Escaping Daddy. Maria Landon

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СКАЧАТЬ always tried to hide from everyone the fact that I wasn’t coping but Doris, my social worker, had been able to see how much stress I was under beneath my seemingly cheerful, argumentative exterior. Doris had introduced me to a nice woman who worked as a foster mother and she had been doing a bit of babysitting for me, giving me a chance to get out and have a break now and then. As the darkness of my despair threatened to engulf me once and for all I took Brendan round to her house and asked if I could leave him with her for a while. She agreed immediately without asking any questions. She was a kind woman and I knew he would be in safe hands for as long as he was with her. I think perhaps I hoped that she would adopt him once I was gone, because she had already formed a bond with him.

      It was agonising to say goodbye to the baby I loved more than anything in the world, to walk away from him feeling as if my insides were being physically torn from my body, but at the same time I was in a hurry now that I had made up my mind to get the whole thing over, eager to move on to a better place, or at least to be at peace, and to finally put an end to the pain. If Brendan was going to be better off being brought up by someone else I didn’t want to have to be around to watch it happening; I wouldn’t have been able to bear that. It was better that I acted quickly and decisively to end my life for everyone’s sake. He would be free to get on with his life and I would be free of the pain.

      I took him from his pram on the pretext of checking he was dry and comfortable, and held him for as long as I could bear, drinking in the scent of his skin as I kissed him for the last time and passed him across to the kind foster mother who had no idea of the turmoil churning around inside my mind. I was always good at hiding what I was feeling, giving people the impression that I was on top of everything, that I didn’t have a care in the world.

      After handing him into her care I left the house without looking back because I couldn’t bear to see his trusting little face watching me go, and I walked straight back to my flat. I didn’t want to think about anything else now that the final decision had been taken. It was a relief to be able to work on autopilot. The pain in my heart was so agonising I was frantic to numb it as quickly as possible.

      I had been saving up paracetamol for weeks, knowing that this moment would come, that I would eventually have to admit defeat and give up Brendan and my life. Stockpiling tablets whenever the opportunity presented itself had been a habit of mine for many years. Knowing that I had them there was like knowing that there was an emergency exit available to me if life became intolerable. Having a potential way out sometimes made life seem a little more bearable during the years when I was with Dad or locked up in one children’s home or another.

      That morning, the moment I was alone behind my own front door I swallowed the tablets in greedy mouthfuls, washing them down with swigs of cheap wine. Then I sat down and waited for them to take effect, relieved to have finally made the decision to give up the struggle and to go on to somewhere peaceful. I was in a confused and emotional state already and once the tablets started working their way into my system reality became even more blurred, the world around me drifting into a sort of comfortable haze, a bit like a waking dream. The pain was fading just as I had hoped and life began to float away from me.

      I could hear the phone ringing but I couldn’t make any logical decision as to whether to answer it or not. In the end my hand just picked it up, like a robot, wanting to stop it from making such an irritating noise, and I put it to my ear. The deep voice on the other end was unfamiliar and I had to struggle to take in the words, forcing my brain to try to make sense of them and my mouth to respond in the way that the caller might expect. It sounded like a kind voice, someone who was trying to make a connection with me. It was probably only a few seconds but it seemed like an age before I realised it was a man called Rodney I had met a few days before, who had asked for my number. There must have been something comfortable and reassuring about him that had struck a chord because I had given him the number without hesitating, which I would never normally do with a stranger.

      Who knows why he chose that moment to make a call? Maybe there was some higher force directing his actions, someone or something that wanted to stop me from doing what I was doing, or maybe it was just a lucky break.

      I forced my brain to focus on what he was saying. It sounded as though he was asking me out. I didn’t have the nerve to tell him I couldn’t accept the invitation because I would be dead in a few hours’ time. I don’t know if the words that were coming out of my mouth were even making sense by that stage as I strained to make normal conversation.

      The call from Rodney gave me a cause to hope, a tiny straw to cling to. It sounded to my desperate ears as if he was my knight in shining armour. When you are as near to the edge of the precipice as I was, the smallest thing can tip you either way. Just hearing from another human being, knowing that someone out there thought it was worth picking up a phone to call me, that this man was actually wanting to get to know me, made things feel different. By the time I finished the conversation and hung up, my life no longer seemed to be the same terrible black hole of despair it had been just a few minutes earlier. I had even managed to make a date to meet him, but meanwhile the drugs I had put into my system were well into the process of closing my life down.

      Now that things weren’t as painful and bleak as they had seemed before his call I no longer wanted to die but my head felt so heavy I wanted more than anything else to lie down and go to sleep. This stranger on the phone had thrown me a lifeline and I grabbed it, battling to stay awake, knowing that once I gave in to sleep that would be the end, that by the time anyone found me I would be long dead. I had to keep going, but the drugs had penetrated deep into my blood by then, relentlessly doing their work of shutting everything down. I had just enough brain cells functioning to know that I couldn’t do this on my own, I had to get help.

      I didn’t have the strength left for more than one phone call by then. Not able to think of anyone else to turn to as I struggled to stay awake, I forced myself to concentrate for a few more seconds and dialled my mum’s number. If my brain had been functioning logically I would have tried to think of someone else. This was the woman who had disappeared for most of my childhood and although we were back in contact again, there was no maternal bond between us. But in those moments, as my life was slipping away, I wanted my mum to be the one who was there for me. No way would I ever have wanted to rely on her for support or advice if I had had a choice–but I didn’t. She was my only chance.

      As soon as she answered I somehow managed to make her understand what I had done despite the fact that I could hardly get the words out. She made it clear to me that she was pissed off to have me messing up her day but a few minutes after hanging up the phone and lying back on the verge of surrendering to sleep, I heard the distant wail of an ambulance siren responding to her call. I was drifting in and out of consciousness by the time it arrived at my door and fell silent, replaced by the sounds of running feet and banging doors. At that moment I gave in to the tablets, knowing I was no longer alone as I slipped into unconsciousness, only vaguely aware of feeling myself being lifted onto a stretcher.

      In hospital, after I had my stomach pumped, a psychiatrist came to talk to me, and then within a day they were releasing me back to my old life and all the problems that came with it. I was terrified that now they would take Brendan into care but to my surprise, Doris gave such a glowing report on my mothering skills that they didn’t even mention it. They said they weren’t surprised I felt suicidal after everything I had been through in my life and that they would look around for more ways to support me.

      I’d been given another chance. Now it was up to me to try and make it work.

       Chapter Three A Ready-Made Family

      When Rodney first spotted me from the window of his van as I pushed Brendan’s pram along the pavement, there was no way either of us could tell anything СКАЧАТЬ