The Uncommon Life of Alfred Warner in Six Days

by Juliet Conlin

  He woke briefly to white, painful light and the sharp stench of disinfectant. He was in hospital. His eyelids were almost too heavy to lift, but he could make out Isobel leaning over him. He opened his mouth.

  ‘Hush, Alfie. Don’t speak. You’re in hospital. They think you’ve got pneumonia.’

  He began shivering violently, yet the blood rushing through his body felt like lava. He closed his eyes and fell asleep again. When he next surfaced, he was feeling calmer, although he still couldn’t take a deep breath. He could no longer smell any disinfectant, and even with his eyes closed he could tell that the light was much dimmer now, which seemed odd, but perhaps they’d moved him off the ward to a single room. He opened his eyes slowly. He was lying in some kind of cubicle, around six by eight feet, windowless, and a white curtain instead of a door. He was soaked through with sweat. A woman, standing with her back to him, turned around. Alfred gasped, painfully.

  ‘Johanna!’

  Johanna sat down gently on the bed next to him. She wore a dark blue blazer with a flower broach in its lapel. Her hair was shot through with grey, but her hands were smooth and white, like a young girl’s. He reached out and touched her arm.

  ‘You’re here,’ he said, stroking the fabric of her jacket. ‘I thought you were dead. I thought – ’ He found himself blubbing.

  ‘Shh, mein Täubchen,’ she said, picking up a damp cloth and dabbing his forehead with it. Her touch made him shiver. ‘Don’t strain yourself.’

  ‘Why didn’t you answer my letters?’ he asked. His tongue felt thick inside his mouth. He was fiercely thirsty.

  ‘But I did. I answered every one. Look.’ She pulled a thick pile of letters from her bag, tied together with a white ribbon.

  He gave her a puzzled look. A throbbing pain flashed through his head. ‘But –’ Then he passed out again.

  He woke again minutes later with a surge of panic, afraid he might have just imagined her. But there she was, sitting in a chair beside his bed. She was reading a book, but he couldn’t see the cover. Somewhere close by, a clock was ticking loudly.

  ‘Johanna,’ he said. ‘You found me again. You’re here.’

  ‘Yes, I’m here.’

  ‘You look lovely. Older.’

  She smiled. ‘Well, you haven’t exactly fallen into the fountain of youth, either.’

  He tried to laugh, but fell into a painful, wheezing cough. Then he grabbed her wrist. ‘Johanna,’ he said urgently, his chest on fire, ‘I must tell you something.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I should have told you years ago. I – ’ He looked from left to right, but they were alone. He whispered, ‘I can hear voices.’

  A warm smile crossed her face. She reached out and stroked his cheek. ‘Yes, mein Schatz. We all hear them. All of us.’

  Alfred frowned. ‘All of us?’

  ‘Yes.’ She pointed to a corner of the cubicle. Three small blond children, whom he hadn’t noticed before, were playing quietly with some dolls. ‘Don’t we, children?’

  They looked up, a boy and two girls, and nodded. ‘Yes, Mama,’ one of them said, and they went back to playing.

  Alfred sank back onto his pillow, a smile on his face. ‘How wonderful,’ he said. ‘What are their names?’

  ‘But you know their names,’ Johanna said, sounding a little annoyed. ‘Emil, Marie and Brynja.’

  Alfred coughed again painfully.

  ‘I managed to get out,’ Johanna whispered urgently. ‘Before they put up the wall.’

  ‘The wall?’

  ‘Yes. Didn’t you hear? They built a wall. Right across the city.’ She sliced the air with her hand.

  He tried to sit up, but couldn’t. ‘I don’t understand,’ he said weakly.

  ‘You’re just very tired,’ she said. ‘And ill. You must rest.’

  With all his strength, he raised himself into a sitting position. Waves of ice and heat washed through him. He was trembling. ‘Who are these children?’ he demanded.

  Johanna got to her feet and leaned over him, pushing his arms back onto the bed without much effort and pinning them down. She smelled of apples. ‘You need to rest, Alfred. Now be sensible.’

  He tried briefly to free himself from her grip, but it was in vain. His muscles were too weak. ‘I don’t understand,’ he managed to say, and was suddenly engulfed in exhaustion and was gone again.

  He was woken by the sound of footsteps and the rustle of stiff fabric. He could still feel Johanna holding his arms down, but when he opened his eyes, he saw that there was now a white-clad doctor holding his left arm, and a nurse holding his right. They were speaking in urgent whispers, but he couldn’t make out what they were saying.

  ‘Johanna?’ he asked, a fresh panic overcoming him. There was a high ringing sound in his left ear. ‘Where’s Johanna?’

  ‘I’m here,’ she called, and it took him a moment to discover where her voice was coming from – she was standing near the white curtain, and was being held from the back by a man who looked, to Alfred, vaguely familiar.

  He struggled to free himself, ‘Johanna!’ he called, but the arms holding him down were too strong. He writhed and fought, managing to free his right arm, while Johanna was shouting, ‘Let me go! Kssss, Alfred, Alfred! Help me!’ He lashed out at the doctor on his left, but the doctor caught his free arm and held it down firmly across his chest, making it almost impossible to breathe. He strained to look across the room, but Johanna was gone, and then, feeling the sharp prick of a needle in his shoulder, he slid into unconsciousness.

  Three days later, his fever broke, and he was transferred to the main ward. Isobel came to visit him every day, looking tired and concerned, telling him over and over how worried she had been. Once, she brought John, but he just sat on a chair, looking nervously around the ward.

  When he had first woken to find that his body temperature had dropped back to normal, his head clear, his breathing painless, Alfred assumed that Johanna had been nothing but a figment of his imagination, a cruel hallucination created by the fever. But as the days went by, and his mind and lungs became clear again, he began to suspect that his voices had brought her. They had brought her – for reasons he could not understand – and then snatched her away again. They couldn’t just leave well enough alone. He felt betrayed. And now, they wouldn’t respond to his calls. He wanted Johanna back, just for an hour. He longed to talk to her, if only to say goodbye. For the first time in his life, he began to hate his voices. His grief consumed him. For days, he passively absorbed the hospital routine of waking, eating, doctor’s rounds, medication, Isobel’s visits, during which he hardly seemed to hear what she said.

  Finally, ten days later, he was discharged. He would no longer need hospital care, but was told that a full recovery would take several weeks, perhaps even months. The doctor told him he had also had a severe infection in his left ear, but that any discomfort or mild hearing loss should pass with time. Isobel came to accompany him home. He packed his few belongings into the small bag she had brought, together with a copy of his discharge summary. On their way out, the ward nurse stopped him. ‘Dr Barnes wants a word before you leave,’ she said.

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yes. He . . . he’s a specialist. On the first floor, room fourteen. He’s expecting you.’

  Dr Barnes was a tall man with a mat of black hair and long, slim fingers with disproportionately large knuckles, which he repeatedly flexed and cracked. Beneath his white coat, he wore an open-collared shirt and blue jeans.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ Barnes asked Alfred, once he and Isobel had taken a seat opposite him in his office. Isobel was worrying a button on her jacket, and when she looked up, Alfred gave her a reassuring smile.

  ‘Much better, thank you,’ he replied.

  ‘I gather you suffered smoke poisoning some years ago. What with the pneumonia, it might take a while before your lungs have fully recovered.’

  ‘Yes,’ Alfred said, a little impatiently. He had heard all
this from the doctor who had signed his release note. ‘Yes, I understand. But – ’ he reached over to Isobel and gave her hand a gentle squeeze, ‘I’m already feeling much better.’

  ‘Good, good,’ Barnes said, leaning back. His chair made a small squeaking sound. ‘Now, Mr Warner – or may I call you Alfred?’

  ‘Please.’

  ‘Great. Alfred. Now, you were pretty sick when you were brought here. Do you remember that? Anything about the first couple of days here?’

  Alfred turned to look at Isobel, but she kept her head bowed and wouldn’t meet his gaze. And it slowly dawned on him what kind of specialist Barnes was.

  Barnes’ chair squeaked again as he leaned forward. ‘We were all pretty worried about you. Your temperature was at 105 degrees for several days.’

  Alfred cleared his throat. ‘Yes, I know. Dr Watkins explained this all to me just half an hour ago. He has prescribed four weeks’ convalescence, and after that, I’m certain I’ll be fine again. So, what exactly can we do for you, Dr Barnes? I’d like to get home.’

  Barnes nodded. ‘Right, right. I’m sure you do. Very well, Alfred, I’ll get right to the point. Have you ever experienced, hmm, episodes of severe confusion, or disorientation?’ He pulled at his long fingers, producing a soft, nauseating popping sound. He continued. ‘Or perhaps even hallucinations, hearing or seeing things out of the ordinary? Hmm?’

  Alfred’s hands started trembling in his lap, and he faked a cough to cover it up. Finally, he said, ‘I’m not sure what you mean.’ His voice rang dull inside his head.

  ‘You see, many patients experience this sort of thing when the body temperature exceeds a certain level. But in your case, it was so extreme, so beyond anything I or my colleagues have ever witnessed, that I’m concerned it may have been a – ’ he paused. ‘I’ll be frank with you, Alfred. It appeared very much like a psychotic episode. And given its severity, I would have to guess that this wasn’t the first time it’s happened.’

  ‘I see,’ Alfred said slowly, trying to ignore the scratching inside his chest brought on by his coughing fit. Beside him, he could hear Isobel picking at her nails.

  Barnes continued. ‘Alfred, if I am right, then you need treatment. In my experience, these things only get worse. They don’t just go away by ignoring them. And there have been some real breakthroughs recently, in terms of medicating this sort of problem.’

  Alfred took a deep breath. So this was it. All he had to do was confirm Barnes’ suspicions, and he would be free. Free. It was almost a revelation. He had never asked for the voice-women – they had come to him when he was six years old, so very young, too young to defend himself. He had never been given any choice. At this very moment, he could hear one of them crying softly, and it angered him. They had betrayed him. He felt so very, very tired. Barnes was looking at him expectantly, invitingly, his look a bridge Alfred could cross. With the shortest of words, the smallest of gestures . . . Suddenly, his lungs tightened so that he could hardly breathe.

  And then Isobel spoke up. ‘I don’t think there’s anything wrong with my husband, Dr Barnes,’ she said, her voice small but steady, breaking the thick silence. ‘I understand why you might be concerned, but I can assure you that this sort of thing has never happened before. Not since we’ve been married, anyway. I – I don’t want him to be taking any medication unnecessarily.’ She held out her hand for Alfred, and he took it.

  Barnes let out a loud sigh. ‘Very well, Alfred. I don’t want to talk you into anything. But if you ever . . . ’ He took a small prescription pad from a desk drawer and quickly wrote something down. ‘This is the name of a colleague of mine. Very fine chap.’ He passed the note to Alfred, and then rose from his chair and walked them to the door. ‘Thank you for coming. I hope you recover quickly.’

  He and Alfred shook hands. When the door had closed behind him, Alfred tore the note into little pieces and stuffed them into his pocket.

  When they arrived home, John was watching television. At first, Alfred feared he had been suspended from school again, but then remembered it was a Saturday. John jumped up when they came in.

  ‘Hi Dad,’ he said. ‘How are you feeling?’ He went to take Alfred’s bag, and their hands touched briefly. John’s face had the soft, spongy look of a much younger boy; for a moment, he wasn’t the hard-edged sixteen-year-old Alfred knew.

  ‘I’m much better,’ Alfred said. ‘Thank you.’

  John stood awkwardly in the middle of the room with the bag in one hand, and then shrugged his shoulders, as though shrugging off his boyishness and reapplying his armour of adolescent indifference.

  ‘I’ll be upstairs,’ he said, leaving the living room with the bag. ‘I did myself beans on toast for tea.’

  Isobel closed the door behind him. ‘He’s been very worried about you,’ she said.

  That night Alfred slept fitfully. His dreams were vivid and wild, but always vanished the moment he broke the surface of sleep. In the early hours of the morning – a pale dawn was stealing into the room – he woke once more, startled. His heart was racing.

  Isobel’s voice came into the semi-darkness. ‘Alfie? Is everything all right?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Sorry, did I wake you?’

  ‘No.’

  There was a long silence. Alfred’s heartbeat gradually returned to normal. He closed his eyes, thinking Isobel must have fallen asleep again.

  ‘Alfie?’ Her voice was soft, but not sleepy.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘That doctor, the psychiatrist – ’

  ‘Yes?’

  He heard her turn onto her side. ‘Alfie, I know you talk to yourself.’ She spoke very quietly.

  He kept his eyes shut. ‘It was the fever,’ he said. ‘I had some very . . . disturbing dreams.’

  ‘No, Alfie. I don’t mean when you were in hospital. I mean – ’ He heard her take a deep breath. ‘You have conversations. I’ve heard you. Many times. Usually when you’re in the garden, when you think you’re alone. The first time, back home – ’ She was talking about Mauchline. ‘After the fire, my dad was out and I’d gone for a nap upstairs, but I couldn’t sleep. I heard you talking to someone, and I went out onto the landing and saw you, sitting on the couch, talking to yourself.’

  He didn’t speak.

  ‘But it wasn’t just yourself you were talking to. You were having a real conversation. I sat there and listened for a while.’

  ‘You never said anything.’

  ‘What was I to say?’ She sounded tired – not sleep-tired, but weary. ‘I thought it was just something . . . some reaction to what had happened. You know, the shock of the fire, or something. But then I caught you doing it again. And I was going to ask you about it, but – ’

  ‘But what?’ He was slightly breathless; he felt a jagged tickling sensation at the bottom of his lungs.

  She whispered, ‘Why did you never tell me?’

  ‘Was this why Dr Barnes wanted to see me?’ he asked. His heart was beating fast again. ‘You told him?’

  ‘Of course not! I cannae believe you would think that.’ She sat up. Her silhouette was blurred in the dim light, and he couldn’t make out the expression on her face. ‘Twenty years, Alfred. For twenty years I’ve said nothing, wondering if I should be worried, concerned that I may have married a man who has some . . . some mental imbalance. And I’ve waited, waited for you to speak to me – at times I thought it was me who was going mad. And I’ve been so bloody lonely.’ She covered her face with her hands and started crying.

  Alfred sat up and put his arm around her shoulders, drawing her in to him. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘When you were sick, and you started ranting, it was . . . it was terrifying. Then they told me they’d like you to see a psychiatrist, and I thought: This is it! They’ve found out and they’re going to take you away.’ There was panic in her voice. ‘And what would I do then? Without you?’

  It took Alfred six weeks to recover fully after his release from hospital.
During that time, Isobel fussed around him constantly, serving him breakfast in bed, ensuring the fireplace was always lit, insisting he wrap himself in blankets at all times, making him endless cups of tea. On occasion, he would catch her staring at him, and then she would give him a conspiratorial smile and a nod, as though to say, ‘It’s all right. Your secret’s safe. You’re free to talk to them now.’

  But she never said as much out loud, and besides, Alfred wouldn’t have done so. Not only because communicating with his voice-women had hitherto been intensely, almost painfully private, and that asking him to talk openly with them in Isobel’s presence felt tantamount to being told it was all right to defecate in front of her. But also, more importantly, he didn’t want to talk to them. He hadn’t yet forgiven them for bringing Johanna and then snatching her away so violently. So when they came – calling his name

  Alfred! Alfred!

  commenting on his improving state of health when he managed a two-mile walk without feeling exhausted

  Well done! You’re doing so much better, aren’t you?

  offering helpful advice in the kitchen

  Look out, Alfred! The milk’s about to boil over

  reminding him of appointments

  Don’t forget the doctor’s at two o’clock

  – he ignored them. For several days, they called and shouted and yelled his name, but he blocked them out. He needed time without them. And after a while, they gave up, leaving behind a silence so unfamiliar, so profound, Alfred didn’t know whether to feel exhilarated or terrified.

  The silence wasn’t to last for long.

  They came one night, as Alfred lay in bed beside Isobel. He and Isobel hadn’t made love since before his illness, but now he felt healthy and strong again, and the sight of her slightly parted lips, the curve of her hip beneath the blanket, the pale swell of her breast, aroused him. He slipped his hand under the sheet and placed it on her warm upper thigh, and

  Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

  an ear-splitting, dizzying screech, causing him to snatch his hand back from Isobel’s thigh. Isobel stirred. Alfred lay back down slowly; his eardrums felt as though they were on fire. For a few minutes, all was quiet. The ringing in his ears died down and he wondered whether the sound might have been nothing but a particularly loud night owl. Slowly, he reached out and stroked Isobel’s face. She stirred again, and smiled, her eyes still closed. Taking a deep breath, as though she were breathing him in, she shuffled closer and moved her hand onto his groin.