The Rapture (14 page)

I can't continue. My sudden burst of conviction, if that's what it was, has evaporated as quickly as it arrived. I sink back down on the pillow. Frazer Melville doesn't speak.

At half past three there's an update. Reports about the extent of the damage are confused, but the quake, whose epicentre is in the Sea of Marmara, just outside the city, measured 7.7 on the Richter scale. It struck at fourteen minutes to one local time, and triggered a mini tsunami that swept south of the conurbation. First estimates say that about forty per cent of the city is affected. At least ten thousand buildings have been destroyed, among them the famous Blue Mosque. Skyscrapers and homes and office blocks and schools have collapsed. I imagine toy building blocks, and a pall of cement dust. It's not yet dawn, so there's almost zero visibility, and a high risk of aftershocks. First estimates say tens of thousands will be dead or injured and trapped. How many doctors, over the next few days, will be asking those saved from the wreckage whether they're aware of any sensation below the waist? Or the neck?

I feel nothing. Then, just as I am beginning to wonder why I am not reacting, the top half of my body starts to sweat, and then shake. Tonight it is a nightmare. But soon it will officially be day. And real.

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.'

I look. There are certainly plenty of listings. 'An amateur geologist from Whitstable,' murmurs Sheldon-Gray, now determined to enjoy himself. 'A woman called Mitzi in Prague quoting the Book of Revelation: "
There was a great earthquake and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair and the moon became as blood and every mountain and island were moved out of their places
." We have entered the seven-year Tribulation, she says, when the raptured shall ascend to Heaven and the sinners burn in hellfire. Well, we're all aware of Pentecostalism being the new European craze . . . here's another one: someone in Utah who works with crystals, calling herself Daughter of the Planet,' he reads. 'Crystals are also very
a la
mode
nowadays too, I understand, we mustn't underestimate them, must we.' He scrolls down. 'I am sure that if we were to investigate Nostradamus, we would find a reference there too.' I close my eyes and open them again. He is still there. 'You've been in this business long enough to know the pitfalls, Gabrielle. We all find ourselves vulnerable around some of these very, er,
intense
young people. The professional thing is to recognise that vulnerability and take the appropriate steps to counter these, er, unhelpful impulses and reactions.'
Bibble babble
, says Bethany in my head, and I squash a panic impulse to laugh aloud.

'Are you saying I've mishandled Bethany's case?' I say, trying to keep my voice even. But I don't manage it, and my boss's shockingly blue eyes adjust themselves accordingly. Perhaps they are multi-functional, and he will now use them to X-ray the contents of my skull in search of proof that I have a screw loose.

'Well, what do you think?' he asks with a weary sigh. I don't know his age, but suddenly he looks it. A man with a pension plan and a set of discreet escape routes. 'Look,' he says, gesturing at his screen. 'You can see from this that the world is full of people like Bethany Krall. Our job is to free them of their fantasies, not collude in them.' He smooths down his pink-and-grey tie and picks up the phone, indicating that our meeting is over, and begins to dial. I feel instantly uneasy. Who is he going to call, and what is he going to ask them?

'And if we can't manage that, Gabrielle,' he says, almost as an afterthought, receiver cocked to his ear, 'well. The fact is, if we can't manage that,
we do not have a job.'

When I drop in on Bethany later that day, it seems that she has heard about the earthquake, despite being in seclusion.

'Jackpot, Wheels,' she greets me. Her eyes are woozed, as though she's seeing oncoming headlights, and welcoming them.

'How do you know?'

'It woke me up. I can still feel it,' she says, pressing her palm to her almost breastless ribcage. 'In here. And all over my skin. Now are you going to tell me I'm wrong?'

'No. It happened.'

'And are you going to tell me it's a coincidence?'

Nothing in my training has prepared me for something like this. But it has taught me 'solutions' -what Bethany might call babble responses - to certain situations. Like now. 'Yes,' I say. 'I'm going to tell you I think it's a coincidence. So would Dr Ehmet, who has family in Istanbul.'

'Of course he'll say that. Because it's the only thing he can say, because he didn't listen to me when he should've.' She lowers her head so it's level with mine. 'You've got to get me out of here,' she whispers urgently. 'Can't you see that, you dumb cow?'

'I can see that's what you want, Bethany,' I say. 'But you're in here for your own safety. And other people's. You're here to get well.'

'You know that's fucking bullshit,' says Bethany. Her eyes are darker than usual. 'I need to get out of here. This earthquake's, like,
nothing
. There's way worse coming. I can feel it, yeah. Seriously. It's fuckingmega. On October the twelfth. The big one. I don't want to die in here. I need to get out. You've got to help me.'

I feel phantom pins and needles in my legs. Anxiety. 'What's happening on October the twelfth?'

Bethany kicks at the floor with her scuffed black trainer. Her face is like the faint jazz of an oncoming storm. 'It's something new. No one's seen it before. It starts in one place and it spreads everywhere. Too fast for anyone to do anything about it. Just help me get out of this place, Wheels. I don't want to fucking drown. Not here.'

'Is it a flood you're talking about then? A flood in the UK?'

'It's more than that. But I don't know what.' Her eyes flicker warily and her voice becomes urgent. She seems scared. 'It's your job to help me, right? So help me.'

As I make my way to the lift, Frazer Melville calls.

'What time do you finish work?'

'Five-thirty.'

'Can you come to my office at the university? Bring Bethany's notebooks - all of them. Can you get here by six?'

When is an appropriate moment to tell a man that his existence weakens you? When is an appropriate time to admit that you can no longer control your heart? Not now. Not ever.

'I'll see you there,' I tell him casually.

When carrying a body up two flights of stairs, there is only one convenient method, which is that favoured by firemen when they rescue people from burning buildings. Hence the ignominious position I find myself in now, slung over Frazer Melville's broad shoulder like a sack, while he puffs his way doggedly up the steps, the bag containing Bethany's notebooks - which I sneaked out of Oxsmith under my gel cushion - swinging off his other arm. If there was any residual coolness between us after this morning, the comedy implicit in this indignity has put an end to it. We stop on each landing, so that he can regain his breath and I can laugh -because it's either that or cry, and when there's a choice between humiliation and amusement, I know which response is best in buildings with no decent access. The university's physics department is housed in an ancient block that is undergoing some kind of elaborate reconstruction involving multi-layered scaffolding and the removal of asbestos. As soon as I saw the entrance, I recognised it as unfriendly. Not to say actively hostile. 'I'm sorry,' Frazer Melville apologises again, still puffing. 'I should have thought about it. It's just that I keep forgetting you're disabled.'