The Writing on the Wall — Excerpt from 'The Black Dog'
I knew there was something wrong as soon as I opened the door, even before I saw the note. It just felt wrong, smelled wrong. I remember I paused to listen before I pulled my key out of the latch and stepped inside so I could close the door behind me. I had a bag of groceries, I'd called at the Tesco in town on my way home, and I put it down in the hall when I spotted the yellow Post-it note stuck to the sitting room door. I shivered, then moved forward to read it.
Ruth — don't come in. Call the police. I'm sorry. Michael x
Of course I did go in. I opened the door and went into the sitting room, which was exactly as it should have been. I poked my head into the kitchen: everything was fine. Then I went into the bathroom.
Nothing could ever have prepared me for so much blood. The bath Michael lay in looked to be full of it. Eight pints, that's what they say we have in us. I've got a bucket with marks on the inside so you know how full it is. I know what eight pints looks like, how long it takes to drain away down a plughole.
Had I been in a certain type of film, I would have screamed at the sight, long and shrill and loud. But most of us don't scream; that kind of intense shock robs us of the ability. The noise I made was more like a whimper: wretched, miserable, horrified.
I thought of the note Michael had written before he climbed into the bath and did that to himself, the note with that ridiculous little 'x' at the end, as if a symbolic kiss could ever have made this better, and I sank to my knees and wept.
The next few weeks passed in a daze. I have no idea how I got through them, but it seems I did. Afterwards, things quietened down. People stopped popping round so often and called less frequently on the phone. I suppose for them, things got back to normal.
As for me, I went to work and came home again. I cooked meals and cleared up afterwards. I wandered around the flat picking things up and putting them down. I took Michael's clothes out of the wardrobe and sorted them into piles to throw out or to give to charity, then I hung them all up again. I found his diary and slept with it under my pillow for a week before I read it.
Reading it felt wrong, and yet it helped. Reading the words he had written meant I heard his voice speaking them in my head. It was a comfort. He chatted to me about his work, about us, how much he was looking forward to our holidays, what he planned to buy me for my birthday. It made me smile and it made me cry, him looking forward, me looking back. Then, suddenly, the tone of the entries changed. He started talking about a black dog, or more accurately, The Black Dog. I had no idea what he meant. The entries stopped altogether about a week before … about a week before. I flipped through the blank pages, trying to make sense of it, trying to understand. Then I found a last entry, scrawled across the page in an unsteady hand. All it said was: 'They're coming.'
Ruth — don't come in. Call the police. I'm sorry. Michael x
Of course I did go in. I opened the door and went into the sitting room, which was exactly as it should have been. I poked my head into the kitchen: everything was fine. Then I went into the bathroom.
Nothing could ever have prepared me for so much blood. The bath Michael lay in looked to be full of it. Eight pints, that's what they say we have in us. I've got a bucket with marks on the inside so you know how full it is. I know what eight pints looks like, how long it takes to drain away down a plughole.
Had I been in a certain type of film, I would have screamed at the sight, long and shrill and loud. But most of us don't scream; that kind of intense shock robs us of the ability. The noise I made was more like a whimper: wretched, miserable, horrified.
I thought of the note Michael had written before he climbed into the bath and did that to himself, the note with that ridiculous little 'x' at the end, as if a symbolic kiss could ever have made this better, and I sank to my knees and wept.
The next few weeks passed in a daze. I have no idea how I got through them, but it seems I did. Afterwards, things quietened down. People stopped popping round so often and called less frequently on the phone. I suppose for them, things got back to normal.
As for me, I went to work and came home again. I cooked meals and cleared up afterwards. I wandered around the flat picking things up and putting them down. I took Michael's clothes out of the wardrobe and sorted them into piles to throw out or to give to charity, then I hung them all up again. I found his diary and slept with it under my pillow for a week before I read it.
Reading it felt wrong, and yet it helped. Reading the words he had written meant I heard his voice speaking them in my head. It was a comfort. He chatted to me about his work, about us, how much he was looking forward to our holidays, what he planned to buy me for my birthday. It made me smile and it made me cry, him looking forward, me looking back. Then, suddenly, the tone of the entries changed. He started talking about a black dog, or more accurately, The Black Dog. I had no idea what he meant. The entries stopped altogether about a week before … about a week before. I flipped through the blank pages, trying to make sense of it, trying to understand. Then I found a last entry, scrawled across the page in an unsteady hand. All it said was: 'They're coming.'
