John had got into the habit over the years of periodically receiving a friendly greeting of "Hi it's Kristine" in her well modulated pleasant voice and feelings his spirits instantly lift. Thios time, it wasn't that long ago that they'd gone out for a meal and slept together, although time sequences didn't matter in itself. She returned from her own wanderings and they had the knack of being in the right mental state at the right time as he was conveniently unencombered at thatr moment.
"Lovely to hear from you as always," he answered and Kristine was instantly fond of the sound of that unmistakeable voice that had both class and intelligence."I assume you have some plan in mind for us both," he added, saying the first words that came to mind.
"Well, I've only just come back to London so you might know of a good restaurant. You know the kind of place I like," she answered carelessly. It did not cross his mind to ask where she'd been as their relationship was determinedly in the present though they'd had the chance to talk in depth and know each other at the Howard League of Penal reform where they'd both been guest speakers.
"So how's life going in these days in the halls of justice," Kristine asked lightly a few hours later on. She'd approved of his choice of restaurant. The atmosphere was pleasantly relaxing and, though it was large, it also conveyed a sense of intimacy in John's eyes.
"Oh, nothing much," John said in a leisurely fashion after he finished off the last of the soup and contemplated the world with faraway eyes."I've seen quite a bit of Sir Ian Rochester recently and strangely enough, qwe get on comfortably. I reminisce with Monty about the old days when Nikki and Helen were more in our orbit and made our lives interesting and, oh yes, there was the judges' bash."
The change in expression on Kristine's face told John straightaway that he'd made a serious blunder. The momentary chill silence felt twice as long as it's timespan and this didn't help him feel any better.
"The judges' bash? You mean that friends of yours like George and Jo Mills gathered for a drinks evening not counting others I've met over the years and you didn't tell me about it?" she finally said in outraged tones and certainly weren't theatrical banter.
"You know how it is, Kristine. You come and go.I never know where you are at any given moment," John started to say but Kristine cut him off.
"Not good enough, John Deed. You have my mobile number. You could have phoned. You know how prompt I am in getting back to you even if I'm not immediately available."
There began a ding dong verbal battle of wills which John inwardly felt he was steadily losing however much he robustly defended himself. Kristine pressed him hard on the matter until John sort of apologised as he'd totally overlooked the matter at which point, Kristine smiled ever so slightly. A silence fell around them while other couples chatted sporadically in the soft lights around them all.
"It's all right John. Part of me likes a really good argument from time to time and, fortunately you don't make it easy. There's always another time," she said in gentle tones.
"I didn't know you cared so much," John found himself blurting out. The words hung on the air until the waiter arrived to take their order for the main meal. Automatically, John found himself reading out the choices as the restaurant didn't have a Braille version of the menu. It seemed that they fitted around each other without thinking about it as Kristine told the waiter of their selection in a clear tone of voice. John was suffused with the easy familiarity with which they were to spend the night together as they'd become accustomed to do.
The maths teacher strolled along the corridor with his hands in his pockets and not a care in the world when he sighted the head teacher's door. He'd been left a note to call in for a private meeting which he assumed was nothing but good news, possibly a chat about his future job role and his career in general. he'd moved to this school a year or so ago and he felt that his energetic enthusiasm and go getting style was giving his pupils the extra push they needed. He conceded that not all of them were receptive but reckoned that you can't make an omelette without breaking eggs or so he'd been brought up to believe.
He'd spent his tea break in his special seat in the staff common room surveying all around him. His superior gaze briefly passed by the English teacher, the pupils' friend who'd had obvious reasons in blanking his natural charms. He looked at the new teacher with more sympathetic attention and had him figured as having the right attitude but a bit sure on nous. He was shuffling a piece of paper nervously before he sf out the door as soon as the bell rang.
The head teacher wiped his brow after getting to the bottom of his first investigation. As it started to get underweigh, it immediately struck him how vague and misleading his description and explanation of the sequence of events and how crystal clear Ms Stewart's account sounded. The facts sprang out into the open air in short order. What he needed to decide was whether this was stupidity or prejudice. The way the dialogue was phrased left him
"But I'd never heard before of two women, err, living like that and with a girl. I honestly thought the child had made a mistake and I wanted to put it right," he finally attempted to excuse himself.
"So why didn't you properly intervene to step her being got at?" the head teacher pursued.
"I did try and shut everyone up and get on with the lesson," the teacher answered, shuffling uncomfortably in his seat. The head teacher decided to keep it short and sharp and made it clear that any more complaints along this line would be more severely dealt with. The man caved in at once and finally tottered out of the room and headed for his next lesson. In the meantime, the head teacher had some homework marking to do for the class he taught ready for the next inquisition which promised to be a trickier affair.
The maths teacher strolled in with all the confidence in the world but was sharp enough to spot the look on the other man's face which wasn't as welcoming as expected. His defences were up at once.
"I've received a strong complaint by the mother of one of your pupils, Rose Stewart-Wade relating to the last lesson you took her for. She says that you were sarcastic and negative in your manner. Perhaps you care to explain what happened?"
"Oh that girl," he replied dismissively."Of all my pupils, she's definitely on the bottom rung. She really doesn't respond to all I'm trying to do."
"Perhaps it's the way you say things. I've got her reports in front of me. She's certainly very talented in english and arts but not so hot at maths. It's not uncommon. You should be able to handle a pupil who has an enquiring original mind and pleasant enough from what I've seen of her."
"But that doesn't take away from the fact that I can't get through to her but I can with her peers. She's not on my wave length. She's not on anyone else's," blustered the man, running his hand through his spiky hair.
The head teacher raised his eyebrows as he picked up the other man's rising tone of exasperation in his voice. The final words sounded personal to him. His thoughts flicked over and over like a falling hand of playing cards to shape the conclusion that Ms Stewart's verdict was harsh but thoroughly justified.
"You know as well as I do that all children should be treated alike. You've got enough experience to know this. I know there's a lot you're not talking about and I assure you that the only way to save your skin is to be honest," he said in determined tones, knowing that he was pitching this just right to eliminate this outbreak of homophobia. The logic was mathmatically correct. Hee kept it in reserve that Ms Stewart's promise of extra teaching for Rose would be the final clincher on tghe deal he was determined to impose.
St Mary's hospital was a typical NHS edifice, a red brick Victorian core with a series of bolt ons over the years, in particular a late nineteen austere forties wing and most recently, a spacious atrium beloved of the recent customer services ethos. Somewhere in the middle, its soul and purpose lay in clinically clean wards and operating theatres in which the daylight was rarely seen. It was here that Nurse Lancaster and Junior Sister Betts materialised in their professional selves at the allotted of their lovers, Jo Mills barrister at law was similarly reaching for her white wig and black gown from her locker. The other lover, Beth Pritchard put on her dark glasses while preparing to drive up the motorway against the dazzling sunlight just after exchanging a tender conversation with Karen just when she was changing where she wished her all the best for her new press assignment.
Both women had been around long enough to be sure of themselves to be suire of their position in the hospital hierarchy and kept clear of petty jealousies. On the face of it, the consultants and, below them, the registrars ruled the roost while Karen and Jane and their like were the mere assistants. In reality, their assistance was vital for the day to day running and an avuncular consultant like Ric Griffin, a medical versaion of the newscaster, Trevor McDonald madee his quietly persuasive presence felt. However, Jac Naylor the very abrasive and ambitious registrar really believed it. Both Karen and Jane noted how she also treated junior registrars under her iron tutelege with equal high-handed lashing sarcasm and they were hard put to it to deploy subtle techniques of subtle deflection to hold their own.
"Oh, I suppose that you and your underlings are working to rule? Sorority rules OK. I need an extra scrub nurse aqnd I don't suppose you care that my operations are backing up fast," she sneered at Karen just when she was in the middle of checking off her duty roster. This woman was acting like a spoilt child, she sighed under her breath, just when she needed Jane to work for her for her own purposes. Very reluctantly, her professionalism bade her to switch Jane for scrub nurse duty for the urgent operation Jac Naylor was jumping up and down about and Jane gave her a sideways look. Both women were worldly wise enough to suspec that there was an underlying self interested motive in raising Jac's profile. Karen also knew that Jane hated working for Jac Naylor but she could see no way out of it.
"Ok, I'm assigning you Jane Lancaster. You should know that the nurses have been run off their feet recently. I want her back with me for a job I've got later on today so just remember it," Karen replied, unable to prevent an edge of exasperation leaking into her voice in the last few words.
"My my, a case of PMT if I'm not mistaken, Junior Sister Betts. I suppose you save it up for work like you all do. Anyway, you come with me," Jac retorted, a flick of her long brown hair being her gesture of demanding to be instantly obeyed. Karen's look of regret criss-crossed with Jane's of suppressed anger.
The operation might have lasted an hour, give or take a bit but to Jane, it was an eternity of torture, only alieviated by the job in hand. The job was easy enough, given her length of all round experience but it was made a nightmare of pedantic, hair-splitting torture of just how the particular surgical tools must be presented. Jane begrudgingly conceded that Jac Naylor was talented, but bitterly resented her prima donna ways which there was no need of. When she'd finished, she bestowed satisfaction which largely centred on herself, and at that point Jane shifted off quickly. Her moment of emotional release was in hurling off her scrubs to the far corners of the changing room and finally making a bolt back to the ward.
Akll this time, Karen had busied herself as best as she could but a good half of her mind was worrying about Jane. She knew her friend was experienced enough but she had a bad, bad feeling nonetheless. One look at Jane's face as she strode towards her told her the worst.
"Want to talk in private? It's best you say what you're going to say in private," Karen jumped in. It captured the other woman's rage and gave her a measure of self control.
"Anyone wants me, I'm busy. Anything you can't handle then hold off till I'm back and that includes any requests for help," Karen said shortly, indicating that sghe trusted their initiative.
"I'll kill Jac Naylor," Jane said huskily, her hands white and shaking which told Karen everything.
"I shouldn't wonder but she's not worth doing time for. Believe me I know," she said clearly and firmly to the nurse which trook her aback. She didn't think she should be considered speaking literally."Go on, kick the wastebin. I'll cover for you."
Jane shot her boss and friend a grateful look, jumped up and a resounding clatter split the silence while Karen looked on nonchalently.
"That feels a whole lot better but we need to stop being fucked around by the likes of her, all of us. We ought to work to rule or something," Jane said in an unsteady voice as she was gathering her thoughts.
"We're without a RCN rep at present. The last one got a move up north," Karen answered as a formal statement, letting the pause sink in.
A wide smile started to spread across the other woman's face as a brilliant idea started glowing in her mind with a blinding light.
"Hey Karen, that's the answer. Jac bloody Naylor keeps throwing sarky comments like that in our faces. Why don't we take her up on the offer. You'd make a great rep. You've got the get up and go and everyone respects you..."
A vivid flashback temporarily dazed Karen. There she was, not wearing her dark blue uniform but her favourite brown suit. She was outside Larkhall Prison greenhouse and she was G Wing Governor and fighting an undercover battle with Eric Bostock, that hatchet faced chief executive officer of Lynford Securities in his bid to take over the prison. Yvonne Atkins was the leader of the prisoners, the first woman she'd ever fancied and flirted with, and she was leading a sit in along with prisoners whom she respected for the most part in fighting the same battle as herself in occupying the greenhouse. She had protested against the heavy handed suggestion for prison officers to storm the greenhouse.
"Karen Betts, voice of the people. Shouldn't you be in there with him?" Bostock had sneered. How long ago that moment had seemed when she was a lifetime's experiences from the woman she was now? All at once she returned to the present and her sense of reality outweighed the delicious temptation to stick it to them. She knew the right answer and reached for the letter in her drawer.
"I hate to disappoint you Jane but I have to decline. Take a look at the letter from Human Resources promoting me to Ward Sister in place of Chrissie Williams who moves over to Keller ward," karen said regretfully, flattered by her friend's vote of confidence in her.
"That means you'll have even more power," broke in Jane eagerly until Karen cut in.
"I'd be only too glad to stick it to Jac Naylor any way how but we need to look to the long run. Who knows, there could be nurses complaining and I couldn't be boss and rep at the same time, especially if I'm the subject of the complaint. I'd be in too compromising a situation."
"Then who's there to do the job?" remonstrated Jane forcibly and then saw the meaning look in Karen's eye."You mean me," she added fearfully, her breath taken away by the prospect. .
"You've come a long way without knowing it. You're not Miss Party Girl out on the pull and for the nearest bar though you know how to have a good time. You've got just as much strength in you as I have. You've got the lovely Jo Mills on hand for legal advice if you need it. You don't just mouth off as others listen to you," Karen said clearly and Jane knew she'd changed, becoming more serious and outward looking.
"That's all very flattering but I don't see myself as onwe tough bitch," protested Jane.
"There's ways and means of doing things and you've got more prospects than most. I can still be your useful second string against the likes of Jac Naylor. Think about it Jane. Two for the price of one," insisted Karen persuasively.
A whole lifetime passed while Jane fell silent as her fears battled with her selfless ambitions. It was true that she had more verbal confidence than most but was that enough? Karen looked on sympathetically, notr wanting to crowd her friend.
"I don't want to spoil our friendship if I'm as mouthy as you think I am," she said a little shakily as she weighed the idea carefully."If I do this, I'll need someone available to coach me and training. I want to know what I can and can't do. I don't want to pole in and make an arse of myself. I also want to check it out with Jo," Jane finished in her appealingly frank fashion.
"I'll contact Chrissie. She knows everything around St. Mary's and I'll need a little hand holding myself for my new job so I know what you mean," joked Karen about the veery heterosexual Chrissie Williams."Any other help I can organise including time off, I'll get for you. after all, we trust each other."
A warm glow settled down on the room as if the sun was shining down instead of the fluorescent strip lights above them. Suddenly, the door opened and Jac Naylor poked her sour face round the corner.
"I heard the sounds of ructions down the corridor and I thought should I phone security?" she jibed.
"There's nothing in my room that I can't handle and also on my ward seeing as I'm taking over from Chrissie Williams as Ward Sister. Just remember that," glared Karen angrily. Jane suppressed her laughter while Jac Naylor's face dropped a mile. She'd find out in due course the other bombshell of the other news item to be arranged at a nurses meeting.