Page 64 of A Helpin g Hand for the Village Nurse

‘I’m not really hungry,’ Ottilie replied.

‘You must want something – even if you don’t fancy it, you need a bit of fuel inside you. How about I see if they have a pasty or something? I’m sure Magnus would warm it for you in his microwave.’

Ottilie nodded, though she wasn’t bothered either way. At least it seemed to make Lavender happy.

‘I’ll be back in a tick,’ she said, hurrying towards the stairs.

Ottilie could hear Fliss talking in the next room. It sounded like a one-sided conversation, as if she might be on the phone. Ottilie pulled out her own and scrolled through some old emails, looking for the phone number of her home insurance. It was probably a good idea for her to make some phone calls too, and that was perhaps the most important one.

Twenty minutes later, Ottilie’s phone call had ended. She’d been staring into space in the five minutes since, and it was only the sound of Lavender knocking on her door that snapped her out of it.

‘Magnus didn’t have any pasties so I got—’ Lavender strode to the desk and dropped a white paper bag onto it. ‘Ottilie…What on earth is the matter?’

‘I’m fine.’

Lavender clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and frowned. ‘Seriously? This is what fine looks like for you? I can see you’re not fine. What’s wrong? I mean, apart from the obvious. Has something else happened today? Because I know it’s been a stressful one, but you weren’t like this first thing.’

Ottilie wondered whether she’d simply been hiding it better first thing. But first thing she hadn’t had a conversation with her home insurers that had ended in her being told that she wasn’t covered for flooding. First thing she hadn’t been staring down the fact that her home was conceivably damaged beyond what she could afford to fix, and first thing she wasn’t contemplating the idea that she had no plan B. All her money, everything Josh had left her, had been sunk into the gorgeous cottage that was meant to be her new forever home, somewhere she could feel safe and start again without him. But what now? Now it was under water, and even when that was resolved – as it would naturally be, she supposed – what was she to do about the inevitable damage?

She tried to see it logically. She didn’t yet know how much damage there was and it might not be so bad. But she was buckling already under the weight of everything that had gone before, and this was the final straw that everyone talked about, the one that would break her back.

‘You should go home,’ Lavender said. ‘Let me ring round and cancel your appointments. It’s bound to be on your mind and I’m sure Fliss will agree that you need to be on site, doing the necessary.’

‘But there’s nothing I can do, is there? Until the water goes, what is there to do?’

‘I don’t know, but there’s no point in you being here.’

‘You and Fliss are here, and you had flooding too.’

‘Fliss has her other half on hand to deal with that, and so do I. You have?—’

Lavender stopped mid-sentence, but it didn’t matter, because Ottilie knew what she was about to say and it was true – she had nobody to help her. The thought of going home to face that mess alone seemed so overwhelming that she suddenly wanted to burst into tears. But she wouldn’t allow that to happen.

‘At least there’s no more rain in the forecast, so with a bit of luck the levels will go down quickly,’ Lavender added. ‘That’s a silver lining, isn’t it?’

Fliss appeared at the doorway and looked pointedly at Ottilie. ‘Are you still here? Surely none of your patients are so urgent they can’t wait? You must want to go home and start sorting out?’

Ottilie fought harder to keep the tears at bay as she shook her head. ‘I don’t want to look at it. I don’t know where to start. At least here I feel useful; I know what I’m doing. There…I feel so helpless.’

‘Have you called your insurers?’ Fliss asked.

‘Yes.’

‘Good, at least that’s one thing you’ve dealt with. I can give you the number of a professional who might be able to help with the clean-up, and I’m sure Victor will bring his pump round as soon as he can. Everyone’s in this together and we’ll all help each other out. Chin up, Ottilie. It seems hopeless now, but in a few weeks we’ll be dried out and decorated again and it will be like it never happened.’

Ottilie nodded, her throat tightening. She wanted to give words of appreciation, to thank Fliss for her encouragement, but she couldn’t. Instead, her throat narrowed and her heart started to pound and the room began to spin around her, and though she pulled and pulled she couldn’t get any air into her lungs. She knew what was happening to her and she knew how to stop it – she was a nurse after all – but she couldn’t. It was like she’d left her body to drive itself, looking helplessly on from the sidelines as she gasped for air and her heart beat at twice the speed it was meant to.

And then Fliss’s face was close to hers, calm and sure. ‘Breathe…that’s it, grab a hold of it and breathe…’

Ottilie wanted to, she really did, but she could only stare at Fliss, hearing her words but barely comprehending them.

‘Ottilie!’

Fliss’s hands were on her shoulders. She twisted to look at Lavender. ‘Top drawer of my desk…little bottle of rescue drops. Nip and get them, would you?’

Lavender rushed off while Fliss turned back to Ottilie. She was in total control, her words calm, her tone measured. ‘It’ll pass in a minute, I promise. Try to breathe for me – I know it’s hard, but try anyway.’

Ottilie closed her eyes. What was happening to her? She’d been anxious before, but never like this. And in the background there was shame. Whatever else was going on here, she didn’t want Fliss to see her like this. She didn’t want anyone to see her like this. She fought harder for control, trying to concentrate on slowing her breathing.

---