Instrumental (11 page)

Medication is a bastard. I can't tell you. Clonazepam, diazepam, alprazolam, quetiapine, fluoxetine, trimipromine, citalopram, effexor, lithium, tramadol and dozens of others, some at the same time, some cycled through in succession, some combined, some in the evening, some in the morning. And I had no choice – if I refused they were given to me by force.

There was therapy (group and individual) but none of it made any difference at all because I was incapable of lucidity, of rational thought,
of any fucking thought at all. They even had me on a drug to help combat self-harm. It was a vicious fucker that stopped the brain releasing endorphins in response to pain, so if I did find a way to cut myself it would just really, really hurt and there would be no high at all. Vile.

Some of the other guys on the ward were genuinely terrifying; one found out I was a pianist and told me he'd break my fingers one by one. Then he just stood really, really still and stared at me, not in a good way. I told him to knock himself out and he still didn't move. So I turned around, closed my eyes and told him I would count to thirty and during that time he could do whatever he wanted to me. He still didn't move. Pussy.

They'd searched me thoroughly and I had nothing to help me die. Everything got too much – guilt at what I was doing to Jack, my fucking head hurt so badly, I couldn't leave, I couldn't stay, I couldn't think, speak, act, dream, imagine. I was stuck in some weird, Big-Pharma-sponsored circle of hell. And there was nothing I could do to escape.

And so I figured I'd tried the ‘healthy way' of asking for help. It clearly hadn't worked. And now it was time to do it my way once and for all. Which meant death once again. And planning to kill yourself in a secure ward on a cocktail of mega drugs ain't easy.

I had a mental health nurse (bodyguard) nearby all the time, even when sleeping. There were no blades, sharp objects, no access to the roof, meds were kept ultra-secure under lock and key. So I figured hanging was the only viable option. I knew there was a changeover of my psych guard around 2 a.m. each morning. And I knew that the
TV had a nice long aerial cable. So I pretended I was out cold around 9 p.m. and simply waited. The guy was bored out of his skull and when his replacement arrived they made small talk for a few minutes during the handover. Why wouldn't they? I was dead to the world, it was the middle of the fucking night, the guy was on £8 an hour with better things to think about than keeping an eye on some privileged wanker like me.

They were chatting quietly in the corridor outside my room. I scampered over to the TV set and unplugged the cable. I snuck into the en suite bathroom and stood on the toilet seat, throwing and threading the cable through a vent in the ceiling. I made some kind of noose (not too different from tying a double Windsor), shoved my head through it, gave it a good tug to check it would hold, and jumped.

Thing about hanging – it doesn't strangle you. The whole point is that if you do your calculations correctly, it snaps your neck. Should be over in about 0.6 seconds, lights out, fade to black, done. And had I had the luxury of a giant roof beam, stepladder, proper rope, calculator, internet connection, isolation and Boy-Scout-worthy knot skills it would have been just like that. But no. I fell, nothing snapped (except the last little grubby bit of my mind that was still intact), I saw lots of weird colours, everything become instantly focused and vivid and ‘in the moment', and I could feel myself starting to choke. This is the worst thing that can happen with hanging. I couldn't get down to do it again properly; I knew that if I was found I'd be rescued; depending on how long that took I could suffer some kind of brain damage due to oxygen deprivation; and then I'd be (a) forever (more) retarded, and therefore (b) unable to finish the job.

So I'm, quite literally, hanging out in my bathroom and starting to lose consciousness when the door is pushed open and my nurse/ bodyguard walks in. His eyes seem to pop out an inch or two, his right hand smacks hard against the wall and bang on top of the panic button, and with the same movement he rushes forward and grabs my legs in a bear hold, lifting me up and shouting for help. I'm not having any of it and start kicking out, wriggling like a motherfucker and grunting, snot pouring out of my nose, spit flying out of my mouth. We're doing this fucked-up kind of salsa dance together when more orderlies run in, assume various positions around me and somehow get me down.

There follows some kind of ‘Benny Hill in a psych ward' sketch I drop into their arms, they relax for a second, I sprint out of the bathroom in my boxer shorts, television aerial around my neck like a pretentious fashion show moment, and start running down the corridors in search of the exit with all the nurses haring after me. Unsurprisingly the ward door is locked, so I grab a giant light stand next to it and start pounding on it. It doesn't budge, I look fucking stupid, and whirl around using the lamp like a
Cuckoo's Nest
light sabre, waving it threateningly at the (ever-growing) group of orderlies fanning out in front of me.

I took seven of them out with my bare hands, threw myself through the door using sheer strength, splintering wood and emerging chrysalis-like into the cold air where I outran the entire security team, boosted over the front barriers and barrelled into a passing cab which screeched off Jack Bauer-style into the night.

Shut up. I lasted about twelve seconds before being pinned to the
floor, carried into a secure room, given something awesome to swallow and hurtling down into nothingness.

When I came to, I paid the price. Giant cocktails of drugs, deep and meaningful conversations with the head psychiatrist, room and body searches, no contact with other ‘residents' (inmates), meals alone in my room, showers monitored.

You cannot imagine the rage. I didn't know such anger could exist. A constant, cold fury, building up for thirty years and then finally allowed to be unleashed.

I wasn't done yet. Something happened to me. Someone entirely new took charge whose sole mission was to get the fuck out of there. As long as it took, whatever lengths I had to go to. Getting ‘well', whatever the fuck that meant, was not going to happen. I could not kill myself in that place and I knew I had to get out of there and find somewhere else to do it.

A few days later I was being taken to see the psychiatrist. There was an office refit going on and he had moved down to the ground floor near the main entrance. Which meant I was escorted (by an even bigger male nurse) out of the locked ward and downstairs. And, remarkably, while I was waiting to see the doc in his sterile but comfortable waiting room, my escort went back up to the ward, leaving me alone. I've no idea why. If it was a communications breakdown, laziness, or simply him needing a smoke, but this was my one chance to get out of there and I didn't hesitate. I walked calmly, confidently, to the main doors, pushed them open and walked out into the sunlight. It really was as easy as that. I reckoned I had about a seven-minute head start before anyone clocked what had happened,
I flagged down a cab and asked the guy to take me to Sloane Square tube station.

I paid the driver (I had the princely sum of £80 in cash ostensibly to be used only for buying cigarettes and shit from the hospital ‘gift shop'), bought a travel card, jumped into the Tube, went all Jason Bourne by getting on and off trains, taking a bus, changing direction, playing spy for a while, and then ended up in Paddington.

I got razor blades from Boots and wandered around until I'd found the kind of hotel that would make you want to kill yourself even if you were perfectly happy before checking in. It cost me £40, the last of my cash, for the night.

I ran the hottest bath I could bear, laid out my razor blades and towels, undressed and sat on the bed. For the first time in months I could breathe. I was alone, no one knew where I was, I felt quieter than I had in years. I slept for a few hours. Proper, restful sleep, not induced by chemicals, just peaceful, fully clothed, muscles not in spasm, head not in a Magimix.

I knew that I needed to say goodbye to my son. I was fucked, but not so fucked that I could simply exit without him hearing my voice or vice versa. A kind of anchor for him made sense in my mind, so that as he grew up and thought back to when his dad killed himself, he could have some small comfort in knowing he had said goodbye. Such is the narcissism of suicide.

I called his mum's mobile and she answered. Important to note that by now I had basically had a complete break from reality. I wasn't aware of that, but clearly I was functioning on a different operating system from anyone else within a square mile or two. Of course I
could call her up, let her know I wanted to speak to my son, had been let out of hospital as a trial to see if I could be trusted to leave for longer periods, and was just checking in. It did not occur to me for a minute that the police may have been contacted, that she had been fielding calls from the hospital and Matthew, all trying to figure out where I was.

And there was still kindness and some kind of love inside her. I don't know why either. But she didn't give me the slightest impression that anything was wrong. She simply said that she would love to see me.

‘How about it, Jimmy? I could come meet you anywhere – we could have a quick ten minutes together and then you can either come home for a bit or not. Up to you.'

And I figured, with the kind of fucked-up, egocentric nobility that can only come from a psychotic break and the heinous amount of meds still in my system, that yes, this was an excellent idea. I shall see my wife for a proper goodbye, kiss her one final time and then come back here and do what needs to be done. Because that is the right thing to do. The right thing to do.

I left everything as it was, laid out OCD-style on the bed, evenly spaced, correctly angled, checked and double-checked, and wandered out of the room towards Paddington station where we'd arranged to meet on the main concourse.

I got there and stood watching the harried, drunk, lost and busy commuters rushing around for twenty minutes until I saw Jane. And Jack. For some unimaginable reason she had brought him with her. A real-life, 3-foot-tall surprise on her part, albeit with the best of
intentions. He was tiny. A little bundle of Puffa jacket and impossibly small denim jeans, holding her hand. As I walked down the escalator towards them I could feel something in my heart thudding and pounding and cracking. And on I walked until he saw me and ran towards me. That hug was every bit as memorable and important as the one I gave him when he was first handed to me in the hospital moments after he was born. And before we even had a chance to say anything, I knew something deep down had shifted.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Matthew coming towards me. He had spoken with the police, I was going to be back in hospital within half an hour. And I wasn't even angry. Relieved, perhaps, more than anything. Because there was a new feeling way down at the bottom of things, trying to get heard. Something happened when Jack's tiny, sweaty hand grasped mine and squeezed it harder than I'd thought possible. When I smelled his little head and felt him barrelling into me shouting ‘Daddy', it was a primal, lizard-brain biological imperative along the lines of ‘Well, you've abandoned yourself, but it goes against the fundamental nature of things to do the same to him, and you know it.' He was an extension of me. A part of me. If the host died then the rest of the organism would also die, and he wasn't strong enough to exist without me at that point.

I wasn't ready to go yet. And if I hadn't called Jane, if she hadn't played me, if I hadn't seen Jack one last time, I would never have heard that inner shout loudly enough to pay attention to it.

I was driven back to hospital.

It felt like all the fight had been kicked out of me. I was floppy, pliable, indifferent. Shuffling around the ward, dribbling a bit, losing
a few more brain cells and memories thanks to yet another cocktail of meds. And then on a visitors' Sunday I was called in and told someone was there to see me. Which was odd because aside from a brief, disastrous visit from Jane and Jack a few weeks previously, I'd never had a visitor before.

It was an old pal I hadn't seen in a long time. An awkward, slightly autistic, fragile guy. A piano fanatic (we'd met because we'd both shared a mutual hard-on for Sokolov bootlegs back in the day). He'd heard I was there and wanted to offer support. And music. When he'd called to arrange the visit he'd been told that no presents other than toiletries etc were permitted (I wasn't allowed to have things delivered to me by this stage because I'd already had knives and razors intercepted). He offered me a giant bottle of shampoo and winked at me. Out of earshot of the nurses he told me to open it up when I was alone. Which I did. And inside this emptied bottle was a tiny plastic bag. And inside the tiny plastic bag was the brand new, recently launched iPod nano. It was the size of an After Eight mint. And the headphones were wrapped around it lovingly. He had filled it up with gigabytes of music. And everything changed.

Under the covers I went. Headphones on. Middle of the night. Dark and impossibly quiet. And I hit play and heard a piece by Bach that I'd not heard before. And it took me to a place of such magnificence, such surrender, hope, beauty, infinite space, it was like touching God's face. I swear I had some kind of spiritual epiphany then and there. The piece was the Bach-Marcello Adagio – a work written for oboe and orchestra by a baroque composer called Alessandro Marcello that Bach loved so much he transcribed it for solo piano. Glenn Gould
was playing his Steinway, reaching out from forty years in the past, three hundred years in the past, and letting me know that things were not only going to be OK, they were going to be absolutely fucking stellar. It felt like I'd been plugged into an electrical socket. It was one of those rare ‘Elvis moments' that I will never forget. It shattered me and released some kind of inner gentleness that hadn't seen the light of day for thirty years.