The Reunion

Walter felt that RenÉe should be in charge of hiring a fourth staff member. She had a good eye, according to him.

‘And we don’t?’ I said to Jeanine.

‘So it seems.’

RenÉe placed ads in the main newspapers and called the employment agencies. She got so involved with it that the bulk of her workload fell to Jeanine and me. She spent entire afternoons meeting more and less suitable people, but no one was taken on.

‘It’s so difficult to find good staff,’ she said, shaking her head as she came out of the meeting room after yet another interview. ‘Before you know it, you’re overrun with people who think that office support is nothing more than typing and faxing. Try and build a good, solid team from that.’

And so we struggled on, because the Trust was growing and work was piling up.

We worked overtime every day and often through our lunch breaks. I became exhausted. I could no longer sleep properly. I felt hounded. I lay with a pounding heart staring at the ceiling, and as soon as I closed my eyes, found myself overcome by a dizziness that spun me round in accelerating circles. I struggled on for a few months but a year after I began I collapsed. I can’t describe it any other way. A feeling of complete apathy set in, spread through me and made everything look grey.

I pull the pile of mail towards me and open envelopes and remove elastic bands. After half an hour I’m already fed up.

What’s the time? Not yet nine o’clock? How am I going to make it through the day?

I glance across the office. Margot is a few metres away; her desk is against RenÉe’s so that they can talk to each other without me overhearing a thing.

The sales force go in and out with rough copies that need to be typed up, mail that needs to be sent by special delivery. RenÉe delegates like the captain of a ship. She gives the worst jobs to me. And there are quite a few of them. Cardboard boxes to be made up for the archive, coffee to prepare for the meeting room, visitors to collect in the lobby. And it’s still only mid-morning. When I pack up at twelve-thirty, I haven’t exchanged a friendly word with anybody and I’m shattered.

3 (#ulink_0ef4987d-4dbd-5263-9f6d-a929e8d776ec)

I arrive home exhausted. My face is drained, I have sweat patches under my arms and my two-room apartment is a tip. After the utilitarian neatness of the office, my scruffy furniture seems even more tightly crammed together.

I’ve never quite managed to turn this flat into a real home, or to put my own stamp on it. As a teenager I dreamed of the moment I’d live alone, and I knew exactly how I’d arrange things. I could picture it entirely.

No one warned me that my entire salary would go on mortgage repayments and the weekly shop. That I wouldn’t have enough money left to keep up with the latest trends. When I go into the kitchen I have stop myself from tearing the brown and orange 1970s tiles from the walls. I could invest in new tiles but not without upsetting the harmonious balance of the brown cabinets and the coffee-coloured lino. So I leave it as it is. My burn-out saps me dry. I lie down on the sofa like a squeezed-out lemon.

I lived at home for the first year of my studies. It wasn’t so bad. I didn’t have to worry about washing and ironing. And in the evenings dinner was always ready on the table, meat and fresh vegetables, instead of the junk the other students were eating. Most of all, it was nice at home. I didn’t think about moving out until my parents decided to emigrate. I was nineteen when they told me about their plans, and I completely flipped out. Where on earth had they got the idea that I was a grown-up? That I could stand on my own two feet and didn’t need their help anymore? I wouldn’t be able to manage without them. Where would I go to at the weekend? Where would I belong? I sat next to my parents on the sofa, covered my face with my hands and burst into tears.

Afterwards I felt a bit ashamed that I’d made it so difficult for Mum and Dad. Robin told me later that they’d considered calling the whole thing off but that he’d convinced them not to let me rule their lives so much.

They gave me the money to buy a flat in Amsterdam and they left. They came back to visit me at the drop of a hat, but only at the beginning.

My answering machine is flashing. A message?

I press the play button, curious. The engaged tone—whoever called didn’t bother to leave a message. I press delete. If there’s one thing I hate, it’s people who hang up after the beep. I can spend the rest of the day wondering who called.

It can’t have been my mother because when she calls she talks until the whole tape is full. She spends most of the year with my father in their house in Spain. I hardly see them.

It was probably Robin, my brother. He rarely calls, only when it is absolutely necessary. If he gets the answering machine he seldom leaves a message.

In the kitchen, I flip down the breadboard, get the strawberries from the fridge, pull a couple of slices of brown bread from the bag and make my usual lunch. There’s nothing more delicious than fresh strawberries on bread. I’m addicted. I think they’ve even helped my depression. Strawberries in yoghurt, strawberries with cream, strawberries on rusk. Each year as the strawberries in the supermarket become more and more tasteless, I begin to worry. The season is over, and that means going cold turkey. Perhaps there are addictive substances in strawberries, like in chocolate. That’s something else I’m hooked on. In the winter I always eat a thick layer of Nutella on bread, and put on weight.

While I’m halving my strawberries, my thoughts turn to that missed call. Maybe it wasn’t Robin but Jeanine. But why would she call me? We haven’t been in contact for such a long time.

I stuff an enormous strawberry into my mouth, and gaze out of the kitchen window. Jeanine and I hit it off immediately but the bond didn’t stretch further than the office until just before I went off sick. She came by a couple of times in the beginning, but someone who lies listlessly on the sofa, staring into midair, is hardly good company. We drifted out of touch. Still, I was looking forward to seeing her again, and I didn’t blame her for not going to more trouble. I was hard work.

Jeanine opens the door and her head is covered in foil. ‘Sabine!’

We look at each other a little ill at ease. Just as I’m about to mumble an apology for my unexpected appearance, she opens the door wide. ‘I thought you were Mark. Come in!’

We kiss each other on the cheek.

‘Suits you,’ I say, looking at the foil in her hair.

‘I’m in the middle of dyeing it, that’s why I’m wearing this old housecoat. You can still see the stains from last time. I almost jumped out of my skin when the bell went.’

‘Then you shouldn’t have opened the door.’

‘I always want to know who’s standing at my door. Luckily it was you.’

I decide to take that as a compliment. ‘Who’s Mark?’ I ask as we make our way along the narrow hall to the living room.

‘A sexy thing I’ve been seeing for a couple of weeks. He’s seen me without make-up, he’s seen my dirty knickers in the laundry basket and he knows that I slurp when I eat, but I’d still rather he didn’t know I dyed my hair.’ Jeanine chuckles and drops down onto the sofa. Her housecoat falls open a little and reveals a faded pink T-shirt with holes in it.

If Mark’s not welcome tonight, perhaps I’m not either. I sink into a wicker chair with a white cushion; it’s more comfortable than I’d expected. We look at each other and smile uncertainly.

‘Do you want some coffee? Or is it time for something stronger?’ She glances at the clock. ‘Half-eight. Wine?’

‘I’ll start with a coffee,’ I say but as she’s walking to the kitchen I call after her, ‘and bring the wine out with it.’

I hear laughter from the kitchen. It was a good idea to visit Jeanine. A bit of a gossip and a bottle of wine, much better than an evening in my flat. This is the kind of life I’d imagined when I moved out of home.

‘Are you back at work?’ Jeanine is carrying two mugs of coffee. She puts them down, fetches two wine glasses from the cupboard and places them alongside.

‘Today was my first day back.’

‘And? How did it go?’

I take my coffee from the table and peer into the mug. ‘It was…’ I search for the right word. ‘I was happy when it was twelve-thirty.’

‘Awful then.’

‘You could say that.’

We drink our coffee in silence.

‘That’s why I left,’ Jeanine says after a while. ‘RenÉe was only taking on people she could manipulate. The atmosphere had changed so much. I told Walter that when I resigned. But you know what he’s like—crazy about our dictator. How did she act towards you?’

‘We hardly spoke to each other. Or to be exact, I hardly spoke to anybody. Most of the people were completely new to me and only about half of them took the trouble to introduce themselves. I had a lovely time opening the post and making cardboard boxes.’

‘You have to leave, as soon as possible.’

‘And then what?’

‘You’ll find something else. Just register with a temping agency.’