She's Mine

by A A Chaudhuri

  ‘Really? How can that be? Surely you knew at the time how badly you were treating them? You’re an intelligent woman, after all.’

  It’s there again, the judging, the probing, the feeling that she is appalled by how I could have treated my own children so badly. But in a bizarre kind of way, it’s refreshing. She’s not allowing me to wallow in my self-pity, she’s trying to snap me out of it, I see that now. Yes, that’s her intention. It must be. She is what I need, what I’ve been searching for in my therapy all these years.

  I sit up, feel the blood rush to my head, my line of vision a kaleidoscope of stars.

  ‘Come and sit here.’ Dr Cousins’ voice is soft again as she beckons to the chair directly opposite her.

  I do as she asks, then find my eyes wandering.

  The first time I entered her room, I was struck by how homely it felt. Part of a two-bedroom flat occupying the second floor of an attractive semi-detached period building, she told me she’d only recently moved in and made it her office. Naturally, I’ve looked into her credentials. When she first told me how much Dr Cousins had helped her, Janine sent me the link to her website, which Miranda, being a typical lawyer, had researched thoroughly before recommending Dr Cousins to her. After completing her training, she decided hospital work wasn’t for her, instead setting up her own practice from home, with a focus on grief counselling. Now that I’ve met her myself, I can see why Miranda was so taken with her. Despite her youth, she has a maturity beyond her years, and it’s uncanny how well she seems to know me already.

  Although she hasn’t lived in her flat for long, it doesn’t feel like that. There are two bookshelves, wall-to-wall with psychiatry-related textbooks, various autobiographies and a few novels, mainly psychological thrillers, which is hardly surprising, I guess, given her profession. On the wall behind her desk there is a framed certificate of her degree in medicine from Imperial College. Her desk is polished and uncluttered, solid dark oak, with a few scattered dents embedded in the wood, suggesting it is second-hand. Various piles of paper are lined up either side of it, and in the middle sits her laptop – probably the newest item in her room – and to the right, a telephone. She has a couple of photographs, one of her as a child, sandwiched between a woman and a man (I’m guessing her parents), and one with a slightly younger boy – her brother, I presume, they have a similar look about them – but I don’t feel comfortable asking her about them yet. I hope to at some point, though. Usually I’m not interested in my psychiatrists’ personal lives because I’m there to talk about me, not them. Plus, like regular doctors, I’m aware that psychiatrists are duty-bound to adhere to a strictly professional relationship with their patients, which has always suited me fine because I think that if I were to see their human side, I might lose faith in their ability to cure me. But there’s something about Dr Cousins I find intriguing, and it makes me want to know more about her. I like the fact that she cuts to the chase, doesn’t sugar-coat my feelings, pander to my shortcomings. Rather, she wants me to face up to and accept them for what they are.

  As I take a seat opposite her, she leans back in her leather swivel chair, her right elbow perched on one armrest as she taps her pen rhythmically against the side of her cheek. There’s almost pin-drop silence as she scrutinizes my face. All that can be heard is the slightly muffled whirr of traffic outside, and occasional human voices. It’s 11 a.m. on Monday, so well past rush hour. Children are in school, adults at work. But it’s still London, and therefore never completely noiseless.

  ‘So how do you feel right now?’

  She continues to examine me with her electric-blue eyes which laser through her designer glasses. I can’t quite tell if it’s a look of concern or irritation, and therefore what she expects me to say. That thirty minutes spent talking to her has cured me of mourning you, and I can now finally move on with my life and forget it ever happened?

  Because, of course, I can’t forget. I will never forget. But I am glad I made another appointment to see her. I don’t feel like it’s been time wasted.

  ‘OK, I guess. I mean, I already feel more comfortable talking to you than the other psychiatrists I’ve seen over the years, even though this is only our second meeting. Somehow, I feel more relaxed here.’

  ‘Good. Why is that, do you think?’

  I fidget in my seat, give a faint smile, and as I do, my stomach rumbles. But I ignore it – the way I always do – because I cannot reward myself with food. Not in an indulgent way. I eat to live, but I never give in to excess. Such behaviour would imply that I have forgiven myself, which I haven’t.

  I give a slight shrug of my shoulders, look around. ‘Because we’re not in some soulless medical centre, I suppose. This is your home, and it feels easier talking to you here. The other places I’ve tried didn’t exactly invite openness, transparency. They just made me feel crazier than I already felt.’

  She laughs, does the cheek-tapping thing with her pen again. ‘Well, we certainly can’t have that.’

  I laugh too. She’s so charismatic, I’m almost mesmerized by her. I try to explain further. ‘Also, with the others, although I’m sure they meant well, it felt like they were going through the motions. They seemed dry, fatigued by years on the job. You seem fresher.’

  ‘I’m glad you feel comfortable here. You came to me for help and I want to help. That’s my job, and I wouldn’t be doing it properly if I appeared disinterested.’

  She smiles, revealing a perfect set of white teeth. I can’t decide if they’re natural or not. It doesn’t matter; they suit her, and only add to her attractiveness.

  ‘Although I take my profession very seriously, I believe it’s crucial to make a patient feel at ease, especially when dealing with an issue like grief. That’s why I decided to work from home. Plus, I enjoy being my own boss.’

  It’s hard not to admire her. She exudes such strength, and she reminds me of my younger self. I once had her optimism, her fighting spirit, but that now seems like a lifetime ago.

  There’s a brief pause. Then, looking at her watch, she says, ‘Well, I think that’s enough for today. You’ve made really good progress, but I get the feeling there’s something you’re not telling me.’

  She looks back up and her gaze cuts through me, causing my muscles to tense, my deprived stomach now in knots.

  ‘You’re holding back,’ she carries on.

  I wriggle in my seat, and now I really need to get out of here because I’m not ready to tell her yet.

  Thankfully, she doesn’t press the issue. Just smiles and says, ‘Same time, next week?’

  I nod with relief. ‘Yes, that would be great.’

  Chapter Ten

  Christine

  Now

  I insert the key into the front door and turn the lock. I can already tell from the open curtains that no one’s in. Greg and I make a habit of closing the curtains when it’s dark outside; a signal that one of us is home.

  It’s Thursday, just gone 6.30, and I’m gasping for a drink. Preferably a large glass of white wine. Although I wouldn’t call myself an alcoholic (I don’t carry around miniature bottles of gin in my handbag or pour vodka on my cereal or anything like that), I’d be lying if I said I can get through a day without booze. It’s a reward, an incentive to get me through it. Every day is an effort for me, and so knowing I can reach for that bottle in the fridge when an acceptable hour arrives (six on a weekday, but any time after midday on a weekend) gives me the strength to plough on. It takes the edge off, helps me to sleep, despite so-called experts repeatedly lecturing us that alcohol is scientifically proven to disturb a person’s sleep. I don’t bloody care; it makes me feel better, blots out my pain, if only for a while, and it’s therefore a friend I can’t do without. It’s not like I give two hoots about my vital organs anyway. So what if my liver packs up? So what if it kills me? So much the better. Although, I wonder what Dr Cousins would say to that? I haven’t told her yet that I use alcohol as a crutch. I expect she wouldn’t
approve, would probably tell me to stop being so pathetic, that I don’t need alcohol to get through life.

  I enter the house, feel for the light switch on the wall, place my keys on the hook next to it, then remove my coat, which I hang on the rack Greg installed. He’s good like that. A real handyman. I remember when we first started dating, my washing machine was playing up and he came and fixed it. Saved me a £200 call-out charge. He would never have done that. But his hands worked wonders in other ways. Mostly up my skirt and down my blouse, but I can’t bear to go there now. Just thinking about what I did fills me with disgust.

  There’s a pile of post on the floor. I scoop it up, take it through to the kitchen, toss it on the sideboard and head straight for the fridge.

  Three days on from my second session with Dr Cousins, I don’t feel quite as empty and depressed as I usually do by the end of the week. It must be her who’s making a difference because nothing else exceptional or different has happened to me since I got up this morning. I worked out in the gym for two hours, did some chores, went grocery shopping, the usual routine. I think it’s her youthfulness that buoys me, and the fact that she’s not afraid to be blunt with me. There’s something so invigorating about that, along with her whole approach to my depression. Although I can’t say I’m suddenly full of hope that life can be good again, I am looking forward to our third meeting on Monday.

  I pour myself a large glass of chardonnay, take a big gulp, savour its delicious, reassuring taste and the instant feeling of relaxation that creeps over me like a second skin, then start flicking through the mail. Most of it’s for Greg. Bills, bank statements, et cetera. But there are a couple of bits for me. The first is a letter inviting me for a mammogram. Great. I toss it aside. I ignored the last one, as well as the one about my overdue smear test, so why should I be bothered about this one? The next is a handwritten envelope. I don’t recognize the handwriting, all in capitals. The postmark is Sunderland. Strange, as I don’t know anyone who lives there. The only friend I have up north is Miranda, but she’s in Newcastle and, like I said, the handwriting’s unfamiliar. I’m curious to know who it’s from and hastily run my thumb through the seal, before pulling out a single sheet of paper, folded once. I unfold it, read what’s written, then everything after is blank.

  Heidi isn’t dead. She’s alive and she is better off with me than with you.

  Chapter Eleven

  Greg

  Now

  I watch you sleeping peacefully in the hospital bed, the most peaceful I’ve seen you in a long time, Chrissy, and I feel a surge of guilt. If I’d been home, you might not have passed out, cracked the back of your head on the tiled floor and become unconscious. Luckily, the doctor who examined you has confirmed there’s no internal bleeding, and that you’re going to be fine. But they are keeping you in overnight, just to be on the safe side.

  At first, when I walked into the kitchen and found you lying on your back and unresponsive, I was angry. I’d immediately spotted the wine glass on the sideboard (I know how much you drink despite not being home when you indulge yourself because I put the recycling out every week) and thought you’d finally done it. Your malnourished, over-exercised heart couldn’t take any more and had finally given up. But as I felt for a pulse with one hand, and called for an ambulance with the other, I noticed the sheet of paper lying on the floor beside you. Waiting for the ambulance to arrive, I read what was written on it, and realized this had caused you to faint.

  I think I might have passed out too, had I not already been sitting on the floor next to you. My fingers were trembling, my palms clammy, my heart pounding so erratically cardiac arrest felt like an imminent possibility. I mean, I’m a prime candidate for a heart attack. Late fifties, crazy work schedule, bad diet, not enough exercise.

  I’d quickly unbuttoned my shirt collar, which was suddenly choking me, and then tried to wake you, shaking your bony shoulders, patting your hollow cheeks, willing you to come around, give me some sign you were still there. And that’s when you began to mumble our first daughter’s name, causing me to sigh with relief.

  In the first six months following Heidi’s disappearance, we and the police received hundreds of calls. All of which amounted to nothing. The police had warned us from the start to be sceptical, and not to get our hopes up. Not because they were heartless bastards, but because they knew the game, had seen it all before. The inspector leading the investigation – Detective Inspector Jack Grayson – was a good man. Forty-five at the time, married with two teenage kids, he was a quietly spoken straight-up sort of a fellow, with kind, sincere eyes and a full head of prematurely grey hair. He was just being honest, looking out for us, because he knew only too well that the situation we’d found ourselves in rarely ended well. But we didn’t listen, or rather, we listened but ignored his advice. We felt cross with his scepticism, his apparent willingness to give in without a proper fight. In the early days, we survived on hope, clinging to any sign, any possibility that Heidi might still be alive and safely returned to us. But Grayson was right, of course. Every call, every possible sighting proved to be a dead end, a road to nowhere fast. As the weeks, months, years passed by, our hope faded, and we became resigned to the fact that Heidi was never coming home, despite the occasional blind lead or odd call from attention-seekers wanting their fifteen minutes of fame.

  It’s been ten years since someone got in contact claiming to have information on Heidi. So this letter comes as a bolt from the blue. The first claim in a decade that she isn’t dead. Even so, I know the police will warn us not to get our hopes up, just as Grayson did back then. The fact that there’ve been no sightings of our child – or even of someone resembling her – clouds this ray of light before it’s even had a chance to flicker with hope. The world is full of crazy people. Not just crazy people, but nasty, malicious types who’ll say anything to gain notoriety, mess with people’s minds. That’s what the detective inspector I spoke to earlier on the phone said. But I didn’t need him to tell me this. I learned my lesson twenty-three years ago.

  But still, there’s something about this note that sets it apart from all the others. For one, it’s the first handwritten note we’ve received. And two, it’s the first communication we’ve had from someone claiming to be the kidnapper. The others were mainly phone calls, or losers turning up at the police station claiming to have seen Heidi with the kidnapper, or to have information connected with her abduction. There was also the occasional email, as time went on.

  But there’s a different feel to this note, a personal touch that sends chills through me when I read it.

  She is better off with me than with you.

  I know it shouldn’t have this effect on me. That I should view the note objectively. Penned by yet another crank who gets his or her kicks out of toying with people’s emotions.

  But I can’t seem to. It creeps me out – the insinuation that Heidi’s kidnapper wasn’t some random stranger but someone who bore a grudge against you, who didn’t consider you capable of being a good mother to Heidi. It begs the question, why? What does this person know that I don’t? And why are they choosing to communicate now, after all these years? To make a statement around Heidi’s twenty-fifth birthday? Or is that mere coincidence? It’s as if our suffering hasn’t been enough. As if they want us – or you at least – to suffer more.

  While you were being attended to by the doctors, I rang Miranda and Janine to tell them what had happened. Both were shocked and terrified for us. I guess Miranda’s like a comfort blanket for me, as Janine is for you. She knows me so well, in fact sometimes I think she understands me better than you. She has this level-headed way of speaking that always calms me down. Like Janine, despite her initial shock, Miranda told me not to panic, to take things one step at a time and not jump to any conclusions before the police have looked into it. But she did say I should have a frank talk with you once you’ve recovered. Ask you straight out why you think the sender might have written those words. Whe
ther there’s any truth to them? Whether there’s something you’re not telling me? I don’t for a second believe Miranda’s trying to make trouble between us. I mean, why should she – she’s been married to Duncan longer than we have to each other, and she’s your friend as well as mine. Besides, I’ve always had the feeling you’ve been hiding something from me. And I think that something has stopped you from moving on with your life after losing our daughter. A secret that has caused you to isolate yourself from those closest to you.

  You can’t be OK with that. Isolation will drive the sanest of people out of their minds. Eventually.

  I don’t know what I’m going to say to you when you wake up, or how the hell we’re going to deal with this. We’ve been strangers for so long, talking about the note is going to be hard. But we can’t hide from it, we have to face it, like Miranda said. Whether it will finally sink us for good or wake us from our apathy and force us to work together remains to be seen.

  At least I got home in time. At least my conscience is appeased by the fact that before I did, I was actually at work, rather than screwing my mistress’s brains out. That’s what I’m really doing half the time when I call you to say I’ve been delayed at the office and therefore please don’t wait up. I never thought I’d turn into my father. When I married you, I could never have imagined cheating on you. And before Heidi was taken, I’d often pinch myself, because I couldn’t believe how lucky I was to have you. Would tell myself that I’d be damned and go to hell if I ever did anything to jeopardize what we had.

  But then you lost our daughter, and piece by piece, my fairy-tale princess disappeared, and in her place remains a shadow of her former self. I’ve tried to be patient with you, but you didn’t make it any easier for me by lounging in your grief, rather than snapping out of it for the sake of our children, if not for me. Seeing the way you raised Ella and Daniel, the way you kept them at arm’s length, leaving me to endow them with the love you never gave them, made me so angry. And it made me fall out of love with you, because I couldn’t believe a mother could behave that way towards her own children. I mean, what if I’d been weak and selfish like you? Our children would have been more screwed up than they already are. They wouldn’t have had a hope.