The A to Z of You and Me

I

Intestine

YEAH, NOW IT comes up.

Intestine.

I could do a whole A to Z of my life’s worth of intestinal misery. What have I ever done to be cursed with a body that deals with any level of stress with a punch straight to the gut?

Three nights I threw up when I moved to secondary school. I didn’t know where any of the classrooms were, I had all new lessons, and I’d been warned these were all going to be much more difficult, I had to wear a new uniform — all that stuff, like a putrefying knot in my belly.

My first day at the garden centre, aged eighteen, I threw up in the lunch break at the sheer amount of new information they were giving me about how to operate the tills. Within a fortnight I was even doing returns and refunds without having to think about it. It’s easy, it’s easy. But my intestines had to have their moment.

It’s like, something has not been worth doing if I haven’t thrown up in contemplating it.

‘Poor love,’ you say, stroking my back as my stomach muscles spasm again and I am subjected to another involuntary heave of fetid breath and spittle. ‘Come here—’ you hand me a pat of tissue and a tall glass of fresh water. I swill out my mouth and spit it down the toilet. Flush it away.

I slip on your dressing gown and look down.

‘It makes my arms look really long.’

‘It’s pretty. Come on, back to bed.’

I shuffle across the landing, trying hard, trying very hard not to shuffle. It’s all in the mind; I need to stride purposefully, pretend I am coping absolutely fine with your announcement of going away.

I’ll shuffle.

Honestly, who throws up at the merest tiniest little upheaval like their girlfriend going away. I’m an absolute lily.

‘Here you go,’ you say, placing the washing-up bowl on the floor beside the bed and climbing in beside me. ‘What does this mean for the insulin you’ve injected? You’d just eaten — does it mean you’ve got to eat something else to soak up the excess?’

I frown and cough to clear my throat. ‘Ohh, I don’t know. I’ve got a leaflet somewhere about sick days. I think it’s fine. I’ll test in a while and see from that.’

‘OK. As long as you’ve got that covered.’

‘Covered,’ I say, snapping my fingers and winking at you in a funky gesture of all-rightness.

‘Listen,’ you say, ‘Ivo. I’ve decided. I’m not going to go on this secondment.’

‘No, Mia, no, you can’t—’

‘It’s three months away, it’s too much. Especially, you know, if I’m not sure I— Well, I don’t even know if I want to do nursing any more.’

‘What? Why not?’

Your face grows unexpectedly sullen, and you hug your knees through the duvet.

‘I don’t know, it’s just — I’ve not met anyone who I can relate to. Everyone seems happy to do the robotic thing, treat all the patients like units.’ You rake your hand down your face, pummel your eye sockets with the heels of your hands. ‘I mean, I feel terrible saying it, because here I am, I’ve spent all this money, and you’re being amazingly patient about the whole thing, and I feel like I’m wasting your time.’

I gaze at you, trying to digest everything this means.

‘I keep thinking this is not what I went into nursing for. I wanted to make a difference for people, to treat people like humans. But if I ever say anything like that to any of the other students, they look at me like I’m insane. It’s so tiring. More tiring than the actual work.’

Now it’s my turn to stroke your back.

‘I just feel like I’ve been so naïve about it.’

‘Listen, I don’t think you’ve been naïve.’

‘I’ve been really naïve.’

‘OK, you’ve been really naïve. But all this stuff — at least it’s going to show you what you don’t want to do.’

‘But I don’t want to spend three months away from you, feeling like a leper.’

‘You’re not a leper, just because everyone else treats you like one. That’s their problem.’

‘But three months of it.’

‘It’s not for ever,’ I say. ‘Look, sleep on it. But I don’t want you to ditch your career just because I’ve got the constitution of an Oxo cube. It’s not fair on either of us.’

You pull in and arrange your limbs around me, delicately avoiding my stomach.

‘I’ll sleep on it.’

‘Good.’

‘If I go, are you going to be sick for the whole three months?’

‘I’ll be fine. I’ll work. I’ll watch the telly.’

‘You’ll use the time to do something amazing and creative, I know it.’

‘Yeah … I don’t know about that.’

Ffff — fuck it: press the buzzer.

Push the button to the click.

Ffffff — Jesus, the pain of it.

Ahhhh. Sssssurges.

Is this it? What if this is it? This could be it. This is definitely it.

No, no, ridiculoussss.

Oh, all I can think of is you. I love you, I love you, I love you, if this is the last thing I think I’m so, so sorry, and I love you.

Calmness. Positive thinking. Put it in context. Concentrate yourself away from pain. Walk away from it.

It’s not pain, it’s sensation. It’s–

Owowowow. It’s making me almost laugh with pain.

No, not laugh.

Sheila appears quickly at the door.

‘What’s the matter Ivo? Are you uncomfortable?’

‘Yes, yes, pain — just here—’

‘Down here, is it?’ She lays her hand flat on my lower belly, gently, gently.

‘Mmff.’

‘Mm-hm.’ She steps back and checks my chart. ‘When did you last pop to the loo?’

‘Mm — two days.’

I wince again as another surge of pain flashes across my middle.

‘OK, OK lovey. Now, I want you to keep calm, OK? We’re going to get this all under control. Do you trust me?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Dr Sood’s in this afternoon, so I’m going to fetch him to take a view.’

As I watch her leave, anxiety seizes my stomach, and the pain lashes back, another whipcrack, I don’t want to be alone — I don’t want to be alone if this is it.

It’s unbearable.

Positive thoughts.

Come on, come on. Think it through, carefully, calmly, calm, calm.

Is it pain anyway? Am I weak? How would I know? Maybe it’s not pain. Maybe I’ve never been in real pain. Maybe only the pain I’ve seen in other people has been the real thing, and I’ve only ever imitated their sucking of the teeth and wincing and cringing and sighing and huffing.

No, no. Calm it. I’m not in pain. Not real pain.

If I were dying, it would be the worst pain imaginable, surely. Is this the worst pain imaginable? No, it is not. What shall we call this? We could call it taken-abackness. It’s like when my knee clicks, or — or when my coat pocket catches on a door handle as I’m passing through and I might say ‘ow’, and I give off many of the signals of having been in pain. But it’s not pain, is it? It’s just being taken aback. Surprised.

And anyway, they don’t let you feel pain these days. They give you drugs. Like they gave Old Faithful drugs. They don’t let you feel the pain.

Thank God.

Fffff. ‘Yeah, he’s in here—’

Sheila enters the room all businesslike, Dr Sood in tow.

‘Good afternoon,’ says Sood. ‘How are things with you today? I gather you’ve been in a little discomfort?’

‘Severe headaches,’ says Sheila, ‘shortness of breath, anxiety over — a number of personal matters. And sharp abdominal pains.’

‘Mm.’ He sets his head fractionally on one side. ‘How’s your vision?’

‘Light hurts.’

‘Breathing is still troubling you, yes?’

‘I cough a lot.’

Nice Dr Sood. He’s calming in a rapid sort of manner. He talks in an efficient, quick and minimal way. His mouth-clicks form an integral part of his speech pattern. To-the-point, but kindly enough.

He turns to Sheila. ‘Any general feeling of panic, of distress or anything like this?’

‘We’ve been using oxygen for a few days,’ says Sheila. ‘Regular shortness of breath.’

‘Any improvements?’

‘Nothing substantial.’

This seems to push him into some kind of decision.

‘Hm. I’m wondering whether we should be administering relief for these symptoms. We can take care of the pain here in your abdomen. But we also have to consider any sort of panicky anxieties you have been experiencing. We could be administering a morphine solution, which should take care of the worst of it, and give you a little more space within yourself to control these symptoms better.’

‘Morphine? I’m not ready for that, am I?’ I look at Sheila. ‘I don’t think I’m that bad.’

‘Well, one of the things we are watching in a case like yours is the contamination of the bloodstream with toxins such as potassium, do you understand? And the build-up of toxins often leads to an increase in anxiety and irritation in the patient, and, well, if the symptoms are as we believe them to be, then you might find that a mild solution can help you—’

‘No, thank you. No.’

I’m surely not far gone enough for morphine, am I?

No, No. I’m not dead yet.

‘I just need a little something to — take the edge off.’ I look up at Sheila, hopefully. ‘Just a little something.’

‘Well, as I say, we can get you some relief for your abdominal pains, which we can probably put down to a spot of trapped wind in your intestine. Sharp, sudden pain.’

As he says it, another flash of pain darts its way through my belly.

‘Trapped wind? Seriously, it’s ffff — it’s really really bad. I’m sweating here, I’m sweating. It’s — ffff …’

‘It can get like that, honestly,’ says Sheila. ‘And it’s to be expected. I’m going to get you something to relieve that, OK?’

‘OK. Yes, please.’

‘And you do not want the morphine solution?’ says Sood.

‘No. No thanks.’

‘May I ask why?’

‘I don’t want to go there. I–I don’t want to.’

‘Addiction is not an issue, if that’s what you’re worried about. It’s entirely up to you and how you would like to handle your symptoms, but just so long as you are aware of the options available to you. I’d like to register with you the fact that I think a solution of morphine would help you along, ease your symptoms to a point where you’ll be in a good deal fairer fettle than you are now. So I’d like you to bear it in mind going forward.’

The two of them depart, Sheila with a little wink, Sood off to the patient he had come to see in the first place. I’m left here with his final words in mind. Going forward.

Going forward?

To what?

Tell me this is not trapped wind. Trapped wind can’t be this bad. It can’t. Old Faithful’s dead, and I’m here wriggling around with trapped wind. I really hope it isn’t trapped wind.

No, I really hope it is trapped wind.

Sheila returns alone, rotating a small rattley white box round and about in her hands, trying to find the best way of opening it.

‘Here we go now. Don’t worry, it’s nothing we haven’t seen before. Fact of life, isn’t it? We’ve got some suppositories here, joy of joys. They’ll encourage the muscles in your lower intestine to start working a bit to try and help you go to the toilet, all right?’

‘Right.’

‘Would you like to pop this in yourself? I mean, I can—’

‘No, no, fine. I’ll do it.’

‘Here you go. If you head over to the toilet, unwrap it, pop it in pointy-end first, and wash your hands after.’

She helps me down from my bed and across the room — and I need it.

I need the help.

Jesus.

I try and take in a breath but fail. Cough more, but stop short in pain.

‘Oh, you’re all right, lovey. Not at the end of your tether yet, OK? You’re doing very well. Now, you might want to run it under the tap a bit first. I’ll be standing out here, so give me a shout if you need me, won’t you? Don’t be embarrassed. Easier said than done, I know.’

I shuffle into the tiny bathroom, and turn and face the mirror. My eyes have yellowing whites, red round the rim.

This is it. Another intestinal episode. The day I thought I was going to die, and it was just a tummy ache.

I am pathetic.

Sheila takes me by the arm as I emerge from the toilet, and bears me over to the bed. An old man.

‘There you go,’ she says, tenderly. She fetches me a small paper cup of pills and pours me a glass of water. I throat the pills and shift them with water, shake my head to persuade them down. ‘That’s it,’ she says, and smiles. I sit back on my pillows, which she fluffs up behind me. She picks up your blanket from the end of the bed.

My blanket.

‘Here you go, lovey.’ She drapes it round my shoulders. It feels heavy and comforting, like a hug. ‘Just imagine those pills working their way up to your head and spreading their magic. And that suppository freeing things up in the opposite direction.’

‘Yeah, yeah. Thanks.’

‘Now bear in mind you might be taken a bit by surprise at how suddenly it works, all right? So I’ve left a pan by your bed in case you don’t make it. And I don’t want you getting all anxious about that. It’s there to be used, so use it if you need it, OK?’

‘OK.’

She looks at me and tuts to herself. ‘Listen, lovey, I’m not here to twist your arm, but are you sure you’re doing the right thing about the morphine solution? It’s really very mild, and I don’t want to see you distressed. There’s absolutely no need for that.’

‘I’m fine,’ I say. ‘I need to stop being pathetic. Get my mind under control.’

‘Well, that’s what the morphine would do; give you a bit of space upstairs.’

‘Like you say, let it go, get a bit of perspective. I can do this. Mind over matter. Just — are you sure, are you totally sure there’ll be no visitors?’

‘Everyone’s aware, all the checks are in place. I’ve left strict instructions with Jackie to make sure everyone signs in at reception, all right, lovey?’

‘All right. Thank you.’

‘Only … do me a favour, if you want the morphine, go ahead and take it. You don’t get extra points for style in this game.’

‘No, I know.’

‘Now, have you got everything? How are you progressing on your alphabet?’

‘I’m up to the letter I.’

‘I? Well, it’s staring you in the face, isn’t it?’

‘I’ve thought about intestines.’

‘No: insulin.’

‘God. Is that an acceptable part of the body?’

‘Yes! It’s a hormone, isn’t it? The main thing I remember about it is that it’s produced in your pancreas by the islets of Langerhans.’ She draws her arms out wide in a romantic gesture. ‘It might be my favouritely named part of the body, the islets of Langerhans … And it comes under I. How about that?’

I’m not convinced.

‘It’s interesting though, isn’t it, all the different hormones and potions your body is able to produce, just like that. Amazing, really. That’s what medieval doctors used to think: your whole body was governed by humours. And if they got out of whack, you’d get ill. It’s not that far off what actually happens with your insulin.’

‘Yeah.’

‘And it makes you think, in a thousand years’ time, they’ll be thinking, What? They used to inject people? In their veins? Seems barbaric.’

Insulin

OK then, OK. Insulin. Another I. The I that defines me. Who would ever think that something as tedious as insulin was ever going to be their biggest enemy? No one. People go through life thinking everything’s going to be fine … No one can be on guard against everything. It’s a slippery slope. So do what I did and be on guard against nothing. Another slippery slope.

Here we go: life is a snow-capped mountain, and all you’ve got to do is choose which direction your slippery slope is going to take. I say choose the sunny side.

They always told me there was nothing I’d done wrong to stop my body’s natural flow of insulin. Not like some people who could never gain control of their weight in these high-sugar, high-fat days. But thinking about it, I don’t think the Mars Bar and the pint of Coke I used to have for breakfast every morning in the school holidays will have helped. That must have been a major trauma for the old islets of Langerhans to cope with. Brilliant times, though, at home with Laura while Mum was at work.

I remember saying to her, ‘Does Coca-Cola really have cocaine in it?’

‘Yeah! Yeah, it does. Like Mars has bits of the planet Mars in it.’

Then, at nineteen, the insulin dwindled, and that was more or less that.

My pee started smelling like Refreshers.

I couldn’t keep the weight on.

So I got my diagnosis, and the NHS gave me my little pouch with everything in it, the blood-sugar tester and the injector pen and the insulin and–

Me, my body; my body, me. I’m all the same, but not. I didn’t want it to happen like that. I am my mind. Not my body. But it was like my body wouldn’t let my mind get away with it.

Mum’s still in her work coat, sitting next to me on the sofa. I’m trying to watch the TV, but she’s flipping noisily through Diabetes magazine, which she’s insisted on subscribing to. I think she thinks I’m going to have a look at it, but I look at the cover and it leaves me feeling tired. Static smiling people of mixed ethnicity. They’re happy because they have diabetes in common. Ha ha ha.

‘You’ve got to stay on top of it though, bab,’ she’s saying. ‘People go blind,’ she says. ‘They lose feet.’

I look at her directly in the eye, and I don’t know why, but I start to laugh.

‘What?’ she says, starting to laugh herself. ‘It’s not funny, this is serious!’

‘I don’t know, it’s — it’s funny for some reason,’ I say. ‘Losing feet. Seriously, Mum, don’t worry about it. I can look after myself.’

Every night after that, she would say, ‘Have you got your insulin?’

‘Yeahhh.’

And if not: ‘What would you do without me, eh?’

These early evening pre-loading sessions round Mal’s are getting out of hand. I’ve landed back in the habit with you away on your work placements, because there’s nothing else for me to do. But when you’re actually in-town-but-impossibly-busy, I sometimes think I’d rather be watching the telly in bed while you revise at the desk. But you won’t have any of it. I only come over to Mal’s out of something like politeness. Politeness to you and to him.

‘Now,’ says Mal, ‘what have I got here?’ He roots around in his jacket pocket, and retrieves a twisted little plastic bag. ‘Here, man, look.’ He jiggles it enticingly and grins.

‘Fucking hell, what is that?’

‘What do you think it is?’

I look closer, at the powder, and I don’t want to say it in case I sound stupid.

‘H,’ he says.

Mal’s car.

It’s the best option.

I clamber and collapse into the back on the driver’s side. Mal swings the front seat down, locks me in. Claustrophobia quickly starts to squeeze my chest. I need to get out, I want to get out. But all exits are blocked. Becca has settled in beside me, and Laura in front of her. Surrounded on all sides with the windows steaming up. No way of opening them. No way out the back.

C’mon, put your seat belt on.

Underway, rubber rumbling on the tarmac through town as Mal manhandles the gears upwards, we’re all thrust backwards and forwards as his feet push the pedals, side to side on the say-so of his hands. I’m fumbling for the seat belt, but I can’t focus. I can’t — get — I don’t know what’s the lack of insulin and what’s the drug, but I’m coming down now, it’s all starting to feel more familiar. Worse than familiar. Yank again at the seat belt but the safety lock’s locked. It’s too awkward, too hard to do. I’m going to leave it off.

Straight orange wash of streetlights replenished on Mal’s seatback, wiped out over his headrest, banished by the black, over and over in rapid rhythm.

Are you good to drive?

Yeah, I’m good to drive.

You’re sure?

Yeah, I’m sure.

I try a little look across the seat to Becca, and she smiles at me, takes up my hand. I want to tell her we have to have a plan, we have to get our story straight, because you’re not on placement this time, you’re home, revising the night away, and I need to have an explanation. But I can’t herd my feline thoughts. Becca has my hand. She’s stroking it reassuringly, tenderly. It’s nice, it’s nice.

Out again on the street, your street, and I’m being walked along the pavement — a long, straight terrace street stretching off into the distance, and I’m measuring out my paces along the pavement, slab by slab. Tiny ups and downs, wobbly wonky. I’ve Laura and Becca on either side, and they’re supporting, and there’s no — where’s Mal?

Jangle now as Becca retrieves her keys for the front door. Laura’s at my other arm, but I can feel her becoming softer, more uncertain. Less and less support. The front door unjams and judders, tattling the knocker familiarly beneath the letterbox.

‘You’ll be all right from here, won’t you?’

Words from Laura to my right, and now her presence drains away, leaks off back down the street, back off to — to Mal?

And now it’s your room, and it’s you. Urgent, attentive, professional.

I look up at you as you tend to me, your forehead frowning, your eyes precise.

‘I’m so sorry.’

Unscary daylight. The safe spacey morning-after wooziness. And you’re being so gentle and kind.

I don’t deserve any of it. Look at you, you’re shattered.

‘Can you remember what happened?’ you say, climbing in at the foot of the bed, giving me a bit of room. ‘Becca was a bit hazy on details.’

‘Just fucking stupid,’ I say. ‘I forgot my insulin, didn’t I? I left it there on your desk. And I was in the club and — you know — I felt a bit weird, and I knew I was having this hyper. I thought I could ride it out.’

‘So you forgot your insulin — and that’s it?’

‘So stupid,’ I say.

‘So why did Becca bring you back? I thought you were out with Mal and Laura?’

There’s a significant edge to your tone, and I feel you holding my glance a little too straight. You’re scanning, scanning.

‘Oh, yeah,’ I say with a wash of unfocused guilt. ‘No, Becca was there too. Mal and Laura and Becca.’

The events of last night are captured only as still images, swelling sounds. It remains aching in my limbs and squealing in my ears and my soul. Tired but alert. Remnants of trippiness in the head.

‘Are you all right?’ you ask. The fatal question.

‘Yep, yeah. I’m fine,’ I say.

‘You sure?’

‘Absolutely.’ I smile. Sort of.

Maybe if I vented everything, maybe it would all work out OK. I can actually feel the tip of my tongue tensing against the top of my mouth to say — to say what?

You’ve tipped your head to listen, eyebrows expectant.

Launch.

‘Listen,’ I say, ‘I wanted to tell you …’

And straight away your face grows concerned. You look away, fearful.

Bad start, bad start. Start more gently.

‘It’s OK, it’s OK,’ I say. ‘It’s nothing major, don’t worry. But it’s just — it’s something I want to feel that I can talk freely with you about.’

‘Drugs?’ you say, looking up at me swiftly and directly. ‘I’m not blind. Your pupils were like dinner plates.’

‘I’m sorry.’

You look at me a moment and reflect. ‘You don’t have to apologize to me, I’m not your mum,’ you say. ‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’

‘Well, I don’t know — it’s not something you can easily talk about, you know? And then — I don’t know, I got scared because …’ again I hesitate.

‘Because what?’

‘Well, there’s your dad and all the stuff you went through with him. And then there’s the fact that you’re a nurse and everything.’ I quickly add this on at the end, because your face falls at the mention of your dad.

‘The fact that you can’t take your insulin properly,’ you say. ‘That’s what the nurse is unhappy about.’

‘Yeah, well.’

I’m relieved to see some of the anxiety has passed from your face. I think maybe you thought my big revelation was going to be about Becca after all.

‘Listen,’ you say, ‘I’m not a fun-killer, and I absolutely refuse to be the one who’s telling you what to do. Don’t paint me like that, Ivo, because we won’t survive that.’

‘I know.’

‘But you’ve got to look after yourself. You’re not like Mal and all the others — you’re just not. You’re not in your body, and you’re not in your mind either.’

As I sit there, the scale of all the lies expands around me. Lies to myself, I suppose. But now you’re here, and you care, they’ve become lies to you. Missing insulin jabs since I was twenty — maybe one a day, every day. And the drugs too — not just pills. Do I need to declare it all? What can I get away with? I feel like I want to tell you everything but — would that be poisoning it for no reason?

‘What’s the matter?’ you say.

‘It wasn’t only last night. There’s been a few nights. Quite a lot of nights.’

‘I don’t doubt.’ You shrug. ‘Do I want to know?’

‘On and off since — well, before you and I were together. On and off.’

‘And while we’ve been together?’

‘The odd weekend — you know when I was stuck at home and you were off on night shift or on placement.’

‘So, what, more pills?’

I breathe out unsteadily.

‘Pills. Some acid.’ I wince. I hear the clicks of the corners of my mouth. ‘A little bit of powder.’

‘Powder? Well, what, cocaine? Or—’

‘Cocaine, yes.’

‘Shit, Ivo. Cocaine? I never thought it was anything like that.’

I sit meekly, while you frown and drill your eyes into the middle of the bed between us, trying to work it all out.

‘So, cocaine then,’ you say.

Oh, don’t ask. Please don’t ask.

‘That’s it? You’ve not done — anything else.’

It’s not a question. I can’t answer. It’s not a question.

‘Heroin?’ you say, and your shock tops out. ‘Jesus Ivo, I just don’t know who you are. Heroin?’

You fling the covers off and start tearing clothes from your closet, wrenching on your jeans.

‘Mia,’ I say. ‘Mia, listen—’

‘I don’t want to hear it. You promised me you’d look after yourself, Ivo. You promised.’

‘Nothing’s changed. Nothing.’

You try to pull on a sock while standing, but stumble and have to sit down. The mattress bounds beneath me as you do.

‘I know you don’t want to hear me, Mia, but I’m the same man.’

You pull on your shoes, tugging at the tongue and aggressively driving in your heel.

‘I just — I get bored, all right?’ I say. ‘Bored and lonely. You’re the one who’s working all the hours.’

‘So, what — you’re saying it’s my fault?’

‘No, no, I’m not saying that—’

‘You want me to give up nursing and come and hold your hand, is that it?’

I close my eyes, stop now. Absorb all the tension in the room. No point, no point. I will not snap back.

‘But it’s so stupid,’ you say. ‘You’re diabetic! What do you think you’re going to say when the doctors start asking you about your history?’

Silence.

‘What if you end up needing a kidney transplant one day? Because that’s what happens. They’ll put you at the bottom of every list. They probably won’t even bother putting you on the list. Jesus, who are you?’

‘I wanted you to know,’ I say. ‘I’ve done it like three times. Ever. And I’m not going to do it any more. It’s stopped.’

Well, there it is. There you have it: me.

All of me.

‘Are you going to say something?’ I say.

‘I don’t have anything to say,’ you say.

And you leave.

I pick up the gun and point it at the customer’s fertilizer, watch the red laser dance across the barcode. It beeps.

‘That’s £54.86 in total please,’ I say, the automatic words feeling good in my mouth. Trusty script. ‘If you’d like to put your card in the machine. And type in your PIN.’

The old guy squints down at the keypad, and thumbs in his number. It’s 1593. We wait, and I look across at Laura, Mal and Becca as they stand awkwardly nearby. I cannot believe I’ve had to get them to come in. I cannot believe I forgot to bring my insulin with me to work.

The printer blurts and chops out the receipts, and I pair them up with the card and hand them back to the old guy, who takes them and trundles his heavy trolley away.

‘You can’t work twenty-four hours a day,’ says Laura, stepping forward once more.

‘I’m not,’ I say, in a quiet voice. ‘I just want to keep busy. Keep occupied. Get paid.’ I can barely bring myself to speak at a normal volume these days. I slot the laser gun back into its holster.

‘Have you spoken to her?’

‘We’ve talked on the phone a couple of times.’

‘And what did she say?’

‘She says she’s got her exams to get through and she doesn’t want to jeopardize them. She doesn’t want to see me.’

‘So do you reckon that’s it then?’

‘Sounds like it, doesn’t it?’ says Mal.

‘I don’t know,’ I say, miserably. ‘I’d say like ninety-nine point nine per cent certain.’

Another customer wanders up, and Laura, Mal and Becca step back once more, wave her through.

Work is good. They’ve been good at giving me extra hours here, and once you’ve been in the job long enough, colleagues start to recognize the patterns. Someone suddenly wants extra hours, no-questions-asked, you oblige.

I’m grateful.

‘I don’t see what the big deal is,’ says Laura, when the coast’s clear. ‘Why’s she looking to control everything you do anyway?’

‘It’s not like that,’ I say. ‘It’s more complicated than that.’

‘Well why?’ she says.

‘It’s not something I can really talk about, it’s a private thing.’

‘Come on, you can tell us. It’s not like we’re going to tell her. You won’t say anything, will you, Becca?’

Becca shrugs. ‘Nothing to do with me.’

‘It’s a basic trust thing, isn’t it? Look, her dad was an alcoholic, and it kind of screwed up her family, and—’

‘But that’s totally different,’ says Laura. ‘You’re not an alcoholic, are you? I don’t see why you should be the one who has to pay for whatever mistakes her dad’s made in his life.’

I close my eyes and try not to boil up at Laura. But it’s hard, it’s hard. She will not read the signs. I don’t want to talk about it. I pray for another customer.

‘And anyway, has she never made a single mistake in her life?’

‘She’s a nice girl,’ says Becca. ‘But, you know, maybe she’s not quite the right one for you, Ivo. Going out at four in the morning, decorating the town. It’s a bit—’ She wrinkles her nose.

I can’t answer this. I’m struck silent; the thick sort of silence where I’m trying to hide the fact that I’m choking back the tears. I clear my throat noisily and find myself exhaling like a horse. I smile broadly and mirthlessly at Becca.

Becca’s brow knits in sympathy, and she puts her hand on my hand and squeezes it.

‘Tough times,’ she says.

I nod, tight-lipped.

‘Seriously, Ivo, you’re better off out of it, if you ask me,’ says Laura. ‘People like Mia — I mean, she’s a lovely girl and everything, but she makes you be someone you’re not, maybe to fit in with what she’s doing, you know? You need to make sure you’re doing what you want to do.’

A smile, a nod, and it’s Becca who finally reads me right.

‘Come on,’ she says to Laura. ‘I want to buy some cut flowers.’

‘Over the other side, by the aquatics,’ I say.

They move away, but Mal hangs around and watches another couple of customers drift through the checkout.

‘So where’re you going to go?’ he asks. ‘Back to your mum’s full-time?’

‘Ah, I don’t know,’ I say, feeling a bit foolish now to be so low.

‘Listen, I was thinking,’ he says, ‘between you and me, I’m going to be getting my own place soon, I reckon.’

‘Really? What about Laura?’

‘Laura’s place has always belonged to her, and I’ve always meant to get my own place — I just never got round to it. C’mon, what do you reckon? We could move in together. Get a bigger place, if we pool resources.’

My absolute instinct is no. I’m still hooked on the idea of you and me: you and me living together and — if I move in with him, that’s like saying goodbye for ever. Like it’s never going to be OK again.

‘Listen,’ he says, ‘I don’t want to say the wrong thing, but—’ he reaches over and tugs the laser gun out of its holster, starts targeting things with its dancing beam ‘—well, there’s nothing in this world that’s all bad, you know? There’s different choices now.’

‘Yeah.’ A dead yeah.

‘We’d be able to do what we wanted. We could hire a big TV, get a new console. Have tourneys, man. Have a bit of a smoke, you know, get the pizzas in, beers. Get Kelvin round, maybe.’

‘I’ll have a think, man, yeah?’

‘OK, yeah. I’m going to look into it meantime.’

‘Yeah — yeah, all right.’

The light flicks on outside. The garden is flung into being once again.

Or was it just me opening my eyes?

I can’t be sure, I can’t be sure.

‘Are you OK, lovey?’ Sheila’s in at the door in a second.

‘Ugh,’ I knuckle my eyes. ‘I don’t want to be the kind of person who complains about lights—’

‘I know, I know. I’m so sorry — we’ve got the contractors coming in again tomorrow or the next day, and they’re staying until they’ve ironed out the problem.’

I frown and scratch at my bristly face. ‘Were you waiting out in the corridor?’

‘You what?’

‘You came straight in.’

‘Oh yeah, I’m keeping vigil outside your room every minute of the day, sweetheart. And it’s only a coincidence that’s where we keep the biscuits.’