All of Me (11 page)

Panicking, I flashed a look around me. The machines were there. The plug was in my hand. It was a different room – similar but subtly different in ways you notice when you’ve got nothing to do but stare at the walls for days – but it was in the same place. I’d been dragged back to Mayday Hospital. I was on Ward 1. They’d hurt me again.

And they were blaming me.

I thought,
I’ve got to get out. These people are going to kill me.

I scrambled around the bed. Where were my clothes?

‘Come on, Kim, you know you can’t get up yet.’

The woman’s tone wasn’t that of a stranger. I stared at her for what seemed like ages, waiting for a jigsaw piece to drop into place. Nothing came. I didn’t know her.

But she seemed to know me.

‘Are you ready to talk this time?’ she asked.

‘Talk about what?’ I spluttered, chest sore as hell.

‘Well, for a start, about why you did it this time? You know I can’t help you if you don’t tell me what’s wrong.’

I shrugged. Whoever this woman was, she was acting as though we knew each other. Usually I’d go along with it but as far as I was concerned, being treated like a medical experiment changed the rules.

‘Do I know you?’ I asked quietly.

‘Oh, Kim,’ she sighed. ‘What are we going to do with you?’

I didn’t reply. The woman came closer. She looked like she was considering her next words. Eventually she said, ‘Okay, have it your way. I’m Dr Picton-Jones, your psychiatrist, as you well know.’

Psychiatrist?

‘I’m the person charged with finding out what’s driving your behaviour,’ she continued, ‘and trying to keep you out of the asylum.’

Asylum?

‘What – like nuthouse?’

I completely forgot the pain in my chest. Panic overwhelmed me and I felt myself actually break out in sweat. I swear I could hear my heart pounding double-time. Asylum? This was all getting out of hand.

‘Look, I don’t know why you’re keeping me here. I need to go home.’

‘Of course you do,’ the doctor smiled, ‘and believe me, there’s nothing more I would like to see than you go home – and stay there. But you seem to enjoy coming back here, don’t you? So, do you want to tell me why?’

Glaring at her, I shook my head. This doctor’s nice words didn’t count for anything. She was still telling the same lies as the rest of them.

They must have drugged me in the hospital. I don’t remember Dr Picton-Jones leaving. The next thing I recall is Mum being there.

‘Look,’ she said firmly, ‘the doctors here want to have you sectioned. Do you know what that means?’

‘No.’

‘It means they lock you up in the loony bin and throw away the key.’

‘Why would they do that to me?’

Mum didn’t know whether to laugh or shout. In the end she did a bit of both. ‘Why do you think? To stop you trying any more of this nonsense again!’

‘What nonsense?’ I yelled. ‘Why won’t anyone tell me?’

Mum’s smile faded. Suddenly she looked like she was going to cry. I really didn’t want to see that.

‘I just want to come home,’ I said quietly.

Mum nodded but she still seemed sad. She explained that Dr Picton-Jones was fighting for my rights in the hospital. Standard procedure was to have me packed off to somewhere like Warlingham Park, a scary-sounding Victorian mental institution. The doctor was doing everything she could to keep me out of there. ‘It’s no place for a child,’ she said.

There were two ways of keeping me out of there, Mum went on. One was to not try to hurt myself again.

‘Do you think you can manage that?’

I felt like screaming again. ‘Of course I can! Who would want to hurt themselves? The only people hurting me are the doctors in this place!’

Mum sighed as she pulled on her coat to leave. She seemed resigned to events, I could tell that, even if I didn’t know what those events were.

What I did know for sure is that she was swallowing the lies the hospital was telling about me.

According to the nurses’ chart at the foot of my bed I was in for almost a week. I remember being there for about two days. Possibly three. Even then I was only conscious for a couple of hours at a time. They must have been keeping me on some pretty fierce pills.

Speaking of pills, when discharge day came again, this time they packed me off with a prescription of little blue tablets.

‘These are for your nightmares.’

‘What nightmares?’ I couldn’t help asking. Yes, I suffered bad dreams – but how did she know that? I’d never told a soul.

The nurse exhaled heavily, her patience already exhausted. That was unfair, I thought. I’d never even seen her before.
She could at least talk to me civilly.

Seriously though, what nightmares? I’d never discussed any dreams with a living soul. Certainly no one who had access to black pipes.

‘Take one a day,’ she continued professionally. ‘They’ll aid your sleeping.’

‘Fine.’

Back home that night, with Nan standing over me, I tentatively opened the packet and popped a little blue oval into my mouth. I don’t know what I was expecting but that was pretty much the last thing I remembered. The next night it was the same pattern. Tablet, water, knock-out. I still didn’t know what all the talk of nightmares was but, I thought,
If these things can stop the hospital dragging me back in I’ll keep taking them.

If that’s what it took to keep them happy, then okay, I could play that game.

It didn’t work out like that. A week or two drifted by and then once again I found myself staring up at the same pastel ceiling, my throat feeling like a flood of lava had passed recently along it.

Back to square one.

The doctors this time exuded a wearied air like they’d seen it all before. I didn’t recognise most of them but once again they seemed to know me – or know of me. There were plenty of heated discussions at the foot of my bed. One would argue this, another would suggest that. I just lay with my eyes closed, pretending to be asleep, but straining to hear every word. It wasn’t easy listening. They couldn’t have been more impersonal if they’d been talking about some insect on a medical student’s dissecting table. And they really didn’t seem to like me. Why else would they conjure up these lies?

‘It’s just attention-seeking,’ one said.

‘Picton-Jones says there must be a problem at home.’

‘The only problem is her. She enjoys causing a fuss.’

‘Well, the girl says she’ll do it again if we discharge her.’

‘She’s manipulative. I for one suggest we don’t give in to her blackmail.’

‘So we’re sending her home.’

‘Of course. Agreed?’

‘Agreed.’

And that was it. I couldn’t tell if they shook hands but it sounded like they were agreeing on a price for a head of cattle. Not deciding on a terrified girl’s future.

At least they helped me on one matter. Dr Picton-Jones had disagreed with them, it seemed. Perhaps she really was on my side.
Maybe she’s not like the others,
I thought.
I’ll make more effort next time.

That next time came quicker than I hoped. Or so it seemed. Keeping track of time was never my strongest suit. I was beginning to see that. In any case, the way the hospital kept me brimmed full of drugs everything was so hazy. Then Dr Picton-Jones appeared at my bedside on discharge day. She was with another woman, a smart-looking blonde who gave a little wave when I looked at her. I smiled back.

‘This is Miss Kerfoot,’ the doctor said, after introducing me to the stranger. ‘She’s a social worker. You might also say she’s the last throw of the dice as far as this hospital is concerned.’

More gobbledegook that meant nothing to me. I tried to look impressed. If this woman was a friend of my only ally in Mayday then she deserved the benefit of the doubt.

‘Miss Kerfoot will be assessing your home environment,’ Dr Picton-Jones went on.

‘What for?’ I blurted out. Ally or not, I couldn’t help it. ‘There’s nothing wrong with my home.’

‘Then it shouldn’t take very long to sort out, should it?’

Miss Kerfoot just stood there, still smiling. She seemed genuine enough. She explained she’d be popping round in the next few days to see how I was. It was her job to look for symptoms that weren’t necessarily medical. Once again, more jargon I couldn’t interpret. So I nodded, and I smiled. Anything to speed the process up and get me home.

The next time I saw Miss Kerfoot was at home. I came downstairs at about five o’clock and she was just there, sitting at the dining table surrounded by files and paperwork. I had no idea how long she’d been around. She must have spoken to Mum and Dad but by the time I entered the room Dad had scampered off and Mum was in a silent fury. Whatever had been discussed hadn’t pleased her one bit. I didn’t think much about it.

‘It’s you I’ve really come to talk to,’ Miss Kerfoot said, unfazed by my sudden arrival. I sat down opposite her and she asked me how I was, how I felt about my sister’s break-up, my dad’s illness, Mum’s accident and Nan’s stroke. I answered as best I could. They all made me sad.

‘Have you cried about them?’

I shook my head.

She nodded and made a note in one of the files spread across the table.

I was vaguely aware, while we were talking, that the noises from the kitchen were getting increasingly louder. Pots were being crashed, pans thumped down onto the worktop and plates thrown around. That was unlike Mum. She was careful and considerate. Normally. But not today.

Then the other shoe dropped.

As far as Mum was concerned, strangers had no business poking their noses where they weren’t wanted. She must have hated this social worker being there. As a family we preferred to keep things to ourselves. That was our strength, in Mum’s eyes. After all, these were the people who hadn’t even told me when Dad had walked out.

I found myself raising my voice just to be heard by Miss Kerfoot. I wasn’t particularly thrilled by her being there either but at least she said she wanted to help me.

‘All I want is to stop you going back into that hospital,’ she assured me.

Hallelujah for that.

‘But what can you do about it?’

Before she could answer, Mum came bustling out to set the table for dinner. Before Miss Kerfoot had a chance to move any of her things Mum flicked the tablecloth and threw it down over the whole table – covering box files, note pads, pens, everything – then slammed cutlery down in front of the pair of us. Miss Kerfoot’s face was a picture. She had a knife balancing on top of a folder and a fork mounted on what looked like a book but it could have been her glasses case.

‘Well, I …’ she began, but there were no words. What could anyone say?

Both of us stunned into silence, our guest carefully folded back the cover and retrieved her things. While Mum carried on bustling around the kitchen as though nothing had happened, Miss Kerfoot didn’t take her eyes off her. Only when she was ready to leave did she take me to one side.

‘I should warn you, I’m going to recommend getting you out of here,’ she said.

‘Why? This is my home.’

She smiled.
That’s her ‘nice’ smile,
I thought.
Her sympathetic one is probably the same.

‘I don’t know what the reasons are, but this is not a healthy atmosphere to be living in. I think you need time away.’

‘What atmosphere? What are you talking about?’

‘Your parents don’t have a civil word for each other. They make no attempt to hide it when you or Lorraine are in the house. Everyone’s obviously struggling to cope with your father’s illness, your mother’s accident and now your grandmother. And then there’s your sister’s marriage problems.’

I shrugged. It didn’t sound good when she put it like that. But they were still my parents. The only ones I knew. Their behaviour was what I was used to. I wished they’d get on better but it didn’t bother me. I was like this, they were like that. That’s the way it was. The only thing I cared about was learning why the hospital kept kidnapping me and subjecting me to God knows what.

According to the medical reports and various hearsay assessments from my friends, the reason I kept being admitted into hospital was for treatment for pill overdoses. Dad had stacks of distalgesic tucked away and, he’d told the doctors, I was downing them by the handful.

Utter rubbish.

I didn’t know why he would make up something like that or why the hospital would believe him. I didn’t dare question him about it. He obviously had his reasons.

Later that night I wondered whether the social worker was right. Maybe I should get out. But where would a fourteen-year-old go? It was completely impractical. I suppose if Lorraine was still with her husband I could have moved in with them. As it was, I had no options. I was stuck at home. Stuck with all the lies. I wasn’t going anywhere.