Acid Rain

by R. D Rhodes

  “Jesus! Next week!”

  They brought their heads closer together.

  “I know. What do they expect us to do though?”

  “What are you two gossiping about?” Sanders chirped loudly from the entrance. She wandered in with a big smile, her blonde hair bouncing, all youth and vitality and good cheer, then she saw the headline and her face dimmed.

  “Oh, Hazel. Just that on the news. Says there’s going to be more cuts!”

  Sanders stopped next to them, her eyes on the screen. “Don’t worry. It’ll be fine. We’re not losing any more staff.”

  “Is there an inspection next week?”

  She turned distractedly to look at them, “Yes, but it’ll be fine.” “I’ll talk to him when he comes and tell him like it is.” She smiled assurance. “Johnny has been sick again. Could you two go and clean it up, please?”

  The two nurses left the room together. Sanders watched them go, then took one of their seats. A correspondent stood outside Downing Street, talking animatedly. Below him little numerical digits rolled from right to left, which were soon replaced by 29th October 2010, UK enters worst recession since 2008. Prime minister David Cameron says, “Not to panic.”

  Sanders back and shoulders rose and fell. Her hands went to her head.

  Suddenly her neck spun round and she looked at me. Her surprise gave way to recognition, then anguish, and she winced as if in pain.

  “Aisha!” she said, “I never saw you there. Look, I’m” she glanced down, “sorry. For earlier. But you need to take your tablets, okay? It’s really important.”

  Her vulnerability was palpable. She looked like she really meant it.

  “No hard feelings, eh?” She kept staring, her eyes begging forgiveness.

  I didn’t know what else to do. I forced a smile back.

  “That’s a girl.” She relaxed, and smiled warmly. She turned her ponytail on me again.

  David Cameron to meet Chancellor tomorrow, rolled across the screen.

  Chapter 14

  I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. When at last the key clicked and the three knocks rapped on the door I got up and headed down with the others, towards the racket of TV audience cheering and canned laughter. In the blackness outside only the half-empty car park showed under the orange light. It looked freezing too, but I was still desperate to be out there, in the relative freedom. Anywhere, instead of stuck in there.

  I entered the common room. The X-Factor's cacophony was deafening. I took in the TV crowd, sitting comatose with their dinner plates, and then I spotted Nina, in that same seat by the window, staring out into black.

  Liz called me and I took my dinner plate and searched the room, seeing the twins by themselves at the same table, and joining the other one. Three of the four patients there were doped up to the eyeballs, two of them slavering into their food. The fourth guy was Sandy, the Yorkshire guy from group therapy. He had on the same red checked shirt and was eating quietly.

  I sat in the seat next to him, as he poked his plastic fork into a chip and lifted it to his mouth.

  “Hey,” I said, “is it Sandy?”

  He turned his head slowly and squinted at me through his bloodshot, lidded eyes. The three lines on his forehead creased. His bristly stubble was grey at the tips, but his eyebrows and the tufty hair that circled his bald patch were white as snow.

  “How are you? I’m Aisha.” I smiled.

  “Yeah, ah eard you this mornin.” he said through his mouthful. “Am okay thanks. And you?”

  “I’m not bad. How you feeling after that class today?”

  His eyes widened a little. A moment's hesitancy stalled his whole body. I glanced behind me to see if anyone was listening in or something. The staff were at the food trolley on the other side of the room, way out of earshot.

  He swallowed and blinked several times, and stabbed his fork back into his plate. “She’s right,” he said. “We are lucky ere. I shoont be moaning.”

  “I’m not gonna say anything.” I said. I ate some of my steak pie and beans. “Why shouldn’t you get day release? And we should all be getting outside daily. Do you not think that’s fair?”

  “It int about what’s fair” he said. “We are really lucky ere. I don’t knaw what I’d do, or where I’d be wi’out this place.”

  I ate some more. The X-Factor wailed out, and I had to talk loudly next to his ear, “Do you mind me asking, what you did when you went away? What did Lucinda mean?”

  He stiffened again. He shook his head, concentrating on his food. “I don’t want t’ talk bout that just now.”

  “Oh. Sorry.” I said. “Okay. It’s your choice.”

  But then something, maybe the sincerity of my apology, made him shoot his head round and stare at me full-on. It was like I’d flicked some psychic button in him. His face came so close to mine I could see the little hairs up his nose, and for a moment I thought he was going to nut me. Crazed, green pupils peered deep, seeming to be staring straight into my soul. I felt uncomfortable, but held my ground, and the longer he looked the more confident I felt that he wasn’t actually going to hit me.

  It was like a bizarre form of initiation, but he seemed to accept what he had found. The ominous glare faded, and a warmer countenance took its place. He turned away with a mischievous grin.

  “Why are you smiling?” I asked, and smiled myself at his complete lack of social etiquette.

  He grinned wider, showing his straight white teeth for the first time. His eyes sparkled as he did so, and I felt briefly like I was actually talking to a real person, that his spirit hadn’t been snuffed out like it seemed to have been for so many of the others here.

  I waited for him to reply. Eventually, he stopped grinning and ate some more food.

  “So, how long is it since we’ve been outside?” I asked.

  He looked up thoughtfully, “Bout’ two months.”

  “Two months!”

  He nodded.

  I checked behind me, to the TV crowd- all the fatties eyeballing some karaoke queen. It just seemed to make the nurses' jobs so easy.

  I turned back around. “They can’t keep us cooped up for so long?”

  He shook his head, “It’s not their fault. It’s just the economy. There’s no money.” He stared at the wall, like he was trying to convince himself.

  I swallowed down a mouthful. I looked towards Nina again. “Is she okay?” I asked. “That girl by the window?”

  He followed my eyes. Her right arm kept coming up mechanically, like a puppet, a new chicken nugget in her hand each time. “No, I woon’t say she’s okay. She don’t talk much. Never as. Sits there near nuff’ every day. The staff keep trying different stuff to elp, but ah think what she went through was pretty traumatic. She ant responded much.”

  I toyed with my food. “What did she go through?”

  “I don’t know. Some sort of sexual abuse. She din’t come to be that way by erself anyway. Ah know. Ah can tell.”

  “It’s a right shame,” he continued, seeming glad to be talking about someone else, “Av tried talkin’ to her, but she’s in er own little world most it’ time.”

  “How longs’ she been in here?”

  “Well, fore me, and av been ere eight months, so am not sure.”

  I poked my fork into the steak pie and the grease oozed out the sides. I felt sick. But I knew I had to keep my energy up. I didn’t even know for sure when the next meal was going to be.

  Sandy picked up the conversation again. “She’s int’ room next to me actually. Looks young for eighteen, din’t she? She-” but he was cut off mid-sentence as his mouth stretched wide-open and he let out a loud yawn. He lifted a hand to cover it, and when he opened his squeezed eyes again, the sparkle in his pupils had vanished and he looked at me blankly.

  I waited patiently, as he zoned in on the wall, “You were saying? About Nina?”

  But it was like he’d had some sort of small epileptic fit. He turned his head towards me but did
n’t know who I was or how I’d got there. He stared down in bafflement at his plate, then at the people around him. Then it slowly seemed to dawn on him, and he turned back to face me again.

  He raised his white eyebrows to push his eyes open. “Sorry,..Aisha. What were it you were saying?”

  “Are you okay?”

  He pushed his fingers into his eyes. “Yeah, sorry. Alt-zeimers moment.”

  “You have Alzheimer’s?!” He was only in his forties.

  “No. Figure it’ speech.” he smiled. “It’s just what ah call these moments ah have.”

  “Do you get them a lot?”

  “Now and again. It’s fine. Just the meds- but ah’d rather ave them than the anxiety.”

  A couple of patients put their empty trays on the stack and headed out into the hall. One of the guys at our table was slobbering into his food. Another guy was crushing up bread in the palm of his hand. I moved closer to Sandy. “When did you last have your meds?” I asked quietly.

  He looked at me, then around the table, as if he was considering the question,

  “I just got them there, fore’ I sat down. Ah get mines twice a day.” he said.

  Shit, I thought. I snapped my head round to the staff again. They were still chatting away, like they had been for the last ten minutes.

  “Do you think I’ll get a second dose too?”

  “I dunno. You’ll have t’ ask. But if you din’t get out’ with yer dinner then probably not.”

  I let myself exhale again. What could I do about it anyway? “What meds are you on?” I asked.

  “I can’t remember the name.”

  “Do you know anything about benzodiazepine?”

  He rolled his pupils up thoughtfully, the full red veins showing in the whites of his eyes.

  “No, sorry. Don’t think I av.”

  “That’s okay. It’s just that I’ve just got here and they're trying to force me to take them. This morning they gave me an injection. I was totally out of it, and I hope you don’t mind me saying this but, a bit like you are now.”

  He smiled. I couldn’t tell if he thought it was funny or if it was just to show that he hadn’t taken offence.

  “And it’s still just wearing off, I still feel a bit lethargic. I don’t even know what they are. I don’t need them. I don’t-”

  “But it will elp.” He said firmly, and from the look he was giving me it seemed pointless to argue with him.

  “Yeah. I suppose.”

  He nodded as if I’d done the right thing by agreeing. He swallowed down the last chip on his plate. “Oh, wait!” he said abruptly. “Av you ever considered suicide?”

  It seemed a ridiculous thing to say, but he looked at me seriously.

  I hesitated. “Yeah, I have. Many times.”

  “Okay. Well, it’s just that ah do seem t’ remember someone who was really suicidal ere, a few months ago. He moved to a different ward after couple it’ weeks, but while he were ere, they got him to take that. Or summit that sounded like it.”

  “Moved him to a different ward?”

  “Yeah. There’s a good few other wards ere. I don’t know much bout’ them though, t’ be honest.”

  “Well, haven’t you wanted to find out?” I asked.

  “No. I were on day release only three months ago. I,”- but he stopped as if he’d gone too far. “How would you do it?” he asked with interest.

  “Do what?”

  “Kill yourself.”

  I couldn’t work him out. I looked in his eyes. Despite the tiredness in them, there was an eagerness as well, that seemed to really want to know.

  I forked up another slice of pie and forced it into my mouth. “Well,” I said, “I would down all the pills I could get my hands on. Get drunk as I could. Go out to the woods. Get in a sleeping bag nice and warm. And hopefully, would just never wake up.”

  “Oh. So you’ve given it lotta thought then?” he lifted his eyebrows comically, almost like he was imitating Lucinda.

  “I’ve thought about it every day for the past five years.”

  His plate was empty, but he stayed at the table.

  “What about you?” I asked.

  “Aw no. Not me. I’d be scared of consequences.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, ell of course. The bible says it’s a sin.” He jumped in before I could reply, “You ever come close t’ it yet?”

  “Yeah.” I nodded. “I’ve came close a few times… What makes you believe in sins and hell?”

  “Ah see things.” He said matter-of-factly. “That’s why ah think I know that there are evil things, which ah just take t’ be form of hell. And if there’s hell then there must be sin, right?”

  “I don’t know.” I said. “Is that how you ended up in here?”

  But his eyelids closed over as he yawned again. His eyes were like two half-shut knives looking back at me. His head swayed to the right and he lifted his shoulder and brought himself back.

  “You really need to come off that stuff.” I said. “Look what it’s doing to you.”

  “No, ah need it! That’s what I was bout to say. It really elps’. I’m knackered but it stops the allucinations. It’s small price t’ pay. Elps’ me sleep too.”

  “You can’t sleep?”

  “No. I only sleep during the day, but these new tablets av really elped change that.”

  “Oh, sorry.” I said. I looked at his empty plate. “..Am I keeping you up?”

  He shook his head. “I can ang’ on five minutes.”

  I nodded. “What kind of hallucinations do you get?”

  “Lotsa things. Angels. Spirits. Red eyes that appear at t’ end of bed and watch me for ages. Just depends.”

  “Is it scary?”

  “Well, yeah, course it is. That’s why ah can’t sleep. Nurses tell me it’s not real, they say it’s out but delusions, but it looks real t’ me. I see it all as clearly as I’m seeing you. But then I do wonder, because I can’t see em’ as much when am on the drugs.”

  I recognized the tune on the TV. Some woman was murdering Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah.

  “What are the eyes like?” I asked.

  He yawned again, and covered his mouth. He’s polite about that, I thought, but he’s been eating the whole time with his mouth open. I could see his tiredness getting a firmer hold, he looked like he’d just done ten rounds in the ring and was about to drop. But still he stayed, holding eye contact. “Well, sometimes am just lying there int bed, and they just appear at bottom, and stare at me. Sometimes the eyes are on a figure. A kind of black figure. Sometimes in a hood and other times they are all on’t their own, staring at me int dark. Sometimes ah tell it to go away and it does, but other times it don’t. They’re always red. Like, blaring red. And really narrow, slanted, like pigs’ eyes or summit. That’s why ah can’t sleep. Or couldn’t sleep before. Usually all that stuff appens at night, when it’s dark, and when am on ma own. It’s just easier t’ sleep durint day when it’s light and feels safer.”

  “Like night terrors.”

  He looked at me, confused. “What are they?”

  “Well, it sounds a bit similar but not quite as creepy. Sometimes, when I’m sleeping, a darkness will come and hover above me in bed, and it seems to hold me down so I can’t get up. I do everything I can to move but I can’t open my eyes. They’re glued shut. Can’t even move my fingers. It’s like I’m frozen stiff.”

  “Oh, night-terrors.” he said slowly, as if it was a foreign language, “Yeah ah get them too. When I av them it’s always same thing, it’s orrible. There are all these figures int room and they all have on same black ooded cloaks, and they keep comin out the floors and passing through the room and going back out t’ walls. And I can never do out but ope to wake up as soon I can. I just keep asking God, “please elp me, please elp me”, and after a few seconds ah can open ma eyes again, and am awake, covered in sweat.”

  I nodded. “So how longs it been since you seen anythin
g?”

  “Bout ten days or so.”

  “And before your medication?”

  “Pretty much every night.”

  “Jesus.” I finished the last bit of pie and rounded up the remaining beans. “Do you ever hear voices?”

  “No. But Dean over there does. He gets it quite bad.”

  I followed his eyes to the guy he had called Dean- a man in his sixties with a gentle face.

  Sandy didn’t elaborate. The “oohs” and “aahs” of the karaoke singer got louder.

  “What load it’ shite, eh?”

  I smiled back at him. The noise got louder and louder until the song drew to a finale. “Hah-lee-loo-eya, hah-lee-loo-eeyaaa, hah-llee-looo-lieeeyaaaaa!” the singer shrieked. A round of applause burst out from the TV. But the patients hardly moved. Ward four seemed more like an old folks’ home than part of a mental institution.

  “THAT’S TEN TO EIGHT PEOPLE, START CLEARING YOUR PLATES.”

  Sandy stood up to leave. “Goodnight.” he said.

  “Goodnight.” I replied. “I enjoyed talkin’ to you.”

  “What? Oh, yeah, you too.” He looked ready to collapse. He pushed in his chair and walked away to the stacking trolley. Nina got up too, as the whole room filtered out like clockwork.

  I rolled over yet again and adjusted the pillows. I thought I must have gone past the point of tiredness. I hadn’t known what to expect. I hadn’t expected anything. But I wondered if this place was any worse than jail would have been. In the darkness of the room, in the silence of the ward, my mind flashed relentlessly through all the events of that first day. The patients, their haunted faces. Nina. Kev and his leering eyes. Sandy, Dr Dickson, Sanders. I kept seeing that door to my room bursting open, the three of them coming in, her with her needle. To have so little privacy. So little option. But what can I do? I considered. I could get my phone call and call Mack? But what can I say that she can act on? And anyway, someone will be right by the phone.

  The visions kept sparking in and out of my consciousness. Nina’s hair shedding as she cried in the group therapy room, the light from the window lighting her up from behind. Sanders desperation for me to listen that morning, her regret later that day.