Her (iv)

His head looks awkward on his shoulders, as if someone pulled it off and stuck it back on again not-quite-right.

Or as if he had his neck broken.

For a moment, I freeze in indecision. On a knife-edge between darting forward to check for pulse, and pulling back, repulsed. Between calling the police, and running (very quietly) out of the building.

What did I do?

More important, what am I going to do now?

I could've stayed here, rooted to the carpet, until the corpse himself turned those glassy eyes on me and smiled. Some practical part of me takes over, places my bag and shoes on a chair out of the way, and twitches the covers back, as matter of fact as a nurse doing this for the hundredth time. I size it up, the dead body, and decide he was too heavy for me to lift. No matter; this version of me is calm and resourceful, it seems. My hands shove most of the bedding out of the way, untuck the sheet, and use it to tow the unfortunate off the bed and into the adjoining bathroom.

Next: to arrange the body as if it slipped. Perhaps he fell like this, bounced off the toilet like this and... There. That would have to do.

A bathroom accident. He was drunk. He fell. Broke his neck. How sad, etc.

Once the sheet is back on the bed, and the duvet arranged on it (exactly as if someone had thrown it back as he got up,) I gather up my things and slither out into the dawn, feeling mucky.

+

The chill air is a dose of reality to wake me from the dim, dreamy quality of his bedroom.

I couldn't expect to get away with this. There are cameras everywhere, these days. I've probably been on camera for most of the time since I stepped outside. This is when I realise I'm wearing an oversized coat and a beanie hat from Marcus' flat. And the same sunglasses I wore at the funeral. When did I fish those out of my bag and put them on? I also realise my feet have carried me an indirect route, and I've crossed the road twice. When I think on it, I feel assured that I'm recorded as little as possible, and hard to identify.

I should dispose of these clothes.

What happened? What did I do? Was it a sex game gone wrong? Does that defence even work for women?

Did I really sleep next to a dead man? A man I killed? Did I kill him? My head is spinning with questions and paranoia. It's easier to step back mentally, and let the unsettling calm take over.

+

The weekend passes in a treacly blur. The anxiety, waiting for a knock on the door, the shadowy shape of policeman spelling out doom on my doorstep. Even Mario fails to comfort me.

Just as bad, or worse, other unsettling thoughts coagulate. How did I miss them before? People near me died. Father. Mother. Marcus.

Anyone else?

I think of the faces glimpsed in that old wooden box, and my anxiety spirals.

The upside is: these concerns dwarf the nerves about my upcoming appointment almost to the point of obliteration. I don't have any worry left to spend on the thought of the MRI.

My mind chasing its own tail gets me nowhere. No closer to any sense of safety or resolution, and still the constant sense of dread, waiting for that knock.

I barely sleep, and when I do, my dreams are a chaotic mish-mash of feelings and ideas that barely make sense. The world is dark red, tending to black, and I'm stuck in a tiny place so small I can barely breathe, so I push and twist, but there's hardly any give in the oppressive black space around me, so cramped that I feel as if my knees and elbows have both ended up in one ear... so I twist and push, and twist and push, but all my efforts to untangle myself only have the opposite effect, until at last I could scream in frustration, or cry in abject fear, but there's no room even for that, oh no, the squashing, squeezing, darkness swallows my voice, swallows me, like a snake swallowing a mouse, and I am helpless in its gullet, but then I am the snake, and the baby mouse caught in my coils is squeaking and whimpering, wiggling the little hands it has instead of paws, but then they disappear in a sea of inevitable muscle and all that's left is a shock of black hair like mine, the whimpering stops, he can't breathe, the little mouse, but I can't let him go, either - there is no room, no room, I can't do anything but squeeze and squeeze, as I am being squeezed, and-

I wake tangled in sheets with the pillow over my face. Once my breathing and heartbeat settle to a normal pace, I disentangle myself from the sweaty bedding, and try to wash away the residue of panic in the shower.

Moving mechanically through my day, I have a keen and ever-present appreciation for the phrase guilt ate away at him... That's how I feel, like I'm being pecked and chewed, and the only question is whether I'll be spat out, or, like in my nightmare, swallowed.

It's all too much. There's a temptation mantling over me, like a hawk over his kill, to pull back away from the horror. Let that cool, calculating side of me take over.

+

I never thought of myself as a claustrophobic person, but now the idea of my MRI stresses me out. I arrive early, as instructed. The wait seems almost as bad as the procedure itself. All that time for me to tie myself up in knots.

A smiling nurse hands me tablets in a tiny white paper cup. In answer to my questioning look, she says, "To help you relax." I'm grateful, but I'm also confused. Never having thought of myself as claustrophobic, I never thought to ask about this. My hands falter. I nearly drop the dose. The nurse keeps her grip on it, and peers at me.

"That is right isn't it?" she says. She peers at my wristband, and checks the file in front of her. She asks me for the first line of my address, flips through the file again, and asks me if I have anyone to take me home. (I say Yes, because a taxi counts, right?) She beams. "All cleared with Dr Grant last week. Here you go."

My hands are shaking twice as hard. She's confident I am the person in the file, but I've never spoken to a Dr Grant. I've never even heard of him.

Still moving robotically, the medicine is down my throat before I've even finished thinking about it. I resist the mad urge to stick my fingers back there and make myself throw up. The idea of being not in control is almost as disturbing as being in that machine. Worse, because how can I explain it? I do things when my guard is down. Things I don't remember. Normal things, like speaking with a doctor, or bad things like... Well. I'm not even sure. That's the problem.

The minutes tick by. I wonder if it's possible to resist a sedative by sheer force of will, and even if it is, I wonder if my will is strong enough. Suddenly, I want to skip this whole farce. I don't care anymore, give me a knife and a mirror, I will sort it out myself! This rebellious thought rises in me like a tide of black sludge, but it's right around now that the meds kick in, and suddenly I find I care even less. The black wave retreats from my gentle sigh, and I am pleasantly heavy.

+

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