Healer of My Heart

by Sheila Turner Johnston

  She couldn’t sleep. She lay on her back and looked at the dark ceiling, the quilt heavy on her, the room warm despite the approach of autumn. He had called her an emotional cripple. Despite the wonderful freedom of the summer, despite all her efforts, the ability to spoil anything good that happened to her was still a talent that she could not shake. She put a hand over her face in the dark. That boulder of hatred was still there, that vat of boiling anger, which spilled and burnt her and anybody who got close to her. Most people never came back to be incinerated twice. Most people.

  Her mobile rang. Startled, she checked the time. Two o’clock in the morning. The name flashing on the phone was ‘David’. Long ago she had changed his brief ‘DS’ to his first name. She pulled the phone onto the pillow and nestled it to her ear.

  “Hi,” she said.

  His voice was tired, flat. “Robyn. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s OK. I’m sorry too,” she said into the dark.

  “You’ve no reason to be sorry.”

  “Yes, I have. I broke a window after you left.”

  “You what?”

  “I reported it as an unfortunate accident. Hopefully it’ll be fixed by Monday.”

  “And was it an accident?”

  “No.”

  He went quiet. She lay without speaking, just keeping the phone lying at her ear, content to wait out his thinking time. Then his voice again. “Robyn?”

  “Yes?”

  “Do you have any idea how alike we are?”

  She rolled onto her side. “No, David, you were right earlier. I’m an emotional cripple. You’re not. That’s how different we are.”

  “When you and I were first getting to know each other…” She heard his smile as he stopped and said “Remember?”

  “I do. You should have told me to get lost.”

  “When you and I were first getting to know each other,” he repeated, “I told you that I had made choices and that you could too.”

  “You told me Catherine Earnshaw had made the wrong choice.”

  “So I did.” After a moment he went on slowly: “I want you to say to me that you are making the choice, of your own free will, to stay crippled, to stay afraid, to retreat to your burrow, even – especially – when you can see light ahead.”

  She didn’t answer immediately and he waited out her thinking. Finally she said: “I don’t have the choice. It’s too difficult. I can’t face it.”

  He said almost desperately: “But you have been facing it! I have seen you. Don’t give up now. I’m with you, Robyn, all the way.”

  “But David,” she said sadly, “don’t you see? You’re the problem.”

  Another silence. Then he said: “I know what I see. I see that you and I meeting was always going to be dangerous.”

  She didn’t answer that. A minute later he said softly: “Robyn?”

  “Yes?”

  “I wish you were here beside me now.”

  Her knees pulled up to her stomach in a reflex act of protection. She buried her face in the pillow and fought against the longing in his voice, a longing that leapt away from the safe bounds of friendship and into a land she never wanted to revisit. She felt as if she were being torn in two. He had woken something in her that terrified her. It was a feeling that was so good and so bad all at once. His voice was loaded with all that had caused her pain, all that had humiliated her, all that she felt she could never bear to hear again. Her mind was damaged. But her body had begun to tell her that it was not. It was a contradiction she did not know how to deal with.

  She turned her head back, put the phone to her ear again; tried to speak lightly. “Be serious! David Shaw could have had half the women in Florida.”

  His reply was quick: “Maybe I could. But I came back across the Atlantic to the one woman who won’t have me.”

  Silence. Then she said quietly: “Goodnight, David.” And ended the call.

  She set the phone on the bedside table and curled into a ball beneath the quilt. The phone bleeped. She reached for it again and read the message.

  David had sent one word: “Shalom.”

  Apart from his first year, when he had been terrified, Tim had always loved the first few days of a new school year. The community exploded into life: before the serious work began experiences were shared, friendships renewed, jokes swapped, gossip traded. Along the walls of the main corridor, pupils shoaled in vibrant groups, laughing, fooling around, poring over timetables and spotting clashes before the teachers did. Screens showed off photographs of the places they had been over the summer.

  Tim leaned against a radiator, happy to watch and to look out for Chloe. He looked up and down the corridor and spotted her with some other girls from her form class. She was looking cross and they were looking suitably sympathetic. Hypocrites! thought Tim wryly. The word’s out that David is available again.

  There was no sign of him, although he thought he had spotted a small green car at the far end of the car park. David’s reply had been odd when Tim had said casually to him at the weekend, “Back to the grindstone on Monday. See you there, man.”

  “Yeah.” David had replied. “Possibly.”

  Tim chewed his lip thoughtfully. Much as he liked David, he regarded him as headstrong, self-willed and, like all those cursed with charisma, used to getting his own way. He had a strong suspicion about the real reason for David’s ambivalence about the new term. The guy hadn’t taken his advice of earlier in the summer. If he was infatuated with Robyn Daniels, then Tim knew he would go up in flames before he would give up. The idiot might have let things get worse, not better.

  Tim sighed. He hooked off his glasses and polished them vigorously with the end of his tie. In the Holy Huddle, Tim was well aware that he himself was regarded as the plump, gentle one. David was the incendiary, the spiritual bomb. Yet he was going to talk to him again, and risk an explosion.

  Penny Woodford was looking terrible. Her hair was like straw, the purple ends rough and unkempt. Her uniform was wrinkled, the cuffs of her blouse dirty. She had lost weight.

  One or two of her year tried to talk to her, but Penny rebuffed every approach. Last year she had been unpopular, certainly, but she had been sparky, giving as good as she got. Now there was a vacantness in her eyes, a lethargy.

  Edith Braden had noticed it too. At lunchtime towards the end of the first week, she fretted to Robyn in the staffroom.

  “She looks really ill. I wonder should the school contact her home, just to check things out.”

  “I think that’d be a good idea,” said Robyn. “I’ve tried talking to her but she just looked through me.”

  Angus was sitting several feet away, absorbed in a newspaper. Robyn gave him very little thought; she was just thankful that he had given up and stopped harassing her. He had hardly spoken to her all week, and when he did, it was only to wish her a polite good-day, or to hold a door open for her.

  Edith shook her head. “And another thing,” she said, her face creasing with worry, “I saw David Shaw talking to her this morning. They were in an empty classroom. He’s the only one she seems to be talking to. It’s very odd.”

  Angus’ paper moved slightly and he glanced across at Robyn. He raised his paper again.

  “Anyway,” said Edith, “he wasn’t looking very friendly. He seemed almost exasperated with her. I didn’t like to stare, but I was going into the room next to where they were, and I’m sure I heard her swearing at him.”

  “That wouldn’t bother David,” said Robyn, opening a yogurt.

  “How would you know?” said Edith crossly.

  Robyn licked yogurt from the inside of the lid. As she did so, she saw Angus look quickly at her and away again. With rapid movements, he folded his paper, stood, and left the room.

  The next day, Friday, Robyn marked Penny absent.

  At lunchtime, she saw David across the dining hall. He was on duty, helping the new junior pupils who were still rather lost in the size of the school. Their blazers
were crisp and new and a bit too long in the arms. When she first spotted David, he was hunkered in front of an eleven year old girl, looking into her scarlet face because she had dropped her plate with a resounding crash. The floor was strewn with chips and orange juice and the entire queue was laughing at her.

  Robyn knew the child would never forget the humiliation. Then David said something that made the child start to smile. He made a funny face and started to hop around like a monkey from the Jungle Book. The girl laughed and so did everyone else. David stopped the entire queue and let her choose her lunch again. Then he paid for it himself and carried it to the table where her friends were watching. Carefully he laid out her cutlery, set her plate down and placed her drink beside it. With a flourish of his hand, he gave a mock bow and pulled out the chair for her. Robyn watched as the child sat beside her speechless friends, suddenly transformed into the centre of envious attention.

  When Robyn looked for him again, he was wielding a mop, cleaning the floor. The image tucked itself into her mind as she turned away.

  She didn’t hear from him all weekend. He had avoided being in sight of her all week. She tried not to mind. It was what she wanted after all. The summer was time out that should never have happened. He would settle into life and look back on her as a temporary distraction, a bit of an oddball.

  That night she fixed the chair under the door handle and went to bed. After a moment she put a hand out to check that her phone was in reach.

  On Monday morning, Penny was still absent. Robyn noticed that David was not at morning assembly. This was unusual. David never missed it as a matter of principle. Occasionally he took part.

  Robyn had to attend a meeting at breaktime, so it wasn’t until lunchtime that she went to the staffroom. She was hungry and ready for a rest after a hectic morning. She made herself a coffee and sat alone in a corner. Angus came and sat almost opposite to her, but at the far side of the room.

  At first she didn’t listen to the chat around her. It was always there, like wallpaper.

  “The holy ones are the worst,” said Billy Dobbin, over to her right.

  Matt Harkin ambled over to him. “You are so right, Billy. All perfection on the outside. Just as bad as everyone else inside.”

  “Worse. Definitely worse.”

  Gradually, a sense of something having happened impinged on Robyn.

  “Still,” said someone, “it’s hard to believe. He’s a bit different all right, but he seems like a decent guy. But you never can tell, I suppose.”

  “Poor Penny. I wonder what she’ll do? She’s hardly likely to be back in time to do her exams.”

  Edith came in, her face white. She made straight for Robyn. “I knew something was up. I knew it.” Her voice rose in pitch. “He’s young and he’s handsome, God knows, but her? How did he fall for it?”

  Robyn had gone rigid. “What’s happened?”

  “Men!” Edith’s voice was almost a wail, “they’re all the same underneath. Specially the young ones. You think to yourself, there’s a decent young chap. And look what happens.” She threw her hands in the air. “If you can’t trust David Shaw you can’t trust anyone.”

  Robyn leaned forward, took Edith by the arms and shook her. “Edith, what’s happened?”

  “You haven’t heard? Where have you been? Well,” she said, “I suppose the pupils will only be hearing by now.”

  Robyn was ready to hit her. “What’s happened?” she said again loudly, shaking her harder.

  Edith took a deep breath. “Apparently it all happened on Friday afternoon,” she said. “Penny Woodford’s pregnant and she says David Shaw’s the father. He’s been suspended.” She slapped her hands on the arms of her chair. “And Penny’s vanished. Can’t find her anywhere.”

  Robyn sank back into her chair, her breath leaving her as if a fist had slammed into her stomach. She saw Angus watching her across the room, an unpleasant grin smeared across his face.

  23

  LIKE INK THROUGH a blotter, the news soaked through the school. Every class was agog with it; every corner was a corner of whispers. Robyn set some work for her senior class after lunch and left them. She climbed the stairs to the art rooms. She had never been up here. She searched each one until she found Tim Thompson. With a raised eyebrow of request and apology to the teacher, she called him out. He came slowly, even his unruly red curls looking sombre, subdued.

  “Tim, what happened?”

  Tim shrugged, a helpless puzzlement etched on his features, his whole demeanour upset.

  “It was just after lunch on Friday. He was on his way up to the library when the Head called him to his office. He just didn’t come back.”

  “Have you seen him?”

  “Yesterday. But his parents are so upset they aren’t really welcoming visitors. I didn’t stay long.” He scuffed a shoe around and looked at her sideways. “I don’t think it was me he wanted to see.”

  “Where exactly does he live?” she asked.

  Tim told her. “Big place. You’ll know it by the two big lilac bushes on each side of the gate.”

  “And is there no news of Penny?”

  “None that I’ve heard.”

  “Thanks, Tim.”

  Robyn turned back to the top of the stairs. Tim said quickly: “If you see him…” He hesitated awkwardly, “…be careful what you say to him.”

  He went back into the room, leaving her to wonder what he meant.

  She had a free period before her last class and shut herself in her storeroom. In one corner a pile of texts sat where David had put them before the holidays. The day he had told her that there was always colour, that we either find it or mix it ourselves. The day he had first touched something in her and sent the first weak ripple trembling across the surface of still water. The day he touched an injured heart with an audacity heavy with the threat of healing.

  Images reeled through her brain, tumbling, indisciplined. Lying on his back on Scrabo Hill, convulsed with laughter. Frowning with concentration as he fought with a wonky screw on her door. In the cathedral, eyes closed, quiet. Looking gently up at her and telling her she was the good news, not part of the bad news. Pretending to be a giant crab and chasing her. Standing in a crowded shopping centre holding a toddler and telling two open-mouthed girls that he ate children.

  She got up restlessly and paced the room, arms folded tightly. There were other images. Close conversations with Penny Woodford. Guiding Penny along a Belfast pavement, a hand hovering at her back. Deflecting the conversation every time she tried to ask about her. Refusing to recognise any gulf between their worlds.

  Robyn closed her eyes and rested her forehead against a bookshelf. One other image. Last Friday at lunchtime, turning an embarrassed little girl into a star. Then bending his own back to wipe her dinner off the floor. It must have been only minutes later that the Head had sent for him.

  Trust had always been a husk of a word to her. It had a dictionary definition but had no form or shape. She could use it in sentences, read it on a page, and yet have no grasp of its meaning. She had never trusted anybody; it always led to betrayal, hurt. Always.

  She sat again heavily, putting her elbows on the window sill and lowering her face into her hands. Even her own mother. That was just the worst and latest betrayal. If a mother’s love is not an immovable rock, if a mother’s love can bend to expediency, if a mother can watch her child be perverted, sullied, terrified, and do nothing to prevent it, then who in this world is to be trusted?

  Unconsciously, she touched the spot beneath her index finger where a thorn had drawn blood one day and he had laughed.

  A minute after the final bell, Robyn lifted her bag and walked through the school gate. It was nearly a mile, but she found the house easily. It was about half way along a quiet, elegant avenue, one of a line of houses that estate agents called ‘gentlemen’s residences.’ She stopped and studied it, aware that she was stepping for the first time into David’s own territory, and that she
had no idea how she would be received.

  To one side of the front porch, a tall stained glass window spanned the height of the wall, lighting the stairs. She scanned the upstairs windows, wondering if David’s room lay behind one of them.

  There was the little green hatchback. She passed two other cars at the front and at the bend in the gravelled drive she looked round at the neat flower beds, the immaculate lawn with its edges trimmed and straight. A pampas grass gracefully dominated one side. Chrysanthemums splashed the ground with colour near the door, and baskets of petunias and lobelia trailed down the walls of the porch.

  It was hard to believe that the small, neat woman who answered the door was David’s mother. Apart from a slight likeness around the cheekbones, she had passed nothing of herself to her son. He was almost entirely a bigger, stronger version of his father. His mother was reserved, even unfriendly, her face etched with strain. Robyn explained who she was. She lifted her bag a little. “I’ve brought some notes for David.”

  Elizabeth put out her hand for them. “Thank you. I’ll give them to him.”

  “Perhaps I could see him for a moment? I may need to explain some of the… stuff.”

  Elizabeth hesitated, passed a hand across her brow. “It’s not an easy time.”

  “I know,” Robyn said quickly.

  Elizabeth raked her with a look. Robyn dropped her head. Then she began to pull a folder from her bag. “I’ll leave this then. But please tell him I called.” She looked up again. “Please.”

  Elizabeth looked back into the house and then turned, her shoulders sagging suddenly. “He’s in the back garden. But please be quiet. My husband is lying down. He’s taken this very badly.”

  Once through the kitchen and out the back door, Elizabeth left her to go down the steps alone. Robyn passed a weeping cherry tree and stepped onto the lawn. The back garden was very large, neatly cultivated for about two-thirds of its length, then thickly planted in a small copse of shrubs and trees. In the afternoon light, magpies were chattering in the branches. A weak breeze fidgeted through the leaves.