Eeny Meeny

6

Would they ever stop torturing her?

Amy thought she would be safe at Southampton General. That she would be left alone to heal and grieve. But they were intent on tormenting her. They refused to let her eat or drink, even though she begged them to. Her tongue was swollen, they said, her stomach too contracted and her bowels might tear if solids passed through them. So they’d hooked her up to a drip. Maybe it was the right thing to do, but it wasn’t what she wanted. When had they ever gone without food for over two weeks? What did they know?

She had a morphine drip too, which helped a bit, though they were scrupulously careful not to overfill it. She operated it with her left hand, punching the button when the pain became too much. Her right hand was cuffed to the bed. The nurses bloody loved that, speculating in loud stage whispers about what she’d done. Killed her baby? Killed her husband? They really were enjoying themselves.

And then – God help her – then they’d let her mother in. She went berserk at that, shouting and screaming until her bewildered mum had to retreat on doctor’s orders. What the fuck were they thinking? She couldn’t see her mother, not now. Not like this.

She just wanted to be left alone. She would concentrate fiercely on the things around her, staring at the intricate cotton weave of her pillow case, gazing for hours on end at the hypnotic, glowing filament in her bedside lamp. That way she could zone out, keep her thoughts at bay. And when a vision of Sam did spring up from nowhere, she would hit the morphine trigger and for a moment she’d drift away to a happier place.

But she knew in her heart that she would not be left in peace for long. Demons were circling her now, dragging her back to the living death she’d left behind. She could see the police hovering outside, waiting to come in and question her. Didn’t they get that she never wanted to answer those questions? Hadn’t she suffered enough?

‘Tell them I can’t see them.’

The nurse who was busy studying her charts looked up.

‘Tell them I’ve got a fever,’ Amy continued, ‘that I’m asleep…’

‘I can’t stop them, love,’ the nurse replied evenly. ‘Best get it over with, eh?’

She could never suffer enough. Amy knew that really. She had killed the man she loved and there was no way back from that.