I will myself to calm. I have to think rationally and find out exactly what caused my fitting. It’s got to be some kind of drug or poison. My first thought is to find a medical dictionary which lists substances that might cause seizures. I hadn’t taken any prescription drugs at Shaloma and I know Karlos didn’t. We both hated anti-depressants and tranquillisers; he said he’d had a breakdown once when coming off a Prozac derivative and never touched anything after that. Wolf’s ugly face with its blackened teeth rises up in my mind. He said he’d had a breakdown coming off Valium. It could quite possibly be him and Hattie using some drug they had, maybe even an illegal one. I remember Karlos saying he’d heard they’d squandered their money in less than a month and were living in some squat down Point Road. Neither of them liked us. They could’ve been looking for money? Drug-fuelled crazies did things like that when they needed a fix. Elsa had been angry because Hattie and two men wanted to visit me in hospital. Why would they come? Wolf must’ve been one … Nic, Gruesome George – he was also a dark horse. There wasn’t much love between me and George, although Karlos got on okay with him. I remember Dr Brink asking him about his Trithapon, so he was taking medication, but that doesn’t mean he would’ve killed me. We hardly spoke to each other, although he did come to my funeral for some strange reason, so I can’t rule him out.
My mind spins with unanswered questions, but the more I think about it, the more I’m convinced it’s got to be those drug-crazed, evil stuff-ups. I think back to the blank prescription from our long-dead Dr Clark which was left on Nat’s car. Is someone helping from the other side, giving us a clue? Was it some prescription drug? But why leave it blank? Why didn’t they just list what it was if they really want to help? There are thousands of poisons out there. How am I going to find out unless they exhume my body and test it, and that’s not an option.
I think back to the lab and all the testing we did for toxins. Tricyclic anti-depressants cause convulsions if the dose was high enough. There were hundreds of them on the market. I remember the sad cases of fatalities of children who ingested them like sweets after fishing through their mother’s handbags – we are such a pill-dependent society and doctors dole them out far too easily. I think back to my studies. An overdose of an anti-depressant affects the autonomic nervous system, as well as the central one and even the heart. You need a high dosage, but they definitely can cause seizures serious enough to cause the type of damage I had. Damaged people are full of irrational hate. They have no morals or conscience. It has to be one of them. Why else would anyone want to harm me and make it look like I’d been drunk?
I think back to that last night in the hospital. Dr Rajeet thought I was on the road to a long life. Did one of them come back to the hospital in the middle of the night to finish off their failed murder plan? It was a Tuesday night, and Karlos went to the meeting. I’m sure they would’ve asked about me and he could’ve told them I was going to Hillcrest Hospital the next day. It would be quite easy for them to creep into King Edward’s in the middle of the night. No-one would have questioned them because they were white and anyway the nurses didn’t monitor who came or went. It’s not impossible.
I shake my head. I can’t explain the fitting but if I think about it rationally, the most likely explanation would be that my death in King Edward’s was a medical mishap. I let out a dark laugh. There’re certainly enough of those covered up in the medical world. But at the same time there’s got to be some point to me coming back. If one of those scum tried to kill me by somehow forcing alcohol and poison into my veins, then they deserve to be punished. Perhaps if I can find them and see what they’re up to I’ll get my answer, but how to make the first move? The blank prescription and these shared dreams and visions show that someone is helping from the other side, and I have to trust they’re someone on the right side of the light.