I feel a depressive slide take hold, nothing but the awful truth falling at the front of my mind. I created them all.
Runner, Oneiroi, Dolly, the Fouls, Flo the Outcast, Anna, Ella, and Grace.
Where earlier sun streamed over the city, clouds have emerged. Birds are no longer singing. The imminent outbreak of rain threatening to crack. Shining with sweat, I take hold of the cab’s door handle and squeeze. Something to hold on to. Something to make this nightmare feel real; spasms of denial like my mornings spent unremembering night terrors: tigers tearing at flesh, clowns with filthy neck ruffles, a giant knife chasing a child. The earlier rejections of truth a balm for my reality.
But now everything is returned to me.
The sound of a small key unlocking my self-slaughter that hangs on a hinge. Nowhere to go. I force my hands down my stinking leggings—Quick, stop her, tries Oneiroi—and drag my nails along my thighs. Too late, Dolly cries.
A downpour of rain hammers on the roof like a dozen angry fists. Windshield wipers screech. I think of the stolen leather jacket, the Electra’s pink neon light, the watery blue of Ella’s eyes—wondering if mine are still green. I check the cab’s rearview mirror.
Yes.
I lower my damp green eyes and pull long-lived-with Ella—the part of me I’ve most wished to escape—tightly toward my body. I submit to her, accepting her heart-racing existence. The Body shaking in forced recognition.
We will be as one. But it will be short-lived, I say.
Ella nods, compliant.
Alone, I feel sick. Dizzy.
I touch my hair, bangs outgrown but its length familiar. And now my cheekbones: still high and soft. When I catch my reflection in the rain-drenched window—eyes shot, mouth downturned and trembling—I look away.
“Who knew?” I hear myself speak.
A traffic light flashes red and the cab slows to a stop.
In his rearview mirror, the driver stares at me. Hard and fixed.
I fold my arms to cover my chest: no longer flat, but mature and plump like bedroom pillows. My real breasts nothing like the dysmorphic prepubescent acorns I’ve imagined.
Who knew?
I look out the window at a mother and daughter preparing to make their way through the rain. A tender, protective arm laced behind the child’s waterproof back. I hate them both.
Our eyes meet.
Worthless piece of shit, the mother mouths.
Whore, the little girl adds.
They laugh and smile and skip over the crosswalk, an umbrella held high enough to protect their hurried march. I force down the dripping window and scream something primal, no words, just noise. Something akin to a rabid wildling. The mother and daughter jump, startled. When the mother turns back to inquire, her loving arm is momentarily dropped, and I am slightly less green because of their separation.
“I have no one!” I scream. “I’m all alone.”
And again, that noise.
Rabid and crazed and hurting.
The mother turns back, holds her child tightly once more, and rushes her across the street. A look of bewilderment wide and alive in her eyes. I have scared them both and I am satisfied.
Baba would relish the fruits of his sadism, Oneiroi says, rocking back and forth against the cab’s leather seat.
Please d-d-don’t let him win, Dolly stammers.
Silence.
“He’s already won.” I cry.
Flash.
Flash.
Flash.
“Thisiswhatalldaddiesdowhenmummiesgotoheaven.”
Flash.
A presuicide high forces my head against the window glass. Again. Harder. Pain spearing the backs of my eyes. Harder. Travels to meet my skull, my nerves. Harder. A choke in my throat.
The cab halts.
“Out!” the driver orders.
Harder.
Harder.
Harder.
We struggle. A grabbing arm and fist. I feel my weight land on the wet, frigid asphalt. A graze to my cheek.
The cabdriver comes in close. “Crazy bitch,” he says, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, a glob of phlegm spat down at my face.
Who knew? the Fouls belittle, laughing.
I lift my head to the rain, my senses alive, the night’s smell increased. The Body feeling like it could run a marathon. A taste of used coins in my mouth. I stand up, adrenaline like a shot in the arm, and call up my shame, directing a sharp slap to my cheek.
Again.
Again.
Again.
The mind is an unfathomable thing, I realize.
I cut across St. John’s Way toward Archway Road, not bothering to wipe away the cabdriver’s spit, traffic barreling along beside me. My pace quickens, the earlier sense I could run a marathon now picked up and gaining speed in the pissing rain. Archway Park; Waterlow Road; Hornsey Lane; Jumpers Bridge now in plain sight. I slow down as I approach the vast linear railings, like soldiers guarding the road, the Body now drenched and exhausted.
Several dark bushes act as bookends for the stretch at Jumpers Bridge. I imagine the countless suicides committed here. How unloved and unwanted they each must have felt. Men and women, boys and girls who believed their worlds too brutal, existing as though underwater—never truly living, simply existing—the people around them casting dark shadows and unreachable. I imagine the insanity of the jump. Bodies slammed by fast-approached asphalt, cars swerving furiously. Limbs broken and scorned. Their defeated, busted bodies forming the same mutilated shape as my own mother’s. Blood trickling out. Eyes still open when the ambulance arrives.
As I edge closer, I hear Daniel’s voice in my head: Just for today I am strong . . . But the words are quickly drowned out by my own: Strong? Never. End it now.
The Voices drift in and out. Like flu. Weather. Weekend shags. I picture Ella—me—on the huge plasma TV. Then Navid, Shaun, and Cassie. The Electra Girls. The club and the Groom House and my existence in both. The New Girl—Ella in the club—who slotted in like some perfect puzzle piece providing a common value. I think about Navid—the man who took me under his paws and was everything all at once, changing to fit whatever I might need him to be: father, lover, employer, higher power. Perpetrator.
He said it thrilled him to watch me as I took on the shape of a stripper. So I entered a world where I allowed the ghosts of my childhood back in, performing pleasure for others as I had for my father. And in some dark, buried part of my soul was a tiny frightened child, in hiding, crouching, scared by the depth at which there lingered something wild.
Tick-tock—
Tick-tock—
Tick-tock—
And now comes the presuicide calm that I’ve read about in books.
A swelling of time and space. All the stars have aligned, and I am nothing; nothing but a small speck of dust. One blow, and I’ll be gone.
No one ever lacks a good reason for suicide. My mother’s was my father, and her father before. I wonder what it must have felt like for her to have that much power. To have the final say. Her suicide attempt holding the grand rites of femininity where women are supposed to lose in order to win—tragically outwitting or rejecting her feminine role at the only price possible: her death.
I climb over the railings and look down, the delicate gold chain and its key still in my hand. Beneath me: the backup, close to a mile, crawling under my feet—snaking the strip—my eyes crimping from their blaring white lights.
Your mother is waiting for you, the Fouls whisper, pointing to the sky.
I crane my neck in search of birds, my mother’s soul not immediately sensed. Where are they? Where have they gone? Each one a story, a truth, a testament against forgetting, against pain, against the loss of my beloved mother. I close my eyes tightly and try to picture one of the many species I’ve photographed over the years, hoping memory will somehow conjure a bird in flight—a slideshow of images flipping at speed through my mind.
The Mind finally settles on a p
hoenix, although I have obviously never met one in real life. I imagine it’s a sign sent down from my mother, the phoenix filling my mind with freedom like an orchestra filling a concert hall with symphony, sounding of love.
Don’t keep her waiting, the Fouls say.
Numb, forlorn, grief drenching my empty body, I loosen my hands. The Voices whispering softly in my ear: Jump, you fucking crybaby.
75
The Solitary Goose
—Du Fu
孤雁不饮啄
飞鸣声念群
谁联一片影
相失万重云
望尽似犹见
哀多如更闻
野鸭无意绪
鸣噪亦纷纷
gū yàn bù yǐn zhuó
fēi míng shēng niàn qún
shuí líng yī piàn yǐng
xiāng shī wàn chóng yún
wàng jìn sì yóu jiàn
āi duō rú gèng wén
yě yā wú yì xù
míng zào yì fēn fēn
The solitary goose does not drink or eat,
It flies about and calls, missing the flock.
No one now remembers this one shadow,
They’ve lost each other in the myriad layers of cloud.
It looks into the distance: seems to see,
It’s so distressed; it thinks that it can hear.
Unconsciously, the wild ducks start to call,
Cries of birds are everywhere confused.
76
Daniel Rosenstein
“Jennifer said I might find you here,” I say.
“Jennifer?”
“Jennifer, Jen. From the meetings.”
John lifts his glass and sips, not caring to meet my eyes; his are defeated and lost, his focus gone.
The bartender approaches. “What’ll you have?” he asks.
“Diet Coke,” I say.
“Make that two,” the Old-Timer adds. “But throw a whiskey in mine while you’re at it.”
I sit, not bothering to remove my overcoat. “A little early, don’t you think?”
“Depends what you call early.”
I check the clock overhead: eleven a.m. A difficult and guilt-ridden decision made yesterday to clear a window in my schedule so I could hunt down John. A huntsman, a hawker, a friend.
“So. Is this how it’s going to be?” I challenge.
“Certainly looks that way, Daniel.”
We both sip our drinks in silence. I imagine my monkey colluding with the drunk one clinging to the Old-Timer’s back, now set free to do as it damn well pleases.
“Another whiskey,” he shouts, slamming his palm on the bar. “Make it a double.”
“Come back,” I say, “there’s a meeting in a couple hours. We can go together.”
The Old-Timer clinks my glass.
“No can do,” he says, eyes fixed on his drink.
“No such thing,” I reply.
He turns to me, rests his palm on my thigh, swaying a little. “You know, I thought I’d cracked it. Just one drink, I told myself. Just to take the edge off things. I thought I was safe. Then one drink became a bottle. Then a phone call. A score. A hit. And quicker than you’d believe, I was right back into it. Deep.”
He holds out his hand. Proof of the shakes.
I place my arm around him, remembering the times we’ve sat together and shared our war stories, shame melting because we were not alone in the struggle.
“I’m sorry I didn’t call you back, John,” I say, suddenly crestfallen. “It’s no excuse, but I’ve had some things on my mind. I split up with my partner.”
“Sorry to hear that.”
Over the years we’ve talked each other down off a cliff regarding our significant losses. For the most part, he was a beacon of the AA Big Book directive, his recovery steadfast and tight. A man with immense integrity whose bridge to normal living was both staunch and unyielding.
“Your monkey try and convince you that you’re no longer an addict?” I ask.
“Something like that,” he says, reaching for a smoke.
“One drink is never enough,” I say. “Your monkey’s a liar.”
The Old-Timer stares into my eyes and nods. “Well, you’d know all about that, right, Daniel?”
“Touché, John,” I say, standing. “Touché.”
He looks over at a couple ordering brunch. “Go,” he says. “I wanna be alone, Daniel.”
As I leave I turn back, reluctantly, and see John order another drink. He lurches on the barstool, no concern for my exit. His stoop not dissimilar from my father’s, content at the bar, shelling peanuts, a TV overhead blasting out talk shows and sports news. A glaze falling over his sad, lonely eyes.
The door now closed behind me, I recall my first and only relapse. I was twelve months sober and a week away from collecting my chip when the monkey on my back forced my desire sky high. I didn’t want to succeed, I wanted to get wasted, have sex. Sabotage all the hard work of the last twelve months because someone looked at me the wrong way. The look turned into defeat; I told myself no one cared. Clara was long gone, work was a drag. Just one drink, the monkey said. It’ll take the edge off things.
Like John said, one drink turned into a bottle, or three. Next, a cab ride to Soho. Cocaine in a bar, girls, more drinks, a hooker.
A shiver falls upon me. “I won’t allow John to give up,” I speak out loud, reminded of how he’s had my back, talking me off a ledge after that messy relapse when all I could think about was getting loaded after Clara’s death. How he had helped me find a sponsor. His grit was much greater than mine, his fight both determined and needed. “I will do the same for him.”
I spin around on my heel, burst back into the bar, and grab John by the collar.
“I’m taking you to rehab. I’ll be back in a couple of hours. Leave, and I’ll come find you. Stay, and we’ve got ourselves a fight.”
John breaks down, slings his arms around my back, and holds on for his life. Purpose and survival forcing our spines to realign.
Outside, I race to my car, knowing I need to get to work by midday, pulling out my phone. I see I have two missed calls and a voicemail. Rattled, I press play.
“Dr. Rosenstein,” my receptionist says, “you need to come into the office immediately. Something terrible has happened. It’s Alexa Wú.”
77
Alexa Wú
“Alexa,” he whispers.
I attempt to focus my eyes.
A blurry Daniel and two vaguely familiar nurses wearing white tunics are standing beside me. One holding a big fuck-off needle that only moments ago was injected into my left arm.
My useless eyes slide around the alabaster room. Placed by the window next to me, violet ranunculus sit in a turquoise vase, their scent a sweet perfume. Outside, Glendown’s residents wander the lawn. Hats and scarves covering soft parts of their bodies. A woman sits on the bench and stares at the sky, awaiting its weather or wildlife. The hazy view caught like an impressionist painting. Thin and visible brushstrokes accentuating the passage of time.
Daniel leans closer and places his hand on my shoulder, adjusts a scratchy smock covering the Body.
I am fatigued. Battle fatigued. I hear him order one of the nurses to fetch another blanket, and my brain, very slowly, realizes it is Nurse Veal. The stern nurse who gave me the medication after I’d smashed the glass in Daniel’s office.
She returns with a white cellular blanket and swaddles it around my chest as if I’m a baby. In the distance I hear Dolly’s cries fade, the medication already taking effect. Its liquid entering my thin, reluctant veins. The swell of drugs races to greet my brain, shooing away the Flock like a scarecrow.
Please let them stay. I need them.
Thrashing the Body is useless. Soon I will lose control of the Body, the Flock. And as much as I want to think I’m fighting the numbing medication, opposing its controlling force, I know it will always win in the end.
The Body lets go. Curling up like a coral shrimp.
Daniel smiles, an unblemished jawline smelling of expensive scent, clean and woody. He rests his hand on my cheek, and my eyes pull down like two garage doors. My mouth dribbling out a warm, dewy moisture. Eyes half-open, I glimpse Charlotte standing at the door, her stunned mouth covered by her chubby hand.
“Bring her to my office when she wakes up,” Daniel says, his words giving way like forgotten snow. “I have to talk to the police now.”
78
Daniel Rosenstein
I slump in my chair, my confidence lost.
This could have been avoided, I think.
I should have had her committed and not have colluded, turning a blind eye to her attempts to bring Navid down. It was too much for her. I should have intervened.
The tyranny of shoulds and musts.
I glance at my clock, awaiting the police. PC Keith Chandler wishing to return to question me further about my work with Alexa Wú. I of course have trust on my side. The offering up of information about a patient deemed unethical in the eyes of mental health law unless patients have disclosed terrorism or murderous intention. I’ve already decided I will not disclose to PC Chandler that I visited the Groom House. I am irrelevant in all of this. But it’s safe to say the Flock gathered enough evidence against Navid Mahal to bring him down.
PC Chandler was only too happy to escort Alexa here for treatment after he’d gently persuaded her down from the bridge and questioned her. Where else would she go? Here she is safe. The medication has likely sent her along a royal road of consciousness, allowing in dreams. There, the inner child will prevail.
A child needs as much time as possible for knowing everything, remembering everything, about herself, even if it takes forever. Why should it matter if things are delayed?
A pause.
A pause.
A pause.
And if some days the mountain proves too brutal to climb, a landslide occasionally sending her off piste, she will get back up. She will rise. Because nothing is more important or more significant than knowing oneself.
The Eighth Girl Page 35