Goodbye Teddy
Page 36
When Michelle comes back later, I ask her if she minds going home with her mum. “I don’t feel very well,” I tell her. I just want to sleep I think. Everything feels so heavy inside. I’m not sure I can stay awake another minute. She tries to kiss me goodbye, but I move away. I can still smell all the bad smell from the blood. I don’t want her to smell it, and I don’t want her to know what my dad and his friend did.
When she has gone away, I tell Alan I am just going to bed to sleep for a while. When I get upstairs and lie on my bed, it doesn’t take long for me to feel like I'm drifting away, except its different, and I feel like I'm falling. I feel like I'm falling into some darkness, and when I open my eyes, I can't move my body, just my arms. I try to shout for Alan, but I can't even make my mouth move. I am paralysed, and I don’t know why.
It makes me afraid. I fight so hard to make my hands move, and when they do, I can feel my heart beating fast inside my chest. Maybe it was a bad dream. I roll over and close my eyes, but almost straight away it happens again. But this time, I don’t get scared and I don’t panic. I don’t feel any pain; it’s all gone. I don’t feel sad. I just feel blank. I let myself fall and everything starts to get darker, like I'm slowly floating away, but where I am going, I don’t know.
I can hear my name. It sounds like its far away, but I can't tell. I don’t want to answer it. I just want to keep falling. Nothing hurts. Not inside or outside. I can feel something, but I don’t know what it is. Like something sharp in my arm, but I can't move to find it. I hear Alan shout my name again and again. “Open your eyes,” he is saying to me, and I do try, but it is hard.
He stands over me when I do, and there is another man there. At first, I don’t know who it is, and then I realise it’s the nice doctor. “There’s an ambulance on the way,” Alan says to me. “Stay awake.”
The doctor says something, but I'm not sure what it is at first. “Another hour and he’d have been dead,” he says to Alan. I can hear him talking, but I drift off again, and when I open my eyes once more, the paramedics are there.
“He has no temperature and barely a heartbeat,” he says to the other man.
“Call my dad,” I ask Alan.
Alan looks down. “I already tried. He says he’s too busy to come. Do you want me to come to the hospital?”
I shake my head and let them take me away. I want to be left alone.
Septicaemia is what they said I had. We raced along in the ambulance, but I don’t remember that much about it. Then, for four hours, I was in the emergency room while doctors ran around and did examinations and things. I don’t remember so much. I think I passed out. They put a drip in my arm, though.
It hurts when I try to move. Every so often, one of the nurses comes into my room and pushes something through it. It makes my arm feel cold inside as it goes in. All I want to do is sleep. I am not allowed anything to eat. I have to go to theatre tomorrow. The doctor tried to ask me how I got injured, but I don’t want to tell him. He says he has to fix me. He says my skin is ripped inside, and they have to put it back together. I don’t want to listen. It just makes me cry. I don’t want them to touch me.
At visiting time, Alan, Will and Michelle come to the hospital. I can see them outside through the window. They are talking to the nurse, but I don’t know what they are saying. I close my eyes, and maybe I fall asleep again, because when I open them, Michelle is sitting in the corner with Will in her arms. “Alan is outside,” she says to me. “Do you want to hold Will?”
I shake my head and roll away from her. I don’t want her to look at me. I don’t want her to know. I don’t want to touch Will. I don’t want to make him bad like me. I wish they would all leave.
“Please, go away,” I say to her. “I don’t want you here.”
She says my name, but I say it again. I tell her to go away and leave me alone. She starts to cry. She stands there for a few minutes but doesn’t say anything. Then, she leaves and I am alone again. She doesn’t see me cry. No one does.
Eighty One
I stand in the lounge with so many boxes around me I don’t even know where to start. I’m excited and afraid all at the same time. Will plays with the chain around my neck and giggles happily in my arms.
It’s January. I am moving out of Alan’s and into my new flat. Alan is here with me. He stands next to me with his hands on his hips, ready for us to start unpacking.
The next part of my life. It feels strange to be facing it.
The flat is owned by my dad and his wife, Joanne. They got married. I didn’t go. I’ve hardly seen him and when I do, we talk as if nothing happened. I can deal with that as long as he leaves me alone. I know I’ll never be rid of him; he is, after all, dad.
College starts in a few days for me. I got in late, but they said I still could do it. I just did a lot of the catch up work at home. I'm set to get C’s at least. Not A’s, I know, but it’s better than nothing. Next year, I'm going to start catering. Everyone needs to eat.
Michelle and I have split up, but maybe it was for the best. I was never right for her, anyway. She’s expecting her next child. Not mine, though. I hope he does right by her. I’m sorry that I hurt her, but I’ll never be sorry I met her. She gave me Will and for that, I’ll always thank her.
He’s the one reason I plan to live. The one thing to keep me going. I hold him as close as I can. I’m going to be the best dad I can be.
“Should we unpack Will’s room first?” Alan says. “At least then he has somewhere to play while we do the rest.”
I look at Will, and he stares at me with those eyes. I nod my head and smile. Will, will always be first.
THE END
Also by JD Stockholm
Dear Teddy
Dark Ramblings of the Phoenix
Telling Teddy
Stupid Boy
If I Were To Die Today
Contact
dearmrted@gmail.com
http://jdstockholm.com/
http://www.facebook.com/dearmrted
https://www.facebook.com/JDStockholmTeddy
These two sites have been invaluable to me throughout the last few years. I salute the many people on there, survivors, directors and above all, my friends. Thank you for the support at those times I needed it.
http://www.isurvive.org.uk
http://www.recoveryourlife.com/
FAQ’s
I’ve been meaning to put this page in all of my books, every time I sit, I can’t think what to write, so I’m just going to try and if anything crops up that someone wants to know from one of my books, then by all means ask, and I’ll do my best to answer.
I get emailed and messaged on Facebook often, not that I mind, I love to hear from people, just it seems if these questions are things many people have, then maybe it’s better to answer them here.
1. Who was the bad man and what happened to him?
I don’t know who he was, or where he came from. I can’t remember him, other than the vague memories that are in my books. I didn’t see him after I was seven years old, but by then the damage was already done and since then, and even until this day, I have flashbacks of his face almost every day. I was diagnosed with PTSD last year. My therapist that I was working with suspects that my mind has shut out his face for a reason, and perhaps its someone I know.
2. What was the medicine my mother was giving to me?
I don’t know what it was she gave me. I suspect it was made of whatever she could find that day. It never really tasted the same, though it was always hot. I think perhaps she put some kind of spice in it. I don’t think it was real medicine, but then I don’t really know.
3. What happened to my mother, father, brother and nan?
My mother passed when I was fifteen. I don’t really like to talk about that part, maybe when I am stronger I will do.
My father is still around, though recently I told him to leave me alone, it had reached the point when I couldn’t take much more from him. I
have to accept, he will never see me how I want him too and he will never take responsibility for his actions.
My brother is still in my life. He does well and recently qualified as a staff nurse. I’m very proud of what he has achieved.
My Nan, she passed when I was twenty four. It hit me very hard at the time, and I suffered mental illness due to the loss of her.
4. Was my brother abused too?
I don’t think so, not in that way, though he has his own things and his own issues. I don’t think he was abused in the same way. I would be heartbroken if I learned different.
5. When did it stop?
Officially when I was sixteen years old, after I had been thrown out, but there have been violent incidents since.