Open Your Eyes

by Paula Daly

  Leon remembered me all right, and he knew that he was no longer married to Gina, so that was a colossal step forward. But it was as if he’d not missed me at all, and to rub salt in my wound, he didn’t even remember not knowing me for the time he’d been in hospital. It was as if Leon had picked up exactly where he’d left off.

  He regarded me, when I walked on to the unit, as he might have done had I walked in on him watching TV at home. He was mildly interested, but he was busily engaged in doing something else, so I didn’t get my reunion, and Leon seemed neither happy nor unhappy that I was there. He just accepted that I was, and probably always had been. ‘Hey, honey,’ he said simply.

  I had to stop myself from interrogating him. From asking about the unfinished book, the hours of video footage, all that bloody debt. Dr Letts warned us not to excite him. ‘You’ll have many questions,’ she told us. ‘For now, though, you must let him be.’

  There were other changes too that were noticeable. Other improvements. Now, it was apparent that Leon could understand that he didn’t always understand, if that makes sense. His self-awareness was returning. He was also aware that there were glitches in his reasoning, and he was getting used to the idea that the person he was presenting to the world was not the person he once was.

  Trouble was, Leon didn’t know which parts of himself were the real Leon. He was unsure which parts of himself he could trust. And all of this was making him more frustrated than he had been back in the beginning, when he’d had no awareness at all. He became more distressed without warning, the erratic violence would still show itself at times too, and now, on top of all this, we had another problem.

  Leon had been heard yelling in his room. He was shouting, ‘Get out! Get the fuck out of here!’ repeatedly. Over and over.

  When this had happened to me, I’d knocked. Because I always knocked. But Leon hadn’t been aware of my knocking, and so I’d gone ahead and pushed the door open without invitation. What I was faced with made my stomach drop through the floor.

  Leon was masturbating. Publicly. Well, perhaps ‘publicly’ was unfair: he was inside his own room, granted, but the doors were without locks, and it didn’t seem to perturb Leon that someone could walk in on him at any moment.

  That was, until Gloria did.

  On the couple of occasions that I’d walked in on him, he was unembarrassed and did not think to stop. And so I’d had to leave the room until he’d seen the act through to completion. I was too mortified to ask the nursing staff or Dr Letts about it, so I’d gone online, only to find, surprise, surprise, that increased sexual appetite was often part and parcel of traumatic brain injury, along with inappropriate sexual behaviour and frequent masturbation.

  Great.

  I didn’t mention it to anyone. I just added it to the list of things-to-be-concerned-about-when-Leon-leaves-the-unit, but in hindsight, I should probably have mentioned it to Gloria.

  ‘Get out!’ Leon shouted at his mother. ‘Get the fuck out!’

  When I reached Gloria, it was as if she was glued to her spot in the doorway and couldn’t get out. She couldn’t move. I rushed to her side, closing the door to Leon’s room, before guiding her gently by the elbow to a row of chairs further along the corridor.

  She was shaking.

  I settled her into the chair. She was silent. Too shocked, too overwhelmed by what she’d just seen, to speak.

  Finally, she asked, ‘Where has my son gone?’ and her eyes were glazed and empty.

  ‘Let me get some tea, Gloria,’ I said, but she reached out and clutched hold of my wrist, stopping me.

  ‘No … don’t go.’ Then she fixed her stare on the blank wall opposite before whispering, ‘That person in there is not my son. I don’t know who he is, but he is not my son.’

  This was the first time I’d seen Gloria crack. Up until now she’d remained unwavering in her resolve. She’d cared for Leon without complaint, never once giving a hint that she was concerned about his behaviour, or worried for his future. It was as if she’d had complete confidence that we would all come out of this unscathed, as long as we kept going, as long as we put one foot in front of the other.

  ‘I’m frightened,’ she said.

  ‘I’m frightened too.’

  ‘What if he stays like this? What if … what if I’ve lost my beautiful son and we’re stuck with this stand-in from hell?’

  It was as if this was the first time she had actually allowed herself to think this way.

  ‘You’ve not lost him,’ I told her. ‘Leon will be back.’

  ‘When?’ she demanded. ‘When will he be back?’

  I wished I had an answer. Wished I could comfort her, but I knew, she knew, that there was no answer.

  She turned to face me. ‘I can’t take him.’

  There was alarm in her expression and terror in her voice.

  ‘I can’t take him,’ she said again. ‘And I thought I could … I really thought I could. I’d decided that if you didn’t want him, then I would take him home with me and care for him. But …’ She began to tremble. ‘… I don’t think that’s going to be possible.’

  ‘No one expects you to take him, Gloria.’

  ‘But he’s my son,’ she cried. ‘I should at least want to take him. I always said I would walk through fire for that boy. Husbands, lovers, you can tire of … that kind of love can wither with time, but your own flesh and blood? I always thought I would die for my children.’

  ‘No one knows how they’re going to feel when something like this happens. It’s easy to pass judgement until it’s actually you that’s facing such uncertainty.’

  She nodded but I sensed she didn’t feel at all soothed by my words.

  ‘Jane,’ she said, dropping her voice, ‘I’ve not told this to anyone, but I’ve begun questioning my faith.’ I went to interrupt but she hushed me. ‘I’ve questioned if God really does have a better plan for Leon. Because, right now, that’s hard to believe. I look at Leon in that room, doing that thing, and I feel … I feel abandoned by God.

  ‘I don’t know what to do,’ she said. She was still clinging to my wrist, but I wasn’t sure she was even aware of it. Finally, she whispered, ‘I’m in despair.’

  The following day, Dr Letts said, ‘I’d like to be able to tell you that despair is an uncommon reaction amongst care-givers, but that would be untrue.’ And then she gave us and Inspector Ledecky the go-ahead to revisit the day of the assault with Leon. It was sickeningly disappointing though: Leon did not recall anything of what had happened that day, and the only thing he seemed certain about was that I did not do it. I was not involved, he said, and seemed most perplexed when Inspector Ledecky raised the issue, saying he couldn’t understand why he would have said such a thing in the first place.

  ‘She’s my wife,’ he said to Ledecky, affronted.

  He also had no memory of the weeks preceding the attack itself. This was common, Dr Letts told us, and as much as Inspector Ledecky gave it her all, as much as she tried to take Leon back in time, in an attempt to get him to recover anything – Anything, no matter how insignificant – it was clear she was flogging a dead horse. So a very dispirited Ledecky told Gloria and me that instead she’d concentrate on analysing Leon’s computer for clues, and I thanked her, told her I appreciated her continued hard work on the case, and in that moment there seemed to be a kind of thawing of the ice between us, a loosening of the mutual agitation. And then, just when I thought there couldn’t be anything else thrown at us for the time being, we were told, seemingly out of nowhere, that Leon would be coming home.

  Dr Letts gathered us for a meeting and said she deemed Leon ready for re-entry, as she happily referred to it, and none of us were quite sure if she was serious. He wasn’t ready. We weren’t ready. My job would be starting again shortly, and I didn’t know how I would cope.

  Leon was coming home, and we would receive no help. None whatsoever.

  I didn’t feel capable of taking care of him and I hoped Dr
Letts would throw me some sort of lifeline.

  ‘What do other families do?’ I asked her. ‘How on earth do they cope?’

  ‘I’m not sure everyone does cope,’ she replied honestly. ‘But there comes a time when we feel the patient is more suited to a home environment, rather than continue to stay at the unit. And that’s where we find ourselves with Leon. He’s ready, Jane.’

  She went on to tell me that, shockingly, brain injuries were more common than breast cancer in the UK, but that the families of brain-injured patients were left virtually to their own devices once the patients left hospital. ‘It’s not how we want it to be,’ she said, ‘but I’m afraid it’s how it is. Some illnesses and conditions get far more attention, far more resources. And, sadly, it seems as if neurological conditions are left right at the bottom of the heap.’

  ‘You’ve done so much for him,’ I said quietly.

  I didn’t want to complain to this brilliantly minded woman who had given my husband the very best care possible. But I was terror-stricken. How would I cope? How would Leon cope around the children day in, day out? He found noise and distraction difficult. He could only handle one stimulus at a time – if he was concentrating on a task, such as lacing up his shoes, practising his writing, he couldn’t bear to have music playing, or anyone conversing nearby.

  Sharing space with two children under the age of five was going to be a living hell.

  After the masturbation incident, Gloria had given me a brochure. There was a residential care home near Southport called Magellan House, which specialized in treating young people with head injuries. She told me to hold on to it. She’d been to visit it and said it was a good place. She said Leon could be happy there, if that’s what it came to. I thought of it now as I spoke with Dr Letts.

  ‘He hasn’t been left alone yet,’ I said to Dr Letts. ‘I’m not sure he’s OK to be left alone.’

  ‘It’ll be tricky to start with. You may not feel confident leaving Leon, but there comes a time when you just have to take the plunge.’

  ‘Is he safe?’

  ‘We believe so, yes. Safe to take care of your children? No.’

  I felt as if I was stepping into an abyss. Like that trip home from the hospital with your newborn when you find yourself stunned to be entrusted with caring for something you know you are in no way prepared to care for. Except this wasn’t an infant you could tuck under your arm.

  Leon was a six-foot-two, fifteen-stone, angry slab of tightly packed muscle. And he had an irrational mind and frightening temper.

  ‘I’m sure it will all work out fine,’ Dr Letts said weakly.

  18

  We were now into autumn, Martha’s third birthday passed without fanfare, and Leon was home.

  He was asleep; he slept a lot. A full eleven hours each night and two to three hours each afternoon, though this morning he’d felt more woozy than usual and had gone back to bed at 11 a.m.

  Dr Letts had told us at our last meeting that ‘Sleep is the one thing he must be allowed to do. It’s how his brain repairs itself. Without it, his confusion and agitation will be much, much worse.’

  ‘But for how long?’ Gloria had asked.

  ‘Allow him to rest each day for as long as he needs.’

  ‘I mean,’ Gloria had said, her jaw tightening, ‘how long before he doesn’t need all this extra sleep? How long before he can function without it?’

  And Dr Letts had given one of her that’s-a-question-I-don’t-have-an-answer-to smiles that we’d become very accustomed to.

  I knew why Gloria was asking. She wanted to know how long before Leon could get back to work. I’d told her about the money situation, about Leon not delivering his manuscript to his publisher, and she’d become quietly stricken. Gloria’s generation didn’t do debt. It’s not how they were brought up. It was the one thing they’d been taught to fear most as kids – along with the Cold War and poliomyelitis.

  I’d not told her about the video footage. Not yet anyhow.

  For the time being, Leon was sleeping in the spare room. I hadn’t been sure how to approach the conversation of our sharing a bed. Sex, intimacy, had not been broached by either of us, nor by any of his carers. No one had given me the tools to cope with any given situation, and I’d been too embarrassed to bring up the subject with his clinical team. I really didn’t know how I felt about it. It was too soon for any kind of intimacy with Leon. I knew him, and yet I didn’t know him at all. I knew his naked body almost as well as my own, and yet change the mind that’s in charge of that naked body, and the body becomes that of a perfect stranger.

  As it turned out, Leon solved the problem as soon as he arrived home. Five minutes after walking through the door, he took hold of his bag and asked me where he would be staying.

  He followed me up the stairs, and sat himself down on the end of the double bed in the guest room. Leon patted the mattress a few times and for a second I thought he was gesturing for me to sit beside him. ‘Nice,’ he said pleasantly, testing the mattress again by rocking his hips from side to side. ‘The bed seems firm enough.’

  ‘Hope it’s OK.’

  I said this even though he’d slept here countless times: when we’d argued; when I was nursing the kids, and Leon’s writing was suffering from the broken nights; in the height of summer when our room was like a furnace and neither of us could stand the heat coming off the other’s skin.

  ‘There’s plenty of space for your clothes,’ I said, ‘but of course you’re welcome to leave them in our … you’re welcome to leave them in my room if you prefer.’

  Leon spread his hands wide. ‘I’m easy.’

  ‘Well, I’m only just down the hallway if you need anything … Is there anything you want right now? Would you like me to show you how to work the shower? It can be kind of temperamental; you have to fiddle with the hot tap until the—’

  ‘Jane,’ Leon said, smiling, ‘I’m going to be fine. Thanks again for having me. Thanks for … well, you know … thanks for all of it.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ I said, and I tried to hold his gaze. Then I looked away and bit down on my lower lip.

  I needed to say something.

  And because he was being so genial, because he was being so accommodating, I was finding it hard to come straight out with it.

  ‘Leon,’ I began carefully, ‘there’s something we need to talk about.’

  He looked at me in anticipation.

  I laughed a little to try to mask my self-consciousness. ‘It’s kind of awkward actually.’

  At this, Leon’s expression did not change. He still regarded me with polite interest, as if what I was about to say might turn out to be some kind of pleasant surprise. A day out perhaps. Or a present I’d been withholding.

  Leon missed the cues others picked up on. ‘Kind of awkward’ would make a normal person, and I hate to use the phrase ‘normal person’, because it’s so bloody unkind, but those words would make a normal person sit up.

  Leon remained relaxed. Happy.

  ‘You see this lock,’ I said to him, turning, gesturing to the bedroom door. ‘I had it fitted for you.’

  ‘So …’ He paused, unsure what the relevance was. ‘So you could lock me in?’ He was perplexed, but not really put out by the notion.

  ‘No, sorry, you misunderstand. It’s there for you to lock yourself in.’

  He dropped his head at this but I could tell he still didn’t know what I was getting at.

  I moved towards the bed and sat down beside him. ‘It’s the masturbating, Leon,’ I said bluntly. ‘We can’t let the kids see it.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘You do understand that, don’t you?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I know you’ve just arrived home, but I need to know you’re going to do certain things in private. They’re so very young, Leon, and they don’t understand what’s happened to you. Not really. They’re not old enough to understand what makes you behave so differently to before.�
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  ‘Am I really so different?’ he asked earnestly, and as I looked at his expression – worried, shame-faced, almost – my heart broke for him.

  ‘Not so different, no,’ I said, trying to back-pedal. ‘You’re not so different to me. But to them you’re not quite who you were. They get confused and I really need to protect them from—’

  ‘Protect?’

  Leon’s spine straightened, and he shifted away from me.

  ‘What do you mean protect?’ he said.

  I swallowed. I’d told myself I’d be firm when I did this. Told myself it was kinder to give Leon the ground rules straight away. Let him know what he was and wasn’t allowed to do and then there’d be no ambiguity. ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘protect.’

  He didn’t speak.

  I watched him carefully.

  You never knew what would set him off. There was a fine line to tread between getting him to behave in the way that I needed to, and having him totally lose his shit.

  ‘It’s as serious as that, Leon,’ I pressed. ‘They’re so small. I must protect them from you sometimes. You’re not always OK. You do understand what I’m saying, don’t you?’

  I repositioned the mouse and sat back in the office chair. Rain was hitting the window as if someone was firing a hosepipe at it. Leon’s computer had now been returned to us and I opened another one of Leon’s video files, and watched as the camera panned along the street.

  I’d yet to find a media file that wasn’t filming the street, and when I’d mentioned this fact to the uniformed officer, who’d returned Leon’s computer the day before yesterday, asking him what the forensics team had found on there, he’d seemed clueless as to what I was talking about.

  ‘I’m just the delivery boy,’ he said.

  The camera panned left to right, left to right, along Lawrence’s property, as if Leon was looking for something in particular, and then, like almost all the others, the film cut off.

  I checked my watch.

  I’d come up here to find out some information about teaching creative writing to offenders. Prisoners. I was scheduled to be at Walton Gaol this afternoon and I needed some tips. Of course, I could have used my own laptop. But Leon didn’t know about that and using his computer gave me the excuse to snoop in his media files. My laptop was hidden beneath my bed.