Page 51 of Before You Say Goodbye

“So does Maddie,” Bowie said belligerently. Autumn couldn’t argue with that. Perhaps there was even an argument that Maddie might love him more. She was the only one to try to respect his wishes and would be no less devastated by his death than any of the others.

“I know they love me,” Bowie said. “That’s never been something I have to worry about. And I know how lucky I am to have people who care so much. I just wish they loved me enough to let me make my own decisions. But they’re not thinking about me. They’re thinking about themselves.”

Chapter 10

When they brought Bowie home from hospital, everything was different, both physically and emotionally. The moments of high energy and happiness he’d enjoyed before had gone and he was barely able to walk across the room. Marley had broken a couple of his brother’s ribs in his effort to save him, but that was the least of Bowie’s issues. His entire body was swollen and bruised, his backache was ten times worse than it had been and his headaches had increased in severity. His pain was no longer sporadic, it was constant and unbearable. Bowie made it very clear that he held them all responsible. Every time he writhed in agony, he glared at whoever was nearest to him. He barely spoke to anyone except to snap at them all. Even Autumn and Maddie, the only people he permitted to touch him, were not immune to his rage. He had warned Autumn once that he was ungracious when he was ill. She knew now what he’d meant. At times he was so rude, ungrateful and selfish that she didn’t like him very much at all. He took every twinge out on the people around him and the Whittles retreated into themselves in a way Autumn hadn’t thought they would ever do. She found herself wishing he’d accepted the palliative care he’d been offered by the doctor. They were out of their depths here — drowning in a sea of despair — but when she dared broach the subject with him, he snapped at her. He didn’t want strangers in his home. He didn’t want anyone he didn’t know to see him like this.

Maddie feigned strength in Bowie’s presence but, when he wasn’t in the room, she sat alone and cried. Sometimes Ben tried to comfort her, but she would push him away. She was almost as angry as Bowie at their parents for going against his wishes, and even angrier that they still — despite the state of him — couldn’t see that what they had done had been wrong.

Everyone else was different too. Bluebell barely acknowledged anyone. She stayed close to Bowie and tried to help him as best she could but, mostly, he ignored her. Eventually, she took the hint and stopped trying altogether. Still, she spent her days close by, usually staring at the television screen and watching him out of the corner of her eye.

Marley barely came out of his bedroom. He’d tried, earnestly, early on, to get his brother to talk to him but Bowie constantly ordered him to leave him alone. Pip and Marley were sharing a bed, because Marley cried so violently in the night that Pip was afraid that he might get up and attempt to take his own life.

Autumn was greatly concerned for her friends and their mental states, but she didn’t have any time or energy to attempt to help them. She was far too busy trying to lift Bowie’s spirits all by herself.

He was awake all night almost every night. He’d curl into a ball in their bed and clutch his chest or grab his head in his hands, trying to concentrate his way through waves of pain. One night, a violent spasm took him so much by surprise that he bit through his lip until it bled everywhere. Autumn did everything she could think of to help him. She stroked him wherever he hurt, tried to distract him with stories or aimless chatter, let him squeeze her hand a little too hard when he needed to. His mood swung unpredictably between desperately frightened and terribly sad. When she wasn’t there, he called for her constantly, shooing away anyone else when they tried to tend to him instead. He never said it, but she knew he had grown afraid of being alone. Even when they were sleeping next to one another, Bowie would wake her up as soon as he was conscious, just so that he wouldn’t be by himself. There was nothing Autumn could do to help him, but she would rush to be beside him whenever he called. It was terrifying. His cancer was taking him out pieceby piece. His body would either survive it or it wouldn’t. All they could do was wait.

When things got really bad, Bowie would ask Autumn to kill him. Those were the worst times. It was always during the night, when she was feeling at her most fragile, and nobody was around to stop her if she gave in to him. He would hold her body close to his and beg her, sometimes for hours at a time, to end his suffering for him.

“I can feel it, it’s in my head. Please find a way to help me die, Autumn. Please.”

Autumn would largely ignore his requests, hushing and soothing him with meaningless words. She felt so terribly sad for him, so unbelievably sickened by it all, that some nights she would start to think about it. On those occasions, Bowie would sense her self-doubt and latch on to it.

“You could smother me,” he’d say. “Just knock me out with alcohol and smother me in my sleep.”

“I’d get caught,” she would reply. “Do you want me to spend the rest of my life in prison?”

“Then buy me some strong painkillers. Leave them by the bed and I’ll take them myself.”

“No.”

“Autumn—”

“No, Bowie!”

For the first few days after Bowie was discharged, she felt as though she was managing quite well, but — after a fortnight — when Autumn realised she hadn’t showered for four days, eaten in twenty-four hours or slept for any period longer than an hour for almost a week, she started crying in the shower one afternoon and found she couldn’t stop. She tried everything, but every time she quelled her sobs for more than a few seconds, they returned more obvious and violent than ever.

In the end she gave in, resolving that the family would have to see her cry today. It would be the first time since Bowie’s heart attack that she’d let any of them see her being emotional. She’d pretended to everyone, thus far, that she was coping just fine.

She wrapped her hair in a towel and pulled on a dressing gown, preparing herself for concerned conversations about the state she was in. As she padded down the corridor, relieved to feel at least clean at last, she heard Bowie calling for her from the bedroom and froze, realising she wasn’t going to be able to go to him. She couldn’t take another day of it. She was sick of the same four walls, of the endless cups of tea, of the crying and sobbing and screaming. Autumn willed her legs to take her into their bedroom, but she felt paralysed.

Her reluctant feet turned left into the living room instead of right towards their bedroom. Emma and Ben were sitting, still and silent, on the sofa. Autumn marched past them and out of the front door. She tore her towel turban from her head and threw it down on the grass. She didn’t know where she was going, she only knew that she needed to be out of there and on her own.

She tore barefoot and shivering across the garden and into the shrubbery that surrounded it. Distraught, she sat against the trunk of an oak tree in a wooded area at the front of the house, as far away from the bedroom she shared with Bowie as she could get without leaving the grounds. She pulled her dressing gown around herself, put her head in her hands, and wailed. For the first time in a very long time, although she knew she could completely surround herself with people if she wanted to, she felt totally on her own. She stayed there for hours, well aware that Bowie would be upset by her disappearance. He would be forced to accept help from people he was angry at for their betrayal. But she couldn’t bring herself to go back to him.

It was dark when Marley came looking for her. He headed straight to where she was sitting. Autumn fathomed there were security cameras somewhere she didn’t know about. She bet they had been watching her. She didn’t care. Maybe it would do them good to see what they were doing to her.

He sat down next to her, saying nothing. Autumn hid her head in her hands, feigning indifference. They stayed that way for almost an hour. He listened to her crying without a word and she felt supported by the heat of his body beside her. Eventually, she collapsed in on herself and sought his comfort. Marley wrapped his arms around her, kissing the top of her head.

“I’m sorry, Autumn,” he whispered.

His voice was kind and his arms protective and strong. She realised nobody had held her in weeks. Marley smelt and felt the same way Bowie did, so she wound her hand in his jumper and closed her eyes, pretending it was Bowie’s chest she was nestled into instead. Marley rested his chin on her head, the way Bowie sometimes did in bed. He let her hold on to him until she stopped crying. She wondered, guiltily, if he knew she was pretending he was his brother. If he did, he didn’t say. He let her rest against him until she’d stopped crying, then encouraged her to look up into his eyes by cupping her face in his hand.

“Done?” he asked softly. She nodded. “OK, then. The family wants to talk to you. When you’re ready.”

Autumn was gripped by sudden fear. She remembered their very early conversations in the apartment in New York, when Emma had warned her that she’d need to act like part of the family — she’d need to put her own feelings to one side and let them focus on Bowie’s care — or else she wouldn’t be welcome to stay with them. She knew Bowie would never let them make her leave, but she was still worried she’d lose their blessing to be here, and now, though she’d wanted nothing more than space allday, she wanted nothing except to be back in the arms of their family as night approached.

“Are you going to send me home?” she asked Marley.

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