‘Yeah – it was obvious you didn’t think I fitted in with your new crowd.’
Emma stared at his palm – the burnt skin. Scars never healed. Oh, they faded. You could cover them with make-up. Invent an entertaining story to explain them away. But they’d always be there, reminding you of the truth.
‘And then you stopped calling me the fixer. You chose another word instead.’
Emma scrolled back through her memories. She drew a blank.
‘What?’ she said.
‘Maybe I should leave you to figure it out,’ he said, and the stony expression returned. ‘Why did you have to come back, Emma – just when I was managing to put all of this to rest?’
He left to check on Andrea and Gail in the shop. After finishing tidying up, Emma too went outside. Dust flew into the air as she slid down the wall by the back door and landed on the ground. Dash ran over, panting, candyfloss-pink tongue hanging out. He nuzzled her neck and lay down, his head on her knees. Briefly, old, familiar negative thoughts jumped into her head:I hate myself. I’m a bad person. I wish I was dead.
‘Why are you so forgiving?’ she whispered, and stroked his ears.
He licked her hand.
Bligh’s mum had met someone else during his last years at high school. The signs had been there. She’d started staying out at night. Bligh talked of his parents’ arguments and did everything he could to keep his mum happy, regularly baking her favourite coconut cake and doing the housework. But it wasn’t enough to stop her moving away. She was keen for him to visit often, but his dad became fragile and faced problems that forced Bligh to stay. He hardly talked about his mum, but when he did, his face flushed and his voice wavered as if sadness blew on sound waves like a breeze.
Was that why he’d stood by Emma for so long? Because belonging to something, however screwed, was better than the prospect of being alone?
Until she’d finally gone too far, even for Bligh, and had thrown his misguided loyalty back in his face.
Emma could hardly find the strength to get back on her feet. It reminded her of days spent on the pavement in Manchester. How numbness crept into her legs, which buckled when she finally stood up. But sitting here moping wouldn’t get the rabbit hutches clean. And it wouldn’t help Andrea or Bligh, who’d hardly had time to sit down since that Christmas she left.
She straightened up, brushed herself down and mulled over a proposition she’d been meaning to put to Stig.
12 months before going back
Emma sat in a chair opposite someone called Ben. She was beginning to regret dialling the number on the orange flyer. The small office at Stanley House wasn’t as friendly as the waiting room, with its comfy soft chairs and piped pop music. The only sound here was a clock ticking. The chairs were wooden. Emma squinted in the artificial light.
For the first time ever, her problems wereofficial.That word made her throat constrict. She was in the system. Ben was the assessment officer. She’d thought he’d be wearing a suit; that more than ever in her life she’d feel that she didn’t fit. What a relief to be met by a T-shirt, jeans and tattoos.
After breathalysing her, Ben filled out the top of a form and consulted a stand-up calendar on his desk. It was June the fifteenth. Emma rarely knew the date. He pushed the paperwork and pen across. ‘First things first. Fill this in.’
Her eyes scanned the questions, and pages rustled as she gave details about her drinking habits, medical history, financial and family situation, criminal record and drug use – at least she could skip those last two sections. Her insides felt numb. Her writing hand shook. The complex horror of recent years had been reduced to a list of scribbled answers on a page.
‘And now for the most important question,’ said Ben in a voice loaded like a gun. A gun that made her afraid, because when it went off, the race would start – the race to facing her problems head on. ‘Why are you here, Emma?’
Was that a trick question? ‘I want to stop drinking. For good.’
‘Nice one. I agree that’s the right option for you.’
Her brow furrowed.
‘Some people come in with ideas about simply cutting down.’
‘I just want you to make all the craziness go away.’
Ben leant back in his chair. ‘For the treatment to work, you are going to have to stop first.’
His words didn’t compute for a moment, and when they did, instinctively her hands covered her face. ‘Are you messing with me?’ she asked eventually, looking up. ‘That’s your job, isn’t it? That’s why I’m here. What’s the point if you expect that to happen before I even start?’
‘We’ll sort out a detox – at the end of that, you’ll be dry. But this isn’t about stopping; it’s about staying stopped, and to do that, you have to change the way you think.’ He handed over a box of tissues. ‘Only you can do this, Emma. We’re here to offer support, but you’ve got to take responsibility for yourself. That’s what recovery is about.’
Emma stood up and paced the room. ‘But I’ve tried so many times. I… I can’t do it on my own.’
‘You’re braver and stronger than you think.’
