Man Of Few Words

Chapter 86

It's been several days since I last wrote, so I'd better tell you what's happened – and what hasn't – in the meantime.

I had a really bad stomach the day after Inge stayed over. I don't think there was anything wrong with the food – when I texted her to ask, Inge confirmed that she'd had no issues – I think I just ate more than I should have. It seems the reason I don't generally have much of an appetite these days is that my body can't cope with a lot of food at one time. I didn't really have much of an appetite that evening either. I just kept eating because it tasted good, and because I was going with the flow of the experience and enjoying myself.

Enjoying myself. Big mistake, David. Big mistake.

The tummy trouble only lasted a day, but it really wiped me out. I had no energy at all for a couple more days, but was able to stay reasonably relaxed and comfortable and get some rest. And I had plenty of leftover Thai food for refueling, just a little bit at a time.

But then Sunday came around. On Saturday evening I had tried to follow something like a "normal" timetable. I figured if I ate a meal at about 6pm then went to bed at about 10pm, I'd hopefully wake up at the right sort of time in the morning, and be able to get through The Big Day Out without being too much of a liability.

I went to bed straight after I ate though. I just couldn't do anything else. Even slouching on the sofa was too much like hard work. I fell asleep in bed before it even got dark, but it was a fitful sleep. I woke up feeling even more exhausted than I'd been when I went to bed, but now my brain felt strung out and overloaded too. I don't remember what I'd been dreaming about, but it seemed to have really wound me up.

On top of all that, I just felt depressed. Not a shred of positivity anywhere in me. Just a void. It was still dark at whatever time it was when I woke up, and it stayed that way for a while as I just lay there staring into the fuzzy blackness feeling nothing. My thoughts were bouncing around all over the place, but they kept coming back to the same place:

I can't be bothered to live. I can't be bothered to live. I just cannot be bothered to live any more.

I just lay there through the whole of the dawn chorus. I lay there as the volume and frequency of traffic noise and general London ambience gradually increased. I lay there as the almost complete blackness of my bedroom transitioned imperceptibly to a gloomy blue-grey, the blurry outlines of its furniture and fittings slowly fading into view – familiar yet loathsome.

And I just lay there when my phone pinged, then did exactly the same when it rang some time later. Quite a long time after that, the door buzzer went. And still I just lay there.

The buzzer went a few more times, then the phone again. My tear ducts opened. I didn't sob or whine or convulse, I just lay on my back staring at the grey nothingness of my bedroom ceiling, tears flowing one-by-one down the side of my face and into my ears.

I had known this was going to happen. It's all I'd thought about all night. I had known that I would need to act, that I would need to do something in order to pre-empt the drama that would result if I simply did nothing. But still, I could only bring myself to do exactly that – nothing.

So I just lay there.

All of the windows and doors in my flat were open, and I could here the murmuring of voices at the front door below. But I couldn't make out what they were saying until,

"David!"

It was my mother's voice.

"David, we're here. Please come down," she implored, "Or call us or text us or something. Please! We're worried."

She didn't sound worried. She sounded really pissed off.