Chapter 2

Clare Baker:

I wanted to die. I intended to die. I used the last of the cash I’d earned on my back to buy a dose which should finish me off. I went out of the city, thinking I’d find somewhere out of the way, somewhere I wouldn’t be found until it was too late. You don’t want to hear about my life, though, and I don’t want to think about it anyway. Just look at me. Walking skeleton. Needle tracks in both arms. But I floated away on a synthetic high, not bothered about where I was going. It couldn’t be worse than what I’d had, could it?

But I woke up, death warmed over. In hospital, dammit. What idiot messed up my death? Bleeping noises. Drip. Sore, aching. Miserable. The nurses, well ... they were careful, professional, but I could tell they were uncomfortable with me. Because I was an addict? Because I attempted suicide? There was no physical craving, I found out that there was something in the drip to suppress the withdrawal symptoms. I had the required visit from a head-shrinker, who was more ... empathetic? than the nurses.

“There are not enough places in detox,” he said, after the interview. “But I think you might be ready for that. Am I right?”

“If I could, I would change, but...”

“You will be having a visit from a social worker. I will recommend that you have a place in a half-way home, and your doctor will have a letter explaining.”

“Thank you. I don’t know if...”

“I know. There will be a CPN to visit you, a Community Psychiatric Nurse.”

He left. I can’t say I was happy, or confident, but at least I felt someone cared, which is something I’d not experienced before.

The social worker visited, a woman who was harried and obviously under pressure. But she did get my details and reassured me of prospects of follow-up. I thought that was it, and I waited for the end of my stay in hospital. Other than the drip, I hardly needed any attention. I could feed myself, wash myself. But then I had another visitor. Two visitors. Two visitors who actually made me think I’d have some real support.

“Hello Clare! My name is Kat. You won’t remember, but I was with you when you were brought here. This,” she indicated the slim girl next to her, “is my friend Penny*. We’re here to offer such support and friendship that we can. The services will do what they can, but it’s not as much as you’ll need, I think.”

*See ‘The Troubled Man’. Penny is married to David Tomlinson.

I looked them up and down. They made an odd pair, Kat plump, red-haired, motherly, and Penny, dark haired, very slim, younger. However, there was something about them that tied them together. “Why would you do that?”

“I like to help people,” Kat said, and seemed to be about to go on, but was interrupted.

“David – my husband – and Kat helped me. I was very unhappy and had a dreadful stammer,” Penny told me. “David has a special gift, and so does Kat.”

“I am a witch,” Kat explained. “I’m what the uninformed would call a ‘white witch’ if they believed what I could do, and a charlatan if they didn’t.”

“Oh.” I didn’t know what to make of that at all. “I’m supposed to leave here soon.”

“Yes, they don’t keep anyone in any longer than they have to,” Kat said, rummaging in a large purse, or was it a shoulder bag? “Here,” she extracted a card and a pen, and scribbled something on the back of the card. “My address and phone number, and Penny’s. I suppose you don’t have a phone, do you?”

“No, I don’t. All I have is the clothes I had on in the woods, and a purse with some odds and ends in.”

“Well,” Penny put in, “I think you’re not too different in size to me, so I’ll bring a few things in, if you like.”

“Thank you,” I said. What was I to make of that? They left, and I chewed over the experience. Perhaps, just maybe, there was hope for the future? Anyway, late that afternoon, a doctor came to see me.

“Well, Miss Baker, how are you feeling?”

Before I replied with something noncommittal, I hesitated, but said, “Actually, I’m not sure. I was pretty pissed to wake up in hospital. I really intended to end it all. But since then, well, I’ve had some visitors and I think there might be a chance to change. I didn’t have anything to hope for, before.”

“Uh huh,” the doctor was nodding. “Doctor Hughes, the psychiatrist, said you’d been very open with him. Although that was a very serious attempt, you aren’t suicidal now, are you?”

I just shook my head.

“Good. It might be difficult, but yes, there is hope for you. Your visitor, Missus Bird, left her address with us. You would have a supportive place to live if you go with her, and an address for benefits and so on. I’m going to discontinue that drip, as you’re eating and drinking normally, and I’ll prescribe some capsules for the withdrawal. You’ll have to follow a scheme to reduce the dosage over a few weeks. Can I trust you to do that? Once you leave here, you could just pop the pills until you run out, and you’d be about back to square one. If you follow the plan, you will gradually get rid of the physical craving, but it won’t be easy.”

I thought about that. “It’ll be ... tough. But...”

“Doctor Hughes thought you would prove to be a tough girl, and determined. I know him well, and he’s usually right, even when I’ve been unconvinced. Anyway, the drip is coming down when this bag finishes, and the capsules will begin with the evening round.” He looked at me, apparently searching for something in my eyes, and smiled. “I wish you well, Clare.”

“Thank you, Doctor.” And he left.

An hour later, the machine controlling the drip bleeped, and a nurse came round, switched it off, and disconnected the pipe to my arm. She wheeled the thing away, and shortly after came back and took the needle out of my arm, leaving a ball of cotton-wool taped over the tiny wound, and an instruction to press on it for a few minutes. I did as I was told.

The evening meal, sandwiches, arrived. I declined the tea, and washed the food down with water. I had a book to read, courtesy of the ‘Friends of the Hospital’. It was a romantic novel, not exactly gripping, but reading passed the time. Then Penny came back, with a bundle of clothes. Undies, t-shirt, sweat-suit.

“Try these,” she said, “there should be enough adjustment in the waist-band. Your trainers should do, and I’ll take your old things to wash.” She smiled. “I’ll let the desk know you have somewhere to go; you’ll be staying with my Dad and stepmother. She is a nurse, and will help you manage your medicines. Kat and Harry don’t really have room for visitors, and there’s two young ones in the house too.”

I was a little unsure about going to live with someone I hadn’t even met, but I didn’t say anything, just thanked Penny and settled back down to read.

I slept fairly well. Hospitals are not conducive to a restful night, but it wasn’t too bad. I was woken too early, of course, dressed in the outfit Penny had brought, and sat out of bed to eat my breakfast. The doctor stopped on his rounds to tell me I’d be leaving after lunch, with a month’s supply of capsules, but I’d need to register with a GP, as I hadn’t been registered with a family doctor in years.

Shortly after lunch, I was sitting in the day-room, waiting. My bed was needed. A motherly woman, fiftyish, but very well preserved, laughter lines, just a little grey in her short dark hair. Dark blue outfit with an embroidered logo on the breast. She came over to me.

“You must be Clare,” she announced with a smile. “I’m Clare, too. Clare Sanders. Penny’s step-mother, as it happens. Kat asked me to pick you up. You’ll be staying with me, but we’re to go to Kat’s first, okay?”

“I suppose.” I wasn’t entirely sure, but did I have a choice? Not really. We took our leave of the nurses at the desk, who looked up briefly and smiled as I said goodbye. It’s a big hospital, and it was a long walk to get out of the building in the first place, and longer still to get to the far side of a big car park. She unlocked a small car and opened the passenger-side door for me.

She drove reassuringly carefully, without any muttering about other drivers or the congestion, and at length, drew up outside a very ordinary semi-detached house. She led the way down the drive at the side and through a gate into a fairly large, well-kept garden. In front of me was a large lawn, and on the lawn a circle of rough stones standing about two feet tall. In the middle, an ordinary wooden garden bench, with Kat sitting on it, wearing a red, hooded robe. She stood when she saw us enter.

“Come in and sit, Clare, please?”

I did as I was told.

The other Clare, though, said, “I need to get back to work, Kat. I’ll be along in a couple of hours or so, I expect. See you later, Clare.” Kat just waved, and she left.

“Well,” Kat said, turning her attention to me. “Don’t worry. You’re entirely in control of what happens here. If you prefer, we can just go into the house and have a cup of tea and a bun or something. However, I believe you need help, and I think I can help you. I told you I’m a witch. We’re sitting in my consecrated circle, and my mother and daughter are around if I need support. May I pray with you?”

I sat next to her, my eyes on hers. She said nothing more, and I relaxed as I felt no pressure whatsoever. I’m not sure how long I sat there. In the end, I was thinking, ‘What have I got to lose? What am I afraid of?’

“Okay,” I said. Now, I don’t think I had any expectation of anything spectacular, or in fact anything noticeable. Honestly, I was just desperate enough to try anything. “What do I do?”

Kat lifted her eyebrows and stared at me. “I would like you to look inside yourself. Breathe slowly, hold it, and breathe out slowly. Feel your body, your heartbeat. Close your eyes. That often helps.”

Yeah, I know. Psychobabble, yes?

But, dammitall, she’s trying to help.

I closed my eyes. Focussed in. Concentrated on breathing slowly; harder than it sounds. Felt my heartbeat, pounding. Not what was supposed to happen, surely?

Kat Bird:

It was obvious that Clare was sceptical, but she was at least humouring me. Her eyes were closed, and she was breathing slowly and deeply. I stepped away, and began to dance, widdershins. The dance enveloped me, and as I spun, I sang, circling my little henge. Circling the bench and Clare. This was one of those occasions when I became the dance, and I was not alone. Other figures danced with me, among them Aibhilin and my mother. And a tall, slim young man; Diamuid. My young son, born at the Equinox. As we danced, he stopped behind Clare, and laid both hands on her head.

Another presence in the centre, a glowing, tall, female figure. Viviane.

I had to concentrate on the dance; I wanted to stop and watch, to make sure what was happening, but I knew I mustn’t break the spell we were weaving. But as I continued to dance, I heard the sound of retching, then a sigh. The other figures faded away, and I knew the dance was over, and I went to sit with Clare.

Clare Baker:

I heard Kat beginning to sing, though it was words I didn’t recognise; perhaps they weren’t words at all. But I felt, I felt, wrapped, enfolded, in calm. My heart ceased to pound. I just sat, enjoying the unfamiliar sense of peace. But then there were hands on my head, each side, holding me gently. The peace remained, but I felt a heavy, cold lump somewhere in my middle. Moreover, that lump was getting heavier and colder. I was still enfolded in calm, but this – foreign – feeling grew and grew. Suddenly I was nauseated. Really badly ‘right now!’ nauseated, and I retched. That cold, heavy lump? It was moving, and I was being sick, quite out of control. Thoughts of making a mess of my lap? My nice clean trousers? No. Just getting rid of whatever it was. Yes. Just like being sick normally, in fact, worse. But then it was over. Done. Just a sore throat and a nasty taste in my mouth.