Memories are made of this

The world outside kept turning
After he had gone there was time for more things, like her Welfare Rights work; which slotted in comfortably with her evening A-level English class. It was mainly by talking with others that Esther realized fully she wasn’t alone with her own sadness and struggles. Sangria Paw, despairing, stuffed her damp tissue back into the belly of her hideous crocodile fake handbag as she struggled to locate her noisy mobile to turn it to silent.
“Here we go again!”
She looked expectantly at Esther who in response shuddered; aware at the pressures her client placed on her, only a volunteer representative after all! At that moment and in that awkward silence as the doctor, solicitor and a disability agent eased into their rolls behind the long, smooth trestle table and various legal papers the annoyingly cheerful clerk of the court bounced into the tribunal room. He let the door swing with a bang behind him, coughed and settled himself down importantly, pushing a Kleenex tissue box further onto the table to make room for the fresh jug of drinking water that he put carefully down. Dr. Brewer, from Hangover house in the next town, scratched his red nose and wiped his expensive glasses, with what looked like a dirty dish cloth. Miss Moore the solicitor meanwhile advised how the informal hearing would proceed. A fly buzzed round the sticky room, dive bombed into the slatted graying vertical blinds, and then over their heads for an attack. Clerk of the court again allowed the door to slam shut as he continued to fetch and carry more official looking papers and he seemed blissfully unaware of the case papers that fluttered from Sangrias knees or of the solicitor’s eyes rolling in contempt.
Esther now noticing her client knuckles whitening and her breathing quickening as she struggled to move in her chair and release some of her arthritic pain and cramps. She continued to bat back replies to questions such as matters of incontinence or how long it took to walk five hundred yards. Her sobbing increased as Dr Brewer forced her to share the most personal details including how often she emptied her bowels, were there accidents of the most personal kind and when exactly did her pain begin. Esther sensed her mounting anger as she saw her client push her thick hands into the small of her back. She refused the water her mother poured for her and continued to re-arrange her sari as she swept the folds of silk material in.
An emergency siren echoed in the distance and then closer, in fact right outside on the suburban pavement voices grew louder, the start of another confrontation maybe. Sangria finally dropped her guard.
“I am sick of you and your bloody stupid questions. Why should I have to fight for this money? I have lost my dignity, my freedom as well as my choices.” They on the board looked in horror as she let rip. “Once I owned a profession and an identity just like you but look at me now! A sniffling wreck wearing support stockings, I can only wear slippers, cannot get into or out of the bath, have no visitors unless they are paid to care, apart from Esther that is! What shall we talk about, my bowel movements perhaps?”

How could anyone know the fear Esther faced but she had to let it go if she was to ever think of being of use to those outside her own comfort zone? Meeting and facing as well as helping others helped her to deal with her own fears and pain with success perhaps she wasn’t quite as stupid and thick as her stepfather had said but just simply human instead.