Stench

by AB Morgan

  Anna had a vague impression that she had not been wearing her shoes when her cousin Gemma came to collect her from the funeral home.

  She hadn’t been permitted to see Damien’s body when they repatriated him from Afghanistan. Brenda, the rest of the family and the representative from his regiment said it would destroy the positive memories she had and the picture of Damien as she had last seen him. Her final memory had been a vivid one: a lasting embrace, the feel of his shirt, his smell and then her words ‘Don’t do anything stupid, like getting yourself killed.’ He had ruffled her shiny hair, kissed her forehead and had simply said ‘Ditto, Fruitcake.’

  The funeral had been a living nightmare for her. The GP had been called into action and, as she required sedation purely to make it through the service, a small supply of diazepam had been arranged. As a result, Anna had felt slightly detached as she watched the service happen around her. Her parents, Joyce and Scott Pardew, who had flown in from Spain to be with her, physically held her upright, one at either hand as prayers were said, eulogies spoken, and hymns sung with cracked voices barely managing to compete with the organ. However, it was the interment that proved catastrophic for her mental health.

  ‘Full military honours with a fine display of demented grief-stricken wife in widow’s weeds,’ was how Brenda had described the scene at the time. According to her, Anna had gone crazy trying to prevent the lowering of the coffin into the ground, by screaming and clawing at the pall-bearers – all fine military men every one of them - and finally passing out in the arms of Damien’s senior officer. With help from her mother, he bundled her back into the church and called an ambulance.

  When conscious of her surroundings again, Damien was shouting at her, swearing and bawling like a sergeant major. Those words were seared into her brain.

  ‘You failed me, wife. I’m fucking freezing and you abandoned me, you bitch. Get up. Come to me. I need you. Quick fucking march, bitch.’

  Anna tried, but, from what she could make out, she’d been kidnapped and held against her will by strangers in a grey prison.

  She ranted, and she begged, but was watched over, day and night, by mysterious guards who did nothing to understand her desperation. They grabbed her, lay her face down on a hospital bed and injected her with drugs. She fought them, scratching and punching out at whoever tried to get in her way. Damien had cheered her on.

  ‘Go on Anna, flatten the bastards. They can’t keep you from seeing me. Don’t let them stop you. I need you. They have no right to come between us. Hit him. Use the chair. Pick it up. Now.’

  Anna didn’t realise that she’d been in two different hospitals. She didn’t have much recollection of the first, other than her frantic attempts to escape and run to Damien. But the second hospital had been a secure psychiatric unit where they didn’t hold back on the use of sedation and, despite passionate protestations, she was forced to accept much-needed respite.

  Damien hadn’t let up. He had been furious with her for leaving him.

  ‘You’re late on parade, soldier. You were ordered to get yourself back to base and you have deliberately disobeyed orders. Do you hear me, bitch? Left, right, left right, about turn. Yes, you bitch, double time.’

  Anna had done as she was told. She marched in the corridors, she double-timed on the spot, she saluted, and she dropped to the floor.

  ‘Take cover! Incoming!’

  There were times when she would scream back at Damien to stop shouting at her. She badly needed a reprieve from his badgering and demands, and when finally, she managed a drug-induced sleep it was nothing short of a blessed relief from the non-stop torture he was putting her through.

  After several days, the drugs had begun to dull his constant taunting and Anna realised how hurtful he had been. This made her question his dedication. He was still around but was apologetic, making her sad instead of afraid.

  She had tried to ignore him and actually had succeeded on one occasion when she made her way to the bathroom accompanied by a silent nurse chaperone. She managed not to respond to Damien’s voice.

  ‘Sorry, my sweet Anna. I’m sorry, Fruitcake. I didn’t mean to be so vicious. I miss you so much it made me angry. Can you smell me still? Can you hear me? Don’t tell them if you can. They want to drug you up to the eyeballs. Look at you. See what you look like now? That’s their fault, Fruitcake. You have to be clever. Don’t let them see you talk to me. Tell them nothing.’

  Anna didn’t talk back to him and for once she didn’t turn around to see if he was there but, at that moment in the hospital bathroom, Anna couldn’t recall the last time she had seen her own reflection. She stood at the sink, staring at herself, holding onto the cool of the ceramic, bathroom door open, being watched by the lady who never strayed more than six feet away. There was a head-height mirror above the sink. Anna blinked slowly. Her face was thin, ashen with puffy half-circles of pink beneath her eyes.

  For a second or two she believed she was a ghost. That it was she who had died and gone to hell. She touched her cheeks with her fingertips. Her skin was clammy. From between dry cracked lips she stuck out her tongue and opened her mouth, only to close it again hurriedly in disgust at the sight of a white furry coating. Her hair was caked to her head where she had lain on it, and in other places it refused to obey the laws of physics, poking out at impossible angles, matted and greasy. With no energy, and no will left to care about herself, she returned to her bed and lay upon it, eyes open, staring at the wall.

  ‘Fuck off, Damien. Leave me alone for five minutes. I’m tired.’

  The psychiatrists were resolute that Damien’s voice should be silenced, but when faced with this possibility Anna felt a sense of panic at the threat of abandonment and decided she wanted him to stay. The more drugs they gave her, the quieter Damien’s voice appeared to become. He wouldn’t call to her as often as he had done before the funeral, and in turn she found she couldn’t cope without hearing his voice, so she lied and told them it had gone.

  ‘Yes Doctor, I feel so relieved. Yes, Doctor, I’m much better now.’

  It was a desperate situation and one from which she would not fully recover.

  10

  Insight

  Anna never forgot when she had first met Sara. It was as clear as a digital film playing in her head. A woman of her own age, she had long auburn hair, kindly grey eyes and an air of reassurance that Anna wanted to bottle and keep for ever. When she appeared on the ward to see her, Anna had no idea who or what she was.

  ‘Hello, my name is Sara. Your consultant has asked our team to meet with you to see if you would be suitable for support from us. I’m from something called the Early Intervention Service. We work with people who may have experienced their first episode of psychosis.’

  It was that word “psychosis” which hit like a fist into Anna’s stomach. No one else had spoken to her about what might actually be wrong with her. She was told in woolly terms that she had experienced a reaction to her husband’s death. It didn’t require a degree to work that one out.

  ‘Can you tell me why you think you are on a ward for people with mental health problems?’ Sara had asked.

  ‘My husband was killed.’

  ‘Do you think everyone whose husband is killed ends up on a psychiatric ward?’

  ‘I’m not sure. What do you think?’ Anna was annoyed that this woman had been so brutal. ‘It’s not a fucking walk in the park, that’s for sure.’

  ‘Too bloody true. I take it you’re keen to get back on with real life? Or am I wrong?’

  ‘She’s a clever one. Don’t for God’s sake tell her you think about dying every night. Say you want to grieve properly and you can’t do that in a hospital. That’ll get her going. Anna! Answer the woman.’

  ‘I would be lying if I said I was keen to get on with life. I’m petrified actually, but I do think I need time to grieve and it can’t be normal to do that here.’

  The two women talked for over an hour, mostly about Damien.
Damien’s death, his career, and how they met, before moving on to Anna’s childhood, schooling, friendships, life as an army wife and, soon enough, the subject of admission to hospital was revisited.

  ‘I ended up here.’ One arm swung out as Anna gestured to the neat clinical room around her. A single bed with a duvet and one pillow. No taps on the wash hand basin, no proper doorknob, just a handle to fit fingertips into, nothing on which to hang a ligature or to cut yourself, although the chair wasn’t fixed to the floor, nor was the bed.

  ‘I’ve stayed in worse places. But you shouldn’t be here. Be careful what you tell her. Are you listening to me?’

  Anna turned around to see if Damien was behind her. He occasionally caught her by surprise by whispering loudly in one ear and then the other. Sara must have seen her looking at the furniture and then responding to no one.

  ‘Can you tell me what you were thinking when you assaulted staff with a chair at the previous hospital. I’d like to know, in case you’re feeling the same way now.’

  Anna couldn’t believe what she had been accused of and glared back at Sara not knowing what to say for the best. Nothing was said for at least five long seconds and Sara waited, smiling briefly, until it became apparent that Anna either had no recall of assaulting anyone or was simply declining to discuss the matter.

  ‘I don’t remember actually hurting anyone. Was it serious?’

  ‘Serious enough for you to end up on a secure unit, I’m afraid to say. The member of staff concerned decided not to press charges; you weren’t aware of your actions.’

  Tears appeared in Anna’s eyes. ‘Is she okay? What did I do?’

  ‘Well, according to what I know and what’s written in the risk assessment in front of me,’ Sara said looking down at a raft of patient notes resting on her knee, ‘you developed superhuman strength and took an almighty swipe with a chair at the clinical ward manager. He couldn’t get out of the way as he was trying to protect another staff member and you caught him slap bang on the top of the nose, knocked him unconscious. To finish him off, the force sent him flying into the wall and he ended up with an unhealthy dose of concussion for his troubles.’

  Anna listened, concentrating hard on every word. Her eyes narrowed, disbelieving. ‘No. I think you’re mistaking me for someone else. I’m not a violent person. I wouldn’t do anything like that. I would definitely have known.’ Anna searched back into the dim recollections of her admission to the first hospital ward, but she couldn’t even bring to mind the name of the place or the faces of the people who had surrounded and restrained her. She did recall a distinct smell of stale sweat and bad breath, only to realise that it was her own.

  ‘You did twat him. Splat. His nose made a hell of a crack. I thought you’d broken the chair leg, but no, it was his nose. Then he hit the floor like a sack of shit after he bounced his head off the wall. Boiiiiing! Bloody good effort on your part, by the way.’

  ‘Anna, Anna?’ Sara was trying to get her attention by calling her name and waving a hand slowly to break into her thoughts.

  ‘Is he alright now?’ Anna asked, almost not daring to find out.

  ‘He’s not back at work yet, but he’s a tough old thing.’

  ‘Do you know him?’

  Anna noticed that Sara avoided eye contact, but any reply was curtailed by a voice from the doorway. A tall Indian man in shirt, tie and chinos, answered for her. ‘Quite well as it happens. He’s her husband.’ The tone was stern. ‘Can I talk to you please, Sara?’

  Despite making an effort to close the door, there was ample gap for Anna to make out what was being said. She sidled closer.

  ‘Was there really no one else from your team who could have carried out this assessment? I’m not sure it’s fair on the lady.’

  ‘Then maybe you shouldn’t have told her, Sunil, and allowed me to inform her of the possible awkward details.’

  ‘Would you have done?’

  ‘I was just about to, as a matter of fact. You don’t think I’d be so unprofessional as to misinform a vulnerable lady like her, do you? We had no choice. We’re so short staffed and we’ve been set ridiculous targets by NHS England. It was either me as assessor, or a breach. If we breach targets then I have to do a report for the commissioners, which I haven’t got time to do either. We didn’t even have enough people to send two members of staff, like we would normally do. Patient choice seems forgotten about by the powers that be.’

  Sunil mellowed. ‘Sorry. I should have known better. How’s the old man’s head doing?’

  11

  Wednesday Evening, The Valiant Soldier

  Rory didn’t usually visit the local village pub during the week but a sudden need for alcohol arose shortly after he ended a telephone call from his mother. She had decided to visit him and her incessant badgering had finally won the day.

  ‘It’s my own bloody fault,’ he said to Barney, who passed him a pint of chilled lager to refresh him after the one-mile walk from the cottage.

  ‘Here you go, young man. A pint of the devil’s piss. I don’t know why you drink the tasteless stuff. Try a slurp of this beauty,’ he added as he insisted that Rory take a sip of real ale.

  ‘Not bad.’ Nonplussed, Rory could do no more than nod in appreciation of Barney’s efforts to convert him. ‘This one’s nice and cool though. Cheers anyway.’

  ‘Now then, what’s this about your mother driving you to drink before she even gets here.’ Barney had heard Rory confirm, with Rob the landlord, a reservation of a room for the weekend, made for his mother.

  ‘I should have kept my bloody big mouth shut. She panics about everything. She hates that I’ve moved so far away and she convinces herself that I’m depressed and miserable.’

  ‘She does have a point. You can appear a bit down in the mouth at times, if you don’t mind me saying so. You’re too serious about things and you hardly ever talk about yourself. Bikes - yes. Personal details - no. I wouldn’t even have known you had a mother if you hadn’t said.’

  ‘I’m a private person, that’s all. I prefer it that way.’

  ‘Talking of keeping things private, or not, Steve’s a good one for snippets of gossip. He tells me, that girl who drives the dark blue Mondeo is having bike lessons. She seems to be popular. I had the vicar at the garage yesterday asking about her.’ Barney took a long appreciative gulp of his beer. ‘Do you know Brenda Chamberlain?’ Rory shook his head. ‘Well, that’s lucky for you. She’s a pain in the proverbial. Anyway, she’s the girl’s mother-in-law. Anna’s husband Damien was—’

  ‘Killed in Afghanistan.’

  ‘Yes. That’s the one. She still goes to his grave and she talks to him. Like a proper conversation, so I’m told. Spooky and sad, ain’t it? Thanks to the vicar, I found out the reason she’s watching the Fewtrells. She a freelance journalist and she’s working on some story about slave labour. Brenda, through the sodding vicar, has asked me to warn Anna of the risks. How am I supposed to do that without her knowing who asked me?’ Barney raised his glass to his lips again and this time swallowed almost a third of a pint in one go.

  ‘Steve should have kept his thoughts to himself but I think he’s a bit concerned about Anna Chamberlain. She comes across as defenceless and he’s a sucker for a sob story. I’m surprised though, she doesn’t strike me as being the undercover journalist type, but she did mention that she was working with your mate Konrad Neale on a tricky story, perhaps she has hidden talents. She’s got another bike lesson tomorrow, so I suppose I could drop into conversation about the vicious dog, the shotgun, the acid, and Mad Leo’s police record. That should be enough. Out of interest … do you know much more about her?’

  At the sound of a heavy latch being lifted Barney looked past Rory, sat more upright on the wooden bench seat and beamed as his rounded wife waddled in to the pub through the wide doorway. ‘Netty, get me and Rory another pint each while you’re at the bar, there’s a good wench.’ He flinched as, smiling, she punched him squarely on the l
eft bicep on her way to greet Rob and furnish herself with a glass of wine.

  ‘Don’t you wench me, you chauvinist pig. It may be date night but if you think you’re on a promise, think again.’ Several customers smirked at the lively repartee. ‘Lager is it, Rory?’ Annette cheerily enquired.

  When she plonked her fulsome frame into the pew next to her husband it groaned in protest at the additional weight. She threw three packets of peanuts into the middle of the table. ‘A small snack before dinner.’ Having overheard part of their conversation, she was eager to hear who the men were talking about. ‘The young lady on stakeout in the Mondeo? Yes, I know the one.’

  ‘Rory has taken a shine to her. Ain’t that right?’ Barney said as he opened a packet of nuts and poured a handful for himself. Annette reached across him laying claim to a bag of her own.

  ‘Not exactly, no. In fact, not in the slightest.’ Rory shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘She’s still grieving for her husband by all accounts and I’m too busy with work.’

  ‘She’ll have money,’ Annette teased through a mouthful of peanuts.

  ‘No, really, I’m not interested.’

  ‘She’s got nice tits.’ Barney accepted a dig in the ribs from his wife for this comment. She was still smiling.

  Rory was able to fend off a stream of reasons for developing a relationship with Anna as proposed by Barney. However, he had trouble dealing with Annette probing into his personal life. ‘You wear a wedding ring, Rory. Can I be rude and ask where she is?’ Rory said nothing. He stared at his pint and took a drink by way of avoiding having to answer the direct question.