Kathy H., a 31-year-old car­er with over eleven years of expe­ri­ence, reflects on her pro­longed tenure in the role. While she acknowl­edges that her extend­ed ser­vice isn’t sole­ly due to excep­tion­al per­for­mance, she takes pride in her abil­i­ty to keep her donors calm and facil­i­tate their recov­er­ies. She attrib­ut­es her suc­cess to an instinc­tive under­stand­ing of when to offer com­fort or space. Despite her com­pe­tence, she humbly rec­og­nizes that oth­er equal­ly skilled car­ers receive less recog­ni­tion, and she address­es poten­tial resent­ment over her priv­i­leges, such as choos­ing her donors, often favor­ing those from Hail­sham, her child­hood home.

Kathy explains that her pref­er­ence for Hail­sham donors stems from a nat­ur­al incli­na­tion to con­nect with those who share her back­ground, which helps sus­tain her emo­tion­al resilience. She recounts how recon­nect­ing with Ruth, a child­hood friend, rein­forced the val­ue of these bonds. Over time, how­ev­er, few­er famil­iar donors remain, mak­ing her work increas­ing­ly chal­leng­ing. This dimin­ish­ing con­nec­tion has led her to accept that her time as a car­er is near­ing its end, though she cher­ish­es the mem­o­ries and rela­tion­ships she’s main­tained through her role.

A poignant moment with a dying donor high­lights the sig­nif­i­cance of Hail­sham in Kathy’s life. The donor, near­ing the end of his life, finds solace in Kathy’s vivid descrip­tions of Hail­sham, as if her mem­o­ries could become his own. This encounter deep­ens Kathy’s appre­ci­a­tion for her upbring­ing, real­iz­ing how for­tu­nate she and her peers were. The donor’s long­ing for her past under­scores the emo­tion­al weight Hail­sham car­ries for those who nev­er expe­ri­enced its com­forts.

Now, as Kathy dri­ves across the coun­try, she often mis­takes land­scapes or build­ings for Hail­sham, par­tic­u­lar­ly sports pavil­ions that evoke nos­tal­gic mem­o­ries. These struc­tures remind her of the pavil­ion at Hail­sham, a cher­ished place for soli­tude and cama­raderie. The chap­ter clos­es with Kathy’s lin­ger­ing attach­ment to her past, as she con­tin­ues to seek traces of Hail­sham in the world around her, a tes­ta­ment to its endur­ing impact on her iden­ti­ty and emo­tions.