The Inspector sits down now and Susan knows that there is more coming.
“Miss Blakely, what can you tell me about Mike Moss and about why he would have told the church about you and Dave Ramsey?”
CHAPTER 29
Minutes become hours. Hours become days. Days, she hope, will eventually become weeks. There is no press story about her and Jane. The days shorten with the incoming autumn. Linda is mobile within a few days of coming downstairs, using crutches and finding muscles that she did not know could ache so much. A semblance of normality descends on the Pilar household and sometimes it seems, even to Linda, as if the events of the summer are just some aberration of her memory. Only the sight of the shells at the side of her bed stays as real proof that Jane was a part of her life for such a significant but short time. The shells and the constant ache as she wakes or lets her mind go to the times that they had shared in the Hebrides and in Santiago are proof. She cannot wear Jane’s ring - to all outward appearances she is back in her marriage with Ken.
Ken tries - she has to give him that. He looks after her, enquires after her needs and tries to be the person he was before all this happened. But the paradox is proving to be true that the more one tries to make things the same, the more they are by definition different. Their intimacy is gone. They have had sex but it was as lonely a place for Ken as it was for her. She was not repulsed or anything like that. It was just not the experience that she wanted to be having when it happened. The memory of Jane’s lovemaking made Ken’s actions simply mechanical. He turns his back afterwards as often as she does.
The children have adjusted to the near return to normality. Angela has come out of her shell of regression and all that Linda ever said to Kenny about Jane was that she and his father both love him and that they will be together as always. As for Jane, she is a nice woman and has been very important to Linda. Linda heard herself use the past tense. Kenny said nothing. He just listened and went back to his computer. After that, he behaved as usual and was seemingly more preoccupied with the trials of adolescence and all that entails than he was with Linda’s troubles. He brought his pals in to watch rugby on the TV and apart from the absence of lager cans, which would undoubtedly come later, it was a scene that Linda imagined would be repeated over a good few years to come. He went off abseiling with the school and seemed to master the skill quickly. His voice was deepening and he was showing every sign of being an all round accomplished sportsman. He is living life to the full at home and away from it and Linda cannot be sure whether the slight distancing between her and Kenny is the result of the normal preparation of adolescence for leaving the nest or of talking to him about the press. She sees that now as perhaps an unnecessary family crisis – a crisis that was occasioned by her own insistence that the children should be told about the possibility of a smear against her name. Perhaps Ken was right and they should have left well alone.
She returns to work two weeks after the start of term, unable to tolerate her enforced idleness any longer, and somewhere in her mind knowing that she has to at least see Jane. That was a thought that she did not allow to linger in her conscious mind for too long. She is determined that she will give her employers not one single excuse to say that she and Jane are behaving inappropriately in the workplace. She will see the woman only on the same basis as she would see any of her colleagues - strictly in the course of business.
It is strange to hobble on her crutches into the Department and to be welcomed by her secretary and by colleagues. She missed all the start of term business and her own department is in full swing. All right, she planned the term from the house and the communications have flowed backwards and forwards but she still feels like a stranger at one level - a stranger and something of a short-term celebrity because of the car attack.
She makes it to her office without too much difficulty but it is tiring and her movement around the department, the lecture halls and the campus is going to be limited. She chooses to have coffee and sandwiches in her room and only to go down to the lecture and seminar rooms when she is taking classes. Her Department is twenty strong and over the course of the first day virtually everyone makes a point of coming to see her, to ask how she is and to take a professional steer from her on some aspect or other of the work. Everyone comes, that is, except Jane. By the end of Linda’s first day back, Jane has not appeared. Linda sorts papers at her desk long after most people in the Department have gone home, knowing full well that she is hoping that Jane will call by. She stays on in her office until she can no longer delay her return to the family and the supper that she knows Tina is preparing.
Eventually, towards five-thirty, she takes her crutches and makes her way along to the lift. Her secretary, who insisted on staying behind until the Professor was ready to leave, is at her side. They are close to the lift when Jane appears, coming out of the small room at the end that they use for storing media technology equipment. She is in earnest conversation with Hector. She stops in her tracks, before turning to Hector, as if for some support. They will all be in the same lift and the doors are now opening.
“Hello, Jane,” is all that Linda can think of to say. She has thought about this moment for weeks and this is all that she can say.
“Hello, Linda. How are you?” Jane smiles an uneasy smile.
They are in the lift, everyone letting Linda go ahead. It is a stupid, awkward descent with banal talk from Jane and from Linda about the accident and what Linda’s first day has been like. Finally, Jane volunteers that she will have to come and see Linda about her research at some point. Linda takes the opportunity to turn to the secretary and to ask her to fix a time in the diary.
They separate at floor level. Hector, silent until now, takes Jane’s arm and announces that the best pub for that drink would be the Thirsty Duck. What does Jane think? Jane looks at Linda as she replies that that will be fine. The two women manage to take one final look at each other as they go their separate ways, Linda to the car spaces marked with wheelchairs where a taxi is waiting, Jane and Hector to the walkway that leads to the University students’ favourite pubs. If Linda thought that she detected a longing look in Jane’s eyes, she persuades herself later that she was probably kidding herself. Perhaps Jane is on the baby quest with young Hector? Young Hector would not mind that in the slightest - she knows that. The thought is more than Linda can cope with, even though Jane might well feel the same about her and Ken sleeping together these last weeks.
The next day is one that will remain with Linda for the rest of her life. It is the day on which the press publish their story about her and Linda. It sits like an accusation on the breakfast table the next morning. Ken has gone down a few minutes ahead of her. Tina is there, silently cooking eggs, her back firmly to the room. The children will not make their appearances till the last moment and after several calls up the stairs from Tina. At least that was the usual pattern of the morning departures to their various days.
It is a day that will shape Linda’s life from here. She knows right away that she will do what people with any sense or courage do in these circumstances. She decides to brave it out – she will not hide at home.
It is somewhere between seeing the strap-line - ‘The University of Lesbianism’ and reading the rage in Ken’s expression that she takes that decision. No matter what the article says, she is not taking this like a victim. It might well be crunch time but she knows that Jane and she have done nothing wrong and she will not allow herself to be stigmatised.
Ignoring Ken, she reads the article once and then again after the first shock of seeing herself described in print has abated. They are both named. As is the trip to the Hebrides, the implication being that it had been a gay jolly at public expense. The trip to Spain is there as is the fact of Jane spending time with Ken and her. The implication this time is that a three-way frolic is the only thing that could possibly have happened on the trip. Now, the article goes on, Linda is back at the University after the recent car attack. The pol
ice are still continuing their enquiries. What is the University doing, allowing all this to go on in the workplace? What about young students? And so on. This is of course why the press have not published until now. They were waiting for Linda’s return in order to maximise embarrassment to the University; to expose Linda to the full glare of publicity.
Ken is livid - there is no other way to describe his silence. He snatches the paper from Linda, storms from the kitchen and out of the room. Linda’s fear for the children leads her to shout after him,
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going to speak to the kids - what do you think I’m going to do?”
She leaves him to it. There is no point in a scene between them as well as all this. She decides that she is going to go to work. She has to be there to bat for herself. No one else will. But the children should not go to school. She turns to Tina.
“Will you have the kids at home today, Tina?”
Tina looks at her, comes over to her and puts an arm round Linda’s shoulders.
“Of course I will. Don’t you worry. All this will sort, you know.”
She has rarely felt so grateful for such kind words. It is as if Tina is momentarily her mother, protecting her and her grandchildren from the enemies outside and inside.
She stays in the hug, just saying “Thank you”. There is no need to say anything else.
It is ten minutes before Kenny and Angela came downstairs, neither of them in school attire. Ken has obviously had the same thought as herself. And to give him his due, he is calm and reasoned with the children and the two adults slip back into their well rehearsed united front teamwork. The children come and just hug her and Angela says,
“Daddy says they are saying lies about you, Mummy.”
“A lot of it is lies, yes, Darling.
Kenny wants to see for himself.
She retrieves the article and gives it to him. He reads it, pales, and looks at her with near loathing. He says nothing, just leaves the room. Tina goes after him. She is the best person to do that just now, both Linda and Ken know that.
They leave for work, Ken and she, just ten minutes later. The children and Tina are not to answer the door or the phone but they are to ring if anything untoward happens. It is quite possible that more reporters will want the story. Ken drops her at the entrance to the Department, not a word uttered between them on the short journey.
She goes straight to her office, nodding briefly at her secretary, who simply smiles and says “good morning” as she does every day and as if nothing is any different. Linda knows everyone will be talking about this and that the article will be doing the rounds. That is human nature. But, good for her secretary, she carried it off as if nothing was amiss. Linda’s first action is to ring her solicitor. She has a long-standing arrangement with Malcolm Paterson, who until now has handled things like her parents’ estate and the purchase of their home - nothing unconventional like this. What can he do to help? Luckily for Linda, Malcolm’s is a tough firm who know employment legislation backwards. Malcolm’s advice is to sit tight, do nothing and let the firm put a warning shot across the bows of the University. In these days of Human Rights legislation, he points out, there is great restraint amongst employers on issues like this. She is able to reassure Malcolm when he asks, that the trip to the Hebrides was done, as it were, by the organisational book. Malcolm wants to know for his own purposes what the relationship with Jane is, then and now, and she tells him that too. She suggests a libel case against the press for the untruths in the article but even as she asks the questions she sees the folly of that line. Malcolm is clear. He points out that the press could argue that it was in the public interest to know all this and she does not want to end up arguing what parts are true, what false. Does she? No, she says at once, she does not. Malcolm will phone the Principal. She agrees and waits.
Malcolm comes back to Linda by phone about thirty minutes later. The Principal, Linda surmises, quickly became unavailable and Malcolm Paterson finally spoke to the Head of Human Services - the personnel service. The University was aware of the article, yes. Doctor Gray and Professor Pilar were both respected colleagues. The University was considering the article. Linda’s solicitor delivered his question, asking for confirmation that there was no employment issue here. He made a reference to Human Rights legislation. Even if there were truth in the article, which of course was not the subject of his call, many people of the opposite sex were in personal relationships at work - was that not true? In fact, do a significant number of marriages not originate from the workplace? Linda listens as Malcolm indicates that the Head of Personnel appears to have been reassuring. The employment issue appears to be secured. Even so, she just hopes that the University is not reserving its position and that that was the reason that Robert Thane did not speak personally to her solicitor. Malcolm advises her, and she can only follow his advice, to carry on as usual. What Linda will never know is whether the phone call will influence the position.
She goes about her day as best she can. She sees several of her colleagues, some of whom say that they were sorry to read the article; some of whom say nothing, as if it does not exist or as if it is not worth the space of discussion. She thinks that a few might be avoiding her. She cannot be sure. But in the whole day, not one person asks her if the article is true. And for that sensitivity, she is grateful. She does not see Jane at all and the secretary says that Jane has been in, made the appointment to meet with Professor Pilar the following week and is going to write her research at home for the rest of the day.
It is four in the afternoon when she is finishing a seminar with third year students on ancient sexual rites - why did theses twists of fate make a seminar like that appear on the programme today of all days? As she leaves the room, Robert Thane appears as if just happening to pass the lecture room. He just comes over and hugs her and asks how she is coping. He points at her leg but his eyes say that the question is about the article. She mutters that she is hanging in and he suggests a drink in the University Lounge for senior staff, at end of play. She accepts with more than a little relief, knowing at the same time that it will be a gauntlet of a walk to that lounge.
Her senior colleagues are there - to a person. Robert is on his feet to help her to a seat and to see to her gin and tonic. People ask about her leg and they go on to talk the talk of academia – with not a word about the article or the fallout from it. What happened behind closed doors today with the University solicitors and the Human Resources Section, she will never know. But the line that her University is taking is clear – one of unquestioning business as usual.
She is home by taxi towards six o’clock. The children are watching TV, Ken with them. Tina has departed for her own flat and will be back in the morning. A family conference is to happen, Angela informs her importantly. She joins them. The atmosphere, she picks up right away, is calm. Ken takes the lead. The press have not bothered them today and they have to go on as a family from here, at home and at school or work. He and Linda will talk to the school and make sure that they are not troubled there by other pupils or by the newspapers. Kenny baulks at this. The whole thing is bad enough without them doing that. Linda persuades Ken to leave the school and they all compromise on a phone call to the Head the next morning. The children will go back the day after tomorrow. Angela thinks that this is great - another day off school. But Kenny is moody - Linda can see it. She knows that it is best to let Ken lead. There will be a time soon enough when she can talk in private with her son if he will let her.
It is towards eight when she finds a moment to ring Susan. She needs to gauge the reaction of her friend to the article - Susan is very balanced in her views. It is not nice to be exposed like that but the article was so off-the-wall that the main reaction in the public who matters is likely to be sympathy. Linda tells Susan about her day at work and can only see the logic of what Susan is saying. Then Susan tells her that Jane has just left her flat. Linda’s young lover has spen
t the later part of the day with Susan, raging at the article and trying to sort out what her reaction should be. Linda cannot help the moment of jealousy that she feels for the time Susan has just spent with Jane. But she is glad that Jane had somewhere to go. But what does Jane mean, how should she react?
Susan explains. Jane is intelligent and articulate. Why should she be browbeaten by some petty piece of journalism? It is not usually in her makeup to be a political animal in the ordinary run of events. But this is different. She has been provoked and she refuses to stand by and let that happen. She has only ever held her head up and stood for what she believes in. She is not about to be cowed into either denying who she is or running away and hiding because of it.
Jane ended up asking Susan for the names of serious journalists who might be interested in doing a profile on her. She told Susan that she was prepared to talk about being a professional, homosexual woman and what that experience is like. She will be leaving Linda out of it. This is about bigotry at this, the beginning of the twenty first century. She was quite fired up, talking to Susan and Susan tells Linda that she liked what Jane has to say. Before agreeing, she asked Jane again whether Linda would be deliberately kept out of what would be said. Jane agrees that she will and said that the children come first. Susan undertook to ring a journalist friend, regretting only that in all the current circumstances she cannot take on the article herself.
A woman called Helen Moore rang Susan and Jane back within the hour. She was a social commentator and journalist for a Sunday broadsheet, The News on Sunday, and would like to meet Jane. Jane and she had a brief conversation on the phone and decided on the general thrust of the article - the public and private aspects of coming out, helping parents and families to adjust, making the commitment to open honesty and most of all, challenging the workplace not to work to any double standard. It would be done carefully, of course, and no, Jane need not talk about anyone else. This was about the difficult times she has had, present and past but she would also talk about the positive choices she made to live as a lesbian and about the difficulties that anyone in her professional situation can face.
Exposure Page 27
