They may not mean to, but they do - 14. Fourteen

Keith had been surprised to find that despite Thomas living 50 miles up the A1, his work was mainly in Leeds. His charity had their offices in a school in Roundhay, in North-East Leeds. It wasn’t an area that Keith knew well, his life had been spent further South and Leeds to him was the city centre and little else. The journey felt endless, though it only took 30 minutes; partly because the city seemed so monochrome and the same, with one housing estate very much like another. He knew he was being unfair. He’d grown up on a 1950s estate; the houses might look different in style, but they had that same grim sense of uniformity even though owners tried to give each one some individuality.

There were nerves too, he wasn’t exactly sure what he was letting himself in for and going into Thomas’ world took him out of his comfort zone. Keith consoled himself that if it was electrical, then it had to make sense to him no matter how outlandish. He’d managed to get hold of his former workmate, Nico, who loved little machines. Nico had never heard of Michael Atkinson but was familiar with the sort of machines Keith talked about and they had a profitable chat.

The school was set back in its own grounds, which was something of a relief. The main block was a series of 1960s slabs forming courtyards with interlocking blocks of differing sizes. It had been designed by a well-known architect, and as a school had worked well and been popular, but the metal and glass panels used in the sides of the buildings, Thomas said, had been a nightmare to maintain. A small fortune had had to be spent on rectifying leaks and insulating the walls. The result of the changes was that whatever colour scheme was intended, the original blend of blues, grey and white was compromised by replacement, there were brightly insistent panels standing out from the more muted older ones. To Keith’s eye, it all looked like it needed a good coat of paint.

There was a big new block that held science labs and other trappings of 21st-century schooling, and parts of the old school buildings were surplus to requirements but being as the school was Listed it was difficult to demolish anything. The solution had been to rent space out, and three educational charities used the buildings as offices.

Keith’s schools had been Victorian, big forbidding places. This was quite different. He tried and failed, to picture what being at school here would be like. Certainly, it felt very strange for it to be so empty, without the echoing noise of school children. He followed instructions and found an entrance-way near the back with an entry-phone. Entering codes and following a disembodied voice got him into a lobby that seemed more recent, crisp cream plasterboard covering up whatever had been there before. There were names and logos for the three charities that shared the building, a couple of chairs and a table with a pile of magazines that seemed aimed at people who worked in education.

Thomas appeared, washing his hands. “You made it OK then, no problems finding it”, Keith shook his head, “Good. Sorry about the wait, I was early and ended up using the loo!” He leaned over and kissed Keith.

“Should we be doing this?”

Thomas laughed, “We’re adults, and it's only kissing so I don’t see why not. Alison is running late, so we can grab a coffee and I can show you round. Not that there is much to see.”

The corridor was a bit bleak, and it led into a single large room. Keith wasn’t sure what he had expected, certainly something grander. The room was divided into areas with a selection of mismatched bookcases and filing cabinets. There were a few pot plants, but the main impression was a sea of books, papers, and box files, and two of the desks were similarly overflowing. There were pictures on the walls, of various school children engaged in arts activities, and all one wall was given over to the window with a terrific view of the playing fields beyond.

“Sorry, it's always a bit chaotic. There are only three of us in the office, the rest of the work takes place in our partner schools. Space is at a premium, we can’t really afford to rent more, so as the number of our projects increases, so does the sheer stuff we have to find room for.”

But Thomas became aware that Keith was not paying attention, “Shit, sorry about that. We’ve been meaning to get it sorted.”

‘That’, was a nasty node of wires, extension sockets and more.

Keith tutted, and then laughed at himself, “Sorry, you never really switch off. Look I’ve got some stuff in the van that would sort some of the problems at least.”

When Alison finally arrived, it was to an apparently empty room. Her call of hello was responded to by a more distant halloo from Thomas, making coffee in the neighbouring kitchen area, and a muffled grunt from Keith. So it was that Alison’s first view of Keith was of his blue serge covered backside appearing from under a desk.

“Well, that’s sorted the worst of the problems, but you really should get it seen to proper and have some more sockets put in. I could do it for you, given time. Shit, sorry. Didn’t see you there.”

“Hello, I’m Alison. I presume you must be Keith?”. She wasn’t tall, with grey/blond cropped hair and clothes (some sort of blouse and trousers) which seemed to be both striking and practical. Her eyes, behind a pair of clear-rimmed glasses, were eager and keen, friendly if wary and Keith guessed she didn’t miss much. Her voice combined warmth and firmness, she reminded him of one of his primary school teachers, all the kids had been scared of her yet loved her and would do anything for her.

“Hi, sorry about that. Thomas went off to make coffee and I was trying to tidy things up a bit.”

She gave him the sort of smile which suggested sharing a secret, “I should be the one apologising. Working in this building is a nightmare, there just aren’t enough electrical sockets for modern life and when you try and get someone to add more, all they do is suck their teeth. Bloody nightmare”. She pulled herself up sharp, “Sorry. You don’t need my worries.”

Keith smiled, “No problem. But having been down there”, he nodded at the wall, “I can understand. Makes me glad I generally work with walls you can drill.”

She smiled back, “Oh, Heaven!”

Thomas appeared with the coffee, “Ah, I see you two have met.”

Keith looked wry, “I managed to introduce myself rear first!”, Thomas looked puzzled.

“Keith was very kindly trying to sort out our electrics and backed out from under the table. Frankly, any help is welcome in this chaos. Now, shall we?”

With that, she ushered them along a series of corridors, access-controlled with a swipe card. She turned to Keith and gave another of her secret smiles, “The advantage of being Head, you are allowed to go anywhere. Even now, I have a ridiculously gleeful delight in appearing out of doors which say No Public Access or some such.”

They ended up in what looked like a meeting room.

“We couldn’t think where to put it, and this is reasonably secure. It’s been in storage for ages, but Frances, our Head of Arts, unpacked it and checked it over. It looks OK, just doesn’t work. Oh, and there is a selection of spare bulbs, some are as old as the work itself.”

Sitting on the table was Mounted Figure 3. It looked not unlike the images they’d seen on the internet, just a little sadder and more tired. It was surprisingly crude as if someone had made it on the kitchen table (Keith found out later that Atkinson had). Someone had evidently dusted it, but the Perspex was cloudy in places, wires looked suspiciously loose, and there were connections that had Keith’s fingers itching, whilst neither of the armatures seemed as firm as they ought to be, and the whole looked in need of more than just tlc. Still, he could at least have a look.

He stared at it for a bit. “I’ll have to take it to pieces to see what’s inside. Is that OK?”

“Of course. As long as you can put it together again!”, Alison’s smile took the sting out of it.

“It’s going to take a bit of time, so you two don’t need to hang around.”

“If it’s OK, I’ll go and get a bit of work done”, Thomas gave him a peck on the cheek, “thanks.”

“I suggest that we re-group for lunch. I’ll have to stay here I’m afraid, Keith. Security means that I can’t leave you alone and untended. I’ll be as quiet as I can and do some work.”

He said OK and got down to it. It was a bit like doing a puzzle at first, albeit a sort of weird three-dimensional one made largely of something like Meccano. And he got hooked, slowly and surely dismantling and testing the individual components. He lost sight and sound of Alison, she was there, working on papers but he was hardly aware of her, and both were so absorbed in their work that they found no need for conversation.

Goodness knows how long had passed when he found her standing next to him and realised, she had said something to him. “Would you like a drink, tea, coffee, water?”

So, she went off to make tea, but not before requesting him not to wander around. And before long she was back with tea and biscuits, and the way she said this latter reminded Keith of a naughty schoolgirl. “I won’t ask how it's going; it always annoys me when people do that. I assume that you won’t be able to magically fix it today?”

“I don’t think so, a lot of the wiring needs replacing, and I think there may be problems with some of the motors, and the transformer.”

“Bugger. How complicated is that?”

“I’m not sure, I’d need to do more dismantling. Look, would it be possible for me to take this away? It would be a lot easier if I could dismantle things on my kitchen table and tinker with them”, she looked a bit aghast, “I know it’s a bit difficult, but coming up here every Saturday might not be possible, and if I do, it will take ages. Also, when I’m at home I can tap my mates for help.”

“I see. I’ll have to ask. I’ll check with the trustees and if they are happy then we can send it with Thomas. As far as I see it, we have three choices, do nothing, and let the piece moulder, get you to do what you can or pay over the odds for specialist help. And I know what I favour.”

“Ah, I thought I might smell tea”, Thomas appeared and looked down at the bits on the table, “I hope you know how that goes back together again.” Keith’s response was a playful thump on the arm.

Thomas laughed, “I’ll get you for that, just you wait”.

By the time lunchtime arrived, Keith had got somewhere and going off for lunch almost felt a waste of time. But Alison had brought food with her, and they had a rather delicious picnic in her office. This was rather tidier than Thomas’, but she admitted that having an office team to organise her helped. Still, the room was full of books and file boxes, whilst the walls were a mix of statistics charts and photos of children. When Keith started to look at the charts, Alison laughed and told him not to look at them as she seemed to spend most of her working life knee-deep in charts.

There was a quiet area, with chairs and a low table by the window and sitting there they ate their picnic. At first chatting about nothing in particular, then Alison asked them if they are doing anything for half-term. Keith looked blank, he’d no idea when half-term was.

Thomas smiled at the way their worlds sometimes didn’t intersect, “Two weeks today. I’m not doing anything special, and I don’t think Keith is.” Keith shook his head.

Alison explained, “I’ve just had a significant birthday, and I decided to treat myself to a weekend at a Spa.”

“So, you’re not walking then?” Thomas turned to Keith, “Alison usually spends most of the holidays walking.”

“No, because of my op. on my knee earlier this year, I’m not allowed to do any serious walking. Yet”, she looked almost gleeful at the prospect of returning to walking. “Hence the Spa. I was supposed to be going with a friend, but he’s had to cancel at the last minute. Rather stupidly we went for one of those pay-up-front deals where you get a better price. He’s a friend, but we’re not that close, so we’d booked two rooms. So, I’m stuck with them.”

Both Thomas and Keith stared at her, unsure where this could go. Alison seemed to enjoy their confusion, “I wondered whether you might like to join me? We don’t have to spend lots of time together, during the day I plan to take full advantage of the Spa, but we’d dine together in the evening. So, I need some civilised and entertaining company”, her eyes sparkled with mischief as she said this.

Keith’s first thought was, so why them? But Thomas was closer, “You mean that you want a couple of gay guys to keep you entertained?” They both smiled, and Keith sort of understood that this type of banter between the two was common, but he wasn’t that used to it.

“What do you say?”, Thomas looked at Keith. They’d not talked about holidays. “I know it seems a little soon, but it's only for a few days and getting away would be nice. I don’t have anything on at work, all our half-term events are being handled by our partners, so I’m not needed. Could you get away?”

Keith half nodded, “I think so, there’s a couple of jobs I’d have to check on.”

Alison brought things briskly to a close, “Think about it, and let me know. If you can, by this weekend”.