He agreed to it on Saturday afternoon, just before we went out to find costumes for a Halloween party. It was an impulsive decision. He’d stuck the tab under his tongue before I could fully comprehend what was happening.
After about an hour of shopping, he began to get uneasy.
“Let’s go home?” He said.
The walk back was beautiful. He developed this child-like fascination with everything around us. He saw colours I couldn’t fathom where the floor was nothing but concrete. He giggled, kissing me and never letting go of my hand. This is fine, I thought. Lovely, even.
“What do you want to do?” I asked him when we got back to his room.
“Music,” he said, still grinning like mad. I searched for a playlist of 60’s hits because that’s what he wanted. We just lay there, listening, him occasionally looking up and smiling at me.
I knew something had changed when he went quiet. I kept asking him if he was ok. He said he was fine. But it wasn’t fine. He was lost in his thoughts. Eventually, he just stopped answering me.
Then he sat up and blurted, “Mum!”
“No,” I said in the calmest voice I could find. “You’re with me. We’re in your room at uni. You’re ok.” He nodded and lay back down.
The second shout was louder. It caused one of my housemates, Jacob, to come and check on us. I didn’t know if I could be scared yet, or if he would soon snap out of it and go back to the wonderful colours and shapes and smiling. Jacob left because he didn’t know either.
The next time he screamed, he jumped up abruptly. I continued with my calm voice, despite everything inside me beginning to panic. “It’s ok. This is just a bad part but you’re going to be ok, you hear me?”
“Ok, mum.” He said. I searched his face and knew then that he wasn’t in there. I called Jacob back because I had no clue what to do. I thank the universe that I did because what happened next I couldn’t have dealt with on my own.
Whatever he saw in his chaotic muddled haze must have been horrible. He launched at the windows and ripped out the blinds in mad terror, attempting to escape. I managed to pull him back by his jumper but he didn’t stop thrashing until Jacob pinned him to the wall by his throat. I called another one of my housemates to help hold him.
As soon as I left the room, every muscle that had tensed and every tear stinging my throat came tumbling out of me while upstairs he let out blood curdling screams between pauses. As much as I tried to push the thought away, I was genuinely afraid he’d never be the same again.
Eventually we called 999 for an ambulance. When they came, his screams had subsided, but they brought two police officers in case we still needed help holding him down. It seemed like forever, but finally they called for people to come with them to the hospital. Jacob and I rode in the police car, which may have been quite cool under different circumstances.
When they brought him out, I realised I didn’t want to see him. It was hard watching someone I knew so well morph into something completely unfamiliar. His eyes were still alert but they glazed over me. The doctors asked him some questions but he just stared at them. They said we could wait with him, but we didn’t want to.
Sometime later, the doctor came back out and told us he was being moved, ushering us to follow so we knew where he’d be.I stood beside him and held his hand. He seemed better; his eyes could focus on me. His mouth kept opening as though he wanted to say something. He was looking at me like he recognized me and it was keeping me together.
As it was getting late and I hadn’t eaten, I asked him if I could leave. He clung on to my hand tighter, still not saying anything. I told him I’d stay for a while.
I later discovered that he hadn’t recognised me at all. Apparently, we looked terrifying, towering over him, but he was just willing himself to stay calm.
He was moved again, another curtained off room. Now he could speak but was still disoriented.
“Do you know who these people are?” The doctor asked.
He glanced at us. “Some people I met at uni, I’m guessing.”
When Jacob and I went outside, I called his brother to ask if I should contact his mother.
“No,” he said. “Just wait for it to wear off, for him to understand what’s real and what’s not.”
He was sitting up and smiling like normal when we returned. Too normal. He was giddy, as though nothing had happened, but he still wasn’t himself. He pointed, convinced there were Aztec symbols on the walls and that the curtains were moving. It all seemed so absurd.
“Same time next week?” he joked.
I suddenly realised that he had no recollection of anything that had happened. I couldn’t breathe, the room suddenly felt so small. I went out into the corridor, Jacob following. Neither of us knew what to think, and although it was just shy of midnight, we were completely exhausted.
He was still grinning, pointing at “snowflakes” on the walls when we got him home. I ordered him to go to sleep.
At around 3am, I heard voices, one of them his, in the kitchen. There he was, arguing with my housemate’s boyfriend. Finally, he actually said the words, “I was in control for most of that time.” And I screamed. Everyone fell silent.
He finally listened. In his room, he apologised, and meant it, but he still didn’t really remember anything. He asked me to stay with him, so I did. In the dark, I asked him if he felt better now, if he felt safe.
“Yes,” he said. “Do you?”I didn’t answer.
Creative Non Fiction Writing at Reading 