Page 4 of The Beach Holiday
3
NOW
The light stings my eyes. Why is it always so bright in the mornings? After opening them for a millisecond, I close them again. I think if I shut my eyes I am also blocking out the external noises. I can hear the world around me getting up and getting on with their day. There are only two things I want to get up for, two things that there seems purpose for. One of those is my weekly session with Dr Bhaduri. I even make an effort and put on a dress and do my hair. Even though I feel self-conscious; is the dress too bright? I feel eyes on me everywhere.
But today is not another session with Dr Bhaduri. I will have to wait another three days for that. The weeks feel long but I spend time thinking how to block out the external world, and the noise of everyday life. I know he has expectations, and I am not fulfilling those expectations. But I go each week because I like him. And it fills the long days. He makes me feel warminside when he speaks. I have missed the warming tones of the voice of a man. His voice is like caramel. Even when he speaks the name I am assured belongs to me, but I barely recognise it these days. I hear echoes of it from my past. Sadie Adamson. But it won’t resonate properly with me. It is just a bunch of syllables that I no longer associate with who I am.
Who am I?
Who have I become?
I am nothing.
You’re nothing.
I often think of all the things Ishouldsay to Dr Bhaduri and maybe this is one of the many things he would want to hear from me. That there is a voice that still haunts me. I went somewhere to escape it but sometimes, it is still there. Probably because of what I have done.
I usually let the words evaporate and disappear from my mind as quickly as they arrive. Other times, I feel an uncontrollable rage. The emotions are so close to the surface sometimes it’s like I can touch and taste them.
Am I a violent person? The constant whirring thoughts, they drag me from my bed each morning and hold me hostage all day before they become my nightmares. I sleep but the images come with me to my bed.
I am so tired even the dreaming exhausts me, then it stays with me, day and night: a strange tiredness that is neither here nor there. I occasionally try to lie down during the day to sleep, but as soon as I lay my head on the pillow, the desire to slumber is gone.
Eventually, I find the energy to get out of bed and pick my way across a mass of discarded paper. I try to look away fromwhat is scrawled all over them. I had been writing again last night. Some might call it journaling, or free writing. Maybe I would have done the same under other circumstances. I scribble so fast that no sooner have I finished on one piece than I have cast it aside and begun another. I will need to tidy that all away. Someone could see that and then what would they think of me? Messy? Inconsiderate? No, something much worse than that.
These days I am exceptionally conscious of keeping the tiny spaces I inhabit neat. I don’t need to spread my belongings around. Besides, I don’t own anything. It helps me think better so I pick up the papers and push them into the corner of the wardrobe, ignoring the piles that have already accumulated in there. I find my way to the bathroom and to the sink where I wash my face. I look at myself in the mirror. I am not yet thirty years old, and it appears to me that I am looking at a reflection of a woman twice my age. I must remind myself daily of my name, age, and where I live. Or I am sure I will go completely mad.
The noises around me become louder and I feel a crushing sensation in my skull. I touch it to make sure something isn’t constricting it because surely there must be. I turn on the tap and even the sound of running water is too much. I need fresh air. As I reach the door that leads outside, there is a far-off scent of bacon frying. I feel my mouth fill with saliva. I am going to retch.
Today I know I will meet Jane. She had just appeared there one day on a bench a few metres from the front of the house, overlooking a mass of fields. I feel like she is an angel. I’m not religious or particularly spiritual but I am looking forward toseeing Jane again. Because now she sits there and waits for me, every Tuesday. It has become our thing. I have a thing and it feels good. I feel almost alive. I used to have so many things, every day used to be a vibe of some sort. Now it’s just me, and a head of swimming thoughts.
Jane is older than me by about five years. She likes to talk, she says. I let her do all the talking for the first few weeks and then I began to talk back. She seems to like that, and it feels good to talk to someone and have them listen when they aren’t getting paid to do it. I appreciate my sessions with Dr Bhaduri, but it is his job to sit with me for an hour each week. Jane is just a person like me, who saw a bench and was able to form a connection with me, and I feel lucky. Lucky Tuesdays I call them. I feel as though I need something to cling to although I’m not sure why. It doesn’t matter, does it? Nothing matters.
I move tentatively towards the bench. I am worried if I hurry Jane will turn, see me coming and leave. It’s hard to know why Jane likes me, and I fear if she knew the real me, the person I had been a few weeks ago, she wouldn’t want to sit with me on Tuesdays. If I approach cautiously then I can be on the bench before she realises what is going on. But I don’t know why I am always so worried. Jane is a very accommodating person. She makes me feel very relaxed. And I think she wants to be there; I think she is genuinely interested in me. But then I once thought that about many other people, and it keeps turning out that they don’t actually see anything in me at all. She does seem interested in my story though. If only I could be the one to tell it to her. To everyone else who wants so desperately to hear it.
I sidle up to the bench and sit down as she looks over at me.
‘Sadie! Hi.’ She always seems happy to see me.
‘Hello, Jane.’ I look down at my feet and realise I am wearing odd socks with my trainers. Jane follows my line of vision. She blows out a laugh through her nostrils. I smirk shyly. Will she think I’m mad?
‘How are you today?’ She has a flask of coffee and begins to pour out two cups. I skipped breakfast again. It is becoming a habit. The stench of bacon hadn’t helped. A couple of coffees will bridge the gap until lunchtime.
‘Thank you,’ I say, taking the coffee. That is the routine we were in already, me and Jane, a couple of girls, just hanging out on a bench, listening, talking. I feel a twinge at lost friendship. I have many lost friendships, but one in particular has brought me to where I am today: living each day without any purpose. But Jane and I have been able to strike up an easy rapport and I know I can’t be completely incompetent, can I?
Jane has told me so much about her life in a short time. She likes to tell me things and I like to listen. It is like a comfortable storyline that feels so achingly familiar, the normality of it all. And I don’t have to do anything except sit and take it all in.
I take a sip of my coffee. I flinch. It is hot, and I feel the tingle of heat on my lips where it scalded them. Jane doesn’t notice. She is looking across the field full of cows. Longhorns – Jane had told me their name. I could have guessed from the length of the spikes on either side of their head. They are magnificent beasts.
Jane has told me a lot about herself. She has been married. Twice. She has one ten-year-old daughter who lives with her dad, but Jane sees her twice a week and for more extended periods during the holidays. She spent a summer in France, alone last year, learning how to make wine, and she reads a book aweek. She has been a teacher, a yoga instructor, a party planner and ghost-wrote an autobiography for an English actor; she did a degree in creative writing and met him through an old school friend.
I know so much about her. She has yet to ask me any direct questions.
‘I love all animals.’ Jane sips her coffee and looks at the cows. ‘I mean, look how happy they are. Just living life so unconsciously. Not knowing what the next hour or minute will entail, just chewing and breathing.’
I look at the cows and try to see them as Jane does, but suddenly one cow’s neck is sliced open. Blood is streaming from the wound, like someone is standing behind pouring red liquid from a jug. My heart pounds hard in my chest; my hand goes to my neck. I glance at Jane, and she is looking on unperturbed. She can’t see what I see.
‘Don’t you think?’ Jane’s voice is loud.
