‘Yes.’
‘Hi. I’m an agency nurse on this afternoon, and I was hoping we could have a little chat about how things are?’
‘I don’t know you.’
‘We could get to know each other.’
‘Will you work here again?’
‘I don’t know. I hope so.’
‘Can you take me for a walk?’
‘I’m not sure. I’ll need to see if you’re written up for escorted leave.’
‘I am.’
‘I’ll need to check. I’ll be right back.’
The lady who I have never met before walks away.
1.35 p.m.
Smoke last cigarette.
1.45 p.m.
The lady (who I have now met once) comes back.
‘Sorry I took so long. I couldn’t find your notes.’
‘That’s okay.’
‘They were right at the back of the filing cabinet.’
‘That’s okay.’
‘You do have escorted leave written up, but the nurse in charge says we’re a bit pressed for staff today, because of sickness. It might not be possible for you to have a walk this afternoon. Did you get one this morning?’
‘No.’
‘Oh. I’m so sorry about that, Mark.’
‘It’s Matt.’
‘Sorry. The nurse in charge says that your mum comes in around 4 o’clock. You’ll be able to go for a walk with her. Is that okay?’
‘Yes.’
‘It’s awful when they’re so short of staff, isn’t it? Oh I am sorry, Mark.’
2 p.m.
In TV lounge. Listen to an argument between two patients about what they want to watch. Think about cutting my throat. Listen to Simon. Think about whether the TV might be linked to Simon. Think about whether Simon can transmit thoughts through the TV. Think about what I would cut myself with. Think about smashing a coffee mug. Listen to Simon. Sit on my hands. Listen to argument between the two patients. Think about Cloth Dolls. Listen to Simon. Think about Atoms. Listen to Simon. Look at a coffee mug on the magazine table. Listen to Simon. Simon is lonely. Think. Think. Think.
4 p.m.
‘Hello sweetheart.’
‘I want to go home, Mum.’
‘Oh baby.’
‘Don’t call me that!’
Look through the stuff she’s brought. Mars Bars, Golden Virginia, cartons of Ribena and Kia-Ora, a new sketch pad and pens and a camouflage jacket from the army surplus store on Southdown Road. Say thank you, and try to smile.
‘Matthew, sweetheart, look at your tooth. Let the nurses take you to a dentist. Please, for me. Or let me take you. The doctor said—’
‘It doesn’t hurt. Don’t make a fuss.’
‘I want my handsome smile back.’
‘It’s not your smile.’
4.10 p.m.
Go for walk around hospital grounds. Tell Mum that I am better. Tell her there is nothing wrong. Ask her if dead people can transmit thoughts through a TV? Try to accept her reassurances. Try to remember she is on my side. Tell her that I am better. Ask her if I am better?
5.30 p.m.
Mum leaves. Dinner arrives. Eat.
5.50 p.m.
Sit in the smokers’ garden with other patients. Some of them talk. The manics talk. But they talk crap. Most of us don’t say anything. Those who don’t have cigarettes blag off of me, and promise they’ll pay me back when their giros come through. There is nothing to do.
6.30 p.m.
Take a shit, then go to bedroom and try to masturbate. Fail.
6.45 p.m.
Back in smokers’ garden. It’s getting cold.
7.05 p.m.
Pace up and down the corridor. There is another pacer – a black man with long greying dreadlocks and an open shirt showing his chest. We keep passing each other in the middle. We smile at each other. This is fun. Up and down the corridor, smiling each time we pass. Saying hello and goodbye. We start to pace quicker so that we reach each other sooner. We start to run. We laugh each time we meet, doing clumsy High-Fives. A nurse comes out of the office and asks us to settle down.
7.18 p.m.
Back in smokers’ garden. It isn’t really a garden, it’s a claustrophobic square with a few chairs, and dead butt ends littering concrete slabs. There is literally nothing to do.
7.45 p.m.
Go to make a cup of tea in the kitchen. Two patients are snogging. They ask me what I’m looking at? I leave before the kettle boils.
7.47 p.m.
Back in smokers’ garden. Nothing.
9.40 p.m.
It’s dark, night-time, there is mud in my mouth, in my eyes, and the rain keeps falling. I am trying to carry him, but the ground is wet. I lift him and fall, lift him and fall, and he is silent. His arms hang lifeless at his sides. I am begging him to say something, Please! Say something! I fall again, and I am holding him, holding his face to mine, holding him so close I can feel his warmth leave, and I am begging him to say something. Please. Please. Talk to me.
10 p.m.
Called for evening meds. Wait in a queue for medication that I don’t want. Avoid eye-contact with the other patients who are doing the same.
10.08 p.m.
Get given tablets, an assortment of colours and shapes in a plastic cup. Ask what they are for?
‘They’re your tablets, Matt. You need to take them.’
‘The other nurses tell me what they’re for.’
‘Then you know.’
‘Please tell me.’
‘Okay. These two are to help with the difficult thoughts, and the voices.’
‘I don’t hear voices.’*
‘Well—’
‘I don’t hear voices, okay? It’s my brother, for fuck’s sake! How many times do I need to tell you people this?’
‘Please don’t swear at me, Matt. I find it intimidating.’
‘I’m not trying to intimidate you!’
‘Okay, well please don’t shout then.’
‘I didn’t mean to intimidate you. I didn’t mean that.’
‘Shall I tell you what the other tablets are for?’
‘Yes please.’
‘This one is because you’ve been having some side effects, it should help with the dribbling at night. And this one is your sleeping tablet. Actually, you can try without this if you want?’
‘Which one?’
‘The sleeper. It’s PRN. You don’t have to have it.’
‘I’ll try without. It leaves a taste in my mouth.’
‘A metal taste?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s very common. See how you get on without it.’
‘I didn’t mean to intimidate you, I’m sorry.’
10.30 p.m.
Go to bed. Wait for sleep.
10.36 p.m.
There is a knock at my door, someone says I have a phone call.
The night-shift nurse is reading a magazine at reception. She watches me lift the receiver.
‘Hello.’
‘Sorry I didn’t make it today.’
‘That’s okay.’
‘It’s my ma, she’s—’
‘It’s okay.’
‘How are you, anyway?’
‘It’s Jacob, right?’
‘Yeah man, you know it is.’
The nurse pretends to read her magazine. Pressing the phone tightly to my cheek, I whisper. ‘Thank you for calling.’
There is silence at the other end. Then, ‘I can’t hear you, Matt.’
‘How’s your mum?’ I ask.
‘She’s alright. She got a new chair today. She’s bitching about it – says the head rest makes her look disabled. I mean, for fuck’s sake. How disabled does she need to be?’
Someone laughs. There’s someone with him. I ask what he’s up to?
‘How are you, anyway?’ he asks.
‘What you up to?’ I ask again.
‘Having a smoke with Hamed.’
‘Yeah?’
br /> ‘Yeah, man. He’s got some killer Green. I’ll bring you some in next time if you want? I would have come today, but you know how it is with—’
‘Don’t worry about it.’
I don’t want him to be smoking with Hamed. I don’t know Hamed. I don’t want the world to keep turning without me on it.
‘How are you, anyway?’ he asks.
‘Ask your fucking brother.’
‘I can’t hear you?’
‘I’m locked up.’
There is silence. Then, ‘What did you say?’
‘I said I’m locked up.’
‘No, before that. You said something about my brother?’
I don’t answer. The nurse flips a page of her magazine, staring straight at me.
‘Come in tomorrow, if you want.’
‘I don’t know about tomorrow, mate. It’s just—’
‘Or the next day.’ I’m clenching the receiver so tight my knuckles ache. I can hear the start-up tune of his X-Box 360.
‘Mate, I’ve gotta go. It’s my ma. She’s calling me. I’ll give you a shout soon, yeah. Catch you later.’
10.39 p.m.
Listen to the automated telephone voice – The other person has cleared. The other person has cleared. The other person has enough shit to worry about without you to deal with too.
10.41 p.m.
Hang up.
10.45 p.m.
Lie in bed. Twisting my sheets into knots.
12.30 a.m.
Get up and request sleeping tablets. One more cigarette. Climb into bed. Wait for sleep.
1 a.m.
The viewing slat on my door lifts. Torchlight shines against my chest for a single rise and fall. The viewing slat drops.
2 a.m.
As above.
3 a.m.
As above.
7 a.m.
Get woken by a knock on my bedroom door, and the call for morning medication round. I have a metallic taste in my mouth, a side effect of the sleeping tablets.
(Repeat)
*I don’t hear voices
In the smokers’ garden dry leaves scurried across the concrete slabs, or trembled at the high wire fence.
I would watch them, waiting for him to reveal himself. If I kept my mind sharp, stayed alert, he would speak. He had chosen to be with me, not Mum or Dad or his friends from school. He didn’t talk to the doctors, the nurses; I couldn’t expect them to understand.
In my room, at night, if I stayed awake, filling the sink with cold water to splash my face, if the tap choked and spluttered before the water came, he was saying, I’m lonely. When I opened a bottle of Dr Pepper and the caramel bubbles fizzed over the rim, he was asking me to come and play. He could speak through an itch, the certainty of a sneeze, the after-taste of tablets, or the way sugar fell from a spoon.
He was everywhere, and in everything. The smallest parts of him; electrons, protons, neutrons.
If I were more perceptive, if my senses weren’t so blunted by the medicine, I’d be better able to decipher, understand what he meant by the movement of the leaves, or the sideways glances of patients as we sucked endlessly at cigarettes.
drawing behaviour
Drawing was a way to be somewhere else.
Mum brought me a new sketch pad onto the ward, and the right type of pencils and ink pens. So when I wasn’t smoking or trying to sleep, I did sketches from my imagination.
I’m an okay artist. Mum thinks I’m better than I am. At home she has a drawer full of my pictures and stories, dating way back from when I was little.
For her fiftieth birthday I wanted to give her something special. I was fifteen and knew I wasn’t the easiest teenager to live with. I wanted to let her know that I loved her, and I still cared. I’d decided to try a portrait of her, but when I ran it past Dad he said, ‘Don’t you think she’d prefer one of the family?’ I knew he was right, so I set about doing that instead. I decided to draw us on the couch together, but I wanted it to be a surprise, so what I did was come into the living room whenever she was watching TV or reading or whatever, and I’d make secret notes and partial sketches to help me remember details, like the way she holds her neck slightly to the side, and how she crosses her legs, with one foot wrapped right behind the other ankle.
I think personalities are hidden in these details, and if you capture them properly, you capture the person.
This was a long time after Simon died, and it wasn’t like we thought about him every day. Or I guess Mum might have, but I didn’t. Not so much. And nowhere near as much as I do now. But I decided it wasn’t right to have a family portrait without him in it.
In the end I did something I’m really proud of, and I don’t get to say that often. I took one of the framed pictures of Simon from the mantelpiece – the one of him beaming proudly in his new school uniform – and drew it on the little table beside the couch, where we kept the newspapers. I drew Mum beside him, then myself between her and Dad. I got Mum’s crossed legs pretty much perfect, and I did Dad biting at his bottom lip like he does when he concentrates. Self-portraits are the hardest. It’s hard to capture your own self, or even know what it is. In the end I decided to do myself with a sketchbook on my knees, drawing a picture. And if you look carefully, you can make out the top of the picture – and it’s the one we’re in.
I think that’s sort of what I’m doing now too. I am writing myself into my own story, and I am telling it from within.
On the ward, I sat in the smokers’ garden, and pictured my flat. I thought about my kitchen and drew it, complete with chipped tiles and blistered wallpaper. Nanny Noo is standing at the sink peeling vegetables, with her packet of menthol cigarettes on the counter. When I draw pictures from my mind, I like to think about where I would be standing if I were actually there. I’m standing in the hall, just out of sight. I even put a bit of the door frame along one side. It wasn’t bad, and I was really concentrating on it, so I didn’t notice the other patient glancing over.
Her name was Jessica, I think. She said she liked my picture, and would I maybe draw her too?
When you are drawing something that is in front of you – rather than from the place in your mind where pictures form – it makes you think more about where you are, and feel yourself actually being there. I don’t know if that makes much sense, but it’s true.
Jessica once had a baby girl named Lilly, but Lilly was evil. This is what Jessica told me to explain the scars. She invited me into her room and closed the curtains. I said it would help to draw her in natural light, but then she unbuttoned her blouse and took off her bra and we sat in silence for a while.
I could have drawn other patients; perhaps Tammy in her pink dressing gown, holding her teddy. She would cry at how beautiful it was to be seen. I could have sketched the man who checked his shoes every ten minutes for listening devices, or captured the blur and chaos of Euan as he bounced off the walls, seeking excitement. I could have drawn Susan, who would spend lunchtimes gathering the salt shakers from every table until Alex screamed at her to stop it and they both descended into hour-long sulks. There was Shreena’s hair, matted and greasy, that she would pull out in clumps and leave on surfaces – I could have drawn those, perhaps catching her personality in the parts she chose to shed.
There were nineteen beds on the ward, with new patients arriving as others checked out – like the world’s wackiest hotel. I could have drawn them all. But I only drew Jessica. I drew her half naked in the half-light of her room. And I drew her scars. She’d fed the devil at her breasts, then cut the pain away.
‘It’s perfect, Matt. Thank you.’
‘Okay.’
‘It’s really perfect.’
‘You’re welcome.’
I didn’t want to think about where I was, to feel myself being there. I didn’t draw any other patients, and I didn’t draw the charge nurse in her office the next day, holding my sketch of Jessica, and slowly shaking her head.
‘She said it was per
fect,’ I protested weakly.
‘It’s not the point, Matthew.’
‘She asked me to do it.’
‘She felt pressured. And she isn’t well.’
‘This is fucking bollocks.’
‘Please don’t use that language.’
‘Well it is. It is fucking bollocks. I didn’t even want to draw the bitch.’
‘Matthew, that’s enough. Nobody is telling you off. This is about boundaries. Everyone is here to get better, and that includes you. I’m asking that you don’t go in other patients’ rooms, even if they do invite you.’
‘She did.’
‘And I’m asking you not to draw the people here. Between you and me, I see you’re talented.’
‘Please don’t.’
‘Well—’
‘Don’t. I don’t need this. I won’t draw anyone else. I’d decided that already. I never wanted to in the first place.’
‘Okay. Well, let’s leave it at that then. And Matt, I wasn’t telling you off.’
‘Can I go?’
‘Of course.’
I drew Nanny Noo in my kitchen, and the bench at the park where I used to sit with Jacob when we bunked off school. I drew the outside world. If you ever visit my parents’ house, you’ll see my family portrait above the fireplace. Mum loved it. Drawing is a way to be somewhere else.