Unquiet by E. Saxey

Author:E. Saxey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Titan

SATURDAY

No class, but as soon as I woke, I sat up in bed. I wanted to draw the ivy again, but I never drew on a Saturday. I’d made that decision myself, as a kind of pledge: if I took my art seriously, I should treat it as work, and set it aside for that time. Still, I imagined how I might do it: extending the tendrils, making them reach downwards and sideways across the paper. Holes lay behind the ivy, rotten and unstable. When I moved, flecks of ash from my hair fell onto the bedcovers, and I imagined myself grinding them into paper, what marks they’d make. As I stretched, I kept an ear to the noises of the house but didn’t hear Sam moving at all.

This was procrastination. To keep my end of the bargain with Sam, I’d have to begin investigating.

I rose, and retrieved Toby’s cards from the library without looking at the mess of pink wine-stains in the corner of the room. Sam had pointed to the card of The Larches, but it had no telephone. It seemed rash to dash off there, hopelessly slow to write a letter and wait for a reply. I told myself that Sam’s wavering finger hadn’t ruled out the other rest homes. Possibly he’d stayed at more than one of them as he convalesced.

The Havens had a telephone. I quietly left the house, walked to the post office and asked them to connect me. I pictured the telephone ringing in a clean, light room.

The woman who answered sounded northern and personable. I asked her if The Havens was a private hospital. I was afraid to ask: are you an asylum? She offered to send me a printed guide to their services.

‘I’m looking for my brother, who went missing last year. He may have lost his memory.’

‘How awful,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid that if he’s here, that would be confidential, so the most I could do is ask him to write to you. I’m so sorry.’

‘Oh, I’d not considered…’ I felt bad about misleading her when my missing person was safely home. But I was also frustrated by her refusal.

‘Could you give me his name, and describe him? So I can pass on a message.’

I described him, to preserve the pretence. When she spoke again, her voice was relieved. ‘I can tell you this: all the men we’ve had this year have been older than that. Older than forty, even.’

I hastily called the other homes which had a telephone. One didn’t connect, another two claimed confidentiality. Calling in person would have been better. I could have shown Sam’s calling card to the staff, and watched their faces.

Since The Larches had no telephone, I resolved to visit them today. As soon as I did, I knew I’d been fooling myself; the trip had been inevitable, from the moment Sam pointed at the card.

After Sam’s accident, I’d assumed I’d never go to Breakwater again. Without a word to him, I set off for my second visit there in a week.

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