Resident Not Available - a Pastoral Episode

A freezing Swanvale Halt afternoon: I went to the church to collect the reserved sacrament to take to Alison, who lives in the block of sheltered housing flats adjoining the churchyard. I should have seen her in the week before Christmas, but she'd been in hospital and this was the first time we could set something up. I keyed in the number of her flat and waited a minute while the keypad beeped. 'Resident not available', the machine told me. So I tried to phone her, and found the line busy. I had a leaflet to drop round to a new resident around the corner, so did that, returned, and tried again, with the same result. I popped to the Post Office before coming back, and yet another attempt to make contact brought no further success. It was now 25 minutes after our appointment, cold, and getting dark.

I went to the church office, and happened to mention the situation to Sandra the office manager. She sings in a community choir with one of the other residents of the flats, and before I really knew what was happening called him: he wasn't at home, but gave us the number of another neighbour. This all seemed to be spinning a little out of control: I didn't really have any reason to think Alison was lying incapacitated on the floor of her flat and we were now only one over-excited misinterpretation of a sentence away from the fire brigade turning up. Sandra's friend's neighbour pinged me in to the flats and I eventually found Alison's door open and Alison herself contentedly watching the TV with the sound turned up so loud it obliterated even the residual chance she might have had of hearing the intercom when I called. The phone was still hooked up to a call from 2 1/4 hours earlier, explaining why the line was busy. The number was displayed as 'withheld', so possibly Alison had been unwittingly saving any number of other people from nuisance calls from the same source. 'It's lovely to see you', she said, having completely and blissfully forgotten our appointment.