I stagger back to the bedroom, tug open the drawer to my nightstand, grab the plastic bag containing the pills. Propelled now only by fear, the primal need to survive, I shake one into the palm of my hand.
For a millisecond I stare at it, stiff and white against my shining, sweat-slick skin.
But then the pain unfolds inside my chest again, so I don’t think any more. There’s no time.
I tip it into my mouth, tilt my head back and swallow.
I have sometimes thought that if relief had a colour, it would be the lavender of the sky at dawn. When you’ve made it through the night, and you weren’t sure you would, there is a certain aching sweetness to the sight of it.
But this morning I can see only dark, violet thunderclouds of regret.
It took less than ten minutes – after my heart rate had returned to normal – for the shame to descend, the guilt of having done something I promised Rachel I wouldn’t. I ran tothe toilet and heaved and heaved, shoved my fingers against the back of my throat until I tasted blood, trying to bring the pill back up.
Fuck. Fuck. Come on. Come on.
But I was dehydrated. There was nothing in my stomach, no way to force the thing from my body.
I make a strong coffee now – possibly not the brightest idea, given that my heart rate’s been on the ceiling for the best part of the night – then return to the living room. I sit bare-chested in my underwear on the sofa, hands wrapped around the cup, trying to think.
My gaze turns to the only wedding picture Rachel and I have up in the flat. We always sort of disliked our official photographs: formally posed and stiff, gazing, as directed, into each other’s eyes. Both trying hard not to laugh. It was also the first and only time I’d ever put gel in my hair, which resulted in me looking as though I’d taken a wrong turn out of military service.
But this picture we liked. The sole natural one, capturing a perfect, private moment. We were both laughing so hard that our cheeks were wet, and we were having to hold each other up.
I wish I could remember what had set us off. Rachel can’t, either.
The sight of it is like a trip-switch to my heart.
The worst part is that what I have done was entirely illogical, of course. Dangerous, even. Swallowing a substance that essentially freeze-frames your body, in the midst of a suspected heart attack. But, subconsciously, I guess I’d been starting to see that pill as my lifeline. In the thick smoke of the moment, I just wanted to get to safety.
15.
Rachel
May 2000
I am home from my work trip. Josh has cooked, and we sit at our little kitchen table to eat steaming bowlfuls of linguine and clams. I have changed into joggers and an oversized hoodie – both Josh’s – my hair loose around my shoulders. I love the feeling of being intentionally unkempt at home, after all the stiff shirts and high heels and hairspray I am obliged to wear for work.
‘Sorelli’s has shut down,’ Josh says, after a while.
Our beloved first date restaurant. ‘I saw. Sad, isn’t it?’
He nods. ‘Feels weirdly emotional every time I walk past it.’
‘Slow-cooked ragù till we die.’ I smile at him, twirling pasta on to my fork.
He smiles back, but it feels oddly off-kilter, the atmosphere between us strange. Like snowfall in the middle of summer.
Shadows have begun to wrap the room. The water pipes are winding down for the night, clunking and knocking beneath the floorboards. I scrunch my toes, feeling their warmth through my feet.
I notice his battered copy ofFinnegans Wakeupturned on the countertop. A sure sign that he’s been attempting to take his mind off something. He’s been trying to get through it for the past two years, his go-to book when he needs to distract his brain, because he says he has to concentrate like fuck just to make a single paragraph of progress. Usually, odd as it sounds, I quite like to see that book lying around. Because it almost alwaysresults in some creative brilliance, whether literary or culinary. Often both.
‘Is it writer’s block?’
‘Sorry?’
I nod over at the countertop. ‘James Joyce has made a reappearance.’ I reach across the table and take his hand. ‘Please talk to me.’ I sometimes have to remind him to do this, when he gets lost in his own head, the thoughts fast and cold as a hurricane, the kind of mental weather that steals your breath.
‘Rach. There’s something I haven’t told you.’
