window and open it, letting a blast of air blow the hair from my face.
‘I don’t want Ed and the kids to have to look after me, visit me. I want to let them get on with their lives.’
Kerry sits up and leans on the bed as I say the words. ‘What do you mean, Jen?’ There is worry in her voice.
‘I mean I have the power to let them be free. I can let them live their lives without this person I have become.’
‘No, Jen. I died so you could live.’
I throw up my hands. ‘You call this living? Sleeping half the day away, not knowing what day of the week it is? Not being able to live my life with my husband and my children?’
‘It won’t come to that, Jen. You just need to find the right tablets, the right help.’
‘What do you think will happen if they can’t find the right combination and I get sectioned? Do you think I’ll ever be able to have control over my life again?’
‘So what exactly are you saying?’
‘You know what I’m saying . . . Maybe they’d be better off without me?’ I pull open a notepad, click the pen and begin writing.
‘Um . . . what are you doing?’ Kerry asks, peering over my shoulder.
‘What does it look like? I’m writing down how I would, um, you know I mean . . . if I don’t get better and I have to—’
‘Overdose? Jen, you’re not serious!’
‘No, you’re right. What if I’m sick, or worse, what if I shit myself? Not quite the final image I want to leave Ed with. Gosh, there aren’t that many choices, are there? Oh! I could always . . .’ My blue pen scratches out my suggestion, cutting into the paper.
‘Jen, this is completely out of the question.’
‘You’re right. I want to leave the least amount of bother for Ed when I go, he’ll have enough to deal with, you have a point. He’ll never get the stains out of the carpet.’
What am I doing? This has got to stop. I turn to Kerry, who is wearing her most superior ‘you’re acting like a child’ look. I sigh, put my hands up in surrender and close the book.
‘OK, OK . . . you’re right.’ I take a deep breath. I need a plan. ‘Right. I’m going to stop the tablets so at least I’m in control of my faculties. I’m going to ignore you. I’m going to give my family good memories of me so that if I don’t get better . . . those will be the things they will be thinking of, not some woman forcing down protein shakes through a straw and talking to air. I’m going to up my sessions with Dr Popescu; I’m going to need his help even more and he offered twice weekly sessions if I wanted them. But I need your help too. You have to help me. You can’t interrupt conversations, you can’t shout for my attention, OK? You have to help me make them think I’m better so I can give them what they need. Can you do that?’
‘If you stop taking those vile tablets, we have a deal.’
We shake hands and for the first time in months, I don’t wake with my dead sister shivering beside me.
‘So far so good,’ Kerry whispers as we sit at the bottom of our parents’ garden. It’s been a week without the tablets and I feel more like my old self.
Nessa arrives as I straighten myself and walk into a hug.
‘You look good today, new meds?’
‘Um yeah. New meds. Dr Popescu thinks we might have cracked it, I see him twice a week now.’
‘So he’s helping?’
I nod.
‘Is she here?’
I shake my head and smile, ignoring the loud crunching sound as Kerry bites into an apple. She stops chewing, her eyes widening and her hand covering her mouth. Kerry swallows a large chunk of apple and mouths ‘Sorry’ to me.
‘Look what your mum found!’ We walk towards the bench and I pull up my collar against the sharp breeze. She places another box of Kerry’s notebooks beside me and passes one into my hand.
‘Kerry Hargreaves 2001 The Bubble Gum Experiment.’ The pages are brittle with time but inside, Kerry’s writing is perfectly preserved.
‘Aw, she was only six. Gosh, she was meticulous, wasn’t she?’
‘Yep. One obsessive quest to another.’ We continue turning pages, returning to the warmth of the kitchen as we go through the next volume.
‘Do tulips prefer