by Finn Bell
“You smell terrible and there’s mud on your face. I’ve already sent Tobe to clean himself. Off you go, you know where the downstairs bathroom is,” Margaret says with the tone of someone used to being obeyed.
“Did you—” I start saying to Maria before she interrupts me. “I already put your bag in there,” she says. We don’t live together and because I often have to do shift work I keep a bag of spare clothes at Maria’s place. One of the small mercies of your partner refusing to marry you, I think ruefully as I head off to clean myself.
I turn the hot water all the way up to scalding and just stand there in the mindless, glorious heat as my brain throws up random pieces of the day. For some reason I find myself thinking back to just after the explosions, when Tobe found the family picture on the ground among the debris next to the house. I remember the image; everyone was there, smiling by their Christmas tree. Younger faces from a happier time. William was still just a young boy in that photo. I realise now that I know all the other faces as they look today. Everyone but William. But he looked just like his father, that’s what Enid the retired school teacher said in the coffee shop.
As I go through the absent-minded motions of washing myself I wonder why William dying like he did makes all this seem so much worse. How did Becca Patrick put it? It will be big news because now even worse things are happening to good people who’ve already had bad things happen to them before. And she’s right, because we feel that it’s too much badness, it’s not fair anymore. First your son, your brother gets cancer, and then you miraculously manage to save him only to have him die in the street right in front of you. And then today happens. It’s not fair, not right. All of this happening to one family. It’s too much. Like there’s some deep-down, built-in, universal expectation in all of us that while bad things will happen it won’t ever be too much. The world will test us but not break us. Like somehow, we’ll all get just as much bad stuff as we can handle and no more. Because otherwise it wouldn’t be fair. And life is fair. Must be.
My musings are derailed as I get out of the shower to see the words ‘STOP ME’ clearly outlined on my forehead in solid black capital letters.
For a moment I worry that I did actually get a concussion from being knocked over by the explosion, then I look down at my discarded Happy Hearts Daffodil Trust hat and notice a folded pamphlet tucked into the lining.
When I unfold it, I see that it reads ‘STOP METHANPHETAMINE’ and my sweat must have transferred the first letters to my skin. As I turn it over I see that it’s a pamphlet for a fundraiser featuring the face of Doctor Angus Wu, under a strident message urging parents to help “Fight the growing dangers of drug addiction in our small, unspoilt town of Lawrence.” Yeah, I think, grimacing as I toss the pamphlet in the trash. After today people will look back at this as a more innocent time.
* * *
I’m on my second far-too-strong gin and tonic, trying not to think of the case, when dinner conversation inevitably turns to events in Lawrence and the usual isn’t-it-all-too-terrible platitudes when Margaret says, “Well no, it’s not. I saw the news and it actually made me feel really good.”
“Giving us some context may help mother,” Tobe says when he catches our uncertain expressions.
“Now Tobe insists on disagreeing with me but he’s always been such a kind-hearted boy and he does suffer greatly from both philosophy and spirituality,” Margaret says as she reaches over to pat his hand. “And you can’t use exceptions and anecdotal evidence to prove the norm. If anything, what I heard today proves my point exactly because it is so unusual. When push comes to shove most parents will choose themselves over their children.”
“Pardon?” I say, realising now where Tobe gets his habit of saying things out of the blue as if everyone else is on the same page.
“I assume this is about the media coverage of the Chens and the Blacks?” Tobe comments.
“Indeed, think about the stories on the news. The Chens gave up everything they had to find a cure for their son’s cancer, and this Sam Black walks out of terminal care, with what must be the certain knowledge that in doing so he is killing himself, just for the slim hope of helping his child one last time,” Margaret states.
“This is news exactly because it is unusual. People are drawn to the stories not because they speak to a deeper truth of the sanctity of a parent’s love that we all share, but because they offer the glimmer of hope that the opposite is not in fact the much harsher truth. The attraction these stories hold comes from us sensing the difference between how things are and how they ought to be,” she adds.
“Which, ironically mother, is an apt definition of spirituality in the first place,” Tobe counters. “And you have yet to provide any proof that parents normally choose themselves above their children. The fact that most people in most countries around the world survive to adulthood would imply that you’re wrong. And, I must add, I still fail to see why any of this would leave you feeling good.”
“We’ll get to that, but first let me say that managing to grow older is not the same as actually succeeding in growing up,” Margaret replies. “I spent 30 years in psychiatry and I can tell you that while many people are able to act like they are healthy, normal adults on the outside, this is far from the truth. Why do you think the world is such a mess dear boy? When I retired, the most conservative global estimates for mental illness were one in every four people and most research now suggests it’s closer to one in three. All over the world. And that excludes cases from war-torn countries or those who are poverty stricken or had some traumatic life event happen. It even discounts people with genetic predispositions to mental illnesses. That means one in three otherwise healthy, normal people have a mental illness without any reason we can see.
“It usually shows up in the late teens or early twenties,” Margaret continues, “so it’s not like they’ve even had much life in which to make themselves sick. It appears as if they have everything they need to grow up healthy and yet so many of them end up broken so young. It’s because they don’t in fact have everything they need. The only thing that could reliably explain a phenomenon so pervasive on a global scale must be something fundamental. It must be the parent child relationship. And we already know this relationship is crucial to becoming a healthy adult.
“It probably wouldn’t surprise any of you to hear that children in foster care, or who are homeless or are separated from their parents at an early age, are up to five times more likely to develop mental illness than kids who grow up in what we think of as normal families. But that still doesn’t account for one in three people becoming mentally ill who are from these so-called normal families. This is because normal families don’t actually exist. We like to think most parents love their children to the point where they would do anything for them, and most would say so when asked, but it’s simply not true. The balance of evidence suggests the opposite. Because most parents will choose themselves over their children. Even if they would never admit it,” Margaret concludes.
“I’m still failing to see the happy in all this Margaret,” I say.
“Look, regardless of whether the parents are ever confronted with this choice or not, the child can still sense it. The child knows what love and care are even before they have the capacity to understand it or the language to express it. It’s instinct, biology, he or she has an inbuilt need to be loved and cared for and when that need doesn’t get met it hurts and eventually the pain makes them sick, mentally ill.
“We see echoes of it in nature. We know female animals will abandon their young to their deaths if their own survival requires it. A starving polar bear will eat her own cub to live rather than allow it to suckle on her past the point of her own survival. Yet when it comes to human beings we seem unwilling to accept the same truth, even ignoring the overwhelming balance of proof found in emotional, physical and sexual abuse and neglect rates, not to mention the dubious reasons behind many adoptions and abortions.
“I p
ut it to you that to find a parent who undeniably loves their child and will literally do anything for them, even sacrificing themselves like these stories we hear today, is rare. That’s why they are so touching to us all. Most children are raised because in modern civilisation it is more convenient for the parent to do so than not. Children can sense it. Now thankfully most parents aren’t forced to choose their own survival over their children’s, but the truth seeps through to the child in smaller ways in any case. Like when parents put their own needs above that of their children in their day-to-day lives. Kids know it, they can feel it. They know their parents won’t really be there for them, won’t choose them at the cost of their own lives. Their worlds are wrong and eventually it makes them sick.”
“Margaret, if all this is true and Sam Black is one of your special people who actually loves his kid despite the norm, then why did Remu Black turn out to be such an ambitious criminal?” I ask.
“Ah, now you’re confusing sanity with morality. I think you get that from Tobe. Being an evil person isn’t the same as being an insane one,” Margaret says.
“And yet both goodness and sanity are only possible if a person is able to sense external reality,” Tobe says, “which first requires a mind healthy enough to do so. My mother is implying that you can’t separate evil or insanity from illness,” Tobe adds, then continues with a smile. “I feel like I have to apologise to you Maria. Mother and I enjoy robust debate and while this topic may seem dire I can assure you that between the two of us my mother, whom I am certain loves me more than herself despite her argument,” Tobe says, taking a moment to smile at his happily nodding mother, “is in fact by far the more optimistic of the two of us.”
“It’s ok,” Maria says with genuine enthusiasm. “This isn’t our usual dinner conversation and I spend my working days with seven-year olds so it’s seldom this thought-provoking. But I like to hear new perspectives, new ideas.”
“Well I’m not buying it Margaret,” I say. “I’m not saying that most people aren’t messed up somehow, I’m right with you there, even if most people don’t want to see it. But I don’t think you can take all the ways people end up going wrong and boil it down to one simple cause and go ‘aha’. Things just aren’t that simple.”
“Oh I agree,” Margaret says. “If we went around the world and looked at each instance of those one in three people then there would be unique factors that helped things go wrong in each of them. But you’d also find those same factors in many cases where nothing went wrong at all. I’m saying the difference is going to be more basic, deeper. It’s going to be whether your parents loved you more than themselves.”
“I agree with Nick,” Tobe says. “It’s a compelling theory Mother, and as romantic as most of your notions, but without real proof it remains just that.”
“And yet if you can disprove all other possible causes for an event then whatever remains, however implausible, must be the truth,” Margaret debates. “And soon this will become more than just a theory. We’ve already passed the point where brain scanning technology can tell us with surprising accuracy in real time exactly what chemicals are released in the brain as a person lives through their day. In a few years it will be cheap and easy enough to stick some sensors on the side of someone’s head and get a clear idea of exactly what they are feeling every day. Chemicals don’t lie. What if we did that with parents? You really think the results would show that every parent loves every child?” Margaret asks.
“Ok Margaret, lay it out for us,” I say. “You’ve drawn out a pretty dark cloud here so the silver lining better be good.”
“I don’t need to convince you Nick. The argument will do that on its own. It just takes time, and you don’t even need to be in a line of work like yourself that confronts you first-hand with the things broken people are capable of. Even Maria will be able to tell you which of her kids have better parents and which don’t, although she probably never would,” Margaret says, gesturing at Maria.
After a moment’s hesitation Maria nods and says, “Yes, I’d say that’s true. None of us would ever say anything openly, not even teacher to teacher. And it’s not like we really know because we don’t follow our students home, but if you work with young children like I do then it’s difficult to ignore. Most seven-year olds are so full of life; everything is new and fun to them and it’s like they have endless amounts of hope and hunger for the world, so it’s easy to see the ones who don’t. The ones who seem sad or angry too often. And then you meet the parents and immediately you think, ‘Oh, that’s why’.
“It’s hard, because you can’t ever say anything or do anything to help them unless there’s actual abuse going on. There’s no ‘love your child better’ law and no way we can prove or disprove it. And I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s had a really good kid and then met their parents and privately wished I could take them home and raise them myself. Or seen how good some parents are with their kids and wish I could give all the troubled kids in my class to them. You can’t say these things. But it’s there.
“The closest we come to openly discussing it is when teachers talk to other teachers at the end of the school year to tell them the kids with problems to watch out for in their class next year. Too often we all notice that problem kids have difficult parents. Then a few years later, when puberty hits, you hear about the same kids but with bigger problems like fights, drugs and suicide,” Maria says. “I don’t know Nick. It happens every year and I do wonder.”
“See, it’s already happening,” Margaret remarks. “But there is a silver lining as you said Nick. That’s why I feel good. It’s what struck me when I was watching the news today. If it is indeed true that most parents will choose themselves rather than their children, then consider the implication of the opposite actually being the case, however uncommon this might be.
“Imagine how rare, how fortunate we are, to have parents and children who are part of the very few who do love the other more than themselves. How special. It made me think of my own parents and I’m sure. I think of Tobe and I know. It fills me with a sense of gratitude because I can see no reason but luck, no way I could have earned or deserved this above anyone else, and it gives me such sympathy for the people who’ve never known it.”
* * *
“So anyway, that’s Tobe’s mum. Unfortunately she comes with the package. I’ve done what I can to shield you from her so far. And hopefully me being an amazing lover will sway the balance even now,” I say to Maria as we’re driving back in her car on the way to her place.
“I like her. She thinks about things, we need more people like that,” Maria replies.
“Oh, trust me, Tobe comes out with enough pearls of wisdom on his own. I’m just happy I only ever experience two of them at a time. Can you imagine what the conversation is like at their family reunions?” I ask.
“Stop it, they’re good people,” Maria says. “And they’re sweet to each other. And she likes you, I don’t know why you say different. She told me you’re good for Tobe too, said that you help keep him grounded.”
“Aww, and they say gin doesn’t say nice things about people,” I reply, eliciting a gentle punch on the shoulder from Maria.
“Margaret does mix a mean gin though,” I continue. “And I have to say that second glass tasted a lot like I would be trying to seduce you tonight.”
“For shame Mr Cooper, it’s a school night,” Maria replies, smiling at me. “Besides, I know you, you’re not coming in. You’ve barely said a word all night, neither has Tobe. You’re not going to sleep tonight, you’re going to toss and turn and eventually go sit up at 3:00 a.m. and think about this case and then have to drink too much coffee to keep going tomorrow.”
“Hey, I fall asleep like clockwork between 10:00 and 10:30,” I reply, receiving a look from Maria.
“Ok, 10:30 sometimes 4:00,” I say. “But this time could be different, I could be growing as a person and what not.”
“You want a bet offi
cer? This isn’t my first rodeo you know. It’ll be you and Tobe and goodness knows how many others. I don’t know if it’s a guy thing or cop thing or both but it’s a thing. You can’t let things go, not even for a night,” Maria says, sounding like the thought bothers her more than she’s letting on.
“Mmm,” I say but don’t go any further.
“Do you think there’s a chance you’ll be able to help, to change things?” Maria asks.
“You mean with the case? I don’t know. Why?” I say.
“Because I think you can’t stand failing Nick. That’s why you don’t sleep sometimes. It isn’t because you’re thinking of solutions to the problem. It’s because you already know there’s nothing you can do anymore, but you can’t accept it because that would mean you’ve already failed. You sitting up is really just a way to delay it. And that would be ok if only you didn’t choose to try and solve impossible problems all the time,” Maria says.
“I don’t get to choose the problems,” I answer.
“No baby, but you chose the job,” Maria counters. Should have seen that one coming.
* * *
THE TWO MEN IN THE DARK
The sun will rise, that’s what I keep telling myself. All I have to do is keep going and eventually the sun will rise. It becomes a prayer repeating in my head, in the background, like breathing, automatic, something I can’t live without. I’m completely lost now. It’s fully dark under the trees and I’m simply too exhausted to run so I painfully stagger along only slightly faster than walking pace. It’s far too cold now to stop and I dare not risk it.
