The Memory Tree (5 page)

As the blue-stone walls loomed closer, Sealie would feel her heart beat quicken and taste the bitterness of bile in her mouth. Sometimes, in the early days, she retched violently, and stood by the roadside, dazed and mortified, mopping her mouth with a tissue.

Hal was well enough treated in J-Ward. It housed many violent patients with severe mental illness, but was staffed by nurses, not warders. The inmates were not convicted felons. They had been found unfit to plead, and a system struggling with concepts of mental illness and criminal behaviour did what it could.

In these early days she’d sometimes find her father sitting with his hands between his knees, and was stricken to see saliva running unchecked down his chin. At other times his limbs were restless and jittery or worse, his eyes rolled way back in his head. The first time she experienced this, she thought he was having a stroke and screamed for help.

‘It’s a reaction to the medication,’ a nurse assured her. ‘No harm done.’

Sealie nodded dumbly.
Why didn’t they tell me what to expect?
She felt herself trembling, and despite the fact that she wanted, more than anything, to get away, she sat frozen in her seat as the nurse wiped her father’s chin and hurried on to other duties.

She saw little of his violence. If he were going through a period of distress or instability, the charge nurse phoned to tell her not to come. This policy was to spare the relatives and friends and to avoid exacerbating the problem behaviour. There were a couple of visits, however, when Hal’s mood changed with savage swiftness, and she was forced to retreat before a barrage of obscenities and curses. Nurses moved in to restrain him, but not before the young woman was seared by the madness in her father’s eyes.

As time went by, Sealie began to wonder if the chemically restrained Hal were not more distressing. She could shut herself off from the violent stranger who looked so much like her father. But when his mood was sombre and perplexed, when he dribbled like a baby and his eyes rolled back, when he cried out for understanding, there was no refuge.

‘I did what I had to do,’ he’d explain with weary insistence. ‘I had no choice.’ Then in a voice filled with anguish, he’d murmur over and over, Christ’s words from the cross, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’

And his slow tears, coming from some desolate place, fell without check, while Sealie’s throat swelled painfully.

How much longer can I do this
? she often wondered.
No-one would blame me if I never set foot in the place again
. Then she’d remember being hoisted onto her father’s broad shoulders when she was too tired to walk. Or sharing the chocolate milkshake they both loved. She’d remember his clumsy efforts at tying her hair ribbons in Mrs Mac’s absence and his shy presentation of the watch she no longer had any use for.

Despite her delicate features and slender figure, despite her revulsion and fear, Aunt Sealie was a strong woman; steadfast and loyal. Family was central to her just as it had been to Hal. For better or worse, he was her dad and she would never abandon him.

Sealie drains the last of her coffee and busies herself with Zav’s breakfast. She will have to get ready for work soon, and knows if she doesn’t wake him, Zav will remain in his cocoon all day. She poaches an egg, puts some bread in the toaster and makes a pot of tea, arranging it all on a tray with a glass of orange juice and the newspaper. At the last moment, she adds a pen, hoping he might while away some time on the crossword or the sudoku. It drives her crazy to think of him sitting there all day, doing nothing.

‘Wakey, wakey,’ she sings, opening the blinds. ‘Rise and shine.’

Zav’s sleep-tousled head appears from under the bedclothes.

‘For God’s sake, Sealie, do you have to be so cheerful in the morning?’

She indicates his breakfast on the bedside table. ‘You can always make your own breakfast,’ she snaps. They both know that this is an empty threat. It’s part of the fabric of their lives. He grumbles. She responds. He complies. They are like an old married couple. They share too much history to imagine life any other way.

Zav is the first to back down. Arguments take too much energy. ‘I might go down to the library this morning,’ he offers. ‘Can I pick anything up at the shops?’

Sealie can think of nothing she needs, but won’t let the opportunity pass. She tries to encourage Zav when he’s in a conciliatory mood.

Especially when he makes an effort.

‘You could pick up some Granny Smiths. I might make an apple pie for the weekend.’

‘Sounds good.’ Zav attacks the egg with something like an appetite, then lays down his fork.

‘Seal?’

‘Yes?’

‘Why can’t we go to the Minister? They reckon she can overrule the Department.’

Sealie sighs. ‘I’ve done that. Don’t you remember?’

She remembers only too well—the assistant, grave and sympathetic on the phone, the letter it was suggested she send. The pain of writing it.

Dear Minister,
(she wrote)

I wish to appeal the Department’s decision in the matter of the release of my father, Heraldo Juan Rodriguez. As you can see in the enclosed file, I am already taking care of my brother, a Vietnam veteran suffering from depression. I cannot be expected to care for my father and my brother in the same house.

While the doctors insist that my father is no longer a danger to himself or the community, I cannot be sure that returning home will not awaken old memories for both of
 
them.

I cannot be held responsible for the consequences.

I have power of attorney for my father, but have always left the house in his name. It was his wedding gift to my mother and I could never bring myself to change the title deeds. Now this sentimental gesture means that the Department refuses to find him alternative accommodation as he already owns a house.

My brother is dependent upon me, and looks on the house as his home. He, too, is fragile and must not be allowed to live alone.

I make this one last appeal to you to revoke the Department’s decision and find a place for my father where he can be watched and cared for.

Yours sincerely,

Selina Rodriguez

She never got to meet with the Minister. The response to her letter was brisk.

Dear Ms Rodriguez,

The Minister has advised me to express her sympathy at your situation, but due to a shortage of suitable places, she is unable to overturn the Department’s decision conveyed in the letter of 14 December.

She also advises me that the Department will continue to monitor your father’s condition. You are entitled to a full review of his situation twelve months after his release from care.

The Government is grateful to the family members, like yourself, who have enabled this enlightened policy to be so successfully activated.

Yours sincerely,

Marco Torino

For Judith Torvey, Minister for Social Services

Sealie’s hand, still holding the letter, had dropped into her lap. She had to read it twice before she was able to fully comprehend its meaning.
It’s too much. Don’t let it happen.Please, God—it’s not fair
. Her thoughts, as always, turned to her brother.
At least spare him. Hasn’t he suffered enough?
But she was pleading with a God she had long since ceased to believe in.

Zav was reading the newspaper when she came in with the letter. She handed it to him without preamble and watched his face as he read it. He swore softly and crumpled it in hand. ‘I won’t let it happen. I won’t.’ His voice began to rise. ‘Do you hear me? I won’t fucking allow it.’

I can’t take much more of this
. Sealie fought to control her anger. ‘For God’s sake, Zav—can’t you see? We have no choice. None. None at all.’

She moved towards her brother but stopped when he looked directly at her—something he did only rarely. The old panic was in his eyes. ‘We’ll stick together, won’t we, Seal? We’ve always stuck together.’ In an awkward gesture, he put his arm around her shoulder. ‘I don’t want to make things any harder for you—but I’m not sure I . . . how . . .’ His grip became tighter. ‘I’m just . . . I don’t . . .’

Sealie felt her anger drain away. ‘We’ll manage,’ she said. ‘I promise.’

So my father and aunt repeat a conversation they’ve had so many times that it feels like a formula.

‘We’ve got no choice, Zav. We can’t just turn him out onto the street.’

‘I won’t speak to him.’

‘No.’

‘I won’t have anything to do with him.’

‘I understand.’

‘Don’t expect me to eat with him.’

‘I never said you’d have to eat with him.’

‘He always loved you better.’

‘It was Mum he loved best of all.’

‘I know—Sealie, I don’t really feel up to the library. Can you get me the new Wilbur Smith on your way home?’

‘Alright. If you really can’t go out. I’ve got to get ready for work. Make sure you get up today.’

He nods. But she’s unconvinced.

I’m not convinced either.

Sealie works for the local council as an accounts payable clerk. Dreary work for one who used to dream of a life in the theatre. She still does. Dream, I mean. She always sees herself as the prima ballerina. She listens to the soft swish of her slippers on the boards, feels the tickle of tulle as she brushes it with her arm. She points her toe and curtsies into the warm darkness that swells with applause. There are always flowers—roses, frangipani and pale green orchids. She accepts them gracefully and glides away to her dressing room where she smiles tenderly at her pale, oval face in the mirror.

She’d be embarrassed to think anyone knew about these daydreams, but I say good luck to her
.
They do no harm to anyone else and I’m absolutely certain that they make her life easier.

She did attend classes as a child. Two years before Paulina died, Sealie was wobbling her way through kindy-class.

‘You can never start too soon,’ her mother said to the doubtful Mrs McLennon. ‘We don’t want her bones to set wrong.’

They all went to see her perform in her first Christmas concert. She danced onto the stage in sequinned, blue satin pyjamas, as she and her class lustily sang, ‘Santa’s coming, off to sleep. With toys into our house he’ll creep.’ After interval, she donned a pink tutu with wings and flitted happily around the stage, grinning down at her family. They all thought she was wonderful, but families are like that. Madame, an old friend of her mother’s, watched her more critically.
She may have something of her mother’s talent,
she mused.
Time only will tell.

Sealie sighs and boots up her computer. It’s the end of the month, so there’s plenty to keep her occupied. She has always had the ability to direct her mind and focus away from painful thoughts. She does this either by daydreaming or by work. Today the figures on her computer take her through to lunchtime when her friend Cassie joins her in the coffee shop next door. They do this every Friday, two partnerless, childless women, the approach of menopause ready to strike a line through the second option. Cassie doesn’t really care. Unlike Sealie, she has little instinct for motherhood and the way her life is organised, very little time.

Sealie would have been a wonderful mother. How do I know? Because she held me with so much tenderness. She was only seventeen, but she loved me from the moment I was born. She used to hold me and dance, humming little lullabies. That’s when she was still a dancer. She never became a professional ballerina; she grew too tall. But in those days dance was her centre.

Cassie has always tried to make time for Sealie. She’s the only one at work who knows her story and the friendship goes back to their schooldays.