Don't Be Afraid Read online

  “But I’m not,” I said, my voice now equally steely. “You couldn’t ground me, anyway,” I added bitterly. “I’ve grounded myself.”

  She sighed and dropped the remains of the bottle into the bin. And then she stood there, looking out of the window. I followed her gaze, and we were silent for a while. She looked so weary and her eyes were shiny. I felt so guilty – for a change.

  “Look, I . . .”

  But she didn’t want to talk about it any more. She stopped me with a wave of the hand. “I’ll go and get you some more tonight. I know where Angus keeps the prescription,” she said curtly, and went to sit in the conservatory.

  As soon as Angus arrived, she left without a word. I was afraid she would never come back.

  “What’s wrong?” Angus asked that night, as we were having dinner. “You are very quiet. And Clara looked strange when I came in.”

  “Nothing.”

  “Did you two have an argument?”

  “No, no. I’m just tired.”

  Angus kept studying my face throughout the meal, but he didn’t ask again. He went into the study to practise, and I was left alone to think and to berate myself, the music of his violin, for once, failing to soothe me. I was strangely satisfied when, stepping into the kitchen for some tea, I felt a tiny, overlooked shard of glass pierce my bare foot.

  36

  Dusk

  Watch while night falls

  Inside my heart

  Isabel

  I sat at the window in my bedroom, in complete silence but for the ghost of Angus’s music seeping through the wooden floor from downstairs, like the echo of something long forgotten, long lost. Tears veiled my eyes as the lilac light of dusk enveloped the garden and, beyond it, the loch and the woods. Mist rose from the ground and Venus was bright in the sky – the landscape was exquisite, but I couldn’t appreciate its beauty.

  As day smudged into night, I thought back to all that my father had told me about my mother’s illness, about his attitude towards medication. The damage that man had done to me, the damage he’d done to my mum, was immeasurable.

  Prayer was what was needed for me, he would have said – prayer, and pulling myself together. Not that he knew what was happening to me. I couldn’t tell him. I would never tell him.

  The words my father had said about Mum, the words he had repeated over and over, had become a sort of curse, an evil spell. They took on more power every time they were repeated, turning a lie into a semblance of truth. The mind of a child couldn’t tell the difference.

  I knew what he said made no sense. I didn’t believe him.

  And yet I did.

  I had to break the spell he’d cast over me, somehow. The spell both my parents had cast over me, something that had waited in silence inside me until one day I pricked myself on the spindle of the spinning wheel. I was the cursed princess in a black fairy tale. Would there be a happy ending for me?

  No prince, no knight could save me, even with all the power of his love.

  I had to save myself.

  To [email protected]

  From [email protected]

  Clara found out I’m not taking my meds. She hasn’t told Angus yet, but she probably will.

  To [email protected]

  From [email protected]

  You’re not taking your meds? But Isabel, why? They can make you better! Why, why are you refusing them? It’s not because of the crap your father used to say about your mum, is it? I remember him ranting and raving to my parents about the evil of modern psychiatry. What a tosser. Please tell me it’s not because of that!

  To [email protected]

  From [email protected]

  I just can’t bring myself to take them.

  From [email protected]

  To [email protected]

  That old fart doesn’t have a clue, Isabel. He’s always been a moron, especially when it comes to you and Gillian. I don’t know how your stepmother puts up with him. Please, Isabel. Do it for Angus, do it for me. Take those bloody medicines!

  Emer xxx

  Outside, the wind was blowing cold and hard. Sometimes the four walls of my house didn’t feel like a shelter; they felt like a prison. I was being punished for a crime I had never committed. I wished I could step out into the freezing evening air and let it blow all the pain away. Breathe life into me once again.

  That night I dreamt I’d gone outside – I could feel the crackle of dead leaves under my feet; I could see the winter sky above me; I could smell the scent of wind and wet earth. It was so real – and then I woke up, and I was imprisoned once more.

  37

  Within

  I look within

  And I still see the little light

  Isabel

  The woman looking back at me from the mirror the next day was pale, her hair unbrushed, blue bags under her eyes. That woman was me.

  I went downstairs slowly, one step at a time. I could hear Angus and Clara talking, and my heart skipped a beat. What was she telling him? Was she telling him about the medication?

  I stepped into the kitchen with my heart in my throat.

  “All okay, then? I’m off,” Angus said, placing a kiss on my cheek.

  That was all.

  She hadn’t told him.

  Once Angus had driven away, Clara and I were alone, and it wasn’t exactly comfortable companionship. We sat at the kitchen table with our morning coffee, the tension between us palpable. She, too, looked like she hadn’t slept much. I could feel her shifting on her chair, preparing to speak, and I was afraid of what she would say.

  Maybe she’d tell me that today was her last day. That she would not come back.

  “You’re not going to stay with me any more, are you?” I said, my eyes low.

  I was expecting to be scolded, I was expecting her to tell me how disappointed she was, but she didn’t. Instead, she put a hand on mine, in a rush of emotion.

  “What? Oh, Isabel. There is no way I would not come back to you,” she said softly.

  “You look tired.”

  “So do you. I could barely sleep.”

  “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry to give you this worry.”

  “Don’t say sorry,” she said. “Come on. Let’s go to the conservatory and we can talk. We’ll sort it all out, you’ll see.”

  We sat among the plants and flowers. The scents were lovely – lavender mixed with the stephanotis and the aromatic herbs, and a strange, almost otherworldly scent of honey. I closed my eyes briefly and opened them again to see Clara looking at me, concern etched all over her face.

  “Just . . . tell me. Explain to me why you are not taking your meds; tell me properly. Tell me everything, and we can talk it through.”

  I took a deep breath, cradling the hot coffee in my hands. “It won’t work. I just can’t do it. I can’t take those medicines.”

  “Why do you say that?” she asked as I took a sip of my coffee. She was so calm. It always seemed to rub off on me.

  “Because I tried. I’ve been trying all this time . . . I’ve been trying for weeks.”

  “You told me your father says the medication is poison.”

  “Yes. He said that’s what killed my mum. She was taking pills that made her feel like she wanted to die. How could she stand to leave us?” I burst out, and suddenly it wasn’t about the medication, it wasn’t about the medication at all.

  It was about my mum. That she had abandoned me when I was too small to even remember her face. When I needed her the most. To think of the mothers who are forced to leave their children because of illness, or war, or poverty – but she chose to do so. A part of me couldn’t forgive her. A part of me was still a crying child, lost and left to fend for herself.

  “Your mum was sick. It wasn’t the pills that killed her. She had an illness, just like you do—”

  “You always speak like you know her.”

  “I can empathise with what she’s gone through.”

  “You recovere
d,” I said.

  A short hesitation. “There is hope, I promise you.”

  Another silence while I stroked my hair pensively, smoothing its waves down. “My father always said I’m like my mum. Not Gillian: Gillian is like him. She even looks like him . . . The funny thing is, I can’t really remember my mum. So I don’t know how I’m like her. Apart from little things they told me: her love of art, the colour of her eyes . . . They’re like . . .” I struggled to find the words. “Like pieces of a jigsaw that I can’t quite put together. Too many pieces missing, I suppose . . .”

  “Maybe you can be proud to be like your mum.”

  “I am. But . . .”

  “But?”

  “But it’s scary. Thinking I could be like her in everything. Including this . . . thing that has taken me. This illness.”

  “This illness is something that has happened to you. This illness is not you.”

  “Really? Because it feels like there’s nothing left of me.” I took a breath, inhaling the sweet scent of honey. And then, like water gushing through a broken dam, all the words that had been choking me finally came out. I was ready to tell my story. “I suppose, looking back, the signs have always been there. I mean, the signs that I was going to be like this, one day. I used to get very upset about little things that shouldn’t have worried me much, that didn’t worry other children much. Like . . . Oh, it’ll seem stupid to you.”

  “No, tell me.”

  “Well . . .” I tucked a tendril of hair around my ear. It was difficult to speak up. As if my secret sorrow was a thing of shame. Not even Angus knew everything.

  “I was afraid most of the time. Of silly things. Like . . . in my school, we were made to eat whatever we were given. And some days there was food I hated, like, say, cauliflower cheese. When it was time to line up for lunch, we would find out what was on offer that day. I used to worry so much before we got to the dinner ladies, my tummy would cramp, my heart would go crazy. I can see now how my panic was just . . . strange. Sort of out of proportion to what was really happening. I was scared of my teachers, scared of other children, scared of my own shadow. Was just . . . terrified. I tried to tell my dad, but every time I was upset about something he just told me to get on with it, and he was right, I suppose. Except I couldn’t . . .”

  “He wasn’t right. A child is not supposed to just ‘get on with it’. You deserved help and comfort. You were only little!”

  “I was sure my mum would have understood me. But she wasn’t there. So every day I went to school in terror and I couldn’t tell anyone.” I looked down at my hands. The blade cutting me inside, again. “Sometimes I got so scared about things I couldn’t breathe.”

  “I’m so sorry, Isabel.”

  “It wasn’t always terrible, of course,” I hastened to add. “I had lots of friends and I loved drawing and reading and climbing trees and playing with my dolls . . . I wasn’t always a miserable child. Not on the outside. Just . . . there was a part of me nobody knew about. I kept it secret. I swallowed it down. I thought it would never come up again. But it did.”

  “But you didn’t let it destroy you. You had such a difficult start in life . . . and you still studied art, you married Angus . . . You built yourself a great life. Most people don’t achieve half of what you have! You are an illustrator, you work for publishers all over the world . . .”

  “Worked. Past tense.”

  “You’re doing something for yourself, now. Chrysalis.”

  “Yes, but that’s not the point,” I looked at my hands again. Those hands that used to hold a pencil and a paintbrush with such passion, such enthusiasm. “My life has . . . imploded. I can’t explain, Clara. One day it was like a switch going on, and that was it. I couldn’t switch it back off. I began to feel frightened of everything again. Everything. It’s difficult to explain . . .” I repeated.

  “There is no need to explain. I think I know what you mean.”

  “People say ‘snap out of it’, ‘pull yourself together’, as if I have a choice. Just imagine, if you were about to be hit by a car. That moment of pure terror, where you think you’re going to die. Then multiply it by forever. This is how I live. Nearly every instant of my day.”

  “Well, that is how a person should live,” she said.

  I was astounded. “What? Why should anyone live like this?”

  “Fear is natural, even useful.” She shrugged. “It’s just that usually we keep it in the back of our minds, otherwise we wouldn’t be able to live. We would go crazy.”

  “How is a state of fear natural?”

  “What I mean is . . . these bodies we live in are so fragile. We could get sick any moment. Something terrible might be developing inside us right now and we wouldn’t have a clue. Bones are easy to break; flesh is easy to burn and mangle . . . You might be doing something as simple as getting a bowl out of a cupboard and before you know it an oven dish falls on your head and you die, all because you wanted to make a shepherd’s pie.”

  For a moment I must have looked like I had no idea what she was talking about. And then I had to laugh, even in my upset.

  “Shepherd’s pies are bad for you, I always knew that.”

  She smiled back and shook her head. “What I’m trying to say is that everything is a dangerous business. I was at the stables yesterday, up at Ramsay Hall . . .”

  I felt a stab of longing, thinking of Ramsay Hall, thinking of the horses. Especially Torcuil’s mare, Stoirin, the beautiful honey-coloured horse I used to ride.

  Thinking about Torcuil, his easy companionship. His constant, steadfast presence . . .

  “I watched the riders on their horses. Thinking how easy it would be for them to break their necks. In a single moment. And still, you never think about that. You’re sort of aware of it, somewhere in your consciousness. But it’s never at the forefront of your mind, otherwise nobody would go horse riding, or do much else, for that matter.”

  “Exactly! A part of me always felt like that, but I just got on with things. Now, I can’t any more. I just can’t, Clara. I’m so afraid. All the time.”

  “You know what I think?”

  “What?”

  “That if you take your medication, if you manage to follow the therapy like the doctor advised . . . Just how it came, this . . . monster you’re fighting will leave you.”

  I shook my head. “It’s never going to go.”

  “Then maybe you have to learn to live with it . . . keep it in its place. Slap it down when you need to. But still live your life. You can do that.”

  “My mother couldn’t. It killed her. She didn’t want to live any more, not even for me and my sister.”

  “Then don’t follow in her footsteps. Be stronger. Fight harder.”

  “You sound like a Nike ad. Just do it.” I shrugged my shoulders and looked into my cup. “I don’t think I can,” I added feebly. I had no fight left. I had used it all just to stay alive, to keep breathing.

  “But I think you can. And so does Angus. If your mum was still here . . . if your mum could see you now . . .”

  “She’d be so disappointed in me.”

  “Oh, Isabel, that is not true! If she could see you now she’d be so proud of all you’ve done in your life. She would look after you. She would help you get better . . .”

  “Well, she’s not, is she?” I said in anger. All of a sudden I felt overwhelmed, nearly nauseated by the conversation. “I’m going upstairs. Sorry, Clara . . .”

  “Isabel, wait. We need to talk about the medication. We need to make a plan.”

  “I’m sorry,” I repeated. “It’s not going to happen.”

  Her expression filled me with guilt as I rushed away, to the safe haven of my bedroom.

  To [email protected]

  From [email protected]

  So, it doesn’t look so good with the French guy. When we came back from India, he flew over to Ireland with me, and it was great. For the first couple of days. Then he sort of realised that I r
eally am blind, that it’s not a stage gimmick – the blind harpist and all that. I mean, he knew, of course, but he didn’t realise how much it affects my daily life. He realised I walk with a white stick, and believe me, there were things I wanted to do to him with that stick after two days! He treated me like I was completely useless. Like I couldn’t even blow my nose by myself. Short of cutting my food and feeding me, he behaved like I was a toddler. I just told him to go. Let’s face it, I’ll never find anyone. Thankfully Donal was at hand with some ice cream and some good music, God bless him.

  Tell me about you.

  Emer xxx

  To [email protected]

  From [email protected]

  Oh, Emer, I’m so sorry. The French guy sounds like a real pain. Donal is always there when you need him, isn’t he? Emer, have you ever tried considering him as more than a friend? Because I know and you know he has had a terrible crush on you since you were five.

  Isabel

  To [email protected]

  From [email protected]

  Yeah, Donal is a great friend, but nothing more than that. And if you think he has feelings for me, you are SO wrong! I’m like his little sister. And you didn’t tell me anything about you.

  To [email protected]

  From [email protected]

  Me? I’m grand.

  Isabel xxx

  38

  Perfumed rain

  The story between us

  Is two notes and a look

  Angus

  She walked like she owned the world. There was no shyness about her. If you had to say one thing about her, you would say: She’s strong. There was no doubt in her eyes. That was Bibi, marching towards me, a smile on her face. She took my hands and she kissed me on both cheeks, beaming like she had been waiting for me and for me only.

  She hadn’t, of course. That was how she greeted everyone. And it was wrong that I noticed her kissing James, a piano player, the same way she kissed me, and looking at him with the same light in her eyes.