Crossing The Line

I don't socialise with people I work with, in fact I try not to build friendships with people I work with - they don't have to like me, just respect me. That doesn't mean I avoid getting sucked into people's personal lives and the associated problems - pastoral care I think is the expression, but sometimes you get put in situations you'd rather stay in bed to avoid.

Let me explain.

Squirrel, our, twenty six year old, secretary is going to be made redundant. My boss has made the decision, and myself and one of my fellow managers know - it's a matter of when not if. The problem is that Squirrel and myself have grown very close over the five and a half years that she has worked with us.

She began working with us back in April 2001 and to be honest we got on like the proverbial house on fire from day one, despite the twenty year age gap. I think the attraction was because we are two of a kind, both shy, sometimes unsure of ourselves and ultimately we both realise there is more to life than office work. We exchanged Christmas and birthday presents (in Janis's knowledge), she would send me messages on the internal e-mail system and texts to my phone - there never was and never has been a sexual attraction, as I say it was down to two kindred spirits.

In the Autumn of 2001 her long-term boyfriend dumped her by text and she wasn't so much upset as angry - in fact I could see that beneath the knowing exterior she was a potential bunny boiler - but that soon passed and she got on with her life again.

We grew closer after an incident early in 2002 when one of her superior officers in the Army Cadets, in which she is a staff sergeant, played a pretty shitty practical joke on her and I was the shoulder she needed to cry on. After that everything was going fine until late in 2002 when her parents announced they were moving to Ireland to set up a saddlery business. This affected her very badly, the thought of being left to fend for herself was something she couldn't handle and the on the Friday the week before Easter 2003 I found myself in a car park in the New Forest talking her out of committing suicide.

If that wasn't surreal enough, on the Sunday as I was leaving the house my phone went and it was an e-mail from Squirrel telling me that her Dad had died the previous night from a heart-attack in a restaurant in Cork, Ireland. Her parents had been visiting Ireland to tie up a few loose ends prior to starting their new life. I text her back and told her if there was anything she needed she should let me know, she replied saying thanks and she'd be in-touch.

Knowing her state of mind before he had died I wondered how she'd handle his death. It was obvious from the moment she started with us that she idolised him, he had been in the Army in the King's Troop and he had encouraged her to be an Army Cadet where she has risen to Staff Sergeant. I tried texting her over the next couple of weeks leading up to the funeral and got one reply, looking back I can see how she thought I was being a nuisance, from my point of view I needed to be sure she wasn't going to harm herself. I mean she was going to kill herself the day before her Dad died what would you think?

When she came back to work three weeks after his death she was in floods of tears most of the time but we'd spend time together chatting (or getting involved as one member of staff put it) and despite her best attempts at being horrible to me we got through it and she became stronger.

She'd changed though.

The light in her eyes had gone out, the cheekiness, the humour, the lust for life, all gone. She talked about harming herself physically, it was a classic cry for help and I was there to help. Her work is patchy, sometimes she's the best opganiser in the world, other days she can be as useful as a chocolate teapot.

As I said she'd been badly let down by her boyfriend just after starting with us and again two years ago by another member of the Army who she had chased for a year or so. Now she was punishing herself by not going out clubbing or to the cinema or pub.

In November 2003 I had my heart attack but I couldn't tell her. It was a classic case of 'survivors guilt' - I just couldn't face telling her that I'd survived where her Dad had died. The following year when Nigel died she was brilliant, not one of the girls in my team said a word - perhaps they didn't know what to say - but Squirrel was there for me and that's a memory I shall treasure for ever.

Last year we had a major falling out and things were just about civil for eight months or so, the upshot being that for the first time since 2001 we didn't exchange birthday or christmas presents. When we came back after Christmas 2005 though things were back to normal, or at least as near normal as they have been since her Dad's death three years ago.

This year when I came back from two weeks in France I looked at her and realised what a beautiful young woman she has grown into, (when you work with somebody forty odd hours a week you don't always look that closely at them, well I don't anyway) - one that any parent would be proud of. And do you know what, I told her so. I told her that I'd forgotten how good looking she was, I told her she could take it whatever way she choose because she must know after five years getting to know each other I wasn't interested in jumping her. I also said how I couldn't understand why she hasn't had a boyfriend for four years - although I think we both know why that is - she's punishing herself over her Dad's death. When I left the office after telling her that she sent me a text thanking me and telling me it meant a lot to her for me to say those kind words.

Now because of the restructuring plans for the way our office works she'll be out of work, possibly before Christmas and knowing that makes me feel like I've got Edgar Allen Poe's Tell Tale Heart nagging away at me.

We are supposed to be having a boss/managers meeting this week to discuss matters but there's only two days left and I'm tied up all day tomorrow and Friday morning - next week is half term and I'm off for the week so that delays things for another week. See, I'm doing my good boss routine, it's wrong but sometimes a friend needs a bit of protection - even if it's only from herself.