Marshmallows for Breakfast

by Dorothy Koomson

  Large, clean, furnished with brass and marble and clean white towels, it was also empty, all eight stall doors stood open.

  “I thought that was what you wanted, I've seen you. I know what you re like. I thought that was what you wanted.”

  I leaned over the bank of sinks, each carved out of smooth cool stone. I stared down into the bowl at the white plug.

  It was heat first of all. A torrent of it lighting up the cells in my body, burning me up from the inside out.

  I pressed my palms flat against the stone, steadying myself, allowing the coolness to seep into me.

  “You're special. Stop fighting, you're special.”

  Air. I couldn't get air into my lungs. I pressed my right hand against my chest, trying to calm my speeding heart, trying to ease my wrung out lungs.

  “Stop fighting and I won't kill you.”

  I was going to pass out. If I couldn't get air into my lungs, I was going to pass out. It'd happened before. I'd been like this and I couldn't stop it, and then the blackness had come. But not for years. This hadn't happened in years.

  The vice around my chest tightened, the beating of my heart sped up, running away from the fear of a memory. I was stuck here. I couldn't stop myself. I was trapped in this moment. The memory was becoming stronger, the words growing louder.

  “I thought that was what you—”

  The door to the bathroom opened, swung back on its hinges and banged against the wall. I jumped. Jumped out of the past into the present. Suddenly I was here again. In a hotel bathroom. Not back there. Not back when.

  “Oops, sorry,” a woman said when she saw me jump, before she went into a stall, slammed and locked the door.

  “Don't say sorry,” I wanted to tell her. “You just saved me. You just rescued me from that place.”

  CHAPTER 29

  The auditorium could seat three hundred people. The original outbuildings of the manor house had been converted into a conference center with meeting rooms, business communications center and the auditorium.

  The lights were lowered and at the front a spotlight was on the guest speaker; the screen behind her was lit up with graphs and figures. She was lecturing on the changes in recruitment practices. I knew that because it was written on the sheet in front of me. The sheet that was part of my delegates’ pack. I knew because my eyes had scanned the front page of my delegates’ pack and had read those words. Hadn't taken them in, hadn't digested them, but like the good girl I was, I had read them. Nothing had registered since the moment beside the stairs. Since I glanced up and saw him.

  He hadn't seen me, I was sure of that. As sure as I could be. I'd stayed in a locked stall in the bathroom for an hour before I ventured out, finished checking in and went upstairs to my room on the fourth floor. All the while I'd been on the lookout, in case I bumped into him. In case I had to see him up close and act normal and say hello.

  As I sat in the auditorium, I knew I wasn't completely safe. Proximity wasn't an issue now, unless you counted the space in my head. That area he prowled around, baring his teeth, growling like a bloodthirsty animal.

  Weeks after I finished my work experience at the Harrogate Local & International Chronicle, when I'd spent a fortnight making tea, photocopying and transcribing interviews, when I'd been totally enamored with the whole process and decided it was for me, Lance asked me to come to a party at the paper.

  “Nothing fancy,” he said. “But it's a good way to get your face known. If they see you again they'll remember how good you were. There may be a job in it for you when you finish college.”

  Since I'd been a little girl noting down my stories and pieces of my imagination, writing had been my passion. What he was saying meant my dream could come true, I could become a journalist.

  It was a quiet party, held upstairs at a pub in Harrogate. The air was heavy with cigarette smoke, and the smell of beer and cheap wine clung to the smoke. I sat in a corner, not really a mover and shaker, far too shy to just go and talk to the editor or the deputy editor. Or, indeed, anyone with the word editor in their title apart from Lance.

  Being there was enough. Lance spent a lot of time at my side, getting me drinks, introducing me to people, and as a result a few people said to give them a call if I wanted to come back to do work experience again. I was made.

  I wasn't drinking much. Had managed to choke down a half and was struggling through a pint. Since the split with Tobey, anything more than three drinks transported me to a bad place, where I felt sorry for myself. Where I wanted to remake myself in Penny's image, in anyone's image if it would get my wonderful boyfriend back. I hated feeling like that. I didn't understand how I could let a man do that to me. Make me feel like that but I did.

  It was getting late and I had to get the train back to Leeds. I had three- quarters of a pint sitting on the table so decided I'd finish it before I left. I went to the loo and lingered there, looking at myself in the mirror. I wasn't always staring at myself in shiny surfaces but I was fascinated. What was it about me that had sent Tobey back to his ex? Did she have longer, more feminine hair than me? Mine was halfway between my shoulders and my chin. Did she have more beautiful eyes? Mine were such a deep dark brown they looked black, as though I had two large pupils. Did she have a smaller mouth? Because my lips were pretty full-on. Did she have a nicer nose? What was it? Oh stop it, I told myself. You should be over this by now, it's been five months. He isn't coming back to you.

  I washed my hands in the little sink, went back to the table. As I returned to the bar, I saw Lance and three men from the sports desk crowded around the table where our drinks were. They were snickering one of them using his body to hide the glasses on the table from the rest of the bar, the other two men I didn't really know watching, egging him on with their whispers. Through the slender gap between their bodies I saw they were pouring a glass of vodka into my drink. Right, so that's how you get your laughs, is it? I thought.

  I wandered over and when they saw me they all straightened up. Lance looked a little guilty; the others could hardly hide their amusement. Clearly they wanted to see me a stumbling drunken mess. If I hadn't caught you, you'd have been in for a shock, I thought. I'd have just sat here and bored you stupid about my wonderful ex- boyfriend. “All right, lads?” I asked, as I took my seat at the table again.

  “Yeah, yeah,” they said in unison, two of them snickering slightly.

  “Cool,” I said and reached for my drink. My fingers grazed the fat, sweating body of the glass, but fumbled and the glass toppled over, the liquid glugging out onto the dark wood table, dribbling down onto the floor.

  “Ah, damn!” I said regretfully as I looked into their faces. “That was almost a full pint, as well.”

  Lance guessed that I'd seen them. He knew that I wouldn't make a fuss but I wouldn't drink the spiked drink. I wish I was the type to make a fuss, to draw attention to myself when I'd been wronged. I wasn't. Lance knew that. Lance counted on that, I realized later.

  To avoid any more of their nonsense, I decided to leave, to get the train home and to remember not to drink with them again. Lance offered to walk me to the station.

  As we wandered through the dark streets of Harrogate towards the train station, I gulped in the fresh night air. I loved the cleansing feel of it after the fug of the pub. Halfway to the station, Lance stopped in the middle of the pavement.

  “I'm worried about you getting the train back so late on your own,” he said.

  “I'll be fine,” I said.

  “No, really, I'd hate myself if something happened to you.”

  “Seriously, I'll be fine.”

  “Look, my flatmate's away, she won't mind you staying in her room.”

  His concern was real, I could feel it, but I wanted to get home. To sleep in my own bed. And I still felt a little uneasy about the drink thing in the pub. It hadn't been him, but he hadn't stopped them. It was a joke, but trying to get me drunk, spiking my drink, wasn't funny.

  “I'll
drive you back to Leeds first thing in the morning,” he said.

  It was a long way back home and I had stayed at Lance's place a few times when I was going out with Tobey. It was quite a big house arranged over three floors and because they all worked, it wasn't a scuzzy student place. He lived there with three other people and they were all friendly. I still hesitated. I really did want to go back home; I was meant to be going for a pub lunch with my flatmates tomorrow. And also, there was that other issue. It still hovered around us, still concerned me a little.

  “Look, Lance, I really like having you as a friend,“ I said, feeling uncomfortable bringing it up but emphasizing the word friend. I didn't want him to think I thought I was extra-special, that I thought I was something special so he was harboring feelings for me, but I wanted to say something to make it clear that I didn't want to kiss him again.

  “Yeah, I know,” he said, looking a bit put out. “I haven't tried anything, have I?”

  Embarrassment washed through me. That had sounded arrogant. God, what an idiot. He must think the worst of me. What am I like? Of course he doesn't fancy me. If he did, he'd have tried to kiss me again, which he hasn't.

  If I didn't stay over, I realized, he'd think I had a big head or something.

  “OK, I will stay over,” I said. “Thanks so much.”

  He smiled. “Come on. And if you're really good, I'll buy you a bag of chips on the way back.”

  I thought that was it. The matter was closed. Over. And it was. Until a few hours later. Around the time he said to me, “Don't you ever get frustrated?”

  “Oi, come on,” someone said as they nudged me. “We're supposed to convene down here again in forty minutes for the group exercises.”

  I twisted to the woman beside me. She was a shapely woman, who, like me, shouldn't wear button-up blouses— the top buttons of her white shirt were straining against her well-stacked chest. She had a friendly face, an easy smile and kind eyes. “We've got yellow lines on our name badges, which means, apparently, that we're in the same group,” she continued to my blank expression. “Which also means we're pretty much screwed because I fell asleep, too.”

  My face offered her a wan smile as I gathered my folder, bottle of water, pen and pad and shoved them all into my large cloth delegates’ bags we'd been given.

  I have to leave this place, I decided.

  I would go upstairs, shower, get changed and then drive over to Leeds to see my former flatmates as planned. They wouldn't mind me turning up two days early. I hadn't seen them in years so they'd probably be overjoyed to see me even earlier.

  “I might see you later,” I said to the woman.

  “If you don't come back, I'll tell on ya,” she warned with another of her easy smiles. She had a soft Welsh accent that purred gently under her words. “Ah, go on, come back. You look like the most interesting person in here. And I know, just know, that everyone else will have done their work.” She grinned at me again.

  I can't leave, I realized. Gabrielle had spent her own money to send me here. Leaving would be a slap in her face, telling her that I had no respect for all that she was working for. I couldn't do that to Gabrielle. And what would I tell her? I saw someone I haven't seen in years and I freaked out? Even if she understood, she'd probably ask me why I freaked out. What it was about him that made me do that to her. I'd have to tell her the truth. Which was never going to happen. I couldn't talk about him. Not to anyone. I didn't even think about him, let alone talk about him. What would that, my refusal to tell her the truth, do to mine and Gabrielle's relationship?

  I had three options as far as I could see: I waste her money and refuse to explain why; or I waste her money and tell her why; or I don't waste her money and don't have to get into the telling or not telling.

  Out of those three options, what was the easiest one? Really, what was the easiest one?

  “All right,” I replied to my yellow group partner. “I'll see you outside in twenty minutes.”

  “Great!” she said. “I'm nipping outside for a fag or five. I'm gasping.”

  Summer and Jaxon rang just before seven o'clock to tell me about their days and to say their dad had burnt dinner so they had to order a pizza. And their mumma had called them again and she was really excited about seeing them on Saturday. And their dad was trying to make a new house but he kept saying he couldn't concentrate because they were making too much noise and did I think they made too much noise? Talking to them gave me a sense of peace. Reminded me I wasn't twenty, alone, frightened. I was nearly thirty-three with a different life and responsibilities.

  I had moved on.

  CHAPTER 30

  The second day of the conference got under way early. It was a bright, sunny day, with a wonderfully deep blue sky and very few clouds.

  By 8 a.m. we'd all breakfasted and were sitting in our well- upholstered seats listening to whatever it was we were meant to be listening to. I wasn't paying much attention. My Welsh friend was called Billie, and she was staying two rooms down from me. She was funny and we behaved like naughty schoolchildren most of the time, giggling in the back, talking about TV programs whenever we had a spare moment, and only doing our work under duress. I was always aware of the monster in the hotel, but after I finished at the conference I was going over to Leeds to see a couple of my old flatmates for two nights and I'd be back down south by Sunday afternoon. I could avoid him for that long because he hadn't seen me. I hadn't seen him—even though I kept a very close lookout—since the other morning and he hadn't seen me. All I had to do was avoid him and then leave and put this whole experience behind me.

  At dinner that night I sat with Billie and we pretended to listen to a pompous man from London expound on his theories on recruiting young women. In reality we were both giggling into our chocolate puddings, wishing he'd shut up. Like a lot of other people in the room, I had one eye on the clock because I was going to call my kids at seven o'clock.

  I missed them. Genuinely missed them. I'd probably seen them almost every day for the past few months and I missed their smiles, and nonsensical conversation, and running around on the sofas, and hearing their keys in my lock. I missed eating dinner with them. I missed talking Summer down from a tantrum and coaxing words out of Jaxon when he was cross.

  When Billie got up to go to the loo I got up, too. I wasn't going to be left with the idiot in front of us. And it was six-forty. They would have finished dinner by now; Kyle wouldn't mind their routine being put out by fifteen minutes. Billie and I parted ways at the lift. I called it and felt mildly anxious as I waited. I knew there was a monster around, I had to get to safety. Absently I jiggled my legs, watching the number lights falling from six to five to four to three to two to one to ground.

  My leg jiggling got worse. The doors took an age to open, but eventually, softly, they parted. I stepped into the wood-paneled box and pressed the button for the fourth floor.

  As I waited for the doors to slide shut again, I heard heavy footsteps heading my way. Probably male footsteps. I willed the doors to close, to let me get away from here. The metal doors began to slide together, when a large hand sliced between them, causing them to clunk to a halt then open again.

  My heart sank, my breath caught. I ducked my head, hiding behind my hair as the man who'd stopped the lift stepped in. He had on shiny black shoes. He moved near to me and I jumped back. “Sorry,” he said, “didn't mean to startle you. I just need to press three.” It wasn't his voice. This one was Scottish. I dared a look at him and he was blithely reading the fire notice on the wall of the lift. I exhaled and told myself to calm down.

  The lift delivered him to his floor and he got out with a brief nod. I pushed the arrow to shut the door and relaxed a little. The lift went up again. “Suspicious Minds” popped into my head. I started humming it as I wondered how long it took to go up one more floor.

  I was examining the black strip on my swipe card as the doors finally opened. At last! I thought as I stepped forwards.<
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  Someone had been waiting for the lift and he appeared in the gap between the doors as they opened to free me. He smiled at me, and I offered a small smile without eye contact. He stood aside to let me past. I rushed down the corridor, turned the corner to my room, which was almost like walking back towards the lift. A couple was wandering down the corridor, and the man stepped aside to let me pass. I smiled a thank-you.

  The smooth flatness of my key card slipped in my hands. I was excited. Pathetic as it was, I was going to talk to Summer and Jaxon and that made me so happy. At the next turn another guest left his room, shutting his door behind him, checked the handle. Turned in the direction of the lift.

  He seemed to take up all of the corridor all at once. He seemed to grow seven feet tall. A smile crawled its way across his face. “Aren't you going to say hello?” he said.

  When I was packing to leave Australia, I sold almost everything. I didn't have time to organize shipping stuff home, so I kept a handful of my favorite books, my favorite CDs, my laptop computer and as many of my clothes and shoes as I could pack. I decided to pay excess fare if I had to, but everything else—from my bed to the teaspoons, my plants to my reusable shopping bags—I sold. I had an open house afternoon and sold everything. I made about $1,500, which was about £650. I gave it all to the Samaritans because I wanted to help them to help other people. I had to make sure that if another person ever got to the point where Will's wife had, they'd reach out for help instead of hitting self- destruct. I know what it's like to be on that ledge. To want to jump or even to just let go and fall. I know what it's like, and the thought that I'd been partially responsible for driving another person to that point… That's why I had to leave. I could never be responsible for doing to another person what someone had done to me.