She glanced up, conscious that something around her had changed. The green man was flashing on and off and the other pedestrians had almost crossed the road. She jogged after them, clutching the fag packet in her pocket, bribing herself on with the promise of a cigarette when she got to work.
Chapter 4
The morning dragged by like a stranger's funeral. Maureen found herself picking over everything Winnie had said, looking for clues about the family, guessing what she really meant. Liam had told her that Una was pregnant, but Maureen wasn't concerned: she knew the baby would be safe from Michael because Alistair, Una's husband, was so even-tempered and he had always believed Maureen about the abuse. What jarred more intensely was Winnie trying to listen to her. Douglas used to say that Maureen was hyper-vigilant with her family, always looking for signals and signs, clues about what was going to happen next, because nothing was predictable. He said it was a common behavioral trait in children from disturbed backgrounds.
She couldn't remember Douglas's face properly anymore. All she could picture were his eyes as he smiled at her and blinked, a strip of memory floating in a void, like an animated photofit strip. Maureen looked across the desk at Jan.
Jan was tall and blond and plump around the middle. She had an inexplicable penchant for wearing green and purple together and giggled about it, as if she were a great character. She stayed with her parents on the south side but resented living in their warm home and eating their groceries. Her parents had retired recently and seemed to spend their days kicking about the house, bickering with each other about minutiae. Jan kept trying to engage Maureen in the dull stories by asking about her own parents: did they fight, were they happy, who took out the rubbish? Maureen made up a story about a close family of two with an adoring mother who was very religious. Their father had left them when they were very young. She didn't remember him but he was a sailor with a gambling habit and a beard. When Maureen saw her fictional father in her head she always imagined him steering a fishing boat and wearing a yellow sou'wester and joke glasses with pop-out eyeballs on springs.
"Smoke?" said Jan.
"Two minutes," said Maureen, and went back to staring at a chapter in the housing-law textbook. It didn't make any sense. A regulation had imported a double negative into the legislation. She was crap at this. When they had given her the job it was because of Leslie and the posters, not because she had shown any capacity to map housing legislation or write summaries. The few reports she had submitted were politely bounced back for revision by the committee and she knew their buoyant faith in her was flagging.
In anticipation of the funding cut, the Place of Safety Shelters had moved to the cheapest city-center office in Glasgow. It was an ugly, gray, windowless room. The funding cut had been deferred because of the poster campaign but the PSS stayed there, saving their money as best they could, getting ready for the hard times ahead.
The poster campaign was one of the few selfless things Maureen had done with Douglas's money. Leslie didn't tell the committee they were doing it. They plastered the city with the posters in one long night, working from west to east and finishing at dawn. Not many people phoned the funding committee number at the bottom of the poster to protest. The picture was quite obscure and most people didn't know what it was about but, still, the funding cut had been deferred for six months. Everyone in the office had been speculating about the posters after the decision was announced; Leslie called a meeting and admitted responsibility. She told them that her pal had masterminded the scheme, paid for it all herself, and now she'd like to work for them on a voluntary basis if they could find a place for her. They saw that Maureen had a degree and gave her the housing job. She'd been a hero two months ago – everyone in the office wanted to talk to her. The desk she shared with Jan was right by the door and she could hardly get a full hour's work done on any given day because women kept stopping by for a chat. She had a lot more time now.
Work was a reluctant ten-minute stroll from Maureen's house. She hated the ugly office, the endless river of broken women they had to turn away, and her occasional strained run-ins with Leslie. Once or twice in every working day Maureen wanted to get up and walk out but she stopped herself. She'd be letting Leslie down if she chucked it and she was doing something that mattered. She could stay for a short while, until the money ran out. So she was spending her days trying not to cry in front of Jan, avoiding Leslie and writing reports on housing-law regulations with exceptional incompetence.
Jan stood up from her chair and pulled on her coat.
"Benny Hedgehog?" she said, picking up her fag packet.
"Naw," said Maureen, taking one from her own. "I'll just have a Silkie."
They made sure they had a light and headed downstairs to the street.
Staff weren't allowed to smoke in the gray open-plan office. The air conditioning didn't work well so the committee had decided that only the waiting women could smoke. Jan and Maureen spent large portions of their days downstairs trying to think of something to say to each other. Cliques of exiled smokers are usually intimate and pleasurable, coming together as they do in ten-minute bursts of addicts' camaraderie. At the PSS Maureen found herself spending a lot of time with Jan and other women in whom she had no interest, trying to participate in conversations without crying, grasping for the appropriate response when Jan upped the friendship gears with whispered confidences.
"You all right?" asked Jan, as they took the first flight of stairs. "You look a bit pale today."
"I need a fag."
"I think you're getting the flu." Jan lowered her voice. "Did ye hear about Ann?"
"Ann?" said Maureen.
"Ann Harris, remember? She came to us, she was all cuts and bruises and didn't want to go to Casualty. She moved into Leslie's shelter."
Maureen did remember Ann because of her peculiar coloring. Ann's pink skin clashed with her yellow hair, making her look angry or ashamed or on the verge of throwing up. She wore a big yellow-gold identity bracelet that accentuated the discord, as if she were decorating the mistake. Maureen had noticed that wearing big jewelry was a feature of the very rich and the very poor for essentially the same reasons. But she remembered Ann most vividly because so few women came in after a bad beating. For most the decision to leave was a long, slow dawning.
Ann had come in wild-eyed and badly beaten, smelling like a long binge on cheap drink, asking for the pictures to be taken before she was even assured of a place. The Criminal Compensation Board photographs were always offered to the women. They provided evidence for interdicts and criminal prosecutions. Usually the women didn't want proof, they just wanted to get away and feel safe, but Ann wanted them. She didn't want to prosecute, she said, just wanted a record, just in case. She sat next to Maureen on one of the plastic chairs, waiting to be interviewed, and then waiting again for Katia to set up the camera. She sat staring at the floor, taking the fags Maureen offered her, smoking around the split on her bottom lip. The swelling was as thick as a thumb, like a localized collagen implant.
"Well," continued Jan, "she's disappeared." She looked shocked, as if the end of the story had come as a complete surprise to her.
"She's probably lying drunk somewhere," said Maureen.
"No," said Jan, "because she emptied her locker and she's gone."
"Well, she's left, then," said Maureen. "What's surprising about that? Lots of women leave without saying anything."
Jan had heard the story from someone else and they had been very surprised. She didn't remember why but she knew that they were. She opened the glass door and slipped out into the street, feeling sure she had forgotten part of the story.