Thundering Heart

I wake up with a thundering heart for the hundredth time, blind palms once again searching the sheets for his inert form, too scared to open my eyes in case I see him lying there, looking back. When I touch hard wall I know I’m safe. Until then, I’m afraid to say I really don’t.

I fall asleep every night thinking of those guilt-inducing eyes of his, waking to the vivid memory of his cold dream-body lying beside me in my narrow bed, all entangled with my limbs, staring soullessly at my face. He has the gaunt look of a particularly depressing question, waiting patiently for an answer already predicted.

Can you be haunted by someone who’s still alive?

I think you can.

It’s 7:45 and I have to get up right this minute if I’m to make it to work by 9. Shoving my recurring nightmare from my sleepy head, I clamber out of bed, across the obstacle course of my room, pull the curtains wide and spy the remaining dusk retreating from sun. All I can make out in the navy sky is softly settling snow. That makes me very happy. Snow Days remind me of the comfort of padded cells in mental asylums you see in films. The world’s padded with an extra-calming layer of white and the psychos (like me, like him, like all of us) are appeased into nothingness. We drink cocoa and light the fire, or put the heating on full blast, allowing ourselves the luxuries we normally ration. The world’s on hold and even adults make snowmen.

Shaking such thoughts from my head, I head for the shower. I burn my skin thoroughly and satisfyingly before stepping out and drying off. The misty mirror beckons the brush of my fingers, so I swipe at it, revealing a striped flash of reflection.

It isn’t me. It’s him.

I jump backwards, almost trip over the edge of the bathtub, catching myself just before catapulting in. That flash of reflection caught the accusations in his gaze, not the guilt in mine. My mind’s playing tricks on me. This isn’t fair; I only dumped him because he deserved it.

After the mirror incident, I’m tetchy and shaking somewhat, and consider calling in sick to work. My boss knows the bare bones of what happened and yet will not, I feel, be sympathetic. And to think, she used to be my friend before promotion turned her nose up and scrunched it into disapproval. No, I’ll face work. I won’t let this beat me. And anyway, I can’t sit around all day with nothing to do but mull over past mistakes.

I stride out of my cosy flat and into the Winter Wonderland. It’s almost daytime now and a few brave souls are making newborn footprints in the crisp flat snow. The snow stops, and then the sky’s the same bright white as the ground-cover. Trudging off across the park, I take in the picture-postcard beauty of the undulating mounds and trees dripping with crystals. My feet are already soaked (damn my work-shoes, damn them to hell), but I’m feeling somewhat relaxed.

And then I see him.

It isn’t really him. I know that; I’m not stupid. But it could be, from behind. He has the same shuffling gait, height, hair-colour, curls and coat. For a split second I’m convinced and then I notice slight differences, like in the boots this man is wearing (Dave once said “Doc Martens are for teenage lesbians”… I can’t see him buying a pair any time soon). Only then do I know it isn’t him and can breathe again. But for that moment I’m back in my dream and my fingers are reaching out, touching his beard and feeling hair but not heat. In my dream he can move but not breathe; stare but not speak. I’m terrified of him and yet I still love him.

Why oh why do I always mourn my asshole ex-boyfriends?

It's like, in the absence of the intimacy we once shared, my mind’s flirting with another universe – one where the events of last month are null and void. Parallel universes where things are different. One where he’d never raised his martial-arts-trained fists. One where I’d never baited him into it.

I must imagine him everywhere because I hate him as much as I miss him. These two undercurrents are colliding with such force that a huge wave forms. I’m riding the crest of that wave now, but it’s OK, I tell myself resolutely. My wave will dissipate. Give it time. Maybe in the future I’ll even forgive us both.

I keep walking, my thoughts lost in a swirl of what I know to be true and what I wish the world was like. A snowman smiles crookedly at me from beyond the path. I smile back. It’s gigantic. Someone must have gotten up pretty early to build him. Then I think about it further – it’s only been fully light for about ten minutes and this big-boy’s over 6-feet high. Whoever built him must have started when it was still dark, I realise as I pass. 'Unwholesome' is the only word for that.

Then it clicks. His scarf.

I rush back across the buried grass, yanking the striped scarf from the snowman’s neck, searching wildly for the label. I swallow dryly when I find it. Paul Smith. I knew it. This is the spit of the scarf I bought him for Christmas. Either that or it is the scarf I bought him.

A nasty breeze whips by and I notice that I’m alone in this corner of the park. I can’t help but have a flash-back of our last phone-call. The one where he begged me to take him back, apologising profusely, crying pathetically. And me yelling “No. Never!” – still furious, inconsolable. And his “Fuck you then,” in a hollow, spiteful grumble.

I fall further back. Remember the pain of that first punch. The humiliation and surprise of all the others. The precise moment when it dawned on me that he could kill me if he wanted to. That it was going that way right now and I was helpless. And I feel that way again, suddenly.

He’s watching me. I know he is.

I run to work. Never in my life have I flown so fast along such a slippery path. I almost fall twice, bringing to mind bad slasher films like Scream, where the inappropriately dressed girl stumbles and the psycho in the mask comes up behind her and stabs her in the chest with a fatal embrace. On some level, I’m debating whether the stupid girl in this case may have been Drew Barrymore, aware that such an inane, pointless thought should not be my last.

I get to work though. I get there and go inside. I’m alive! I’m safe and he can’t get me.

And then my phone rings abruptly. It’s him. I deleted his number a long time ago, but I recognise the last few digits nonetheless. I let it ring. Fuck you, I think, not entirely sure of anything anymore.

It rings again.

FUCK YOU! Even my thoughts tremble in my head.

When it rings again, I pick up. If that snowman was his idea of a sick joke, he needs to know I’m not amused, to think I'm no longer scared.

“Hello? Chrissie?” says the voice at the other end. It isn’t his. Now I’m confused.

“Hello? Dave?” I answer dumbly. There’s a silence while my whole body tenses until I feel like I may snap.

“… Chrissie. It’s not Dave. It’s his flatmate, Sam. I don’t know how to tell you this, but I thought it should come from me. I didn’t want you hearing on the grape-vine”. He sounds more scared than I am. I hate to say it, but I’m sort of intrigued.

“Go on,” I say, suddenly steady, “but if it’s a message from Dave, I don’t wanna hear it. I think he's said enough”.

“No,” he says, “I'm sorry. Dave’s dead. He hung himself last night. I’m so sorry…”

Not sure what to say, I drop the phone and watch it shatter into its component parts.