‘I didn’t lie.’
‘You didn’t tell me the truth either. I’ve looked him up, Edward Clarke. He was thrown out of medical school not long after you broke up with him.’
‘Because of the letters you wrote.’
‘Maybe. Either way, I was right, I knew there was something wrong with him. He took odd jobs at different hospitals until he got this one. I think he chose this hospital to be close to you. Do you understand? I think he’s been following you for years and I don’t think this is over. Tell me where he lives.’
‘I don’t remember.’
‘Yes, you do. Tell me. I won’t let him hurt you again. I won’t let anyone hurt you again.’
‘I’d like to sleep now,’ I say and close my eyes.
‘I brought this for you,’ she says, and I hear her put something down on the bedside table. I open my eyes long enough to look at it, but I don’t look at her. ‘I thought it might remind you who we were, who we could be again,’ she says. I don’t answer. The gold bracelet looks so much smaller than I remember, I’m amazed it ever fitted around my wrist. It’s the one she stole from me when we were children. My date of birth carved into the gold. Her date of birth too. Terrible twins. It still has the safety pin I used to mend it when she broke it. So fragile. I’m amazed she still has it, I want to touch it, but I don’t. I close my eyes and turn my back on her. I long for the silence to return and swallow me down into the darkness, I don’t want to hear any more. I get my wish. The door closes and I am left alone. The bracelet is gone and so is my sister.
After
Six Weeks Later 15th February 2017
I stand at the end of our bed, watching his face as he sleeps. Paul’s eyes move beneath his closed eyelids, and his mouth has fallen slightly open. He’s aged over the last couple of months, the lines have carved themselves deeper, the circles beneath his eyes a shade darker than before. I’m watching over a fully grown man and yet all I can see is a picture of vulnerability. I stand in the glorious silence that only the night can deliver and carefully consider whether I have made the right choice. I decide that I have. I won’t let my past dictate our future.
I’ve been home for just over a month now. After so long in the quiet darkness, it felt like sensory overload when I first left the hospital. The world seemed so fast, so loud and so real. Perhaps it was always that way and I just never really noticed before. It took a while to adjust, to process it all. I’ve been to the site of the accident, a trauma counsellor at the hospital thought it would be a good idea. There was a bunch of dead flowers by the tree. Someone kind must have thought that I died that night. I think a version of me did.
I am trying to move on. I have forgiven Claire now too, so much so that we offered to look after the twins while David and Claire had a romantic Valentine’s celebration yesterday. I thought they deserved some quality time alone together, I even prepared a special meal for them.
It was nice having the twins here. They had an afternoon nap in our spare bedroom, it was the first time they slept here and I kept checking on them to make sure they were OK. I stood in the doorway and stared at their pink cheeks, wild tufts of hair, both dreaming away like two peas in a pod. I’d stuck some luminous stars on the ceiling, which they seemed to love. I kept turning the light on and off to show them that stars can’t shine without darkness. They cried less than normal today, Paul was so good at knowing how to keep them happy. Speaking to them in the right tone, always making everything better. The house is silent again now. I check the time: 03.02.
Even a few weeks later, there are still some side effects from the coma. I experience horribly disturbing nightmares and I have trouble sleeping since I woke up. I creep downstairs and Digby comes to meet me. We have a puppy now, a black Labrador. It was Paul’s idea. I walk through to the kitchen, glancing at the clock before beginning my routine: 03.07.
I start with the back door and repeatedly turn the handle until I’m sure it is locked.
Up, down. Up, down. Up, down.
Next, I stand in front of the large range oven with my arms bent at the elbows. My fingers form the familiar shape: the index and middle finger finding the thumb on each hand. I whisper quietly to myself, whilst visually checking that everything is switched off, my fingernails clicking together. I do it again. I do it a third time.
Digby is watching me from the kitchen doorway, his head tilted to one side. I go to leave, lingering briefly, wondering if I should check everything one last time before I do. I look at the clock: 03.15. There isn’t time. I put on my coat, grab my bag and check the contents: Phone. Purse. Keys. As well as a few other bits and pieces. I check twice more before attaching Digby’s lead to his collar, then make myself leave the house, checking the front door is locked three times before marching down the moonlit garden path.
I find walking helps and the puppy appreciates it whether it’s night or day. Just a couple of blocks and some fresh air and I can normally get back to sleep. Nothing else seems to work. I walk along the main road, not a single light shines from any of the houses, as though everyone else has gone and I’m the only person left in the world.
I carry on through the sleeping streets under a black blanket of night sky covered in stars, like sequins. They’re the same stars I looked up at over twenty years ago, but I am forever changed. There’s no moon, so I am completely cloaked in darkness as I turn into Claire’s road. I stare up at the house, taking it in as though looking at it properly for the first time. It should have been mine, I was born here. I tie Digby’s lead to a lamppost, take out my key and head inside.
I check on Claire and David first. They look so peaceful, lying completely still, facing away from each other.
The wheels on the bus go round and round.
I think that’s supposed to mean something, them lying like that. Something about their relationship, but I can’t remember and it doesn’t matter now anyway.
Round and round.
I check David’s pulse. There isn’t one, he’s already cold. I move around to the other side of the bed to check on Claire. Her pulse is weak but she has one. I guess he ate more of the meal I made them. The bag of drugs from the hospital seems to have worked. I had my doubts, but then if a hospital porter can figure this stuff out, with the help of the internet it really shouldn’t be beyond someone like me.
Round and round.
I walk to the children’s bedroom, before coming back to Claire.
The wheels on the bus go round and round.
The sound of the twins crying shatters the silence. I lean down closer to the bed, hoping she can hear them.
All day long.
I whisper in her ear, ‘Two peas in a pod.’
Her eyes open and I jump back from the bed. She looks towards the sound of her children screaming down the hall. I relax when I realise she can’t move anything other than her eyes. They’re wide and wild as she stares in my direction with a look I’ve never seen in them before. Fear. I hold the petrol can up so that it’s within Claire’s field of vision. She looks at it, then back to me. I study my sister’s face one last time, then take her hand in mine, squeezing it three times before letting her go.
‘I never was fond of gas,’ I say, before leaving the room.
After
Wednesday, 15th February 2017 – 04.00