Liz Jensen - The Rapture

Frazer Melville and I have not been acquainted long enough to fathom each other’s behaviour in a crisis so when he turns his back on me, I do not take it personally. He needs space to think. But I wonder nonetheless what is going through his mind. Does he resent me for wanting to pick his brains at the charity event at the hotel, for dragging him into this? Do I resent him for not knowing what to do now, for not comforting me with the reassurance that it’s a coincidence, just like the hurricane? Together, we are alone. We cannot help each other, any more than we can help the people of Istanbul. Clumsily, I roll away from him and do battle with my thoughts.

At five he gets up silently and makes us both coffee. We barely speak. We drink it in bed, with the TV news on. Most of Istanbul is razed to the ground. At least three oil tankers have sunk. The Bosphorus is mayhem. Onshore, women wail amid the rubble, men storm about with spades. A baby screams hysterically, without seeming to draw breath. A thick eiderdown of dust covers the devastated city. Fires have broken out because of gas leaks. The images are beyond terrible. We watch, transfixed. Frazer Melville barely blinks.

On one comfortingly diminished plane of logic, I am thinking: coincidences happen . But another, more grandiose, legalistic counter-thought runs: Frazer Melville and Gabrielle Fox, because they had knowledge they did not disseminate, are responsible for manslaughter on a massive scale, and at worst are mass murderers by default. Their sins of omission have led to atrocity on the scale of any war crime.

We will go our separate ways. We are not a couple. We are two distinct and very different people on the verge of an abyss we could never have imagined. There’s no rule-book on how to behave in these circumstances. Frazer Melville leaves the house before me. Feeling foolish but defiant, I go online and donate a thousand pounds to Merlin, a small but apparently highly effective disaster relief charity which my father became involved with when he retired. But although the indirect supply of tents and doctors and pharmaceuticals to Turkey’s victims makes me feel better, it’s brief. Within minutes of logging off, the guilt has swamped me again.

At nine I leave for work as usual. Because I don’t know what else to do.

The heat has become so ferocious that venturing outside is an ordeal, something one must gear up to, armed with drinking water, sunglasses, cream, headgear. Items that were once optional accessories are now survival kit. Out on the street, the sky bears down like a low ceiling that will collapse at any moment under the pressure of the sun. It’s too hot for the gloves I normally use for the chair, so on the way to the car, my hands slip on the wheels. By the time I get to Oxsmith, I’m ready to smash something, which is ironic, given that my morning is taken up by two sessions of anger management, in which I must try to pass on advice and wisdom that I am catastrophically failing to heed myself. While I have seventeen teenagers all breathing in rhythm, and envisioning serene landscapes, positive energy, and blah blah, I am frantically plotting my next move. Which is a trip in the lift to my boss’s office, because saying nothing about Bethany’s prediction is no longer an option. I know Sheldon-Gray is going to take this badly, and already I am despising him for it.

No sweaty stuff today, no rowing machines, no towel-rubbing, no ungk and gah. Dr Sheldon-Gray is fully dressed, in a pink shirt and pink-and-grey tie. The smooth skin around his clipped goatee looks freshly exfoliated and moisturised. This level of care indicates he has meetings lined up. Real meetings, with real people.

I do not count. I realise I have drunk too much coffee. I’m jittery with caffeine.

‘So who’s the latest problem?’ demands my boss as soon as I appear in his line of vision. Since asking for Joy McConey’s notes and leaving the charity event early, I have fallen out of favour. I am now officially an annoyance. ‘I’ll take a bet on it being our little auto-asphyxiating Tourette’s friend, whats is name.’ He drums his fingers on the polished walnut of his desk.

‘No. In fact, I wanted to talk about the Istanbul earthquake.’

‘Terrible tragedy. Appalling. Yes. Hassan Ehmet has family nearby. He’s taking time off. No flights going there at the moment, but he’s managed to get one to Athens that’s leaving around now — drove up to Gatwick first thing, called me from there.’ Dr Ehmet, with his little ‘heh’ and his bad haircut and his PhD thesis waiting at the printer’s at Oxford University Press: how will he cope in the midst of a catastrophe on this scale? ‘He plans to drive across,’ Sheldon-Gray is saying. ‘Frankly, I doubt we’ll get him back. Turkey’s going to need all the trauma counsellors it can get. So we’ll be stretched here again, I’m afraid. What’s new, eh? Anyway, you wanted to say?’

‘Bethany Krall.’ His face tightens and clouds over. But before he can protest, I get straight to the point. When I explain that Bethany Krall apparently made an accurate prediction about the quake — as lightly as I can, which is not very, because I am actually scared and angry, and can’t be bothered to hide it — he starts rocking in his chair. When I mention Hurricane Stella — another ‘prediction’ — Sheldon-Gray twitches his head like a cow shaking off flies. I realise that he respects me some sixty per cent less for having raised the matter. Feels a forty per cent increase in contempt, even. I can’t blame him. Most of me feels the same. When I offer to explain in more detail, he declines in a way that brooks no argument. For a psychiatrist used to hiding his emotions, he is unusually transparent. Elaborately adjusting his cuffs, he takes a deep breath.

‘Gabrielle, I am shocked and disappointed and — yes, I’ll say it — appalled . I had thought more highly of you. Look. You can be sure Bethany told Hassan all this nonsense too. The difference is, he’s a scientist.’ But how has Dr Ehmet reacted? I wonder. What does Sheldon-Gray know about it, if Hassan’s on a plane? ‘History is repeating itself here, is it not?’ the man in pink continues loudly. His voice has a politician’s edge to it. There are times when you feel very alone in your body. This is one of those times. I would like to slide away and replace myself with a clone whose face doesn’t redden. ‘Let me tell you something you should know about your predecessor. We talked before about her notes, and why I removed them from the file. The fact is, they show that Joy McConey became disastrously involved in Bethany’s fantasies. She ended up convinced that her predictions were coming true. I’m sorry to tell you I’m having deja vu here. Joy McConey sat right where you are now and made claims about Bethany which clearly showed her to be unbalanced.’ I nod. ‘So perhaps you can understand that I am alarmed when you too begin to show signs of being gullible? Will you also be needing some time out?’ He spits out the cliché. like the hairball it is, and nudges at his mousepad.

‘But the earthquake — she predicted it to the day. That’s simply a fact. Hurricane Stella too.’

‘Gabrielle. Have you by any chance heard of the internationally renowed search engine Google?’

I guess it’s another rhetorical question so I don’t answer. I want to grab him by his pink tie and strangle him but he has somehow succeeded in knocking me back. ‘Let’s just type in ‘Istanbul earthquake predictions’, shall we, and then advance our search, as the technology permits us , to specify dates preceding the quake.’ He clicks ostentatiously. ‘And look what pops up. Aha. Aha. Yes, well. No surprises here, Gabrielle, or at least not to me. Just a quick glance at this screenful of information here is enough to tell me that young Bethany Krall may not be alone in having, er, foreseen this tragedy.’