Chapter Seven
Fin
Icome to, my chest rising from the bed with an almighty jerk. I’m coughing and spluttering, oxygen and breathing not able to commit to being friends. My heart pounds somewhere in the vicinity of my windpipe, leaving a horrific sense of abandonment in the empty cavity of my chest.
A waking nightmare.
Waking has never been one of my favourite states, but in the weeks following Marcus’ death, I found I was almost unable to stay awake and spent most of my time sleeping. Banishing reality, I suppose. I just couldn’t get out of our bed, like grief and guilt weighted me down against the mattress, its invisible hands holding me captive there. But it wasn’t a true sleep. A restful sleep. More like a loss of consciousness where I was forced to watch our last morning together playing on a loop inside my head.
Did he say goodbye? Did I miss any clues?
These days, sleep comes easy only with the aid of pills. Without them, I sleep fitfully, plagued by nightmares. Nightmares that follow me into the light of day. I might feel normal for a few moments after I open my eyes, stuck somewhere between the emptiness of sleeping and the as yet unrealised reality of the day. In the back of my head, I sense something is missing, but for a blissful minute, I’m not sure what. I’m just normal. Nothing bad has happened. Everything remains the same. In the natural order of things, the fog of slumber clears and with it, a cold reality sets in: I no longer have a husband. A home. A place in the world.
Then, more occasionally, I wake like this.
Terrified. I feel like I’m choking. My nose burns with the phantom sting of salt water and my skin prickles from the burn of the sun. I know it makes no sense, this drowning by empathy, but yet here I cower, coughing and spluttering, desperately fighting to stay alive.
My breathing is erratic as I swallow mouthfuls of air, struggling to inflate my lungs, able to wipe the tears from my face only as I begin to calm, inhaling large gulps of oxygen. Physically shaking, I force myself back against the pillows and pressing my hand against what I think is my diaphragm. I push myself into the mattress, willing my breathing to catch up with my reality.
I’m dry. I’m on land.
I’m not dying. I never was.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Concentrate on the rise and fall of my hands, the birds singing outside, or the lines in the ceiling. Concentrate on anything else.
Intellectually, I know guilt is the cause. I might not have had a hand in his death, but I feel I’m somehow to blame. I’d stopped feeling invested in my marriage long before he died.
Once I’m able to push away the terror, I can rein in my thoughts, my heartbeat finding it’s equilibrium, though I feel like I’ve been lying here an age.
Ivy’s alarm sounds through the thin wall, and a moment later, I can hear her stumbling about her bedroom. It’s mornings like these that makes me thankful she’s a heavy sleeper, but it’s sort of comforting, listening to her start her day. I’m grateful that, this morning, her only morning free from the salon, she’s disciplined enough to set her alarm. This small piece of domestic normality is something to hold onto; something to concentrate on. I’m here—so is Ivy—and I need to appreciate my friends more.Even if their kindness hurts.
I stretch out my trembling arms, for once not depressed that my fingers almost touch the walls either side of my bed. My breathing is as it should be now, panic reduced though I’m still shaken.
Fuck it all. I’m so tired of not feeling like me. Sick of being afraid of what the morning might bring. Tired of those around looking at me like I’m about to crumble from the outside in; like at any moment I might implode and collapse.Turn to dust.
From terrified to angry, I swipe my phone from the small mirrored table masquerading as a nightstand. Flicking through my emails, I notice one from Soraya asking if I’ve time for a chat later today. I sigh, though it’s not exactly bitterness that prompts me to do so, more a small and suddenwhy.Why me and not her? Why not the stranger on the street? The uncharitable thought prompts a wave of guilt, because without my friends, who knows where I’d be.
I read once that grief must be tackled in stages, but I can’t seem to get beyond my fearful state. No, that’s not quite true, because I’m plenty angry. Angry that this has happened; that I’ve lost everything. It’s an anger I keep bottled up inside. A rage I can’t express; I’m just so sick and tired of being terrified all the time.
‘You want a coffee?’
Ivy’s voice from the other side of the door pulls me from my own head, away from what I don’t care to share. My throat is hoarse as I answer.
‘I’ll make them.’
I note Ivy’s tone is sleep filled but not unfriendly which, after yesterday, is all I can ask. We managed to avoid each other after our chat, mainly because Saturday turned out to be her busiest day so far. I’m pleased business is going well, especially so soon after opening. I’m also pleased we didn’t sit down to dinner together later that evening. She’d said she had a heap of paperwork to deal with and spent most of the evening glued to her laptop and receipts, whether in truth or just to avoid me, I can’t be sure.
Out in the kitchen now, I fill the kettle with icy cold water, grabbing the jar of instant from the cupboard above. I miss my Italian built-in coffee machine; I wished I could’ve brought it with me. It’s not the most sensible thought, but out of all the trappings of my previous life, good coffee is one of the things I miss the most. It’s not as though there’s space for an espresso maker in here; the kitchen is barely big enough for its tiny rectangular table setting. We don’t usually eat in here as it’s become Ivy’s office of sorts, her laptop taking up the tiny dining space, while I’m camped out in her office space, I suppose.On the table, piles of paperwork and invoices are piled strategically and weighted with items varying from a garlic crusher to a can of stewed prunes. I guess Ivy must have some method in that madness, though to me it just looks chaotic.
She didn’t have a lot of money left over after the salon refit, which was seriously seventies in its décor. The flat above the salon wasn’t much better. We’d done what we could to bring it up to date, firstly by pulling up the almost psychedelic carpets running across the entire floor. It was the kind of floor covering with a pattern so mad that, if you stared at it for more than a minute or two, you were left feeling dizzy. I scuff my toe against the kitchen floor, thinking it was lucky for her bank balance we’d discovered fairly decent floorboards underneath the yuck. After an unpleasant day of sanding, Ivy, Nat and I had whitewashed the boards, coating the kitchen units with the same paint. The resulting effect is a little more shabby than chic, but pretty enough, especially paired with the scrubbed pine table and DIY’d white-washed chairs.
‘Don’t you own pyjama pants?’ Ivy appears in the kitchen doorway dressed in blue flannel and a Ramones tee, her hair looking like a magpie’sdes res. Her frown is directed in the vicinity of my legs causing me to look down at my nightwear, or lack thereof. What I’d thought was an oversized t-shirt has come up a little bit short.
‘Could’ve been worse.’ I have a thing for lingerie and flimsy nightwear; or rather, Ihada thing for those kinds of frippery. These days, what you see is pretty much what you get. Panties. Tees. Marginally bristly legs.
‘Can you make mine a tea?’ she asks through a yawn. ‘And there are sultana muffins June baked in the bread thingy.’
I turn to pull out the tea canister when my phone buzzes against the kitchen worktop.
