Stuck In A Hole

A change of career seemed like a good idea, even if it had landed me in this predicament . . .

WHEN you get stuck in a hole, you learn a lot about yourself.

I read that in a self-help book once. Of course, I don’t think the author was stuck in an actual hole.

I’d known the floor in the master bedroom was unstable. My husband Gary told me to take it slowly; naturally, I ignored him.

Prising the floorboards up, I was trying to see how bad the situation was. The ceiling underneath turned out to be lath and plaster.

As soon as I put weight on it, it disintegrated.

I crashed through the ceiling into the dining-room below. I let out a gasp as I fell, my whole body flinching as I anticipated landing with a thump. There was no thump. The top of me was still in the bedroom, elbows resting against floorboards.

The bottom half of my body was dangling from the ceiling of the dining-room below.

“Hello . . . ?” The word came out as more of a splutter. The air was thick with destroyed plaster, smelling of dust and grime.

There was no reply. Obviously. It was a vacant house.

What was it the self-help book said? Learning about yourself was all very well, but how could you get out of said hole?

If I wrote a self-help book, it would go like this:

Step one: try to get yourself out, you dummy.

That advice was too literal for your average self-help guru. Not enough jargon. There wasn’t even a hashtag. #Justgetyourselfout #Youabsolutemuppet

I blew out a breath and wriggled my hips.

Embarrassment is a powerful motivator.

I didn’t want to have to confess to anyone that, on the first day of my new career, I’d made such a colossal mistake.

Surely I could work my body loose and – and what?

Drop ten feet on to the concrete of the exposed dining-room floor? My knees were already dodgy.

Now that the shock was wearing off, I could feel them throbbing.

I stopped wriggling. Hauling myself up seemed like a better idea than going down.

I braced my hands against the floorboards to pull myself up.

It felt like the most intense Pilates workout ever. And I’d never been good at Pilates.

****

“I just feel . . . a little bit stuck. Like maybe this isn’t right for me any more.”

In the conference room, the heating was on too high. Stuffy. One of the fluorescent lights emitted a faint whine.

Across the table, my boss was looking at me with wide eyes.

“What do you mean?” I gave a shrug, forcing an apologetic smile. I hadn’t meant to say it. Now was my chance to take it back.

“Maybe being a paralegal isn’t right for me any more.” I bit my lip. “I’m going to leave. Sorry.”

My boss, Kalim, was ten years younger than me, a hangdog 40, and I thought of him like a little brother.

He might technically be my manager, but I’d been with the firm for 17 years, whereas he’d parachuted in six years ago with a wardrobe of tailored suits and a solid gold business card holder.

Kalim left me to my own devices. I was the company’s most experienced paralegal and I completed twice as much work as some colleagues.

Once a year, we completed the charade of the Employee Appraisal.

I said I liked working at Ferguson Lang and he said I was a hard worker and then I got a 1.5% pay rise.

That was how it went, year after year.

“You’re – leaving?” Kalim scrubbed a hand across his face.

“Sorry,” I said again. “What can I do to persuade you to stay? A promotion? More money?”

“It’s not really about the money.”

“Flexi-time? Subsidised childcare? Company car?”

If Kalim had been less panicked, he might have remembered that I walked to work. And my daughter, Lauren, was twenty-four. I pushed my chair back. “Sorry again.” “Sonia, we can’t lose you! How does a twenty per cent pay rise sound?”

I did the maths in my head. It sounded nice.

Enough to help Lauren with the deposit for a house. Enough for a holiday.

I remained silent, imagining myself settling into a first-class airline seat. Champagne? Don’t mind if I do.

Kalim must have taken my silence for hesitation.

“Twenty-five per cent pay rise.” He slapped the conference table. “That’s the best I can do.”

Later, when I told Lauren about what had happened, she was floored.

“Brilliant! All that extra money!”

I sighed. Even if you were in a hole and

surrounded by wads of cash, you were still in a hole.

****

“Hello!” I tried to shout as loud as I could. There was still dust in my throat and it set me off coughing.

My sides ached from being wedged in the hole.

My bruised knees throbbed. I wanted a drink of water. Come to think of it, I wanted a G&T.

“Hello?” I called again, when my coughing subsided. My voice sounded pathetic.

Thinking about my self-help book (the one I was absolutely not going to write) was a good distraction from my mounting sense of defeat.

Step two: swallow your pride and get some help.

My bag, with my mobile phone inside, was out of reach, sitting by the door.

There was a broom leaning against the wall. Maybe I could grab it. I’d use the broom handle to pull my bag towards me.

It would be mortifying to call my husband or my daughter for help, but what was the alternative?

Everyone needed a little help sometimes. Even me, someone who claimed staunchly that I could do it alone. What a fool.

With all my might, I leaned forward, swatting wildly at the broom handle.

The broom clattered to the floor, out of reach.

****

“If you don’t like your job, get a new one.”

Lauren shrugged and sipped at her milky tea. I rustled a few Bourbons out of the packet and considered her suggestion.

My daughter took after me, looks-wise. She had an untidy mop of sandy hair and narrow grey eyes that turned stormy if she didn’t get what she wanted.

But she was her father’s daughter in temperament.

Everything was black and white. Like something? Do more of it. Don’t like something? Do less of it.

It was easier for youngsters, though. Lauren was twenty-four and already on her third career (shop work, then PR, now nursing). I was approaching the big five-oh and I wasn’t sure I had the resilience for a new career.

Staying in my job as a paralegal – with a 20% pay rise – would be simpler.

“I’m just fussing.” I ate a biscuit, my voice growing muffled. “Don’t mind me.”

Lauren pressed her palms against the kitchen table and fixed me with the same hard stare she’d used as a recalcitrant twelve-year-old.

“What did you want to be when you were a kid?” I racked my brains. “I wanted to be a crocodile.” Laughter burst out of me. “I wanted to build Lego houses.” Lauren rolled her eyes. “You could still build houses. You’d look good in high-vis.”

It was a joke, but my smile was faraway.

We switched topics – Lauren’s new boyfriend was the spitting image of Poldark, apparently – but my mind kept drifting.

Houses. Building houses. I loved a bit of DIY.

Gary was better suited to weeding the garden and reading the newspaper.

This meant I was the one who spent weekends putting up shelves and fixing the garden gate.

I’d even taught myself the basics of electrical work, thanks to Youtube.

Doubt crept back in. I slurped the last of my cold tea. I was a forty-nine-yearold mum, not a builder.

****

With all my might, I strained towards the broom handle. It lay tantalisingly out of reach.

My muscles stretched – and released. I wilted on the floorboards.

It had been ten minutes and I was still stuck. Was I going to be here all night? “Hello . . .”

My voice was sounding increasingly timid. I wasn’t going to rouse any rescue services by whimpering.

Step three: take a chance, and be prepared to make an idiot of yourself.

I balled my hands into tight fists and took a deep breath.

“Help me! Someone help!”

It might be one of the neighbours who found me, or a passer-by. What an idiot, they’d think.

Some middle-aged woman trying to renovate a house and ending up stuck like a suckling pig.

I could feel my face flooding red-hot with the effort of yelling. “Help!” Embarrassment couldn’t kill you. Inertia was a much more deadly force.

****

“The Masons are selling their house.” I slumped down on to the sofa. “Number sixty-three.”

“Hmm.” Gary, in his armchair, didn’t look up from the newspaper. “Nice chap, Alan Mason.”

“He and Carol have really let the place go.” I couldn’t keep the glee out of my voice. “Bet it’s a disaster zone.”

“Shame, shame,” Gary murmured.

“No, it’s great! We can get it for a song.”

Gary folded his newspaper, meeting my gaze for the first time. “What’s that, my love?” I was worried my husband would think I was insane. Blowing our life savings on a run-down three-bed-semi?

Me, quitting my job to renovate houses? Starting a whole new career from scratch?

Gary asked a lot of questions, and we spent the evening discussing the logistics of it, but in the end, he agreed.

“If you want to do it, I think it’s a marvellous idea.” And he returned to his newspaper.

****

“Help!”

I felt like an inflatable toy that had lost half its air. My voice was more of a wheeze than a yell.

Was I really going to be stuck here for ever?

Or, you know, until Gary noticed there was no dinner on the table and came looking?

“All right, Mrs Foster?”

A man poked his head around the door. I craned my neck to look at him.

When I’d learned about angels in Sunday School, I’d never imagined they’d be thick-necked and moustachioed, wearing a green Kappa tracksuit.

“Rhys, thank heavens. I’m stuck.”

“Yeah.” Rhys smoothed his black moustache. “You are.

“I was just measuring up for the new fence, and thought I heard a wild animal trapped in here.” I grimaced.

“No, just me.”

Rhys put his hands in his pockets, rocking back on his heels.

“Er, you couldn’t help me out, could you?”

Rhys’s eyebrows shot up. The idea had apparently never occurred to him.

“Right you are!”

****

It wasn’t the most auspicious start to my new career. Rhys, who hauled me out by my armpits, earned a permanent place on my Christmas card list.

I spent the next few days nursing my knees. And I had to pay an exorbitant amount to get the hole in the ceiling fixed.

My husband, bless him, listened to my tale with real sympathy in his eyes.

“You must have been scared, love. Let me make you a nice G and T.”

Lauren, of course, burst out laughing when I told her what had happened.

“Bit more interesting than a day at the office, eh?” she said between giggles.

I gave a rueful smile. If my life were a self-help book, how would the final chapter read?

Not sure yet. I’ll let you know when I’ve lived it. I do know there are lessons still to be learned. Mortifying ones; scary ones.

Renovating the Masons’ house is bound to involve plenty more hiccups.

What’s the alternative, though? Never trying something new? Being stuck in a figurative hole instead of a real one?

Where would be the fun in that? ■