by Lucy Dawson
Rosie twitches and turns over, starting to restlessly sense our presence in her sleep.
I put my finger to my lips. ‘Come to the bathroom,’ I mouth and creep back out.
I wait in there for a moment or two, looking at my reflection in the mirror and am just beginning to wonder if he’s gone back to sleep, when he shuffles in, hair all over the place, eyes squinting in the light.
‘What’s going on?’ I ask, concerned.
‘Nightmares,’ he says and scratches his chest before pushing the door to, reaching for some loo roll and blowing his nose deliberately quietly.
‘Poor little thing,’ I sigh. ‘That’ll be my fault for shouting in the shop. I must have stressed her out.’
He frowns, then shakes his head. ‘No. I had nightmares. About her.’
‘Oh Tim!’ I reach out and put a hand on his arm.
‘I couldn’t get to sleep. I closed my eyes for literally ten minutes and had the most horrific one I’ve ever had, about Rosie.’ He crosses his arms making my hand fall away from him. ‘I needed to go and make sure she was OK.’
‘Of course. Are you coming back to bed though? It can’t be comfy on the floor in there?’
He shakes his head. ‘I think I’ll stay with her.’
I look at him carefully. ‘Are you sure you’re all right?’
He hesitates and I’m astonished to see tears forming in his eyes, which he wipes away quickly.
‘Why don’t you tell me about the nightmare?’ I encourage. ‘Sometimes it can help to say it out loud? It doesn’t feel as scary then.’
He gives a small, desperate laugh. ‘No, thanks. I don’t want to think about it ever again, let alone discuss it. It was terrifying.’
‘But just a dream,’ I remind him. ‘Come on, tell me.’
He looks at me and takes a deep breath. ‘It involved Paul Jones being in Fox Cottage. I could hear him laughing but I didn’t know where he was or where Rosie was either. I kept rushing from empty room to empty room and the laughter was coming from a different place each time. Then I heard Rosie screaming. It got worse after that.’
‘OK, just stop,’ I say quickly. ‘It’s all right.’ I put my hand back on his arm. ‘You don’t have to continue.’
‘Everything is feeling very real to me at the moment. I’m sorry. I know I’m stressing you out and I don’t mean to. What with these bits of candles, séances, carvings all over the ceilings, newspaper clippings from nearly thirty years ago and exorcisms, my head’s a mess.’
I cross my own arms, shivering in the cold, my teeth giving an involuntarily chatter as I try and think of something to say – but I’m not fast enough for Tim.
‘Look, just go back to bed,’ he says brusquely. ‘We’ll talk more about it in the morning. I know you don’t believe in this kind of thing, but I do, and I’m freaking out. I feel like we’re playing parts in some improvisation horror movie I don’t even know I’ve been cast in.’
‘Sweetheart, you’ve always had a wild imagination. It’s what makes you a good actor.’
‘Don’t, please!’ He lets his head hang back in despair. ‘This is not bullshit. I promise you.’
‘I know it isn’t! You are a good actor. The fact that you got the part proves it. That’s what we need to talk about in the morning – how we make that work.’
‘I told you, I already refused it – and we won’t talk about it in the morning anyway.’ He rubs his eyes and mutters. ‘I think she’s right. Something big is going to happen, I can feel it.’
‘Of course she’s right. You have an amazing agent. She’s spot on, this is just the start. You got one part – you’ll definitely get others. We just need to find a way of getting you to auditions.’
He shakes his head. ‘No, that’s not what I’m talking about. And I can’t get to auditions from here anyway, that’s just crazy!’
‘Why not? I’m going to have to get to work from here!’ I can’t help but make the point.
He yawns, involuntarily. ‘OK, I really don’t want to fight with you now, it’s what – 3 a.m.?’
‘One,’ I correct him.
‘Whatever. It’s late. Honestly, go back to bed.’
‘No, come on – you’re right, we need to discuss this. If you won’t go to auditions, why don’t you finally ask Sam for some help? You’ve proven you’re still good enough to get parts. Get him to fast-track you. If he can’t open some doors, no one can.’
He exhales heavily. ‘You really don’t get it. It’s not your fault, but you don’t. Stuff just isn’t black and white like that. For one, if this ever happens, I don’t want to use any connections – it means everything to me to get it on my own merit. For two, Sam would never push anyone he sees as a threat. I couldn’t say this to anyone but you, but I’m a better actor than him.’ He shrugs. ‘I know it, he knows it. I got all the parts at school he didn’t. I was like Neil in Dead Poets Society and he hated it. He could have got me seen for a hundred things by now if he wanted to. And he hasn’t.’
I can’t help but think that’s absolute rubbish. Sam is an A-list star. Why would he feel threatened by Tim? This is all starting to sound increasingly paranoid. Worryingly so.
‘I know you won’t agree with me,’ he whispers urgently, ‘but Harry would have done it in Sam’s position. No question.’
I can’t help it. I snort with disgust.
He looks up at the ceiling. ‘Harry really didn’t set out to screw us.’
‘That’s exactly what he would have done, given a chance,’ I retort before I think. It’s the middle of the night – my brain is not working properly.
Tim looks confused. ‘I don’t understand what you mean by that?’
I hesitate, on the verge of finally telling him, after ten years, what his beloved friend, his ‘family’, did to me that first night I met him. I want to explain that back then, I didn’t think he would believe me over Harry, but the longer we’ve been together the more it’s become about not wanting to torpedo his most important male relationship because I love him. But yes, I was frightened and no, it wasn’t OK. I know Harry doesn’t like me – he’s been downright rude to me at times – and although he’s not laid a finger on me since that night, it’s pretty sad that I consider him managing such a basic principle of acceptable behaviour a positive. I won’t care if we never see him again, but as that doesn’t seem a likely prospect anyway, and I know Tim is already very hurt – do I need to stick the knife in a little bit harder, twist it a little more? Probably not. Although something occurs to me randomly: ‘Did Harry know it was my money from the start?’
Tim looks at me in disbelief. ‘You want to do this now too? I don’t know! We didn’t discuss it. He asked if it was Dad’s money and I said no. By default I suppose he knew it was yours?’
I nod. Maybe Harry did do this deliberately to spite me and drive a wedge between us, knowing it would cause huge problems. I wouldn’t put it past him, but even if he did it’s badly backfired and he’s deeply damaged the person he claims to love most in the world. Tim is on the verge of spiralling out of control.
‘I’m sorry that I’m handling everything so badly.’ He echoes my thoughts, sitting down on the edge of the bath and looking up at me. ‘This whole thing – the move, all of it – has really done my head in. It’s not just raked over the past, it’s dug it right up; all of my anger about being sent away after what happened – I still can’t believe they did that to me, to be honest, now that I’m a parent myself. I was already struggling and now we’re actually here, it’s even worse. I got the part but I can’t take it and that bloody house,’ he shudders. ‘I really, really don’t want to move in tomorrow. Something terrible is going to happen.’
‘You feel like you’ve had a premonition? Is that what you mean?’ I’m starting to take this seriously. I don’t think he’s well at all.
‘Kind of. This fear is in my head the whole time.’ He taps his skull. ‘But not just for me – more for you and Rosie. The Parkes t
ried to get rid of whatever is in that house and it didn’t work. What makes us think we can? How do I keep us safe?’
‘Whoa – stop now. They tried to get rid of what, and how?’
‘Whatever is in the house,’ he repeats, looking back at me, frightened. ‘They got a priest in too! Mrs Parkes told me!’
I narrow my eyes. ‘I think we can discount anything that woman says, don’t you? Look, let’s see how you feel about it all in the morning, OK? No one is going to make you do anything you don’t want to. We should go back to bed now, though. You’re going to be so tired in the morning otherwise.’ It’s exactly what I might say to Rosie if she woke up in the middle of the night, and he knows it.
‘You go,’ he’s resolute. ‘I’m going to sleep in with Ro again. I don’t want to leave her on her own.’
I don’t push it. I just kiss him good night and return back to our room. I slide under the cold covers and type ‘Paranoia’ into my phone before landing on the page of a mental health charity.
Paranoia is feeling or believing that you are under threat when there is no evidence that you are. There are different types of threat, from thinking people are trying to take over your mind, through to believing you, or your loved ones are at risk of being harmed or killed. You might be convinced that you are being watched or that people are talking about you. Sometimes these suspicious thoughts might be justified. They can help to keep you safe, if there is evidence to support the thoughts. For example, if you saw lots of people being sick after eating from a tray of food, you would be right to be suspicious. However, it would almost certainly be paranoid to believe all of your food is being poisoned by an organisation hired to kill you. Sometimes this paranoia can take the form of a delusional disorder called PSYCHOSIS, where you see the world in a different way to everyone else around you. You might experience delusions (thinking you are all-powerful/something is trying to harm you) or hallucinations (seeing things others don’t, like faces, or religious figures. Hearing voices that can seem hostile). People might tell you they are worried you are losing touch with reality. It can be upsetting when people close to you don’t seem to believe you. This can make you feel more scared and frightened, sometimes angry and frustrated. It’s important to remember psychosis is an illness just like any other and can be treated in a way that enables you to function day-to-day and feel supported.
I lie back on the pillow and stare up at the ceiling. Is that what this is about? Has moving back here triggered some sort of post-traumatic thing that’s led us to this point; full-blown paranoia or psychosis? I’ve been so busy focusing on Isobel’s ‘psychological issues’ – except she knows exactly what she’s doing – that I’ve totally missed Timothy’s genuine ones. Has he been steadily losing the plot right under my nose?
I don’t know what to think any more. Everything is falling down around me.
‘It’s just here.’ Adam points to the newly puttied window frame. ‘When I shut the door, literally a whole lump of the wall crumbled out. I didn’t want you to think I’d damaged it, then just left it.’
‘Thank you. It’s kind of you to have taken the trouble to fix it back in.’
‘I’ve not done a professional job or anything… obviously,’ he smiles briefly, ‘and I know you’ve got the builders starting on Wednesday, so they’ll rip it out again in any case, but… anyway, I’ve told you now.’
‘It’ll stop any rain getting in for a few days though, which is great.’ I shiver. ‘It’s so cold in here.’ I eye his fingerless gloves and glance across at his tray of brushes. ‘I’ve probably got a heater in a box somewhere. I’ll see if I can find it.’
He hesitates. ‘I’ve got one, I just didn’t want to be cheeky and plug it in. It’s your electricity. You’ve been kind enough, letting me use this space.’
‘Oh, you must plug it in! We really don’t mind,’ I say sincerely.
‘Thank you,’ he says quietly. ‘I did want to ask you another favour though: I hope I won’t need to, but if I run out of time today, would it be all right to come in tomorrow too? Even though it’s a Saturday?’ He scratches his stubble. ‘I’m just desperate to get this last work finished, that’s all.’ He motions towards a canvas sitting on the easel: a dark swirling mass of purples and blues. I think it’s supposed to be a sea. It looks finished to me, that’s for sure.
‘Of course. That’s no problem.’ Then I get to the point of why I’ve come in. ‘How’s Isobel this morning?’
He looks uncomfortable. ‘I don’t know. I haven’t seen her. I’m really sorry about what happened yesterday. All of the shouting and crying. It was very upsetting. Isobel is so fragile at the moment. She doesn’t sleep well and things seem even worse when you’re overtired, don’t they?’
I nod.
‘She’s a sensitive person at the best of times – by that I mean she’s very attuned to how other people are feeling. She has a very highly developed sense of empathy. When other people are upset – like her mother was last night – she finds it hard.’
‘Her mother doesn’t seem to be quite as delicate as Isobel is,’ I can’t help the tartness in my voice.
Adam looks down at the floor. ‘Eve has a tendency to speak before she thinks sometimes, that’s for sure. Have you been out on the back road to Lake Vyrnwy from here?’
I’m slightly startled by what appears to be such a random question. ‘Not for a long time. Why?’
‘That’s the road she and her husband were on when they had the crash that killed him. You wouldn’t want to break down there at night on your own, it’s very rural. It’s also a pretty straight bit of road where they were, yet Eve’s husband swerved off it for no apparent reason. Eve had to run for quite a while on her own to get help, and because it was in the middle of nowhere, the emergency services took a long time to get there. She had to sit in a stranger’s Land Rover with the farmer she’d woken up, waiting, behind her own crashed car containing her dead husband. So she’s not had it easy.’ He sighs deeply. ‘I’m not trying to excuse her having a go at you yesterday, she can be very hurtful when she wants to be, but she’s… got issues.’
I hesitate. ‘That’s really horrible and I know what happened to you, Tim and Isobel wasn’t long after that, either, which must have affected her too. But don’t we all have a story to tell? My parents died in a car crash.’
He looks horrified. ‘Oh, I’m so sorry, Claire. I didn’t mean—’
I hold up a hand. ‘Please don’t feel bad. That’s not why I’m telling you. I’m just not sure having a damaged past excuses bad behaviour later in life. That’s my point.’
‘It doesn’t. I’m not saying that, it’s just… oh.’ He trails off and gestures suddenly out of the window overlooking the forecourt. ‘Looks like you’ve got visitors.’
I glance behind me to see a small red car has pulled up and a grey-haired priest in glasses is climbing out. ‘Oh God,’ I sigh.
‘No, he probably just thinks he is,’ Adam remarks, and I half smile.
‘I better get on. Needs must when the devil drives.’
‘I’m sorry you’re having a tough time of it and I’m really sorry about your parents.’
‘Thanks.’ I mean it sincerely and as I walk back through to the middle bit of the house, I feel glad Tim said he could work there. He does seem like a nice bloke.
Father Mathew turns out to be a nice enough man too, although a pretty condescending one. Tim offers him a tea or coffee as we sit down on the sofa in the big sitting room, to which he replies a coffee would be lovely, and beams straight at me. I let it go, because he is here at short notice on a Friday and, if it helps Tim, I’ll make him all the coffee he wants. I disappear off to make it like a good little wife, returning with a steaming mug to hear him saying gravely to Tim that the difference between blessing a house and providing an exorcism is that to perform the latter, you need a possessed person, which we don’t have.
‘Popular culture usually depicts the possessed as teenage childre
n because people subscribe to the notion that children have a particular energy that demons are attracted to. As a father myself I can’t deny that’s true about the energy, but—’
He must see the look of surprise on my face because he holds a hand up to show me a wedding ring. ‘I crossed over from the dark side myself.’ Tim laughs heartily, and Father Mathew smiles. ‘That is to say, I’m a former Anglican who converted to Catholicism. You aren’t expected to give up your wife and children if you already have them.’ He turns back to Tim. ‘I’m sorry, where was I? Ah yes – teenage children. So that’s where the idea of possession comes from – a demonic entity taking over a living human – but historically it was used in all sorts of situations that, today, we would quite rightly understand is a person suffering from a mental health issue. In that instance they need medical help, of course. Genuine demonic possession is a very rare phenomenon.’ He takes a sip of his coffee.
‘An interesting one though,’ I say politely. ‘What are the criteria for being considered genuinely possessed? Is there a check list?’
Tim gives a slightly nervous laugh that I know means ‘don’t take the piss’.
‘I’m serious,’ I say innocently. ‘I really want to know.’
But Father Mathew isn’t concerned. He’s seen my type many times before. ‘Well, I suppose there is, in a way.’ He sits back comfortably and crosses his legs. I suddenly wish my sister was here. She’d love this. ‘You’ll have seen films like The Exorcist,’ he says to me cosily, ‘so you’ll know that one of the associations with possession is the afflicted person having unnatural postures, possibly levitating,’ he eyes me keenly and I keep a completely straight face, ‘sometimes odd facial expressions or their voice might change and become guttural.’
I stop grinning inside and remember Isobel yesterday, before reminding myself quickly that her voice didn’t become guttural, just normal in comparison to her usual stupid dreamy-fairy one. I’m not feeling quite as charitable towards Isobel this morning given that she’s pretty much the main reason I’m wasting my time talking to a priest when I’ve got a house to unpack. Funnily enough, there were no old newspaper cuttings on the carpet when we arrived this morning, now the locks have been changed.
