Rosie Dixon's Complete Confessions

“Have some more wine. It tastes like gnat’s piss but there’s nothing else.” Quint fills my glass to the brim before I can say anything and puts half a sausage in his mouth. “Cheers.”

I remove the piece of sausage from the front of my uniform and raise my glass. He is so uncouth but it is Christmas and I don’t want to be unkind.

On my right, Fatcock—I mean, Fishlock is telling Penny about this book where they had a dinner party and the man put blobs of cream on the girl’s breasts and licked them off. It does not take them long to get down to brass tacks, does it? Penny is saying that brandy butter would be even better. She does ask for trouble, that girl.

“I was thinking of going for a walk after lunch,” says Robert. “Would you like to come?”

“I’m not so sure about the walk,” says Penny. “But the rest of it sounds delicious.”

Robert takes a swig of wine and I can see his nostrils quivering. “Would you care to pull my cracker?” he drawls.

“Love to.”

They grapple under the table for a few minutes where there is a tired crack—I hasten to add that this comes from the cracker they have just pulled.

“What have you got?”

“Another hat.” Robert picks up the motto and starts reading: “What is eight inches long, two inches thick and has two balls?”

“A twin compartment, swivel lid pencil box.”

“That’s right. It could hardly be anything else, could it?”

“It could have been my cock if it had been a couple of inches longer,” says Quint crudely. “Anybody fancy any more turkey?”

“No, thank you,” I say coldly.

“Go on. You don’t look like a girl who has to worry about her figure.”

The blooming cheek of the man! He looks like an advertisement for Michelin tyres and he dares to talk about figures. By the time I have thought of something cutting enough to say, he has taken my plate and shambled off.

“I think he quite fancies you,” says Penny.

“I wouldn’t go for him if he was the last man on earth,” I say furiously.

“You wouldn’t get the chance, darling. I’d be standing over him with a shotgun. How much longer do we have to stay here, Robert?”

“The consultants will carry the flaming Christmas pudding round the flaming room a couple of flaming times and then Matron will say a few flaming words and we’ll give her three flaming cheers and piss off—those of us who can still flaming well stand, that is.”

Robert is quite right about the standing up bit. Everybody around me seems to be well away. Thank goodness poor Labby is not here to see the way her fiancé is behaving with Nurse Wilson. I would not have thought she was like that. Still waters run deep, obviously. And look at Sister Bradley with Shameless. I always thought there was something a bit funny about her. The way he is fiddling with the berries on her holly suggests that they might know each other a bit better than the average doctor and sister in the hospital. Of course, if she pins it there she is asking for trouble.

“Here you are. The turkey was finished so I brought you some Christmas pudding. Do you like it flambé?”

Quint dumps a large helping of flaming pudding in front of me.

“It’s a bit large,” I say.

“Then leave it for a few minutes, it will have burnt away to nothing.”

“I thought you said the consultants were going to carry the pudding round the room?” says Penny.

“Probably the plate was too hot or they cut themselves during the last operation,” says Quint, spraying us with beard-shredded Christmas pudding.

“Or they didn’t want to run the gauntlet of that lot,” Robert nods towards a group of housemen armed with roast potatoes and sprouts who are shouting and booing.

“Oh what fun,” squeals Penny. “Just like Dublin.”

In a few moments it is more like Belfast as a hail of missiles fills the air and people start taking shelter under the tables. I would expect the senior staff to go spare but I see Mr Hockey, one of the top surgeons, hurling rolls with the best of them while Matron is carefully filling her glass below table level.

“I’d love to stay for Matron’s speech,” murmurs Penny into my ear, “but Robert thinks it will be safer at his place. See you.” She gives me a broad wink and the dirty duo scamper towards the door. It’s all right for some, I think bitterly. Of course, I don’t envy them the sex. That isn’t my scene anyway. But I would like a little companionship—especially at Christmas time. At the moment I have nothing except the uncouth Quint, who eats like an extra in an Elizabethan banquet scene. I look across the table and even he seems to have disappeared. The dying embers of his Christmas pudding are extinguished by a direct hit from a dollop of mashed potato. He must be cowering under the table.

“Fellow Adelaideans.” The old geezer sitting next to Matron is trying to make himself heard by banging a bottle on the table. Unfortunately the one he has chosen still has quite a lot of wine in it. “Fellow Adelaideans. We’ve all had a lot of fun and I’m glad to see that your healthy high spirits don’t diminish with the years. But now it’s time to be serious for a minute—” He ducks just in time as a piece of Christmas pudding spatters harmlessly against the wall behind him. There is a shout of “Let the stupid old fart finish what he’s saying.” This is acknowledged with a gracious nod from the head table and a few seconds later Matron rises to her feet still brushing the Graves from her bemedalled bosom. At the same instant I become aware of something rubbing against my knee. What is happening below the table? Is that crude brute, Quint, trying some clumsy pass? I am feeling about as Christmassy as a pair of punctured water wings and in no mood for high jinks. I am fed up with octogenarians molesting me and being exposed to every time I go down the street. Now is the time to take a stand!

An opportunity is not slow to present itself. As Matron starts droning on about the debt we owe to Christian ideals and the kitchen staff I feel something firm, moist and hairy pressing between my legs. This is too much! Quint has chosen the wrong moment to force his unwelcome attentions on me. Gritting my teeth, I draw back a foot and lash out with all my might.

The yelp that follows is impressive, as is the way the table rises a couple of feet into the air. Those Labradors are strong—especially when you kick one of them in the balls. I spring back so fast that the bench I am sitting on collapses and Boy seizes the table cloth and pulls everything on to the floor for twenty feet. It is only the return of his master from the toilet that prevents him from mauling one of the senior consultants who is trying to climb onto a serving trolley.

“Why the hell did you do that?” snarls Quint, when some kind of order has been restored and it is explained to him what happened.

“I thought he was you,” I mutter.

Quint’s laugh is short and insulting. “You flatter yourself, don’t you, woman? You must live in some kind of fantasy world if you honestly believe I’d be likely to make a pass at you.”

It is at that moment that I decide I hate Adam Quint more than any other living thing in the world. There is nothing more infuriating than being spurned by a man you would not touch with a bargepole.

After Christmas everybody is in a filthy mood and good cheer is spread thinner than the marge on the dining hall bread. The patients all behave like kids who have been told that they can’t have any more sweets and the medical staff are liverish and hungover.

In the circumstances, the Eastwood Tennis Club New Year’s Eve Ball suddenly looms like Cinderella’s big night and this is probably one of the reasons why it is such a disaster. That and the fact that Geoffrey does not tell me it is fancy dress—and the fact that nobody realises I am not wearing fancy dress. When the secretary’s wife compliments me on my Carmen Miranda costume I could kill her. The live band is not a success—in fact it is arguable whether some of them are alive and it is the worst possible night for the central heating to break down. I had not realised that we were going with Geoffrey’s mother and father and Mrs Wilkes keeps looking at me and pursing her mouth. When I ask for a vodka and orange I think her lips are going to disappear for good. “Are you sure that’s not too strong, dear?” she says.

“Don’t worry, Mumsie,” says Geoffrey cheerfully. “Rosie drinks like a fish.”

Mrs Wilkes smiles like she believes it and I wish I had a cigar to light up. Why does he have to call her Mumsie? It makes me want to throw up.

“Care to take a turn round the floor?” says Mr W. rising to his feet. “I’ve got something I want to talk to you about.”

Probably going to ask me if my intentions are honourable, I think to myself as Dadsie draws me to him like a life jacket and sets off on an energetic quickstep—the band are playing a waltz but I am not fussy as long as I can keep my feet out of the way; it would help if we danced in the same direction as everyone else, though.

“It’s my feet,” says Mr W. “You see I get this strange twitching sensation every time I go on the escalator.” I stifle a groan with difficulty. Once people know you are a nurse they start asking all the questions they would never have the cheek to ask a doctor unless they were one of his patients.

“I haven’t got on to feet yet,” I say, wishing I could say the same for the bloke who has just given me flat toes. “You’d better see a doctor.”

Over Dad’s shoulder I can see Mumsie watching us as if she expects me to start coaxing the old man’s cock out at any minute. I know she does not think I am good enough to whiten Geoffrey’s tennis shoes but I wish she would not make it so obvious. If she knew about her precious son and Natalie maybe she would not continue to think that the sun shone through the slit in his Y-fronts. Little Madam said a few typically unnecessary things when I mentioned I was going out with Geoffrey. I suppose it must have been jealousy but there was no need for her to repeat the lies told by those horrible ton-up boys. She should never have seen Ted again, let alone believed all that rubbish about me loving every moment of my horrible ordeal in mum’s bedroom. Just shows you what family loyalty means when you have a rotten little slut for a sister.

“How’s your mother keeping?” says Mrs Wilkes when I hobble back to the table.

“How is she keeping what?” I say. I don’t like her, you see. Mrs W. gives a tinkling laugh like a piano going over the edge of a cliff. “I meant, of course, is she well? I never seem to see her these days.”

Nor will you, I think to myself. Not if she sees you firSt Mum is terrified of Mrs W. and will go to any lengths to avoid her. I tell her not to be stupid and that the Wilkes are just as common as we are really, but it does no good. Old man Wilkes owns an electrical goods shop and is a Rotarian. My old man is a builder’s foreman and a Sagittarian. They might come from two different worlds as far as Mum is concerned.

“Your father doesn’t play golf, does he?” says Mr W.

He knows bloody well that my old man does not know a brassie from a brassiere.

“He used to watch Leyton Orient till they put the prices up,” I say. “I think you’re drinking my vodka, Mrs Wilkes.”

“Oh. Was that yours? I thought it was my orange juice. I’ll have to be careful, won’t I? I don’t want to get tiddly.”

I force myself to smile and look round for Geoffrey. He is dancing with the girl who is his mixed doubles partner. She has very protruding teeth and I reckon she has to be careful not to stand too near the net.

“They move well, don’t they?” drones Mrs W. “Sometimes I wonder if they’re going to be partners for life. Linda’s such a lovely girl, isn’t she?”

Linda Allcock’s dad has a Rover 2000 so it is no surprise that she is favourite with Ma Wilkes. “Lovely,” I echo.

“And how’s your sister? She’s such a gay little thing, isn’t she?”

Mrs W. manages to say “gay little thing” like she means raving nymphomaniac. She is right of course but blood is thicker than water.

“She’s doing very well,” I say.

“I always see her with a new boy. She knows how to do the rounds, doesn’t she? Not like you, you’ve stuck to our Geoffrey for years, haven’t you?”

“You make me sound like a burr,” I say acidly. “Will you excuse me for a moment? I’ve just seen someone I don’t know over the other side of the room.”

Mrs Wilkes gets further up my bracket than a slim inhaler and I would love to do the dance of the seven veils in the middle of the floor. The trouble is that this is exactly what she would like me to do. Anything that turned Geoffrey off would make her evening. If I wanted to give her a coronary I would get Geoffrey to announce our engagement just before the last waltz. There are limits, though.

In the end I content myself with ordering two double vodkas at the bar and telling the upper class twit behind it to get Geoffrey to pay for them. I knock them back like a female Humphrey Bogart and hardly remember anything that happens during the rest of the evening. Mrs W. says something pointed about me leading the conga into the gents but I expect that she was exaggerating as usual.

When I get back to the nurses home it is to find the place in an uproar. Apparently, Penny is with Matron and it is rumoured that she is going to be sacked.

“What happened?” I say to Labby who, like me, is now off night duty.

“She attacked a patient,” says Labby.

“Attacked a patient?” I know the girl has a wild streak but I would have thought that she would have attacked one of the medical staff firSt Most of the rest of us would have done. “Why?”

“She was trying to rape him.”

“Rape him!?” I sit down on my bed and try and keep calm. “How can a woman rape a man?” I mean, I know that Penny is no slouch when it comes to flinging woo but this is ridiculous. Most of the patients are not in a fit state to be raped anyway.

“It was a man called Julian Mayfair. He’s in a plaster cast from the waist up.”

“What did she do to him!” I shriek. I mean, it’s awful, isn’t it?

“Calm yourself, Rosie. He was in a plaster cast to begin with. That’s how she managed to rape him.”

Julian Mayfair? It does ring a bell. I remember Penny mentioning some patient she had a crush on. A crush? It hardly bears thinking about.

“What happened?”

“She was potty about the chap but apparently he didn’t want to know. He was only interested in birds. I remember Penny saying that he was repressed and that she was going to liberate him. I heard him crying once when she gave him a blanket bath. Then came night duty.” I suck in my breath sharply. I was wondering what was going to happen when Penny went on nights. “Penny was able to resist him for a couple of nights and then—”

“Yes, yes.” It is not like Labby to hold back on any dirty details. I already know more about Tom Richmond’s body than he does.

“I can hardly bring myself to say it.”

“Force yourself,” I say grimly.

“I don’t know if I should.”

“Labby, I’m your friend.”

“You promise you won’t tell anybody? I don’t want it to get around.”

I have to fight hard to stop myself from laughing out loud. People tell Cilla Bias things because she is cheaper than Radio Luxembourg.

“You can rely on me.” If the girl does not spill the beans soon I am going to tear off her arm and beat the truth out of her with it.

“Of course, quite a lot of people know already so I suppose it won’t matter if I tell you.”

“Thanks a lot.”

Labby sits down on the bed beside me and takes a deep drag at her cigarette. “Well, you see, what happened is this …” I am expecting to hear the Archers theme music when the door opens and Penny comes in. Labby looks disappointed. “Oh,” she says. “Well, I suppose Penny can tell your herself, now.”

“Back to Daddy,” says Penny. “Oh dear. He is going to be disappointed.”

“Did you get the sack?” Labby sounds almost joyful.

“Yup,” Penny nods. “Matron told me to go and never darken her surgical swabs again.”

“How awful!” Labby rushes off to tell everybody.

“Penny! What have you done?” I gush, once we are alone.

“I’ve struck the first great blow for Women’s Lib. How many girls do you know that have raped a man? Whilst Greer writes, Green acts. From now on no man is safe. For every one of us that is raped, I’ll rape ten of them.”

“Penny, how did you do it?”

“Everybody asks me that. Nobody asks me why I did it.”

“Why did you do it?”

“Because I fancied him rotten and I felt sorry for him. I thought he was all shy and uptight. The product of thousands of years of sheltered upbringing and rubber sheets. In fact he was a fink. I realised that when he started screaming. I should have gagged him firSt”

“Or given him an anaesthetic.”

“Fat lot of good that would have been. There’s another example of discrimination for you. They can chloroform us and work their filthy wiles, we can’t chloroform them and work their filthy willies.”

“When did he start screaming?”

“Soon after I’d mounted him.”

“Mounted him!?”

“How did you think I was going to do it? Bore a hole in the bottom of the bed?”

“But how—I mean—”

“Darling, don’t be coy. It doesn’t suit you. Robert Flashcock said a few things about you that you wouldn’t like to see pinned up on Matron’s notice board.”

“I don’t know what he’s talking about. I fell asleep when I went round to his place.”

“Really? Well, I’ve heard of sleep walking but this was something else by all accounts.”

Typical, I think to myself. Why must men always justify their unpleasant actions by making up lies? First, those greasers with Natalie and now Flashlot—I mean, Fishcock—I mean, Oh! You know who I mean, with Penny. It really is not fair. Still, there is no point in making a fuss about it. Nobody ever believes you. “I’m more interested in hearing what you got up to,” I say.

“I realised how highly sexed he was when I gave him a blanket bath. He came up like a rocket launcher. Terribly embarrassed, too. I was really touched—so was he, actually.”

“I can imagine,” I say.

“When I was on nights I found myself thinking about him all the time. I was like a child left alone with a bag of sweets.”

“And he couldn’t move?”

“Only below the waiSt The rest of him was in plaster. He couldn’t move his arms. You can imagine how my heart went out to him. I thought I must be doing him a favour.”

“What did you do?”

“Careful, darling. You’re drooling. I held myself in check for a couple of nights and then I couldn’t restrain myself any longer. My oppo went off to see a chum and I could see this divine hunk flexing his toes in an agony of frustration. What am I here for? I asked myself. I must bring balm in whatever shape seems to be handiest at the time. I stole down the ward and got cracking with the screens. He had stopped moving around by then but I thought he was being discreet.”

“Uum,” I say.

“Tenderly I slid back the sheets and caressed him to a state of passive enthusiasm.”

“‘Passive enthusiasm’?”

“He was doing a marvellous imitation of the Eiffel Tower but his eyes were closed. I thought he was pretending to be asleep.”

“Then what happened?”

“When I saw the goodies it was right back to the sweets again. I always preferred hard centres. Never could stand strawberry whips, nothing kinky about me.”

“Yes,” I breathe. “Then what?”

“The floodgate broke. You know me, I was born to the saddle. When I saw his pommel I just had to pummel. I had my knicks off before you could say Tally Ho! and vaulted across his thighs. I’d only cantered a few hundred yards when he started screaming the place down. You know, I think he might really have been asleep all the time.”

“That might explain the screams.”

“That’s what I thought. After that, things became a bit sordid. Night Sister came along and all the screens fell down.”

“And you had to get off?”

“Well, I couldn’t stand the noise. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to rape a man but they make the most awful row. I don’t know what they’d be like if they had to have babies.”

“And they’re going to kick you out?”

“They have kicked me out. Matron was terribly cut up about it. I told her she was making a mountain out of a molehill—I don’t mean anything disrespectful by that, Julian was quite well endowed really—but it didn’t do any good. I think it was knowing the family that made it so difficult for her.”

“When are you leaving?”

“Right away. I’m just going to pack my things and chalk ‘G.B.H. is the worst poke in the hospital’ on the old bastard’s door and I’ll be off. Keep in touch. I don’t reckon you’re going to be able to stick this place much longer.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Go home until Daddy gives me some money to clear off and do something else. I’ll send you a postcard.” Twenty minutes later she had gone. Of course, she was very free in her ways, but I know I am going to miss her.

CHAPTER 10

“Did you hear what someone wrote on G.B.H.’s door?” giggles Labby the next morning.

“‘G.B.H. is the worst poke in Queen Adelaide’s’?” I reply smugly.

“It didn’t say ‘poke’.”

“Well, it was Penny and you don’t have to tell me what it did say.”

Penny’s departure is big news and by the time the rumours have stopped flying around most people believe that she was engaged in a gang bang featuring half the walking wounded in the hospital. Poor Julian Mayfair has to be moved to another hospital and there seems little doubt that a good deal of his distress can be attributed to the fact that his most frequent visitor was called Cecil and had yellow streaks in his hair. Impulsive Penny was fouling up the Gay Liberation Front—or Gay Liberation Behind as I think they ought to be called.

It is funny, but shortly after she leaves, Mark rings up. I happen to be in the hall at the time and I hear G.B.H. in the act of putting the receiver down. Mark has rather a toffee nosed voice and stutters a bit but he seems very nice. It is difficult to hear him because there are a lot of dogs yapping in the background. He seems relieved to find that Penny has gone back to the country and rings off soon afterwards.

Fortunately, perhaps, there are always lots of scandals going on and, by the time everybody has finished discussing the dirty deeds committed over the Christmas period, the Penny incident is just one amongst many.

As winter grudgingly gives way to spring (nice that, isn’t it? I’m not just a pretty face, you know) the subject that increasingly forces itself into people’s conversations is The Inter-Hospital Rugby Union Football Knock-Out Cup. This would normally interest me less than an underwater pipe lighting contest but I am now sharing a room with Cilla Bias. Labby knows the score behind every bruise on Tom Richmond’s battered face and as Queen Adelaide trample their way towards the final her enthusiasm becomes contagious. It is like when England won the World Cup. I remember throwing my framed portrait of Troy Donahue through the front room window when Alf Ramsey scored the winning goal in the final.

“If only we can beat Northminster then we’ll be in the final against St Swithin’s,” sighs Labby. “I do hope MacSweeney doesn’t have to have his cartilage out.”

Fortunately, Queen Adelaide’s has a large medical staff otherwise some of the patients would never see a doctor. Those doctors who are not playing rugger are either training to play rugger or recovering from the injuries received when they did play rugger. It is rumoured that interviews with the head of the medical school are held at Twickenham with applicants expected to attend wearing shorts and scrum caps.

“If we get into the final, will you be one of the cheer leaders?” says Labby. “Like I said, it’s tremendous fun.”

“I remember,” I say, trying to control my enthusiasm.

“Everybody throwing bags of soot.”