Before I Wake

by C. L. Taylor

  “Maybe I should.” There are a million things I want to tell her while she’s still her, in the present, but I don’t know where to start. I don’t want to tell her that I suspect that Brian is cheating on me or that I think Charlotte’s ex-best friend and boyfriend may have something to do with her accident. What I want to do is tell Mum how much she means to me and how I wish I could take away the terrible disease that, day by day, is stealing another part of her away from me.

  “I love you, Mum.” The words tripping off my tongue come so quickly they run together. “I don’t say it enough but I do. We all do. And I appreciate all the lovely things you’ve done for me in my life and I’m sorry I’ve been a terrible daughter—”

  “Susan!” The smile slips from Mum’s face and she purses her lips. “Don’t you dare say such a terrible, untrue thing. I couldn’t have asked for a better daughter than you.”

  “But I ran away.” Tears well in my eyes and I frantically swallow to try and dispel them. “I ran away to Greece when you needed me and—”

  “Susan!” She crushes my hand between her two smaller hands. I’m surprised at her strength. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare apologize for that when that…that monster…did the things he did to you. I just wish your dad had been around to stop him from—”

  I stare at her in horror. She wasn’t supposed to know about James. She wasn’t supposed to remember. I phoned her from Gatwick Airport while I was waiting for my flight to Greece and told her everything. I needed to talk to someone, to purge myself of three years of hell, but I didn’t think for one second that she’d take any of it in. I didn’t even think she’d know who I was. How could I have been so selfish?

  “Charlotte sends her love,” I say, desperate to change the subject. “She’ll be along to visit as soon as she can.”

  “Oh, that would be lovely.” Mum’s face lights up and I say a prayer, begging whoever is in charge of the universe to make my daughter well so they can spend some time together, so it’s not a lie.

  “I’d like that,” Mum says. She rummages in a little drawer in the table beside her and presses a brooch into my hand. It’s glass and paste, a bouquet of flowers with a ribbon tied around the stem. It’s terribly old-fashioned but very pretty and sparkly. “Give this to Charlotte with my love. Tell her it’s to bring her luck in her exams.” She fixes me with a meaningful look. “I was wearing it the day I met your dad, you know.”

  I open my mouth to thank her, to tell her how touched Charlotte will be, but find I can’t speak.

  “I have something for you too,” Mum says, twisting back to her drawer. I try to object, to tell her she mustn’t, when Mozart’s Symphony Number 40 in G Minor fills the air and I rummage in my handbag for my phone.

  “Brian?” I say, standing up and walking across the room, my back to Mum, my voice hushed. “Now’s not a good time. I’m with Mum.”

  There’s a pause, then, “It’s Charlotte,” he says. “You need to come to the hospital. Now.”

  Tuesday, October 16, 1990

  Tonight I finally got to see James’s house. And now I know why he kept me waiting for so long.

  We were supposed to get to his house for one o’clock, the time Mrs. Evans had said we should come for lunch (yes, he lives with his mum!), but we’d hit the pub early and James, who was ridiculously nervous but wouldn’t admit it, insisted we have one more for luck. His mum wouldn’t mind if we were late, he said. She was probably too busy watching Murder She Wrote to notice the time.

  Two hours later, we finally rolled up at his house in Wood Green. James could barely get the key in the lock and I couldn’t stop giggling.

  “Shoes,” James said, nudging me in the ribs as we fell into the hallway.

  “Socks!” I nudged him back and burst out laughing.

  “No.” He glanced down at my beautiful red patent heels. “Take off your shoes. Mother doesn’t allow shoes on the carpets.”

  I reached a hand down and yanked one shoe off. I had to brace myself against the wall to stop myself from tumbling over. “I thought you were playing a word association game. You know—shoes, socks, toes, feet…”

  “Why would I do that?” He gave me a look. “I’m not a child, Susan.”

  I shrugged and reached for my other shoe, unsure what to say.

  “Kidding!” He poked me in the side and I instantly lost balance and tumbled to the floor. “Feet! Cheese! Beans!”

  I laughed as he helped me back onto my feet, but it felt forced. The joke wasn’t as funny anymore.

  “Slippers,” James said.

  I assumed he was still playing the word association game so I ignored him and glanced around the hallway instead. It was a wide space but the deep red textured wallpaper and mahogany furniture that lined one wall made it seem small and dark. A single lightbulb, smothered by a dark brown velveteen lamp shade, hung from the ceiling, and framed photographs decorated one wall, some in black and white, some Technicolor but faded with age. There were a lot of a small blond boy with a wide smile and sparkling blue eyes, so I stepped toward them to see if they were of my boyfriend.

  “Slippers.” James grabbed my wrist and jerked me back toward him.

  I yanked my hand away and rubbed my skin. “James, that hurt.”

  He kicked something across the carpet toward me. “Stop making a fuss and put those on.”

  I looked down at the beige suedette slippers at my feet and shook my head. They looked like something my grandma would wear.

  “You need to put them on, Susan.” He yanked open the cupboard door beside him and pulled out an identical but larger pair of slippers and slipped his feet into them. I looked at his face, waiting for him to burst out laughing, but it didn’t happen.

  I looked back at the slippers. I didn’t like the way he was telling me what to do, but the last thing I wanted was for us to get into an argument before I met his mum for the first time.

  I put the slippers on, trying not to think about who’d worn them before.

  James looked at my feet then laughed and said they suited me. He slipped a hand around my waist, pulling me into him, and his mouth found mine. I relaxed in his arms as he kissed me.

  “Come on,” he said, taking my hand, “let’s find Mum. I just know she’s going to love you.”

  He led me down the corridor and through a white door.

  “Mum,” he said, holding tightly onto my hand, “this is Suzy. Suzy, this is Mum.”

  I smiled and held out my other hand as the small, dark-haired woman on the sofa stood up and crossed the room toward me. It remained outstretched as she swerved around me and disappeared out through the living room door.

  “James,” she said from the hallway. “A word, if you please.”

  I was surprised by her strong Welsh accent. I’d assumed she’d be posh like her son.

  James followed her wordlessly without so much as a backward glance at me, pulling the living room door closed behind him. I stood stock-still, staring at the closed door. When I finally moved, it was to perch on the edge of the pristine maroon leather sofa that shared a wall with an enormous mahogany display case. On the wall opposite me, hanging behind a sideboard housing a small gray television and an ancient-looking record player, was the most terrifying batik wall hanging I’d ever seen. It was black with a huge tribal mask in the center, picked out in blues, whites, and purples. The mouth was open, gaping, a black void beneath empty white eyes that stared across the room at me. I looked away to the bookshelf, crammed with green-spined hardbacks I’ve never heard of, and then at the table covered with a white lace tablecloth, laden with food. My stomach rumbled at the sight of plates piled high with cucumber, egg, and salmon sandwiches, a beautiful fluffy Victoria sponge on a silver cake stand, and bowls of olives, nuts, and crisps, but I didn’t touch a thing.

  Instead I wandered up to the bookcase, plucked a green
book off the shelf, and opened the cover. Ten minutes later, the sound of raised voices filtered into the room. I placed the book back on the shelf and opened the door a crack.

  “James?” I shuffled noiselessly toward a door at the other end of the house. It was ajar, light flooding out, turning a triangle of maroon carpet pink. The murmur of voices filled my ears as I drew closer. “James?”

  “How could you?” His mother’s voice was strained, verging on hysterical. “After everything I do for you. How could you be so disrespectful?”

  “Mam…please…calm down.” My outstretched hand fell away from the doorknob. James was talking with a strong Welsh accent too. “We’re a couple of hours late, that’s all.”

  “For family lunch! Have you no manners? Or did you lose them all the day Da killed his self?”

  Killed himself? I rested a hand on the wall. James told me his father had died of lung cancer.

  “I’m here now, aren’t I?”

  “Late. With her. Some tart you’ve known for ten minutes.”

  “She’s not a tart, Mam. She’s special.”

  “And what does that make me? Something the cat dragged in.”

  “Of course not. You’re—”

  “I got up at 6 this morning to clean the house, James. 6 a.m.! I’ve been scrubbing and cooking and cleaning all day. For you, Jamie, for you and that woman. The least you could do is show me some respect and turn up on time. I thought we brought you up better than this.”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake—”

  A sound like a cracked whip cut him short and he gasped. I took a step back from the door. The maroon walls seemed darker and the furniture bigger. Even the photographs were leering at me. I tried to take a deep breath, but the air was thick and heavy and I felt it catch in my throat. I glanced toward the front door.

  “James! James, I’m sorry.” Mrs. Evans’s voice was thin and desperate. “James, please don’t go. I didn’t mean to—”

  I was sent flying as the kitchen door slammed open and James flew out toward me. He gripped my wrist and yanked me after him as he strode toward the front door.

  “We’re leaving.” He pulled me, slippers and all, out into the front garden. I stretched my fingertips toward my beautiful red patent heels, but we were already through the gate and onto the street. “Fuck family lunches. Fuck her. Fuck it all. Now do you see?” he said, shaking me as he twisted me to face him. “Now do you see why I didn’t want you to come back to my place?”

  He didn’t say another word to me for the next hour and a half.

  Chapter

  Nine

  “I don’t know why you’re looking so stressed.” Brian indicates left and exits the roundabout. “It’s good news.”

  I glance at him. “Is it?”

  “Of course. You heard what the consultant Mr. Arnold said. Charlotte’s tube is out and she’s able to breathe unassisted. The damage to her cerebral cortex has healed.”

  “How unassisted is her breathing if they’re insisting she wears an oxygen mask? And the exact words he used were ‘the scans show the damage has substantially reduced.’”

  “Yes. It’s healed.”

  “Reduced, not healed.”

  Brian exhales slowly and deliberately. “Sue, we both heard him say there’s no medical reason why she shouldn’t wake up.”

  “But she hasn’t, has she? I’m delighted that she can breathe on her own now, but it doesn’t mean anything if she still hasn’t actually opened her eyes and—”

  “Oh, for God’s sake!”

  “Brian! Can I just finish my sentence? Please?”

  He shoots me a sideways look and raises his eyebrows.

  “I’m worried because of the other thing Mr. Arnold said, the part about the longer Charlotte stays in a coma, the more likely it is that she could develop a secondary complication. She could still die, Brian.”

  “Could being the operative word, Sue. You need to stay positive.”

  I rest my head against the headrest and stare up at the dull gray interior of the car. I’m snapping at Brian, and it’s not fair, but I can’t shake the feeling that this is all my fault. If I’d been closer to Charlotte, if I’d encouraged her to talk to me, if I’d run up the stairs after her instead of returning to my book, maybe she never would have walked in front of a bus and maybe she wouldn’t be at risk of pneumonia or a pulmonary embolism now.

  “I should have protected her, Brian,” I say quietly.

  “Don’t, Sue. It’s not your fault.”

  I look at him. “I didn’t protect her but I can now.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “If I find out why she did what she did and tell her that I understand, that I’m here for her, maybe she’ll wake up.”

  “Not this again.” Brian sighs heavily. “For the hundredth time, Sue, it was an accident.”

  “It wasn’t. Charlotte tried to kill herself, Brian. She talked about it in her diary.”

  There’s a squeal of tires on tarmac and my seat belt cuts into my throat as the car swerves sharply toward the oncoming traffic. I want to scream at Brian to stop but I can’t speak. I can’t scream. All I can do is grip the seat belt with both hands as we hurtle toward a 4×4. A cacophony of beeping horns fills my ears, and then Brian yanks the steering wheel to the left and we lurch left, speeding toward the grass verge, then lurch back to the right so we’re back in the center of the road.

  My husband’s top lip is beaded with sweat, his face pale, his eyes staring ahead, fixed and glassy.

  “You nearly killed us,” I whisper.

  Brian says nothing.

  He says nothing all the way home, then he turns off the engine, opens the car door, and crosses the driveway without looking back. I stay in the car, too stunned to move as he lets himself into the house, crosses the kitchen, and disappears into the hallway. I don’t know what scared me more—the fact that we nearly drove headfirst into another car or the look in Brian’s eyes as it happened.

  My hands shake as I reach for the handle and open the car door, and I pause to collect myself. I’m being ridiculous. Brian would never have risked both our lives like that when Charlotte still needs us. He was angry, I reason as I cross the gravel driveway and approach the house. He asked the other day if there was anything in Charlotte’s diary he needed to know about and I said no. I lied to his face and he knows it.

  “Brian?” I open the front door gingerly, expecting Milly to come bowling over but she’s not in the porch. She must have followed Brian into the living room. I’m about to step into the kitchen when something red and chewed in Milly’s bed catches my eye. It’s a “Could not deliver” slip from the Royal Mail. How did that end up in her bed? I turn and see the mail “cage” we erected around the letter box on the floor. It’s the third one that Milly has managed to wrench off the door. The older she gets, the wilier she becomes. I crouch down and pick up the remains of the card, smiling when I see what the postman has written—“in the recycling bin.” Brian thinks the postal worker is probably breaking Royal Mail rules by putting our undelivered parcels in the recycling bin, but I think it’s a fabulous idea. It saves him from hauling them back to the depot and it saves me a trip to town. I duck back outside and lift the lid on the recycling bin.

  I reach down and pick up a green plastic parcel with Marks and Spencer splashed down the side. It’s hard, like a shoebox, not floppy like clothes. It can’t be shoes. They’re the one thing I still insist on buying from the shops. When you’ve got feet as wide as mine, ordering shoes off the Internet can be a bit of a gamble.

  “Brian?” I carry the parcel into the house and search for my husband. “Oh, hi, Milly.”

  She looks up from her prone position in front of the cold hearth, then lowers her head and sighs when she realizes I’m not Brian. He must be in his study. Milly knows she isn’t allowed upstai
rs.

  “What have we got here, then?” I tear into the plastic packaging and discover a cardboard shoebox. “Very brave of Daddy to choose shoes for Mum—”

  The opened box tumbles from my hands and a pair of beige suedette slippers tumbles onto the rug.

  They’re meant for me. But they’re not from my husband.

  ***

  “Brian?” I push open the door to the study. “Brian, we need to talk.”

  My husband is sitting in his chair, his head in his hands, his elbows on the desk. He doesn’t look up at the sound of my voice.

  “Brian?” I fight to keep the quiver out of my voice. “Brian, please. I need your help.”

  He raises his head from his hands and slowly tilts back his head to look at me. His expression is blank, his eyes as fixed and dark as they were as we careered into oncoming traffic.

  “What do you want, Susan?”

  “I…” I hold out the slippers but I can’t do it. I can’t tell him that James sent them to me. There’s no note, no purchaser details, no gift card—nothing at all to prove who sent them. And besides, Brian looks like someone just hollowed out his soul.

  I perch on the edge of a wooden chair near the door. “I’m sorry, Brian.”

  My husband doesn’t say anything but I can tell he’s listening, that he wants me to continue.

  “I’m sorry I told you there wasn’t anything to worry about in Charlotte’s diary. There is.”

  “What?” Brian is no longer slumped back in his chair. He’s sitting up straight, the tips of his fingers splayed on the desk, his eyes fixed on mine. “Tell me.”

  “She…” I can’t do it. I can’t ignore my gut feeling that I shouldn’t. Not with Charlotte’s safety at risk. “Why did you lie about going to the pool, Brian?”

  “What?”

  “Last week, when you took the morning off, you told me you went shopping and swimming.”