Losing Inertia

by VK Gregory

  ‘What? It’s the not the same,’ he shook his head, looking in the mirror with me. Together, side by side, we looked sick, a couple in need. We might have been poster children for help the poor, AIDS or disaster relief. On the mantelpiece, ahead of me was a picture from when we first met, our very first date. Long before camera phones, we’d had snapshots taken in a photo booth. We sat side by side, still strangers, but our smiles revealing the spark of lust and desire that crackled between us, our shoulders touching, hands invisibly clasped out of sight.

  We were much younger of course, but my lightly peach coloured skin and plump cheeks were a stark contrast to the girl I saw in the mirror right now. I swallowed a lump in my throat. His jaw that had once been strong, now looked bony and oversized, his skin was sallow and his thick wavy hair was non-existent.

  ‘Undress,’ I turned to look at him,

  ‘Excuse me,’

  ‘Undress, do it,’ he looked serious but his eyes weighed down with such concern and pain that I did what he asked. Slowly removing clothing piece by piece, an ill-fitting blouse stolen from a livingstatues wardrobe, a pair of trousers kept up with a belt. He disappeared while I got undressed down to my underwear and then stood in the stale warmth of the living room, waiting as he returned with the digital bathroom scales,

  ‘Go on with you,’ I laughed, I hated scales, I hated to know my weight, what on earth was the point in this exercise.

  ‘Trust me, Katy,’ I smiled and flicked back my hair,

  ‘Like what you see sailor?’ I struck a pose, my hip thrust backwards, hand resting to one side as I raised an eyebrow,

  ‘Please,’ stepping on the cold scales, I saw a number that made no sense, a number I had not seen since I was a child, it took several glances to make sense of it, the numbers seemed garbled.

  ‘That’s impossible,’ I stepped off and stared incredulously at the number. Shivering now I turned back to Daniel,

  ‘Look’ he said, showing me the mirror again, and this time I saw. I really saw. I had lost weight, but not a little bit from stress, or from my accident. I was as skeletal as the livingstatues; my skin looked loose around my middle, taut over clearly visible ribs but hanging unflatteringly around my jutting hip bones. My once too plump thighs were shapeless straight bones with no fat; I could almost circle them with my skeletal hands. They didn’t even touch at all.

  ‘I would have noticed’

  ‘You see yourself every day you’re starving, just like she is,’ and then I looked at him, how had I missed his gaunt face, or his dark circles under his eyes? I didn’t notice how much he had slowed, or the bony fingers reaching out to hold mine. I saw now the tiny thin wrists, childlike almost, and I knew under his clothes he would be as skeletal as me.

  ‘I don’t understand, we eat,’ although over the last week or so I’d been eating apathetically, it seemed like too much effort, and every effort I made never seemed to fill the hole of hunger that burned inside my ‘we eat…’

  ‘I know but we’re starving, we really are,’ I sat down, wearing only underwear, the white elastic, balancing on jutting hip bones. I thought and then I cried. It all seemed so utterly hopeless, what were we fighting for? The endless empty world? A slow death?

  We sat in silence, a room full of starving people, breathing stale, decaying air. Suddenly he stepped forward,

  ‘Let’s go to the chemist, we can get protein drinks, and some of those special drinks for dying people, they’re full of nutrients. We’ll aim for high fat, lots of protein,’ My lips turned upwards in an attempt at a smile but there was only a cavern filled with bleakness, absorbing any pretence at hope. Like water into wine, the bleakness turned hope to despair.

  ‘My mother—’

  ‘Let’s focus on us’

  ‘What’s the point Danny’ He pulled me to my feet and he hugged me, something told me he felt the same, yet somehow, he was fighting on, and his lent me his strength. It circled me like a hungry wolf, feeding of the despair until I felt the energy to let go.

  ‘I love you, you know. You always make it seem better. We’ll fight this,’

  ‘Together’ he replied and then I fell into his arms like a textbook heroine, wrapping thinning arms around his neck, rubbing my cheek against his stubble, feeling the unfamiliar angles of his cheekbones. He had a way of holding me like he was my protector, that made me feel simultaneously strong and childlike at the same time. I revelled in the dichotomy of my feelings until we felt strong enough to get dressed and leave.

  The chemist was close, and we drove with caution. Stopping outside, I marvelled at how normal everything still looked, how it could be any day. Except we had stopped right outside, on double yellow lines, I almost laughed when I saw a parking attendant down the road, his book in his hands as he examined the line of cars outside the jewellers. He would never make it to us.

  The single painted door of the small village pharmacy stood open, and inside I could clearly see at least seven shoppers blocking the tiny, cluttered aisles. I knew it was going to be difficult to squeeze past them without touching them, but suddenly it didn’t seem to matter. I squeezed myself past a teenage boy, holding my hands high and away from him, in case we should touch. But then I saw his face, his gaunt, suffering face and I understood what Danny had seen long ago. They were dying. They were all dying.

  I stopped and stared at the young man. I guessed he was a teenager by his clothing but his face could have been 100 or more. I stared at him feeling empty and useless and then carried on.

  The inevitable happened - I nudged a middle-aged woman whose skin hung in drapes around her chin. She recoiled in horror at my touch, her eyes filling with agony. I simply stood there, watching as she withered and screeched and disintegrated and died. Her face disappearing before me, her eyes firmly on me as she weathered the agony. I felt less than nothing as I watched her disappear, her screams filling the air.

  ‘I’m sorry’ I said, but I did not feel sorry. I wondered if she was grateful.

  ‘Over here’ Danny called, and I walked away from the pile of ash to where he’d found the tins of protein drink, ‘you grab some of these, I’m going to see if I can find those drinks for dying people,’ I looked at the powders, they had interesting names such as ‘bulk up’ and ‘ XXL Muscle drink,’ I laughed to myself as I looked over them. Which ones should I try, the ones with added ‘creatinine’ or the ones with ‘super vegetable protein formula’.

  We carried as much as we could in one trip. At least now we wouldn’t have to expend energy cooking.

  We sat in the car, breathing heavily, muscles shaking with exhaustion,

  ‘We won’t make it back,’ Danny said, taking a deep breath, ‘best stay nearby,’ I just wanted to sleep and was beyond arguing.

  We found a small semi-detached house with a red door, just three doors down from the chemist. I want to say we chose it because of the red door brought some sort of luck and joy to me. But we really chose it because outside a woman stood holding her front door keys. I noticed as we neared her, that on the key ring was a photo of two small smiling red-headed children. She was poised ready to open or lock the door.

  It was easy to get past her, I simply touched her outstretched hand, her perfectly French manicured nails withering beneath my touch.

  Daniel said nothing and I was thankful. I collapsed before I could make it to the sofa, but he caught me, somehow finding the strength to lift me in his tired arms and carry me. I hoped he would never let me go.

  I lay there as Danny made me a drink,

  ‘My speciality’ he said, handing me a glass of pinkish liquid, it thick and foamy and seemed to bubble on the top as a stripy straw stood unsupported in the middle. I stared at it without any enthusiasm,

  ‘No milk, just water, sorry,’ I tasted it slowly,

  ‘Thank you,’ I tried to put it down but he shook his head,

  ‘Drink it all Katy,’ I took another sip, but I gagged as I swallowed,

  ‘Enough,’ I
whispered but he kept pushing the straw back into my mouth as I tried to push it away,

  ‘A little more, just a little more,’ it tasted bitter and acrid in the back of my throat, threatening to come back up.

  I fell asleep, curled up on the sofa, a warm woollen blanket wrapped around me, but still shivering in the cold.

  Waking up in the house was a shock, it was dark and my breathe froze in the air, like a pale haze before me. For a minute, I was horribly disorientated.

  ‘Danny’ I called, wondering why I couldn’t see much, then I remembered. There was no electricity here and obviously, the curtains were drawn and it was night. I found myself shivering uncontrollably, ‘Danny?’ I sensed a movement and heard a moan.

  ‘I can’t see anything’ my heart was thumping loudly, beating strongly against my chest, panic was rising in my throat making me want to vomit back the thick shake,

  ‘What? Hang on, one second’ and suddenly the room lit up with a light orange glow, ‘I found the torch before falling asleep,’

  ‘Thank god for that,’

  ‘Yeah, well, it was me, not god,’ I sighed and took the torch off him. He was sat by a fireplace, in a worn armchair, a blanket draped over his knees, also shivering,

  ‘It’s too cold to stay here,’

  ‘No worries, I found a good supply of coal outside. We’ll be just fine, I didn’t have the energy to make a fire before falling asleep,’ I looked doubtfully at the fireplace but he smiled, ‘or we can go back to the windfarm, I can make it,’ he looked cocky but not sure of himself, ‘maybe in a few days, eh?’ he coughed and wiped his mouth on his sleeve, nauseated I cringed, on edge,

  ‘What?’

  ‘Just let’s get this place comfortable,’ I tried to stand and quickly lost balance, Daniel reached a hand out to steady me as I found my feet.

  ‘Wait until day time, Katy, according to my watch it’s 3am. Just lie down for a bit.’ so I lay back down on the sofa, shocked that even that small standing had made me tired, lying there I wondered what we could do next - what could we do to help us survive.

  I dozed off at some point in the night, and when I awoke Danny was not in his chair. Sitting up carefully I looked around, a hot fire crackled and sparked in the fireplace, filling the room with an orange glow and a delicious heat which burned my cheeks. I was still cold and shivering, despite the fire, but an intense, mouth-watering aroma drifted over to me.

  ‘Danny?’ I called hopefully,

  ‘One minute’ he shouted back, and I got myself into sitting position, looking around the room.

  The house was a bit dated. Extremely bright and busy carpets made me feel a bit nauseous, but it was the sunlight streaming through the windows that made me feel unexpectedly and wistfully sad. Sitting here, basking in the rays of sun, I thought of holidays and long sun-drenched summers as a child. I could almost taste the saltiness in the air, the warm sand beneath my feet, as I sat there. I willed myself into my dream, I needed to feel the long summer rays on my skin, but instead I shivered. The image was gone.

  ‘Ta da!’ I turned around and Danny had a tray in his hand, on it was a cup of something steaming, and a plate of bubbling food,

  ‘How?’ I cried, reaching for the tray eagerly, he placed it on the table next to me,

  ‘That’s hot chocolate powder, and a bowl of tinned soup, I heated up from the cupboard,’

  ‘But how? we have no electricity,’

  ‘I found a camping stove, the gas should last us a while,’ a boyish smile appeared on his face when he saw how pleased I was. The hot chocolate was divine, a warm, silky smooth drink that chased away the shivers into the ether. The soup was far from the best I’d tasted, but I ate it thankfully, enjoying the sensation of warmth reaching from my head to my toes, travelling down my body like a single drop of red paint in a bowl of white.

  ‘Thank you, so much,’ I wiped my mouth with my fingers. Watching me as he drank his tea, he nodded,

  ‘I thought it would help,’

  ‘So, what now? What’s the plan?’ he shrugged at my question,

  ‘Make home here, right here, we have coal, we have tinned food, and a gas stove, there’s a shop nearby, we stay here’

  ‘Until?’ always he lived in the present,

  ‘Well, until we get stronger?’ he looked confused, ‘Katy, is there somewhere you have to be?’

  ‘Don’t be silly, I’m just saying we stay here? Live here? But what then?’

  ‘What’s the rush? Exactly what do you want to do? There’s nowhere to go, nothing. We’ll go back to the windfarm when we have the strength’ and of course he was right, it made sense he was right. Yet somehow doing nothing seemed more like giving up. Waiting to die.

  So, I pottered around the house, making it homely, looking through the cupboards, searching for blankets and warm clothes to keep away the cold and games to occupy us. I came back with a stack of things,

  ‘See I found scrabble, game of life, trivial pursuit, chess and a pack of cards, although it looks like a few are missing,’ he looked up from where he was sitting, reading a magazine,

  ‘Well the pack of cards should burn well,’ he barely glanced at me and I gritted my teeth, feeling annoyance bubbling inside,

  ‘So, what do you suppose we do? Sit here and read trashy magazines?’ he put down his trashy magazine,

  ‘It was a joke Katy; lighten up, you know I like scrabble and what’s this one? trivial pursuit. Of course, perfect,’

  ‘Well, I enjoy this stuff, and it’ll keep us talking at least,’ he rolled his eyes at me and went back to his magazine, I glanced at the front seeing some barely dressed woman, with gigantic breasts bursting from her skimpy red tight dress. I felt a great desire to throw the scrabble at him.

  Chapter Nineteen

  We didn’t return to the windfarm. Neither of us could summon up the necessary strength and will to do so and it wasn’t so difficult living without electricity. Once you got used to the inconvenience of it, it felt a bit like camping, only it lacked the jovial holiday atmosphere that takes the edge off the cold and perpetual canned dinners.

  ‘How long does it take to die of starvation?’ I asked Daniel, one gloomy and cold evening, when even the blaze from the fire didn’t keep us from shivering and no position felt comfortable on my fatless bones. He put down his scrabble pieces and stared into the flames, as if the answer might be there among the red-hot coals,

  ‘Weeks.’ He looked at his own hand, ‘Maybe the protein shakes are buying us time,’ I ran a hand over my ribs, feeling the outline of each one, like speed bumps on a road. I didn’t need a mirror to see we were both locked into a life-death struggle, a struggle we were slowly losing. How much longer could our starving bodies sustain us?

  ‘Keeping us just alive you mean? Teetering on the edge of death?’ I was being deliberately depressing and I knew it, but I enjoyed seeing his eyes widen in surprise and fear,

  ‘I hadn’t really thought of it like that, but, yeah, I mean maybe,’ he looked down at his letters, hiding the sign of concern, ‘maybe not quite keeping us alive, but slowing down the rate of starvation,’ we looked at each other briefly, not able to meet each other’s eyes, and then around our little room. We lived in only this one room. I slept on the sofa, him in a big armchair. Both pulled close to the fire, our only source of heat. Sometimes I sat so close, I felt the skin on my legs burning and hot, stinging where the healing burns had already tightened and knotted. And I didn’t care. Even then I shivered still.

  The only time we moved was to get up and use the toilet or when Daniel brought us food and shakes. It was a wretched existence, every bone in my body hurt, every muscle, I was so tired that even picking up the scrabble letters was like lifting a dumbbell, the green rack felt as heavy as rock. The trek to the toilet was exceptionally difficult and took much longer than it should, and even though we both lay there with the scrabble board on a small side table between us, we rarely made words. We sat, we listened to the roaring wind
s outside, we shivered. We spoke apathetically.

  This wasn’t a life I wanted to extend.

  ‘I’m going to stop eating,’ I could not predict his reaction, I expected him to show anger or annoyance, fear or despair but he only kept staring into the flames, his letter rack resting in his bony, blanket covered lap, the letters falling out, upside down. A letter T rested on his thigh. ‘Daniel?’ my voice was whispery quiet, I almost didn’t want to disturb him, his quiet reverie looked peaceful, accepting. A stab of fear wormed its way into my stomach,

  ‘Yes. I mean, of course.’ he tore his eyes from the fire and instead looked down at the letters on his lap, I wondered if he were hiding tears, not that I could imagine him ever crying.

  ‘I just don’t want to die slowly for weeks and weeks more, I’m tired. I’m just tired,’ I reached out and took his hand, feeling the papery thinness of his skin over the bones. Still some part of my being was crying for me to stop saying this, stop wanting death. That worming fear tried to grow but had no strength or conviction behind me. While my heart cried out it’s pleas, the dark pull of death reached into me and threatened to drown me.

  We stayed like that for a long time, just holding hands, not speaking. Preparing ourselves for something we knew had to happen. Something inevitable. But should we go down fighting, suffer a long painful death or should we allow it happen quicker, let go and embrace it? I looked at Danny and realised he didn’t have any fight left in him.

  Maybe he had been fighting for me alone.

  I was ready to embrace it, if Danny could let go of the idea of being my protector. He was waiting for a promise of something more.

  ‘You know; I was thinking about this world. Maybe death is the answer,’

  ‘To what?’ his voice was suddenly sharper but controlled,

  ‘I mean, maybe when we die, we get to go back, to our old world. Like living is keeping us here, and we get to wake up in the moving world again, our world,’ he didn’t answer, ‘it makes sense, if you think about it. There’s only us here, so we are the…” I couldn’t think of the word, my once quick-fire brain now answered me sluggishly, painfully slow, ‘anomaly? We are the ones that changed, not the rest of the world. Maybe death is our only escape,’