In January when Claire Andrews and Olivia Adamson bought the Shallowfield Surgery, Evangeline Christodoulou was spending her days happily employed as the Practice nurse in the Millmoor Health Centre and spent her nights equally happy in the arms of a firefighter.
In fact she
was so happy with her professional and personal situation that a team of wild
horses wouldn’t have been able to drag her away from either of them.
Siti Shahara
on the other hand was at that time stacking shelves at the village store for Anuruddha
Gunasekara and living in a bed sitter above the Bengal Curry House.
Through no
fault of her own she was let go by the executors of previous partners at the Shallowfield
practice, they only kept on a skeleton staff, so therefore they only needed one
receptionist and Lynn Cooper had seniority.
She was far
from happy with her situation and she was desperate to get her old job back as
receptionist at the surgery.
Siti had
told the other receptionist, Lynn Cooper, as much on several occasions, so when
Claire Andrews asked
“Is it worth
our while speaking with her?”
Lynn replied
“Very much
so”
It proved to
be a very simple exercise to persuade Siti to abandon the world of Baked Beans
and frozen dinners in the general store and return to the Practice.
Siti was
born in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in 1979 but she was brought to Britain when she
was only two years old and after 33 years of living in the Britain she spoke English
like Celia Johnson in Brief encounter and thought of herself as British.
Her
migration to Downshire took a considerable amount of time but once she arrived
in Shallowfield she felt like she’d come home.
She loved Shallowfield because it wasn’t the kind of place you passed
through on your way to somewhere else and she liked that very much.
If you were in Shallowfield it was because that was where you were
headed for in the first place.
You know people in a place like Shallowfield and you noticed strangers
easily which was very important to her.
Siti had lived in Shallowfield for over ten years and she really liked
it, she felt safe there.
Which is why when she lost her job at the surgery she would rather do a
menial job at Anu’s general store than leave for a bigger town with greater opportunities.
After Claire
had approached Siti and persuaded her to make a career change back into health
care she couldn’t hand in her notice quick enough.
Anu knew
that working for him was only a stop gap for her, he had only offered her the
job because he and Harjeet from the Bengal wanted to help her out.
So Anu gave
him a job in the shop and Harjeet rented her a bedsit over the curry house.
They were
both delighted when she was reemployed in the job she loved.
Anu didn’t
really need to employ her in the first place and he didn’t need her to work her
notice but Siti insisted.
When she
walked into the surgery on her first morning back she hugged Lynn like her life
depended on it, and because she was only five feet tall she had to stand on tip
toe to do it.
By the time that
there was only one position left to fill at the Shallowfield Surgery, Eva’s
situation in Millmoor had changed, her firefighter lover had turned out to be
very handy with their fists and by a team of wild horses wouldn’t have been
able to keep her there.
But as Olivia
and Claire sat in the Brown Windsor alone one miserable Snowy January Evening with
just one vital position left to fill, they were unaware of her change of
fortunes.
So as they
ate they discussed the crucial vacancy they had to fill that of the practice
nurse.
“Look we
both know who we want” Claire said
“Evangeline”
they chorused
“Yes but
we’ll never get her” Olivia replied
“We could
make her an offer” Claire suggested
“Look this
practice has twice the number of patients as Bushy Down and one in three of
them are private, but there is still a limit to what we can offer her” Olivia
said
“She’ll
never come all the way out here anyway”
“It’s worth
trying”
“But she’ll
never be able to afford to live here” Olivia said
“It was
difficult enough for us to find somewhere”
“I have an
idea about that” Claire said
“What?”
“Number two
Folly Cottages”
“That’s
brilliant” Olivia said “why didn’t I think of that?”
So that was
how they managed to lure Evangeline Christodoulou to Shallowfield with an
improved package and a tied cottage.
It was a
real coup for Claire and Olivia to secure Evangeline’s services, they had tried
to get her to join the Bushy Down surgery but never quite managed it.
The pair of
them were as pleased as punch, in fact they were so pleased with themselves
that it bordered on smugness.
They
wouldn’t have been quite so smug however if they had known the truth of it.
Because
although Evangeline had played hard to get, in truth she was desperate for it
and would have willingly paid Claire to get the job.
Evangeline Christodoulou
was thirty two years old and was a striking looking woman with alabaster skin
and short and wavy raven black hair.
As her name,
Evangeline, suggests she was of Greek decent and it was the anglicized version
of the Greek name, Evangelos, meaning “to bring good tidings”.
And that was
precisely what she did, and that was why she was so popular with colleagues and
patients alike.
In the interim the practice put Eva up at the Shallowfield Lodge Hotel
while the cottages were being made ready.
So on her first day she travelled
to the surgery with her new bosses.
Once they
had arrived however the task of showing her around and doing the introductions
fell to Siti Shahara.
Evangeline
took to her immediately, initially because she was one of the few people she
towered over, if four inches was considered towering.
But beyond
that she was taken to her because she was such a nice person and they became
instant friends.
Apart from needing to be shown the inner workings of the surgery, the
processes and procedures, she also needed a guided tour of the area.
District nursing being part of her remit after all, so she needed to
familiarise herself with the district.
First of all she bought herself an ordinance survey map of the
Finchbottom Vale, between the Dancingdean
forest and the Pepperstock Hills, which encompassed her territory.
The problem was that maps weren’t really Eva’s forte.
She did have a satnav in the car which would get her from A to B but
that wouldn’t help her map out the district in her head.
So she asked Siti, she was the obvious choice to her mind as apart from
Lynn Cooper she had lived in the area longer than anyone that she knew.
And more importantly than that Eva liked her, because she was kind, had
a heart of gold, and was hilariously funny, and above all she felt like a
kindred spirit.
Where Olivia
Adamson was the master organiser of the practice, Eva was the doer, in fact she
was a tour de force, she was the practice nurse, the phlebotomist, she ran the
clinics, she did home visits and was an all-round good egg.
A week after
Eva started at the surgery, it was Valentine’s Day and despite being new to
the practice she had clearly made enough of an impression in that short time to
receive 8 valentine cards, all hand delivered to the surgery.
“I got one” Said Lynn and smiled
“How many did you get Siti?” Eva asked innocently
“None” she replied and Eva thought she detected a hint sadness in her
response
However Siti quickly asked
“Aren’t you going to open them?”
“No, none of them can possibly be from someone who knows me enough to love
me and if they think they do they are probably a stalker” she said and went to
the office.
On her rounds that morning she thought about how sad Siti had looked
when she said she didn’t get a valentines card, so when she stopped for fuel in
Childean she bought a card for her and wrote inside to “Pretty Siti”.
When she
returned to the surgery she went straight to reception and said
“Here, Siti”
Siti got up
from her desk and walked to the counter.
“Hi Eva” she
said
“I finally
got around to opening those cards and one of them wasn’t even for me” she said
“Who is it
for then?” Siti asked
“You, you
plum” Eva joked and Lynn looked up from her desk and smiled a knowing smile
“For me?”
she said and her face lit up with delight “Thanks Eva”
As she
walked to her office she thought that with that smile on her face she really
was “Pretty Siti”
Weekends and
evenings all through the month of February, once they had done all the local
stuff, Siti and Evangeline explored the local Geography.
Beginning in Shallowfield they went as far as
Purplemere in the north and from Mornington in the East and Childean in the
west.
A lot of it
was new to Siti as well because some of the outlying villages and hamlets had
no public transport and she didn’t drive so she had never seen them.
So for of
lot of those places she was merely keeping Eva company, which she didn’t mind
and Eva was certainly grateful for.
They had felt like kindred spirits from the start and that feeling grew
stronger and stronger over the weeks.
On the 1st
of March, Evangeline moved into number two Folly Cottages, a full two weeks
earlier than her employers, Claire and Olivia, who were in numbers 1 and 3
respectively.
Her earlier
occupation was courtesy of her brother Emilios and a battered transit van.
But helping
her to unpack and settle in was her favourite companion Siti, who else.
It was a
small cosy cottage in the middle of a terrace of three but Eva was a single
girl and planned to remain so, therefore the cottage suited her very well indeed
and the setting was simply idyllic.
The view of the lake was spectacular, although she couldn’t see it all
or discern the teardrop shape that gave the lake its name.
But the view of the surrounding ancient woodland of the Dancingdean
Forest was majestic.
Much of the modest body of water was obscured from view but it was
beautiful and relatively unspoilt which was why Claire and Olivia had fallen in
love with the place, and Eva could certainly understand why.
Teardrop Lake was certainly more idyllic and peaceful than she was used
too.
She had trouble sleeping for the first few weeks as there was little or
no noise pollution.
Although the lake was well used there were no speed boats or jet skis,
only rowing boats, canoes, dinghies and skiffs.
As she stood outside the cottage on the day she moved in, taking in the
vista she spotted some hardy soul sailing out on the lake, she hadn’t sailed herself
since she was a teenager, she thought perhaps she might try it again, with city
perhaps, but on a much warmer day.
Comfortable in her own mind, that she had the lay of the land
sufficiently well to find her way to her patients, Eva and Siti reduced the
frequency of trips out in the car.
The pair of them still hung out together however and with the spring
well and truly taking hold they concentrated their attention more on
recreation.
Siti was no more familiar with Teardrop Lake than Eva was so with the
aid of a local map provided by Lynn Cooper they explored the surrounding
woodland together.
And there was an awful lot of forest to explore, along with all the
hidden delights within, two follies, a Watch tower, Olwen’s chapel, a
waterfall, a number of brooks and streams, a 16th Century Bridge and
lovers leap.
So plenty to keep them occupied.
At the beginning of April another nurse arrived at the practice to
lighten Evangeline’s work load.
She was a pretty young nurse, called Kate, who had the young Doctors
dancing attendance on her, which lightened Eva’s load in that direction as
well.
On Easter Monday the day began with warm spring sunshine and clear blue
skies so the two friends planned to visit the next point of interest on their
map.
They met at Lynn Coopers House, where they had coffee with her before
they set off to see one of the Folly.
There were two Folly’s in the Dancingdean Forest, both in sight of the
Lake, the first one was built in the 19th century by the then local
Nobleman, the Earl of Dancingdean, a vain and self-important man, who had it
built for himself, in the style of a Castle Keep.
It was on top of a hill overlooking the lake and when it was completed
he had the surrounding Forest cleared so everyone for miles around could see
his standard flying from the turret.
The second one was erected by Ezekiel Cooper, who lived on the opposite
side of the Lake.
Which was apt because Ezekiel was opposite from the Earl in almost every
conceivable way, he was not of the nobility, he was not born into privilege, he
made his money in the cotton Mills of Lancashire.
And in response to the Earl’s construction he had built a gaudy Folly of
his own in the Victorian Gothic style and like his noble adversary he had the
surrounding Forest cleared so everyone around could see his standard flying.
The reason they started their expedition at Lynn’s, was because it was
Coopers Folly that they were going to see that day.
It was quite a steep climb from the lake side up to the Folly and
despite the coolness of the spring morning they were both hot and breathless by
the time they made it up there.
Once they had arrived Eva sat on a large rock to catch her breath while
Siti clambered about the site quoting facts about the monstrous building from a
local history book.
But Eva was more focused on the speaker than words.
She wasn’t beautiful in the way that most people considered that Eva
was.
Siti had an
aquiline nose and finely chiselled features, her eyes were warm and intelligent
behind her gold rimmed spectacles and her intellect was as sharp as was her
wit.
To the
casual observer, because she was dark skinned, her hair looked black but it was
actually dark brown which was fine and straight and she wore shoulder length.
Eva thought she
was only on the attractive side of beautiful by virtue of the fact that she
never wore a scrap of makeup, so what you saw was what you got.
But with a
little makeup on her pretty face she’d have looked gorgeous.
“More
gorgeous anyway” Eva thought
Eva was suddenly
brought back to the moment when Siti said
“We’d better
get moving”
“What?”
Siti pointed
heavenward
Evangeline
looked up to see the sky had visibly darkened.
“Ok” she
said “Let’s go”
They
clambered and scrambled their way back down the hill to the perimeter road just
as the heavens opened.
They were standing
on probably the most exposed part of the road and for a moment they were caught
like rabbits in the headlights.
“Quick this
way” Eva said and grabbed Siti’s hand and they ran to the nearest large tree
which offered them some protection from the deluge.
They were
giggling like schoolgirls when they reached sanctuary and squeezed up close to
the trunk.
Eva looked
down at the giggling Siti as rainwater dripped from the tip of her aquiline
nose.
She giggled
again and put her head back and shook it like a dog would, and that was when
Eva did it.
Siti was
only 5ft tall so with Evangeline’s 4” height advantage over her she was in the
unusual position of being able to kiss downwards on to Siti’s inviting lips.
It was a deliciously gentle kiss to which Siti responded in kind.
When they stopped Siti looked up at Eva and said
“I wasn’t expecting that"
Then Evangeline kissed her again
A much more urgent, passion filled kiss altogether, perhaps too much so
because Siti suddenly pushed her away.
“No, no” she said “I can’t”
Then she ran off into the rain
“Siti!” Evangeline called “Please don’t go, I’m sorry”
But Siti just kept going and didn’t look back.
Eva traipsed home miserably through the rain, kicking her way through
puddles and chastising herself for her stupidity, and her haste.
“You idiot, you stupid idiot, you’ve lost your friend now” she shouted
into the rain.
She got home to the cottage and silently stripped off her wet clothes
and dried her hair before redressing.
Eva walked into the kitchen and switched on the kettle and got out two
mugs, then she paused and put one back.
She was just pouring the hot water onto a teabag when there was a gentle
knock at the door.
Eva put the kettle down and walked to the door and when she opened it,
she saw Siti standing on the doorstep looking like a drowned rat.
“I don’t want to run away” She said pathetically
“You don’t have to baby” Eva said “Come inside”
Eva’s heart swelled as she looked at the beautiful forlorn creature
dripping on the carpet and she quickly wrapped her in dry towels.
Eva dried Siti’s fine dark brown hair and when she stood there wrapped
in fluffy white towels with damp tousled hair she looked at Evangeline with her
big brown eyes and asked
“Can you kiss me now?”
Eva’s heart skipped a beat and she smiled at Siti and duly obliged her.
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