Bittersweet

Thursday 29 July, 7:32pm

The vines that hang outside our window have grown particularly long this summer. Usually, I have to stick my head out of the window and look up towards the roof to see them, but now, I can comfortably lay in bed and enjoy a view of them swinging in the breeze. The leaves flutter behind the glass, and I’m tempted to open the window, pluck one of the leaves from the vine and hold it against my cheek. I wonder if they would be warmed by the sun, or still cool from the brief rain shower that fell last night. I don’t move from the bed, though. It’s too comfortable.

Vines grow where they have no business growing. The more you leave them be, the more they grow. If we moved out tomorrow, the vines would keep on growing, making a cast in the shape of our house. Like a tea cosy, Adrian had said when I voiced this to him earlier. The thought made me laugh, but it was only half true. Tea cosies protect kettles, keep them warm. I’m not sure the vines on our house have quite the same intentions.

*

Friday 30 July, 4:46pm

I came home from work early today. It’s Friday, and I guess the warm weather and the promise of a sunny weekend had put Mandy in a good mood, because she let us out at 4:30 rather than 5. I like Mandy. She’s nice. Nicer than our old supervisor, anyway.

I got out of the car and stood for a moment to admire the golden light filtering around the house. It made the vines growing up its side look beautiful, deep shades of green interspersed with white veins almost hypnotising me. I would have stood there for a bit longer, allowing the scene and the soft rustle of leaves to ease the tension in my shoulders, but a low growling caught my attention. I couldn’t see where it was coming from, but it was close. I approached the house, my eyes on the ground, trying to find what made the noise when I saw it. An orange paw stuck out from underneath a particularly dense patch of leaves. Maggie was stuck in the vines.

“Maggie!” I cried, dropping to my knees immediately, scrambling to free her delicate body. She was crying now, her mewls grating me. With one final tug, she shot out from under the vines, her tail between her legs. She hid under the car, her lamplight eyes flashing at me from the darkness.

“Maggie, it’s okay, darling, come here.” I said, holding my hand out to her. I was worried she could’ve been seriously hurt, maybe dislocated a limb; for a cat of her age, it’s not unlikely. The thought of vet’s bills made me even more desperate to check she was alright as I crawled towards the car.

“Freya, what are you doing?” Adrian’s voice called from above me. I turned to look over my shoulder and saw him stood in the doorway, arms folded, watching me with an incredulous smile.

“It’s Maggie, she was stuck in those stupid vines, I’m just trying to make sure she’s okay.”

The smile slipped from Adrian’s face. He knows how seriously I take Maggie’s health these days.

“Let me go and get her treats, maybe that’ll persuade her out from under there.”

“Thanks, babe.” I said, watching him retreat into the house. I keep inching towards the car, keeping my hand outstretched, trying to coax Maggie out. I was in such a good mood, and now this. One minute I’m admiring the vines, the next I want to rip them down.

I hear Adrian’s footsteps behind me and turn as he hands me the treats. Shaking some into my palm, I hold it out to Maggie.

“Come here, love, that’s it. It’s alright.” I say, trying to sound as soothing as possible. Slowly, she crawled out from underneath the car and Adrian gently scoops her up.

“Let’s get you inside, you silly old cat.” He said. I smile as I watch him carry her back inside, cooing to her all the way.

I close the door resolutely behind me, dropping my bag down in the hallway. I lean against the wall and try to slow my breathing. I looked up as Adrian’s shadow fell over me.

“I checked her over and she seems fine. A bit spooked, but fine.” He tells me, winding an arm around my waist. I let him pull me close and I rest my head against his chest, feeling the steady beat of his heart against my cheek.

“Thank you. I really appreciate that.” I mumble.

“Anything for you, love. Also, if we’d had to have gone to the emergency vets, I’d never hear the end of it, so that gave me an incentive, too.” I could feel his grin against the crown of my head, and I laughed. He tried to pull away, but I made a small noise of protest, clutching him tighter to me.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” He asked. I shook my head, not wanting to look at the concerned lines on his face. I hate making him worry.

“Nothing, it’s just… I really didn’t like seeing Maggie like that. In those vines. It scared me.”

I felt Adrian’s hold on me tighten. I didn’t want him to pity me, but it felt nice to be held.

“I know babe, but she’s okay now. She’ll stay away from them from now on. I’ll even trim the vines over the weekend, if you’d like.”

I finally pulled away and looked up at him. It never fails to surprise me just how beautiful he is. I look away, suddenly embarrassed by the way he was looking at me. Like I held all the stars in my eyes. Like I held the answers he was looking for.

“I’d like that. Thank you.”

I placed a quick kiss to the corner of his lips, then ducked under his arms and hurried upstairs. I needed to sit somewhere cool, quiet, and dark, away from Adrian’s reproachful stares and the rustling of the foliage outside.

*

Friday 30 July, 9:25pm

It was Adrian’s idea that we get an early night, and for that I was grateful. I wanted to put this whole situation behind me, but there was something tugging at me, like I’d trailed in one of the vines on the hem of jeans. I couldn’t get the image of them out of my mind. Soon those vines are going to grow up the rest of the house, nestling in the gutters, backing up the rainwater. They might even grow through the window if I left it open. I might come home from work one day to find them twisted around the bedspread, winding around the desk chair. They might even grow on me if I stayed still long enough. I’m not sure if that thought scares me or soothes me. I lay down in bed with my back to the window. I know I’m imagining it, but I can almost hear the vines tapping their leaves on the glass. They want to come in. My body tensed so suddenly I felt like the tendons in my neck might snap. I go to sleep and have restless dreams about long vines and swinging from the window in a noose made of my own hair.

*

Saturday 31 July, 7:12am

I wake with a start. Adrian hasn’t got up yet, I can feel his steady breath fanning the back of my neck. Usually his weight, his warmth, is a comfort, but today I dart out of bed. Something is wrong, something has shifted, like someone moved the mirror or the wardrobe a couple of inches to the right and the now the whole room feels off. Something dark is struggling in my mind, but each time I try to grab hold of it, it slips, it scatters, it retreats further back. This feeling weighs on me as I pace from room to room, sightless, aimless. I walk downstairs, only to quickly walk back up once I see the tendril of a vine wafting against the glass panel in the front door. I can’t get away from them. They’re everywhere. I feel my neck, my arms, my back, itch like the vines have wound their way round them, like it’s poison ivy crawling along my skin and I’m clawing it at, trying to get it off me, trying to block out the noises coming from inside, from outside, screams, my screams—

“Freya? Freya!”

I didn’t realise how much noise I was making. Adrian must have peeled me off the floor because now I’m sat at the kitchen table and there’s a cup of tea in front of me. It’s too warm to drink tea. I’ll have to find a way to pour it down the sink when he’s not looking. I don’t want to offend him, but he’ll figure out what I’ve done. He always does.

He’s talking but I’m not really listening. I’m staring at the back of his head, trying to count the individual hairs curling along the nape of his neck, trying to look anywhere else but out the window. Those vines are haunting me. I need to cut them down.

“What?” Adrian asks, turning to face me. I stare at him and go cold. I’ve never seen him look frightened before. He looks like a child, like the pictures his mum showed me the first time I went round their house, pictures of him in Halloween costumes and school uniforms. I feel hysterical giggles bubble up my throat and clap a hand to my mouth to stop them. I must have looked insane.

“What?” I manage to say, tears pricking my eyes as I fight back the laughter. This isn’t funny. None of this is funny.

“You said something just now. About burying something.”

“No, I didn’t.” I feel like I’m losing my mind.

“Yes, you did.”

“No, Adrian, I didn’t.”

“Look, love, did something happen yesterday? Did you have a bad dream again? I told you it wasn’t a good idea to stop seeing Michael—”

“Babe, please, I don’t want to have this conversation again, I really don’t, okay? Talking to Michael helped for a while, but there’s only so long you can sit in a musty office and go round and round in circles before you start doubting the effectiveness of therapy, alright? I tried it, it didn’t work, and that’s that.” I no longer felt like laughing.

“I’m just saying, Frey, that it was really scary to find you like that this morning. I don’t want anything bad to happen to you. I just want you to be alright, okay?”

There were tears shining in his eyes and the rising sun shining on his skin. I felt horrible then, truly horrible, for putting him through this. This isn’t the first time, and it certainly won’t be the last. I wanted to reach out, to feel his warm skin, the firm muscle, to promise him that I’ll try to get better, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. He stared at me for a little while longer before breaking my gaze. He glanced at the clock on the oven and sighed.

“I need to get ready for work. Want me to stay here for the day, look after you? We could watch the Lion King again.”

I knew then how concerned he was. We reserved the Lion King for really bad days, days where we were both too tired to think. I didn’t want today to be a bad day. I have to pull it together. I can’t make him worry like this, it’s not fair.

“It’s okay, love. I’m okay. You go to work, and I’ll call Michael later. Don’t worry.”

His face broke into that dopey grin he knows I’m so fond of, and he crossed the island between us to gently cup my elbow and place a kiss on my temple. I rested my head in the crook of his neck and breathed him in, clean cotton with a hint of aftershave. I felt my gut twist. I watch him leave for work and wonder if he regrets choosing this. Choosing me.

*

Saturday 31 July, 6:00pm

Adrian won’t leave me alone. I don’t blame him. I guess he was expecting me to do something while he was at work. I keep catching him in doorways, hovering, watching. I feel his eyes on me and I resist the urge to look around. I know he’s concerned but it just sets me on edge. I don’t like the feeling of being watched. It’s bad enough with those bloody vines outside.

“I’m okay, babe, I really am, so please go and sit down.” I plead, having turned around to see him lingering just behind the kitchen counter. He looked like a kicked puppy begging for his owner’s attention. It was getting on my nerves.

“You sure you’re alright, love?”

“Yes. Of course. Now please, go and relax. Watch some tv. I’ll be done in a minute.”

He gave me a weak smile and made a big deal out of winking at me. I know he wanted to see me smile, so I did. He left and I turned back to the washing up, keeping my eyes resolutely away from the window in front of me. I could feel the sweat trickling down my back.

I stand at the sink and think about eight years ago, when I was at university, too gripped by anxiety to get off the bus to go to campus. So, I just rode it back and forth, from one end of the city to the other, getting off at the end of the line and getting on another bus. I would stare out of the window, trying not to catch sight of my reflection, trying not to hate myself. Until one day Adrian sat down beside me. I don’t remember what he said to me, but I remember how he spoke. Soft, low, like I was a street cat he was trying not to startle. He was the only thing in the world that was real to me at that time. I guess I never stopped feeling that way. I want suddenly, then, to touch him, to feel him, to remind myself that he’s real, and that I’m real too. I feel like a ghost, haunting the family home of some unfortunate couple. So, like I ghost, I start slamming doors and moving chairs and starting fights. I don’t know how to ask to be held, I don’t even try, I just stand at the threshold to the living room and hurl abuse at him, shout at the top of my voice all the swear words I know like an overgrown child, I hiss and scream and stamp my feet, all to feel that tremor in my limbs, the shaking in my fingers, to know I’m alive. I feel it most acutely when Adrian storms past me, bumping into my shoulder so hard I cry out. He has one hand on the front door handle, feet shoved roughly into his shoes when he turns back abruptly.

“You don’t have to do this to us, Frey. To yourself. I love you. I wish you could see that.”

He closes the door behind him, and I flinch at the absence of sound. I was expecting him to slam it. The gentleness hurts the most, the knowing that he could never hurt me, and that I’ve hurt him, over, and over, and over again. I stare at the door before walking upstairs.

*

Saturday 31 July, 9:58pm

I don’t remember getting into the shower, but I’m glad I did. It’s too warm. I can’t sleep. Sat on the floor, letting the cold water run over me, I can feel myself sharpen. I close my eyes and see flashes of the hours previous, and I feel a shame so fathomless it turns my stomach. I don’t know what to do with it, I don’t know how to stop this feeling, but I need it to stop. I need it all to stop. I need to do something about those vines.

I walk through the house, trailing water after me like ectoplasm and jam the door to the garden shed open. I rarely come out here, it’s Adrian who looks after the DIY jobs, but I at least know where he keeps the shears. I grab them and walk back towards the house, feeling every blade of grass under my feet.

I walk to the foot of the house and look up, shears in hand, ready to cut down those godforsaken vines, only I’m not looking at the vines. I’m not stood in front of the house anymore. I’m in the middle of a forest, fog pressing in from all sides. I can barely see one arm’s length in front of me. My feet are carrying me forward and I can’t stop, I want to stop so badly, I don’t know what I’m going to find at the end, but I don’t want to find it, I want to stop—

I lose my balance and fall backwards over something hard and solid. I blink and take in the image of my house, and an unfamiliar shape at the base of the bushes. What in the hell is going on here? I inch towards the shape, fear boiling in my lungs and

and

Adrian.

No.

Adrian laying facing down under the bushes.

I blink again and I’m not looking at Adrian anymore, I’m back at the forest, looking at my parents.

My parents.

MY PARENTS.

Laying face up next to a towering oak, vines covering their bodies, faces red and black and blue, tendrils growing out of their eyes and mouths and noses, fungus rotting their skin.

I walk back inside.

The curtains are still drawn in the living room, and I sit with my back to the window. I don’t want to look outside.

Aunt Sarah told me they died in a hit and run. But I saw them in that forest. I was twelve when they died. But I saw them in that forest. Aunt Sarah raised me and never said a thing. I saw them in that forest.

Did I do that? Did I hurt them? The same way that I’ve hurt Adrian? Did I hurt Adrian? I must have. He’s lying outside. He must be so cold. I can’t bear the thought. I’m dialling a number on my phone before I can properly think.

“Hello, 999, what’s your emergency?”

“My boyfriend is outside.” I don’t recognise the sound of my own voice. It sounds alien, hollow, rasping.

“Your boyfriend is outside?”

“Yes.”

“Is he threatening you?”

“No.”

“Then what is he doing?”

“He’s lying down in the garden.”

“Lying down?”

“Yes.”

“Is he hurt?”

“Yes.”

“Does he have a pulse? Is he responsive?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t checked.”

“Do you need an ambulance for him?”

“I don’t know. I think he’s dead.”

“You think he’s dead?”

“Yes.”

“Why do you think he’s dead?”

“I think I killed him.”

I don’t remember doing it, but I can feel him under my fingernails. I can taste his blood in my mouth. Bittersweet.

I sit with my back to the windows, my knees pulled up to my chest. I try not to think. I do a lot of thinking anyway. Blinking is scary, so I try not to do it. I can see them when I blink, all three of them, like they’re burned into my eyelids. I don’t remember anything else but the images of them. I come to when the sirens barrel down the street and the blue lights sting my retinas. I don’t move. I don’t blink. I just sit.