Bad Timing and Me

Belle

Chapter One

You told me once, there is no wrong path.

Well, you’re mistaken.

I took it last night.

Air rushes in as I try to remember. Piece it together. What happened… Where I am… How I got here. The darkness behind my eyes, bruised and throbbing. The metallic tang from where my teeth snare the inside of my cheeks. The burn in my nostrils and the back of my throat – the tell-tale sign of a rolled twenty-pound note.

My body lies heavy and loose, an empty vessel dumped on a cold, hard surface. Holding my breath, I coax a twitch into my toes. They snap and crack, as if treading on broken glass – yet they graze something soft. Familiar.

My shower mat.

Please… let it be my shower mat.

Please, let me be at home.

Carried on a vapor of hope, I prise open my sticky lids and inch myself upwards, nausea ambushing every cell as I struggle into an awkward side-seat. My vision appears like muddy water, and I blink and blink and blink again, until sketchy shapes begin to take form and at last, I can see… My ripped palms and torn knuckles. Naked thighs. Bloodied kneecaps. Bruised ankles. Filthy, scuffed soles.

With each layer of discovery comes an electric pain. Coursing through my body’s war-torn landscape, surging up and out over my bloated tongue and stinging lips, crashing and shattering against the walls and floor and door and ceiling of my tiny bathroom.

And then I see it. The object which may hold the clues.

Pitching forward, I grapple for my phone.

I need an explanation.

And I need it fast.

The freshly splintered screen bursts to life, its accusatory glare making me instantly recoil.

11:01

Thursday, 22 February

Shit.

I should have been at work four hours ago. Writing business. Making money. Doing what I do. On a normal day, I’d launch myself into the shower, then run around drip-drying as I scrape my hair into a messy topknot, snatch a mismatch of designer clothing, and book an overpriced Uber.

But today is not normal.

Today, I don’t care if I’m late.

I don’t care about the business. Or the money. Or my precious reputation.

I don’t care… about anything.

Hovering the phone in front of my face, I wait for recognition. But it doesn’t know who I am. Demanding my pin, once, twice, three more times, until a thin, transitory message tells me to Try again in 1 minute.

Panic sears.

I press the device to my third eye and pray for a download.

But nothing comes.

So I cradle it against my chest and start to count. Rocking back-two-three, forth-two-three. Falling into the bygone benevolence of my mother’s arms. Hallucinating her lullaby-breath in my hair. Her whispers of reassurance which would soothe me to sleep. Feverish echoes from once-upon-a-time. When I could call her a mother, and not just Mum.

‘Darling,’ she says, her voice real enough to touch. ‘Are you okay?’

Tears spill down my face.

‘Belle, what’s happened?’ As if she can see. As if she’s really there.

I close my eyes.

Start to slip away.

‘Belle! Talk to me – please.’

I return with a jolt, nostalgia cracking around me. In my lap, my phone is alive, bright with the word MUM.

‘Darling. You called – what’s happened?’

Confusion builds.

I called my mother?

Why have I called my mother?

I stare at the phone, at the photo beneath her name. The two of us, cheeks pressed together and fresh with freckles, our Julia Roberts smiles stretching as one. Almost perfect reflections – only the lines of time defining us as individuals.

Oh, that photo.

The moment my sister had captured it, Mum had snatched my phone. Diving into my contacts, she’d swiped a thin, paint-stained finger through my endless list of clients, chewing on her bottom lip until, finally, she found her own entry. Quickly, oh-so-quickly, she attached the photo, then edited her name – Mum changed to MUM. A small, high-pitched ‘hmm’ concluding her artistry. ‘Now, you’ll definitely know it’s me calling. Might mean you’ll pick-up a bit more often.’ She giggled. That light, breathy resonance which had appeared not long after she lost my father. A gauche attempt at a joke. To deflect from what we all knew was the real reason for the hijack – an anxious endeavour to preserve the rarity of that moment. Hopeful it might grow into something more tangible.

The tragedy was, she only managed to achieve the opposite, and her desperation now greets me whenever she calls. Mocking what could have remained a sweet, scattered memory.

But as I peer down into her warm-water eyes, I’m struck by something new. Unexpected. And unwanted. It’s me who’s desperate. Me who misses her. The woman who’s always been there despite the fact she wasn't for so many years.

‘Mummy,’ I whisper.

What more is there to say?

How does a daughter tell her mother she’s lost – and isn’t sure she wants to be found?

Killing the call, I sink back down. Down and down, and down some more, into the dark.

A world I welcome.

A world I can pretend you still exist.

Chapter Two

March - Therapy Week One

If there was a Pantone called Kind, it would colour-match Ruby’s eyes. Rich, pure, and intensely comforting. Like a mug of Guatemala's finest.

‘Shall we start with what’s brought you here?’ Ruby says, holding my gaze from her armchair.

Her voice too, is kind. A fleece blanket straight from the airing cupboard. Yet her words, strike like bullets.

I inch away, the plump cushions behind me wheezing as I push back into their unfamiliar hold. Almost imperceptibly Ruby follows. Her head moving forward to gently close the gap I put between us, face framed by curls as black as my outlook, alive in a way in which I find impossible to connect.

She smiles warmly. ‘Take your time, Belle.’

Belle.

The way she says my name is soft yet authoritative, glossy lips meeting in the middle to pronounce the B like a rosebud popping open in the late-spring sunshine. I imagine my mother enunciating it in the same way. How it might have made things different. But that wasn’t a combination Mum ever achieved. Soft, yes. Authoritative, never.

They say we choose our parents. That before we enter this world, our souls know exactly who is right for this lifetime's purpose. It’s always made me wonder about mine. My purpose… as much as my parents.

I tried to unravel this once with Harry. Nine years into our relationship and a couple of weeks into our engagement, when I grasped the nettle and decided it was time to discover each other on a deeper level. He’d laughed politely. As if I’d delivered a joke but botched the punchline. Called me a hippy in that lovingly dismissive manner of his, then moved evenly on to a less rebellious topic.

All I’d wanted was one, real conversation. Proof we had it in us to reach beyond the day-to-day and into ‘the bigger picture’. But Harry… Harry liked to remain firmly above ground. Burying his head in the sand had always been as deep as he’d ever willingly venture.

And anyway… me… a hippy?

Earning a six-figure-salary from dredging our seas of oil?

‘Belle?’

Ruby’s voice jolts me back.

‘I know this can feel overwhelming,’ she says, Nubian nose dipping towards her pretty, pillowy mouth, ‘just start wherever you can.’

Propping her elbows onto an empty notepad on her knees, she presses her palms into a prayer and touches her chin to her fingertips.

Delving into my vacant brain, I scrabble for words. Desperately trying to fit them into an answer which might satisfy us both. The seconds murmur by, counting, condemning my ineptitude. Invoking a distant, but recognised, chill. Playtime with my father… Fumbling through encyclopaedias, rummaging for answers I was never going to find amidst the fear of letting him down. The tap-tap-tapping on his wristwatch growing faster, his breath louder, more exasperated with every disappointing tick-tock.

From over the coffee table, Ruby offers me a box of Kleenex.

‘This is a safe space, Belle,’ she says, as tears split my cheeks. ‘Sometimes the body gets there before the words do – that’s okay.’

And even though I’ve no idea what any of it means, it brings a flutter of calm. Like a delicate breeze from a landing butterfly.

‘This,’ I croak, indicating my sodden face. ‘I can’t stop crying… I’m thirty-three years old and I cry all the time. I don't know what’s wrong with me.’

I stare at Ruby helplessly as she observes me. Quietly. Intensely. As though she’s able to see straight though my pupils into the puffy, desolate space behind.

‘And you want to make sense if it,’ she finally says, words hovering between question and answer. ‘Is it this specifically, that encouraged you to seek help?’.

If I had the strength, I’d laugh. Encouraged, not an expression I’d choose.

Forced, perhaps? Coerced?

What is the word for when there’s no other option?

‘My boss thinks it’s exhaustion,’ I say. ‘That’s what I told him – when the doctor ordered me to take time-off.’

The memory brings an urge to vomit. My call with Benedict, still raw with disrepute.

‘Absolutely. Of course. No problem, Mags,’ he’d said, the use of my nickname only adding to my guilt. ‘How long do you need? A couple ‘a days?’

In the static, I heard him chewing on his thumb – teeth clacking, lips sucking. A habit he adopts whenever he’s weighing cost against gain.

‘Weeks,’ I said feebly. ‘I need a couple of weeks.’

He’d started to cough. Like he’d inhaled a splinter of nail, or spikey cuticle. Then, once again, there was nothing but fuzz.

‘Uh – um – are you uh – okay, Mags?’ Benedict eventually asked, his usual eloquence stilted by his continued attempts to dislodge the disbelief caught between his tonsils.

‘Exhaustion,’ I lied, desperate to put us both out of our pain.

‘Exhaustion,’ Benedict repeated, as if I’d invented a new term.

‘Exhaustion,’ I echoed. Trying to make it real – in both our heads.

‘God knows if he bought it,’ I say, coming back to Ruby. ‘Benedict calls me Mags – as in Maggie Thatcher. He tells people it’s because I’m made of iron, but actually, he gave me the nickname when I was promoted. First female director ever in my department.’

‘A great achievement.’ Ruby smiles.

But I’m unable to return the gesture.

‘I’ve been wondering recently if— Well, what if that’s why I got the position? You know, to tick a box?’

‘Do you have reason to believe that?’

‘My colleague, Jake, says it’s the only reason.’

‘What about Benedict? Do you believe that’s why he’d have promoted you?’

‘He’s the last person to conform to all that,’ I say, comforted by the conviction in my voice. ‘He couldn’t care less about demographics – as long as we’re making money. There’s only one occasion I can even think of when he’s differentiated me from the guys.’

Ruby straightens up. Tilts her head.

‘Jake was berating me for being too female,’ I explain. ‘He accused me of lacking balls because I’d given a client a night to think on something. But I knew if I’d pushed, the client would walk. He just needed a bit of time to convince himself he was the mastermind, not us – well, me. Anyway, Jake asked Benedict what he’d have done and without hesitation Benedict said he’d have given no leeway. You should have seen Jake. He literally grew by half-an-inch – almost made it to five-foot-seven. But then Benedict laughed. ‘That’s the problem with the male ego, mate,’ he said to Jake. ‘We blokes would rather lose the deal than lose face. Whereas a bird… a bird uses a bit of emotional intelligence. Plays the long game. We’ll see, but I reckon Mags has this spot on.’ It was nice, you know. The reassurance. Doesn’t often happen in my world.’

‘Do you mind Benedict refencing you like that?’

‘Mags, you mean?’

‘A bird?’

‘Oh, that’s nothing,’ I shrug. ‘You should hear what Jake calls me.’

Ruby’s pen runs across her notepad.

‘And this occasion…’ Ruby looks back up. ‘Was that before your promotion or after?’

‘Erm, after, I think… Yes, definitely after. It was the same night I—’

Heat courses through my body, skin turning clammy beneath my cashmere as I lock my lips. Bite back the memory.

Not here.

Not now.

One of Ruby’s eyebrow’s arcs skyward. ‘The same night as what, Belle?’

Her voice is as calm as an ocean under a full moon, yet I can sense the tide turning inside her.

‘The night I—’

The night, I met you.

And as the evening’s echo comes flooding back, I have to fight not to be swept away.

Staring ahead, I focus on Ruby’s necklace. On the metronomic rise and fall of the turquoise beads lining her collarbone. The way they ebb and flow with such envious ease.

‘Belle, your doctor's referral said your collapse occurred after a night out. Is it the same occasion you’re referring to?’

Without looking up, I shake a no. Slowly. Methodically. Left. Right. Left. Right. Each careful movement biding me time.

‘That was a few years back now... My collapse was last week,’ I say.

I’m aware of Ruby scribbling another note. Underlining it twice.

‘Okay, Belle. Let’s focus on the collapse today as it’s our first meeting.’

I glance back up and she smiles, then drops her gaze to her pad, pausing for just a second before flipping to a new page.

A sheet of A4 down already.

From under her papers, Ruby pulls the letter I presented upon arrival.

‘Belle, your referral says you were unable to explain the events leading up to the collapse. That when you regained consciousness, you were suffering short-term memory loss – unable to explain the events prior to waking up. Is this still the case?’

I nod.

‘Have you ever had any form of counselling or therapy before?’

Another rush of heat.

‘No!’

Of course, I haven’t, I want to add. Therapy’s for the weak. The self-indulgent.

And yet, here I am.

‘Belle, I want to reiterate that everything we discuss is strictly confidential. The only exception is if I’m concerned for your safety.’

I shrug, the caveat hardly applicable to me.

Ruby passes a clipboard across the coffee table. ‘This assessment form is standard practice in a first meeting,’ she says, as I study the clinically-white sheet attached – a column of tiny text on the left, numbers on the right.

She explains I must mark the number that best applies to each question. One being: strongly disagree. Five being: strongly agree. Explains that the questions will help ‘us’ assess my state of mind. Give ‘us’ an indication of how far gone I am. She doesn’t say that exactly, her version, strictly professional. But I can read between the lines even if I’m struggling to read the questions.

‘I’ll go through that again, just so you’re sure,’ she says.

From anyone else, it would be horribly patronising.

Cautiously, I start to make my way through the list.

1. Find it hard to get up in the morning 1 2 3 4 5

2. Anxious about going to bed at night 1 2 3 4 5

3. Little interest or pleasure in anything 1 2 3 4 5

Thankfully, it’s not as difficult as I feared, and my answers fall into a steady rhythm of detached five’s.

Then comes question sixteen.

My pen slows. Begins to twist in a disconcerted figure of eight.

Averting my eyes from number 5, I stare hard at 1 and 2 instead, as I force the nib westward. But it has its own agenda. And as it curves back to the east, I sense the sun being swallowed by the night.

Not 5…

Please, not number 5.

Miraculously, it listens. Veering back, towards the ambivalent curves of 3, which I circle with speed, before moving swiftly on to the remaining questions – each a simple 5.

And then it’s done. Test completed. Only one question which caused me to stumble.

‘One too many’, I hear my father grunting.

Ruby’s features remain passive as she marks my paper. Equally passive as she returns her attention.

‘Question sixteen…’ she says, straight to the point. ‘What made that answer different from the rest, Belle?’

‘Because—Well, I wouldn’t. Couldn’t.’

‘But you have had thoughts you might be better off dead?’

Hearing it spoken out-loud makes the whole of me sink.

‘I’ve— I’ve thought about going to sleep. Not waking up.’

‘Can you explain why?’

‘It would be a relief. You know, to just---’

My honesty takes me to the bottom of the abyss.

‘Thinking back to the night of your collapse, Belle – is there any possibility you might have tried to harm yourself?’

‘No! I mean, as I said, I don’t remember— But no... Not in the way you’re suggesting.’

‘Okay. Let’s look at it another way. Could you have deliberately put yourself in danger?’

I should be able to respond immediately. Should be able to say, No! Absolutely not. But my thoughts won’t allow me to speak, tripping over themselves as they sprint towards the truth. To the underpass near my apartment, cautiously avoided by lawyers and bankers, yummy mummies and yoga bunnies, even on the brightest of days. Me too… until recently. Now, my route home is guided by the amber eyes of cigarettes watching from the shadows, my footsteps swallowed by dirt and damp, and the tormented mutterings of those who reside in the murk. And then the other end… The road I cross without caution, each time wondering – hoping – if today might be the last day I need to play that careless game.