XI | Something Changed
❦
My name wasn’t always
Tammie.
The things that
happened to me
that resulted
in my coming here
before you
were—
An unwanted voice.
‘Fiona?
‘Are you alright?’
One of the nurses.
Or both.
It’s hard to tell
above the sound of
the water falling.
Tammie
covers her mouth
with both hands,
grey eyes
alight
with laughter.
I don’t find this very funny.
‘What should I do?’
I ask her.
She shrugs,
water dripping through her bedraggled hair
like loose threads.
You’d look pretty
in long hair.
No way.
It’ll make my eczema worse.
Our clothes
are soaked.
For the first time,
I realise
she’s wearing different clothes already.
Did she bathe
before waking me up?
I must have slept
for
a long time.
You’ll need to bathe again.
It’s okay.
Her giggling is like music.
Then
the nurse’s voice again.
‘Fiona!
‘What are you doing in there?’
I motion for Tammie
to keep
absolutely silent.
‘I’m bathing!’
I yell over the sound of water.
‘Without a towel?
‘Did something happen?’
‘No!’
My mind is blank
with confusion,
wondering what
made the nurses
interfere
when they were
perfectly
good
shadows
before.
Something’s definitely wrong
with this place.
‘Can you get me one?’
I say.
‘I forgot.’
Silence.
Tammie has both hands
over her mouth,
water still cascading
down her head.
She watches me
take off my clothes,
throw them in
a wet corner,
waiting for the nurse
to come back
with a towel.
There’s a knock on the door.
I open it a crack.
A towel is stuffed through.
I mumble thanks,
switch off the water
and leave Tammie
in there
alone.
The nurses check me over
for cuts and bruises.
Then, they fling
the cubicle door open
to check inside.
Tammie stands there
in her soaked clothes,
dripping hair,
grey eyes stormy
and haunted,
staring right at me.
What have you done?
I sneeze.
❦
After letting me
get changed,
I sit with Tammie
in the study room
until bed time.
We stay silent,
curled in the warm chair,
fan stirring our damp hair,
waiting for 9pm.
Only the plain nurse
watches us.
(The pretty one
disappeared
somewhere.)
I’m worried about
what happened before
but the plain nurse
catches my staring
and smiles reassuringly.
‘I didn’t do anything,’
I say for the
umpteenth
time.
She nods.
And the three of us
lapse into silence
again.
When the rooms
open,
I lie on my bed
determined
again
to stay up till the morning.
But the pretty nurse returns,
switches off the light,
and the next thing I know,
it’s morning.
I’m woken by
the nurses
because it’s medicine time again.
I sit up,
rubbing my eyes.
Tammie
isn’t here.
❦
I eat the dozen pills
on the paper plate in front of me
and follow the angmoh nurse
out
to wait for
Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata
to end.
❦
I spend the day
in the study room,
drawing pictures
on scraps of paper.
Writing captions
for the abstract, undecipherable images.
Time passes
in a blur.
And Moonlight Sonata
is seeping
through the walls again.
The nurses follow me
to the main hall.
They stand behind me
as I wait for my turn.
Familiar eyes watch me
from another armchair.
My name is called.
A dozen pills and a paper cup.
Bathing time.
Bed time.
The sun rising,
a dozen pills.
The sun setting,
some more pills.
Time passes by like this.
Until one day,
I wake up
and there are no nurses
in my room.
I eat breakfast alone.
I wait for medicine time alone.
For the first time in a week,
I go to the greenhouse
alone.
❦
