Anger surged through my veins. I pushed away from them, sneering. “What about my marriage? You both know so much about what's going on with my life do you? Is that what he wants to talk to me about tonight, huh? That he's sick of me? Wants to stop or he's going to leave, is that it? How nice for you all to spend so much time discussing my private matters without me. Aren't I lucky to have you three making choices on my behalf!”
“If you confided in your husband once in a while, maybe asked what he thought of the situation, perhaps he wouldn't need to share his concerns with us!” Bonnie bellowed, throwing her hands up in the air in exasperation. She took a step back and breathed deeply, squeezing her fingers over her mouth as if she could hold back her words. Her nails were painted the same pillar box red as her lips and despite my fury, I thought she looked like something out of a painting in her despair.
Isabel was balling a tissue between nervous fingers, breaking off little pieces and dropping them at her feet. She hated confrontation. “Look Roxy,” she said, her voice tentative and gentle. “We just want what's best for you. I know you want a baby, but there are other ways to make a family that aren't going to kill you. Please, just think it through okay? We don't want to lose you too.”
I felt the guilt flooding through me as the words left my sister's mouth. I knew how scared she was. How devastated they'd been by our mother's illness and subsequent death. Our mother, Rosie, had suffered with severe Bipolar disorder throughout the whole of my teen years. I still don't know why or how it came on, but once it hit, there was no turning back for our family. She had been a storybook mother for the first twelve years of my life, before suddenly transforming into a complete stranger, seemingly overnight.
At first, it had been almost fun to have such a cool parent. I could still remember being woken by my mum long after midnight, pulled from my bed and dressed in a sequin jumpsuit before being led into our small back garden. I was twelve years old. Isabel had been guarded and confused as Rosie had insisted she get up and put on her best party dress, but mum had soon convinced her to lighten up and enjoy the festivities. Bonnie had needed no encouragement, she hadn't stopped squealing in utter delight. We'd lit the floodlights, turned the music up loud and had our first taste of alcohol as our mother had made sickly sweet, ridiculously strong cocktails for all of us.
I can still remember the laughter. We'd been creased double, our sides aching, breathless with mirth. We'd jumped on the trampoline, holding hands to steady each other, tipsy and stumbling and then laughing all over again. Bonnie had said that mum had begun crying over something at one point, but I couldn't picture it now. We'd been told later, though none of us had any recollection of it, that the police had been called by several of our neighbours. Our Auntie June, Mum's sister had been called, finding the twins vomiting and mum in a terrible state, bellowing like a banshee and throwing handfuls of lettuce at anyone who approached her. (I remember finding this utterly hilarious every time it was brought up in the years to come).
I, apparently, had fallen asleep on the kitchen floor, and had to be carried upstairs by a policeman. I had no memory of this either. Auntie June had told us dribs and drabs of the story, mainly in the midst of a row with my mother, which became an ever frequent occurrence as Rosie's condition deteriorated. She would spit little titbits out, accusing and bitter, until we had collected all the pieces of information, figuring out what had occurred that night. I could never be sure her version was the entire story though. My mother had no memory of what we had done either, so couldn't say otherwise. That night could have ended so badly for all of us, but after reasoning at length with the police, Auntie June had somehow convinced them to let Rosie go with just a caution. These days I'm not sure we would have been so lucky.
It was a memory the twins and I both treasured and hated in equal measures. It had been a crazy, unpredictable adventure, something so unorthodox we couldn't help but enjoy ourselves, yet it had also been the first night we had all realised something was a little off with our mother, though it would be a long time until we understood quite how bad things were for her. The years that had followed had been hard. Mum had brought home a stream of men, partying hard, and fighting harder. She would go out to clubs and start a brawl with anyone who dared to look at her the wrong way. She was always sporting bruises, either on her knuckles, her face or both.
She'd been admitted into a mental hospital on three separate occasions, each stay spanning months. Our now deceased, and very beloved grandparents had come to live at our house to take care of us, and it had felt once again like a party, all be it with an uneasy undertone to it. Mum had always come out of hospital calm, serene, ready to be there for us, to make it all up to her family somehow. But each time, she had slipped back down into the mania again. Or worse, the dark, desolate depression that never seemed to end.
Rosie had hated taking the pills, insisted that she didn't need medicine, that she was all better. She never could see that it was the pills that were the reason for her sanity. That they were the only reason she wasn't streaking naked through the streets or sobbing in the shower with a blade to her wrists.
As I got older and my grandmother explained her condition to me, I began to see it for myself. I saw how she relied on the medicine to keep her sane. The differences that crept in as the days passed without it. I would beg her to swallow the pills. I would crush them and mix them in her tea, so desperate was I to keep her safe. It rarely worked. She would pretend. She would lie. She would swear she had taken them already. And when she was discovered, she would plead with whoever had found her to keep her secret. Even knowing what would happen, Isabel hadn't been able to betray her. I knew she blamed herself for what happened in the end.
My mother, my real mother, the one before the mental illness, the mother who liked to lie in and who could play pirates as good as any child, the woman who would patiently sit with a net, waiting to catch the brightest butterfly in the garden just so we could have the pleasure of setting it free again, would have never dreamed of lying to me. My mother who had brushed and plaited my hair each night before bed, couldn't possibly be the same woman who had slapped me hard across the face for trying to convince her to take a little blue tablet. I spent most of my teen years trying to get her back. The mother I had grown up with. I didn't want this person, this imposter. It was as if a demon from another world had crept inside her and taken over her mind. And I was terrified.
I didn't want a mother who allowed me to throw as many parties as I liked. I didn't want her to offer me alcohol and cigarettes, and one time, cocaine. I didn't want any of it. I just wanted my mum back. The real version of her. It was a wish that had never come to pass.
When it came to the end, it had been me who had found her. Me who'd been the one to have to call the police. It seemed fitting. After all, it had been me who'd resisted this new version of her so vehemently. I had wanted her gone. But I hadn't wanted this. Not ever. I hadn't even bothered to call an ambulance. The body was a shell, cold and hard, life long since departed. The corpse was swinging from the frayed brown rope we had kept for emergencies in the shed. I'd noticed every little detail. I wish that I hadn't. Those intricate images haunted my dreams for years. The colour of her toenails, translucent pink against pale stony feet. The knife on the table, clean of blood. The smell of burning beef and tomatoes. She had left a stew, of all things bubbling dry on the stove, a note beside it. It had read,
I thought it would be easier if I cooked before I left.