Getting Over It (13 page)

Chapter 17

D
ID YOU HAVE A NICKNAME
when you were little? When I asked my friends this question, nearly everyone said yes. Marcus denied it at first, but later admitted that his adoring mother called him “Ver Likkle Chubbly.” Luke’s despairing parents dubbed him “Trouble.” Lizzy’s unofficial name was “Jellytot.” Michelle’s astute parents referred to their daughter as “Madam.” Tina’s mother re-christened her “The Squeak.” Laetitia’s parents—it goes without saying—stuck grimly to Laetitia. And my father? His nickname for me was “The Grinch.”

Never a great one for reading books in which no one dies, I forgot its origins and often skipped to infant school squawking a sophisticated homemade song to myself: “I’m the Grinch! Little Grinch!” As I grew up, my father stopped calling me the Grinch and started calling me Helen. Only when scribbling my annual birthday card did he revert to the teasing familiarity of “Dear Grinch.” As signs of affection were rare in our house, I accorded “Dear Grinch” the same degree of symbolism that most patriotic citizens reserve for their national flag. And then I found out.

I was in the pub with Tina one Friday, a few months before my father died, indulging in a fond whinge about Jasper. He’d dismissed the Divine Comedy (my favorite band) as “poncy shite” and had forced me to listen—on my car stereo, mark you—to Daryl Hall and John Oates. Secretly I admired his nerve, if not his taste in music. Tina exclaimed nastily, “He’s a grinch, that one!”

I started and said, “A grinch? What do you mean by that?”

She gave me an odd look. “You know! Mean. Petty! Fun-crushing!”

I smiled weakly and said “Is that what grinch means?”

Tina hooted. “You’re having a laugh! Didn’t you have Dr. Seuss in north London?
The Cat in the Hat? How the Grinch Stole Christmas?
No?”

I shook my head, muttered, “No, no,” and ran to the bar to buy the next round. The next day I sped to the library and asked the librarian to help me find a children’s book. She smiled a collaborative smile.

And I discovered that a grinch was not—as I’d imagined—a cute, furry, little love bundle but a spiteful, red-eyed, cave-dwelling creature with a heart “two sizes too small.” Sure, he turns into a sweetie at the end. But right up to the penultimate page, the Grinch is a vicious, ugly slimeball with no friends.

I didn’t want Tina to laugh at me again, so I decided to share my life-shattering news with Lizzy. She’d give it the sober consideration it deserved. After my tenth bottle of Becks, I boohooed out the shocking tale in a wetly incoherent ramble. And she laughed at me!

“Helen,” she tinkled, “it’s a pet name! I’m sure he didn’t mean anything by it! It’s just a nice word, like… pumpkin! My dad still calls my sister Pumpkin—and she’s thirty-one and as thin as a whippet!”

I staggered to bed tear-stained and woke up feeling foolish. Lizzy, the voice of reason, had spoken. My father dubbed me the Grinch because it was a nice word. Nothing sinister. In fact, I should count my blessings—after an unfortunate accident during assembly, Michelle (then aged four) spent the rest of her elementary school life under the moniker “Stinky Pooh Pants.” And that was just the teachers!

I’d blocked out the hurt when, a few days later, Lizzy approached. She hoped I didn’t mind, but she’d been discussing grinches and pumpkins with a pyschologist friend and he’d said, “What these names mean is less important than how they make you feel.” Had I thought of confronting my father? Certainly. Like I’d thought of painting myself green and running down Oxford Street butt-naked. I hate shrinks. Ferreting out issues where there are none. I shoved this irksome exchange to the back of my mind, where it stayed. Only occasionally does it drift back into consciousness.

Such as this morning, when I wake from a restless sleep and cringe at what a fool I made of myself last week, trying to stop Marcus from shagging Michelle. At times like these, I am The Grinch. Mean-spirited. Petty. Fun-crushing. My father was right. Can’t confront him now, though! Meanwhile, I haven’t seen bronzed hide nor coiffed hair of Michelle or Marcus. I presume he’s staying at her place. He always disappears after scoring. I swear he does it to convince his conquests he’s infatuated. One realization about Marcus—his utter lack of spontaneity. Even Jasper had his spur-of-the-moments, bless him. But Marcus’ every move is premeditated.

I wish them luck. I say this not because I’m nice suddenly, but because I have a date with Tom tonight. Michelle is welcome to Marcus Microwilly. In all fairness, they’re beautifully suited. Long, foodless days pounding the treadmill, steamy passionate bitching sessions, hours of mutual grooming, hot sizzling nights on twin sunbeds… . It’s mid-afternoon and I am wondering if I’ll be invited to the wedding when the phone rings. Michelle!

I don’t say “Funny, I was just thinking about you” because nothing would please her more.

“How are you?” she squeals as if she hasn’t spoken to me for a decade.

“Fine, how are you?” I say cautiously.

“Great, great. Honey, I have a favor to ask.”

Oh, yes?
“Oh, yes?”

Michelle pauses. “It’s kinda good news and bad news. Marcus has asked me out. But I won’t go if you don’t want me to. I don’t want to upset you.”

Ooh, she’s a pro. I keep my voice light. “Michelle, it’s great news. I’m so happy for you. And I can’t imagine why you think I should mind. Marcus is”—I search for a searing phrase—“a small blip in my past. Small being the operative word!”

I can hardly believe my own daring, and neither can Michelle. She snaps, “God, you’re bitter,” and bangs down the phone. I take a deep breath, inform Laetitia that I’m popping out for a double espresso and I’ll be back in five minutes.

“Get me an almond slice and a still mineral water,” she shouts after me. “I’ll pay you after I’ve been to the bank.”
After I’ve been to the bank for you, more like,
I think. I rewind that last thought and brood on it.

Am I bitter? Of course I am! Who wouldn’t resent Laetitia’s infinite list of demeaning chores! I’m a journalist, not a butler! In theory. And why am I even friends with Michelle? Because seventeen years ago we shared an interest in Japanese pencil cases and
The Sound of Music?
I am storming along the pavement, throbbing with rage, my face crunched into a scowl. I must look like a bull mastiff. I try to breathe through my nose and relax the frown. Passers-by are regarding me warily and dodging out of my path. I see myself as they must see me and feel sick at heart. I don’t want to be this… this bitter person.

I force my frenzied mind to calm, more pleasant subjects, like Tom. Those eyes. His mouth. My heart starts racing again and I smile inside. Pathetic! But it worked. We are meeting tonight outside Covent Garden station at 8
P.M.
(My mother—unwillingly placated by the promise of a day at a health farm—has relinquished a Monday night. A hard bargain, as limited access to food panics me and I hate being prodded.) I’m wearing black trousers, black boots, and a gray V-neck top. For a change.

I purchase the almond slice, the mineral water, and—in my newfound spirit of zen—a double decaffeinated espresso. I hold the door open for a smart elderly man. The kind of man who makes my insides shrivel with pain because he didn’t die of a heart attack at fifty-nine.

It’s not personal. It’s not his fault. It’s not personal. I bite back the swell of resentment and force a smile. The man winks and says in a cut-glass accent, “You’re so kind!” I beam, and look away fast as my eyes fill with stupid tears. I’m kind. I bask in the glow of a stranger’s praise as I puff up the stairs to
GirlTime.
Maybe, if Tom could see me now, I wouldn’t disappoint him.

I march back to the office and recognize the tone of my phone ringing. Laetitia, of course, is reading the
Daily Mail
and ignoring it.
Please don’t let it be Tom canceling.
“Hello?” I say fearfully, snatching up the receiver.

“Helen!” says a quavering voice. “It’s Vivienne! And I’m afraid, I’m sorry to tell you… oh, it’s shocking news—”

My voice is hoarse with terror. “
Tell me now
!”

Vivienne wobbles out five words before bursting into tears. “Your mother’s slit her wrists.”

Chapter 18

O
NCE, AGED SIX
, I was walloped and sent to bed at 5:30
P.M.
for saying in front of Michelle’s mother, “Daddy, isn’t it true we can’t pay our mortgage?” Admittedly, I didn’t actually know what a mortgage was, but it was an impressive phrase I’d overheard somewhere and was desperate to use. I was also accustomed to my mother—never a great listener—absentmindedly agreeing with everything I said even if it was a humongous fib.

Alas, Mrs. Arnold’s eyes lit up like Beelzebub’s and my father blamed me for what he predicted as the certain ruin of his financial reputation. As I sniveled myself to sleep, I prayed that my father and my mother—who hadn’t dared tiptoe upstairs to console me—would die in a tornado. At that moment I considered Orphan Annie the most glamorous creature in the world and wished fervently that I were her. Miss Hanigan was a pleasure compared to my evil parents! Scrubbing floors would be a privilege! The delight of being made to sleep on a bunk bed! And I’d get to sing “It’s a Hard Knock Life!” in an American accent.

But twenty years later, being an orphan patently doesn’t appeal to me quite so much because when Vivienne tells me that my mother has slit her wrists, my legs go numb and I sink to the floor with a moan that Lizzy later terms—in a whisper of hushed awe—“feral, primeval, chilling, like a wild animal writhing in pain.”

As the most savage noise ever heard in the airy open-plan
GirlTime
office is Laetitia snarling because the Dunkin Donuts assistant put too much milk in her tea, my impression of a tiger with earache gets noticed. Lizzy and Laetitia leap toward me, crying, “What’s wrong?” Their faces are indistinct, as if we’re under water and it’s hard to breathe and I gasp to the blurriness, “Oh please not my mother not my mum oh please don’t take my mummy oh god, not her too,” and my head swims and I choke the words “Oh please not my mummy” over and over until they form a seamless shroud that shields me from reality.

Meanwhile, the receiver dangles, faint hysterical squeaks emanating from it. Lizzy snatches up the phone while Laetitia takes this—perfect—opportunity to slap me hard and stingingly across the face. By the time I’ve said “Ouch” and glared at her, Lizzy is crouching and gripping my trembly clammy hands.

“Helen,” she says in a clear firm voice, looking straight into my dazed eyes. “Your mother is okay. She’s not dead. Okay? Can you hear me, she’s fine.”

I stare helplessly at Lizzy. I don’t understand. I feel like a five-year-old. “She’s slit her wrists,” I say doubtfully.

“Only superficial cuts,” insists Lizzy in the kind of loud emphatic voice my father used to use when addressing foreigners. “Grazes. Vivienne was phoning from the hospital, they’re in Casualty, but it’s not serious. Your mother is fine, she’s fine, okay?” I nod and say okay.

I am shaking like an elderly poodle in a cold bath. I don’t know what to do. Happily, Lizzy makes an executive decision: “I’ll call you a cab to the hospital right now. Won’t I, Laetitia?” she adds. Laetitia—who doubtless relieved some long pent-up tension with the slap—nods once and says, “Absolutely.”

Lizzy helps me to a chair and sits me down. She rushes to the kitchen, returns with a bag of brown sugar, and tips at least half into my double decaff espresso. “Drink that,” she orders.

“You wouldn’t,” I grumble, and take an obedient sip. Fortunately the cab arrives within minutes and rescues me from Turkish coffee hell. Lizzy, who has packed my diary and other debris into my bag, helps me into the cab. But first she sweeps me to her in a warm solid hug and says, “It’s going to be okay, I know it. And”—she pushes me back a little to look at me—“oh, Helen, I’ve been a neglectful friend. I—”

I stare at her, confused. “Lizzy, don’t be mad! You’re a great friend. All that wasted reiki! I’m the bad friend.”

I’m thinking of tai chi and pointy feet, but Lizzy is shaking her head. “No, Helen. I should have looked after you more. I could see you, festering, and I should have said something but I didn’t want to…”

Festering?! Bring back “racoon,” all is forgiven! “Lizzy,” I say, “I’m honestly fine, I just had a shock about my mother, but as you say, she’s okay, she’s not hurt. And I’d better rush.”

Lizzy seems reluctant to let go of me. “Do you want me to come with you?” she says. I shake my head. “Be kind to yourself,” she says, giving me a little shake.

I sit in the cab. Kind. That word again. I’d like to be kind. Although, when I see my mother, I am going to kill her. How dare she pull a stunt like this, the selfish cow! My heart pounds with the terror of it and I lean back and grip the seat. Jesus, what possessed her?

When I run into Casualty, it’s déjà vu, it’s
Groundhog Day
meets Amityville, it’s that vomitous, surreal whirl of impending doom all over again. It doesn’t help that the place stinks of wee. Stinks! I look wildly around and see—oh thank god—my mother and Vivienne huddled in a corner. Vivienne’s bright orange fake fur coat (she bought it after being attacked in Islington while wearing her mink) shines out amid the drab defeatism like a bad taste beacon.

I bound toward my mother and my anger dissipates as I see her weary, chalk-white face. She is wrapped in a gray blanket. Gray, I decide, is all very well on the catwalk as a clever foil to your skinny wealth and muted sophistication, but it is shit shit shit in hospitals and funeral parlors because it’s for real—all shabby poverty and lackluster hopelessless.

“Helen!” whimpers my mother. Her spindly wrists are wrapped in makeshift dressings. I bend and hug her tight. Vivienne swiftly vacates her seat so I can get a better hold. My mother sobs in my arms and I rock her like a baby. “Oh, Mummy, promise me, never never, terrible, Daddy would be furious, you know I’m here, what would I do? Okay, looking after you.” While this isn’t exactly a coherent sentence, it makes perfect sense to my mother who nods and sniffs and burrows closer to my chest. I glance past my mother at Vivienne, who I can tell is gagging for a Marlboro Light. I indicate with my eyes to the exit. “I’ll join you in a sec,” I mouth. She draws her orange coat around her, smiles tensely, and teeters off.

My heart twists as my mother bawls silently, her fingers digging weakly into my lap. I wait and wait, hug and hug, until the crying subsides and try not to think that I could have avoided this by meeting Tom on a Thursday. Then I say sensible things like “How long have you been here?” and “Do you want a hot drink?” and “Is the pain bearable?” She answers, respectively, “Ages” and “Had one” and “Not too bad.” When I suspect she has no more tears left, I ask her if she minds if I see how Vivienne is. “It must have been a shock for her, too,” I say gravely.

My mother nods dumbly and looks at the floor. “I’ll be back almost immediately,” I say, “so stay right there and don’t move. Promise promise?” My mother recognizes the phrase I’d squeak while bargaining for treats when I was five and we were a family. She manages a sad smile and replies, “Promise promise.” I kiss her on the forehead and run off to find Vivienne.

Vivienne sits on a wooden bench and lights what I suspect is her fortieth fag of the day. She breathes the smoke slowly, exhaling lovingly out of her nostrils before speaking. “She knew I was coming round at four-thirty, after school and my Italian class. We were going out for coffee. Oh god, it was frightening. I think she’d only just done it.” Vivienne’s scarlet mouth trembles.

“I rang the doorbell and she didn’t answer. I rang again. Still no answer. I thought she must have been held up at school. I was just turning away to go and wait in the Jag when she opened the door. She looked as weak as water and so pale—like a Scotch person!” Vivienne is so agitated that my wince at her blithe prejudice goes unnoticed as she rattles on. “She held out her wrists, said ‘Look what I’ve done,’ and burst into tears. It was horrific. She’d used a pretty blunt razor blade—she’d pushed it backward and forward, but not, thank god, deep.

“There were masses of scratches, and welts of blood. I was so shocked, Helen, I nearly fainted on the spot. She seemed fine on the surface—quiet, but fine. Back at work, busy with the children, on top of your father’s finances—imagine! Cecelia! I, I never thought, not in a million years, that she’d do something like this. It’s been, what, five, six months, I thought, surely, she should be over it by now… er, shouldn’t she, or, ah, maybe not?”

Vivienne, who has been talking more to herself than to me, glances at my face and stutters to a halt. I don’t shout at her, even though I want to. Even though, at this precise moment I’m busting for an excuse to shout at anyone. If Johnny Depp sauntered past and accidently trod on my toe right now, I’d crucify him—brooding designer stubble or not, that man would be pulp!

But to Vivienne, I keep my voice steady and say, “Vivienne, I, I, you know, I, thank god you found her, you, I, no, I’m thinking, five months, it seems ages, maybe, to you, but to her, and, I mean, to me also, it’s no time. No time at all. I, also, stupid, I thought she was, well, getting better, but it’s a, not right. She isn’t over it. I don’t know how long it’ll take. Longer. Maybe she’ll learn to live with it. I hope. But, sorry, I’m burbling, go on.”

Vivienne takes another drag on her cigarette. She sucks so hard, I’m surprised it doesn’t shoot down her throat. “I took her to the kitchen and wrapped her wrists in damp tea towels and drove her straight here. She said she’d done it in the bathroom and she’d ‘lost a lot of blood’ so I ran upstairs to see, and it didn’t look so bad—I couldn’t see any blood, but I’m not an expert in these things, and she’d put towels down to, I expect, protect the carpet, but there wasn’t any blood on them, so I rushed down again, and called an ambulance and they—outrageous!—said I should drive her! I’ve a good mind to write to my MP! Whoever he is.

“So I brought her here, and they assessed her for”—sniff—“suicidal intent, and from what she said, they said it was probably a cry for help rather than a serious attempt to, you know… and they patched her up ‘for now’ and, but, what gets me is, when they asked her why she did it she said, she said…”

Vivienne—who I thought would only ever cry if Gucci’s flagship store in Sloane Street was wiped out in a freak thunderstorm—sniffs and dabs at the corner of each eye with her thumb pad.

“What?” I whisper.

Vivienne swallows hard and adds, “Your mother said, ‘There’s no point. Not without my Morrie.’ She said, ‘The world keeps turning and I can’t see any point.’ Oh, Helen. I didn’t realize before, how much she loved him.”

I pat her trembling hand and suspect, meanly, that Vivienne is so overwrought because if her husband died, she’d crack open the Bollinger, maintain he wouldn’t have wanted her to mourn, and continue to prey on impressionable young men with even more gusto than she does already. But I shake my head and sigh, “Neither did I.” Privately, I wonder to what extent today’s dramatics relate to my mother’s feelings for my father and to what extent they relate to her feelings for herself. We go back inside. My mother has fallen asleep in her hard orange plastic chair. She looks about ten years old.

We sit and wait to be called and suddenly I realize. Tom! My date with Tom! Shit. A large notice forbids use of mobile phones inside the hospital so I grab mine and run outside again. It’s 6:37
P.M.
I ring Megavet and—a plague on my house or what?—Celine answers. It’s suppertime and today’s special is humble pie. “Celine,” I say in my most winsome tone, “it’s Helen Bradshaw, the one who—”

“I know who you are,” she says in a sharp voice. Bugger.

“Is Tom there?” I say.

“He’s busy,” she snaps.

I refuse to freak out because I know that’s what she wants. I decide to play it straight. “Celine,” I say, “I was supposed to be seeing Tom tonight, but I can’t because my mother has had to go into hospital suddenly, it’s an emergency, very serious, and I’ve got to be with her. I’d be so grateful if you could pass on that message to Tom.”
You sour bitch,
I add silently. I am amazed and grateful when Celine summons a shred of humanity from the air and says, in a serious tone, “I’m sorry to hear that. Of course I’ll tell Tom. Go and look after your mother and don’t worry about it.”

I’m stunned. “That’s really kind of you, Celine,” I say.

“My pleasure,” she replies. I beep off the phone. Wow. What did I do to deserve that? Maybe she’s found a suitor for Nancy—a well-to-do Mercedes named Charles, with alloy wheels and leather trim. More likely she’s thrilled that family tragedy has blown my date with her beloved boss. I hurry back to Casualty. My mother has woken up and is complaining that her “wrists hurt.” You don’t say. I bite my tongue to stop it flapping out something facetious.

Approximately three years later, my mother’s name is called and she, Vivienne, and myself are ushered out of the godforsaken waiting room and into what appears to be a corridor separated into tiny little cubicles. “Did you bring your swimsuit?” I joke feebly to my mother, who doesn’t laugh. The duty psychiatrist—who has deep purple rings under his eyes and looks like he’s been in a fight—glances at me as if to say “Arse.” I assume a meek expression and shut up. We can’t all fit into the shoebox cubicle, so Vivienne offers to wait outside.

I don’t blame her. In the shoebox to our left a man is shouting and in the shoebox to our right a woman is weeping. How relaxing. I glance nervously at my mother for signs of mental instability, but she sits quietly on the cubicle chair and allows a nurse to dab a clear liquid on her wounds. I may need new glasses, because I have to squint to see the cuts.

“This is saline solution so it’s going to sting—but only a little,” says the nurse kindly. My mother nods. She is uncharacteristically docile while her wrists are wrapped in a big sticky, tapey plaster and a thin bandage, and even when she’s given a tetanus injection. “Just to be on the safe side,” says the nurse cheerfully. I smile gratefully at her. As soon as she leaves, Nasty Cop—alias Dr. Nathan Collins, according to his badge—begins an interrogation.

How has she been sleeping? What’s her appetite been like? Has she found it hard to concentrate? Has she had thoughts of wanting to join her loved one? Thoughts of wanting to go to sleep and never wake up? Why did she do it? Has she ever done this before? Was it on the spur of the moment? Did she write a suicide note? Does she wish that she were dead? Did she want to be found? What did she think it was going to do? What does she want? Has she felt suicidal before? Has she ever taken an overdose? Has she ever tried to harm herself in the past? Has she been seeing things that aren’t there? Or hearing things? Has she a support system?