In Jeopardy (24 page)

The horse says, ‘You have always known this. On this journey you will face loss and grief.’

Her trusty steed trawls through the river washing away hurts embedded from the past in order for her to live a life unencumbered by that which is irretrievable and redundant. Reluctant to release the shreds from her sad, glamorous former life, the river current prises these treasures away from her. Richard, who didn’t play fair, faces the force of the knight’s sword. He used the law and lies as weapons against her. Despite this, kindness in its many forms has knocked at her door, yet she blocked her ears and shouted:
Go away
.

She realises and shakes her head; she could have been plunged to ruin. Instead, she stands at the threshold of a new realm; icy, changing winds that swirl around her lifting her off her feet and sweeping her away from her old life. The knight along with her sorrow and all she no longer needs fall and dissolve in the river. She rides the horse alone; the animal’s courage and endurance becomes her own. She is alone, free and no longer beholden to a man who built a prison around her.

Furniture salvaged from the house is a thread from her former life that needs to be cut away. The dream revealed this to her with frightening clarity. Without delay she calls the Salvation Army to arrange a donation. They cannot collect these treasures inside a week.
Do I knock on neighbours’ doors, introduce myself and offer discarded chattels free to anyone who wants emporium furniture?

Her thoughts are interrupted by a voice at the end of the phone, ‘Miss, do you want to arrange a collection date? I haven’t got all day’.

It is mid-morning when she hauls her collection of chattels onto the path outside her terrace. A neighbour from a few doors away walking his dog stops. Since moving into the street the neighbour and his male partner have smiled and waved although they have not exchanged words with her. Until today she returned their gesture from behind the fence, or when leaving or returning to the house.

‘Your treasures are a bit flash for this neighbourhood.’

‘That’s why I’m moving them on.’

‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to seem rude. Anyway, my name is Shane, dog’s name is Gunter.’

‘I’m Christine – pleased to meet you.’

‘Likewise. You’ve seen my partner Anthony?’

‘Yes, but we’ve not spoken.’

‘I hope he’s done the neighbourly thing and been civil enough to greet you with at least a wave?’

Shane continues to generate polite conversation. The dog barks, impatient to forge on with the walk to the park at the end of the street. Shane ignores Gunter until the dog starts up again; he growls back.

She suspects Shane is eyeing up the junk she left outside the terrace. She wonders whether he is burning with curiosity at why she is ridding herself of stuff that drips of money. She punctures the silence. ‘You don’t want any of this. These are the dregs of the marriage I’m in the process of ridding myself of. Bad karma all round.’

Following this meeting with a new neighbour, Shane introduces her to his partner. They meet over coffee, share meals and strike up what seems to her an unlikely friendship.

Their first meal is at a local Italian eatery. They start with champagne, then progress to red wine to accompany the meal, and finally finish with a rich port with their dessert. Conversation stalls and Christine’s focus shifts to Anthony. ‘Has there been any improvement in your dad’s condition?’

He looks at her; the colour drains from his face and whitens. ‘How do you know about my dad? He took a turn last night and was rushed to hospital after midnight.’

‘Were you on nightshift? That can’t be possible. How do you know Anthony’s dad was rushed to the Emergency Ward?’

‘I wasn’t rostered on, I wasn’t there. Didn’t one of you tell me the other day?’ Christine realises that she just knew. Had she intercepted Anthony’s thoughts as he worried about his dad?’

Shane grins then frowns. ‘Are you psychic or something?’

‘It’s no joke Shane, what if I said
yes
? What if I said that I have only confessed this to two other people in my entire life?’

‘Can you tell me – is my dad going to be okay?’

‘No – I’m sorry, I mean, no I can’t tell you – it doesn’t work that way.’

‘How long have you had these special powers?’

‘As long as I can remember – and these
special powers
as you call them – are a liability. You don’t want to know about it – what I see – what I have seen.’

‘We do, don’t we Anthony?’

Anthony shrugs non-commitment.

‘At least I’m interested in your story.’

‘It’s no story; it is all true, frighteningly true.’

Anthony pipes up, ‘I want to hear what you have to say, it might take my mind off Dad.’

‘Strange beings obviously not from this world, and also, seemingly ordinary beings appear then vanish without warning. Other times I hear a voice, look up then behind me, finding there’s no one there. When night’s volume is reduced almost to silence, when walking alone on still days without breeze, music might begin to play then stop. I look in the direction it comes from and there is no explainable source.

‘As a child, at school with friends, whether outside playing sport or attending chapel service again I heard voices, music no one else heard when I’d asked,
Can you hear the music?
Sometimes when I played in matches against a team from another school an unknown figure would kick or throw the ball in another direction from where the player aimed. On these occasions team mates and opponents commented on how this minor occurrence was a stroke of bad luck, unfair if it cost us the game. Luck went for us and against us, but I couldn’t reveal what I thought I saw.

‘I told my parents about the dramas that unfolded in my room when alone at night, during the day and in the half light. They dismissed them as products of an overactive imagination. I persisted describing the odd girl wearing a bonnet, lace-up boots covering her ankles, her dress a dull colour falling past her knees. She held a younger brother’s hand, almost dragging him behind her and followed their mother who often carried a cane basket. They were my first sighting of strange phenomena passing more than once through my bedroom and not noticing me.

‘My parents didn’t understand and dismissed my accounts as wild imaginings I engineered from bedclothes that hung on a chair or doorknob. My bored, active mind, manifesting images and sagas from light and shadow created by shifting moonlight.

‘They explained away other accounts I presented of things I couldn’t explain or prove. When they overheard me speak to a tree in our backyard, a bush or flowerbed in a park or someone only I could see, it was the same mantra: because I didn’t have someone to play with I would wish so hard for a friend that I imagined one into existence. I didn’t understand how a child totally dependent on adults, invisible alongside much older siblings had the power to essentially dream up something that didn’t exist. It was odd how what I saw and heard were explained away as manifestations of what I desired, then more bizarre that they would vanish once I started school and had company of my own age. My mother warned me not to talk about this to anyone, especially not at a school or even to a friend. I see this kind of thing all the time.’

‘Wow, that’s some story.’

‘Only it’s not. It’s all true, every last word of it.’

‘It must have taken some courage to speak up, considering your parents made fun of you.’

‘No wonder you denied your gift for so long. It’s a pity that for one moment they didn’t think that there was something in what you were saying.’

‘I don’t hold any of this against them. It’s not like it was deliberate. In many ways they were forward thinking and liberal in their attitudes.’

‘Now – what do you think about these experiences?’

‘I can’t ignore them as they have become more frequent; they often occur at work and relating to patients and their treatment. I have come to accept they are not necessarily in conflict with the scientific nature of my work.’

‘Did you ever consider quitting nursing?’

‘Not until recently, and strangely, not because of my gift. I came close to burnout, fortunately avoiding it thanks to my brother and a colleague.’

Christine’s divorce and severing of ties with Richard brought a number of boons. She kept her promise and attended Julian and Lucy’s wedding, returning more than once to the United Kingdom to visit them and travel. Natasha was accepted into the Australian Ballet and lives in Melbourne with her partner who is also a dancer. She lived with Christine for the first six months in her home north of the city. Diana hasn’t returned to Melbourne but Christine and Natasha are hopeful. Lawrence is completing his final year in physiotherapy, plans to travel to Melbourne and stay with his sister as he has an interest to work and live in Melbourne.

It has been four years since Christine stopped nursing. She still works in the medical profession and with hospitals. When the divorce and settlement were finalised she returned to part time study. She now teaches Nursing at a city tertiary institute, lecturing and tutoring. The other component of her work is to visit students on their practical training at a number of city hospitals, often finding herself at her old hospital and in the company of former colleagues.

She cannot say whether some of the following events and the frequency of such encounters she has had are serendipitous or disconnected random events.

Anthony’s father did recover. Heart palpitations were an early sign of potentially serious cardiac complications. He had a triple bypass followed by rehabilitation and significant changes to diet fortunately averting disaster. Anthony continued to press Christine for insight that would yield answers, even half answers, on the outcome of his dad’s recovery. Again and again she drew blanks. The only reassurance she could offer was to support her friend and to speculate from general medical experience reminding him that his dad’s progress was encouraging.

When Christine accepted her second sight wasn’t going away because she wished it to she made steps to understand and develop this gift. She found a metaphysical bookshop located in the city centre; it also has a library and study groups. Although she initially sought information to further
explain her experiences she developed an appetite for this material, to the extent that she thought it was written for her alone. She attended sessions held at the centre and met people like her, drawn to explore experiences they couldn’t explain or who were drawn to metaphysical studies and occult practices. In an unexpected way acceptance of her second sight became integral to her professional life.

She finds herself attending a lecture with a group of students in the hospital’s morgue. Before they enter, Tamara, the nurse conducting the tours says, ‘Do I have any queasy stomachs here?’

No one responds.

‘If anyone is having second thoughts about entering – this is the best time to leave.’

At the back of the room there is a row of small rooms where autopsies are carried out. Christine is at the back of the group and room. As she is tall she sees over the group of heads in front of her where two male medical workers in white coats walk past the group. She is distracted by their entry before her attention shifts to the older man who carries the clip board. ‘We’ll begin with the body in Room Two; the paperwork is labelled Priority.’

‘Why is there a rush with this one?’

‘He was the victim of a street fight; police are pushing for results. The cops are familiar with hospital protocol. If we hurry this process and stuff up, it’s our heads on the chopping block. They have a special interest in this one.’

Christine is distracted by these words. Her interest shifts from the mortician’s lecture to this conversation.

‘Is he a sex offender released on minimum sentence? Has one of his victims hunted him down and cut off his balls?’

‘Not so dramatic, but it isn’t the first time he’s landed in Emergency injured from provocation. This one has a history of aggression. He’s made a mess of some of his victims that we’ve had to patch up.’

‘Well known? Who is he?’

‘Roland Adams.’

Christine thinks it’s him, at least it could be. Blood races to her head; sweat breaks through prickly skin and pours over her face, neck and upper chest. She reasons this would be a fitting end for the brute then rebukes herself for thinking in terms of revenge.
How primitive of me.

They disappear into a room where only authorised personnel are permitted.

Since that final encounter with Roland she had not stumbled across him. In the early days she talked herself into forgetting him and what happened that night. It was by virtue of being in a relationship with Richard, or rather, dealing with his cruelty that allowed her memory of Roland to remain dormant.

She is overcome by a flush of excitement.
I hope it’s him; it would be poetic justice to find Roland laid out on a gurney
. She muses that a wave of relief would follow, erasing the possibility of ever stumbling across him again.

The mortician’s voice humming in the background fills the room. His lecture becomes a garbled string of words that grate on Christine and she is anxious for him to shut up. Sooner than she expects the mortician claps his hands giving the impression that he is concluding with a theatrical gesture before saying, ‘…on behalf of the students…’

Again Christine tunes out her attention, shifting to the closed door where the white-uniformed men take away the body on the gurney. Her attention snaps back to a shuffling noise and blur of voices crowded around the mortician. She watches and waits for the group to file out before she
approaches the mortician intent to syphon information about the body in Room Two – at least she’s going to give it her best shot.

She notes the name tag on his white coat reads
Jeremy
and he notes there are two tags pinned to her jacket – one reads
Visitor
the other
Christine
.

The mortician breaks the silence. ‘I know you from somewhere – I’m sure of it.’