“I wouldn’t recommend it for you. I think you’ll find whoever you consult, they’ll say the same thing.”
The doctor is talking to me very slowly as though I’m not of sound mind or am hard of hearing. But he’s the deaf one. He’s barely listened to a word I’ve said. Every time I mention brain fog, he smiles as though I’m exaggerating. He’s making me feel as though I don’t have any real problems—not important medical problems. Just trivial middle-aged female ones that barely warrant his attention.
“I... Is this because there’s a shortage of hormonal drugs—they’re running out of stock?” It’s all I can think to ask, yet I did read that in the paper recently.
He smiles again, throws down his pen. “It’s nothing to do with that. As I’ve already explained, because of your family history of breast cancer, the risks would outweigh the benefits. But I’d be happy to prescribe you a course of antidepressants or refer you for cognitive behavioral therapy to help alleviate some of your symptoms.”
I don’t want to take antidepressants; I’m not depressed. And therapy isn’t going to lift my brain fog. I’m going to have to tell Dan that his menopause expert was useless. In fact, I don’t like dealing with men in these matters. I want a female doctor, I realize—someone who understands firsthand what I’m going through.
Standing up, I dab the perspiration above my mouth discreetly with a tissue. “Thank you, but this was a complete waste of time. How can you possibly be of help if you don’t take women’s symptoms seriously?”
He looks at me in surprise. I’m a little surprised at myself too. I’d never have dreamed of talking like that to someone in his position before...before...meeting Jess.
Outside, I take a moment to gather myself. It’s Monday already; I’m due back at work tomorrow and don’t feel any better for my week off. If anything, I’m in a worse state than when I left.
Just now in the waiting room, I read an article about the body’s reaction to being attacked: fight, flight...or freeze. I wonder whether that’s part of my problem in some way. I know I’ve heard about this somewhere else recently, but where? My thoughts are so disjointed, it’s a wonder I can remember where I parked the car.
I look at my watch, wondering what to do. Originally, I was intending to go to town for a stroll around the shops. But in light of the doctor’s appointment being such a flop, I decide that the best place for me is home; peace and quiet before tomorrow.
To my disappointment when I pull into our driveway, Rosie’s bike is leaning against the garage door. I consider getting back inside the car and driving off, anywhere... But I can’t, shouldn’t. Rosie’s not a monster; it just feels like that sometimes.
I’m tiptoeing down the hallway, hoping to make it upstairs without disturbing her, when she calls out. “M?”
I set my face at pleasant. “Yes, darling?”
“Can you come here?”
Her voice is labored, monotone. Is she bored?
“Mum!”
No, she’s angry.
I know from experience there’s only one thing to do: hear what she has to say. If I don’t, it’ll escalate to a full-blown rant.
Hanging up my coat, I go through to the kitchen, my feet leaving damp trails on the wooden flooring. It’s a frosty day, yet I’m too warm. I’d like to take a shower and get out of these clothes. I hope she isn’t going to—
She’s sitting with her arms folded. In front of her, on the table, is my mother’s cocoa tin.
I drop my tote in shock, my compact mirror falling out with a tinkle of broken glass as it hits the floor.
“When did you get this?” Grim-faced, she holds up the letter.
“I...” I busy myself with the broken mirror, bending to pick it up, blood rushing to my head.
“I can tell you exactly when you got it,” she says, scraping back her chair. “The postmark was six weeks ago today. Six weeks! What the actual fuck?”
“Please, Rosie,” I say, setting my tote on the counter. “Don’t do this. Not today.”
“Don’t do what? Don’t make a fuss? Are you for real?” She comes toward me, seeming taller than usual, or maybe I’m shrinking. I can’t feel my feet. Are my feet on the floor? “I don’t believe it! You get this letter and your response is, what, to put it inside a fucking cocoa tin?”
I grip the counter edge. “Stop swearing. I can’t think when you get like this.” She’s standing too close. I’d move away but daren’t let go of the counter.
“When I get like this? You think this is about how I get? Oh, that’s priceless!”
I look beyond her at the tin, feeling violated, as though it held my mother’s ashes. But it held more than that. Her spirit was in there, her struggles against a man who let her down repeatedly, at a time when men had all the power. She couldn’t even purchase a washing machine without his say-so. He left her destitute and I grew up in the shadows of that.
What does Rosie know? She’s twenty-one and spoiled rotten.
I straighten my back, letting go of the counter. I’m not going to be intimidated in my own home. She’s just a child. “How dare you go through my things? Who else knows about this?”
“What, the tin...or the dirty little secret?”
My face reddens. “I meant the tin.”
“Just me. I’ve known about it for years. I check it from time to time to find out what’s going on, because you never tell me anything... But this?” She flaps the letter. “This doesn’t belong in here. This isn’t one of Georgia’s shite school reports or a till receipt for Marc Jacobs... So why’s it there?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Really?” She’s got a nasty smirk on her face. “Because I think you wanted it to be found.”
I laugh, tucking my trembling hands inside my cardigan pockets. “That’s ridiculous! That makes absolutely no sense.”
“Yes, it does. You wanted someone to rescue you.”
“Rescue me?” I laugh again, up at the ceiling, but it makes me feel dizzy. “From what?”
“Don’t you mean who?” She looks at me as though I’m an idiot. “Dan, for God’s sake. Dan!”
“What? How is—”
“He’s a bully, Mum! He manipulates you. He’s a master at it—controlling your every move and making it seem like he’s looking out for you.”
“That’s because he is!”
“No, he isn’t!” she yells, hands flailing. “That’s how he does it! He makes it seem like he has your back, like he’s the nicest guy in the world. But he isn’t. He’s a controlling bastard. And you can’t even see it!” She takes a step toward me, stabbing the air between us with her index finger. “Look at you! He’s made you afraid to be yourself and interact with people and have a life of your own. You’re all perfect and stylized and scared to have an eyelash out of place.”
I smile reassuringly. That’s what she’s basing this on?
“But I was always like that, Rosie. You can’t blame Dan, just because I like wearing nice clothes and doing my hair. If anything, my mother—”
“God, it’s not about the hair.”
“You were the one who mentioned how I look.”
“Okay, then,” she says triumphantly, one hand on her hip. “What about Auntie Fiona? She’s scared to visit because of him.”
“Oh, that’s rubbish and you know it. That’s not why she doesn’t visit. She’s busy with her puppies and—”
“Oh my God, you’re doing it again!” She stamps her foot. “It’s not about the fucking puppies! Stop getting off track. You’ve got him by the balls with this!” She waves the letter at me. “I’ve prayed for something like this to come along and prove I’m right—to show you what I mean. And now we’ve got him, M. It’s all here, in this letter, everything we need... So, what are we going to do about it?”
I look at her standing there with her hair in plaits, wearing a miniskirt with stripy tights and a revolting sweater that says SHIT across the chest: militant, furious, determined. And I know this is my fault, that I’ve let her get away with this for too long.
“We’re not doing anything, Rosie. You’re going to calm down and you’re going to stop swearing at me and being abusive... Obviously, the anger therapy isn’t working, which Dan very kindly pays for.”
“I’m abusive? What the hell’s wrong with you? What about the way he spoke to me the other night? He threatened me with violence, called me a bitch.”
“That’s because you swore at me. He was defending me.”
“Oh my God, Mum! Look at yourself, look what you’ve become. Stop being so docile. Wake up!”
I can’t take any more of it then. Closing my eyes, my hands in fists, I scream, the only way I can think to silence her. “STOP IT!”
It was so loud, so shrill, I think I’ve broken my throat.
When I bring myself to look at her, she’s wearing a different expression. Her hood is up and the anger and height are gone.
“I’m sorry I lose my shit with you all the time, but it’s hard when you love someone.” She folds the letter back up, dropping it into the tin, putting on the lid, sliding it across the table toward me. “Do what you want with it. I honestly thought you finally had a way out, that I’d get you to see what I’ve been able to see all along. But obviously that’s never gonna happen.”
She walks from the room, head bent.
“Where are you going?” I ask hoarsely.
“Anywhere that’s not here.” At the door, she turns to look at me. “You’ll never find a way out. And I can’t stay and watch it anymore.”
For a moment, she seems older. She looks like a woman who has been through life and has suffered its disappointments. Maybe she has. Maybe she knows more about what I experienced growing up than I realize. Maybe she’s been going through her own version of it right here.
I don’t want her to end up like me, somewhere like this. I want her to be happy.
So, I let her go.
The garden’s very still, drops of ice on the tips of the grass and leaves. As I walk across the crispy lawn in my socks, without my coat or scarf, I don’t feel the chill underfoot.
Sitting on the swing seat near the summerhouse, I swing back and forth, the wood squeaking, metal chinking.
I’m still holding my mother’s cocoa tin, the folded letter rattling around inside.
I’m not thinking about Mum or Fiona or Dan or the letter. I’m thinking about Rosie, who is somewhere out there, cycling around, distressed, alone.
I shouldn’t have let her go.
Some people, like her and Jess, can’t stand by and watch things happen; nor should we ask them to. I know that now.
It takes me half an hour to find her, driving around the neighborhood, my wet socks slipping on the pedals. Finally, I spot her bike leaning against a bus shelter. She’s sitting on the bench with her knees drawn to her chin, rocking herself as the electronic display announces the next bus. She doesn’t notice me because she has her hood up and is wearing headphones. But even when she does see me, she makes no sign of recognition.
She approaches the car, though, lets me put her bike in the boot. And although we drive in silence, she puts her hand on my knee and I feel a connection between us that I haven’t felt in a very long time. “You’re not wearing any shoes” is all she says.
“I know.”
Back at home, the cocoa tin sits between us at the kitchen table. “I’m sorry,” I tell her.
“No, I’m sorry,” she replies.
“You must think I’m pathetic.”
“Not at all. I love you.”
“I love you too, Rosie.”
She hesitates before speaking again, dunking a biscuit in her tea. “Is it about the money?”
“Only partly.”
“Then what?”
“It’s difficult to explain.”
She smiles sadly. “It’s okay. You don’t have to.”
I wait for Rosie to go upstairs to run a bath before phoning.
“Hello?” I wrap my fingers around my mother’s cocoa tin, feeling the soft metal buckle. “Jess?”
“Yep?”
“It’s me.”
“I know it’s you.”
“Oh. I’m sorry if this is a bad time to talk...?”
“It’s not. You’re fine.”
I close my eyes to concentrate. “I...I’m sorry this has taken me so long. I hope you can forgive me for being so...so difficult. But my situation is complicated and I...” I pinch the bridge of my nose.
“It’s all right.”
“Is it?” I start to cry very quietly, but I think she can hear me—can tell.
“Yes. Tell me what you wanted to say.”
“Can’t you guess?” I ask.
“Just say it.”
I hold the tin a little tighter. “I want to do something about the letter.”