From a Safe Distance

by Bishop, Julia

  I didn’t know how long I’d been alone in the flat. One moment I’d been trying to get people at school to sponsor me for a Channel swim, the next I couldn’t even get in the bath.

  A sharp knock at the door broke into my curtained world.

  ‘Oh … Gatters!’ Patrick was looking at a face I hadn’t seen for a while and he had to smile quickly to hide his reaction. ‘Can I come in?’

  He followed me along the passage to the kitchen. Until then, I had not let anyone see me without make-up, but now I didn’t care. Everything had sunk inside me to its lowest level. I had no resistance, no opinion, no emotion. Patrick coughed and we sat on the pine chairs. His jacket sparkled with drops of rain and he brought a school smell with him which sent a wave of guilt and anxiety through me. He took off his glasses and wiped them clean. There was concern in his voice.

  ‘Have you been to see Keith?’ We had the same GP.

  I shook my head. Speaking was an effort.

  ‘Only … ’ He coughed again. ‘I think you should, my dear. Because I think you’re depressed.’ There was that word. I hadn’t heard it for a while. ‘Do you want me to come with you?’

  ‘Across the Channel?’

  ‘No, Vee. To see the doctor.’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Patrick sighed. ‘They’re worried about you at the College. Please let me drive you down to see Keith.’

  His will was there, still strong; mine had evaporated. There was only his to follow.

  ‘It would be a good idea if you had a bath before we go, I think,’ he said kindly. ‘I’ll wait in the living room, shall I, while you do that, yes?’

  A moment later, as I went towards the bathroom, I heard curtains being jerked open.

  We sat in the dimly-lit cell that was the doctors’ waiting room.

  ‘Vee Gates?’ came a voice. It was becoming more and more difficult to move, but I stood up and managed to get into Dr Mann’s room with Patrick’s help.

  ‘Hello, Vee.’ Dr Mann shone his grey eyes at me over his glasses. His gaze was almost painful and I looked at my knees. He must be able to see into me, see what a weak person I am. ‘Do you mind Patrick being here?’ I shake my head. I sense that Dr Mann and Patrick are looking at each other, because I recognise a parcel of silence despite the blackness.

  ‘How do you feel?’

  It is like being asked to speak a foreign language. ‘Can’t … describe. Grey.’

  ‘Do you think you are depressed?’

  That word again. I nod. ‘Worse … than at uni … ’

  ‘Would you like to see a psychiatrist?’

  Something melts in me and I want to cry, but I can’t. The only psychiatrist I want to see right now is Max. But the word “psychiatrist” tells me it is the beginning of the end. I am worthless. I’m not even worth all this effort from them. Patrick moves his hand as if he is about to put it on my arm, then thinks better of it. He mutters something about letting Mum know, then he and Dr Mann have a short conversation.

  Not caring what they say is a bit like being a child again.

  ‘I think you should go into hospital, Vee,’ Dr Mann says in the end. ‘I’ll make the arrangements. You go home and put a few things in a bag. Patrick’s offered to drive you over there.’

  ‘Not … like a dog … on a lead!’ It is the old nightmare and I am Aunt Mary. I am afraid and intensely fragile. I don’t know what to expect or how I am going to deal with this. I haven’t mentioned Aunt Mary to Patrick. Why are they being so nice to me? I am angry because I am failing, so why aren’t they angry with me? Then I see it. The white door is swinging open, the padlock hanging by a curved metal finger, and a black tunnel appears; I can hear the echo of rows of black doors closing sharply along it, like an old train about to leave. An angry voice repeats that I am useless. The white door, the whole building, seems to be moving slightly, up and down, and getting larger, filling the world. The ivy is now blue, sparking, electrified.

  Then I realise that I am the one who is moving towards it, towards its black tunnel, but I am beyond fear. I am powerless, as in a dream, pulled in and pushed along by the black wave. A face appears, speaking, but I cannot understand the words. The tunnel opens out inside and there are people walking and sitting. The carpet is stained and I can smell tobacco and disinfectant. Someone is asking me questions in a quiet place with soft chairs. I try to answer, but my voice is slow and old. Then I hear a different voice which leads me along a corridor with a lot of noise. Walking is difficult. I follow a pair of shoes which has to slow down. An arm points to a bed in a small room.

  The first night, everything moved into a different perspective, a kind of flat inevitability. Resignation, surrender, but without effort. All the possibilities of my life were reduced to a black dot, a single point in time, where I was completely and inescapably alone.

  I am a grey slab floating on a dark sea. I can see nothing, feel nothing except a warm rush sometimes between my legs. I am not asleep, nor am I awake. The black wave takes me along and I cannot move, cannot choose where I am going. My head is a black screen and I cannot tell if I have a body. There seems to be some kind of awareness behind the screen, but I don’t know if the awareness is part of me. Sometimes I think I hear a voice in the distance and sometimes it seems possible that people are touching me, but then I am alone again on the dark sea for an eternity.

  A crack appears to the right of my black screen. One eye has opened and light is coming in. Like tuning an old TV set, both eyes then try to adjust to a different channel, a different reality. The picture is blurred and I remember my glasses, but I have no idea where they are.

  This is not my bedroom. My head aches. I don’t know where I am or how long I’ve been here. Somebody is sitting in a chair outside the door; she gets up when she hears me try to speak. I cough, then feel weak and lie staring at the irregular pattern of the ceiling tiles. The person has disappeared. I sleep for a while. When I wake up, everything is still grey and grainy, but I think I hear Max’s voice. Or is it Jim’s? Someone is sitting in the chair by my bed. I still find it hard to understand what he or she is saying, but I pick out the word “water” and nod my head. The liquid is passing through my mouth and throat as if it were my first ever drink.

  At least I know I have a body now, if only because it has no strength. The person is talking to me, explaining something. They want me to sign a piece of paper. I notice bags of clothes on the floor, a vase of flowers. They don’t look real.

  I sleep, wake and sleep again. It might be another day. Now I am being taken somewhere in a wheelchair, up in a lift and along a corridor with a different coloured carpet, my head bent forward. Blue things. The voice is telling me I’m useless and I cannot question what is happening. We arrive at another small room. I am told to lie on a black bed. There are three or four people in the room and some equipment.

  Someone opens my dressing gown and puts stickers and wires on my chest. A needle is inserted into the back of my hand, then I hear the hiss of the oxygen mask.

  They put it over my face …

  Oh, God, Vee, he thought. He wished he’d been there. He felt terrible. He had a pain.

  ‘Darling, are you alright? You’re very quiet this evening.’ Helen took the plates away. ‘I think you’re spending too long on the book. What’ve you read?’

  He couldn’t answer properly. He had not seen the meal in front of him that night. All he could see was Vee’s book on his desk, open at the next chapter Helen would read. She thought he’d been overdoing it, but he was in a state of shock.

  A baby! And then that description … Back in the attic, he felt a sudden anger. He wanted to trash the room, and the only thing that stopped him was the thought of Helen’s reaction. Why hadn’t Vee told him about being pregnant? They needn’t have parted; she had really wanted to go with him to Edinburgh, hadn’t she? He found himself panting, walking to and fro, wringing his hands, trying not to scream out, squeezing his head. They could have brought u
p the child together. And even if she didn’t want it, she could at least have told him! He brought his fist down hard on the desk. Then his eyes filled with tears and he found he was sobbing. But he couldn’t share this with Helen, not right now, and certainly not with Simon, who seemed to be drinking too much. So he tried to pull himself together. How different his life would have been! Though he couldn’t imagine not having Grace and Anna – or Helen. He wasn’t aware just how much he needed to be involved in helping Vee until then. Oh! A gripping pain and he dropped to his knees…

  ‘I came up to ask you if … Max! Are you alright? Oh my God. Simon! Simon! Max is having a heart attack. Get an ambulance!’

  12

  Moods

  Despite her anxiety, Helen wanted to read what Max had read before his collapse. She took the relevant chapters to the hospital; it was something to do while she was waiting, sitting by his bed. Then she continued reading beyond that.

  They took me to the black bed and the mask several times. Time lost its meaning: it was something other people controlled. I was bathed. I was fed some jelly, with a spoon, like a baby. They gave me tablets every day.

  Once, as I walked along in my nightdress, they were watching me in the irregular corners of my vision and I didn’t know why. I heard a voice making a strange noise, then realised it was mine. Not the same voice which came to me in the dark times, telling me I was useless, scorning my every move, showing me I could do nothing right, filling my head with expletives and deserved derision as if I had headphones – no, these sounds were different and came from my mouth. Then the nurses began talking about me as if I couldn’t hear. I was being steered, even though nobody touched me, back into my room. A scream erupted from me and I was suddenly strong and unbearably angry. I set about destroying the room and then I was grabbed and put on the bed. A sharp sting in my bottom, then I was crying, panting, held still for a moment. The anger faded. I lay half asleep. But my soul-pain was still there. I knew it would not stop until after I had more ECT or until I died.

  These were the two Black Posts I clung to: ECT and Death. The intensity of each moment had to be escaped and the two Black Posts were all I had. Nothing else mattered. I dreaded losing hold of them. I had to have one in each hand all the time and I couldn’t let anyone take them away. Anything anyone did was likely to disturb them and I couldn’t bear the idea of a single word doing that much damage. I was lying on a flat stone in a black desert, pinned there by the wave, now lapping quiet and congealed, as I waited to find out which of my posts would be stronger.

  Suddenly I had a new, bright red tide in my head, mixed with the black. The two strands, black then red – well, really they were ropes to pull on, but I could never find the ends – took me one way, then another, like driftwood.

  Strange world. No sandwich. Blue things. Yes I know I’m useless. You keep telling me. I know. Nurses watching me. Doctor talking to me. Sitting. Can’t speak. Elbows on knees, hiding face. Slow. Colours strange. Blue things. Trying to walk. Can’t feel anything. Brain is black hole. Yes I know. Hate myself. Want to die. Would do it if had energy. Must deserve it. I’m useless, I know. They’re watching, on edge of my screen. No food. Hide my head. I’m useless … NOW! ENERGY! Oh, hello, nurse – you’re Steve, aren’t you? Pleased to meet you! – Now I must dance, and all these other people must dance too! I’ll teach them what REAL dancing’s all about! Why do they look at me like that? – Why so down, Cam? – Don’t give a damn, Cam! – Don’t be like a lamb, Sam! – Hahahaha! – I have lots of plans for this hospital, but I haven’t got time to discuss that with you right now – can’t stop – think I’ll get a Mercedes like that – I’ll go into town tomorrow – I like dancing – wheee! J’aime danser – et chanter – don’t want to stop or go to my room. Bet I could teach you a thing or two in my room, eh Steve? Nudge, nudge, say na more!.. FALLING. Must sit down. Speed of falling – brain shrivelling. Can’t be seen. Hide my face. Not a real person. Not worth anything. Can’t control it. Yes I know I’m useless. Feel guilty. Am nothing. Deserve to die …

  Then one day it was time to speak to the psychiatrist.

  ‘Vee? Doctor Wilson will see you now.’

  As I walk slowly into the room, I am aware that several other people besides the doctor are there, sitting in a semi-circle, with him in the middle, at the top, under the window.

  ‘Well, Vee. How do you feel now after some ECT?’ The doctor’s bald head is shining.

  ‘I … think I feel a bit better. But what has been going on? Is that what a breakdown’s like?’

  ‘You have been having mood swings. It’s not simple depression as we first thought, but manic depression. Rapid cycling.’ At least there was a name for it, I thought, looking at my knees. And at least I could now string a sentence together.

  ‘You have two more treatments next week, which should improve things even more. We’ve put you on lithium. There are leaflets about that; just ask the nurses. Any questions?’

  ‘No.’ Doctors don’t have that much time. When I left the ward round, Kit, a foreign nurse, came up to me and said I had a visitor. Disguising his reaction to me just as Patrick had done when he came to my flat at the start of it all, the headmaster of Arnold College was waiting in the visitors’ room.

  ‘Hello, Vee. How are you?’ his voice boomed.

  ‘Not too bad.’

  ‘Look, Vee, I won’t beat about the bush. I think it’s time we called it a day, don’t you?’

  Patrick had crept into the room in front of him a moment earlier. He had brought me some flowers but did not take part in this: he couldn’t change what had been decided. The headmaster left.

  ‘Why haven’t you been before, Patrick?’ I sobbed.

  ‘I have been before – twice, in fact!’ Patrick sounded almost insulted, but immediately calmed his voice. ‘Well actually, I’m not really surprised you don’t remember. You were very ill.’

  ‘The ECT has affected my memory, too.’ I tried to stop crying. ‘I don’t know if you ever get this, but I have a kind of feeling that a memory exists, without being able to say what it is. It’s as if some memories are trying to reach me from behind a curtain. It’s a bit like when you’re hunting for a particular word.’

  ‘I know that one!’

  ‘Oh, but I’m so tired. I’m sorry, Patrick, but I’m going to have to sleep now.’

  When he had gone, I realised that I’d actually been crying: I hadn’t been able to until then. A strange progress to wish for. And the hostile voice in my head was gone for the moment, at least. It was as if the black wave, which I could hardly remember now, had been washed away with clear water. I slept. I always had to sleep for some time after ECT as well, and usually woke up with a headache and too late for lunch.

  Patrick came back the following week.

  ‘Why do I have this feeling I’ve lost my job?’ I was puzzled by the nagging thought.

  Patrick coughed and was obviously trying to think how to answer.

  ‘I have, haven’t I? You know something I don’t! What’s happening, Patrick?’

  ‘Don’t you remember the headmaster’s visit last week?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, he … er … He said, “I think it’s time we called it a day”.’

  ‘So it’s true then.’ I felt empty.

  I was shocked to see a grey, pinched face looking at me from the mirror. The real me. I washed, then decided it was time to ask the nurses some questions. ‘Ian, have you got a moment?’

  ‘What’s up, Vee?’

  ‘I need you to help me sort some things out in my head.’

  ‘Right. I’ll be with you in one minute. Wait here.’

  I stood outside the nurses’ office on the dirty carpet.

  ‘Now, shall we talk in your room?’ I had formed a bond with Ian, the most approachable of the nurses and I felt stressed when he wasn’t on duty.

  ‘Ian – how long have I been here?’

  ‘You’ve been on Tor ward, oooh, a
bout six weeks.’

  ‘As long as that!’ Suddenly I realised that I had not lived part of my own life.

  ‘You were very unwell when you arrived and you went – d’you want me to explain what happened?’

  ‘Please.’

  ‘You went into what’s called stupor for over a week. We were worried about you because you didn’t eat at all then. When you came out of that, your moods started swinging violently; you had eight or nine “ups” and eight or nine “downs” in a day! Then you started a course of ECT, twice a week, and I think I’m right in saying that you’ve only got one treatment left.’

  ‘That’s right. How many’s that?’

  ‘That will be ten.’

  ‘Do you think I’m better now? I can’t really tell.’

  ‘Oh, I should say so! The ECT has made a massive difference. You could hardly speak or walk.’

  ‘But now I’ve lost my job.’

  ‘That’s bad luck. But Vee, people don’t understand mental illness. They read a newspaper report about someone having been murdered by an “axe-wielding psychopath” and they think that everybody with mental health issues is like that. They don’t consider the possibility,’ he went on, with an exasperated smile, ‘that the sufferer is actually more afraid than they are. And they conveniently overlook their own aunt, or whoever, who’s not well, because that can’t possibly be part of the same thing, can it? The main thing, though, is that they can’t see that people don’t choose to be ill. I mean, did you choose what’s happened to you? But, hey, listen to me going on!’