Fractured(49)

‘Sshh,’ I giggled back, but was pleased I wasn’t alone in my assessment.

With the problem taken care of, Louise sent the junior on their way and turned back to us saying, ‘I’m not quite sure what you want to do next. Would you just like to wander about and say hi to people or do you want to have a poke around at your desk?’

‘Er, just the desk, please, I think.’

‘All right then. Well, good luck. I’m sure I’ll see you again before you leave.’ And with that she turned to walk away.

‘Um, Louise.’

She turned back and was a fraction too slow in sliding the smile across the look of irritation on her face. The I’m-a-busy-woman-and-I-really-don’t-have-time-for-this look was just peeking out from beneath.

‘Which one is my desk?’

A look of almost delighted astonishment filled her face.

‘Oh my God. You really do have amnesia! How bizarre! Matt said you did… But, well, it’s just so utterly unusual.’

Her fascination with my condition lasted all the way to my desk as we wove around and between the cubicles of my co-workers. Some dismissed me with a fleeting glance, but many of them looked up and smiled. I smiled at everyone; just in case I knew them well.

Eventually she stopped in front of an area where two desks sat face to face. A young woman sat in one, banging furiously away at the keyboard in front of her.

‘Dee, can you spare some time to show Rachel a few things?’ And then, as though imparting the most delicious of secrets, she stage whispered, ‘She really does have amnesia!’

We waited until she had gone, then the young woman got up from her chair and held out her hand in greeting.

‘Hi. I’m Dee Ellis and we both joined the magazine at about the same time.’

I nodded, and smiled back at her, unable to think of anything to say.

‘And we both can’t stand Louise.’

I grasped her extended hand warmly. I didn’t know who the heck she was but I felt I had just found a friend.

Dee was extremely patient but I could tell from the surreptitious glances at the wall clock and her computer that we were keeping her from her work.

‘Look, I can see you’re busy, please don’t feel you have to babysit me here.’

She smiled ruefully.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said apologetically. ‘Big deadline coming up. You know how it is.’

I didn’t actually.

‘Is there anything Rachel can look at while she’s here? Perhaps something she was working on last week that might help her to remember anything?’

Dee looked directly at Jimmy and, unlike Louise, I could see that she had warmed to him in an instant. I liked her even more.

‘Well, there’s nothing that she was in the middle of.’ She frowned as though searching for a key to unlock a door. ‘You’d been working really hard to get everything done before your friend’s wedding. How was that, by the way?’

‘I missed it.’

‘Bummer.’ She bit her lip in concentration. ‘Oh I know. Would it be useful if you looked through some of the articles you’ve worked on in the last few months? Is that the sort of thing that might help?’

‘That would be great,’ I assured her.

She disappeared from us then, murmuring something about ‘archives’ and while we waited I sat down at the vacant desk. There were no personal items cluttering up its surface and nothing to be found in either of the two drawers, except the expected stationery. I shut the drawers with a guilty slam when Dee returned carrying a stack of magazines, feeling like I’d been caught snooping.

‘Here we are. You can see which ones you were involved with from the indexes. And I’ve just checked that the conference room is free, so if you like you can browse through them in comfort in there.’

Although constructed of wall-to-wall glass, the conference room at least gave us some degree of privacy from the open-plan office. Jimmy laid the stack of magazines he had taken from Dee’s arms down on the polished oak table and pulled out a couple of the comfortably padded chairs. I checked out the dates of the issues, and dragged the earliest one towards me. Jimmy plucked a random one from the pile and when I raised an eyebrow to look at him questioningly, he gave a boyish shrug.

‘I thought I could do the quizzes while I’m waiting.’

We sat in silence, reading the back issues for several hours. Twice Jimmy left and returned with Styrofoam cups of something hot and brown from the nearby vending machine. The room was filled with nothing but the sound of turning pages.

‘You know, some of my stuff is really quite good,’ I observed, closing another magazine and placing it on the completed pile on the table.