by Bev Thomas
We became the best of ourselves.
I have never found relaxation easy. The need to be useful pumps through me like blood through my veins. Relaxation wasn’t a feature of my life growing up, and I had simply never learnt the habit. In pockets of empty time, I was always moving on to the next thing before I had finished what I was doing. The simplicity of the cabin soothed me. A small functional kitchen. A table outside to wipe down. A wooden floor to sweep. We wore the same clothes every day. We lived on little, needed little, and somehow it made us gravitate towards rather than away from each other. All our rough edges rubbed away. We were four smooth pebbles tumbling along the shoreline.
I stopped wearing earrings and make-up. I pulled my hair back into a ponytail. I caught the sun on my face. My freckles appeared. Carolyn’s too. And in two days, Tom turned a deep shade of brown, his hair bleached blond in the sun.
‘You’re so lucky,’ Carolyn said, flicking his back with her sunhat, ‘look at the colour of you – I’m like a mottled tomato.’
Tom laughed. ‘Come on, tomato face – let’s take the boat out,’ and I watched as the two of them pushed the small wooden boat away from the sandy bank into the lake. Tom rowed, while Carolyn languished at the bow, her fingers trailing in the flat green water. Pretty soon, he dropped the oars and let the boat drift along the bank. I listened as he read from his book, quoting passages out loud. ‘Nature was here something savage and awful, though beautiful,’ he said, ‘think of our life in nature, daily to be shown matter – to come in contact with it – rocks, trees, wind on our cheeks! The solid earth. Contact! Contact!’ he shouted, dramatically, laughing as he beat his fist against his chest. ‘Who are we? Where are we?’ and he suddenly stood up in the boat, so Carolyn shrieked. ‘Henry Thoreau,’ he said, flipping the book closed. ‘One of Chris’s favourites. Amazing stuff, eh?’ And for once, I think we all agreed.
Away from home, the twins were able to avoid their usual points of difference, and allowed themselves to be who they once were. Carolyn, who I imagined would quickly tire of life in the woods, seemed in fact to revel in it. As the days wore on, she allowed Tom to take centre stage, like an actor stepping aside for the understudy, who, nervous at first, then shone brightly in the spotlight. He showed her how to whittle wood into a point. How to carve a design with the knife. ‘No,’ he said, moving her fingers gently around the knife, ‘more like this movement.’ He taught her how to build a fire and to light one without matches. On Thursday, when he said he was going to spend the night in the small wooden shack by the lake, I was surprised when Carolyn asked if she could join him.
We all saw a new confidence in Tom. In the hustle and bustle of our everyday life, he constantly found himself in situations that demanded things from him that he could not give. Even David and Tom developed an unprecedented ease between them. Away from the points of usual contention, they were stripped back, like the pale carved pieces of his wood, to father and son. David, away from the pomp and status of college life, wore shorts and an old t-shirt. They gathered kindling together and chopped logs for the fire. David, for his part, was able to see Tom in his element, to marvel at the skills none of us had really seen before.
It seemed hard to believe what had happened just six weeks earlier. That bleak place he’d been. And perhaps, what was also suspended in that week was my sense of reality. The cabin by the lake enabled me to pretend that things were fine. Those awful moments that I revisited in the dark hours of the night; the rush up the stairs, my thumping heart, David’s shoulder hammering against the bathroom door; I could pretend for those seven days that none of it had happened. I could look at that green jewel of a lake and blink it all away.
On the day when David had to make a trip into civilisation to send a work email, the three of us took a walk. It was Tom’s idea to follow the stream that was below our cabin. ‘Check out how close we can get to the source,’ he suggested. We found a path alongside the gushing, bubbling water. We crossed rolling green hills, dotted with cows, sheep and lambs, tracking the stream until it came out into an open field. Ahead was a large farmhouse and an odd movement in the distance, up and down between the trees.
‘Look,’ I said, pointing, as we got closer, ‘it’s a boy – on a trampoline.’
The garden was large. The boy wore jeans, his chest was bare. Next to me, I felt Tom tense up at the sight of another human being. His torso was thick, muscular. He was not a boy. He was a teenager and when he caught sight of us, he waved. ‘Do you want a go?’ I felt Carolyn’s enthusiasm, a surge forwards, just as Tom flinched back.
‘Let’s head to the lake,’ he said. ‘We can go for a swim.’ We all agreed. For Carolyn and me, there was something mesmeric about the sight of the boy twisting and turning and flipping like a bird through the air. For Tom, the boy seemed a threat, a source of anxiety. A reminder of all the things he was not.
What perhaps we all realised, but did not want to acknowledge, was that Tom excelled in situations away from people. He shone when he was alone. It was something I found unbearable. Perhaps for someone who has spent her life inextricably entwined with the lives of others, it was incomprehensible. I needed others, relied on them, and so his isolation seemed a failing, not a source of strength.
It was a concept I found so alien it scared me.
The morning we were due to leave, I woke with a profound sense of dread. The thought of leaving was like an ache, a sharp pain in my chest. I felt tearful as I folded the clothes and wiped down the wooden breakfast table. While David and I cleared up, the twins went up to the lake for the last time. Perhaps it was my wanting to parcel up what had happened, perhaps it was my wanting to defend against what would come with our inevitable return to London, but in trying to celebrate what had happened with Tom, I was turning it into something else.
‘Wasn’t it great,’ I said, ‘to see Tom whittling the wood? Catching fish at the lake? Did you see,’ I continued, ‘how he lit a fire without matches? And that raft from the logs … the tripod for the fire … It was like one of those reality shows in the jungle. He’d have done well in one of those,’ I laughed. It was stupid. Of course, he wouldn’t actually have coped well with all those people. I was describing it all to David as if he hadn’t been there at all. It was clear from his silence what he felt.
David nodded, but he said nothing, and I should have left things well alone. Instead, I rambled on, as if by talking about Tom, I could capture the essence of him, preserving him as one might a small rare plant in resin. ‘Amazing,’ I said, ‘how he managed to make a raft. A raft!’
It was then he snapped. ‘Jesus, Ruth. What the fuck’s wrong with you? Six weeks ago, he was face down in a pool of his own vomit. Excuse me for not being excited over a Bear Grylls Adventure,’ he spat. ‘Shall we crack open the champagne because he can take a crap in the woods and whittle a few sticks?’ His eyes were blazing. ‘Nothing’s changed.’ Then he looked squarely at me. ‘Nothing’s ever going to change, is it?’
We packed silently. The twins returned and, as we’d asked, Tom had brought back the hand-carved fishing rods and laid them outside the cabin to take home. When David reversed the car to load up the boot, there was the unmistakable sound of splintering wood.
‘What the bloody hell was that?’ shouted David, as he leapt from the car.
‘Dad—’ Carolyn shrieked, as she ran to the back of the car and picked up the broken pieces of fishing rod. ‘Look what you’ve done!’
‘What on earth did you put them there for?’ and he swung round to Tom.
Tom glared back at him and shrugged. ‘Not going to be much use in London anyway.’ He picked up the pieces and hurled them into the woods; they made a clattering noise as they tumbled down the valley.
‘I wanted to keep mine,’ Carolyn said, turning a piece of splintered wood over in her fingers, and it wasn’t clear whether her sadness and anger were directed at her father or Tom.
‘Stupid place to put them,’ David muttered under hi
s breath.
That was when I began to think Tom had left them there deliberately. As if he knew that, just like him, they had no place in London.
On the way back in the car, I talked about the week, how perfect it had been. ‘We should come back.’ While everyone was quick to agree, I knew it wasn’t something that we could ever replicate. What I didn’t know then was that it would be the last time we would be away together as a family.
Before we got to the motorway, I suggested stopping at a country pub on the way home. ‘We could get some lunch. Enjoy the last of the sunshine.’ I heard my voice as they did. Too jaunty. Too jolly. Needy and irritating. There was little enthusiasm for the idea.
‘I have some stuff to do,’ Carolyn said eventually and David concurred, said he’d rather get back. ‘I need to check in on emails before the onslaught of Monday.’
Tom said nothing.
We drove back mostly in silence.
As we turned off the motorway and began the drive across London, I felt an ache. A feeling of homesickness for the cabin, the lake – and for the family we had been.
Seventeen
Dan is late for his appointment. While I’m waiting, I place a call to the Bristol surgery. When I ask the receptionist about the notes, she tells me she’s just sent something across to the Hackney practice. ‘Can you forward it to me?’ I ask. But, of course, I know she can’t. She’s only authorised to pass the information to his new GP – so she refers me back to Dr Davies. I then leave a message for her to send it on to me.
It’s half an hour into the session when he arrives. He looks pale and agitated and sits small and hunched in his chair. There are dark shadows under his eyes and a fresh bandage on his wrist.
‘Talking about it all,’ he says, ‘lifting the lid on it … the feelings were difficult.’ His words are clipped. ‘I tried to resist.’ His eyes fall to the bandaged hand in his lap. ‘But the voice got louder.’
‘The voice?’
‘Haven’t I told you about the voice?’
‘No,’ and I feel a sudden chill. ‘What voice?’ I ask.
He shrugs. ‘Hers, I guess. Mary Tyler Moore,’ then seeing the look on my face, ‘my mother,’ he says quietly. ‘The wrong one died – is what it always says. I felt anger for the first time. I felt furious. I felt glad she lost the thing she loved. Glad she lost Michael. Glad that she was punished by his death.’ His words come out in a rush. ‘But feeling those things wasn’t enough. I didn’t know what to do with them. I cut myself. Just a bit. It didn’t work. Didn’t make me feel better like it usually does. I needed something else. I thought about what you said—’ and as he looks up at me, I feel suddenly alert. Wary. ‘About not keeping it all in here,’ and he presses his bandaged hand to his belly. ‘I called her.’
‘Your mother?’ I feel a creeping sense of unease. Free-floating. Non-specific. Like a dusting of something.
He nods. ‘I knew she wouldn’t have moved. I rang the same number. It was strange hearing her voice after all these years.’
‘What happened?’
‘When she picked up – I didn’t answer. She said hello? a few times. Then I put the phone down. I think it would be better to see her face to face. It’s not a conversation I can have on the phone. I need to go to Bristol.’
I can see that we only have ten minutes left in the session. His plan worries me. We don’t have much time. I need to find a way to share my unease, without lecturing him.
‘I can discuss things with her,’ he continues, ‘you know – an eye for an eye,’ he says tightly.
‘An eye for an eye?’
He nods.
‘If people have been negligent – they deserve to be punished. Don’t you think?’
‘You’re talking about revenge? A sense of retribution for what happened to you?’
‘All this stuff,’ he says, nodding around the room, ‘it was better when it was packed away.’
He sounds breathless. Panicky.
I acknowledge how the coping mechanism had worked for him before. Now things have been opened, they feel out of control.
‘Being attacked in the park has opened the floodgates,’ I say. ‘Flashbacks from that incident – but perhaps more significantly, from your childhood. These are very complex feelings. Things have become muddled. Things feel very difficult.’
His hands are twisting in his lap.
I tell him to imagine a chest of drawers. Drawers opening randomly, the contents of clothes spewing out all over the floor.
‘As fast as you try to clear them up,’ I say, ‘another drawer flies open and there is more mess. More chaos.’
I tell him that the idea is not to get rid of the mess. Not to change the life he has had. It’s the cards he’s been dealt. Instead, the focus is on having some control and order over it.
‘The purpose is to open a drawer yourself, when you want to. Look inside. Rummage around with the contents. Place them neatly back, or mess them up, whatever you want.’
He’s looking at me intently.
‘But the point is – you will be able to close the drawer when you want to.’
He seems to settle, to like this concept. The image of the chest of drawers.
I see his hands relax in his lap. Something has shifted. In a short space of time, I have turned things around. I feel relief. A small flash of pride.
‘At the moment, it feels as messy as fuck,’ he says, and shrugs, ‘and like I can’t clear it up on my own.’
I nod. ‘I understand,’ I say, ‘and I’m not saying this will be easy. Or that it will be something that happens overnight. It’s the very process of looking back, getting the contents of the drawer out, examining it carefully, understanding the messy feelings that have been locked away that is the focus of our work together. I will be here to help you.’
He is staring at me with a fierceness I haven’t seen before.
There’s a silence.
‘So,’ he says, ‘not a good idea to turn up on her doorstep?’ His tone is lighter. He smiles.
I smile back.
‘It’s not my job to advise,’ I say. ‘What I do say to people is that when you are full of a strong feeling – when you have perhaps connected to a feeling that you have shut away – such as rage or anger – it can feel very uncomfortable and unfamiliar. The desire is to quickly get rid of it. I would urge caution.’
I talk with him about how cutting and hurting himself has served this purpose in the past. That these overwhelming feelings have been kept at bay, but now something has changed. ‘The wound will not close up,’ I say, ‘the trauma is wide open. What worked before won’t necessarily work any more. You need a new way.’
‘A new way,’ he repeats, as if trying to understand the concept.
We talk about his desire for revenge. How it shows he is in touch with his anger. I tell him I can’t say whether it’s right or wrong to see his mother further on down the line. What I do know is that it is helpful to wait. To hold onto the feeling – and the desire to act.
‘I suggest suspending any action, until you’ve had a chance to open the drawers. Put the things back in the way you want to.’
He’s nodding.
‘I’d like to suggest that you work through the feelings here. With me. Bring them here. Direct them here.’
The mother he didn’t have, was what Robert said.
And as he nods, he fixes me with such a stare that I have to blink, then look away.
It’s a moment I will come to look back on. To turn over and over in my head. Direct them here. The intense look on his face. An eye for an eye.
When I tell him it’s time, that we need to finish, he looks calm. His breathing is measured. His face relaxed.
‘Thank you,’ he says. ‘That was good. Really helpful.’ He stands up.
‘See you next week,’ he says. ‘And good luck.’
I frown. I don’t know what he’s talking about. My face is blank.
‘Your appointment? Next
Friday. Out of the office?’ he says as he reaches for his rucksack.
I don’t know, for a moment, what he means.
‘But I’ll be seeing you on Thursday?’ I say.
‘Yep – of course,’ he says, tapping a hand to the side of his head.
As he leaves, I feel a pull of something. A small snag. Like the thread of a jumper caught on a nail, gently unravelling as I walk away.
*
That evening, I’m looking for a film to watch and I come across Ordinary People. I feel uneasy as the movie begins. A boy, not unlike Tom, trying to settle back into his home life after a suicide attempt. I am transfixed. How can I have forgotten this film? Mary Tyler Moore and Donald Sutherland. Her brittle departure at the end. It reminds me of what Dan said he liked, the inevitability of the ending. I sit for a moment watching the credits. Her grief is like a boulder. Tears are streaming down my cheeks. I find myself thinking of Dan and his mother – and the similarities between Mary Tyler Moore’s preference for the son who died. Lovely handsome talented Bucky. Her love, her joy for her older son. It’s so obvious why Dan chose the film as his project. How it spoke to him and his experience. A revelation. It’s only then that my mind drifts to the other films he’s talked about. I can’t remember them all, but the ones he’s mentioned recently come to mind. Cuckoo’s Nest … Sophie’s Choice. And it’s only when I think of Thelma and Louise, and that final freeze frame of the Thunderbird, that I gasp and make the link. I glance at my watch. It’s too late to call Robert, so I email him instead.
