The Breakdown(59)

‘I just feel so tired all the time.’

He smooths my hair off my face. ‘If you feel you can’t cope, why don’t you ask to work part-time?’

‘I can’t.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because it’ll be too late for them to find someone to replace me.’

‘Nonsense! If something happened to you, they’d

have to.’

I stare at him. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Just that no one is indispensable.’

‘But why did you say something might happen to me?’

He frowns. ‘I was making a point, that’s all – as in, if you broke a leg, or got run over by a bus, they’d have to replace you.’

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‘But you said it as if you knew something was going


to happen to me,’ I insist.

‘Don’t be ridiculous, Cass!’ His voice is sharp with annoyance and I flinch, because he doesn’t often raise his voice. He catches the flinch and sighs. ‘It’s just a figure of speech, OK?’

‘Sorry,’ I mumble. The pills are chasing the panic

away, bringing sleep in its place.

He puts his arms around me and draws me to him

but it feels awkward.

‘Just think about speaking to Mary about going back part-time,’ he says.

‘Or not going back at all,’ I hear myself say.

‘Is that what you want, to stop working altogether?’

He moves back and looks down at me in puzzlement.

‘On Thursday, you said you were looking forward to

going back.’

‘It’s just that I don’t know if I’ll manage to do

everything that’s expected of me, not when I’m feeling like this. Maybe I could ask for a couple more weeks off and go back in the middle of September, once I’m feeling better.’

‘I doubt whether they’d allow that, not unless Dr

Deakin says you’re not fit to go back just yet.’

‘Do you think he would?’ I say, even though there’s a part of me telling me to stop, to remember the phone calls, to remember Jane, to remember that I’m not safe at home. But I can’t hold on to those thoughts long enough to focus on them.





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‘He might. Let’s just see how you get on with the

pills you’re taking. There’s two weeks until school starts.

Once you’re taking them on a regular basis, you’ll probably feel a lot better.’

FRIDAY AUGUST 28th

The front door closes behind Matthew. From the

bedroom I listen as he starts the car, drives to the gate and disappears down the road. Silence settles on the house. Struggling into a sitting position, I reach for the two little peach-coloured pills lying on my breakfast tray and scoop them into my mouth, washing them down with orange juice. Ignoring the two slices of toasted brown bread, sliced down the middle and arranged artistically rather than just stacked, and the little bowl of Greek yogurt and granola, I lie back against the pillows and close my eyes.

Matthew was right. Now that I’m taking the pills

on a regular basis, I feel so much better. My life has improved dramatically in the last – week, two weeks?

I open my eyes and squint at the clock, looking for the date. Friday August 28th, so thirteen days. I might not remember very much but August 15th is ingrained in Title: The Breakdown ARC, Format: 126x198, v1, Output date:08/11/16





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my brain as the date I had my breakdown. It was also Mum’s birthday. I only remembered once Dr Deakin had left that night, and when I realised I hadn’t gone to lay flowers on her grave, I became distraught all over again and blamed Matthew for not reminding me.

Which was hardly fair, as I’d never told him her birth date, something he refrained from pointing out, telling me instead that I could go the next morning.

I still haven’t been because, physically, I can’t. I take two pills before I go to bed so that I sleep all through the night and each morning, before he goes to work, Matthew – taking to heart Dr Deakin’s admonishment that I should rest – brings me another two along with my breakfast tray. It means that the anxiety I always feel once he’s left for work has dulled by the time I’ve showered and dressed. The downside is that, by mid-morning, I feel so sluggish that it’s hard to put one foot in front of the other. I spend most of my days drifting between wake and sleep, sprawled on the sofa, the television switched to the shopping channel because I can’t summon the energy to change it. Sometimes, in the background, I’m vaguely aware of the telephone ringing but it barely pierces my consciousness, and because I never answer, the calls become less frequent. He still calls, just to let me know that he hasn’t forgotten me, but I enjoy imagining his frustration at not being able to get hold of me.

Life is easy. The pills, powerful though they are,

allow me to function on some sort of level because the The Breakdown





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washing gets done, the dishwasher gets loaded and the


house gets tidied. I never really remember doing any doing of it, which should worry me more than it does because it means the pills are playing havoc with my already failing memory. If I were sensible, I would half the dose. But if I were sensible, I wouldn’t have needed the pills in the first place. Maybe if I ate a little more the pills wouldn’t affect me as much but it seems that I’ve lost my appetite as well as my mind. The breakfast Matthew brings me goes into the bottom of the bin and I always skip lunch because I’m too drowsy to eat. So my only meal of the day is the one I make in the evening to have with Matthew.