‘Thank you,my precious,’ he says, laughing at his own joke.
I groan in horror. To be seen is to be humiliated on a near constant basis.
‘Tell me about hospital,’ he goes on, cautious as he pronounces the last word.
‘You want to hear about it? That would make you the first.’
‘I do. Your email made it sound intense.’
I nod, trying not to think too hard about my deranged attempt at reconciliation while still out of my actual mind. I would re-enact all three Peter Jackson epics in full costume for the chance to unsend it, to repeal whatever glimpse he had of me at my worst. But instead, the only way out is through.
‘It was. They had me in one of those white straightjackets, Hannibal Lecter–style.’
‘Really?’
‘No.’
He laughs again, the only person who seems to appreciate when I am actually trying to be funny.
‘The ward was noisy – lots of people losing their minds in Melbourne, apparently. I saw a lot of doctors and talked about myself a fair bit, which I obviously loved. And someone did my laundry there, too.’
He does not laugh at this, aware of how not funny the situation had been.
‘Did it help?’ he asks, sitting on the wooden bench beside the flower bed, concern in his eyes.
I sit beside him and try my best to explain without betraying myself.
‘It didn’t, and it did. That is how I ended up with my autism diagnosis, and the extras, once we got through the other things the doctors thought it might be. When they sent me home, I had the worst dissociative episode I’ve ever had, so things felt like they got worse, until I came back here.’
‘And now?’
‘I’m still figuring it out. I’ve got a lot of work to do, but I am starting to feel a little bit closer to myself, whatever that means,’ I say, unwanted tears pushing their way out of my eyeballs against my will.
‘That’s good.’
He takes my hand in his, squeezing it in his lap like he has many times before.
‘What if we start over, both try to be better friends to one another from here on out?’ he suggests.
‘I would love that. Although, there is nothing that feels more impossible to me right now than starting things over with you, Fran.’
‘Oh, right.’
His grip on my hand loosens, and I squeeze his to make sure he is still there.
‘Part of this whole deal is revisiting old memories, just a constant stream of them, all the time. I can’t really control it, it’s exhausting. I think it’s my brain’s way of realigning and starting to heal itself. So that’s what I mean. A clean slate is kind of impossible for me right now. But I would love us to be better friends to one another, me to you especially. I will do my best not to cry or try to kiss you every time I see you. That would be a good starting point, I am aware.’
I say the last part while wiping away my tears.
‘Well, I mean, that’s . . .’
My phone starts to vibrate in my pocket. It is on silent because it is always on silent, but it is still a strange sensation because no one has phoned me in months. When I take it out, it is even stranger to see Luke’s name on my screen, because I do not think he has ever phoned me in our lives.
‘Hello? Why are you calling me? This is so weird,’ I start.
‘Nora, Dad has had a heart attack. We’re on our way to the hospital. You all need to get here, now.’
Everything begins to melt. There is this thing that happens when you get the bad phone call, where your brain runs a montage of every bad phone call you have ever had and you remember life is a tiny thing, really, strung together with a limited number of precious moments spaced out unevenly between bad phone calls. And the bad phone calls are there to remind you to stop wasting so much bloody time.
