Behind Her Eyes

‘Pinch myself and say I’m awake? Every hour? You want me to go around this place doing that? Like we don’t have enough people thinking we’re crazy.’

‘Then it won’t matter.’

‘If you say so.’

‘And what’s with the fingers?’

The spot by the river under the tree has become theirs, and while the spell of weather holds they spend their free time there, happily lazing under the branches in the warmth.

‘Your hands look different when you’re dreaming. I learned all about it in a book David gave me when I was little. My parents took it away from me – they said it was rubbish, I think David did too a little bit – but it wasn’t. It taught me everything I’m going to teach you.’ She’s almost content, and although the moments like this are fleeting and she’s still filled with grief and guilt that she hasn’t dealt with yet, they are definitely more frequent. Becoming friends with Rob has saved her from herself. He’s bringing her back to life.

‘They’re right about you,’ Rob says. ‘You are crazy.’

She swats at him and laughs. ‘It’s true. You’ll see. Same with the time. Time is never consistent in a dream. Clocks change faster.’

‘I am awake.’ He smiles at her. ‘See? I’m doing it.’ He wiggles his fingers and stares at them.

‘You don’t have to do it all at the same time.’

‘If I’m going to look like a mental,’ Rob says, ‘then I intend to look like a proper mental.’

Adele looks at her own hands, dry blue paint under her nails, David’s watch face glinting in the sunlight. Rob was right, and the nurses are pleased with her new water art – if it can be called that – but it’s not helping her lay her family to rest. Instead, she’s found she imagines the old disused well in the woods at the back of her parents’ house. She sees herself standing beside it and pouring her past into it. Maybe one day she’ll find it metaphorically full, and then she can cover it over and move on. Maybe then she’ll sleep. Like she used to. She’s missing that time behind her own eyes. It’s a part of her, and guilt isn’t enough to shut it off completely.

‘Just do it, Rob,’ she says. ‘You’ll thank me.’

‘Okay, okay. Only for you though.’ He winks at her and they smile at each other, and the warmth isn’t only from the sunshine, but from within her for a moment too.