Right to Die

by Hazel McHaffie

  ‘Adam. What do you think?’

  The minute I began to answer there was a sudden silence. Then the guys sniggered. What had begun life in my head as a one-line denunciation of the whole monarchic system, emerged from my mouth as the somnolent drone of a heavily-sedated patient up at the local mental hospital. I managed to cover it up with a second rather more articulate contribution, but things inside my head were whirring and ticking like the mechanism of a time bomb. Okay, from the outside it looked like the drowsy mumblings of an over-fed slacker.

  But I was on the inside.

  After that blinding flash another curtain came down. Is this the end of the second act?

  9 SEPTEMBER—I’m still struggling with yesterday’s revelation. Devlin’s caution has been circling in my brain trying to get a foothold but…

  Let’s see. 1) Naomi hasn’t noticed any problem with my speech. 2) Yesterday’s little display could have been more alcohol-induced than I’m prepared to admit. Jerry was fine apparently and he matched my intake, calorie for calorie, unit for unit. Of course, he is about a decade younger! 3) Maybe I’m just sleep-deprived. 4) We all know that early afternoon is a time when the circadian rhythms slump; maybe mine are just slumping lower than they used to ten years ago.

  One part of me is begging to hang on to these possibilities. Another bit of me is insisting, Don’t delude yourself, face the reality and deal with it pragmatically. This diary is no place for delusion. Whatever the cause, my tongue wasn’t in possession of my faculties at that crucial moment.

  I need time on this one. An experiment or two might prove the point.

  12 SEPTEMBER—Today I contemplated a swift exit from this nightmare. There’s a surprising bounty of DIY advice available on the Internet. But Naomi makes it difficult to think straight. That look in her eyes, the softness of her skin, the feel of her body… it kills me to think of throwing all that away.

  What will it do to her? I can’t talk to her about it – the ‘when’ – not yet anyway. I have to sort this out myself. If it weren’t for her I’d seriously think about ending it now. A nice little parachute accident perhaps. A fall from a bridge. A fast drive over a steep cliff. A long swim out into the ocean. How hard does it have to be? A good active, sporting kind of death would be thumbing my nose at the creeping paralysis.

  Naomi closed down the computer and sat for a long time staring at the blank screen. Here he was, only three months on from the diagnosis, already looking for an escape.

  Had he blamed her? Was it her fault?

  She rose abruptly and went outside to water the garden.

  Would it be better to remain in ignorance? Just because he’d left his diary didn’t mean she had to read it. He wouldn’t know. Or she could just defer it. Everybody said the rawness would heal. One day. But they didn’t know…

  If she discovered beyond doubt that he blamed her… Maybe she’d never find absolution. Except in death.

  13 SEPTEMBER—Because of Naomi I have to think about my strategy. If I do feel compelled by her to hang around, how will I deal with the consequences?

  This lurking anxiety about my speech has reinforced one important bonus. I’m in the right profession. No matter how much my body crumbles, I can still retain my dexterity with the written word and people not in the know need have no suspicion that in real life I’m a bumbling incoherent. Hmmm. That sounds almost positive.

  I’m confused now. Is life more precious today for some other reason? Am I, in fact, in this for the long haul? I devoutly hope not.

  15 SEPTEMBER—Forget positive. Forget life being precious. My mother is driving me in the direction of the loony bin rather than the homely gas oven.

  Okay, I know I owe her a debt I can never repay. She brought me into the world. She scrimped and saved to give me more than the bare essentials. She was a human shield for my cowering body when my father was in one of his ‘moods’. A single mum, she protected us boys from the world during the hard, condemnatory years after his suicide. She took all the flak from relations and acquaintances and every other righteously indignant body. But for a woman who knows the cutting potential of other people’s counsel, she’s unbelievably insensitive to my needs now, and wrapping her criticisms up in biblical authority simply compounds her iniquity as far as I’m concerned.

  I didn’t tell her about my diagnosis for a couple of months. It wasn’t just a natural wish to protect her, more that her reaction to bad news so often jars with mine and I didn’t have the stamina to hear that ‘God helps those who help themselves’ or that ‘these things are sent to try us’ or that ‘everything happens for a reason.’ When I did tell her, all her usual coping strategies deserted her. ‘Oh dear’ escaped before she could edit it, and the pain was written in her eyes. She asked genuine questions, I gave her truthful answers. I felt rather than heard her devastation. And when she left she whispered a crumpled, ‘Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth,’ softly in my ear before rushing off without a backward glance.

  She has been silent on the subject since. Until yesterday.

  In an unguarded moment I made glancing reference to a way out of my nightmare. The torrent I unleashed took me completely by surprise. I wasn’t even thinking of my father until all the religious objections known to man, every negative argument ever propounded, came tumbling out. In short, I would be consigning myself to eternal damnation if I ever usurped God’s supremacy over my mortal flesh. He gave life, it was His alone to take away when He saw fit. Only she tangled it all up in her desperation.

  At first I simply sat and stared at her. I had no idea she could expound on any subject for that long, and with such eloquence. But when the words themselves started impinging on my consciousness, I shrank in horror. My intellectual self told me to go easy because she’d carried ‘the cross of shame’ before, and if she really believed the stuff that she was disgorging now, then indeed, it was shame of the highest order lined with fear of the most primeval variety. But my emotional self recoiled from her prejudice and ignorance.

  Fortunately for her, I couldn’t get a word in edgewise for ten minutes. By then I’d realised I’d be wasting precious energy if I attempted to counter these views. Mere rational argument doesn’t begin to dent armour that thick. All I said was, ‘I didn’t know you felt that strongly about it,’ and shrugged my shoulders as if it were neither here nor there to me.

  But as I watched her walking down the path to return to her solitary home, my overwhelming emotion was one of pity. What kind of religion holds a person in a straitjacket that unyielding? Who needs a God so lacking in compassion and understanding? Unless He’s big enough to bear my anger and my questioning, I can’t believe He’s the being that made the world and mankind with such infinite variety, so many paradoxes, so much inconsistency. (I’ve just noticed I’ve perpetuated my childhood practice of using capital Hs for God; our Sunday School teachers taught us it was wicked to be too familiar with Him.)

  Do I really know the woman who gave me life? I’d no idea she was harbouring these fanatical obsessions. But then again, suicide was a taboo subject in our house. Mention of Dad was too. Maybe it was impossible for her to detach one from the other.

  I couldn’t believe it when she returned to the attack again today, and at a time when she knew Naomi would definitely be out and I would be working at home.

  It was a bad day for her to strike. I woke this morning with a killer of a headache. The medication I was forced to take engulfed my brain in cotton wool.

  My column this week is about the human face of the police force; I was trying to make a case for a return of the bobby on the beat, essentially. A local Asian shop owner gave me a superb interview. He’d apprehended a yob stealing from his shop only to be overpowered and put in hospital during the twenty-five minute wait for the boys in blue. Though still swathed in plaster he’d given me some brilliant sound bites in a colourful if eccentric dialect reflecting his opinions on the subject of law and order which would make the Chief Constable pale,
and the anonymous letters flood in ‘to The Editor’.

  The thoughts came reasonably easily and I soon had a framework, but I couldn’t find the fluency to make the prose sparkle. After several abortive attempts I put it on one side and turned to my novel.

  Until now Naomi is the only one who knows about the book. She hasn’t seen it: I’m not ready yet for objective comment. Everyman and his aunty seem to think they have a novel in them, but in reality most people haven’t a clue about what’s involved or where to start. Even I, a writer by profession, don’t know yet if I’ve got what it takes. But I do know time is running out for me to test the hypothesis.

  This kind of creative writing is a therapy in itself. Once I’m inside my characters, leading their lives, thinking their thoughts, speaking their lines, I’m no longer Adam O’Neill, harassed by deadlines, frustrated by a headache, carrying a fatal disease. It’s a glorious escape.

  Anyway, today the fingers were obedient, the words flowed, and I lost all track of time. I was still in this other world when my mother arrived. I’ve never told anybody that I’m vulnerable in that state but Naomi knows intuitively not to invade my creative working space.

  My mother, however, barging into my physical working area as well as my mental no-go zone, mistook my abstraction for signs of further deterioration, and started fussing around doing things to make me ‘more comfortable’. I know I was grouchy but I can’t help it. With her fidgeting, her chatter, her non-verbals, she was like a persistent wasp.

  ‘Please, Mother, I’ve had a difficult week and a hellish morning. Let’s go and have a cup of tea.’ Pretty mild and reasonable, considering.

  She started to pick up the papers strewn around in the room from my earlier research on modern policing.

  ‘No, don’t,’ I said through gritted teeth. I took a long slow breath and let every word fall singly and in slow motion. ‘Please. Don’t. Touch. Anything. I need to know where each article is. It may look untidy but it’s ordered. I haven’t finished with this lot yet.’

  ‘It’s just not fair on Naomi,’ she said suddenly, sliding the ones she still held onto the edge of my desk as if testing my boundaries.

  ‘She understands. This is my workspace. I’ll clear it all up when I’ve finished writing that piece.’

  ‘That’s not what I mean.’

  She was bending down picking up a pen that had slid from my desk. She placed it with careful deliberation directly on top of the nearest pile of papers as if to prove her point.

  ‘Do you ever think about what she’s going through?’ It was the turn of the curtains to be brought into line.

  ‘Mother, I have no idea what you’re on about.’

  ‘I know it’s not my place to say anything, not now you’re all grown up and you’ve left home and everything, but Naomi is far too sweet a girl to tell you.’

  ‘Tell me what?’

  ‘She’s just getting on with it. She’s not sitting around thinking of ways out, is she? She’s just getting on with her job and running this house and picking up after you.’

  She lifted a book and put it edge to edge with another one on the table.

  ‘Mother...’ It came out more jagged than I intended. I mentally returned the book to its proper place on the floor.

  She plunged her restless hands into the pockets of her jacket.

  ‘I’m sorry, but this is my working space, Mum. It has to be… like this or I just can’t function. Look, why don’t we go into the sitting room? Let me get you a cup of tea.’

  ‘A cup of tea won’t sort this out.’ She dumped herself stubbornly onto the window-seat against the light, leaving her face in shadow. ‘And I’m sorry to go on about this, Adam, but somebody has to before it’s too late.’

  I didn’t trust myself to speak.

  ‘You have to think what it would do to Naomi if you did… you know... take the law into your own hands. I know what it feels like. It just isn’t fair.’

  Ahhhh, that again.

  ‘It’s the people who care about you – they’re the ones left to pick up the pieces. You won’t know anything about it, but they will. They’ll have the looks and the comments and the nastiness of the police suggesting things and the church people hinting things and everything.’

  At that precise moment Naomi got home and put her head round the door.

  ‘Hiya. I’m home. Cup of tea, everyone?’

  ‘Hi, Naomi. No! You sit down, I’ll get the tea. I was just about to anyway now Mother’s here.’

  Normally I don’t leave anyone alone in my study but I was out of there faster than an Olympic athlete in peak condition.

  Without recourse to strategy or subterfuge, Naomi succeeded in taking my mother into the sitting room within five minutes of my departure, and they were soon exchanging tips about gardening, the price of fish and the quickest route to the new supermarket. I took as long as I conceivably could to brew that pot of tea and by the time I wheeled it in (I’ve started to use a trolley in case my wrists suddenly lose power), the worst of my irritation had dissipated.

  Naomi stretched her neck and rolled her head, letting the vicarious tension ease from her shoulders. It was news to her that Mavis had harried Adam in this way. So that’s why he’d asked her those questions suddenly without preamble after Mavis had gone.

  ‘Naomi, am I difficult to live with?’

  ‘No more than usual,’ she’d teased.

  ‘Do my habits annoy you?’

  ‘Apart from your slovenly dress, and your obsession about leaving the newspaper just so, and when you “forget” to bring the gardening tools in and they go rusty in the rain, you mean?’

  ‘No, seriously…’

  ‘You think I’m not serious?’ she cried in mock indignation.

  ‘But am I a real pain in the house?’ he persisted, and now something in his tone made her shoot him a sharp look.

  ‘Not especially, no. What brought this on?’

  ‘Tell me. Go on. I want to know.’

  ‘Well, everybody has their little ways. And everybody gets irritated sometimes. I’m sure you get sick of my habits too. But you’re not a bad old stick. I can cope with the odd foible. The pluses still outweigh the minuses.’ She grinned at him. ‘Why the sudden navel-gazing?’

  ‘Just a little reality check. Don’t want to outstay my welcome,’ he said lightly, not looking at her.

  Cold fingers clutched at her heart.

  ‘Adam… You’re not thinking of ...’

  ‘Of?’ She remembered how his dark eyes had held hers unblinkingly.

  ‘Of… leaving me.’ It came out as a fearful whisper.

  ‘Not at the moment, but Naomi… if the going gets too tough, would it be so terrible for the tough to get going?’

  She flung herself at him and burst into tears. He held her close for a long time in silence, stroking her hair.

  ‘We have to think about you too,’ he said eventually, his voice thick with emotion, ‘What this thing is doing to you. I can’t bear the thought of wrecking your life. Maybe too soon’s better than too late.’

  ‘You aren’t… wrecking my life,’ she sobbed. ‘You’d wreck it… if you left me.’

  ‘But we know it’s coming, sweetheart. We have to be realistic. You’re still young. I want you to go on and enjoy life again.’

  ‘But I want to enjoy life with you for as long as we possibly can.’

  He’d said no more but a strange unease hung in the house.

  She’d got as far as phoning the Scottish Motor Neurone Disease Association for advice but it had felt too deceitful, going behind his back. She hadn’t followed it up.

  The memories robbed her of what little solace she’d salvaged from the knowledge that his suffering was over.

  26 SEPTEMBER—I’ve been on a real roll with the novel. It’s started to take on an autobiographical slant – not intentional but perhaps to be expected, given the dominance of what’s happening to me.

  My main character is a bloke ca
lled Aidan. He’s six foot four (wishful thinking) with a colourful past (poetic licence) and a promising future (if only!). This week he’s heard disturbing news about his health and he’s trying to get to grips with the implications. I’ve been getting up in the night with the scenes, conversations, descriptions, just pouring out of my subconscious. What an adrenaline rush!

  I’m buzzing with energy. Life feels good. Very good.

  30 SEPTEMBER—Yep, delusions have been shattered; no amount of smooth talking will expunge the facts or reinvent them in a more acceptable guise. No matter how hard I concentrate, no matter how determinedly I fight them, the muscles of my mouth and throat and tongue and lips seem periodically to gang up against me. It’s not always a problem but the occasional times it is, boy, is it frustrating!

  I’ve always had an absolute passion for clear diction and the melody of speech. It’s part of conveying the logic of one’s thinking processes. Now some insensitive thief has stolen my fencing rapier and replaced it with a pantomime sword.

  Certain consonants are particularly difficult, I find: p, b, t, d, k, g. It’s unbelievably painful hearing the imprecision. It hurts my sensibilities more than the bodily clumsiness. Language is my forte. And now more than ever I have to show them that my brain is still very much alive, no matter the disintegration of my physical shell.

  It’s becoming a daily challenge, to say things once and be instantly understood. That sudden heavy silence, the pitying look, the too-gentle request for me to repeat myself – it’s harder to deal with than anything else so far in this whole ghastly business.

  Something clenched its fingers hard around Naomi’s heart at this. It had been months after this entry before she had noticed anything. The realisation was brutal.

  It had been disconcerting, the way he stared at her sometimes before he spoke. Was he disgusted by what she’d said? Had he momentarily forgotten who she was?

  He seemed to be slipping away from her in a myriad of little deaths. To lose her communication link with him would be the cruellest punishment of all. She’d kept her fears locked out of his sight for weeks but one day he’d found her lying on the bed sobbing. He refused to leave until she’d confided in him. His explanation was slow but precise.