My gaze falls on the noticeboard: there’s that puff piece the paper ran last Christmas about our work. There we all are in the picture, one smiling team. I’m in the back row. They worry we feel forgotten about, up here. Head office is in London, a much bigger organisation the helpline was folded into a few years ago. But I don’t care about recognition, or team-building. I just couldn’t think of an excuse quick enough to get out of the photo shoot.
I’ve helped out here for a while now, taking the weekend late shifts when other people are busy with friends and family. I’ve let them think it is because I’m busy with work the rest of the time. I don’t want the looks.
My shift started at five, and now I am feeling hungry too. I’ll make another cup of tea for me, and then take my break when Alma’s back and head to Pret, I decide. Alma’s strict. She won’t even go for a loo break unless the junior volunteer’s sitting ready in their chair, which I suppose is as it should be. I wonder if I should go and treat us to one of those mini bottles of wine, half a plastic glass each as we face the night shift ahead. But no, Alma and her rules, she—
When the phone rings I actually jump a little in my chair. First one of the night for me. I pick up within the promised three rings. We don’t even get headsets.
‘Hello,’ I say, making my voice sound warm and calm. ‘You’ve reached the Message in a Bottle helpline. I’m Kate.’
A click. Sometimes that happens, they lose their nerve, we were told in the training. There was less said about the prank callers, bored teenagers and men who’d like to hear a stranger’s voice.
It’s been slow tonight. Alma had been right onto the last few, dispatching each caller with practised ease. ‘Oh, I know love, it is hard, isn’t it, but it’s never too late to build bridges, you know. In the meantime, I know they’ll be so glad to hear you’re safe, now are you sure you don’t want me to take a phone number for you too, schedule a little check-in call from us in a day or two …’
That’s what we do here: people who have run away from home call us and we pass on messages to their loved ones.
RAN AWAY?
Send a message to let them know you’re safe
NO QUESTIONS ASKED
Just phone and give your message
We will pass it on
Send a MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE
That’s what the advert says. They’re all over the place, if you know to look for them: in churches, community centres, sometimes a local paper, if they can find the budget.
Alma’s brilliant at it actually, wheedling out parents’ names, half-forgotten postcodes, ‘how are things with you now?’, sketching over sad details of treatment centres and ‘no fixed abode’, the detritus of broken lives, sounding for all the world like some cosy great-aunt at a family party. She may look like the president of her local WI – that’s exactly what she is – but Alma knows what she’s doing. Building bridges, keeping lines of communication open, delivering messages to family desperate to know something, anything, about their beloved husband, cousin, son … daughter.
As for me, I struggle to build rapport with callers, I’m told, can come across just a little chilly – I even, according to one feedback form (they’re big on all that here, inevitably, there’s endless briefing and de-briefing) lack ‘empathy’ with callers’ situations. Which I find somewhat ironic, to say the least.
But if I can’t be Miss Popularity, at least I’m reliable.
The phone goes again, startling me out of my thoughts, and I pick it up again. The static bursts into my ear, making me wince, then the line quietens to a low buzz.
‘Hello,’ I say. ‘You’ve reached the Message in a Bottle helpline.’ I know: the name is unbearably cutesy. ‘I’m Kate.’
No response. Then another round of pops on the line.
‘Is someone there?’ Perhaps this is a mis-dial, some automated call-centre system gone wrong before a worker gets patched in from his desk in Glasgow or Mumbai to try to sell me something.
‘Hello?’ I say again. There’s a burst of static, but beneath it I can hear muffled sounds now, like someone talking through water.
It’d better not be a crank. We have rules of course, can’t be rude even if they are drunk kids dialling in – ‘You never know why someone might be calling in,’ Alma will tell newbies solemnly, ‘even a prank call could really be a cry for help.’ So when I do get the odd heavy breather whispering obscenities or teenagers giggling into the handset, I make absolutely sure she is out of earshot before I give them a few sharp words, inform them I can trace the call and hang up. They don’t need to know that I can’t.
The line goes quiet again, then someone is there, suddenly real and breathing quickly.
‘Hello, Message in a Bottle,’ I say. ‘You’re speaking to Kate.’ There’s static again and I pull the handset an inch from my ear. ‘Do you need me to call anyone for you?’
More crackles.
‘This line’s terrible, I’m afraid. Is there anyone you’d like us to send a message to?’
It sounds like someone’s talking very far away, but I can’t make out the words. I can stay on the line as long as I feel the need to. I swivel in my chair and look out of the window. The last of the sun is slipping behind the jagged skyline, low rays of light striking the wall behind me as it flares out.
I try again, starting to work through our questions. ‘Are you in a safe place?’
A lull, then ‘… hear me?’ It’s a woman’s voice, a tinny whisper against the buzzing.
‘Yes, I can. Take all the time you need.’ I sip my cooling tea. I never want to scare them away.
‘You’re there!’ The relief’s palpable in her voice, low and hushed. She’s young – they often are.
‘Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere,’ I say. ‘Whenever you’re ready to talk.’ The Post-it I’ve stuck to my handset reminds me of our latest prompt, by order of the helpline’s harried volunteer manager, Chrissie. ‘If you prefer to text, we can, no problem. We now do—’
She interrupts me. ‘I’ve got to be quick. I need you to tell them not to worry any more about their daughter. That she … that I’m fine—’
The words are drowned out by static again. ‘Who? Who do you want me to tell?’ Suddenly my heart is racing.
Silence, then the voice, now tiny, like it’s very far away, ‘… not to worry if they don’t hear from me after this, it only hurts …’ and it’s gone again.
‘I can’t hear you, sweetie.’ I’m gripping my headset to my ears, pressing harder, harder, straining to hear. The line pops and sings.
Then the voice again, now clear, one that I know better than any other. ‘… are Kate and Mark Har—’ My skin is cold, all over.
‘Sophie,’ I say. Finally allowing myself to finally say it. ‘Sophie, is that you?’
But then there’s another burst of static, I can’t tell if she’s still talking.
‘Are you still there?’ I wait, my heart pounding. ‘Are you still there?’
‘Yes, yes, I’m here,’ she says. ‘I’m still here.’
‘Love you, So,’ I say.
It’s all I want to tell her, in the end. I don’t know what she’s going to answer, and then—
The dial tone sounds, too loud as I strain to hear. I breathe out, setting the phone back, slowly.
Every part of me knows that voice. My daughter, Sophie.
By the time Alma’s back, I’m calmer, at least on the surface. I’m good at that. You’re so calm, people kept telling me. And later: I can’t believe how calm you’re being about it. I knew it wasn’t a compliment.
But I find I can’t quite sit still, my mind replaying those few syllables over and over: ‘Kate and Mark Har—’. She was about to say Harlow, I know. ‘Kate and Mark Harlow.’
I’ve told Alma what’s happened, the call that’s finally come for me, that I’ve always expected. The reason, she will know without me having to tell her, that I started to volunteer here.
‘Well, I’m so glad, dear,’ she said, after a pause. ‘I know you’ve been waiting a very long time, haven’t you.’ I returned her hug, so she couldn’t see my eyes fill with tears. Her soft cardigan had her perfume – rose scent and custard creams.