Page 24 of Insomnia

“So if it wasn’t Ben,” Robert says when we’ve said our apologetic goodbyes to a mollified Michelle, “then whatdidmake him wet himself?” That suspicion is back in his face.

“It wasn’t me.” I’m cold this time, tired of trying to explain myself. “Maybe we should take him to a doctor. He had a bad head and then was just staring into space, isn’t that what Michelle said? Maybe he’s got an inner ear infection.”

“That doesn’t explain the drawings.”

“And I’m going to deal with that right now.” Phoebe. Bloody Phoebe. I get my mobile from my handbag and go to my study, closing the door. There’s no place for Robert in this conversation.

“What the hell do you think you’re playing at?” I snap as soon as she answers. “What have you told Will? Abouther? He’s having nightmares—and he wet himself at school. None of that shit back then was my fault, Phoebe, it never was, and I won’t have you bringing it into Will’s life. I’m sorry you’re still so resentful, I’m sorry you think I somehow had it all better than you afterward, andI’m sorry you’re on your own, but I don’t want you near us for a while. Do you understand?”

I’m shaking when I finally stop my rant, and then there’s a long silence at the other end.

“Are you still there?”

“She’s dead,” Phoebe says, eventually.

“What?”

“Mum. She’s dead.”

Airwhoomphsfrom my lungs, a sudden sharp exhale, and for a moment I forget to breathe back in.

“I came back to her room and she was dead.” Her voice is quiet. Controlled. “I should have stayed.” She lets out a long breath and in its raggedy sound I can hear all her contained emotion.

“What happened, Emma? She was fine when I left her with you.What did you do?”

21.

I lie awake all night, itching to get up, to check on the kids, to go downstairs, to complete all my new nighttime routines that are becoming more obsessive compulsive than habit. I can’t risk it though. Our bed is full of tension. Robert’s got his back to me, but I know that I’m not alone in struggling to sleep.

Ding dong, the witch is dead.

There should be some relief with that knowledge. The door finally closing on my childhood. Freedom. And yet I don’t feel any. Not yet. Phoebe’s words echo in my head.

What happened, Emma?

I’d hung up after that, pacing around the kitchen while Robert gave Will a bath and put him to bed, and then, when he asked me what Phoebe had said, I told him I couldn’t get hold of her and then I’d had a very long bath of my own, emotionally exhausted.

The ceiling is a grainy universe above me. What was Phoebe implying? Is this a circle of accusation? I accuse her of filling my son’s head with nightmarish glimpses into our past, and so she accuses me of something worse? The hours tick by. I think about madness. About how I woke up at 1:13a.m., the exact time my mad mother was bashing her brains out against the mirror, and how I haven’t slept properly since. Just a coincidence. It has to be.

As Robert drifts in and out of half sleep, I open my mouth totalk to him at least a dozen times but no words come out. I can’t tell him abouther. Not now. Not after today. So I lie there in silence, desperate to flee my bed and wander the house, until the night cracks black to midnight blue and then gray, and I finally catch an hour’s sleep myself.

22.

SIX DAYS UNTIL MY BIRTHDAY

“I thought I was going to see one of the normal counselors.” My palms sweat as I take the seat Dr. Andrea Morris is offering. She smiles, friendly and open. She’s a bit older than me, maybe mid to late forties, and glamorous in an unintentional way, and after becoming almost friends from the amount of clients I’ve sent to her, it’s strange to be here talking to her in her professional capacity.

“From what you discussed on the phone I thought you might need someone with a broader remit.”

“So you think I’m crazy?” I’m trying to joke but I don’t think it lands. She laughs though.

“No. But you might need a prescription for some better sleeping pills than over the counter can give you.”

“Oh god, yes please. NightNight isn’t even making me drowsy.”

“I can—and will—give you something that will get you some rest, but we need to deal with what’s causing your insomnia. You weren’t overly clear on the phone.”

I’d called her on the way into work, not giving myself time to change my mind, and she’s politely saying that I was very garbled. But where do I start?

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