boss was dying to let her into some kind of secret that only she knew but just about stopped short. There was a faint flush of pleasure on her face as skipped down the staircase and headed out to her car.
Joseph Channing greeted his talented beautiful daughter with his upper class version of open arms and George graciously accepted his greeting. By now, she was in such a pent up state of dying to tell someone about the new love in her life that it overrode her caution about such matters.
"I want to congratulate you on the splendid performance in the Sally Anne Howe case. Monty was sure to give a blow by blow account of the trial and I'd say, considering that your line of work has primarily been civil cases, you have performed splendidly."
"I must confess I had to do a lot of last minute swotting but once I started, I felt comfortable. What was a bit strange was putting that dreadful human resources woman through the hoop, where once I would have defended her."
"It will add more strings to your bow and you'll find that word gets around, George."
The smile on George's face felt very forced and artificial at that moment, as little did dear Daddy know what was to come. For a brief instant, she was tempted to back off from telling him her secret. The phrase 'faint heart never won fair lady' came back into her mind from long ago school lessons. The old fashioned phrase made her laugh inwardly at the delicious irony of the situation. Her spirits rallied but she opted not to drop this bombshell on her poor father too soon.
"It seems to me that I've been channeled by 'that man' in the sort of cases I had been taking on. I feel free to branch out a little and take the sort of work that I feel like doing. Jo Mills may have a rival in handling 'crusading' cases, even though the term embarrasses me."
Joseph Channing alternately glared in sympathy at his daughter's pointed reference to her ex and chuckled freely at her backhanded acceptance of herself in the same league as Jo Mills. He had often heard vitriolic denunciations of her rival so this was a step up in the world. Everything seemed to be coming together in the traditional finale of 'it all ended happily ever after.'
"It's strange the twists and turns that fate plays in our lives and how, after all the fury and uproar, John has turned out to be right all along. If the government wanted to have a judiciary united in thought and deed, it has succeeded admirably- in turning all and sundry against them, even traditional die hard Conservatives."
George smiled dutifully at her father's enthusiasm. Of course, she approved and agreed with the general sentiment. It was just that her boredom threshold kicked in at an early stage at intense and detailed political debates. "Everyone knew what needed to be done, for God's sake, so we might as well get on with it."
"You never know, the chain of recent events might even repair the rent in your relationship with John. I confess that I think of him in much kinder terms than I used to."
At this point, George was seriously alarmed and felt duty bound to put a stop to this train of thought. Having lived a lie with Neil Houghton, she felt duty bound to intervene.
"Daddy, I hope you aren't suffering the illusion that John and I will get back together. Even if both of us wanted it, it wouldn't work out."
"You haven't got Jo Mills to come between you. You can put the past aside as all of us have recently learned to do."
Nice try, Daddy. I admire your silver-tongued guile but it's not good enough, thought George. Suddenly, out of nowhere, her own ploy popped into her own imagination.
"I am getting to be friends with John and we have a further tie through Charlie but that's as far as it goes. The problem is that John is a womanizer and always will be so. It would come between us and spoil what we have………..especially as I have a new partner."
Joseph looked at his daughter more closely. There was a glow that radiated from her and a feeling of tranquillity that was new. He fondly bathed in the satisfaction of being both eagle eyed father and court of appeal judge who had got to the bottom of the matter. "Oh, tell me more, George." "I've realized that I've always gone for the smooth, debonair man who is self assured and basically self centred. Oh sure in his public life, John is dedicated to justice and all manner of worthy causes but in his private life, aside from his major contribution in bringing up Charlie, he does put himself first. The men I've gone out with since then haven't even got John's admirable sense of public values and as for that creep….." "Enough!" said Joseph. " So what's he like?""Well, the proverbial tall dark stranger swept me off my feet and is kind and gentle. It makes a change to have a partner that cares about you and who you care about."
"That's excellent news, George," Joseph said enthusiastically." Is he in the legal profession? We ought to ask him round one evening. I'd be delighted to meet him."
"There's a couple of catches. You wouldn't be meeting a barrister or judge or solicitor but a social worker……" started George, her voice trailing off in an uncertain fashion now she was reaching the crux of the matter. Only that faint light bulb of hope kept shining.
"Well, that's not too much trouble. He is in a caring profession."
"The other catch is that her name is Alice. She's a woman."
"What!" exclaimed Joseph Channing. His mouth hung open and he collapsed back in his chair in shock. His breath came in and out in short sharp bursts for a little while. George dashed over for a glass of water and held it to his lips. She was seriously worried
for him.
"You can't be serious. I mean, what's brought all this on. I can't believe what I'm hearing."
"Daddy, please listen to me," the blond haired woman said with as much sincerity that she could summon up in her voice and trying to engage his staring eyes. "I have succeeded after all these years in finding someone decent who wants me for who I am. I stumbled into this situation and so did she. It was the old romantic story about two pairs of eyes meeting across a crowded room, which I thought was absolute romantic drivel only I found it to be true. You, Monty and the others have taken the unheard of step of going on strike. This is my unheard of step in really falling in love for the first time."
"You always were a heartbreaker," Joseph whispered, ancient memories obscuring the unimaginable present.
"That was because I didn't care about the harm I did. I know this is a shock for you but I want to be honest. Would you really want me to keep something important from my own father?"
"Fetch me a glass of whisky, not that miserable water," Joseph said, his voice becoming more of its normal rumble. He drank deeply of the glass and the world appeared to become more normal and not spin crazily off its axis. At least it looked normally fuzzy as the potent spirits worked through his blood stream.
"You really are serious about this."
"As serious as when I fought this last court case. I truly believe in both."
Joseph squinted at George as he started to assimilate what George was saying. A nameless fear ran through him.
"You need to think seriously about what you're taking on. I assume this woman is experienced in these ways and you are not."
"I can be a quick learner, Daddy. I think I'm a better judge of character than I have been in the past."
Ten out of ten for trying to bowl that tricky googly past my guard, Joseph Channing thought with feelings of respect for his daughter. She's not getting away with it that easily though.
"This could be your professional ruination as I'm not sure your clients are even anything like the somewhat reformed died in the wool conservative as I am."
"Would you rather I choose a more reputable partner and go back to Neil?" George fired back, saving that shot just when it could best be used. Joseph Channing's face and mind went blank as the horrifying implications hit home. He knew that the worst of all worlds was his beloved daughter going back with that fearful weasel, with which he and the brethren had fought a bitter battle. All this time, he did not reply but chewed the matter over. Perhaps the devil he knew might not be the best. George ran her expert eye over his features and made her final move.
"Would it help to see her and for you to make your own mind up? We could perhaps meet somewhere on neutral territory."
"I shall need to think it over, George. You cannot expect a snap answer tonight. You do know that you'll have to tell John. He might not be particularly understanding and liberal minded either," he rumbled at normal volume, subsiding with a suggestion of a chuckle.
George helped herself to a little of her father's spirits, watered it down a touch and as she drank it, permitted herself a slight smile. She was pretty sure she had made a good start in winning her father over.