And she did. A brief text suggesting an early evening drink the following Monday. She’d finished her message with “And no shopping! Promise.”
So a new environment — ‘The Woolsack’, not far from the canal — and a new time of day. As I waited for her in the pub car park I couldn’t help but wonder whether or not she had been tempted to suggest dinner, especially as ‘The Woolsack’ had a solid reputation for food. Of course both making and not making the suggestion carried messages, and I spent the ten minutes I was waiting engaged in theory-making.
It seemed beyond doubt that Ophelia did not find me threatening; if she had, how could we about to meet for the fourth time? Which then begged another question: what did she think of me? She knew my history, my professional interests; she had a solid idea as to why Katie had introduced us, and yet she had not been frightened off. Far from it. The majority of people might have run a mile. So there was something in our interaction which she found valuable, either because she was hoping I might be able to help her (which presupposed she thought she needed help) or because she enjoyed my company, our conversations. Surely nothing more than that.
As it turned out, similar questions appeared to have been taxing her too.
“So why are you happy to meet with me? Why so keen?” Cradling a glass of white wine, she was sitting across from me in a small booth. Being dressed in a lose sweatshirt and faded jeans — her ‘student uniform’ — was, for her, a departure.
“Do I seem keen?”
“Almost indecently so.” Her smile betrayed the joke.
“Then I apologise for being so transparent — though I can assure you that my intentions are entirely honourable.” That made her laugh. “I guess you’ve heard that one before.”
“I might have.”
“Well, in my case it happens to be entirely true. I strive never to be dishonest.”
While I waited for her response, I could do nothing other than cross-examine my words. The possibility that my intentions were anything other than professional had never occurred to me. Yes, she was a fascinating young woman, and an attractive one too; but I was a married man (or rather, a soon to be divorced one) and old enough to be her father — if I was given another seven or eight years.
“Are you though?” She pulled me back from my musings.
“Am I what?”
“Honest. I mean, lots of people say they are — which in itself merely demonstrates that they’re lying. Oh their lies may be small white ones, or even slightly larger grey ones, but they are lies nonetheless. Have you been honest with me so far?”
I have always found ‘truth’ an interesting concept, especially as an individual’s perception of what’s ‘true’ is driven by perspective — and those perspectives are always coloured by state of mind, belief, and so forth. Most of my clients had issues with the truth, either in recognising it or in assuming that it was most often malevolent. And what if someone refrained from divulging ‘the whole truth’ — the sordid details from my time in the NHS, for example — was that ‘economy’ or did it count as a lie?
“An interesting question coming from someone who uses a name that isn’t theirs.” I delivered my riposte with a smile in order to demonstrate that I was happy playing the game with her.
“That’s not dishonesty,” she said after a moment. “I consider it merely personal preference. If you choose to be seen outside of work without a tie on but always wear one when working, isn’t that preference rather than one or the other being an example of dishonesty about who you are? You love ties, but choose not to wear one, or vice versa.”
It was an interesting angle, even if her premise was flawed. I could imagine her debating the subject with her sister.
“And what about you? Why are you happy to instigate our meetings?”
She smiled. “I like shopping, coffee, and white wine.” The latter had been demonstrated by her glass already being half-empty.
I shook my head, still endeavouring to remain playful. “That’s wholly inadequate and you know it. You could have coffee and white wine with any of your friends — even your parents — yet you’re happy to do so with me. I can legitimately replay your question back to you: why so keen?”
That earned a laugh. “Touché.”
As I took a sip of my IPA, Ophelia seemed momentarily distracted by her own drink, her eyes fixed on the glass and the remaining fluid within it. It was that far away listening glance again.
“Because you’re interesting,” she said, looking up. “That’s why I’m happy to have coffee with you. You’re intelligent, thoughtful, apparently considerate and honest…”
“For a man!”
My interjection made her smile. “You said that, not me.”
“Though I’m not so happy with being ‘apparently’ considerate and honest.”
That she ignored. “And you think you can help resolve my issues — assuming I need that help and that you’re the only one who can do so.”
That was bait I was not prepared to take. “And I’m happy to have coffee — and wine or beer, of course — with you for similar reasons: you’re interesting, pleasant company.”
“Isn’t that nice; we’re both interesting people!” She laughed. It was a laugh with an edge.
“And if you do need help, and if I can help, well… that’s a bonus isn’t it?”
“Have you decided yet?”
“Have I decided what?”
“Whether or not I need help? And if I do, whether you’re the man.” Ophelia lifted her glass to her lips. Once again I noticed the change in make-up — colours closer to bright red than pink, more ‘Trixie’ than ‘Enid’ — which picked up on the tone of her sweatshirt. Even dressed casually, she maintained effortless coordination.
“We could find out.”
She leant forward slightly. “And how do you suggest we do that? You already have me labelled as a liar because of my name, so I’m likely to be unreliable when answering your questions.”
I laughed. “I’ve forgiven you the name thing. Let’s just assume your explanation is sufficient.”
“You’re very gracious.” Draining her glass, she stood up. “Did you want another?”
I shook my head then watched her walk to the bar. It was easy to validate her statement about being able to make clothes look good and, now certain that I had previously done so, found myself again trying to recall where I had seen her before.
She was back in a few minutes. “So professor, what next?”
“Why don’t we play a game?”
“I like games,” she said, smiling. Then, “some games.”
“You know ‘truth or dare’?” She nodded. “Let’s play a version of that, but with two modifications. The first is that there is no dare; so you must tell the truth. And the second is that we take turns asking questions.”
“Do you do that with your patients?”
“With my clients? The first part, yes; the second, no.”
“And you’re prepared to make an exception in my case? Risk telling the truth yourself?” I sensed a cloud beginning to build on her face. “How so?”
“Simple. Firstly you’re not ‘a case’. And secondly — and partly because of that — I think it’s only right that the terms of engagement are fair and equitable.” Her brow furrowed a little. “It’s just a game. Think of it like that.”
“And you’ll be honest?”
“Will you?”
For a few seconds she seemed to debate my proposal — either that or consider how to answer to my last question. Ophelia and her inner voice. I watched her take a sip from her refreshed wine glass, then she pushed it slightly away, eased herself back into her seat.
“Who goes first?”
“I’ll start. Something easy.” I had my opening prepared. “Is it possible that I’ve seen you before — before we were introduced by Katie, I mean?”
“Do you read women’s magazines or take clothes catalogues or buy magazines with glossy up-market adverts?” She smiled, anticipating my answer.
“Not a secret passion to which I can confess; so ‘no’.”
“Then that’s an unlikely, wouldn’t you say?”
I nodded. “What about displays in shops, posters, that kind of thing.”
“Isn’t that another question?”
“Context and clarification. Entirely permissible.”
She laughed. “Changing the rules already! Again, where there might be any (and honestly there are very few) these would be in shops you wouldn’t dream of going into.”
We were up and running. “Okay. Your turn.”
She paused; the expression on her face changed.
“However…” she said, open-endedly.
“‘However’?”
“What did you call it: ‘context and clarification’? You might have seen my sister; at university, when you were lecturing there.”
“Really?”
“Very similar,” Ophelia said, clearly marking my surprise. “Same height, build, facial features. Just what you’d expect from sisters I suppose.” She allowed the words to trail away.
I tried to picture a version of Ophelia sitting in the front row of the lecture theatre as if doing so might conjure a memory. Could I see her there? I wanted to, but was struggling. I found it even more difficult to remember students than I did patients.
“That might explain it.” I was keen to close off the question, to keep a sense of equity in order for her not feel she was being interrogated. “So, your turn.”
“Tell me about the NHS.”
I hadn’t expected that. Some narrowing of focus was needed, that was certain, so I forced her to be specific. “Well, the NHS is a very large, public funded organisation whose role…”
“You know what I mean,” she interrupted. “Your role in it. Why you didn’t stay working there. Previously I think you suggested incompatibility.”
So she had been paying attention.
“I studied psychiatry and psychology at university, and so, like all medical students, found myself in the NHS. It was where everyone started. And where lots of people stay, obviously. If you’re half-decent it’s easy to do so. Job for life and all that.”
“And were you — half-decent I mean?”
“I like to think so. Better than most probably.”
“But it wasn’t a job for life. Why was that?”
“Circumstance I suppose. I wasn’t great with bureaucracy; I hated the paperwork and the rules.”
“Rules put in place to protect patients, surely.”
“Of course. And especially relevant to those on the medical side, where physical well-being goes hand-in-hand with invasive procedure.”
“But not the mental? That’s not invasive?”
There was something in her tone which suggested I needed to tread carefully — especially if she was ‘fragile’ herself. I paused to consider how I might frame the next part. “Mental illness is harder. You can’t see or touch it for a start. There’s never anything to be cut out. You can’t simply apply a cast or a plaster; you can’t re-set a broken mind.” I thought I saw her flinch at the thought. “I was inclined to try inventive things in order to get to the root of my patients’ problems more quickly than the predefined procedures allowed.”
“And that involved breaking the rules?” Ophelia lifted her glass from the table, but simply held it for a moment.
“Sometimes.”
“With consequences?”
“For me or the patients?”
“I think I’m looking at the consequences as far as you are concerned.” She smiled, but it was a thin offering. “I was thinking of your patients.” She took a sip of wine.
“Most of them got better, faster. That’s a fact.”
“And some others?”
Economy-of-truth kicked-in. “Took longer. And some were never going to recover.”
“Did you jump or were you pushed?”
“Another question?”
“‘Context and clarification’.”
I laughed. “We reached an understanding…”
Once she had taken another drink, Ophelia replaced her glass on the table and eased herself back again. That was clearly my cue.
Her questioning about the NHS had thrown me; not merely because it forced me to confront some painful memories — and some high-profile and tragic outcomes — but by discussing the subject I might have sewn doubt in Ophelia’s mind that I was in a position to help her. From one perspective she needed help, just as everyone did. Show me an individual who claims not to be harbouring something from which they would love to be freed — be it a memory, or guilt, or whatever — and I’ll show you a liar. In Ophelia’s case I had yet to decide if she trespassed beyond that common norm, and if she did, how far. All of which left me two choices: I could back-off for a while, or I could push on more directly.
“Who do you talk to?”
She was unable not to express both surprise and confusion. “Talk to? You, Katie, my friends, my parents… I don’t understand.”
“No, no; of course.” I tried a smile. “Sometimes — when we’re chatting, for example — you pause before you respond. It’s as if you’re consulting a voice in your head; as if there’s a secondary and private dialogue which informs what you actually say next.”
Her eyes opened slightly wider, her mouth too. There was a pause.
“You think I’ve an imaginary friend?!”
“That’s not what I said.”
“I’m not six!”
She seemed hurt. Or perhaps a little too hurt, her protest somehow disingenuous.
“That wasn’t what I said. And in any case, you may not be doing that at all. Or if you are, you may not realise it. It’s not an uncommon thing, by the way. Lots of people have a kind of ‘inner consultant’ who they call on from time to time, like when making big decisions. It’s almost always unconscious, but some people choose to personalise it. It’s vaguely anthropomorphic.” I paused to see if she wanted to interrupt. “Perfectly natural in fact. Not really unusual.”
“Or crazy?”
I laughed, more for Ophelia’s benefit than my own. “Certainly not.”
“You think I’m crazy, is that it? That’s why you think I need ‘help’?”
The shift of tone was both palpable and instructive. I noticed the colour having gone from her cheeks, and her hands were shaking just a little.
“Look — and I’m being honest, remember? — I don’t think you’re crazy in any way shape or form. It was something I’d noticed (how could I not?) and I wondered if you were conscious of it, that’s all. Nothing more. Case closed.”
The last two statements were, of course, lies.
We sat in silence for a minute or two, each of us a little shaken in one way or another — though clearly Ophelia was upset the most. Concerned that my little gambit had not worked in the way I had intended, I felt it only right that she be allowed to make the next move. What she chose to do — either by continuing or terminating our conversation — would tell me much. Having said that, as I waited I realised that I might have gone too far, that this now had the potential to be our last interaction. While I waited, I tried to process that notion, to see if I could rationalise how I might feel if that was indeed the case. Disappointment probably: that I had been unable to help her; that it would have ended so negatively; that I was to be deprived of her company in the future. And I wondered how she might feel under those same circumstances.
All that formed the basis for another question — but it wasn’t my turn.
“Tell me about the year you lectured at the university.” She seemed to have calmed down, no doubt aided by draining half her remaining wine.
Potential disappointment receded.
“Anything in particular?”
“Firstly what was the module about.”
I relaxed. “As I may have said previously, I was interested in the relationship between an individual’s mental state and their personal philosophy.”
“Example.”
“Example? Okay. If someone is hedonistic, believes life is for living and that they should experience radical new things whenever they get the opportunity, is that more or less likely to make them happy? Or if an individual is cautious, introverted, and not a risk-taker — i.e. their life philosophy is somewhat stoic — does that make them more or less prone to introspection, worry, guilt, fear and so forth? It’s fairly rudimentary stuff, but Frank, the professor, was keen to give his first-year students as broad an introduction to the subject as possible — to philosophy, I mean. Perhaps a little like your Humanities foundation module. He wanted to try and make it ‘relevant’. It can be a dry subject at the best of times; he thought broadening it out, trying to make it ‘real’ for the students, was important. And he wanted to encourage them to start to think for themselves, to recognise the theoretical aspects of stoicism or existentialism or whatever and apply them to their own lives. That was my brief anyway.”
“Sounds a little ‘loose’,” she suggested after a pause, having chased away a frown, “not like the NHS at all.” I would have expected a smile with this, but none was forthcoming.
“In a way I suppose you’re right.”
“And were there practicals? You know, where you had the students try things out?”
“A few. Games mainly.”
“Like this incarnation of ‘truth or dare’?”
“Quite possibly. I can’t really remember.” Sadly another lie.
I looked down at my nearly empty glass.
“Another?” I suggested. She nodded. I stood. “I’ll see if I can think of another question while I’m at the bar.”
This was only partly true. I wanted Ophelia to be clear that, from my perspective, we were not yet finished — and to give her the opportunity to bail out if she felt we were. I had no intention of pushing her somewhere she didn’t want to go. With that in mind, I half-expected her to have vacated the table when I returned.
But she was still there.
“Thank you.” She took the wine from me, drank a quarter of it. “Context and clarification?”
She was seeking permission to carry on. Given some of the other alternatives — like not being there at all — I was happy to indulge her, especially as I hadn’t yet decided where to go with my next question.
“We want to know whether you remember my sister.”
There was something almost playful in Ophelia’s use of the word ‘we’, as if she was toying with me and my idea that she might have an imaginary friend. Yet the way the question was delivered, the tone, its phrasing, also suggested that there was indeed another person involved, that all the while I had been at the bar she had been ‘talking’ to someone in her head.
If I had been a little thrown by her still being there and the extension of her enquiry, her question and that ‘we’ really caught me off guard.
“I’m not sure I can say.”
“She was in that year, and in your module.”
“What was her name?”
“Melissa.”
Of course I remembered her. The name was a trigger. And the name allowed me to place her, and in doing so answer the question as to why I thought I had seen Ophelia before. I hadn’t, but I had seen Melissa.
“Melissa?” I repeated the name, trying to sound vague, trying not to remember. “Yes, I think so. She looked a lot like you?”
“I was two years younger, so not really aware of what she was doing. University was still a little way away for me.”
“And you would have had your own concerns.”
“‘Concerns’?”
“Presumably A-levels and the like.”
“Ah.” Ophelia returned to her wine. Another healthy sip. “Do you know what happened to her?”
“Melissa?” I paused long enough to suggest thought. “Passed her first year and went on to graduate, what, last year?”
“That would have been nice. It was her plan. She regrets not being able to see it through. Or at least she does now.”
Knowing what happened to her, yet having played my cards in the way I had, my only option was to carry on with the charade. “Did she leave then?”
“I think you know what happened, professor.” More wine — an increase in venom. “She killed herself. Or rather, you killed her.”
There had been an investigation of course; I had been interrogated, found to be innocent. After all, how could I possibly be responsible for what someone thought and felt?
“I think you’ll find…”
“There was something in what you said, what you taught, the games you played with the students… And you know which ones I mean. All those theories about existentialism, how life is meaningless. It was all just one big game to you, just like breaking all those HNS rules and getting kicked out of the hospital.”
“I wasn’t…”
“But Melissa was vulnerable, naïve, open to influence. Since our father had died she had been looking for something positive and meaningful; university was supposed to give her that. But all she got was you peddling theories that life was pointless, so why bother?”
“That wasn’t the message, Ophelia. Belinda. Not at all. Yes, we discussed it in groups…”
“And in one-to-one sessions. I know she came to see you. She told me that much. In the space of two terms she changed. She’d been struggling anyway, but you, with your flimsy egotistical showing off, tipped her over the edge. Ripped from her those few things she wanted to believe in.”
“She was troubled, yes.” It was time to defend myself. “Just as you are troubled. But I wasn’t responsible for that; how could I have been? She should have seen someone who could help her.”
At this Ophelia laughed. “Like you, perhaps? Isn’t that what you say you do, help people? Yet you couldn’t see her need, all wrapped up in yourself. You tipped her towards the edge and then, when perhaps you had the chance to rescue her, let her fall anyway.”
“I understand you’re upset…”
“Upset? You don’t know the meaning of the word! Just like you don’t know the meaning of any of the words you use — like honesty for example. We were crushed, mum and I; she had a breakdown, I had to drop out of school. And you… Happily going along with your private practice, your private clients. And help me? I’ve been watching you — we’ve been watching you — lie after lie, untruth after untruth.”
It was here that she threw the rest of her wine at me.
I stood. I had no other option. Ophelia was clearly deranged and my presence could nothing other than aggravate an already tense situation.
“I should go. I need to leave you to calm down.” A reiteration of an offer to help her made it to my lips but I let it die there.
“You bastard.”
Unable not to be drawn into the drama which Ophelia had instigated, several people watched me walk through the bar and out of the door. I felt their eyes on me, yet all the while hoped they would turn their gaze on her, offer to help, to see her home. I had no problem being cast as the ‘bad guy’ if it helped Ophelia exorcise her ghosts.
Except it didn’t.
It was on the local news the following day; how her body had been found early in the morning by dog owners walking the canal towpath. They had speculated that she had fallen into the lock. Witnesses suggested they had seen her drunk in the pub — and that there had been a man with her.
It was the same lock into which Melissa had thrown herself.
I have the whole story of course. In fact, I’m on my way to the police station now to give them my version of it.