In Search of Adam Read online

  Gordon told me that he fancied me. Fear. I was thin. I was beautiful. My hair was lovely. My eyes were canny. Let me fuck you. He was desperate to fuck me. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t escape him. I had to like him too. I had no choice. I had nowhere to hide.

  When I went to the toilet he followed me. I couldn’t lock the door. He told me to lie on the floor. It was cold. It was dirty. It was covered in drops of pee. Mad people’s pee. The coldness seeped into my body. I was frozen. I lay and I watched him. I felt nothing for him. He pushed down his zip and took it out. It was small and stumpy. Snapped within his stumpy fingers. I looked at it. I looked at him. He told me that he loved me. I would have to love him too. He pushed up my nightshirt. He pulled off my knickers. Let me fuck you. Let me fuck you.

  I opened my legs. I let him. I didn’t scream. I didn’t make a sound. He was quick. I felt him graze into me. I didn’t care. I was frozen. An ice queen. Short. Sharp. Thrusts. Hard. Hard. Quick. Quick quick. He groaned. He tried to pull it out. Thick yellow lumps. Inside me. Onto my stomach. Onto my nightshirt. He stood. He pushed it back into his pants. Zip zip zip.

  He left me. I lay still.

  Coldness tingled me. I stood. Thick dribbles. Lumpy. Tumbled down my inner thigh. Rolled down my naked leg and landed on the floor. I left it there. Next to the mad people’s pee. I wiped myselfwith the crunchy sharp toilet tissue. I felt tender. Grazed down there. In there. I pushed my crumbled pink cotton knickers into my clenched hand and I returned to the visitor’s room.

  The next morning he phoned his girlfriend. He told her that I liked him and that I wanted him to fuck me. She told him that she was going to kill me. He told me that she called me a skinny bitch. I liked that I was a skinny bitch. I didn’t like Gordon. I had nowhere to hide. Gordon was going to keep on doing things to me in the toilet. No one cared. No one stopped him. I didn’t care. I was frozen.

  We were told that our ward was to have a party. An Easter disco. Shock. Confusion. Amusement. A chance for us all to wear silly hats and dance around to Agadoo and the Birdie Song. After all. We were mad. Music played. No one heard it. We all had our own noises swirling around inside our heads. Soundtracks played into our worlds. I hated music. Music was too loud. Music interfered with my sounds. My in-head sounds. I sat and I watched. Fourteen of us. I wondered who would be next to visit the mortuary.

  Chris

  Chris arrived. He was in a wheelchair. He had broken both of his legs. He had driven into a wall. Had wanted to die. He was twenty. Drove into a wall to die. He was quiet and I liked him. I sat and I talked to him. He was nice. He was sad like me. I didn’t want to kiss him. I didn’t want to touch him. I just wanted to talk to him. His face was covered in spots. Big-headed spots. Oozing. Yellowheads. Picked. Pocked. I didn’t want to touch him. I didn’t want his face near to mine. I wanted to talk. I wanted to tell him about Eddie. I wanted to tell him about Gordon. He was good at listening. He was soft. Gentle. Kind. Chris didn’t understand. He thought that if I talked to him. Then. Then I must have wanted to be his girlfriend. I thought that he was the same as me. His mother was dead like mine. She had taken tablets to die. I thought that he understood. He wanted me to be his girlfriend. I didn’t want to be. I didn’t want his face next to mine. I didn’t want to be anyone’s girlfriend. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to say no. I didn’t know what to say.

  No no no no no no no no no no.

  I stayed in my cubicle. I sat on the bed. Nowhere to hide. The nurse came in. I was a tease. Tease tease tease. I should not talk to Chris again. He was depressed. He was suicidal. I didn’t understand. I had not helped. I had teased him. I had talked to him. I didn’t understand. I just wanted a friend. I knew his sadness. He was like me. He was alone like me.

  Rita, my father and Crystal went to Spain. On a plane. They made the most of my time locked up. They were able to fit in their first-ever trip abroad. They’d taken Crystal out of school. For a quick week in the sun. I was in the best place. No harm would come to me. I would be safe. They needed a break. They’d had a stressful few months. They’d had a stressful few years. Looking after me. Dealing with my problems. It’d be nice for them to get away as afamily. To be able to have fun. Without me. Without my problems. I was a problem. I am a problem.

  I was allowed out. While Rita, my father and Crystal were in the sunshine. I was allowed out. The nurses thought it best that I start leaving the hospital. Ready for when I was discharged. I wasn’t getting any better. I wasn’t getting any worse. Best I go out a bit. I needed to try and breathe in the normal air. Couldn’t stay in hospital forever. I was allowed to walk around the hospital grounds. It was a sunny day. I was told to stay in the hospital grounds though. Not far from the Mortuary.

  I caught a bus instead.

  I decided to go back to Disraeli Avenue. I wanted to collect something. Something to help me.

  My mother’s house was empty. My father, Rita and Crystal were still in Spain. The spare key. Under the large rock. Next to the rose bush. Was obvious. Predictable. I let myself in. I took off my shoes and I felt the soft red carpet on my bare soles. The house was full of a stale smoke smell. A familiar smell. A secure smell. My mother’s house was cold. Silent and cold. I needed the silence. I needed the calm.

  I walked up the stairs. Memories of those red stairs jumped around inside my head. Images flicked. Then hid. Away away.

  I looked in Crystal’s room. It was once my mother and father’s. Now it was pink. Posters of Care Bears. Of princesses. In beautiful dresses. It wasn’t tidy. It wasn’t perfect. Lived in. Allowed to be lived in. The box room. Now my room. A single bed. A wardrobe. A bookshelf. A stool in the corner. No posters. My room. My lonely space. Secrets under my bed. And in my head.

  I lived in a family home. Their family home. I was hardly ever there. My room was where I slept. Close to work. My room was where I stayed out of their way. But still close. Close to Crystal.

  I went into the bathroom. Stood on the linoleum floor. In the centre of the room. Looked into the pea green bath. I faced the bathroom cabinet. I looked into the mirror. So pale. No makeup. Pale. Sad. Sad staring eyes. I opened the cabinet. Looking for that thing to help me. I took a bottle of paracetemol. One hundred tablets. I walked into the box room. Lay on my stomach. On the green carpet. Feet sticking out of the doorway. I stretched under my bed. Pulled out my mother’s box. Adam’s coffin.

  I walked back down the red stairs. Picked up the telephone. Off its round table. Phoned for a taxi. Five minutes to wait. I sat on the bottom red step. Waiting. Counting. Eight minutes and ten seconds later. The Kingcab picked me up from outside the house. Mrs Russell (Number 10) saw me. Mrs Symons (Number 11) saw me. Mrs Lancaster (Number 7) saw me too. I smiled at her. I had given Mr Lancaster a blow job once. In the toilet at The Traveller’sRest. Five pounds eighty-nine pence. I waved at Mrs Lancaster. She would tell her husband that she had seen me. The Kingcab left Disraeli Avenue. I went back to hospital.

  I was away for seventy-two minutes. Must get back. Must get back. Quick quick. I needed to be on time. I followed the signs. Ward 24. Mortuary. Ward 23. I walked past the mortuary. I understood. I pressed the intercom.

  Buzz buzzzzzzzz.

  The door opened.

  Slam bang bang.

  I carried a white plastic bag. Containing Adam’s box and my tablets. I wasn’t searched. No one said hello. No questions. So. I carried on along the blue carpet. Avoided Derek’s route. Alert alert. Very important mad person approaching. Alert alert. Derek patrolled. Walked past me. I walked back to my cubicle.

  I sat on the iron bed. Carefully. Carefully. I removed Adam’s box from the creased plastic bag. The box. It had once contained shoes. My mother loved shoes. I loved shoes. The box had been altered. It had been personalised. My mother had such an artistic flair. I didn’t. There were tiny painted footprints. Not prints of a foot. They were perfectly painted feet. A memory of Adam’s foot that mymother had captured. There were glittering s
tars. Shooting stars. Shining. Sprinkled with a shimmer. An apple tree was drawn in black charcoal. A snake wrapped around the trunk. All down one side of the box. It was so beautiful. I had never noticed the snake before. His tongue was long. Curled. Pointed. A blond curl was glued onto the box. Such a beautiful box. The lid. The roof to her house of secrets. Delicate italics embodied his name.

  Adam.

  Perched on the edge of the iron bed. I placed the beautiful box in front of me. Gently. It was so delicate. So perfect. I placed it onto the white stretched blanket. Covering the 23. Blocking out the imprinted blue ink.

  Straight-backed. Stiff. I opened the box and took out each tiny item. Laid them in a straight line.

  Blue booties. Hand knitted. Tiny.

  A curl. Blond. In a plastic money bag. Blue letters and numbers on the plastic.

  Hospital wrist band. Black biro.

  Adam Williams. 13-12-1967.

  A black and white photograph. Blue biro on the back.

  Adam. Aged 2 weeks old.

  A knitted hat. Blue. Satin ribbon ties. Straight. Never tied.

  A hand-sewn teddy. Brown. A button for a nose. Never cuddled.

  A letter. Already read.

  A diary. Spoken words.

  A birth certificate.

  Mother Sarah Williams. Father Bill Williams.

  A death certificate.

  Adam Williams. 29-6-1968.

  I opened my mother’s diaries. I read her words. I skimmed. I read. I knew them. I knew them by heart. By shape. By page. The words danced around in my head. Rehearsed words in a well-performed play. I knew those words. They pulled my life together. They tied me with a big pink bow.

  Adam. It was all about Adam.

  I lifted the bottle of paracetamol out of the plastic bag. I took out eighty tablets. Counted them into piles of five. One two three four five. One two three four five. Left the other twenty in the bottle. Spilling from the bottle. I poured cloudy water. From my bedside jug. Into a plastic beaker.

  pip

  pop

  pip pop

  pip.

  Gulp gulp gulp.

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop.

  Gulp gulp gulp.

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip.

  Gag gag gag.

  pop

  pip pop

  pip

  pop.

  Stop stop stop.

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip.

  Keep going. Must keep going.

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop.

  Gulp gulp gulp.

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip pop

  pip pop.

  Quick quick quick.

  pip pop pip pop pip.

  Gag gag gag.

  pop pip pop pip pop pip pop pip pop pip.

  Keep going. Must keep going.

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop.

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop.

  The powdery bitterness makes me gag.

  Gag gag gag.

  I fought myself.

  Keep going. Must keep going.

  I forced myself to swallow.

  pip

  pop

  pip

  pop

  pip.

  There was a lighthouse.

  There is a lighthouse.

  Sits proud on a mountain of rocks. Safe. Tall. Swollen with pride. Scans and shines. Scans and shines. Scans and shines. Flashing out words of warning. Telling passers-by that the eye is watching. Watching. Watching. Always watching. There is a lighthouse. White. Erect. Tall. Proud. Shouting out. Stop. Stop. Stop. Telling passers-by to behave. Restraining. Controlling. Protecting. Yellow eye watching. Always watching.

  Below the cliff. Standing tall. Emerging from the rocks. The throne of rocks. There is a lighthouse. The sea laps and licks and gushes and slurps. The sea bows at the feet of the lighthouse. Admiration. Love. Fear. Fear of the all knowing, all watching, all controlling. Fear of the slender white lighthouse.

  Inside thousands and millions of tiny people hustle and bustle and scurry and scamper. Moved by a need. Controlled by that need. A need to protect. A duty to serve. Watching. Turning. Scanning. Round and round and round and round and round. Protecting. Preventing. Watching. Always watching. Knights ofthe Royal Lighthouse. Serving. Life saving. Watching watching watching.

  I was there.

  I was on the tiny curve of land.

  The banana-shaped bay.

  Two piers.

  One at each end.

  One lighthouse, beyond the left pier, standing tall on the jagged rocks.

  Waiting.

  I was there.

  Being tricked into the cave. Being promised treasure.

  Being lured to my knees. Being promised a map.

  Being filled with sand.

  I was there.

  The light was off.

  Must have been a royal event.

  A national holiday. A day of rest. They failed. Those thousands and millions and billions of tiny men with green skin and orange hair.

  They failed to protect.

  To prevent.

  To watch.

  To warn.

  To save.

  They failed to shine their light.

  They failed to give me light.

  No shining.

  No saviour.

  Nothing unto me.

  Nothing apart from Eddie.

  They failed.

  There is a lighthouse. In Lymouth Bay.

  A nurse found me. Someone had told her. Someone had seen. It hadn’t been long. I was conscious. Lying on my bed. My mother’s box. My mother’s secrets. Curling into me. I was walked to the emergency department. I heard her talking to the other nurses. Another overdose. Put my pie and chips in the microwave. She wasn’t impressed. I wasn’t impressed.

  Drink this.

  Cups and cups of a salty liquid. I didn’t speak. I didn’t say a word.

  Gulp gulp gulp.

  Sick.

  Sick.

  Sick.

  Sick.

  Not nice sick. Not my controlled sick.

  Sick.

  Sick.

  Sick.

  Escaped from me. Carried the tablets out of me. Carried the words shooting. A waterfall of tablets, of water, of salt, of words. Carried the eighty tablets from me and into the cardboard bedpan. Over the cardboard bedpan and onto the floor.

  I had no control.

  I had to let them escape. I had to let them. The nurses. The patients. I had to let them rescue me. Saved from death. I had no choice.

  Three days later the nurse asked the question.

  Why Jude? Why do it?

  Silence.

  Did you realise the dangers?

  Silence.

  You wouldn’t die instantly, you know? It’d take days. They’d eat away at your internal organs and you’d die…slowly…painfully.

  She liked the words slowly and painfully. She left a pause. A pregnant silence. Before uttering the words. They made her smile. I watched her smile.

  She was sitting at the end of my bed. The spare tablets had been removed and no one was asking where I had managed to get them from. The box of my mother’s things had been taken for safe keeping. No one asked any questions. They didn’t ask the right questions. They didn’t ask. They should have asked the right questions. They should have
wanted to clear out my mind. They should have wanted to make me better. But. They didn’t. They didn’t care. They didn’t want to care. No room for humanity on Ward 23. The place was overcrowded already.