Chapter Thirteen - I'll Let You Down

The third floor corridor was the most deserted place in the whole clinic. Ron sat on the cold hard linoleum with his back against the wall. The phone was fixed into the wall just above his head and the receiver was in his hand. He listened to the ringing tone and ran his free hand through his shaggy red hair as he waited.

"Hello Samaritans, this is Susan and I'm here to listen."

"Hello, um Susan did you say?"

"Yes that's right." the friendly voice replied.

"I spoke to Hermione last time. Would I be able to...?"

"She's free at the moment. Let me transfer you over to her."

"Thanks." Ron let out a relieved sigh.

"Hello this is Hermione; you asked to speak with me."

"Hi it's me again; um you probably don't remember me."

"It's Ron isn't it?"

He was surprised,

"You do remember me? Wow."

"Of course I do. I'm glad you called back Ron."

She sounded as if she genuinely meant it. Ron felt a lump build in his throat that prevented him from speaking. There was silence for what felt like an age before he heard Hermione's voice again.

"Ron is something wrong?"

He tried to speak but he could only force out a strangled sob.

"Please talk to me. It's ok I'm not going anywhere, take as much time as you want, but please do talk to me when you're ready."

"I just...for a few days...I didn't feel as if I was on my own."

"And you do now?"

"I don't know." his voice squeaked embarrassingly high.

"It's ok Ron, you're not alone, I'm here for you."

"But she sold me out!" Ron was loud now as he let the sob escape him, the knot in his throat finally loosening enough to let him speak, "I trusted her with all my shit, I thought we were gonna help each other, it was supposed to be us against them and she's one of them."

"Come on, take a breath, calm down for me."

"I'm sorry." his voice quivered, he felt so pathetic to be blubbing like this.

"Don't apologise Ron, you never have to apologise to me you hear?"

"It's just that it was so nice to have somebody y'know? I don't have anything but at least...I thought..." he didn't know what he felt other than lost.

"What about your friends? You said you were with people when you phoned last time didn't you?"

"That was her!" he rasped.

"Just her?"

"No," Ron sniffed and wiped his eyes roughly with the back of his hand, "there's Dee but now the two of them are together. That's not even the point though. Dee doesn't see the doctor any more, it was just me and Jo who were supposed to be..." he couldn't find the words anymore.

"This is about your treatment at the hospital?"

"Clinic, it's a clinic, and it's complicated."

"Well I'm not going anywhere y'know?"

Ron was quiet for a few seconds.

"I see this doctor every morning, the annoying one I told you about, and I can't talk to her like I can talk to my friends...like I used to talk to them," he corrected himself, he wouldn't be able to talk to them again like that, not after this, "and Jo, well she was having a really hard time with the sessions and the doctor seemed to be making her worse. So it was me and Dee who were, I don't know, treating her and it was working. She was getting better."

"Go on."

Ron tried to clear his mind of all the hurt and just tell the story; he took a moment before going on,

"She was always with me whenever my head would...I get these things that confuse me and makes me think I'm remembering but then I don't, anyway she helped me with that. She was always with me during it and there cheering me up afterwards."

"So you were each other's therapy?"

"Yeah, in a way but..."

Ron was silent again. He held the receiver to his head and tried to understand what was causing him so much anger.

"What happened this morning Ron?"

"I was leaving the doctor's office after, well it wasn't really a session but that doesn't matter, and I got her name wrong and she made a big deal about it 'meaning' something and then she told me that she wanted to see me twice a day because Jo had told her about the head rushes."

"I see. Have you spoken to your friend about this yet?"

"No."

"Maybe you should. Maybe you should listen to her side of the story before you judge her, especially before you let yourself get hurt over all this."

Ron swallowed,

"What do I say?"

"Say exactly what you said to me."

Ron nodded. He took another deep breath and let it out before realising what he had just done.

"Oh I just nodded by the way, I know you can't see that over the phone but I keep forgetting obvious stuff like that."

"Hermione sounded as if she had a smile in her voice,

"That's ok."

"I'm sorry."

She sounded sterner now,

"I told you; never say you're sorry to me."

"Sorry." Ron said before he could stop himself, he laughed.

She was laughing too.

"Y'know Ron, the English are supposed to be the nationality that apologises the most frequently?"

"Well we are all brought up by domineering mothers aren't we?" he quipped before his eyes widened and he shivered as if a cold bucket of water had just been thrown over him, "I was! My mother was like that, I know she was, oh my God I almost remembered my mum." he whispered in shock.

"What?"

"Just then when I was describing the typical English mother I recognised the description, I was describing my own mother I know I was, I almost had her in my head for a second."

"Almost?"

"Yeah," he answered, the disappointment in his voice plain to hear, "that's the sort of thing that I was talking about happening with Jo."

"Well go and find her and tell her about it. Tell her about everything."

He nodded again.

"Are you nodding again or are you just thinking?"

Ron smiled,

"I was nodding."

"Good."

Ron pulled himself up from the floor,

"Ok, I'll go and find her now, thank you for...y'know, everything."

"You're always welcome. Call back and let me know how it went."

"I will." he smiled, about to say goodbye and go back downstairs in search of Jo, when a thought suddenly struck him, "Orange!"

"Excuse me?" Hermione seemed quite confused by his random outburst.

"My favourite colour, I'm choosing orange to be my favourite colour, you asked me to let you know."

"I did," she said, the sound of a smile back in her voice again, "so how did you come up with that?"

"I don't know really. I just realised it was the first colour I ever remember choosing. I arrived at the clinic with nothing, not even a toothbrush, and the doctor who admitted me had a bag full of them and told me to take my pick."

"And you chose an orange one."

"Yeah; it was the first colour I ever chose so I figure that makes it important right?"

"Every choice we make is important Ron."

"Yeah." Ron thought for a few seconds before winding the call up, "So I'm gonna go and find Jo, thanks again, Bye."

"Goodbye Ron, I hope I was of some help."

Ron smiled,

"You have no idea how much help you are."

"Good."

"Bye then."

"Bye."

Ron hung up the phone and rested his head on the wall, closing his eyes, and wondered what the hell he was going to do when he saw Jo.

ooo

"Derek...David...Daniel...Doug...Darren...Dominic?"

Jo was staring into Dee's unblinking eyes trying to catch a glimmer as she stumbled across the right name, he was playing it cool to the point of amusement though and she wasn't getting anywhere.

"Dudley?"

Dee finally laughed,

"Dudley? Do I look like a Dudley to you?"

Jo was laughing too,

"Well tell me what it is or I'm just going to keep on guessing."

"Keep on guessing, you'll never get it." Dee shrugged.

"Right; Dirk, Donnie, Dean, Dennis, Dimitri?"

"Oh you're getting exotic now aren't you?" Dee said with great amusement.

"Doris."

Dee could hardly chastise her through the laughter at that,

"Doris is a woman's name!"

"Well that would be something embarrassing enough for you to want to keep it quiet isn't it? I mean there are male Shirleys and that cowboy bloke was called Marian wasn't he?"

"What cowboy bloke?"

"John Wayne I think, one of those butch men from the fifties anyway. Are you a Dorothy?" she said with a wicked gleam flashing in her eyes.

"Let it go, you will never get it." Dee said each word slowly to make sure his point was understood.

"I'm sticking with Dick." the emotionless voice of Ron said from behind the two of them.

They turned around to greet him with warm smiles but his face told them that there was something very wrong.

"Hey mate," Dee said with concern, "I got you a tea but you've been quite a while and its gone cold now."

"That's fine." said Ron as he sat down at the spare chair next to Jo who was looking at him with more lines crinkling her forehead then he'd ever seen before.

"What is it?" Jo said as she tried to read the situation "Was it the session with Rayner? That fucking woman is such a..."

"Don't!" Ron snapped as he stared into her steel coloured eyes with barely suppressed anger, "Don't start that game with me."

Dee pulled his chair around the table towards him,

"Ron, come on mate, there's no need to..."

"This has got nothing to do with you." Ron said, his voice still eerily cold and calm.

Jo was catching up at last as the furrows in her brow began to iron themselves out,

"It's got something to do with me?"

Ron smiled a slight but icy smile at her,

"She told me."

"Who? What?" Jo shook her head and briefly glanced at Dee for clarification.

"Rayner told me about your little chat."

Jo suddenly looked hurt herself,

"She's telling you about my fucking sessions? I'm gonna kill her!"

Jo had been about to rise from the table and go in search of Dr Rayner when Ron let out a bitter laugh that kept her in her seat,

"Oh that's rich!"

Dee tried to mediate once more,

"Listen she doesn't know what you're talking about. Can you just..."

"Stay out of it. This is our business, mine and hers."

"What have I done that has pissed you off? Is she playing us against each other 'cause I thought you were too sharp for that?"

Ron's voice was rising now,

"Explain to me how in your session, to make you better, you end up spilling your guts about my head rushes to Rayner."

Dee turned and stared at Jo, waiting for her to clear up this obvious misunderstanding. Jo looked at Ron for a fraction of a second before her face dropped and her eyes widened. She looked down at the table and her face went pale.

"You're not denying it." Dee said his voice seemed to be hollow as he spoke.

Her head snapped up to Ron, her eyes fixed upon him with a determined focus and she spoke faster than anybody could really keep up with,

"I didn't know I'd done it, I realised what I'd done but she was in the middle of throwing all this other stuff at me, I was...I was...I was going to tell you as soon as I got out but she was just piling all this stuff on me and I was trying to fend that shite off and it just got buried and I didn't mean to tell her Ron, I didn't mean to but she slammed me with the stuff with my mum before I could even register what I'd said and I didn't say it thinking about it I was trying to deflect another barrage load of her crap and it just came out..."

Ron wasn't sure if he was angry with her anymore but he still felt great annoyance and he barked out at her, slamming his palm on the table,

"What did you say?"

She looked back down at the table and took a few deep breaths, Ron could see her eyes rapidly moving and he knew she was skimming through her memory of that session to try to find out exactly what she'd done. After a while she looked up again, she looked ashamed of herself.

"I...I told her about; I didn't tell her to tell her, I mentioned it..."

Ron nodded for her to continue.

"...I told her you were getting flashes. You were feeling familiarity with stuff and you couldn't place it."

Ron sat back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest without a word.

"I'm sorry." Jo whispered.

Dee leaned forward to meet Jo's eyes,

"When was this?"

"This was the bad day, the...er..." she said in almost a whisper.

"...the Beachy Head day?"

Jo nodded.

Ron unfolded his arms. He didn't know if he was forgiving her yet, but he wanted to understand what had gone on in that session, he remembered the state she had been in on that day. He remembered the things she had said about her sessions with Dr Rayner making her worse.

"You said something about your mother, something about her throwing a lot of stuff at you that distracted you, what was that all about?" Ron asked, the harshness leaving his voice as he spoke.

Jo lowered her head right down so her chin was resting on her chest and she started to play with her hands.

"Jo?" Ron pressed.

Looking up she took a calming breath and answered him,

"Nobody knows that I'm here. This is my latest disappearing act. I lied when I checked in and told them that my family knew where I was and that I was trying to get better and all that. I haven't been home for ten months and they've been looking for me and they tracked me down here."

Ron melted a little but he wanted to find out more so he just nodded as Dee moved his chair back around to her side of the table to put a hand in hers as she spoke.

"But this place has anonymity and I told them that they couldn't tell my family they'd found me. Rayner is trying to get me to call home. She was trying to get me to do it in the session, invite my mum to visit; she wanted me to explain why I did it...why I left again."

Ron leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table,"

"She backed you into a corner?"

"Mentally yeah, she was in the middle of all these different speeches about selfishness and parental stress and my problem becoming a greater problem that effects everyone around me and I was trying to deflect all her different angles at the same time and it just came out, I'm sorry Ron, I'm so sorry."

Ron shook his head and took her other hand,

"Forget that."

"I can't believe that I did forget it, I can't believe that I forgot to tell you I'd done it."

Ron let her have a smile with no malice behind it for the first time that morning,

"You had other stuff on your mind, its ok."

"It's not, I'm fucking..." she let go of both their hands and pounded the table with her fists as she raised her own voice from the low shame-filled tone she had been speaking in, "...I'm annoyed with myself now!"

"Well I'm not annoyed with you any more so...I forbid you to be annoyed at yourself." Ron said firmly.

She almost smiled; Ron felt a warm surge inside him because of that.

"You're forbidding me?"

"Yeah." he smiled back.

The smile faded as he asked another question.

"So did she wear you down? Did you call home?"

Jo shook her head.

"Why did you leave?" Dee asked.

Jo sighed and shook her head,

"If I knew that I wouldn't have to be here. That's why I can't make that damn call, what's the first thing they're gonna ask me? Why did you go? I don't know. Where have you been? Places. When are you coming home? I don't want to. What did we do wrong? Nothing. What's wrong with you? Every-fucking-thing! All that phone call is going to produce is questions I don't have answers to and what good is a phone call like that going to do anyone?"

Ron smiled at her again,

"I was really pissed off with you."

"You bloody should be." Jo said.

"No, I shouldn't, I shoulda known, when she first said it my instinct told me she was lying. I knew I could trust you, I knew you wouldn't..." Ron shrugged and pulled her into a hug that released the last little bit of the negativity he was feeling towards her.

"But I did, and I tried to warn you guys about me, I did say to you both remember?"

Ron released her and looked her in the eyes, the grey was now surrounded by pink rather than white, she was about to turn on herself again and he'd set her off. He wanted to stop her before she got going.

"I will let you down. It's what I do, I disappoint people, I set a high standard for myself that I can't keep and..."

"Duncan." Ron said.

Jo blinked and shook her head as if an entire conversation had just been had without her knowledge,

"What?"

Ron grinned and turned to Dee,

"Dwight, Dylan, Dougal, Donald..."

Dee's face broke into a smile and he shook his head,

"Not even close."

Jo laughed and wiped away the tears that had just squeezed from her eyes as Ron continued.

"Denzil, Dermot, Desmond, Darryl, Damon..."

Dee just kept on shaking his head smugly.

Jo rejoined the speculation,

"Dale?"

"Damian, Drew?" Ron laughed

"Duane?"

ooo