bottle on the bedside table is full.
‘I’m not an idiot. I’m not losing my mind. Fucking shitty horrible fucking cancer hasn’t got there yet!’ His voice has grown louder and a little higher in pitch. ‘I know you’re just waiting. I know you hate me. I know you can’t wait for me to go. I’m not fucking stupid.’ He makes a noise like a sob. ‘Don’t think I’m not fucking stupid.’
He means ‘Don’t think I’m fucking stupid’, not what he actually said, with the almost certainly unmeant ‘not’ in the phrase, which entirely turns the meaning on its head.
Up until as little as a few months ago I’d have pointed this out, because, well, it’s just wrong. However, I am learning not to do this all the time. He’s very ill, and constantly either in a lot of pain or so loaded with opiates he struggles to think straight, so he deserves to be indulged. I recognise this. Also, picking him up on this kind of minor mistake only leads to further argument and vexation, and it’s pointless. I’m not dealing with a child still learning the ways of the world and how language works; he’s a dying man. There’s nothing to be gained trying to teach him new things or reinforce stuff he ought to know because he’ll need this information for his life ahead; he hasn’t got one.
And, of course, he’s right, in a way. I am waiting for him to die. I don’t necessarily want him to die (my deepest wish is that things could go on the way they were, just the two of us living here, minding our own business, like we did before the cancer got so bad and spread so far and he became so dependent on me), but knowing that his death is as close to inevitable as these things get, and not far off, makes me wish it was all over with sometimes. Apart from anything else, my knowing he doesn’t have very much longer to live helps make it easier to ignore the insults and curses and the general unpleasantness that him being in this state leads to.
If I faced a lifetime of this, or let’s say ten more years – or maybe just five, or even two – I think I’d kill him, or myself, or run away.
I point at the biscuit-tin lid of drugs. ‘Have you taken the purple ones?’
‘What?’ He glances, then winces with the pain that must have come with the movement. ‘No. Maybe. I don’t know.’
‘You should wait until I’m here before—’
‘Oh, shut up. I don’t know. What are they?’
I pick up the pack. ‘Larpeptiphyl,’ I read off the label.
‘Stupid fucking name. Stupid as the names in that idiot game you play all the fucking time. I think you make half of these up. Is that really what it says? Let me see it.’
‘Here.’
‘Well, where are my glasses ? What am I supposed to do with … What have you done with my glasses?’ For the last couple of years Guy has needed glasses to see things close up. He is vain about this; he would have had laser surgery on his eyes to correct them instead if he’d been well enough.
‘I haven’t done anything with them,’ I tell him. ‘Last time I saw them they were round your neck.’ I wish they were on his head; that’s where they would be in a sit-com. ‘They’ll be in a drawer probably …’ I go to open one of the bedside cabinet drawers but he flaps a hand at me.
‘Never mind. You’ve worn me out with all this bollocks. Just let me sleep.’
I look at the pack of Larpeptiphyl, counting the empty, punctured blisters. ‘You need to take two of these.’
‘Trying to make me overdose now, are you?’
‘No. You haven’t taken the ones for tonight. See?’
‘How do you know?’
‘I counted.’
‘You counted,’ he says, as though spitting the words. I pop the purple pills from their little clear plastic bubbles. ‘Yeah, that’s all you can do, isn’t it? Count. That’s what you’re good at. That’s all you can do: just count. You don’t even have the people skills to be a fucking accountant, do you? I wasted my fucking life on you. I don’t
‘I’m not an idiot. I’m not losing my mind. Fucking shitty horrible fucking cancer hasn’t got there yet!’ His voice has grown louder and a little higher in pitch. ‘I know you’re just waiting. I know you hate me. I know you can’t wait for me to go. I’m not fucking stupid.’ He makes a noise like a sob. ‘Don’t think I’m not fucking stupid.’
He means ‘Don’t think I’m fucking stupid’, not what he actually said, with the almost certainly unmeant ‘not’ in the phrase, which entirely turns the meaning on its head.
Up until as little as a few months ago I’d have pointed this out, because, well, it’s just wrong. However, I am learning not to do this all the time. He’s very ill, and constantly either in a lot of pain or so loaded with opiates he struggles to think straight, so he deserves to be indulged. I recognise this. Also, picking him up on this kind of minor mistake only leads to further argument and vexation, and it’s pointless. I’m not dealing with a child still learning the ways of the world and how language works; he’s a dying man. There’s nothing to be gained trying to teach him new things or reinforce stuff he ought to know because he’ll need this information for his life ahead; he hasn’t got one.
And, of course, he’s right, in a way. I am waiting for him to die. I don’t necessarily want him to die (my deepest wish is that things could go on the way they were, just the two of us living here, minding our own business, like we did before the cancer got so bad and spread so far and he became so dependent on me), but knowing that his death is as close to inevitable as these things get, and not far off, makes me wish it was all over with sometimes. Apart from anything else, my knowing he doesn’t have very much longer to live helps make it easier to ignore the insults and curses and the general unpleasantness that him being in this state leads to.
If I faced a lifetime of this, or let’s say ten more years – or maybe just five, or even two – I think I’d kill him, or myself, or run away.
I point at the biscuit-tin lid of drugs. ‘Have you taken the purple ones?’
‘What?’ He glances, then winces with the pain that must have come with the movement. ‘No. Maybe. I don’t know.’
‘You should wait until I’m here before—’
‘Oh, shut up. I don’t know. What are they?’
I pick up the pack. ‘Larpeptiphyl,’ I read off the label.
‘Stupid fucking name. Stupid as the names in that idiot game you play all the fucking time. I think you make half of these up. Is that really what it says? Let me see it.’
‘Here.’
‘Well, where are my glasses ? What am I supposed to do with … What have you done with my glasses?’ For the last couple of years Guy has needed glasses to see things close up. He is vain about this; he would have had laser surgery on his eyes to correct them instead if he’d been well enough.
‘I haven’t done anything with them,’ I tell him. ‘Last time I saw them they were round your neck.’ I wish they were on his head; that’s where they would be in a sit-com. ‘They’ll be in a drawer probably …’ I go to open one of the bedside cabinet drawers but he flaps a hand at me.
‘Never mind. You’ve worn me out with all this bollocks. Just let me sleep.’
I look at the pack of Larpeptiphyl, counting the empty, punctured blisters. ‘You need to take two of these.’
‘Trying to make me overdose now, are you?’
‘No. You haven’t taken the ones for tonight. See?’
‘How do you know?’
‘I counted.’
‘You counted,’ he says, as though spitting the words. I pop the purple pills from their little clear plastic bubbles. ‘Yeah, that’s all you can do, isn’t it? Count. That’s what you’re good at. That’s all you can do: just count. You don’t even have the people skills to be a fucking accountant, do you? I wasted my fucking life on you. I don’t
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