Right to Die

by Hazel McHaffie

  I’d understood both our guests were leaving on 30th but it transpired that only Paige was. She had to get back to work, having already taken a bonus day.

  ‘Accountants! Her boss doesn’t understand about hangovers,’ Joel grumbled.

  ‘Somebody needs to keep the wheels of society turning while you lay-abouts watch the world go by,’ she retorted with an affectionate grin.

  Joel, who has a propensity to work twenty-hour days keeping his computing business on its high-speed rails, pulled a face at her and turned the conversation back to which marmalade he was having this morning. Naomi is something of a preserver and keeps us supplied with jams and marmalades of varying degrees of exoticness, so the choice is rather more complicated and serious than he is used to.

  I was sorry to see Paige go. She’s great fun and good to talk to. And I’d say she’s a good influence on my erstwhile lunatic brother. While Joel ran her to the station, Naomi ran the vacuum cleaner round the downstairs rooms. I had elected to sort through the piles of papers and magazines and post that had accumulated but I must have dozed off, because I didn’t hear him return.

  When I did surface I could hear murmurings from the kitchen and when I staggered through, Naomi and he were perched on the high stools having a coffee. They were instantly all concern when they saw me but I honestly did feel better for the nap. And by the time I’d raised my caffeine levels, I was much more myself again.

  ‘So what’s on the agenda today?’ I asked. ‘It’s far too nice to be idle.’ The winter sun was glinting on the frosted leaves and the last ribbons of mist were vanishing from the valley.

  ‘Eeeh by gum, lad, tha’s a glutton for punishment, is tha,’ Joel said.

  ‘Can’t keep a good man down.’

  ‘What d’you feel like doing? I’m at your disposal.’

  ‘I feel like a good old tramp in the winter wonderland but the old legs have a different agenda.’ I kept it light. I think.

  ‘Nae probs!’

  Joel was off the stool and bounding from the room. Naomi and I looked at each other and she shrugged her shoulders. ‘Don’t ask me!’

  Next minute Joel was at the door.

  ‘Your chariot awaits. Let’s go, bro!’

  ‘You have to be kidding! Subject myself to a repeat of yesterday? I’d have to be insane as well as disabled!’

  ‘Scout’s honour,’ – he did the salute – ‘No alarms. No breaking the speed limit. Granny-pace all the way. Detours around every speck of gravel. Rolls Royce of a ride. Promise.’

  I looked from him to the wheelchair and back.

  ‘Where did you get that thing from, anyway?’

  ‘Friends in high places. Nothing that a little bribery and corruption won’t obtain. And a smidgeon of the O’Neill charm.’

  ‘Seriously, idiot. Is it stolen property?’

  ‘Insulting as well as ungrateful, huh? I don’t know why you put up with such a curmudgeon, Nay. Run away with me.’

  She hopped into the chair and he was off, leaving me alone and instantly in a better mood.

  By the time they returned, I’d managed to lean more comfortably against the work-surface and the change of weight-bearing relieved the pain in my back for a time.

  ‘Okay, your turn, Adam. You can vouch for my expert handling of this contraption, can’t you, Naomi?’

  ‘Indeed I can.’

  Still I hesitated.

  ‘Go on! Where’s your spirit of adventure? Naomi wants to go out. I want to go out. You want to go out. He, she and it want to go out. It’s a beautiful day; just the kind you’ve always liked; deep and crisp and even. And I for one am raring to go.’

  It took another thirty minutes to get me ready, and I was craven enough to insist on a solemn promise that he really would go carefully, before I let myself be eased into that chair. I also confessed to the problem with my neck. Between them they managed to hedge me about with pillows and sheepskins, and adjust the headrest to be an excellent support.

  It was well worth the sunk pride. The stark trees were etched in white, the leaves crunched beneath my wheels, our breath threaded through the still air like chiffon scarves, and Joel manhandled my chariot with consummate care. We stopped at a little café for farmhouse soup and crusty bread and a legitimate excuse to attend to my personal needs. The break gave me space to notice that Naomi had some colour back in her cheeks and a smile back in her eyes. I’ve been growing increasingly disturbed by her habitually drawn look. She needs Joel too.

  She took over pushing my chair on one of the straight runs but I was instantly tense. In the intimate departments, if I have to accept help, she’s my choice every time; but for the heavy-duty stuff, nope. I don’t want her injuring herself. Or our unborn child.

  Maybe I ought to take up Curtis’s offer of that nurse. Maybe.

  Noelani, curled up in her lap, stretched her legs out expansively and Naomi felt the sharp claws nick her skin. She stroked the warm fur back into a soporific purr, her own tension easing marginally in the process.

  She’d done her best to be subtle about it, and as she put her hand on the wheelchair, Joel had launched into a monologue about a New Year resolution he intended to make. But Adam wasn’t fooled. He’d turned immediately, in spite of the obvious pain involved, and given her a speaking look. When Joel eventually shut up, he’d questioned her strength, her stamina, her ability to bear his weight. It wasn’t a strain but she heard his resistance.

  Lydia might have a solution.

  Thankfully Joel took over again as soon as we started to go uphill. It seemed to be a mutually agreed thing; no discussion.

  My concern for Naomi notwithstanding, the walk was a vast improvement on being cooped up inside. The feel of the crisp air in my lungs, the constantly changing views, all without any effort on my part. It was a surprisingly smooth ride too – or was this only in contrast with yesterday’s nightmare? Having Joel there to accompany me to the gents was a bonus. In an unguarded moment I told him so, and he was in there like a flash.

  ‘I’ll come up as often as I can.’

  I instantly retracted and told him it was completely unnecessary, I’d manage.

  ‘Even if you don’t need it, Naomi does,’ he said simply.

  I stared at him.

  ‘You know I’m right. So, no arguments. I’ll be up.’ I opened my mouth to protest further but he cut me dead. ‘Besides, don’t you think I want to do something. You’re my one and only brother, for heaven’s sake.’

  Maybe I do need help to get around now, but I’m sure I could manage to steer myself if I had something motorised. And we could get these portable ramps (I’ll even check them out in Ursula Major’s wretched catalogues); then I can get in and out of the house myself. I needn’t put demands on Naomi. I needn’t disrupt Joel’s life.

  But this is a warning. I need to stay one jump ahead of them. They caught me on the back foot this time; I wasn’t prepared for the wheelchair sneaking in under false pretences. I do not want other people to hurry me on to the next stage. This is the rest of my life we’re talking about here. It’s my fight.

  It’ll be like preparing for battle: getting inside the heads of the enemy; divining their next move, thwarting their plans. Deciding myself when I need what. I’ll be the Lieutenant Colonel. Flamboyant red punctuating the black.

  Naomi drew back from the screen.

  ‘Oh, Adam. If you’d only known!’

  It was one thing knowing how much he rebelled against Ursula Major’s pressures, and the specialist nurse’s take-over bid, quite another matter to see herself as ‘the enemy’. It had been so hard not to go to his aid. Finding acceptable ways of helping taxed her ingenuity. It was Joel who had hit upon this particular master-stroke. The much-maligned Ursula and Lydia had acquired the wheelchair and arranged for its delivery to the surgery, storing it until Joel could collect it, take instruction in its use, secrete it away at the back of the garage over Christmas. Naomi had decorated it with balloons and lights for t
he race so that the first time Adam saw it, its true function was disguised.

  She smiled ruefully, thinking of Lydia’s horror had she seen Adam being jolted at breakneck speed over the race-course. But the very unsuitability of this initiation had been the camouflage to smuggle in serious assistance. And thanks to Joel’s quick thinking, the transition had been achieved with all the appearance of respectable serendipity.

  She closed her eyes, shutting out Adam’s rebellion.

  ‘Thank you, Joel. You’re a star,’ she whispered.

  31 DECEMBER—The end of 2007. A day when I feel as if I’m saying goodbye, not to a year, but to my life.

  A year ago I was relying on a snippet of lingerie and a quick wit to get me through the tricky moments as the year died; today I’m relying on Joel. I’m not sure if his extended stay is to support Naomi, or because he thinks he won’t see me again, or what. I daren’t ask. I hate seeing her so pale and tired, knowing I am the root cause. I hate seeing him changing from being my lunatic kid brother because of me. They are my links with the me I used to be, and for my sanity I need them to stay a step outside the life I know now. But there is no escape for Naomi while I live, and Joel’s just reminded me that she needs him to be tuned into the trauma, to stand behind her, perhaps even alongside her, in the safety net.

  Would it be easier to have the MND nurse…?

  Maybe. No! She’ll have me mutilating my beautiful house with ugly stair-lifts and double handrails. Turn me into a certified invalid. A wheelchair today; a hoist next month… where will it all end?

  This is not good. I need to be robust for midnight.

  Even Aidan is adding to my melancholy. His story used to be my salvation; no longer. I’m only a few chapters from the finale. The end is in sight – in both senses. But his death throes have become mine. I don’t want to let go of him. I want to howl at the futility of it all. But I cannot – must not – inflict my grief for him onto Naomi; she has sorrow enough of her own.

  Early evening I had to get out of the house.

  Joel fell in with my plan with alacrity and managed to turn the whole thing into a dangerous undercover escapade. He drove us to the supermarket and we invested in some decent bubbly and some nibbles. And a vast bouquet of seasonal flowers and berries for Naomi. It was my first time there in a wheelchair but he loaded me up with the shopping so that I looked more like a trolley than a customer.

  Julie from down the road was the only person we met whom I knew and she was polite enough not to comment.

  ‘Well done for the Boxing Day race!’ she said. ‘We were over at the in-laws on the 26th but I saw your picture in the paper. Looked like a lot of fun.’

  ‘Totally,’ Joel said smugly. ‘And did you hear what we raised? We, as in everybody, of course. Two thousand five hundred and twenty-three pounds and four pence! And if I discover who magnanimously contributed that four pence, I’ll personally reimburse him!’

  We all grinned and parted with good wishes for the New Year. Even that rang hollowly. Good wishes for… what? An easy death? A quick end? I know she wasn’t even thinking of it. What else can people say?

  Joel prattled on cheerfully all the way home. There was so much I wanted to say to him; nothing I could say. Not if I’m to get through this.

  Now I’ve written it down I’m hoping I can let it rest and go out into this last evening of 2007 with a blank slate. I want the two people I love best in the world to remember the occasion with pride.

  Naomi’s precarious composure could take no more. She buried her face on her arms there in front of his diary and wept for all he had lost.

  2 JANUARY 2008—I was too raw to even enter my study yesterday. Today I need to cleanse my mind and regroup, ready for the rest of my life.

  Naomi is out at the sales; the house is mine. If I scream and howl, there is no one to hear me.

  Mother declined our invitation to see the New Year in with us. Standard excuses: she can’t cope with late nights – never could; she doesn’t support heathen traditions like Hogmanay. I half-wondered whether she might make an exception this year, but no. Joel popped over to see her at around 8, but I couldn’t face her.

  Is there no end to my brother’s ingenuity? With fifteen minutes left of the old year, he suddenly produced paper and pens.

  ‘You’ll have the advantage here, Adam, words being the tools of your trade. I guess I ought to handicap you, but since I’m in Santa-Claus-mode tonight, I’ll be generous. At the top of your sheet you’ll see ‘NEW YEAR’ written. When I say, ‘Go,’ you have to start writing down all the words, three letters or more, you can make out of those letters. I’ll leave the TV on low to be sure we hear the bells at midnight and at that precise moment it’s pens down. The person who has the most words by then is the winner. Legitimate words, mind you, Mr Clever Clogs, and you can bet your life, if I smell a rat, I’ll look yours up in the Oxford Dictionary. On your marks, go!’

  That fourteen minutes or so passed like so many seconds. As Big Ben struck, we all shrieked, ‘Happy New Year!’ and exchanged the obligatory embraces, but were then instantly catapulted into wrangling over spellings and the authenticity of the more outlandish offerings. It was perfect. Not because I won the competition, but because Joel beat the odds for us all.

  Soon after that he went to bed leaving a strange silence behind him. Naomi broke it.

  ‘It’s a fabulous night. Look.’

  With difficulty, I turned in my chair to face the garden. It was bathed in milky moonlight, not a breath of wind stirring the trees. The glow of the fairy-lights Joel had hung round our solitary outside Christmas tree was softened by a slight mistiness. As I looked, a lone fox stole out of the shadows and stood staring brazenly back at us. Both he and I seemed to hold our breath.

  With his departure, I turned back without a word and held out my hand to Naomi. Though she responded instantly, kneeling beside my chair, her head against my side, she contrived to keep her eyes averted from mine.

  ‘Thanks, Naomi… for everything.’

  I couldn’t continue. She couldn’t reply.

  Weeping together brought us closer together in that poignant moment at the start of my last year than any brave pretence could. We stayed awake talking well into the small hours.

  After all the excitement of the past few days and the emotional trauma of the night, I was feeling pretty fragile when I eventually dragged myself through the shower this morning.

  I was dreading saying goodbye to Joel.

  He’d already breakfasted and was muffled in his coat and scarf when I appeared.

  ‘What kind of an hour, d’you call this?’ he asked, tapping his watch and glaring at me in mock reproach.

  ‘Civilised?’ I ventured.

  ‘Positively countrified! No wonder we city slickers call this the backwoods.’

  ‘Since when did you become a lark?’ I retorted.

  ‘Since the New Year!’

  Under cover of the laughter, he advanced and took me in a bear hug, talking all the time.

  ‘I leave it to you to coax my renegade brother into the middle lane of life in my absence, Naomi, and for goodness’ sake get him into something more respectable before polite society gets a glimpse of him!’

  I glanced down involuntarily at my loose trousers and polo-neck jumper. He had a point. But before I could form a reply, he had hugged Naomi and departed with a wave and a sepulchral, ‘I’ll be back’. It was on the tip of my tongue to respond, ‘I may be gone some time’, but the connotations hit me in time to bite it back.

  A tyre track was all that was left by the time we got to the door.

  It was impossible to fill the void alone.

  Naomi coped by tackling the debris of celebration. I did my best to clear out the grate but succeeded only in getting ash all over the carpet, and was forced to abandon the attempt.

  ‘Give me a sit-down job, Naomi,’ I pleaded.

  I got the sprouts, carrots and potatoes on a lap tray. Even the basic
s take forever these days.

  Plenty of time to reflect. Too much.

  ‘What d’you think of Paige?’ I called through to her.

  ‘I liked her.’

  ‘She and Joel seem pretty close.’

  ‘Yes. And she must be keen, coming up here for Christmas.’

  I had my own ideas about that. Why do you ask a girl to see for herself your brother’s got a crippling disease, to find out about the family history of depression, suicide, religious fervour? Not exactly a pretty backcloth to romance. Is it testing time before he lets himself get serious?

  ‘Joel’s changed.’ I said.

  ‘Mmmmmhhhm.’

  ‘D’you think she’s right for him?’ I persisted.

  ‘Who knows?’

  I must write that card to him today. I owe him, big time.

  Joel had assumed that she’d ordered the crate of vintage wine but she’d known nothing about it. The handwriting in the card that arrived two days later, though, that was unmistakably Adam’s: ‘For my favourite brother. Thanks for transforming the season.’

  He’d choked over the words, repeating them on the phone.

  ‘You know what kills me? Thinking… this is the last time… for everything.’

  3 JANUARY—Is it time to relinquish ties with work?

  Every year there’s a bit of a bash to celebrate the end of another productive year; a chance for the riff-raff to hob-nob with the elite, a touch of mutual back-slapping, that kind of thing. This year’s bonding was scheduled for a posh hotel in the centre of town. Ground-floor access. All on one level. Ideal. Naomi came with me, so no difficulties about getting there, and I used her as my support to avoid the problem of negotiating a crowded room. So far so good.

  Naomi doesn’t often accompany me to work functions – we’re both so busy there isn’t time to duplicate effort – so loads of people stopped to speak to her, which meant our progress was painfully slow, even for me. Standing, bearing my own weight – she knows it’s a problem! Why couldn’t she remember it? Even holding my head up is an effort these days. But have you ever tried walking into a party and saying, ‘Mine’s a double whisky and a neck brace’? I spent my time propping my chin on one hand or leaning against the wall.