‘Doctor? Leonard Langford. What the devil is wrong with my wife?’
‘Yes, hello. I’m sorry I didn’t catch you yesterday. I’m afraid, Mr Langford, Verity is having a nervous breakdown.’
‘What does that mean?’ Harriet’s hands started to sweat. She almost dropped the handset.
‘It means her mind has given up on her. Taken itself away for a while because something in her life was too much to bear. Have you any idea what that could be?’
Harriet held the phone away from her face while she gulped down what felt like dangerously thin air. ‘How do I help her recover?’
‘Give her time,’ the doctor drawled. ‘Encourage her to eat, drink, get up and go for a walk. If she doesn’t snap out of it in a few days, call me back and I’ll get a referral to Highbury, if you like.’
‘Highbury?’
‘It’s easier than having her languishing at home indefinitely. The psychiatric hospital provides reasonable care. Of course, if a man such as yourself preferred to pay privately…’
‘I’ll let you know.’
She dropped the phone back into the cradle, before sliding down the wall until hitting the floor, feeling as though her bones were collapsing in on themselves.
Nervous breakdown?
Mind given up?
Hospital?
Harriet had no idea how to get her mother to snap out of it. But she would do everything it took to find a way.
In the end, this included almost a week of replacing the half-empty mugs and nibbled plates of food by her bed with fresh ones. She brushed her mother’s greasy hair one evening, pathetically thrilled by how this caused Verity to close her eyes and release a faint sigh of pleasure. Troubled by the scent of decay on her breath, she urged her mother to brush her teeth, to no avail. But then, on the sixth day since Verity escaped into her mind, Harriet found a way to coax her back again. She’d got the idea from the book she’d found in the library on psychiatric ailments, which talked about the power of the senses.
After getting everything ready, she opened the door to allow the fragrance of jasmine to waft over to the bed, mingling with ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow' from the record player she’d lugged upstairs earlier.
‘I’ve run you a bath,’ Harriet said, in a cheery voice with only a hint of a tremor. ‘It’s lovely and warm, and I’ve used your favourite bath salts. Can you smell them?’
Verity tipped her chin up, slightly.
‘Doesn’t that sound nice? A long, hot soak in the bath? You can lie here and listen to your favourite showtunes album for as long as you like.’
To Harriet’s amazement, her mother slowly pushed back the covers and started to haul herself upright. Harriet hurried to offer a helping hand to stiffened limbs. Without saying a word, Verity allowed herself to be shepherded over to the bathroom, where Harriet gently undressed her and helped her into the clawfoot tub. She sank into the water, eyes closed.
‘I’ll leave you to it, shall I?’
Verity didn’t look at her, but her mouth creased up in a smile.
Harriet waited until she was back in her own bedroom before burying her sobs in her pillow. When she’d finally run out of tears, an hour or so later, she found her mother dressed, hair blow-dried and applying a slash of lipstick.
‘I thought we’d have eggs for supper.’ Verity snapped the lipstick lid on. ‘All of a sudden, I fancied an omelette. Is there any cheese, do you know, darling?’
‘I… I think so. Why don’t I see what I can find?’ There might be a stale rind of cheese left, but there was only one egg, and no butter. Or much else. Panicking that her mother would retreat back to the mind-place if she found nothing to eat, Harriet gripped the door handle, preparing to race to the kitchen.
‘No, it’s fine. I’ll do it.’ Verity stood up. ‘If not, I’m sure we can come up with something. It’s what we Hood women do, isn’t it? Make the best of things.’
She paused to pat her daughter’s cheek as she left the room in a haze of jasmine and clean cotton.
Harriet decided the best thing she could do was copy her mother and pretend the past six days had never happened.
When her father came back the following week, nobody mentioned it.
The next time, a couple of months later, her mother stayed in bed for three days. Where a bath hadn’t succeeded, Harriet had come home from school to find Verity rolling out pastry for an apple pie.
