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Countless Page 9

by Karen Gregory


  When they’re gone, I unfold it. It’s for £500. Perhaps I could get a buggy after all.

  Crap Things about the Unit, Number Ten:

  Family Therapy, Mark Two

  I’m cheating. This one was already on the list. But now I keep thinking about one session in particular, the last one we had before Mum decided it was all too much for poor Tammy, just before I got out the last time. Looking back, I think that’s when Mum made her decision. Tammy or me. And we know who she chose: the daughter who wasn’t a lost cause.

  Felicity had been harping on yet again, trying to get us all to open up about Feelings and Family Dynamics and The Function My Anorexia Performed, and how that needed to change when I got home, when I really didn’t see the point. As far as I was concerned, crap happened, and I was the way I was because, well, just because. That’s all.

  That day, I’d barely made it into the room because only a week before it had been the night of the List, when Molly and I looked at the moon and had one of those conversations that happens on a unit, that comes out of nowhere.

  ‘I can’t wait to get out of here,’ Molly said.

  ‘Mmm, yeah.’

  She turned and looked me full in the face. ‘You sound so sincere.’

  I’d never heard her like that, not when talking to me.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Molly looked back at the moon, which was huge and low in the sky, no clouds to obscure our view. ‘You know, sometimes I think you like it in here.’

  ‘No I don’t!’

  ‘Oh, not the eating bit. Just … it’s different in here, isn’t it? No school, no worries about exams and what to do with our lives. All the people fussing around after us, telling us to eat, taking us on day trips.’

  ‘What, like the aquarium?’

  Molly laughed. The aquarium had been the brainchild of one of the support workers. It had all gone quite well until Charlotte, an anorexic originally from Newcastle – they send you all over the country to wherever there’s a bed so she hadn’t seen her family for weeks – suddenly decided the turtles reminded her of her little brother and she was homesick, and she pitched a complete fit. We got some stares from the other visitors as she wailed, leaning back in her wheelchair, us surrounding her in our ponchos and the staff flapping about.

  ‘Yeah, that was a bundle of laughs,’ I said.

  Molly bit down the side of one nail, really short. It must have hurt but she didn’t show it. She’d cut holes in the wrists of her sleeves to poke her thumbs through, but I knew what they were hiding: rows of cuts crossing each other like scores on a chopping board.

  ‘Seriously, you know what I think? I think you’re in here because you’re scared.’

  ‘Whatever,’ I said, starting to laugh, but then stopping when I saw she was serious. ‘What, are you, like, Felicity now or something?’

  ‘It’s not a game, Hedda!’ Molly said and her pale face flushed a deep red. ‘You could die, you know. You will, soon probably, if you don’t sort yourself out.’

  ‘So what?’

  ‘So what?! You’re worth more than that! That’s what. Just look at you.’

  I have to admit, I wasn’t looking my best. I was actually near the unit’s target weight, but I’d come down with a chest infection I couldn’t seem to shift and all the coughing had left me exhausted.

  Molly went on. ‘You’re far nicer than you let on, Hed. Don’t you want to get out of here and do something?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘I don’t know! Anything. What do you want to do?’

  I opened my mouth to reply, and then realised I didn’t know.

  ‘It’s not too late for you. You can have an amazing life filled with … with … oh, I don’t know, all kinds of wonderful things. Are you really going to spend the rest of it in places like this?’

  ‘Well, what about you?’

  ‘We’re not talking about me.’ Her voice was flat, a locked safe. There was no way I was ever getting in, not on any terms but hers. I loved her anyway – I couldn’t help it. ‘Don’t you want to know who you are? Or who you might turn out to be?’ she said.

  Trouble was, I didn’t have a clue who I was, apart from Nia.

  ‘Come on, there must be something. One thing you want to do,’ she said. ‘Have you ever wanted to travel? See the Pyramids or something?’

  ‘Hadn’t really thought about it,’ I said, and I knew then from the hurt look she turned on me that it was a mistake using the I-don’t-give-a-damn voice I normally reserved for my sessions with Felicity.

  ‘Well, start thinking,’ Molly said. She turned to me and gave me a hug.

  I put my arms up and hugged her back and we clung on like that for a while, me knowing she was feeling my spine and the back of my ribcage.

  ‘I’ll start you off,’ she said. ‘I’ll make a list. That way, you’ll have to do stuff when I’m not here any more.’

  Molly said things like that quite a lot, so I didn’t pay as much attention as I should have. I didn’t know I’d be watching her heart stop in the bathroom the next day.

  So, at that Family Therapy session, with Molly dead, I was upset, I suppose. OK, I was raging. And I know it wasn’t Mum’s fault, but somehow what happened was Felicity asked some question and Mum gave some crappy non-answer, and I looked her right in the eye and said, ‘Why did you call me Hedda?’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ Mum said, notching up her accent to something approaching the Queen’s, which was her go-to defensive manoeuvre.

  ‘You heard. I’m serious, I want to know. You could’ve called me Kate or Helen or Jane, or any boring name at all, but you didn’t. You stuck me with Hedda and I want to know why.’

  Dad wriggled in his suit – he was itching to head off and get his train to work, I could tell – and said, ‘Well, we’ve told you before. Your mother and I met at a student play –’

  ‘Yeah, I know that. You bumped into her at the bar in the interval and the rest is history, blah-di-blah. Though, by the way, ditching your girlfriend to go off with Mum was really classy. If you want my opinion.’ No one did, obviously.

  Dad was pretending he was somewhere far away.

  Mum was white.

  I carried on anyway. ‘And I know the play was Hedda Gabler. But seriously, did you even watch the fucking thing?’

  ‘Hedda.’ Felicity’s voice held a warning.

  Tammy sat quiet, her eyes fixed on the carpet, a thumb plugged into her mouth like she was three or something.

  Me though? I was on a roll. ‘Cos I’ve read it. Hedda hates her life. She hates being married. She shoots herself in the head at the end. And I’m wondering why would a mum choose that name for her daughter? Unless maybe you think you’re Hedda.’

  ‘That’s –’ Mum began.

  ‘I think you’re like her. I think you hate not having a career and spending all your time polishing the stupid display cabinet and filling up the freezer. I think you hate it all, just as much as I do, except –’

  I broke off there, because Mum was already on her feet. She didn’t look at me, but at Felicity. ‘These sessions are not doing my daughter any good. I think it’s pointless to continue.’ By ‘my daughter’, Mum was definitely not referring to me. ‘Come on, Tamara.’

  And the next moment they were heading out of the room, Tammy giving me a triumphant little smirk around her thumb.

  Dad looked a bit shell-shocked, but after a few blustering words he followed them out.

  ‘Well, that was fun,’ I said in as sarcastic a voice as I could muster.

  Usually, Felicity would’ve called me out on that, told me I was using humour as a defence mechanism or something, and I would’ve argued back. But after Molly’s death, I don’t think either of us had the heart for it.

  Instead she looked at me and said, ‘Hmmm.’

  But there was none of the usual thoughtfulness or annoyance or whatever in Felicity’s voice. She just sounded sad.

  Chapter 13


  6 WEEKS TO GO

  ‘Do you want to chop this onion?’ Robin says.

  We’re cooking again, this time a curry made from scratch, an open Cooking for Dummies type book on the counter. Robin has bought himself an actual mortar and pestle. I didn’t know real people use those, thought it was something only chefs on telly do. He’s giving something a good whack and I glance at the wall, worried about the neighbours.

  It smells really good.

  Nia hisses a warning in my ear.

  I start chopping, but after a while Robin looks over and says, ‘Bit finer.’

  ‘You want to do it?’ I say, gesturing a little too close to his chest with the knife.

  He backs away and pretends to cower in the corner. ‘On second thoughts, those are perfect, thank you.’

  My eyes are starting to water from the onions so I go through to the living area and open a window. The flowers are still going strong in the window box, all reds and oranges. Even mine. Robin’s told me when to water them – in the evening so the sun doesn’t frazzle them – and, unbelievably, I haven’t killed them yet.

  ‘I love these, you know,’ I call back to where he’s stirring at the stove.

  ‘The flowers? Me too. My grammy’s always saying you’ve got to have colour about.’

  I think about what Mum said, about the curtains.

  ‘I don’t really know how to decorate,’ I say later, at the rickety little table.

  Robin sits back in his chair and says, ‘I could help you paint if you like?’

  I remember the splashes of paint on his ceiling.

  ‘Really?’ I say. ‘Maybe not blue though.’

  I’m still eating. I’ve managed about a third, which is fair going, I guess. In what direction, I’m not sure. Nia seems to have grown wings again and is circling my head. I take one more mouthful, and know that’s all I can do. Anyway, I think my mouth needs about six pints of water to cool it down.

  The baby is moshing inside, like she can’t wait to get out. More fool her.

  I press my hand down on my stomach, hard. Stop that, I think. It’s your bloody fault anyway. Cos blaming a baby for my own stupidity is obviously a sane option.

  ‘Sure, why not? I’d like to help,’ Robin says.

  When I realise what he’s going on about, I say, ‘OK. Thanks.’ Even though I suspect it’s going to take more than a splash of paint to make this place look like anything other than a dump.

  ‘You’re not going to eat any more?’ Robin says.

  I shake my head. The food feels like it’s wedged at the back of my throat. I shift about, but leaning forward makes it worse.

  ‘DVD?’ Robin says. ‘I think it’s about time you watched the first one.’

  This is because I might have let slip that the DVD we watched in the unit that time was The Empire Strikes Back and I’ve never actually seen the others.

  An hour later, I finally stop tapping my feet and settle back to watch.

  When the film finishes, Robin turns to me. ‘Well?’

  ‘Ah …’

  His face falls. ‘You didn’t like it?’

  ‘No, no, I did. It was very … spacey.’

  ‘Spacey? That’s it?’

  ‘Who was the old guy again?’

  ‘Obi-Wan. Hang on – you weren’t paying attention, were you?’

  ‘Sorry … I was a bit distracted.’

  Robin shakes his head, but he’s smiling.

  We go into town the following day and choose paint, curtains and a rug from a big discount shop. I insist on white paint because it’s the cheapest, but Robin makes me buy a bright sunflower print too.

  We spend the rest of the morning splashing paint on the walls. It speckles our hair and our shoulders. Then Robin gets out the new drill he bought and gives a serial-killer chuckle as he presses the button to make it go, wiggling his eyebrows so I can’t help it and start to laugh.

  Several attempts and approximately fourteen ‘trial’ holes later, the curtains and picture are up, if slightly wonky. The whole place seems cleaner, less depressing. The sun is out and it glances off the freshly white walls. I give the window a wipe, half an eye on the curtain pole in case it crashes down on top of my head, but it stays put.

  If you look out past the park and the estate you can see the edges of trees and hills in the distance, sharp and green in the sunlight. I put my hands to my eyes and make a little frame, so I can pretend I’m actually living out in the countryside, not several floors up in a tower block.

  Robin rolls the rug out, which is a bright blue with tiny cream squares in it. My back is starting to ache and there’s a nagging, grinding pain low down in my pelvis when I walk, but I’m used to things hurting. I still put my hand to my back though.

  ‘Here. Do you mind?’ Robin stands behind me and pushes his thumbs into the small of my back.

  I yelp, because it hurts, but he says, ‘Relax,’ and continues pushing and circling with his hands.

  Slowly, the pain eases off and I turn and give him a grateful smile. We stare at each other.

  ‘Why are you being so nice to me?’ I say. I don’t ask it suspiciously or sarcastically. I just really want to know.

  ‘Because you need help and I like you, and I can,’ Robin says back.

  ‘I don’t need anyone feeling sorry for me,’ I say.

  ‘Who said I did?’

  But his face tells me different, and just like that, the good feelings melt away. I hear echoes of Felicity’s voice, remember the expression on her face when she said I was becoming a career anorexic. Maybe I do push people away from me, stop them getting close.

  I think about the notebook where I’ve been keeping a list of all the crap things about the unit, shoved in a cabinet by my bed. When I started writing it, in those silent, scary weeks I was first here, I didn’t think I’d make it. I thought my own list would help me remember. Help me keep my promise to Molly to stay out, or something. I don’t know. But the more I write, the more I wonder. Was hospital all bad? Not always, no. Not always.

  When Robin leaves, I look at the Ana videos again and weigh myself. Then I read more adoption stories on the net and try and think about what I’m going to do and realise I really don’t know. But the insistent movement of the baby is a constant reminder I can’t put things off forever.

  I pick up the phone and dial Joanna’s number.

  We meet the following day in a Starbucks in town. It was my idea to meet somewhere neutral, away from Joanna’s office or my flat. Luckily the place is pretty quiet as it’s a weekday.

  Joanna’s tunic and jeans combo is still intact.

  She buys a cup of herbal tea and I try hard to keep the smirk from showing on my face. Why do social workers always drink herbal tea? It smells pretty nice though and I decide I’ll have one too, which is a mistake because it does not taste the way it smells. I push it to one side.

  ‘So …’ Joanna says. She has a big bag with her but hasn’t pulled out any notes, thank goodness.

  ‘So,’ I say.

  Joanna waits and the silence stretches on forever.

  I don’t know how to start so, in the end, I say, ‘I don’t know how to start.’

  Joanna nods.

  This is excruciating. Worse than Felicity sessions.

  ‘I think I might have changed my mind,’ I blurt out.

  Joanna puts down her cup carefully. ‘Go on,’ she says.

  ‘Maybe … maybe … I don’t know. I don’t feel sure of anything any more,’ I say. ‘My parents came to visit me the other week. They were talking about adopting the baby themselves. My dad said it was his idea too, but then he’s not the one who’s going to be looking after it, is he? They said I should come home.’

  ‘That could be an option. What do you think?’ Joanna says.

  ‘I think it wouldn’t work. Mum doesn’t really want me there. And I can’t see how a baby is going to make things easier between us.’

  ‘I can’t make the decision for you, Hedda.
But you need to know that my paramount concern is for the welfare of the baby. Keeping it is a potential option, but I would need to know that you’re capable of parenting well. Do you think that you can?’

  ‘Honestly? I don’t know. What does good parenting mean anyway? What does it look like?’ I’m talking more to myself than her.

  There’s a pause.

  Joanna breathes on her cup of tea and waits.

  ‘Maybe I should meet this couple,’ I say. ‘It might help me make up my mind.’

  ‘That may not be the best option at this stage,’ she says.

  ‘Why not?’ My voice comes out with an edge of panic.

  ‘Does that worry you?’

  ‘Well, yeah. I need to know more about … I need to be in –’ I stop. Control. I was about to say ‘in control’. Ever since I found out about the baby, everything has been out of control. And I want it back.

  We finish up our meeting with nothing decided, except that raw panic seems to be growing as fast as the baby is. I feel further away from a decision than I ever have, and I’m running out of time.

  I have my first antenatal class to go to after I meet with Joanna. I’m not exactly looking forward to it. I have a suspicion it’ll be full of proud bumps and dads-to-be all giving me that look that says I shouldn’t be there. That unlike theirs, my bump is a massive screw-up.

  My life seems to be one round of appointments. Guess it is a career of sorts.

  I sit in the room with the other pregnant women, the only one there without a partner, and think about all the people involved in my life: social worker, therapist, midwife, obstetrician. Mum and Dad. Robin. Laurel and Molly. But circling them all like a fortress is Nia. For all that there’s actual people in my life, Nia is the only one in this room with me right now, even if I’ve got no one to blame for that but myself.

  Two rows down from me is a girl about my age, sitting with a woman I assume is her mum. Guess I’m not the only screw-up after all. They put their heads together and laugh over something on the girl’s phone.

 

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