The Kindest Thing

Chapter Nineteen

They call me to the stand. They are all in the public gallery: my children, my in-laws, my friend. For a stupid moment I wonder where you are, Neil. It’s an error I want to share with you. I heard somewhere that it’s good to talk to the dead and sometimes I do. Murmur news of my day behind bars to you in the dim, dry, stifling night.

Mr Latimer stands up and addresses the jury. It is his task to convince them that I am no feminist harridan with a smooth tongue who would perjure herself, but a loving wife and mother driven demented by circumstances, pushed to the giddy limit and beyond, now drowning in regret and desperate for understanding.

‘Members of the jury, you have now heard the case against Deborah Shelley. A case which rests on one, and only one, question: was Deborah Shelley suffering from diminished responsibility when she helped her husband Neil die? The answer to that is yes. And we will present evidence from Deborah Shelley to support that. We will hear from Deborah how living with Neil’s terminal illness affected her own mental health, leading to insomnia, panic attacks, anxiety and depression. Her situation was made even worse by concerns over the well-being of her son Adam. Things reached the stage where Deborah was no longer able to act responsibly.’

Adam colours but keeps looking at Mr Latimer. I had discussed with the barrister whether we had to drag Adam into it but he made it plain I needed all the help I could get. And a drug-addled teenager who had had spells in a loony bin would score plenty of Brownie points. Though he had a more elegant way of putting it.

Mr Latimer goes on, ‘Deborah’s neighbour and the expert psychiatric witness for the defence will describe to you a woman who, weakened and isolated, was faced with a tremendous pressure that she was incapable of resisting. Deborah Shelley broke the law because she could no longer differentiate between right and wrong.’

He turns to me and gives the tiniest of nods, a little jerk of his scrappy wig, to calm me. It will be all right, he is saying, you will be all right.

‘Deborah,’ he will make a point of always using my first name – humanizing me for the jury, ‘your husband was diagnosed with motor neurone disease in September 2007?’

‘Yes.’

‘What impact did that have on you?’

‘I was numb at first, it was such a huge shock, and when we learned that there was no cure, that Neil would get progressively worse and then die, well, it was shattering.’

I let my eyes scan the jury. Dolly, jaunty today in pillar-box red, draws her mouth tight in a shrug of regret. And I see the Cook’s face soften in sympathy – or I think I do.

‘But you were able to carry on working and looking after the family?’

‘Yes. I had to. In that sort of situation you cope, you carry on. That’s all you can do.’

‘Some years earlier your mother had died?’

‘Of cancer, yes.’

‘Would you say that she had a good death?’

A torrent of emotions unseats me. I feel my face heat up. ‘No, not at all. She was in a lot of pain. It was horrible. She was on her own at the end. No one ever seemed to talk to her, or to us, about what was happening.’

‘Her death affected you deeply?’

‘Yes, I became depressed.’

Hilda and Flo exchange a look. They know something of this. What? Depression, losing a parent, cancer? Live long enough and I guess the odds are good for all three.

‘And around this time you and Neil had your second child, Sophie?’

‘That’s right.’

‘W-was the d-depression,’ he starts to stutter and segues into the chanting delivery that eases the flow, ‘severe enough to warrant medical attention?’

‘Yes. I saw my GP and he put me on medication. Anti-depressants.’

‘Did these help?’

‘A bit. Not a lot. Mainly it was the time that helped. The passing of time.’

‘How long did this period of depression last?’

‘About a year.’

‘And when you knew Neil had a terminal condition did you think you might become depressed again?’

‘No. Not at first. I was upset, angry – it just felt so unfair.’ It still does. His illness was unfair, his death too. I want him back. Perhaps this is the denial stage. People write about the different stages of grief but I haven’t a clue where I’m up to. He wasn’t dead three weeks when they locked me up. Arrested development.

In the second row of the jury box, the Sailor nods. I’m relieved at his empathy until I realize with a rush of outrage that he is dozing, nodding off. Too big a lunch, perhaps. Not on my watch, matey. I give a sharp cough and he startles awake, rubs his face and rolls back his shoulders.

‘And after the initial shock?’

‘Then I was more worried about Neil, how he would deal with it, and the children too.’

‘Had you any particular fears regarding the children?’

There’s the taste of coins in my mouth as I reply. Blood money. ‘Yes, my son Adam had been having problems. He isn’t well – mentally.’

‘Please can you tell the jury what is wrong with him?’

I cannot look at Adam or I will cry. I want to fend the question off. Tell them what a lovely child he was, how he delighted in the world, show them how beautiful he still is, how he has his father’s eyes and a kindness, a naïvety, about him. Holding my jaw taut I tell them, ‘Adam suffers from delusions. He gets panic attacks and sometimes becomes paranoid. The doctors believe the illness was triggered by using cannabis.’

Even as I say the word I see the Prof and Mousy stiffen, Hilda and Flo shuffle uneasily. A generation thing, I think. The older members of the jury probably see little distinction between cannabis and heroin. I assume those under fifty have at least tried it – even if they didn’t inhale. As for Media Man, in his sharp suit, the Artist, and the PA with her lovely tan and flawless makeup, I bet they’ve hoovered up plenty of coke in their time. The Sailor’s probably seen it all – a new drug in every port, though the ruddy complexion, the road map of capillaries, suggests a lifetime’s acquaintance with the bottle, too.

‘I’m told some people are more susceptible than others,’ I continue speaking.

‘And at the time when Neil was diagnosed, how was Adam’s health?’

‘Not good. Adam had taken an overdose just before.’

‘And as time went on and Neil’s health deteriorated how was Adam’s condition?’

‘Variable. The hardest thing was really not knowing whether he’d be okay or not. It was so unpredictable. He had a couple of hospital stays, in 2008, as a voluntary patient.’

Callow Youth looks anxious. Perhaps he likes to smoke weed but gets edgy. The Prof continues to look remote. Surely he’s come across drug use with his students. I wonder what his poison is. Fine wines? Then I remind myself he may not be the academic that I imagine. He may be a catalogue buyer or a window cleaner or a brickie.

Do any of them blame the parents? See in Neil’s and my treatment of Adam the seeds of his destruction? Are they judging me? Well, duh! The absurdity of the question threatens to make me smile. Not good body language as Latimer walks me through my descent from grace.

‘At what stage did you become ill yourself?’

‘I think the anxiety was there all along but I tried to ignore it. Then when Neil began to talk about-’ I can’t say any more, a ball of grief chokes me. I grip the edge of the stand. There’s a humming in my ears.

The judge leans forward. ‘Ms Shelley, this is obviously very difficult. Would you like a break?’

I shake my head. Find a word. ‘No.’ Fumble for the current of my thoughts. ‘Sorry.’ Good, Deborah, humility, weakness, that’s the style. ‘When Neil said he wanted to plan his death, it began to get worse.’

There is a rush of interest in the court. I see it in the way the PA’s sharp face narrows with interest and the Cook’s head whips up. See it in the way the press reporters at the side begin to scribble. The truth stalks closer.

‘When was that?’

‘In March 2008. About six months after his diagnosis.’

‘And he asked if you would help him?’

‘Yes.’

‘What was your answer to him?’

‘I said, no, I wouldn’t do it.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I didn’t want him to die. I wanted as much time together as possible. And there was help available. Ways of making sure he had a good death, when the time came.’

‘Were you aware that he was asking you to break the law?’

‘Yes – well, I checked actually. I wasn’t sure, but when I looked into it, it was clear.’ Sitting by the computer, scanning the Internet, clicking back and forth, my stomach plunging as I found the same stark answer time and again. Now moves to change the law were gaining ground but too late for Neil. For me.

‘Did Neil raise the subject again?’

‘Yes. We had a holiday together in Barcelona, that September. He asked me then.’

‘And what did you say?’

‘We argued about it. I couldn’t agree to do it. I was angry that he’d asked me again. And I was sad. I’d hoped he’d changed his mind. Given up on the idea.’

Is Sophie hearing this, taking it in? Does she understand that this was not my will?

‘How was your own state of mind at this time?’

‘Shaky. I wasn’t sleeping well and I’d lost weight. I was depressed.’

‘Did you see your doctor?’

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

‘I didn’t think there was anything he could do, really. I just had to keep going. Neil was the one who was dying. I had to be strong for him.’ This is the truth, not an embellishment to prop up my defence. I had felt frayed and woozy; my hold on everything was brittle.

‘Did you ask anyone for help?’

‘I rang the MNDA helpline a lot. Let off steam. But there didn’t seem to be any point in seeing a doctor. Nothing could stop the inevitable. It was something we had to live with.’ Die with.

‘And did Neil ask you to help him end his life a third time?’

‘Yes.’ There’s a wobble in my throat and I sound feeble. What might have happened if you hadn’t? You might still be here, loved and looked after. The three of us round your bedside. A Walton family death. ’Bye, Pa. ’Bye, Adam. ’Bye, Pa. ’Bye, Sophie.

‘And what did you say?’

‘At first I said no, again. But he was begging me. Pleading with me. He wanted it so much and I was so confused. I told him to talk to a counsellor. He said he would.’

‘How was your state of mind at that time?’

‘Worse. I was getting panic attacks.’

Late April and I am in the workshop. Dawn and the birds herald the sun, the raucous sparrows in the eaves, the liquid song of the blackbird. I am kneeling rigid on the rug, one arm wrapped around my chest, my hand at my throat. Pain radiates from my heart, robbing me of breath; my throat is sealed, skin slick with sweat. My mind is diving through the groundswell of terror, seeking to break through to the surface. Even in this wilderness I am able to appreciate that if this kills me I will not be able to help Neil. But it is not a heart-attack: breath comes, and the pain seeps away, leaving an imprint to haunt me.

‘I wasn’t sleeping properly and I felt sick all the time. I couldn’t concentrate on anything.’

‘So you agreed to his request?’

I can’t speak. I press my tongue against my teeth, dam my tears. The moment stretches out. Mr Latimer waits.

‘Yes,’ I whisper.

‘In your statement to the court you have admitted administering drugs to Neil and then putting a plastic bag over his head, is that correct?’

‘Yes.’ An eddy of guilt rocks me.

‘How long after agreeing to do this did you carry out his wishes?’

‘Ten weeks.’ Oh, I wish it had been longer. Another day, another week. I miss him so. I want him back now. Sick as a dog and weak as a kitten, I would take him in an instant, sit in vigil until the only muscle moving is his heart. Relishing the breath of him and the feel of his palm and the smell of his hair.

‘And having made the agreement, presumably you and Neil talked further about how to carry out his wishes?’

‘Yes.’ Oh, those macabre discussions about methods and dosages, cover stories and timing. We went over it again and again. Me rooting out objections, obstacles, dangers. Neil persistently working it through.

Neil had spoken to a counsellor as promised. Now we had to plan his death. Spring was unseasonably warm, that day a cloudless sky. I was supposed to be working on some designs for a new apartment block but I couldn’t settle. I went upstairs to see if he wanted to come down and have lunch in the garden. He liked the idea. Once we’d got him into his shorts and shirt, I helped him to the top of the stairs. There, he lowered himself to the floor. It was easier for him to shuffle downstairs on his bottom, with me yanking his legs or shoving his back when he seized up.

Sophie came in when he was halfway down. ‘You ought to get a stair-lift,’ she said. ‘They said you could get one, didn’t they?’

‘Yes.’ And there was a six-month wait. ‘Yes, I’ll give them a ring.’ Sophie got a text message and before long her friend called round and the two of them went out. Neil and I had lunch, our talk desultory. I cleared the plates and looked out at him. He was settled in the patio in a high-back chair that supported his neck and arms. His face was in repose, his expression reflective. The ache of knowing I was losing him bloomed in my chest. I fetched my camera from the dining room and photographed him from the kitchen window, zooming in to get a closeup.

I took drinks out and joined him. Propped a long straw in his beaker so he could hold it in his lap and still sip it.

‘How?’ The taste of fear made me bark the question. ‘How do you plan to do it? How do we avoid being found out?’

‘An overdose.’

‘There’ll be signs, won’t there?’

‘They won’t necessarily do a post-mortem.’

I shivered in the heat. ‘Neil, I don’t know whether…’

‘Ssh!’ His look was gentle, indulgent, his olive eyes calm.

‘And what do we use, what drugs, how do we get hold of them?’

He didn’t say anything.

‘Could always ask Adam, I suppose,’ I muttered.

Neil laughed and I began to giggle, my anguish punctured. We couldn’t stop and then I was crying too but trying to hide it because I didn’t want to let him down.

‘Might give the game away,’ he said, his chest still heaving.

Rage flared fresh in my belly. It’s not a game! I wanted to scream at him. It’s your life. It’s my life.

I stood up.

‘Where are you going?’

‘The Internet. Marvellous what you can find.’

It wasn’t, as it happens. There was information about the methods used in the Swiss clinics, doses of barbiturates preceded by a strong anti-emetic to stop the person throwing up the drugs. How would we get those? Anti-emetic. Would travel pills help? Sophie always got car sick and we gave her tablets, which seemed to help – but whether they treated the symptom or the cause I’d no idea.

When I typed suicide and overdose into the search engine it threw up everything from paracetamol to heroin.

Rejoining Neil, I told him what I’d read. ‘So we could try a packet of Joy Rides followed by sleeping pills but (a) we’d have to get hold of the stuff first and (b) if they did a post-mortem it’d be an obvious deliberate overdose.’

I felt giddy talking like this, as if in a fever, the garden gleaming in the sun, the scent of cut grass and the bony claws of death crawling up my spine.

‘We need something that could be accidental,’ he said quietly, ‘in case anyone does get suspicious.’

‘Could shove you downstairs.’ I groaned. ‘I can’t believe we’re having this conversation.’

Neil reached slowly across and put his hand on my knee. I turned his hand over, pressed my palm to his, locked fingers, willing him to leave it now, to shut up.

But he carried on: ‘Or something I could have taken myself, without your help, without your knowing. Then, even if it does come out, you’re okay. There’s no risk.’

‘Something you’re already taking?’

‘Would Zoloft work?’ he asked. At that stage he had been prescribed Zoloft for depression.

‘I’m not sure.’

‘Morphine,’ he said. ‘It’s in the breathing kit.’

‘A dose. Not enough to kill you.’

‘Andy Frame will give me some for the pain – the consultant suggested it. It’s also used for breathlessness.’

‘You’re not breathless.’

‘I could be.’ His voice was quiet, delicate.

‘And save it up,’ I said, cottoning on. ‘The syringes-’

‘I think they do liquid, too. To drink. If it’s hard to swallow, to get solids down.’

It seemed so simple. I coveted his equanimity. But there was a backwash of resentment, too, slapping inside me. I gazed at the crimson and yellow splashes of primula, at the buds on the maple. I drank in the sweet, creamy fragrance from the magnolia tree. This, I thought, is what’s hard to swallow. That you want to go and leave me here. You can still talk and laugh and kiss and come. Okay, so we’ll never dance again but you can still breathe and swallow, and yet you want to go.

‘Did you ever consider reneging on your promise?’ Mr Latimer savours the verb though I see Alice’s eyes narrow as she puzzles it out.

‘All the time. I went round and round it in my head, like a maze. I kept hoping he’d die before it came to it. Or he’d change his mind. I dreaded it. I was frightened all the time but I couldn’t see a way out. Most of the time I just pretended it wasn’t really happening. I’d get these panic attacks when I found it hard to breathe, this terrible dread like a paralysis.’

‘Yet you were helping Neil to acquire the medicines you used?’

‘Yes. I thought I was going mad.’

Mr Latimer guides me through the sequence of events, a quadrille of question and answer. Neil’s complaints to Dr Frame and the prescription for liquid morphine. The medicines hidden in his bedside table. One, then the other. More than a month’s supply.

Mr Latimer asks me about the children. I recall one conversation, early evening, Neil in bed resting, me putting clothes away. The banality of it. We’d already agreed to conceal his intention from the children. Knowing how horrific the burden was for me, I could not countenance imposing it on Adam and Sophie. Neil felt the same. It was too much to bear – they were kids.

‘What about afterwards? What do we tell the children?’ I asked Neil.

‘Nothing.’

‘Is that fair?’

He glanced away, then back to me. ‘If we organize it properly, everyone will think I just died sooner than expected. The kids included. If anyone suspects otherwise you could be in trouble. It wouldn’t be fair to ask them to keep that sort of secret.’

I nodded. Neil had redrawn his will and written letters for Adam and Sophie, love letters for them to keep.

At each turn of the dance, Mr Latimer stops to ask me about my state of mind. I tell the court about prowling the house. About the nightmares that waited for me to lower my guard and succumb to sleep. About being unable to share meals because of the way my throat sealed as I raised my fork, nausea gushing through me at the smell of food. How practised I became in hiding my disintegration from the world, from my family, my friends, my clients. Neil was the one who was dying. I was just dropping to bits.

‘On the twenty-sixth of May last year,’ Mr Latimer prompts, ‘there was an incident involving your neighbour Pauline Corby. Can you tell us what happened that day? Perhaps you could start by telling us how Neil’s condition was.’

Dolly perks up, flicking her tongue round, licking her lips. I make a quick assessment of the jury. Half of them have crossed arms, a bad sign, closed, defensive. What they’re about to hear won’t improve matters. What’s important is that they think of me as mad, not bad, and material like this could go either way.

‘Neil had lost a lot of movement in his arms. It seemed to get worse quite suddenly so I was having to do more for him. Feeding and toileting.’

Alice pulls a wry face. Has she known this? An aged parent, a disabled sibling?

‘The neighbours have this cat,’ I go on. ‘It uses our garden sometimes. We tried everything. I was feeling very tired, very tense, and I saw the animal soiling’ – I use ‘soiling’ instead of ‘shitting’ so I won’t offend anyone – ‘in where we have the herbs. I filled a bowl with water and drenched the cat. Mrs Corby had seen me and she came round. She knocked on the back door and said it was outrageous and unnecessary.’

‘And how did you respond?’

‘I lost control. Completely. I was shouting abuse and screaming at her. She threatened to call the police and I – I threatened her with a hammer. I’d been fixing cables to the wall with it. I said I’d hit her with it.’ Stove your fucking skull in, had been the exact turn of phrase.

‘What happened then?’

‘She went back inside.’

‘And what did you do?’

‘I got drunk.’ Sat in my workshop and polished off half a bottle of gin. Hiding from Neil, hiding from the children. Wanting to smash something with the hammer but knowing if I started I might not be able to stop.

‘Had you ever behaved with such enmity, such aggression before?’

‘Never.’

‘Looking back now, how would you describe that outburst?’

‘It was out of all proportion. I lost control. I wasn’t myself.’

‘And how did you feel afterwards?’

‘Frightened. Like I was cracking up. I didn’t know what I was going to do next.’

Mr Latimer pauses so they will have a chance to absorb this. Then he makes a move in a new direction. ‘Had you and your husband discussed when he would take the overdose?’

‘No.’

‘You never asked him?’

‘No. I hoped he’d change his mind, or be too scared to go through with it.’

‘What happened on June the fourteenth?’

‘We had a quiet day. We had a take-away dinner. Then Adam helped me get Neil back to bed. The children went out. Then Neil told me.’ My voice cracks. I freeze again. Feel the dread across my shoulders like a clammy shawl.

Mr Latimer waits. The courtroom ripples. Faces loom at me, then retreat. I am given a cup of water. The judge asks if I am able to continue. I’ve started so I’ll finish. My voice sounds dry, rustles. ‘Neil said he wanted to do it the following day.’

I can hear the suck of excitement from people.

‘Were those his exact words?’

‘No. He just said, ‘‘Tomorrow.’’ And I knew.’

‘Did you try and dissuade him?’

‘No.’

‘You were happy to go ahead?’

‘No. No – I was devastated but I had to… I couldn’t… I had…’ I’m inarticulate, words spilling out like broken teeth.

‘Why had you to?’

‘Because I’d promised. Because I loved him. And I didn’t know what was best any more. I was so confused.’ I have been coached to end on this sentiment. It is crucial. My motives may have been of the highest moral order but my actions were illegal. The only defence I had, the only defence the law of the land allowed me, was a lack of reason, a loss of judgement.

‘I didn’t know what I was doing,’ I say plainly.

‘And do you regret what you did?’

‘Oh, yes. Every minute.’ I mean it.

There is a sound from the gallery and my blood leaps in consternation. Sophie is crying. Oh, my sweet girl. What have we done? I stretch my throat, raise my eyes to the ceiling and blink. But nothing stops my tears spilling.

The judge instructs an adjournment for the rest of the day. The jury file out. There’s a sombre, shaken atmosphere now. And everyone knows what tomorrow will bring. They know I admit to killing him; they know what I used to do it. But until they hear the details of it from me, they can only imagine what it must have been like.