The phone had been ringing for a while now. Helen lifted her head from the pillow. She had assumed Malcolm would pick up. It stopped. She lay her head back down and closed her eyes. The pill she had taken was trying its best to do what it was made to do. She fell back to sleep. How long she had slept before she was woken by the sound of the phone ringing again, she couldn’t tell. Her head felt heavy and she was finding it difficult to keep the sound of the phone from being absorbed by her dreams.
She roused herself and sat up unsteadily. The clock by the bed said it was almost 5 pm. She had been sleeping for a few hours. The phone stopped ringing. She regretted taking the sleeping tablet. Her night would be sleepless, but there was no other way to get through the day. She preferred sleep to everything now.
Malcolm had withdrawn completely from her. He was so unlike himself as to be a stranger to her. Since the Brixton episode he had taken to sleeping in his office, on the sofa bed Daniel had used.
Helen raised herself slowly from the bed and stood on the carpet in her bare feet. Her head felt like a bowling ball. Her neck struggled to hold it steady. She went through to the bathroom and started running a bath.
The evening stretched out before her. It was unbearable. The BBC news. Then something to eat. Then she might read. If she could focus her attention. Lately, as Amy was keeping much to herself downstairs, she had joined Malcolm watching endless inane reality TV shows, sitting in silence drinking their gin and tonics, then red wine. Night would announce itself when he took himself off to bed, and then the empty hours would loiter about Helen with their maddening silence. Last night she had grown so impatient for dawn she had risen and in her dressing gown had gone out into their tiny back garden then, growing ever colder, had waited for the sky in the east to lighten.
Now she opened the bathroom cabinet and looked at the little bottles of pills she had collected. As a child of the austerity years, she never thew out what might be re-used or repurposed. She remembered being prescribed Valium years before. She had never taken them. Not after the first time, when she felt her mind soften around the edges. But now she hunted them for exactly that purpose. The gin did not silence the mind. Valium would.
Helen undressed and clutching the bottle, climbed into the bath. The water was very hot. Her body reacted as it always did, like it was undergoing a trial by fire. Soon the worst was over and she grew used to the heat. She read the label on the bottle and took a full tablet then dropped the bottle on the floor. She made herself comfortable and closed her eyes.
Her mind was caught in a terrible loop. Like a large animal in a small cage pacing round and round. Each of the four walls repeatedly examined for a missed route to freedom. Each wall disappointing her in turn. Malcolm. Clarissa. Daniel. Amy. Malcolm. Clarissa. Daniel. Amy.
How narrow her life had become. Where had her friends gone? Where had her family? Her colleagues?
Malcolm. Clarissa. Daniel. Amy.
She had always preferred being alone. She was a reader, a thinker, a writer. Being alone was her default setting. It had always driven people away. Except Malcolm. He had intruded on her isolation. But being with him was no burden. He was alone with her. He had defended her space from intrusion. He had managed her needs. Forced her to be social for her own good on occasion, but let her retreat just as readily.
Now he was a burden. His presence was an intrusion. His absence was an intrusion, an irritating background noise. Now she was never alone. Never happily alone. Malcolm. Clarissa. Daniel. Amy. Every path to true solitude blocked.
The telephone rang again. She let it. It rang out twice. Malcolm wasn’t home, obviously.
Malcolm wasn’t an irritating background noise like the telephone. He was a cardboard cut-out of himself pointing to his own absence. Reminding her incessantly – what was, is no more. Love gone. Friendship gone. Affection gone. Respect gone. In their place, an abyss.
She began to wash herself and then emptied some of the water out before refilling it with more hot water.
The pill she had taken hadn’t done anything. Her thoughts were with her still.
She reached down and found she couldn’t get to the bottle. She stretched out her arm, lifting her bottom from the base of the bath and tapped the bottle closer to her with the tips of her fingers.
What would two or three do? She had researched it for a novel years ago. But couldn’t remember what she had discovered. She vaguely recalled that it wasn’t as dangerous as she’d hoped.
She took three more.
The bathwater cooled quickly. She turned the hot on with her toe and watched the water rise and rise. She watched it run over the edge of the bath.
She turned the tap off with her toe. And, raising her knees, lowered her head under the water. As a child she would try to hold her breath forever and, her eyes opened wide, would imagine her mother finding her dead in the bath.
Helen found it surprisingly easy to hold her breath. There was no pressure to breathe. She lay there staring up at the moving ceiling. She wondered if she had always been able to breathe underwater. She heard a strange sound. Very slowly, she raised herself out of the water. The telephone was ringing again.
The strange thing was she was dressed and standing in the hall. She looked at the floor and the front door and the photo of Daniel on the hall table. She raised her hand to her head and found her hair dry. She looked at herself in the hall mirror. Everything was as it should be.
Someone said, ‘Malcolm.’ Someone said it again. She looked back down the hall towards the kitchen. He wasn’t anywhere.
Helen was in the front room. There were two gin and tonics on the coffee table. One was empty. Now she was sitting and now she was standing. The television was on. The news was on. She couldn’t hear what they were saying. Both glasses were empty. The telephone was ringing.
‘Hello?’
‘Helen! Where have you been?’
‘Hello?’
‘Helen? Is that you?’
‘Yes, it’s me. I’m Helen. Who is this?’
‘Geraldine.’
‘How are the boys?’
‘The boys are fine, Helen. I’ve been trying all day to reach you.’
‘I’ve been here.’
‘Is Malcolm there?’
‘Yes.’
‘Can I speak to him?’
Helen covered the phone with her hand and shouted, ‘Malcolm? Malcolm?’
‘No. He isn’t here. I thought he was.’
‘Are you all right, Helen?’
‘I’m fine. I had a nap. And a bath.’
‘When do you think Malcolm will be back?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Is anyone else there?’
‘Amy might be downstairs.’
‘Who’s Amy?’
‘My editor.’
‘Can you get her, please?’
Helen put the phone down and walked slowly out to the kitchen. She opened the door to the flat and shouted down, ‘Amy!’
*
‘Hello, I’m Amy.’
‘Is Helen all right?’
‘She seems a little confused. Who is this?’
‘Geraldine. Daniel’s wife. I have some terrible news and I wanted to make sure Helen had someone to look after her. Do you know where Malcolm is?’
‘No. What’s happened?’
‘Daniel. Can I speak to Helen again? She should hear this from me.’
*
‘Hello, this is Helen.’
‘Helen, it’s Geraldine.’
‘How are the boys?’
‘They’re fine, Helen. I have some terrible news.’
‘Why are you crying?’
‘I’ve been trying to reach you all day. The police came this morning. They found Daniel’s car. Helen?’
‘Yes?’
‘They found Daniel, too. Oh, Helen. Daniel is dead. Daniel is dead. I’m so sorry. So sorry.’
‘Daniel isn’t dead; he was just here the other day. He stayed with us.’
‘He’s dead, Helen. The police came this morning. I’ve been in to identify him. He’s dead, Helen.’
Helen handed the phone to Amy, then went into the front room and sat on the sofa.
Amy heard the TV turn on. The BBC news.
‘Hello?’
‘Is she all right? She didn’t seem to understand. Her son Daniel is dead. He killed himself in the back of his car.’
Amy couldn’t speak. In one ear she could hear Geraldine sniffling, in the other a voice from the TV telling Helen the weather forecast.
‘Hello?’
‘Sorry. No, I don’t think she understood. She’s behaving strangely. Like she’s on something.’
‘Did you know Daniel?’
‘Yes, we met when he came to stay. Are you all right?’
‘No, I’m not. It’s my fault. What can I tell the boys?’
‘It’s not your fault. I’ll try to track down Malcolm and look after Helen. Do you have someone there?’
‘My parents are here. Thank you. This is awful. Awful. Goodbye.’
Amy stared at the phone and then at the photo of Daniel on the hall table. She couldn’t fathom that he was dead. It didn’t seem possible. He didn’t seem to her the sort of person who’d kill himself. He had every reason to do it but so did most people. Few actually went through with it.
Amy went into the kitchen and poured herself a wine. She’d been horrible to Daniel. She downed the glass and poured herself another. She’d said such horrible things to him. And then she remembered the message she’d received from him. What was he sorry for?
Helen’s behaviour had rattled her, too. Her son was dead and she was high as a kite. Or so it seemed. Amy wasn’t trained for this kind of thing. She wasn’t someone who knew what to say in terrible circumstances. She wondered where Malcolm was. He was normally home at this time. She didn’t want to be the one to tell him. He would be devastated. He had mentioned Daniel so often since he’d left.
She went downstairs to get her phone.
‘Max.’
‘Hello, Amy.’
‘I need your help. Helen and Malcolm’s son Daniel has died. I’m here alone with Helen who doesn’t seem to understand what’s happened and Malcolm is missing. She doesn’t know where he is.’
‘Malcolm’s with me. We’re down at the King’s Head having dinner.’
‘Oh, thank god! Don’t say anything to Malcolm, but can you get him back here as soon as possible?’
‘We’ll leave asap.’
Amy went back upstairs to the front room.
Helen was sitting on the sofa bolt upright. The TV was muted and she looked at Amy as she came in. Her eyes were wet.
‘Amy, something has happened.’
‘I know, Helen. I’m so sorry.’
‘What happened? It was terrible. I know.’
‘Geraldine rang. You spoke to her on the phone,’ said Amy, trying to get Helen to recall the conversation rather than being the one to tell her.
‘I feel so confused, Amy. I took something to help me sleep. I had a nap and a bath. Now I feel strange.’
‘What did you take?’
‘Valium.’
‘Do you remember what Geraldine said?’
‘Daniel’s dead. But he’s not. He was here today. You saw him. He was helping with Malcolm’s papers.’
Amy sat down and put her arm around Helen’s shoulders.
‘That was a while ago, Helen.’
‘Where’s Malcolm?’
‘Malcolm’s coming home. He has been with Max. Do you remember Max?’
‘Does Malcolm know about Daniel?’
‘No. He doesn’t.’
‘Why didn’t Geraldine tell him?’
‘He wasn’t home.’
Amy heard the sound of the front door being opened. She jumped up and went out to meet Malcolm before Helen could. She led him into the kitchen and sat him down. Kneeling on the floor in front of him, with her hands in his, she told him the news.