The Water Cure(42)

They remain quiet. It’s natural to avoid the broken thing, to distance yourself from it.

‘I really don’t think it will solve anything, Lia,’ Grace says finally. My chest aches. I cough to try and relieve it.

‘Well, that’s that, then,’ I say, and we leave the room as quickly as we entered. Grace puts her arm around Sky’s shoulders so easily, her wet skin leaving the back of her dress transparent. The soaked fabric is thin and blue, and for a second I think of a ghost, the loose pucker of limbs. I have to shake my head to get the image out.





I decided I would take matters into my own hands, that I too could be vengeful. I would make him dissolve with fear like an aspirin in the glass, I would have him fall to the ground and beg me for mercy. Why not? There was only me, my women wanted no part of the plan. They told me I would die trying. I told them I didn’t care. And I didn’t.





On the sixth day without Mother I go straight outside after waking, not bothering to eat. There’s no one around as I move through the corridors, and for a second I permit myself the fantasy that a boat has come, that everyone else has been taken up on it. But it’s only enjoyable because it’s not real. If the last year has taught me anything, it is that being alone is corrosive. I am a person unable to handle it.

I collect a long fingertip of dust from the lip of a vase, a solitary object on the mantelpiece in the hall. It is empty except for a wasp dying in its own sound, vibrating dully against the porcelain. Suffer, I mouth at it.

Somewhere in the night, alone in the bed once more, I woke up and realized there is nothing I wouldn’t do for him. It felt very simple with no other thoughts, without the detritus of everyday sensations, preoccupations. A reminder of how straightforward love can be, sometimes, when it all falls into place.

I find Llew playing tennis with Gwil, and I sit cross-legged on the sandy dirt outside the court, picking at my nails, listening to the sound of them batting the ball back and forth. Gwil’s shouts of ‘Yes!’, Llew’s answering laugh. He must be letting the boy win. Dust stipples my feet in my sandals. I dig my nails into my shin, near to my ankle, so it looks like an insect or a snake could have bitten me. It seems like for ever before the two of them come out of the court, both sweating. Llew gives Gwil a slap on the hand, arms raised high, and turns to me.

‘What’s up?’ he asks, the smile on his face falling a little. Gwil swats his racquet around, listening to us.

‘I just thought I’d come and find you,’ I say, self-conscious. ‘To see if you wanted to do something.’ I do not say anything, we can do anything you want, not in front of the child, though if he was not there I might fall to my knees on the ground and beg.

‘I’m busy,’ he says. ‘Sorry.’ He turns to Gwil. ‘Another game?’ The child nods. As they walk back on to the court, I run behind them. When I grab hold of Llew’s arm, he stops.

‘Please,’ I say, my mouth dry. ‘Please. You don’t understand.’ He tries to draw his arm away, but I cling on. He pushes me once, then again, more forcefully, but I do not let go.

‘Don’t move!’ I tell him, too loudly. ‘Please.’ I can feel love slipping past me like a fast breeze. Like draining water. I am ready to humiliate myself, if that is what it takes. He pushes me a third time and I fall back, stagger hard to the ground. I am on my knees after all. Gwil looks at me in alarm.

‘What’s wrong with you?’ Llew asks me, rubbing at his arm.

‘Nothing!’ I say. ‘But stay with me. Stay.’ I get up, lunge for him again, but he just steps back further.

‘Can you not, in front of the boy?’ Llew demands. ‘Can you please be normal for a second?’

I do not know why loving like everyone else is so unnatural to me. Llew holds up his hands, beckons for Gwil to shelter behind him, as if I am dangerous, as if I am repulsive. Maybe I am. He must know, I think, as if in a trance. He must be able to tell what is going on, even at his age. He’s still a man. This is still all his to come, his heritage, his right.

‘This is all getting a bit much, isn’t it?’ says Llew, attempting to be kinder, to defuse the situation. ‘What has got into you?’ A small pause. I understand that he is trying to shame me for my need, but unfortunately for him and for me I am totally shameless in this regard, I will demonstrate my need over and over for anyone who asks. I would take my strange and incapable heart out of my chest if I could, display it, absolve myself of responsibility.

When I slap him, hard, in the face, his first reaction is surprise.

‘You just hit me,’ he says, feeling out the damage, which is minimal. ‘Didn’t think you had it in you.’

Gwil drops the racquet. He runs to the other end of the court, bleats for someone to come and help, but nobody is around.

I try to lash out at Llew again but he grasps my wrists, holds them tight to immobilize me.

‘Right,’ he says. ‘I’ve had just about enough of all this.’ He shakes me. ‘Pull yourself together.’

The mark my body has left on his is fading already. My whole strength has barely any effect. My anger cannot touch him, cannot even be taken seriously. He is moving away from me all the time.

‘We had a good thing going on, I know. But I don’t fucking belong to you,’ he tells me as I give up the struggle and stand there before him, cowed, staring at him with stinging eyes. He still holds both of my wrists painfully, my palms grazed. I cannot move and I do not want to. ‘I don’t think I’ve done anything to give you that impression.’