Part One Hundred and Fifty Two
It took Nikki only until Saturday lunchtime to get over the hard work of the previous week. It helped of course that, outside, it was a bright day and the first spring buds were starting to appear. Unfortunately, fierce cold blasts of winter wind refused to let go its grip on the world outside, and so Nikki was confined to looking out to the back of their flat to what was there of the garden outside. At least the look of the weather and the lengthening days had the effect of cheering her up. It would not be too long before she would get the chance on a quiet weekend, to put her previous experience of Larkhall to good use. The main difference here was that the garden was hers, Helen freely confessing that plants had a habit of dying on her if they were left in her sole charge.
"You look cheerful, Nikki"
"Ah well, it's the end of the week, and"
"You know that Larkhall is in good hands." Put in Helen.
Nikki smiled freely. That was precisely the case. With one exception, whichever prison officer was on the weekend shift could be trusted to act within limits and that, if Nikki were called upon to get involved, it would be for a good reason.
"You know that it wasn't always that way, especially when half of them were only interested in covering their backs, not with acting for the best"
"I know that I've got you, Karen and Neil to thank for that. "
The day had that hushed feeling, of all's right with the world. After the winter darkness, drab grey skies and periodic wind and drizzle, everywhere looked new painted. Both women fell silent as they drank in the feeling of peace. Minutes later, this was interrupted by the irritating blemish of a solitary helicopter clattering its way across the sky. On such a perfect day, it had no reason to be there when the rest of London was taking life easy.
"So you've finished all your reports"
"All done and dusted and in Karen's hands. Mind you, I may have two more to do next year"
Helen's raised enquiring eyebrows prompted Nikki to continue. She was obviously bursting with news, that she was dying to unload on Helen.
"Karen's just told me that I'm getting two more prison officers"
"I thought the prison service was clamping down tighter on staffing more than in my day. I would have been lucky to get an extra arm"
"Neil has fixed it so that I get two out of the extra prison officers for all the wings in Larkhall"
"You've got plans, Nikki. I can tell that a mile away."
"I've got an idea for Josh to come back to the prison service. He'd be ideal"
"Are you sure he'd be even interested, much less willing to go for the job"
"Well, no," Nikki admitted. "But if I sounded him out, I'm sure he would go for it"
"Why Josh?" Helen probed in a somber mood.
"Why anyone? Because I want anyone who wants to come into the prison service to come in without having the jailer mentality. You know what mindset is like , getting their kicks from locking people up and throwing their weight around. There may be other good people coming in for the right reason, but at least if Josh applied, I know already that there's one with the right attitude"
"You aren't going to get him the inside track?" Helen pursued.
"Of course not." Snapped Nikki. "It's out of my hands. Area is running the recruitment board. The most that I can do is to steer him in the right direction"
A little voice at the back of Nikki's mind told her that Helen wasn't just being cautious and careful, or even putting a damper on the proceedings, but there was more than met the eye. Nikki started to come down off her enthusiasm trip and felt in her bones that Helen wasn't in the best of spirits.
"How are you getting on at work, Helen? You don't sound so cheerful."
"Not so good, Nikki. I've been seeing John for the past five months and, for the first time, I'm doubting my own abilities to deal with a patient. I think I'm losing his plot."
"As in the judge"
"There is only one John, Nikki"
"If you want to tell me about one of your patients, you must really feel up against it"
"I am, Nikki." Helen sighed, "and I need to talk to you about him to work out where the hell to go next"
Nikki looped her arm round Helen's shoulders and drew her to the sofa. She could feel the tension in the other woman's body.
"Well, for a start, he's highly intelligent as you know well enough." Began Helen.
"Well, that's good. That means he must have some insight into himself"
"If only life were so easy…… Inside his profession, he is scrupulously and rigorously controlled in his very word and deed. Even in his battles with his establishment, there is a controlled recklessness in him in doing the right thing. Instinct tells him just how far he can push his luck and, no matter how much hot water he ends up in, at the end of the day, he's a survivor."
"That's the John I know." Pronounced Nikki in answer to Helen's tones of pride in him.
"So what's the downside?"
"The man has a divided soul. Basically, he has felt unloved ever since his adoptive mother committed suicide when he was ten. After that, his adoptive father withheld love from him…….."Helen continued in a more reflective tone, hesitating when she considered her own family background. How had she not spotted that before now, she wondered?" Because of this, he fears being deserted and being unloved by a woman in his adult life. The result is that he is a serial womanizer"
Nikki's eyes opened wide. This was hard for her to get her head round, so grounded was she in her own identity.
"Whatever he had done in his private life that he feels guilty for is guilty for, he basically feels that he has gone past the point of no return. Jo and George entered into a three-way relationship with him to keep him on the straight and level but for all that, he slept
with Connie Beauchamp, not knowing that George had breast cancer. Can you imagine the impact of that on his personality already corroded by guilt"
"But why does he do it?" Nikki exclaimed.
"Why indeed? The only thing I can come up with is that he is addicted to sex as others might be to drink, or to drugs. Falling off the wagon only gives him that temporary lift in his spirits, that he is somehow worthwhile, yet are nowhere near the scale of the disaster that he brings down on himself when it comes out"
"Does he know what he's letting himself in for"
"Aside from not knowing about George's cancer, I am sure he knows every time but the nature of addiction is that he can't find it in himself not to give way, sooner or later."
This made Nikki's head swim. She paused for reflection and, with an effort of will, pulled herself together to focus in on the positives.
"So what can you say he gets out of his close relationships? I mean in general"
"I would say that of late, he is more and more capable of friendships with women, Karen, Yvonne, even me and you to some extent. I can't put my finger on it but it goes against the grain for the normal public school educated man, whose hallmark is male bonding. Then again, he doesn't fit into any mould, only his own"
There was a slight smile on Helen's lips as she uttered those last words. The same remark fits Nikki to a T and was one reason why she was attracted to her.
"So where do Jo and George fit into the picture"
" George has her own cross to bear in her own guilt in not feeling naturally maternal to Charlie, while John by contrast was the perfect father. I am sure that while they have no illusions about him, they accept him for who he is within limits. They both love him deeply, despite the hurt that he has given them, but"
Nikki's large brown eyes and raised eyebrows invited Helen to follow through the train of thought that had temporarily stalled.
"I don't think that he can make their love real to himself."
There was a long silence as Nikki digested everything Helen had said. She had offered her words of wisdom down the years to distressed souls of all kinds, but this felt out of her league.
"I'd have to think this over as I can't think of easy answers. There's some sort of crisis coming on. Out of it, John may find the right direction. I hope so for his sake."
Helen put her arms round Nikki and held her. She didn't have any magic answer but she felt better for sharing her worries. Her intense sympathy for John was so like her. They lay back in the settee on a lazy Saturday afternoon, glorying in the brightness of the day.
As usual, they put on Radio 5 which percolated its cultured influence into the flat. By contrast, the television only broadcast a mixture of sports, soaps and repeats. Suddenly, the soft tones of the radio broadcast prompted their attention.
"Thousands of anti-war protesters have turned out for a demonstration in central London, calling for UK troops to leave Iraq. Police put the number attending at 15,000, but organisers said between 80,000 and 100,000 were at the rally"
As a backdrop to the radio announcer were the sounds of chanting voices, interwoven in formless chaotic carnival sounds. It was made up of thousands of human voices and was punctuated by sporadic outbursts of drumming. This sounded like life to them, and felt intensely familiar to Nikki through every pore of her skin.
"Jesus." Nikki exclaimed. She looked out of the window, and by contrast their street was as quiet and as peaceful as any weekend permitted it to be.
"Wait, Nikki"
"Lindsey German, Convenor of Stop the War Coalition, said: 'We believe that a peaceful solution to the chaos, caused by the illegal war in Iraq will only be possible when the occupying foreign armies have all been removed, so that the Iraqi people will be free to decide on their own political future."
When the sounds trailed away and the next item took its place, their perfect world felt somehow incomplete.
"That sounds reasonable enough." Commented Helen to the radio.
"It must be on the five o clock news. I want to see more." Nikki answered as she reached for the TV remote control. Eagerly, they sat down in the settee. They were just in time.
"Come on, come on." Nikki muttered impatiently as some incongruously supposedly important news item usurped the rightful place.
"Wait a moment, there's the local news." Helen reassured Nikki.
"Yeah, like thousands of demonstrators in the centre of London are only just fill in material, until the really important business of some mindless soap."
Time ticked on with excruciating slowness, as the suntanned man without a hair out of place read from the autocue in front of him. Images of trivia played on as backdrop behind him to their disgust. Sure enough, the fanfare concluded the nation's briefing of all the news that was fit to hear.
"Here it is, Nikki." Helen yelled.
Amidst the irritating 'voice over', the camera's eye looked down on Trafalgar Square. The architectural austerity of Nelson's column was brightened by multicoloured banners of all descriptions, and the square was absolutely crowded out with masses of people. Nikki was fascinated by the passionate foursquare speech of the woman, speaking from somewhere in the crowd, until it was cut off by the sounds of a helicopter clattering away overhead.
"Just forty five seconds?" questioned Nikki scornfully.
"I can tell that you wish that you had been there"
"I might have done if I'd known but how would I go into some crowded room and say, hi there, I'm Nikki Wade, I'm only wing governor of the local nick, lead me to the demonstration. Let's face it, I know I do a good job, but I don't get much street credibility out of it"
"Do you need it, Nikki?" Pursued Helen softly. "I sense another cause coming on"
"Living with you doesn't help me to not pursue causes"
"Don't get me wrong, Nikki. I feel exactly the same as you. I've every reason to loathe the war as two of my recent patients have been discharged from the Army with severe psychological disturbance. I know that if it hadn't been for the war, they would never have needed to come anywhere near me. It's just that they have seen and done things over there that they can't live with themselves. They are the walking wounded, only you can't see their scars. I can see that my time will be cut out looking after them, and there will be more to come. My place now is to heal the individuals, and not fight the big causes. Let's face it, we haven't got much choice but stand on the sidelines on this one and silently cheer them on."
Nikki turned pale. This was another side of Helen's professional work that she hadn't known. She had more reason than ever to believe in Helen's sincerity, as this pencilled in tragedy was something that the impersonal news headlines never mentioned.
"You must know that you could be in a dangerous position if you were arrested. The Home Secretary stands at the top of the shit heap in the world where you work. This is the same Home Office that granted your appeal in the first place. You have to consider realities, and look after those who are in your charge and, through them, try and make a better world in the same way that the antiwar marchers are doing. As for myself, I've got a practice to keep going to heal the damaged souls, war victims included. Of course we are anti war. It's just that we aren't on the streets. That's all."
Nikki fell silent and her face clouded over. She knew that Helen's words made crystal sharp sense, every word of them. She just felt as if the best party had been arranged and she had somehow missed out on it. In the silence, the sounds of the helicopter invaded the peace of the evening with its discordant sounds. Now Nikki knew where and why it had come and gone. If she had only listened to the main news, she would have never known of the existence of the rally. Larkhall used to be like that in an inverted kind of way when she came to think of it, injustices and abuses behind locked doors. She fell silent while Helen clicked the TV off, its usefulness outgrown.
"Didn't you once say that John used to be a rebellious student in his younger days?" Nikki questioned, a random thought caught in passing before it could disappear.
"I can remember him talking of when Charlie was involved in a sit in over the siting of mobile phone masts. He said that his own protests and sit in days were over"
Nikki suddenly grinned. She could visualize a younger, even more reckless, headstrong man, much like herself. This was the reason why she related to him so much.
"Not him, or you or me, Helen. We just do it our way."