Breakdown (18 page)

“Jack, your old man’s—” Steve stopped talking as he came in and my old lady turned away, sweeping back over to the desk, or she seemed to sweep, the pool of mist around her curling into the corners of my vision.

Steve looked me over. “You...? Hm. Your dad. Jack, he wants to know...”

I didn’t really catch much else, just wiped a shaking arm over my cheek, then pushed past Steve.

“Jack.”

I was already downstairs, grabbing my jacket, but before I reached the door, I paused
, hearing three clicks of a hazard light.

“Jack.” Steve was by me, eyes a little wide. “There’s blood smeared on your cheek.” He looked at my hand. “And there... Cutting. Are you cutting again and—?”

I grabbed Steve by the throat, holding him against the wall. Control was slipping from my hands as the struggle to regain control and calm pushed life into a mist I didn’t want to come out of, especially as—“Humpty—”

“Huh?” said Steve.

“—Dumpty sat on a wall, drinking his ale and living life up.”
Again the click of a hazard switch went, and this I time kicked the shit out of the door when it wouldn’t open and stop the damn clicking.
“Threescore men, fourscore more, kick at the bits, fucking him up more.”

“Jack.”

Giving a smile, I licked at his cheek, jaw to cheekbone, loving the rough cut of stubble on tongue and making him fall quiet. “How much do think you’re adding to all this shit, Essex boy? Letting Cutter fuck and cut you? Your Carole know you stay still for that?”

Jack. Age 30

Back in Halliday’s office, sat there on the settee, I stared down at my hands as the flicking of the switch did its job and brought me back. “I didn’t find out about Cutter cutting Steve until a few weeks after that.” I frowned. “Yet there, that moment, I knew...” I shivered. “How the hell did I know it then?”

The office was quiet for a moment. “As with the scalding, your mother, she was a self-harmer with a knife?”

Feeling a little numb, I looked at Halliday. The hazard switch was in his hands, the DVD still frozen on Steve pulling me away from Cutter’s room, the photo of Gray still at his side. “How could I forget that? How the fuck did I forget
that
?”

“Was that the first time that she cut herself in front of you?” said Halliday.

Other images were there, playing with bricks, finding no one in the living room, then toddling on through to see my old lady at the kitchen sink, fingers pressed to her wrist, red colour spilling free... Turning my hands over, I glanced down at them, how clean they were, yet still somehow stained. “Real boys... boys get dirty.”

“Jack.” Craig nudged me and offered something over. “Take this.” The antibacterial hand wash was new. The seal still in place. No hurry, no desperate need to get the lid twisted around so the pump would work, I took it off Craig and opened it up. The wash was cool, but came with that smell that seemed to clean away a few cobwebs. Couldn’t wipe away the stains, though, and it took a flick of the hazard switch to stop me going for a fifth time.

“Jack, would you like to use your photo?” said Halliday. “Would dropping it casually help you more?”

“Vince,” I said quietly, keeping hold of the antibacterial wash and turning it over in my hands. “He said that.” I snorted. “He forced Jan to come all over me, then watched me roll around in the dust saying Jan had made me a man by getting me dirty.” I looked at Halliday. “Real men get dirty.” I frowned back at the soap. “How the hell could I forget that she fucking said it first? That he got it off her?”

“Jack. Those whispers?” Halliday flicked the switch and I nearly dropped the wash. “
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, drinking his ale and living life up. Threescore men, fourscore more, kicked at the bits, fucking him up more.
Who are they from? Who’s whispering to you?”

I frowned, then closed my eyes, listening. And there it was, no more than a soft mumble at the back of my mind, slowly starting to get louder, louder, then I snorted a cold laugh. “Me.”

“Good.” Halliday sounded so quiet. “And what happened when you didn’t listen to those whispers about your mother, Jack? What happened when you ignored your own voice? Who started to come out to play? Who is still coming out to play in order to get you to listen?”

He felt so close, the whispering loud enough to deafen. I felt sick. “I’m still doing it.”

“What?”

“Ignoring Martin,” I mumbled quietly, closing my eyes and seeing Joe’s face. “Joe said I’d tried to get him to take my meds.” I frowned. “Fuck. He’s forcing my meds onto Joe and getting Joe to cry out the injustice of it, because I’m still not listening to him, even now.”

“Martin’s angry with you now, Jack? Why?”

I shrugged a tear free, offered a small laugh. “Because he’s had enough too. I’m fucked up, but even here, now, I’m trying to push for a quick fix. He knows there isn’t one. He’s saying Joe might as well be fed my drugs because I’m not giving them and everything else the time they need to heal.”

Halliday sat back, nodded. “He looks after you, Jack. He might go about it the wrong way, but he’s not your enemy. But he is right. You are trying to look for an easy fix and get out of here quickly. And—”

“There is no easy fix.” I looked from Halliday, back to the door, but mostly to the floor. “Smart bastard knew it all along.”

“Jack, you ‘walk’ into Martin because you’ve known there’s no easy fix. It just—”

“Takes me a while to catch up with the details.” I looked down at my hands. “He was just starting to spread his wings back then,” I mumbled quietly. “When the shit stopped, he took all the fucked-up anger from me, trying to say slower... easier as he dealt with the fallout.” Halliday got my attention. “Slower, easier.”

He nodded, giving a wry smile. “You get there eventually, Jack. You just need to step back and see you as Martin would.”

It was hard, making life take a step back, but the first start was to request a week of category five obs from the staff. That meant fifteen minute check-ins. I only had Joe’s word that Martin had started to show his face, but it was enough for me. For his safety and my sanity, I kept to my own room for pretty much most of that week, with a promise off Craig to keep people away until I felt calm enough within myself to be any different. One fucked-up week ran into two on that score, with Halliday going back to basics with desensitisation to objects and smells. The VR programme hit hard with Jan’s scent, not only sparking blackouts, but throwing me back into the land of stomach cramps and vomit. The programme itself hadn’t even covered any of the shit that happened with Vince, just Jan’s scent in his home setting. Fuck knows I still couldn’t face my own home. For a moment I’d forgotten about taking it slowly, just needing to get close to Jan. I fucking hated life without him. Two months without seeing or speaking to him had my head and heart needing to break the face of the man working the machine to hurry things up. The need was there to throw Jan’s clothes on the floor, just writhe around and get him on my skin, even if it was just an echo. Yet the moment he hit my senses, I was backing away, scrambling for the bathroom, but failing to make it. Hand on the wall, I’d thrown up until it hurt. After that? Life had gone black for a while.

That had hurt the most, knowing I wanted to get close, needing to get close, but crying disgust at how Vince still pushed his way in, stopping me grabbing onto Jan and tugging him into me.

The next few weeks after that? Slow and easy. It got to the point where I could at least keep my stomach long enough to stay in the VR programme for a full five minutes. Three months, and I’d accomplished only being able to stay near the ghost of his scent for five fucking minutes. The simple solution would be for Jan to change his cologne, use different soap. Why the hell didn’t he just change his cologne and soap?

But for today, it was all I needed. I’d not called anyone since my first attempt a few months back. Craig handled any shit I needed, calling my old man and arranging fresh clothes to be brought over weekly, keeping Jan up-to-date, but socialising... I hit an all time low with everyone outside the unit. It didn’t help my ass, I knew that, but it had to be at my pace, when I was ready. It was a fucking selfish and cowardly act, I knew that. Jan... Gray... my old man, they were all trying to lick their own wounds, and I was only piling more shit on them by not talking, but my head... If I couldn’t get things straight in my head, like hell would I be able to help order theirs.

Only today?

I’d asked Craig to text Jan last week, mention a few things I needed, and ask Jan to bring them over.

A week’s notice had to be given to all parties.
Care plan
, Halliday called it;
risk assessment,
Craig opted for,
drugs and target practice on my ass
was my shout. Craig grinned in the meeting, that—
I’m all your ass needs to keep it in line, mate, and don’t you forget it
. To which I’d reintroduced him to
fuck
and
you
.

Stood in the bathroom, I ran a hand through my hair. I was back on silverware and had earned the right to have a coffee in a mug, but no glass and no sharp edges. If I didn’t feel like a nut job before, I did now.

“Here.”

I glanced back and Craig threw something over.

“I want it back after you’ve finished, though,” he said, leaning against the doorframe.

The cologne sat in my hand and I grinned over. “A shave and some cologne? Fuck me, this place knows how to spoil a guy. Still might have to complain to management about the straps to the bed, though. What with the masseur upstairs, punters might get the wrong idea about this place.”

“Hah,” said Craig, not laughing. “You know I’m helping out in the canteen this afternoon, and I’m putting you back on plastic cutlery, Mickey Mouse ones at that.”

“Yeah? What does that make you? Pluto, Goofy, or the one in the dress?”

He pulled a face. “Minnie Mouse?”

“Christ, you know her name? Seriously, mate, you need to get fucked more.”

He flipped me the finger, then pushed away from the door. “C’mon. You asked for this. Don’t keep your visitor waiting and wondering over why.”

My smile faded, and I straightened my collar, using it as an excuse not to look over at the door.

“Screwing with your head a touch, hmmm?” said Craig coming over and resting against the sink. “It’s why we plan and go over these kinds of meetings, Jack. We can re-arrange, Jan—”

I put on some CK One, then handed it back to Craig. “It’s Jan,” I said quietly. “I’m tired of fucking hiding from him. He needs to know that.”

“And if he needs to stay hidden from you for a while longer?”

That caught me off-guard a touch. Was Jan receiving therapy off Halliday too? Halliday would never answer if asked, but, Christ—he maybe came into contact regularly with Jan, and something about that, a link, even a distant one, had life pounding a little closer to reality. “If he needs to hide from me, then he needs to hear I’m here for him when he’s had enough of hiding too.”

Craig patted me on the arm. “C’mon then. He’s in the relative’s lounge. You’ve got it to yourselves.”

Following him out, we headed on past the canteen. Sally was in there, playing table tennis with Alf, and losing by the look of it. She waved over, then shouted “yes” when Alf did the same and she took full advantage of his distraction. Joe had caught a bad flu virus, and he was huddled up in his own room. Every so often a buzzer would go and staff would do a dance around him to get him what he needed.

The relative’s room kind of came at me from nowhere, and I stopped outside, just watching the shift of shadow going on in there. The door was open, but the only sound coming through was my own breathing.

Craig looked back, then eased into a smile. “I love it when you go silent, Jack. I think we all do. Maybe we can keep Jan here? But for now... five minutes,” he said quietly, “no more.” He’d pulled out a timer and he set it for exactly that. “Slow and easy,” he said flicking a look up. “I’m out here. You feel any triggers, you back away for Jan’s sake. You leave. Clear?”

Two other male nurses were over by their station, looking a little too casual as they kept chatter low. I raised a brow and Craig offered a wry smile.

“Backup?” I mumbled.

“Cheering crew. They’ll get the pompoms and skirts out in a minute.”

“Peachy,” I mumbled.

“No ‘fucking’ to go with that?”

I looked at the shadow that had stilled on the lounge floor. “Guess I’m not back on par yet,” I mumbled. Giving him a frown, I headed on through.

Then I stilled.

He wore jeans and black jumper, the latter rolled up to his elbows. Halliday must have whispered in his ear, because Jan stood by the window, the breeze carrying any offer of him away from me. Or maybe he’d always stood like that since we’d gotten out of hospital and I hadn’t noticed his quiet consideration. He’d lost a little weight. He’d always been slim, with a fine swimmer’s ass that drove me to distraction, and his hair had that chaotic look, like he’d stood looking into a mirror and had tried to cover his face, and hide away. Softest brown eyes levelled on mine, and they looked tormented, like they’d spent a lifetime looking for something he’d lost.