Crash, page 15
I didn’t have time to argue. ‘Why not look at those workbooks I bought? There’s food in the freezer and don’t forget to take Honey out. I’ll be home as soon as I can. We can talk later.’
‘Forget it,’ Tom said. ‘I’ll play on my PlayStation.’ He turned his back and threw a ball for Honey, too hard. She watched it bounce off the lawn and crash into a tangled border of faded plants but didn’t move.
I heard Tom mutter. ‘For heaven’s sake, Honey, take an interest.’
The receptionist leaned across the counter, The Haven logo stretched across her chest. I could visit Carl, but I must wait to speak to a nurse first. I sat in one of the leather armchairs and brought out my notebook. I turned to a clean page and wrote ‘Carl’, then looked back at the notes I had written about my diagnosis. There were only four words. Grade Two. Stage Three.
Jack walked towards me, his footsteps muffled by the carpet.
‘Come in here,’ he opened a door to his left. ‘Dr Pritchard will join us shortly.’
Four low chairs were arranged around a beech coffee table. The door closed with a heavy sigh and it felt as if the air had been sucked from the room. No sounds reached us from outside.
‘Would you like some water, Mrs Williams? Is it okay if I call you Alice?’
I agreed to both. ‘I thought I had missed Dr Pritchard.’
‘No, he’s here all day. He said he would see you anytime this afternoon. Oliver Thompson telephoned earlier and spoke to the hospital’s management. He insisted you should be called in. Carl’s been asking for you too. We rang your home and Tom said you had an appointment at the university.’
I spoke abruptly. ‘Just tell me what’s happening.’
The door opened and a short man I guessed was Carl’s consultant, sat down next to me, slamming a heavy bundle of files onto the table. He pulled roughly at his tie and scanned the room.
‘It’s too hot in here. Why do none of these windows open? Jack, can you see if there’s a fan anywhere.’
Jack left us, and the doctor turned to me, holding out his hand. ‘Hi, I’m Mike Pritchard, consultant neurologist. Pleased to meet you at last. We tend to talk to that Thompson chap, only because he pays the bills.’
‘He has power of attorney whenever Carl has a crash, which these days means always.’
‘Since when?’
‘I’m not sure… I wasn’t told. Oliver is Carl’s right-hand man and he acts for Carl in all respects, including paying Carl’s hospital fees from the company accounts. Carl was never very good at separating our finances from the business. It was his, you see, right from the start. But that doesn’t mean you should talk to Oliver about Carl’s health.’
‘Of course. What about you? Stop me if I’m asking too many questions but why weren’t you given power of attorney?’
I’ve never been involved in the business. Carl has never trusted me.
‘It makes sense that someone who’s more experienced handles the finances,’ I replied. ‘It’s years since I was actively involved in the business but there’s something else you should know. More recently, Carl has been prone to paranoid thoughts, which focus on me.’
‘I wondered if that were the case. I’m guessing he’s employed someone almost as paranoid?’
I smiled. ‘You don’t miss much.’
‘Comes with the territory. The overlap between my field and my mental health colleagues is a narrow one. I work a lot with madness and that’s just the staff. Ah, at last…’
Mike jumped to help Jack through the door and as they searched for a socket, I dipped into my handbag to check my mobile phone. There was a text from Dan, telling me that he had mortgaged his house (lol) for opera tickets. He loved me, he added, and couldn’t wait for the weekend.
Mike looked calmer and the perspiration had dried on his brow but I felt chilled from the fan, which was too powerful and close. I smiled at Dan’s words and a flush of warmth spread across my skin. Mike noticed and as if to avoid intruding, turned away, one arm spread along the back of his chair, his free hand covering his mouth. He remained like this for several seconds, focusing on a distant point through the window. I looked at Jack, but he shrugged and folded his arms. The only sound was the occasional burp from the water cooler.
Mike turned back, his sudden movement making me startle.
‘It’s bad news, Mrs Williams. Thompson says your business can no longer pay for Carl to be a patient here. To be frank, we’ve not been paid for the last time the team visited your home. Of course, we should have told you sooner, but he reassured us, said he could sort something out. This is very difficult because Carl is seriously ill. I think he will recover from this episode, he might even find the energy to work again, but at most he has a few months to live.’
I heard a sharp intake of breath. It was mine. A memory of Carl: thin and fit, running and running, then jumping into the sky to catch a Frisbee. His jeans pull away from his stretched torso showing me a ripple of muscles across his belly and a thread of dark hair snaking below his belt. In my mind, he falls to the ground, tumbling, laughing and I pile on top of him. We kiss and roll together across the grass and then his eyes are red, streaming tears, his face covered in itching sores from an allergy to newly mown grass. We had to go home, and I’d bathed his skin with calamine lotion in a darkened room.
A weight settled across my brow and I raised my hand to my eyes.
‘What if he tried, once again, to come off the meth?’ I said. ‘This might shock him into sticking with rehab.’
Mike shook his head. ‘It’s too late. Carl is the drug, the drug is Carl. His brain is damaged. He needs the meth just to be normal, but it will kill him.’ He looked down and stacked the files, squaring up the edges with his palms. ‘It will be quick at the end. That’s the only hope I can give you.’
The fan rattled through the long pause where I was expected to speak. ‘What do we do now?’ I whispered.
‘We can’t move him today. He’s my patient and I’ll do what’s best for him. The costs are already so high that another day or two will make no difference. The best thing for him now is care at home, rather than another hospital. Why don’t you go up and see him? He’s awake. I’ll join you in about fifteen minutes because I want to tell him what I’ve just told you… I mean about the end of life not the finance. We don’t like to do these things without a family member present. We can start planning Carl’s care after we’ve spoken to him.’
Unplanned words blurted from my mouth like vomit. Talking about myself made me cry. ‘I’m having surgery next week, I have cervical cancer.’ I tossed my head to shake away the tears and turned the pages of my notebook, as if something vital was written there.
‘Look, it says so here… I wrote it down.’
Jack walked around to sit next to me and took the notebook from my hand. He tried to put his arm across my shoulders, but I pulled away. I didn’t want comfort from my daughter’s boyfriend.
I wiped my running nose with the back of my hand and controlled my voice, speaking each word in turn as if I were dictating. ‘You don’t understand, I’m going to be fine. I’m going to recover. But you must see, I can’t care for Carl at home.’
TWENTY
THURSDAY 25TH SEPTEMBER
Carl had been moved to a room that had no pretensions to be anything other than a place where the very sick were cared for. Machines puffed and hummed, attached to him by wires, tubes, and clips. He appeared to be asleep, but the nurse spoke to me in a whisper and said that he would respond. I touched his shoulder and he turned to me and exhaled my name on a long, drawn-out sigh. I held his hand, sat down on the chair next to the bed and cradled his head on my arm. He closed his eyes, as I stroked his temple. I smelt his breath, which was stale but not foul, like the gravel at the bottom of a fish tank.
I didn’t whisper to Carl about what we should do about Tom or money. Carl was about to learn that he was dying. He had destroyed the miracle of his life and that was enough. When I first met Carl, he must already have been certain he was unlovable and he would have been shamed every day of his life by Beatrice’s rejection. In turn, he made me feel unlovable and had rejected me but even after this, I felt glad that I had loved him.
I wasn’t sure what Carl understood of the stark facts Mike Pritchard gave him. He nodded when questioned but for much of the time he seemed to be asleep. After Mike left, I stayed and stroked his forehead and gave him sips of water from a cup, like the ones the children used when they were prone to spills.
The nurse asked me to leave when Carl needed support to breathe but first I helped her moisturise the sores on his skin and then washed his face and hands with a warm, scented cloth. I brushed the thinning strands of hair from his face and bent to kiss him. He opened his eyes and found mine, his pupils struggling to focus.
‘I’m sorry.’ It was just audible, but I knew for certain Carl had heard everything Mike had said.
Jack walked with me to the end of the formal gardens. He kept his hands in his pockets as we crunched across gravel paths between crumpled herbaceous borders, tangled with decaying leaves and brown flower heads. At the steps down to the path that led to my car, Jack sat on the wall and pulled a pack of cigarettes from his trouser pocket. He flicked one out for me, but I shook my head. Jack lit his, cupping his hand around the flame and inhaled deeply. The smell of new smoke, mingled with the earthy scent of early evening, made me ache for Dan.
‘Are you okay to walk the rest of the way yourself?’ Jack screwed up his eyes against the smoke drifting from his lips.
‘Yes, of course. It’s still daylight and I need to think. The walk will do me good.’
Jack nodded. ‘And you’re sure about what we agreed?’
‘You’ll keep Carl here until I’m ready to have him home.’
Jack stood up and held out his hand to me. ‘Good luck, Alice.’
As I walked across the grass, I thought about Carl alone in that room and wondered if I should have stayed, but Tom was at home, waiting for me. The light was just softening within the lengthening shadows of the distant trees. The shape of my car grew solid, but its colour was indistinct. A figure was moving. There was another car, parked behind mine. I shaded my eyes, but I was still too far away to make sense of what I was seeing. Alert to danger, my senses sharpened. Yes, there it was, a man was moving around my car. I hesitated. Should I run back to the hospital?
A voice called, echoing across the parkland and the shadowy figure raised a hand. It was Oliver. My fear turned to anger. I don’t want him here. His bulk became solid as he strolled towards me. I hurried to close the gap between us, to get this unwelcome meeting over with. I didn’t greet him as we met, but walked past with my head down, planning what I needed to say. We reached the cars and Oliver opened the door of his new Mercedes.
‘Shall we talk in here? It’s getting cold.’
I shook my head. ‘I’m hot from walking. Here is fine.’ I leaned against a tree and folded my arms, brushing at grass and stones with the toe of my shoe.
‘They told you about the money?’
My mouth felt dry and my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth. I swallowed but there was no saliva. I nodded.
‘Have you said anything to Carl?’
‘Not yet, he’s too ill. He’ll stay here a couple of days, until I can have him at home.’
Oliver jangled keys in his trouser pockets. ‘It’s not my fault. You’ve seen the news.’
‘You should have said something, taken some action sooner. Carl trusted you.’
Oliver looked away and even in the half light I could see a deep, red flush spread from below his shirt collar and up his neck like a port wine stain.
‘The thing is, Alice, I need to hide some money, a lot of money.’ I watched him struggle under my glare. His blond curls, shining in the setting sun, gave him a cherubic aura, incongruous now in one so middle-aged. ‘I need to use your bank account. The auditors are crawling all over me. It might help you too, we could fund some of Carl’s care.’
I felt nothing but disgust. For the first time I was glad that Carl had so firmly shut me out of the business. ‘There is a National Health Service, he’ll be looked after. You and Carl made choices that didn’t include me. It’s too late and almost certainly illegal, to involve me now.’
‘You’ve never liked me,’ Oliver whined, but still he didn’t look up.
‘That’s irrelevant. My opinion of you makes no difference.’
‘I know about you and your lover.’ Oliver smirked, lifting his eyes to judge the impact of his words. ‘I track every email, I know about every shag. I’ve protected you, Alice, but Carl ought to be informed, especially about your tryst in London… at the weekend, isn’t it? The police would also be interested to hear about the drugs you keep in your home. That you leave your fifteen-year-old son alone to pay off dealers.’
The sun burned low through the trees and I heard rooks settle high above us, rattling in the branches. The threat was real. Mike Pritchard had said Carl might well recover from this episode, to some degree. If Oliver encouraged him, he would seek revenge. The best outcome would be legal or financial retribution, the worst case was that Dan might not be safe.
I spat out the words, ‘You are a shit, Oliver.’
‘Be reasonable, Alice. I have to walk away with something and you can too. You’ll only have to hide the money for a few days, until I find somewhere more secure. If you agree, your secrets are safe with me.’
My voice cracked, betraying my fear. I struggled to control the corners of my mouth. ‘You’ve exploited Carl. You’ve preyed on his weakness and addiction. You’re not protecting me, you’re saving up information to use against me… to destroy me. Why are you doing this, Oliver?’
‘I’ve always acted in Carl’s best interests, unlike you.’
I shook my head. ‘You bastard…’
Oliver interrupted. ‘For your children’s sake, I need to save what I can from our creditors. Carl is killing himself with drugs, but you haven’t exactly cared or tried to stop him. I’m asking you to help me now. Come on, Alice, it’s only one more lie. We’re not so different you and me.’
Anger burned inside me and I felt bile rise in my throat. ‘How dare you suggest that I wouldn’t put my children first. And you know nothing about living with an addict. What do you know about family life? Your children have been in boarding school since they were seven. Your wife screws anything that moves. You’re just trying to protect all this.’ I swept my hand over his car, his suit, his puffy, prosperous face.
‘You haven’t exactly been mother of the year,’ Oliver spat back at me. ‘Your son’s been expelled from school, another addict in the making and once again, you expected the business to compensate for your inadequacy as a parent. Without Carl’s money, you’re on your own. If Carl chooses to divorce you, he’ll make sure you won’t see Tom again and you’ll be left without a penny. Dan Lewis won’t be much help. I’ve heard university lecturers earn peanuts and his alimony payments will be high, very high, especially after I’ve tipped off his wife Sarah. A bit too late to find a decent job, isn’t it, Alice?’
The evening breeze cooled, and I felt the hair on my arms prickle. Leaves whispered above me and a fox screamed. The blue sky had spread into a soft orange smeared with dark clouds, like inkblots. I watched a flock of starlings settle into the trees around the hospital, chattering as they fought amongst each other for a perch. Lights from the building glowed warm and safe and I thought of Carl inside. At last, my world made sense. Perhaps Dan was right. Oliver couldn’t touch me because Carl needed me in a way that Oliver would never understand. He always had. Everything was uncertain except this one thing. I smiled and Oliver frowned, puzzled.
‘Do what you like,’ I said. ‘I won’t hide any money for you. It’s over, can’t you see? You can’t control me, or Carl or Dan. Save yourself… if you can.’
I drove home following the red taillights of the cars ahead, as if we were all on the same journey, holding lanterns aloft for each other so that we could find our way home. I listened to the news, still dominated by the run on HBOS shares. Cows swayed over a motorway bridge after milking, silhouetted against the end of the day. I had been taken into the core of Oliver’s dark heart and he knew mine, but right now, I would fight for my family and I believed I could protect Dan. My life with Carl was finished, the business was finished, Oliver was finished. These things would happen and very soon. But I wasn’t finished. Mr Wales had said I would live.
TWENTY-ONE
FRIDAY 26TH SEPTEMBER
Tom burst into my bedroom at the very moment I was laying out my new lingerie and silk pyjamas on top of my duvet. I scooped the guilty underwear into my hands and sat down, crushing them underneath my thighs.
‘If you’re going to see Dad today, can you drop me at Madeleine’s?’ he asked.
‘I thought you didn’t want to…’
‘She’s got a Great Dane coming in for a caesarean and she needs my help. The dog’s too big for her to handle,’ Tom explained, as if this was obvious to everyone except me.
Madeleine had been handling animals larger than a Great Dane for years on her own, but I felt grateful she had allowed Tom to believe he was indispensable. ‘Of course, I said, let me know when you want to leave.’
In the surgery car park, I sent Dan a text.
Oliver knows about us but we’re safe as long as he can’t get to Carl. I’ll do everything I can to stop that happening. This number is still okay.
At the hospital, I checked in at reception. ‘Your husband has a visitor, Mrs Williams.’
Oliver. I didn’t pause to allow her to check the name in the register. I slammed on the keypad for the lift with my open palm and unable to wait, climbed the immaculately carpeted stairs two at a time, hauling myself up by the brass-plated banister.
