#oneaday Day 678: Wasteland Diaries, Part 26

Annie’s question haunts me.

“What are you going to do? Are you going to give him what he wants?”

As I lie awake staring at the ceiling — a familiar sight by now after many sleepless nights — I ponder it. Will I give him what he wants? I’m still not sure if I can, particularly after all this. When it happens — if it happens at all — I want it to be because we’re both ready and able to support both ourselves and the little one — oh God, a little person, an actual real human person…

I screw my eyes up and pull the pillow around my ears as if muffling the sounds of the outside world will also muffle out the thoughts whirling around the inside of my head. I’m going in circles, around and around and around. I don’t even know if the possibilities I’m considering are even, well, possibilities. But my brain, on edge as it is right now, is flitting from one extreme to the other of what might happen when — if — he comes around. And for all I know, that might never happen. Although if that were so why did his–

I growl to myself, more to break the silence than anything else, and the sudden noise in the otherwise almost completely silent room distracts me for a short while. Then it’s back to that sound of emptiness. In the near-silence, all the other sounds seem amplified. There’s the whirring sound of the fridge, the gurgling sound of the dodgy boiler, the sloshing of water in the pipes. Outside I can hear the occasional car going past, the occasional shouting drunkard in the street. These are all sounds so familiar to me by now that I just tune them out usually, but now they’re providing welcome distraction from the thoughts in my head.

Before long, though, they fade into the background once more, and I find myself asking the same questions over and over again. Will I be welcome back into his life? Do I want him back in my life? Could I give him what he wants? Will he give me what I want?

After all, we actually both want the same thing. The only difference is that he wants — wanted — it now, I want it when things are more stable. I couldn’t bring up a child in the situation we were in. It wasn’t that I didn’t want it at all, it’s that it just wouldn’t work, and it would end up tearing us apart. The ironic thing is the way I handled it all ended up tearing us apart anyway. Perhaps if I’d just talked to him, we could have worked it all out, come to a compromise.

But it’s too late to think about that now. He’s lying there, unaware of anything and everything. I don’t even know if he’s dreaming, if he’s aware of what’s going on around him, if he’ll even remember me when he comes back. His reaction showed me that he was on the edge, that his life depended on me, on us.

Do I want that? Do I want him to be dependent on me? I’m not sure I do. I can’t be responsible for the happiness of one human being so completely. Can I? It’s what I’d have to do if I was a mother, so why not–

My thoughts are cut abruptly short by the shrill, piercing ring of the ancient telephone in my flat. It used to belong to my parents and is seriously retro, but I could never bring myself to part with it. Right now its mechanical ring is echoing around my brain. It feels like the loudest sound I’ve ever heard. And it’s frightening.

Phone calls in the middle of the night are only ever bad news. But what could it be? Could it–

I don’t have time to sit around thinking about it. It’ll stop ringing in a moment and despite my fear, I have to know what it is. I leap out of bed and run to the phone in the hallway, snatching it up to my ear and breathlessly muttering “Hello?” just as the person on the other end is saying something to someone else, probably wondering where I am.

“Oh, hello,” comes a familiar voice, their conversation cutting off hastily. “Is that… Evie? Evie Anderton?”

“Yes,” I say, panting. It isn’t far from the bedroom to the hallway but I feel like I’ve just run a marathon.

“I’m sorry to disturb you so late,” says the voice. “This is Dr. Clarkson down at the hospital.”

So that’s his name.

“Hello, Doctor,” I say. “Is… everything all right?”

There’s a pause.

“I… I’m not sure over the phone is the best way to do this,” Clarkson says. “If it’s not too inconvenient for you, I think you might want to get down here quickly.”

My heart leaps into my mouth, and my gut ties itself into a knot. What does he mean? What could have happened? Why is he calling me? Why is–

“Please hurry,” says Clarkson. “I’m sorry I can’t explain more. But if you’re coming, come quickly.”

I slam the phone down without saying goodbye, hastily grabbing the keys off the table in the hallway and bursting out into the street without putting any shoes on. It’s cold outside, and it’s raining heavily. I pull my robe more tightly around myself for warmth, but it doesn’t really matter to me right now. I have to get there.

My bare feet splash through puddles on the floor, spattering the legs of my pyjamas with droplets of water, sticking them to my ankles. But it doesn’t matter. I have to get there.

I round the corner, ignoring the funny looks I get from the few people still wandering the streets at this time of night — mostly drunks and tramps, I guess — and follow the familiar route through the streets to the hospital. The rain is worsening. There’s a flash of lightning and a clap of thunder almost immediately. The storm must be right overhead. But it doesn’t matter. I have to get there.

I burst through the front doors of the hospital and charge straight past the reception area. I hear someone calling after me, then a murmured call to security. But it doesn’t matter. I have to get there.

I take the stairs two at a time — I can’t wait for the lift, I have to keep moving — until I’m on the floor I’ve been to so many times by now. I charge past a tired-looking nurse in the corridor before he can say anything, and see the door to the room I’ve been in so many times in front of me.

Clarkson is sitting on one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs outside the room. He stands at my approach, a warm, fatherly look in his eyes. I want to cry, but there’s no time. What has happened?

“Follow me,” he says solemnly, pushing open the door to the room.

I follow him, knowing nothing except one thing: for better or worse, what I’m about to see will mean the end of this particular nightmare.