by Lisa Swallow
“Talk to me about it,” I say, surprising myself.
“About what?”
“Everything. I can’t deal with my shit tonight; maybe I’ll give yours a go.”
“Your perfect little life with Sky, not happening?”
“Don’t swing back into being nasty again. I want to help you, Jem.”
“Do you? Really? What if I’m beyond help? What if this is who I am and that’s all.”
“Your choice.”
For once, I’m also submerged in drugs and alcohol, lending me understanding to Jem’s perspective of the world. I’m a mess; I want to obliterate what’s going on; otherwise, I’ll sit and obsess about Sky all evening.
“Want to get a few beers and talk about shit?” I ask Jem.
Jem’s eyes widen and he smirks. “Oh, yeah?”
“You and me. Old times.” He opens his mouth to reply. “Just not the girls, you and me. St Davids you and me. Been a while.”
Jem’s face softens into a memory. “Sure, I’m not drinking the shitty cider though.”
We smirk at each other; the biggest link between us for months forged.
I flop into the armchair when we get back to Jem’s suite. He disappears into the bathroom and I wait amongst the chaos of his room. He hasn’t rock and roll trashed the place, but if I didn’t know Jem, I’d be alarmed he’d been robbed. Empty bottles and overflowing ashtrays adorn every surface - I guess Jem doesn’t care about the hotel’s no smoking policy.
I attempt to call Sky a couple of times but there’s no answer. Then I remember it’s 5am over there and give up. In response, I pick up a half-empty bottle of whisky and tip the contents into a glass. Two glasses later, Jem appears from the bathroom in track pants, shirtless. Wet hair curls in tendrils around his pale face and I can see his eyes more clearly. For once, they’re not as glazed.
Room service knocks and Jem goes to the door. I hear a brief exchange and a giggle, groaning inwardly that Jem might invite her in. A sneaky groupie?
Thankfully, all Jem wheels in is the trolley of junk food. Pizza. Instantly, Sky enters my mind. How she’s not only thousands of miles away, but also a life away. There are chips too and Jem grabs a plate, stuffing a handful into his mouth.
“Fuck, she was hot. Didn’t have a friend though, so thought there’s no point asking her in.” He grabs the TV remote and flicks on the TV.
“There’s no point because I’m not screwing a random chick, Jem.”
“Sky’s not here. She won’t know.”
Jem shovels more chips into his mouth and I watch him incredulously. He still doesn’t get what’s between Sky and me.
“What’re you going to do?” he asks, leaving the TV on a music channel and tossing the remote to one side.
“Get very, very drunk.”
“Nah. About the other shit?”
“What can I do? Going to have to face shit and go back to England if I want to see Sky.”
“So, get arrested?”
“Wouldn’t be the first time.” I chuckle, relieved the world retreats as numbness spreads through me.
Jem grins back. “Yeah. Never this, though. Lily’s lost her shit. She won’t win.”
“Don’t want to talk about this crap, man.” I don’t want to think about anything, just wipe myself out and then tomorrow I’ll deal.
As the alcohol fills our bodies, we rewind to old times, discussing everything from teachers we hated at school to early days of the band and stupid crap, we got up to when we were teens. Jem loosens up, and for the first time in over a year, I feel a glimmer of the closeness we once had.
“You’re into this chick big?” asks Jem when we’re half way through our second bottle.
Sky swims across my drunken mind. “Sky. Not just ‘this chick’. Fucking love her, Jem. You don’t get it.”
He studies my face. “Yeah, I get it now. Maybe I didn’t, thought she was playing with you.”
I swig from the bottle, tiredness creeping over me. “You and Liv? Never saw you with a girl longer than a week before her. Not for a lot of years, anyway.”
Jem’s mouth pulls straight. “She was cool. Special. Dunno, maybe vulnerable is what did it. I wanted to take care of her and look what I did. I fucking killed her.”
“You didn’t kill her.”
“They were my drugs, Dylan,” he says quietly, speaking to his bare feet. “We had a fight. I left and she took too much. So yeah, it was me.”
This is the story he told the police, about the fight. There weren’t any drugs found at the scene and they couldn’t arrest him for that. Unease creeps along my spine.
“Do you think she took too much on purpose?” This was heavily denied in the press, the finger firmly pointed at her involvement with Jem.
“Maybe. She was screwed up.”
“What about?”
“Family life. Abuse, that shit. You don’t know the half of it. If I ever met any of her fucked up family, I swear I’d end up in court for kicking the shit out of one of them.” He blinks and rubs a hand across his head. “Maybe I was trying to save her from her world. She thought she could help me too, but all we did was obliterate each other’s lives.”
Jem’s words show insight I wasn’t aware he still had. I want to press the issue, find out what’s beneath his layers but Jem stands, pacing around and running his hands through his tangled hair.
“Don’t kill yourself as well,” I tell him. “You’re worth more than this.”
He fixes me with brown eyes, eyes of someone lost within himself. “Who ever made me worth anything? Living life day to day until the end suits me. One thing this shit with Liv taught me. Live.” He chuckles. “Ironic, fucking name. Yeah, I’ll do what I can because as the old cliché goes, life’s too fucking short. I have my music, my money…”
“And a huge fucking hole in your life you’re filling with drugs. Again. Go to rehab, Jem.”
Jem turns away and lights a cigarette. “What’s the point? Been there, done that. Life’s the same when I leave.” He inhales the smoke sharply and holds it in his lungs.
“Life won’t change if you don’t.”
He exhales. “I just said I don’t want life to change.”
“Yeah? You could have life bigger, brighter, and happy. Not this.”
“Aww, Dylan. I just need the love of a good woman, like you, huh?”
Beneath the sarcasm, the truth lies behind his jealousy over Sky and the reason Lily fucked things up between us to the extent they did. His dark past stretches further behind than mine.
Aware we’re returning to a subject that’ll fuck up our ceasefire, I return to my drink.
And I’m tired. Unbelievably tired and drunker than I thought. The spinning room darkens and I’m struggling to keep up with the conversation. Resting my head on the back of the sofa, I struggle for breath. Great, this shitty cold is moving to my lungs. Fucking perfect. Jem’s talking but his words are distant, retreating into a vacuum surrounding me. Sky’s face drifts into my thoughts, smiling and happy on the island in the sun.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Sky
I always thought ‘time stands still’ was an exaggeration, like in the movies when there’s a momentary pause before a bomb goes off and fills the screen with chaos. Wrong. The surreal world I live in freeze-frames for a second then explodes with the intensity of a supernova. Dropping the phone, I stumble against the sofa. Why is this all so hard?
“Sky?” A distant voice comes from the phone and I pick it back up, blinking away the darkness covering my eyes.
“What happened?” My voice croaks.
“We don’t think Dylan meant to do this,” says Liam, voice faint on the bad connection from the States.
Of course, he didn’t, I want to yell, he fucking loves me, and he wouldn’t do this. “What happened?” I repeat, voice stronger.
“Medication and alcohol. Nobody knew,” continues Liam.
“Steve knew!” I yell, “Steve fucking knew!�
��
There’s a silence. “Okay, maybe he thought Dylan had stopped since he met you.”
“Are you saying it’s my fault for not being there?” I demand. “Don’t you dare!”
“No, Sky. He just got wasted with Jem, drowning his sorrows. He’d taken some sort of pills he was prescribed then drank too much. We think he’d taken some painkillers too. At least he was with someone.”
Stories of stars dying alone in hotel rooms filter through the horror. This happens. And this nearly happened to Dylan.
“Where is he?”
“He’s here, at the hospital. He’s gonna be fine, just needs watching until everything’s out of his system. He wasn’t out long before Jem called the ambulance so no damage.”
“Can I talk to him?”
“He’s sleeping, Sky.”
Shock abates to silent tears, as I hold in the anguish. I have Tara in hospital here, Dylan in hospital over there. I’m torn in two. “I want to come back to the States.”
“Sure, we can arrange that. I’ll get Steve on it.”
What do I ask? Say? “Will you tell me when he wakes up? I need to talk to him.”
“Of course.”
When the call ends, I stare at my phone as if the object is guilty for bringing me more bad news. Dylan almost overdosed because of medication he shouldn’t take, a cocktail to erase the pain.
And I know the one thing that tipped him over the edge.
****
I storm from my flat, wrapped up against the winter weather, scarf wound around my head in the hope of disguising myself. Still numb from Liam’s call, I walk along the street focusing on where I’m going. Bus stop. Hospital.
I halt.
Three men with cameras block my way; if I want to get to the bus stop, I need to pass them. I spin back around as someone calls my name. Wrapping the scarf higher across my face in an attempt to disguise my teary eyes, I walk away. Footsteps follow, rapidly catching up.
“Sky! What’s happening with Dylan Morgan?”
I bend my head and keep walking; my heart charging adrenaline around my body. My scalp prickles, anger coursing throughout me, at life, at Lily, at them. Someone pushes a camera into my face and snaps my resolve of the last few weeks.
“Leave me alone!” I scream at the young guy holding the camera. His sandy blonde hair flops across his forehead and he’s wearing a smug look I want to smack off his face. The camera flashes. “I said leave me the hell alone!”
I attempt to grab the camera from his hands, but he has the strap wound around his arm. Another man approaches, slightly older with curly brown hair who looks like he spends more time waiting around eating than chasing people down the street. He doesn’t show concern for the guy I’m grappling with, instead gleefully photographing the incident.
I turn to him and seize his camera too. He’s off guard and I manage to get it out of his hands. “Stop doing this to me!”
The camera crashes to the floor as I fling it across the street.
“You stupid bitch! That’s criminal damage!” snarls the man. The first guy laughs and takes his turn at photographing me.
Worried the guy whose camera I broke might attack me, I turn and run down the street, the adrenaline of the encounter flooding my already anxious system. I chew the inside of my cheek, desperate to stop the tears in case someone else is around to take more photographs. I veer around a young woman, holding a little girl’s hand, almost knocking her out of the way.
“Sorry,” I say breathlessly and continue.
No footsteps follow, but I don’t turn. I stumble back through the heavy front door of my flat and slam it closed. Breath coming in short pants, I squeeze my eyes closed. This is reminiscent of the day the world discovered who I was. This will always be my life if I’m with Dylan.
Only this time, the thought of losing Dylan sickens me more than any threat to my privacy. We need to get out, create a niche somewhere between our worlds and live there.
Back in the flat, I collapse on the sofa. I need to leave before the ghouls appear at my door, screaming for pictures and information. Reluctantly, I call the number Dylan gave me if I needed help or changed my mind about leaving my flat.
I can’t stay in England while Dylan’s in the mess he’s in. Defeated again, I head to my room to pack. Before I go, I need to visit Tara and although she won’t be aware, I hope she understands.
****
The large black Audi pulls up around the rear of the hospital and I slip out. Not wanting to hang around in the busy car park for long, I tell the driver to come back in an hour. The smartly dressed man nods but his lined face creases with concern. “I was told to take you straight to the airport.”
“I’m a big girl, I make my own decisions. If there’s any problem, I’ll call you.”
I’ve attempted to cover my state of fear and grief with make-up and wrapped a different coloured scarf around my head. I’m half-expecting the police to appear and arrest me for smashing the dickhead photographer’s camera. Managing to get out of my house before more photographers arrived amazed me; a couple appear but news about Dylan still filters from the other side of the Atlantic.
The neon strip-lights in the hospital hurt my sore eyes as I head toward the room Tara is in, hunched down against life. This news is huge; a new episode in the Blue Phoenix soap opera that’s taken hold this year, dead girlfriends, arrest warrants for rape, and now Dylan’s overdose. The early reports I’ve caught suggest this was deliberate, and fanciful stories of how the rape charge and our breakup has caused his suicide attempt ripple across the media.
My time at the hospital is limited; of everybody caught up in this, I’m the most accessible and I’m in a public place. The world and his dog know I currently spend the majority of my days at Bristol Royal Infirmary.
There’s no change to Tara’s situation. Her perpetually haunted looking partner sits outside the room, head against the wall and eyes closed. I can’t tell if he’s asleep or not, and I creep past.
Every time I see Tara, I want to cry. I try to hide this from her parents and Tom, and marvel at their strength. Each time I come here, I wait for the news they can’t do any more for her.
My awareness of how precious life is, and how it can be cut short at any time, increased a hundred times this last week. I haven’t experienced grief before, not really. Both my parents are alive, as are the grandparents I know. My life pre-Grant breakup was constant and steady and I never expected anything to change. I had my life planned and compartmentalised, right down to how many children I’d have, where we’d live in five, ten, and twenty years. Because of this, I pushed away a world of opportunity, denying a chance of happiness because of some weird belief that I have total control over my life.
As I look at the pale-faced person in the bed who is a shadow of my best friend, I know this isn’t true. Happiness should be seized from wherever it comes because there’s no guarantee you’ll find happiness where you want. Dylan’s early words about love and logic resonate. Why did I ever deny something real in the hope of something else coming along that fitted my opinion on what’s correct?
As I sit here, I imagine Dylan too. Is he still unconscious? What does ‘accidental overdose’ mean? What if Liam only told me half a story and he’s really sick. Despite the pull to be with my best friend of twelve years, I know I have to return to Dylan.
I spend a while with Tara, listening to the funnelled noises of the hospital - footsteps, quiet voices, and the machines in the room - willing her to wake up so I can say goodbye. There’s no movement and I end by kissing her cheek, heart ripped apart in my chest in case this is the last time I see her. When I turn, Tom hovers in the doorway and he catches sight of the tears in my eyes. I’m about to ask the question when he shakes his head.
“No better?” I ask hoarsely.
A muscle in Tom’s cheek twitches as if he’s trying not to break down. I don’t know him well, but we’ve comforted each other the last few days and I
hold him, wishing he were Tara, and hope I can pass on to him the strength he needs. His muscles are stiff, and he smells of the sterility of the hospital.
“You’ll tell me as soon as anything changes?” I ask.
He nods, still not speaking.
“Okay. Tell Jim and Carol I called in.” I’d hoped Tara’s parents would be here, so I could try to give them some strength too; but in a way, I’m happy they’re taking a break. Her mum’s vigil by her daughter’s bed broke my heart. Mothers shouldn’t have to watch their children in Tara’s state.
I hitch my leather handbag onto my shoulder as I leave the room, rummaging inside for my purse. I need some quiet, to contemplate everything and get my head together to face the next challenge. Finding a quiet corner, behind a fake plant I sit and sip a can of Coke from the vending machine. Caffeine probably isn’t the best idea as my heart races, but I want to stay awake as long as I can. Once I’m on the plane, I won’t be able to get any updates about Dylan.
Between the plant fronds, I watch people go by. In this part of the hospital, the only visitors are sombre. Confused looking children hold tightly to the hands of serious faced adults; aware something is wrong but not exactly what. The palpable sadness of the ICU isn’t brightened by the yellow paintwork or colourful pictures of tropical paradises. A boy hugging a bunch of flowers, a mix of pink roses and carnations, glances at me and I smile weakly. Nobody else pays any attention to the sad girl on the plastic seat in the corner.
A girl appears through the door the boy came through, and heads toward the reception desk along the corridor. Her long, Scandinavian blonde hair tucked behind her ears catches my attention. I’ve only met her once, but the memory of this girl’s face is seared on my mind, so when she turns to head in this direction, I know who she is.
Every muscle in my body stiffens, and I fight down the desire to walk across and shake her, scream at her ‘why?’ Why is she trying to fuck up my life with Dylan? The girl doesn’t see me, and when I step out from my hidden corner, she halts in surprise.
“I take it you’re not here to see Tara?” I ask in a low voice.
Her face pales, which is no mean feat considering how light-skinned she is, then her cheeks redden.
