Steven Watson - Before I Go to Sleep

I put my hands to my face, felt the swollen flesh around my eyes. I felt a flash of anger. It was clear she didn’t believe me.

I thought back to what I had written. “I told him that I’ve been keeping a journal. I said I had been seeing you and Dr. Nash. I told him I knew about Adam. I told him you’d given me the letter he’d written, that I’d read it. And then he hit me.”

“He just hit you?”

I thought of all the things he’d called me, the things he’d accused me of. “He said I was a bitch.” I felt a sob rise in my chest. “He—he accused me of sleeping with Dr. Nash. I said I wasn’t, then—”

“Then?”

“Then he hit me.”

A silence, then Claire said, “Has he ever hit you before?”

I had no way of knowing. Perhaps he had? It was possible that ours had always been an abusive relationship. My mind flashed on Claire and me, marching, holding homemade placards—WOMEN’S RIGHTS. NO TO DOMESTIC VIOLENCE. I remembered how I had always looked down on women who found themselves with husbands who beat them, and stayed put. They were weak, I thought. Weak and stupid.

Was it possible that I had fallen into the same trap as they had?

“I don’t know,” I said.

“It’s difficult to imagine Ben hurting anything, but I suppose it’s not impossible. Christ! He used to make even me feel guilty. Do you remember?”

“No,” I said. “I don’t. I don’t remember anything.”

“Shit,” she said. “I’m sorry. I forgot. It’s just so hard to imagine. He’s the one that convinced me that fish have as much right to life as an animal with legs. He wouldn’t even kill a spider!”

The wind gusts the curtains of the room. I hear a train, in the distance. Screams from the pier. Downstairs, on the street, someone shouts “Fuck!” and I hear the sound of breaking glass. I do not want to read on, but know that I must.

I felt a chill. “Ben was a vegetarian?”

“Vegan,” she said, laughing. “Don’t tell me you didn’t know?”

I thought of the night he’d hit me. A half-chewed lump of meat, I’d written. Peas floating in thin gravy .

I went over to the window. “Ben eats meat…” I said, speaking slowly. “He’s not a vegetarian… Not now, anyway. Maybe he’s changed?”

There was another long silence.

“Claire?” She said nothing. “Claire? Are you there?”

“Right,” she said. She sounded angry now. “I’m calling him. I’m sorting this out. Where is he?”

I answered without thinking. “He’ll be at the school, I suppose. He said he wouldn’t be back until five o’clock.”

“At the school?” she said. “Do you mean the university? Is he lecturing now?”

Fear began to stir within me. “No,” I said. “He works at a school near here. I can’t remember the name.”

“What does he do there?”

“A teacher. He’s head of Chemistry, I think he said.” I felt guilty at not knowing what my husband does for a living, not being able to remember how he earns the money to keep us fed and clothed. “I don’t remember.”

I looked up and caught sight of my swollen face reflected in the window in front of me. The guilt evaporated.

“What school?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t think he told me.”

“What, never?”

“Not this morning, no,” I said. “For me that might as well be never.”

“I’m sorry, Chrissy. I didn’t mean to upset you. It’s just that, well—” I sensed a change of mind, a sentence aborted. “Could you find out the name of the school?”

I thought of the office upstairs. “I guess so. Why?”

“I’d like to speak to Ben, to make sure he’s going to be coming home when I’m there this afternoon. I wouldn’t want it to be a wasted journey!”

I noticed the humor she was trying to inject into her voice, but did not mention it. I felt out of control, could not work out what was best, what I should do, and so decided to surrender to my friend. “I’ll have a look,” I said.

I went upstairs. The office was tidy, piles of papers arranged across the desk. It did not take long to find some letterhead: a notice about a parents’ evening that had already taken place.

“It’s St. Anne’s,” I said. “You want the number?” She said she’d find it out herself.

“I’ll call you back,” she said. “Yes?”

Panic hit again. “What are you going to say to him?” I said.

“I’m going to sort this out,” she said. “Trust me, Chrissy. There has to be an explanation. Okay?”

“Yes,” I said, and ended the call. I sat down, my legs shaking. What if my first hunch had been correct? What if Claire and Ben were still sleeping together? Maybe she was calling him now, warning him. She suspects, she might be saying. Be careful.

I remembered reading my journal earlier. Dr. Nash had told me that I had once shown symptoms of paranoia. Claiming the doctors were conspiring against you, he’d said. A tendency to confabulate. To invent things.

What if that’s all happening again? What if I am inventing this, all of it? Everything in my journal might be fantasy. Paranoia.

I thought of what they’d told me at the ward, and Ben in his letter. You were occasionally violent . I realized it might have been me who caused the fight on Friday night. Did I lash out at Ben? Perhaps he hit back and then, upstairs in the bathroom, I took a pen and explained it all away with a fiction.

What if all this journal means is that I’m getting worse again? That soon it really will be time for me to go back to Waring House?

I went cold, suddenly convinced that this was why Dr. Nash had wanted to take me there. To prepare me for my return.

All I can do is wait for Claire to call me back.

Another gap. Is that what’s happening now? I think. Will Ben try to take me back to Waring House? I look over to the bathroom door. I will not let him.

There is one final entry, written later that same day. Monday, November 26. I have added the time. 6:55 p.m.

Claire called me after less than half an hour. And now my mind oscillates. It swings from one thing to the other, then back again. I know what to do. I don’t know what to do. I know what to do. But there’s a third thought. I shudder as I realize the truth: I am in danger.

I turn to the front of this journal, intending to write Don’t trust Ben , but I find those words are already there.

I don’t remember writing them. But then I don’t remember anything.

A gap, and then it continues.

She sounded hesitant, on the phone.

“Chrissy,” she said. “Listen.”

Her tone frightened me. I sat down. “What?”

“I called Ben. At school.”

I had the overwhelming sensation of being on an uncontrollable journey, of being in unnavigable waters. “What did he say?”

“I didn’t speak to him. I just wanted to make sure he worked there.”

“Why?” I said. “Don’t you trust him?”

“He’s lied about other things.”

I had to agree. “But why did you think he’d tell me he worked somewhere if he didn’t?” I said.

“I was just surprised he was working in a school. You know he trained to be an architect? The last time I spoke to him he was looking into setting up his own practice. I just thought it was a bit odd he should be working in a school.”

“What did they say?”

“They said they couldn’t disturb him. He was busy, in a class.” I felt relief. He hadn’t lied about that, at least.

“He must have changed his mind,” I said. “About his career.”

“Chrissy? I told them I wanted to send him some documents. A letter. I asked for his official title.”