by Marian Keyes
I had to stay professional. Talk to your friends, I advised. Talk to your mother. Talk to your therapist. You could even, I said, talk to the Samaritans. But there was no point talking to me, because tea (not even the normal, non-herbal stuff) and sympathy weren’t part of the service. I’ll pay extra, they sometimes offered. I always shook my head because, well, it’s not because I didn’t care about them, but if you started to feel bad for one of them, you’d have to feel bad for all of them, and you’d drown, you’d just go under from all the sadness.
So when the crash hit, I was one of the first things to go. Private investigators are luxury items and the It bags and I came out of things very badly. Nowadays, if husbands are playing away, the women don’t want to know, because hanging on to their husband as their finances roller-coaster up and down (but mostly down) is their only chance of saving themselves. Anyway, no one could afford to split up because overnight their family homes were worth nothing. Sticking together had suddenly become the name of the game.
My other handy little earner, doing background checks for companies on potential staff, also croaked in the crash, because no one was employing anyone.
For a while the drop in my matrimonials and background checks was compensated for by a rise in false insurance claims – like my man with the ‘paralysed’ leg who nonetheless managed to carry a bath up a ladder. Banjaxed backs featured a lot in those cases. A claim would be submitted that someone needed bed rest for six months, and consequently couldn’t work, and they needed their health insurance people to cough up. So I was duly dispatched to hide in a hedge with my video camera in the hope of finding the patient playing a lively game of keepy-uppy with his grandson and looking in the whole of his health.
Then one of my biggest employers went to the wall, and that was when I started to get really scared. I had to go cap-in-hand to insurance companies that I’d turned away during the glory days when I’d been snowed under with work. And Ireland being Ireland, they remembered being slighted only too well and were thrilled to have an opportunity to sneer at my reduced circumstances, then tell me to hop it.
To be honest, doing the insurance checks was the part of my work that I disliked the most. I always enjoyed getting a result on a job but the insurance ones started to make me feel squirmy and not right. Because insurance companies are bastards, everyone knows that. They never pay up and on the rare occasions that they’re left with no option but to squeak out a mingy little payment, it’s never enough. People who’ve paid house insurance all their lives, in the expectation that when their time of trouble comes someone will be there to help them, discover they’ve got it all wrong. When their house gets flooded they go to their insurance company, who miraculously manage to find some handy little clause that agrees, yes, right enough, we are liable for flood damage, but only when the water isn’t wet. Or some such similar bullshit.
(Douglas Adams says insurance claims are proof that time travel is possible, indeed that it goes on incessantly. How it works, he says, is that you submit your insurance claim – something run-of-the-mill, like that your bicycle, which, incidentally, happens to be black, was stolen – then the insurance company travels back in time and alters the original document, to make them liable for theft of all bicycles, except black ones. Back they come to the present day, only to send you a snippy letter saying: ‘I refer you to clause such-and-such of your document, which exempts us from liability for the theft of any bicycles that are black, and in view of the fact that your bicycle is as black as our hearts, we are not bound to give you a single penny. I bid you good day, madam.’ And you’re there, driving yourself mental, puzzling at the document and asking yourself: But how do I not remember this mad clause about black bicycles? I’d never have signed it if I’d seen it.)
Like I said, bastards, and there were times when I felt like sticking it to The Man, when I contemplated tiptoeing away from the ‘bad back’ client playing his carefree game of keepy-uppy, and reporting to the sinister corporation that said client was lying flat in a bed, yelping for morphine. But the thing is, if you submit too many reports in favour of the clients, they stop using you – they only want the proof of being defrauded – and I had bills to pay. So given a choice between sentiment and having Diet Coke in my fridge, I was obliged to choose the Diet Coke. Not something to be proud of, but what can you do?
FRIDAY
14
I slept for three hours, which seemed to be the most I could manage lately. I was woken up by the pain across my ribs. This had happened the last time too – a terrible tightness in my chest that was so bad I’d had to stop wearing a bra for a while. Then I remembered my ill-advised attempt at laughter last night in John Joseph’s house and thought hopefully: Maybe I’ve just pulled a muscle.
But I knew it was more than that. Blackness was rising inside me, rolling up from my gut like oily poison, and a heavier outside blackness was compressing me, like I was descending in a lift.
I was scared to face whatever was out there – it was a horrible overcast morning, ridiculous weather for June – but I was too afraid to stay in bed.
I wondered if I should get the search for Wayne underway immediately by climbing straight into my car and driving to Clonakilty, a good four hours away. No matter what John Joseph said, going to see his family was the obvious thing to do. No, wait … back up a minute – the obvious thing to do. Everyone kept telling me that Wayne would not be in the obvious place. So, counter-intuitive as it felt, I’d better hold off on the Clonakilty visit for a while, because it was too obvious. Unless it was an elaborate double-bluff on Wayne’s part and it was so obvious as to be not obvious at all … Christ, it was too early in the morning for this sort of mental gymnastics.
Mum was across the landing, in the office, sitting at the computer.
‘What are you doing?’ I asked.
‘Watching that dirty slut on YouTube.’
‘Which dirty slut?’
She could hardly say it, her lips were so compressed. ‘Zeezah. Come and take a look,’ she invited. ‘It’s utterly disgusting.’
But fascinating.
‘It’s like she’s standing on a surfboard,’ Mum said, staring hard at the screen. ‘And there’s a gynaecologist lying on his back on the same surfboard and he’s trying to do a smear test on her and she’s trying to let him, but waves keep coming along and knocking her balance, then she gets a grip and lowers herself down for another go … I don’t understand this Islam business. I thought their mullah chaps came and clattered the head off you with a bamboo cane if you accidentally let your burka thing slip and a man caught a glimpse of your eyebrow. But look at the carry-on of your woman there. I don’t understand it!’
We puzzled some more over the contradictions in Islam. Well, Mum puzzled and I listened because I didn’t seem to have the energy to speak.
‘Will I play it again?’ Mum asked.
‘You might as well.’ As she had already started it.
‘Why did John Joseph marry a Muslim girl when he’s a devout Catholic? And why did it all happen so fast? “A Whirlwind Romance” the papers said it was. Four months between them meeting and getting married. She must have needed a visa.’
‘But isn’t she going to convert to Catholicism? Didn’t they go to Rome on their honeymoon? Didn’t they get a blessing from the “Holy Father”?’ I said ‘Holy Father’ sarcastically.
‘They most certainly did not get a blessing from the Holy Father. And don’t say “Holy Father” that way. I can hear the disrespect in your voice.’
‘Whatever. It’s very gloomy in here, Mum; can we put the light on?’
‘It’s on.’
So it was.
‘Would you like some breakfast?’ she asked, after we’d watched Zeezah’s clip three or four more times.
I shook my head.
‘Thank God for that.’
‘Why?’
‘There’s nothing in the house.’
‘Why not?’ I still didn’t w
ant anything but I was aggrieved that they weren’t fulfilling their duties as parents.
‘We go to CaffeinePeople every morning and have lattes and low-fat bran muffins. We read the papers. They’re on poles. You read them, then you put them back on the poles. We’re like Europeans. You can come too if you promise not to steal the papers and shame us.’
Suddenly, almost startling myself, I made a decision. ‘Actually, I think I’ll go to the doctor.’
‘Is it the vultures?’
I nodded. ‘And a couple of other things.’
‘Like what?’
‘Ah, you know …’
‘Have you given away your Alexander McQueen scarf?’
I shook my head.
‘It’s not all bad, so.’
I bit my lip. No point in telling her I was well over my Alexander McQueen scarf.
Keeping active, that was the way to get through. So I found my printer and connected it up to the computer and printed out five photos of baldy Wayne, to show to potential witnesses.
Once that was done I decided to ring Artie. Then I hesitated. I felt so odd in myself, so disconnected from the world, that perhaps it wasn’t a good idea to try talking to him. I didn’t know how normal I’d be able to be and I didn’t want to freak him out.
And what if I did freak him out? What if he couldn’t handle me like this? What would happen to us?
These thoughts were so unpleasant that I decided to play it safe: I’d skip the phone call and maybe talk to him later. But there was nothing good on the net, no exciting celebrity break-ups or meltdowns, so after a few minutes I decided: Ah, to hell, I’ll ring him anyway. He’d just have to learn to put up with me being peculiar.
But after all that, his phone was switched off. Maybe he’d gone for a run. Maybe he was already at work and in a meeting. Maybe he was having quality time with the kids, over a breakfast – pancakes, maybe – that he’d made himself. At the thought of them all sitting round the table with their blueberries and their maple syrup, I was assailed by an unpleasant emotion that I identified as mild jealousy. Tricky business, when your boyfriend was a devoted father. It was definitely a challenge getting my head round the fact that no matter how much Artie might care about me, I’d never really, entirely, be his number one.
Okay, time to focus on something else. I rang Wayne’s mobile again; it was switched off. How about his website – could that give me any clues about the person he was? But it was just a record company template and all of the information was factual – albums he’d released, gigs he’d played, that sort of thing. According to it, he was still planning on playing the MusicDrome next Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Well, time would tell.
It was 7.58 a.m., still too early to ring Birdie Salaman, so I looked at scarves on the net while the time inched by painfully slowly. Eventually – eventually! – it was eight thirty, an acceptable time to call someone at home, but after three rings Birdie’s voicemail kicked in. Call-screening? Gone to work? Who knew. I left a message then I took a deep breath and rang Dr Waterbury and prayed that he’d sacked Shannon O’Malley, his receptionist, whom I’d been at school with.
Sadly, she was still there and thrilled to hear from me. ‘Helen Walsh! I was just talking about you the other day! I met Josie Fogarty, she’s got four kids now, and she said, “Do you remember Helen Walsh, wasn’t she mental?” Are you married yet? We must all get together for some vino, a night off from the kids. Great to talk to you. How are you?’
‘At the peak of my mental and physical health,’ I said. ‘Which is why I’m looking for a doctor’s appointment.’
‘God, you’re hilarious,’ she said. ‘You always were. You just don’t care, do you?’
I’d have to change doctors if I had to go through this rigmarole every time I needed an appointment.
‘I’m just looking at the book here,’ she said. ‘He’s out the door with people today, but I’ll see if I can squeeze you in, as a special favour for an old friend. Give me your number there and I’ll call you back.’
The first time I’d been to see Dr Waterbury had been – I counted in my head – December 2009, two and a half years ago. I’d moved into my new apartment around six months earlier and he was the nearest GP.
Shannon hadn’t been his assistant then. It had been someone else, some woman whom I didn’t know, and I’d had a good long wait, over forty-five minutes. Admittedly, it had been December, peak season for doctors.
When I was finally ushered into the inner sanctum, Dr Waterbury had barely looked up. He was bashing away on his keyboard, being baldy and generally behaving harassed. Despite the baldyness he wasn’t as old as doctors usually were. This I liked. I couldn’t abide older men doctors; they acted like they were God and they’re not any more, not since we can Google our symptoms and do our own diagnoses.
‘Helen … ah … Walsh.’ He clicked away, putting me into his database.
Then he put everything aside, gave me the full eyeball and asked, as if he was really interested, ‘How are you?’
‘You’re the expert,’ I said. ‘You tell me.’ Like, what did he think I was paying him sixty euro for? ‘Here’s what’s going on. I’m waking at 4.44 every morning, I can’t eat proper food – I can’t remember the last time I could stomach chicken – and overnight I’ve stopped caring about the plot of True Blood.’
‘Anything else?’
‘I think I have a brain tumour. I think it’s pressing on some part of my brain and sending me a bit odd. Can you send me for a scan?’
‘Dizzy spells? Flashing lights? Impaired vision?’
‘No.’
‘Headaches? Memory lapses? Colour-blindness?’
‘No.’
‘What do you enjoy? What gives you pleasure at the moment?’
‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘But that’s normal for me; I’m quite narky by nature.’
‘Nothing at all? Music? Art? What about shoes?’
I was surprised (category: pleasant). ‘Nice one, doc.’ I looked at him in almost-admiration. ‘I do love shoes.’
‘As much as you always have?’
‘Ummm … I always buy myself shoes in December, high sparkly ones for parties and stuff, and now that you mention it, this year I haven’t bothered.’
‘Handbags?’
‘Now you’re just patronizing me.’ Then I realized something. ‘Well … my sister Claire has a new Mulberry bag, it’s sort of grey-black, it’s pony-skin. I wouldn’t expect you to know it, but it’s fabulous and I always borrow her new stuff – you know, without asking, I just take the things out of her bag and put them into my old crappy bag and leave it for her to find and I run off with her new one, like it’s a joke, although I keep the bag as long as I can – and this time I haven’t.’
‘What about work? I see you’re, ah –’ he referred to my form – ‘a private investigator. God.’ He perked up. ‘That sounds interesting.’
‘That’s what everyone says.’
‘And is it?’
‘Weelll …’ It was a while since I’d been excited at the idea of digging myself into a ditch. In fact my early – forgive me, forgive me – hunger seemed to have abated. Fear of poverty rather than love of my job was what had kept me returning calls and showing up for meetings. And after I’d been punched in the stomach a couple of months earlier by a man I was surveilling, I was less confident about spying on badzers.
‘I suppose it must be very stressful,’ he said, surprising me with his insight.
‘Actually, it is.’ The long hours, the tension of never knowing if I was going to get a result or not, the fear for my physical safety, the lack of opportunities to go to the loo – it all added up.
‘Anything else going on for you?’ he asked.
There was one thing and I thought I’d better say it. ‘You know that story that’s all over the news, the four teenagers that were killed in the car crash in Carlow? I know it’s a shameful thing to say, but I wish I’d been one of them.’
/> He made a note on his pad. ‘Any other suicidal ideation?’
‘What’s suicidal ideation?’
‘What you’ve just said. Having a desire to die, but not necessarily having a plan to bring about your death.’
‘That’s exactly how I feel,’ I said, almost excited at someone putting my strange, frightening thoughts into words. ‘I wish I was dead, but I wouldn’t know how to go about it. Like, I’d love to have an aneurysm.’ Several times a day I willed it to happen; I spoke to the blood vessels in my brain, like people speak to their plants, and urged them to burst. ‘Go on, lads,’ I used to think, trying to fire them up. ‘Do the right thing by me. Burst, burst!’
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘It’s very unlikely you have a brain tumour.’
‘You don’t have to humour me. I can take the chemo, I can take the surgery – I don’t care, I just want it sorted.’
‘It sounds to me more like you’re suffering from depression.’
He might as well have said, I think you’re suffering from fairy wings sprouting out of your back.
There was no such thing as depression. We all had days when we felt fat and cold and poor and tired, when the world seemed hostile and rough-edged and when it seemed safer to simply stay in bed. But that was life. It was no reason to take tablets or get time off work, or go into St Teresa’s for a while. Muffins, that was the cure. Muffins and chunky chips and daytime telly and a few rash purchases on ASOS.
In any case, I didn’t feel depressed, I felt more … afraid.
‘I’m going to write you a prescription for antidepressants.’
‘Don’t bother.’
‘Why don’t you take the script anyway? You needn’t fill it if you don’t want to but you have it if you change your mind.’
‘I won’t change my mind.’
