“Did you bring them with you?”
“Yeah,” I say, and I'm ashamed to admit that I did it so that I could have them on my nightstand for her to see and assume I was still taking them.
“Are you sleeping okay, since coming off them?”
“Yeah, I'm sleeping enough.”
“That's bullshit. I saw your light on at two o'clock in the morning,” Dad says.
“What were you doing up then?” Mum asks Dad as she takes off her hat and smooths her hair.
“Man's gotta pee,” Dad says. “Especially an old man like me.”
“Nothing to do with those nightcaps before bed,” Mum mutters. “So you're not really sleeping properly. Why don't you keep taking the mirtazapine then? Just do a half dose, about an hour before bed.”
“Isn't that the anti-anxiety one? I don't have anxiety.” Depression, grief, addictive behaviour, a little bit of trauma, sure. But not anxiety. I know the worst can happen. It already has.
“Well, you could try the venlafaxine instead. A small dose of that every morning would help you have a bit more energy and bounce in your step during the day,” Mum explains. I hate how she knows so much about this.
“My energy is fine. Dad could barely keep up with me this morning.”
Dad comes back to life. “Absolute bollocks. I was dragging you up the inclines.”
“Well, I didn't see you in the gym after when I was running a sub-30-minute six kilometres!” I know I'm inviting my mother to comment on my excessive exercise, but it's worth it to have this competitive banter with my father. This is what we've always done. It's one of a few things I'm happy to still be doing with him, even though so much has changed in my relationship with my parents.
Predictably, Mum interjects. “You need to be careful with your heart.” She leans over, her tone more scared than scathing. “I've read too many stories about young men having heart attacks after running too fast or doing too much sport.”
“My heart is fine,” I say, and of course, it feels like a lie. Reverting to old Marty, I make my bottom lip turn down and pretend to wipe away tears from my eyes. “Well, the muscle part of it, anyway.”
“Would you maybe try the pills again?” Mum shifts in her chair, uncomfortable with my dark humour as she always is. “Like I mentioned, you could try taking...”
“I heard what you said.” I raise my voice. I'm bored of talking about this. It's eaten up most of the high I felt after the exercise and seeing Jenna again.
“So, you'll do it?” Mum asks, hesitant but still determined.
“Whatever. I'll do it.” I ready myself to stand as a surprising bit of relief seeps in. Thinking about yesterday's tears in the pool, my need for a drink, and my fairly aggressive flirtations with Jenna last night, I realise I could do with having those extremes a bit more under control, especially if I am going to spend a bit more time with her. I really hope I do get to spend more time with her.
“Okay, one more thing,” Mum says, and reaches for my hand as I come around the table, closer to her. I hold my breath until she speaks again. “What do you want to do for your birthday?”
“Mum, I'm really not fussed...”
“Bullshit,” Dad says. “You love birthdays.”
I used to love birthdays. But that was before.
On my birthday last year, Arnie had literally just died, and it was the first day my hours weren’t going to be filled with the immediate aftermath of his death. I’d spent the previous few days with his family helping them liaise with the funeral directors and just staying with Arnie until they collected his body. My dad and I then helped his father clear out all the hospice equipment we’d been loaned, while my mum made sure his mother at least drank water and a little soup whenever she emerged from her semi-comatose state. I’ve never heard worse sounds than the ones Arnie’s mother made sobbing in those first few days after his passing and I doubt I ever will. We had known it was imminent, but I knew from the web of pain that spread across my own body after he took his final breaths that no amount of forewarning or time can stop that kind of anguish. That was why it wasn’t the noises she made that were so frightening, it was the knowledge I could easily have made them myself.
On my birthday last year, I began drinking at lunchtime. I think I stopped sometime in October during a very brief sober week in Ibiza as the season ended and I tried to get a grip on a proper job. As for the birthdays before last year, I was always with Arnie.Thosewere the birthdays I loved.
“I can't really make you a cake this year, of course,” Mum continues. “But I bet the kitchen staff here could do a much better job of it than I can. Did you get the manager's name? Maybe I'll go and ask him.”
“Ma, I don't want a fuss,” I say.
“Then what do you want?”
“I don't know. An afternoon on the beach. Some good Greek food. And a couple of lines of coke and a magnum of champagne, of course,” I say with an over-the-top wink.
“Not funny!” Mum swipes at me with her hat.
