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Hannah: The sunlight through the leaves is so beautiful, particularly that patch there, by those ferns. It's been getting better and better as the sun moves.

Kate: That's the wonderful thing about photographers, they're always seeing photos in things that the rest of us take for granted or ignore.

Hannah: It's true, I was without a camera for ages after my last one was pinched, and I started to lose that 'eye' for a good shot, I just stopped looking at the world around me that way. You know, Kate, last night while you were giving me a bollocking I was actually sitting there thinking I wanted to pull my phone out and take some candid portrait shots, but it obviously wasn't quite the right moment. Would you mind if I took some of you now?

Kate: Don't even think about pointing that camera at me, it'll end up in there, I mean it.

Emma: That's a very nice camera, Hannah, so I wouldn't test her on that if I were you. I saw her rough up a photographer from a gliding magazine once, she warned him twice, but he must have thought she was joking.

Kate: Sorry, but I really hate cameras, I've actually been feeling quite uncomfortable all the time you've had it in your hand, I knew it was only a matter of time before it was pointing at me.

Hannah: I'm so, so sorry Kate, I honestly didn't mean to make you uncomfortable, you can relax, I promise I won't take your picture without your consent. But just for the record, I meant what I said, I really did think you looked fabulous last night.

Kate: Well, Em did my make-up, she paints a face on the potato. If I try to do my own make-up I get in a rage, and I end up washing everything off and not going out at all.

Emma: Katie stop it! If I overheard anyone else saying your face looked like a potato I'd punch them, so the next time you say it you're getting a slap. You've really got to stop that.

Kate: Well, on that cheerful note, can we change the subject please? Hannah, has Em talked to you about our little problem?

Hannah: No, what little problem?

Emma: No, I thought we'd wait for you.

Kate: OK, so we were chatting last night, and Emma made a very interesting point. She and I find ourselves in a very delicate position regarding your pretending.

Hannah: How so?

Kate: We obviously accept that you're not a real para and now we're introducing you to our friends, but when your secret is discovered one day, and it will be, it's going to backfire on us. We'll have two options: we can say we had no idea, and look like complete twats for not spotting an obvious fake ourselves, or we can say we knew but we went along with it, which brings our own integrity into question. Do you see our problem?

Hannah: I do, but I really don't think it's a problem.

Kate: Of course it's a problem. If someone exposes you it'll be all over social media and things will get awkward for us. The kind of disgust, and worse, that a lot of paras feel for pretenders will be directed at us for aiding and abetting one. And all the people who fell for your act will be angry and probably more circumspect in their dealings with us.

Hannah: But you're the only ones who know, and if you give me a few pointers it'll stay that way.

Kate: We might be the first to call you out, but I guarantee we're not the first to notice. You might be able to fool people who know nothing, but any para is going to spot the same anomalies we did, and lots of medical people would too.

Hannah: So I'll just be careful around real paras and medical people then.

Emma: But you won't always know that you're heading into disaster. Let's say you tell your whole long story to a charming guy at a party, including every last detail, and then along comes his friend, a doctor who worked in a spinal unit. You are properly buggered! You can't suddenly clam up after you've been a fountain of fun facts all evening, but you can't risk saying another word or answering a single question because the doctor guy will see through you immediately.

Hannah: That's a pretty unlikely scenario though. Why don't you just coach me, so I don't make mistakes in my story?

Kate: No, that won't help.

Hannah: Why not? If the 'anomalies' are so easy to spot, surely I can correct them and polish my story so all details are covered? I won't have any problem remembering it.

Emma: It won't help because there are things a story can't fix. Like you told us the other night that your car has hand controls, right?

Hannah: Yes, obviously it would have to if I'm T4 complete.

Emma: But it doesn't, does it?

Hannah: No, apparently there are problems with using them if I don't have the right medical paperwork - legal and licensing and insurance, particularly if I was in an accident.

Emma: Exactly, I certainly wouldn't risk it. Now what happens when someone who knows that paras use hand controls sees your car? Say a friend asks you for a lift, what would you do? Or perhaps they've kindly carried something to your car for you, or theirs is parked next to yours? You obviously can't let them see that there are no hand controls, so do you just pretend your car's been stolen?

Hannah: I see what you mean, but I could just be careful about where I park.

Kate: But there are lots of situations like that Hannah, any one of them can catch you by surprise and collapse your whole house of cards. It's a disaster waiting to happen. You told us you had a spinal fusion after your accident, but I didn't see a scar. Was it keyhole surgery via your bum, perhaps?

Emma: It's not just a matter of explaining your way out of each new trap Hannah, there will always be another one around the corner. You have to look at the bigger picture. We think the role you've chosen to play, a T4 complete paraplegic, is just too ambitious, there are too many differences between you as you are, and a real para. Just since we've been here I've noticed half a dozen things that any real para would notice, little things that would be natural if you were paralysed, but they're not natural to you, and vice versa. That's not a criticism, it's just a fact.

Kate: To be even half convincing you'd have to make a serious study of everything there is to know about this role and learn it one hundred percent, then you'd have to stay completely in character all the time, even when it's difficult or counter-intuitive. You'd always have to remember to suppress your natural reactions, and even your pain reflexes. It's only a matter of time before you slip up and reveal that you're not who you say you are.

Hannah: Kate maybe you don't appreciate quite how important this is to me. I won't give it up, not for you, not for anyone. Just to put it in perspective for you: if I had to choose between giving it up just so you don't get embarrassed by it, or packing up and moving somewhere else, I'd move, no question. And Emma, I thought you said you had no problem with it? Well, so much for that.

Kate: And maybe you don't appreciate how hard we've worked to be accepted by the people here, and I for one don't want to see that jeopardised by anything or anyone. Just so you understand how important that is for me, I'd sooner expose you myself than have someone else do it and think less of me as a result.

Emma: Stop it, both of you, or I swear I'm going to bang your heads together, and that's not an idle threat! Hannah, you don't want to move away, and Katie doesn't want to expose you, so stop talking nonsense! And I am OK with it, but you need to listen to what we're saying, it may not sound like it, but we want to help you.

Hannah: You can help by pointing out the things you think I'm doing wrong and telling me which details I need to improve in my story like I've asked you to.

Kate: I told you, we're not going to do that.

Hannah: And I asked you why not.

Emma: Hannah, listen, it's just not feasible or sustainable, sooner or later your body is going to betray you, it's not paralysed and it has full sensation, and that will show.

Hannah: But I feel that I am a T4 paraplegic, I feel that is the right body for me.

Emma: I don't pretend to understand the processes involved there, but the way I see it, the problem isn't with what you feel, it's with what you're expecting other people to believe.

Hannah: But won't it get easier over time, with practice and conditioning?

Kate: Can you really pretend you have no feeling at all and no voluntary movement at all from here down? What if a waiter spills hot coffee in your lap, is your acting good enough to not scream and thrash about, to not even notice? Could any kind of conditioning suppress your reflexes to that extent?

Hannah: But I don't think it...

Emma: Hannah, we have a friend who took a big Le Creuset dish out of the oven and put it straight on her lap, without a board under it. She only realised her mistake when she could smell her thighs cooking. That's what having no sensation means. A few minutes ago I watched you brush a fly off the back of your leg without looking at it, such a natural response you probably weren't even aware of doing it. I think you get my point?

Hannah: I suppose I do. So is she OK?

Kate: It's been nearly a year and they're still doing skin grafts. Hannah there are other situations where one's natural response is to move, can you always remember not to? If you saw a toddler in mortal danger and you could leap up and save her but a real para couldn't, which would you choose? Could you live with yourself if you stayed in character and just sat there?

Hannah: I'd obviously choose to save the child in that situation.

Kate: Fine, but that's an extreme example, so it's easy. But where's the line, the point where you would suppress your instinctive reactions as a caring human being, to stay in character? Would you save a puppy? Or a priceless vase that was about to fall? Or someone's camera that was about to get wet? And in those situations would you waste precious seconds looking around to see if anyone would see you stand up?

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Description

Story starts here

Previous Part here

-----------

Hannah: The sunlight through the leaves is so beautiful, particularly that patch there, by those ferns. It's been getting better and better as the sun moves.

Kate: That's the wonderful thing about photographers, they're always seeing photos in things that the rest of us take for granted or ignore.

Hannah: It's true, I was without a camera for ages after my last one was pinched, and I started to lose that 'eye' for a good shot, I just stopped looking at the world around me that way. You know, Kate, last night while you were giving me a bollocking I was actually sitting there thinking I wanted to pull my phone out and take some candid portrait shots, but it obviously wasn't quite the right moment. Would you mind if I took some of you now?

Kate: Don't even think about pointing that camera at me, it'll end up in there, I mean it.

Emma: That's a very nice camera, Hannah, so I wouldn't test her on that if I were you. I saw her rough up a photographer from a gliding magazine once, she warned him twice, but he must have thought she was joking.

Kate: Sorry, but I really hate cameras, I've actually been feeling quite uncomfortable all the time you've had it in your hand, I knew it was only a matter of time before it was pointing at me.

Hannah: I'm so, so sorry Kate, I honestly didn't mean to make you uncomfortable, you can relax, I promise I won't take your picture without your consent. But just for the record, I meant what I said, I really did think you looked fabulous last night.

Kate: Well, Em did my make-up, she paints a face on the potato. If I try to do my own make-up I get in a rage, and I end up washing everything off and not going out at all.

Emma: Katie stop it! If I overheard anyone else saying your face looked like a potato I'd punch them, so the next time you say it you're getting a slap. You've really got to stop that.

Kate: Well, on that cheerful note, can we change the subject please? Hannah, has Em talked to you about our little problem?

Hannah: No, what little problem?

Emma: No, I thought we'd wait for you.

Kate: OK, so we were chatting last night, and Emma made a very interesting point. She and I find ourselves in a very delicate position regarding your pretending.

Hannah: How so?

Kate: We obviously accept that you're not a real para and now we're introducing you to our friends, but when your secret is discovered one day, and it will be, it's going to backfire on us. We'll have two options: we can say we had no idea, and look like complete twats for not spotting an obvious fake ourselves, or we can say we knew but we went along with it, which brings our own integrity into question. Do you see our problem?

Hannah: I do, but I really don't think it's a problem.

Kate: Of course it's a problem. If someone exposes you it'll be all over social media and things will get awkward for us. The kind of disgust, and worse, that a lot of paras feel for pretenders will be directed at us for aiding and abetting one. And all the people who fell for your act will be angry and probably more circumspect in their dealings with us.

Hannah: But you're the only ones who know, and if you give me a few pointers it'll stay that way.

Kate: We might be the first to call you out, but I guarantee we're not the first to notice. You might be able to fool people who know nothing, but any para is going to spot the same anomalies we did, and lots of medical people would too.

Hannah: So I'll just be careful around real paras and medical people then.

Emma: But you won't always know that you're heading into disaster. Let's say you tell your whole long story to a charming guy at a party, including every last detail, and then along comes his friend, a doctor who worked in a spinal unit. You are properly buggered! You can't suddenly clam up after you've been a fountain of fun facts all evening, but you can't risk saying another word or answering a single question because the doctor guy will see through you immediately.

Hannah: That's a pretty unlikely scenario though. Why don't you just coach me, so I don't make mistakes in my story?

Kate: No, that won't help.

Hannah: Why not? If the 'anomalies' are so easy to spot, surely I can correct them and polish my story so all details are covered? I won't have any problem remembering it.

Emma: It won't help because there are things a story can't fix. Like you told us the other night that your car has hand controls, right?

Hannah: Yes, obviously it would have to if I'm T4 complete.

Emma: But it doesn't, does it?

Hannah: No, apparently there are problems with using them if I don't have the right medical paperwork - legal and licensing and insurance, particularly if I was in an accident.

Emma: Exactly, I certainly wouldn't risk it. Now what happens when someone who knows that paras use hand controls sees your car? Say a friend asks you for a lift, what would you do? Or perhaps they've kindly carried something to your car for you, or theirs is parked next to yours? You obviously can't let them see that there are no hand controls, so do you just pretend your car's been stolen?

Hannah: I see what you mean, but I could just be careful about where I park.

Kate: But there are lots of situations like that Hannah, any one of them can catch you by surprise and collapse your whole house of cards. It's a disaster waiting to happen. You told us you had a spinal fusion after your accident, but I didn't see a scar. Was it keyhole surgery via your bum, perhaps?

Emma: It's not just a matter of explaining your way out of each new trap Hannah, there will always be another one around the corner. You have to look at the bigger picture. We think the role you've chosen to play, a T4 complete paraplegic, is just too ambitious, there are too many differences between you as you are, and a real para. Just since we've been here I've noticed half a dozen things that any real para would notice, little things that would be natural if you were paralysed, but they're not natural to you, and vice versa. That's not a criticism, it's just a fact.

Kate: To be even half convincing you'd have to make a serious study of everything there is to know about this role and learn it one hundred percent, then you'd have to stay completely in character all the time, even when it's difficult or counter-intuitive. You'd always have to remember to suppress your natural reactions, and even your pain reflexes. It's only a matter of time before you slip up and reveal that you're not who you say you are.

Hannah: Kate maybe you don't appreciate quite how important this is to me. I won't give it up, not for you, not for anyone. Just to put it in perspective for you: if I had to choose between giving it up just so you don't get embarrassed by it, or packing up and moving somewhere else, I'd move, no question. And Emma, I thought you said you had no problem with it? Well, so much for that.

Kate: And maybe you don't appreciate how hard we've worked to be accepted by the people here, and I for one don't want to see that jeopardised by anything or anyone. Just so you understand how important that is for me, I'd sooner expose you myself than have someone else do it and think less of me as a result.

Emma: Stop it, both of you, or I swear I'm going to bang your heads together, and that's not an idle threat! Hannah, you don't want to move away, and Katie doesn't want to expose you, so stop talking nonsense! And I am OK with it, but you need to listen to what we're saying, it may not sound like it, but we want to help you.

Hannah: You can help by pointing out the things you think I'm doing wrong and telling me which details I need to improve in my story like I've asked you to.

Kate: I told you, we're not going to do that.

Hannah: And I asked you why not.

Emma: Hannah, listen, it's just not feasible or sustainable, sooner or later your body is going to betray you, it's not paralysed and it has full sensation, and that will show.

Hannah: But I feel that I am a T4 paraplegic, I feel that is the right body for me.

Emma: I don't pretend to understand the processes involved there, but the way I see it, the problem isn't with what you feel, it's with what you're expecting other people to believe.

Hannah: But won't it get easier over time, with practice and conditioning?

Kate: Can you really pretend you have no feeling at all and no voluntary movement at all from here down? What if a waiter spills hot coffee in your lap, is your acting good enough to not scream and thrash about, to not even notice? Could any kind of conditioning suppress your reflexes to that extent?

Hannah: But I don't think it...

Emma: Hannah, we have a friend who took a big Le Creuset dish out of the oven and put it straight on her lap, without a board under it. She only realised her mistake when she could smell her thighs cooking. That's what having no sensation means. A few minutes ago I watched you brush a fly off the back of your leg without looking at it, such a natural response you probably weren't even aware of doing it. I think you get my point?

Hannah: I suppose I do. So is she OK?

Kate: It's been nearly a year and they're still doing skin grafts. Hannah there are other situations where one's natural response is to move, can you always remember not to? If you saw a toddler in mortal danger and you could leap up and save her but a real para couldn't, which would you choose? Could you live with yourself if you stayed in character and just sat there?

Hannah: I'd obviously choose to save the child in that situation.

Kate: Fine, but that's an extreme example, so it's easy. But where's the line, the point where you would suppress your instinctive reactions as a caring human being, to stay in character? Would you save a puppy? Or a priceless vase that was about to fall? Or someone's camera that was about to get wet? And in those situations would you waste precious seconds looking around to see if anyone would see you stand up?

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