You always talk down to us, thought Milena. You make us jump through hoops that are nothing to do with us, and then smile so sweetly when we fall over.
‘Sounds like the viruses,’ said Milena. ‘Just like the viruses. Plato would have hated the viruses, too.’
The School Nurse laughed. ‘Very good, Milena, yes, yes he would have hated the viruses. As we all know, he and Aristotle founded the Axis of Materialist and Idealistic thinking, both of which the Golden Stream swept away. Plato believed in dictators. He certainly would have hated the Consensus, our democracy.’
The School Nurse looked pleased. Got a nibble, huh? Thought Milena. I bet you tell people there are glimmers of intelligence in my face.
‘I agree with him,’ said Milena.
The Lumps all laughed.
‘Are you an idealist, then Milena? Do you think you are just a shadow on the wall of a cave? Perhaps you disagree with Plato and are a materialist. Perhaps you want a Materialist state, with its choice of dictatorship or capitalist, economic terrorism?’ The School Nurse was still smiling. ‘Compare that to an idealist state, a theocracy perhaps? Being told you are damned, and that God wants to burn you in Dante’s Inferno?’
Milena was neither a materialist nor an idealist. Browbeaten, she withdrew into herself. But I know what Plato meant. All of you get everything you know for free without working for it. It isn’t yours. I have to fight for every word. So maybe I am just grumpy old Plato, upset because people have a new tool that makes things too easy.
The School Nurse turned her attention to the other Lumps. ‘Now how did Derrida point out how Plato resolved the contradiction of writing against writing?’
The Lumps chorused, ‘
‘Yes,’ said the Nurse. ‘The root for our word pharmacy. Healing drugs. What people used to call medicine. But in Plato’s time it meant both poison and cure. So Plato regarded writing as a poison that could also cure.’
Milena remembered something. ‘He doesn’t use the word!’ she yelped.
The Nurse faltered. ‘That’s not relevant,’ she said.
‘Derrida says he doesn’t! Not once! Plato doesn’t call writing
‘Anyone like to comment?’ the School Nurse said, on firm ground again.
The beaming faces turned to Milena, hunched on the ground.
‘It’s implicit in the culture,’ said one of them.
‘It can be in the text without being there.’
Milena dug her hands deeper into her armpits. ‘So Derrida can make Plato say anything he wants him to say?’
The School Nurse shook her head. ‘No. But he allows himself the freedom to fully understand Plato in context.’
Anger flowered inside Milena, a rich and vital growth. ‘I’ll tell you why Plato wrote when he hated writing,’ she said. ‘He wrote because he knew that he had lost. He had lost, and everyone was writing, and so he had to write. But he still hated it.’
Like I hate the viruses. But I need them, now, here, to keep up.
Plato lost? The Lumps laughed. How they laughed. Milena had got it wrong again. Plato, the great voice of Idealism did not lose. He had founded the stream of discourse that ruled for two thousand years and nearly destroyed the planet.
The School Nurse scowled and shook her head at them. ‘Remember,’ she said. ‘Now remember, team,’ she said. ‘Milena has no viruses. We’re to use what the viruses tell us, aren’t we? What do we think Derrida would tell us about Milena?’
There was a pause. What was the right line, then? The Lumps waited to be told.
‘Milena is speaking from her own personal experience. She thinks of the viruses as Plato thought of writing. She is viewing the text in her own, unique way. This is inevitable, isn’t it? Milena is a reader of books, after all. One of the few we’ve got left, and Derrida was writing about reading as well.’
The School Nurse smiled at her with indulgence. Then she turned to Rose Ella, the new Nurse, and held out her hands, as if presenting Milena to her. The new Nurse smiled again.
Make me smile back. Go on, challenged Milena. See if you can. She turned grimly back to Ms Hazell.
‘You always use that word 'remember',’ said Milena. ‘You say, 'remember, team'. You never tell us to think.’
They all were silent at that. The Lumps knew everyone thought they were stupid. Milena grimly resisted feeling unkind for reminding them of that.
‘That’s another large topic, the difference between memory and intelligence. Let’s break now. Thank you, everyone. That was a very fruitful discussion. I certainly feel like I’ve learned a lot.’
The Nurse leaned over the table and began to discuss each Lump’s individual project. Pauline was knitting a sweater. ‘Very good!’ exclaimed the School Nurse and held it up.
The new Nurse, Rose Ella, approached Milena.
‘Were you measuring how fast we are? I didn’t see you counting,’ said Milena.
‘I wasn’t here to time you,’ said Rose Ella. She knelt down in front of Milena. She was twelve, thirteen years old. An adult.
‘We’re too slow, huh?’
‘It must be terrible for you,’ said Rose Ella, and reached out with her hand. ‘You’re so intelligent. And not to have a memory.’
Milena rolled her eyes. It must be hell, she thought, to be so pretty and so stupid. Leave me alone.
‘Did you specialise in Learning Disabilities?’ Milena asked.
Rose Ella turned around and sat on the ground next to her. ‘Not particularly,’ she said. ‘No, there was a new emphasis when I was doing my practicals. You know, the new fashion. There are fashions in everything.’
Milena liked that. It was honest. It seemed to treat Milena with a measure of respect. ‘So what’s fashionable now?’ Milena asked feeling herself going shy.
‘Originality,’ said Rose Ella. ‘They’re telling us to look for originality, and Develop that. Nobody’s coming up with anything new. Not in science, not anywhere.’
‘So I’m original, huh?’
‘I think so,’ said Rose Ella. ‘I’ve never heard anyone say those things about Plato.’
Milena’s eyes seemed to go hot and heavy. Praise made her heartsick; she was so unused to it, and needed it so badly.
‘Lot of good it does me,’ murmured Milena, looking down.
‘You like theatre,’ said Rose Ella gently.
‘They briefed you, eh?’ Milena wished she had something to do with her hands, some leather to stitch, some brass to polish. Her hands were always empty. ‘I don’t know. I just like to imagine things on a stage. You know, costumes, lights. I put on the Christmas show.’ Milena was going to tell her about the costumes, the golden shoes, and the brass ice bucket that was supposed to contain myrhh.
‘Oh, yes, they told me about that!’ exclaimed Rose Ella, forgetting herself. She pulled her curly blonde hair back behind her ears. That made her ears stick out. ‘It sounded lovely! I was really sorry I missed it.’
‘They told you all about it, eh,’ said Milena. She fell silent. For a moment there I thought you were being friendly. Milena shifted where she sat, jerking her buttocks nearer to the wall, sitting up straighter. She would tell Rose Ella nothing else. She answered the next few questions with a yes or a no.
Rose Ella looked chastened. She had forgotten some of her training. Never tell a Disabled Person that you already know about what they’re going to tell you. Milena could see the new Nurse think that. Milena could see her try to make amends. Rose Ella started to talk about her family. Her father restored furniture. Her mother was a glass-blower.
‘Have you ever seen the glass-blowing?’ Rose Ella asked. ‘It’s lovely to watch.’
‘Sizing up a future Placing for me?’ said Milena.
‘No,’ said Rose Ella. ‘I’m just proud of my mother.’
‘Mine’s dead,’ said Milena. ‘She was an idiot. Well, not really. But we ended up here. We were from
