Алекс Михаэлидес - The Silent Patient

My father greeted me with typical hostility. “You look terrible, Theo. You’re too thin. Your hair is too short. You look like a convict.”

“Thanks, Dad. Good to see you too.”

My mother seemed more depressed than usual. Quieter, smaller somehow, as if she weren’t there. Dad was a heavier presence, unfriendly, glaring, unsmiling. He didn’t take his cold, dark eyes off Kathy the entire time. It was an uncomfortable lunch. They didn’t seem to like her, nor did they seem particularly happy for us. I don’t know why I was surprised.

After lunch, my father disappeared into his study. He didn’t emerge again. When my mother said goodbye, she held on to me for too long, too closely, and was unsteady on her feet. I felt desperately sad. When Kathy and I left the house, part of me hadn’t left, I knew, but had remained behind—forever a child, trapped. I felt lost, hopeless, close to tears. Then Kathy surprised me, as always. She threw her arms around me, pulling me into a hug. “I understand now,” she whispered in my ear. “I understand it all. I love you so much more now.”

She didn’t explain further. She didn’t need to.

* * *

We were married in April, in a small registry office off Euston Square. No parents invited. And no God. Nothing religious, at Kathy’s insistence. But I said a secret prayer during the ceremony. I silently thanked Him for giving me such unexpected, undeserved happiness. I saw things clearly now, I understood His greater purpose. God hadn’t abandoned me during my childhood, when I had felt so alone and so scared—He had been keeping Kathy hidden up His sleeve, waiting to produce her, like a deft magician.

I felt such humility and gratitude for every second we spent together. I was aware how lucky, how incredibly fortunate I was to have such love, how rare it was, and how others weren’t so lucky. Most of my patients weren’t loved. Alicia Berenson wasn’t.

It’s hard to imagine two women more different than Kathy and Alicia. Kathy makes me think of light, warmth, color, and laughter. When I think of Alicia, I think only of depth, of darkness, of sadness.

Of silence.

PART TWO

Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive, and will come forth later, in uglier ways.

—SIGMUND FREUD

CHAPTER ONE

Alicia Berenson’s Diary

JULY 16

I never thought I’d be longing for rain. We’re into our fourth week of the heat wave, and it feels like an endurance test. Each day seems hotter than the last. It doesn’t feel like England. More like a foreign country—Greece or somewhere.

I’m writing this on Hampstead Heath. The whole park is strewn with red-faced, semi-naked bodies, like a beach or a battlefield, on blankets or benches or spread out on the grass. I’m sitting under a tree, in the shade. It’s six o’clock, and it has started to cool down. The sun is low and red in a golden sky—the park looks different in this light—darker shadows, brighter colors. The grass looks like it’s on fire, flickering flames under my feet.

I took off my shoes on my way here and walked barefoot. It reminded me of when I was little and I’d play outside. It reminded me of another summer, hot like this one—the summer Mum died—playing outside with Paul, cycling on our bikes through golden fields dotted with wild daisies, exploring abandoned houses and haunted orchards. In my memory that summer lasts forever. I remember Mum and those colorful tops she’d wear, with the yellow stringy straps, so flimsy and delicate—just like her. She was so thin, like a little bird. She would put on the radio and pick me up and dance me around to pop songs on the radio. I remember how she smelled of shampoo and cigarettes and Nivea hand cream, always with an undertone of vodka. How old was she then? Twenty-eight? Twenty-nine? She was younger then than I am now.

That’s an odd thought.

On my way here I saw a small bird on the path, lying by the roots of a tree. I thought it must have fallen from its nest. It wasn’t moving and I wondered if it had broken its wings. I stroked its head gently with my finger. It didn’t react. I nudged it and turned it over—and the underside of the bird was gone, eaten away, leaving a cavity filled with maggots. Fat, white, slippery maggots … twisting, turning, writhing … I felt my stomach turn—I thought I was going to be sick. It was so foul, so disgusting—deathly.

I can’t get it out of my mind.

JULY 17

I’ve started taking refuge from the heat in an air-conditioned café on the high street—Café de l’Artista. It’s icy cold inside, like climbing into a fridge. There’s a table I like by the window, where I sit drinking iced coffee. Sometimes I read or sketch or make notes. Mostly I just let my mind drift, luxuriating in the coldness. The beautiful girl behind the counter stands there looking bored, staring at her phone, checking her watch, and sighing periodically. Yesterday afternoon, her sighs seemed especially long—and I realized she was waiting for me to go, so she could close up. I left reluctantly.

Walking in this heat feels like wading through mud. I feel worn down, battered, beaten up by it. We’re not equipped for it, not in this country—Gabriel and I don’t have air-conditioning at home—who does? But without it, it’s impossible to sleep. At night we throw off the covers and lie there in the dark, naked, drenched in sweat. We leave the windows open, but there’s no hint of a breeze. Just hot dead air.

I bought an electric fan yesterday. I set it up at the foot of the bed on top of the chest.

Gabriel immediately started complaining. “It makes too much noise. We’ll never sleep.”

“We can’t sleep anyway. At least we won’t be lying here in a sauna.”

Gabriel grumbled, but he fell asleep before I did. I lay there listening to the fan. I like the sound it makes, a gentle whirring. I can shut my eyes and tune in to it and disappear.

I’ve been carrying the fan around the house with me, plugging it in and unplugging it as I move around. This afternoon I took it down to the studio at the end of the garden. Having the fan made it just about bearable. But it’s still too hot to get much work done. I’m falling behind—but too hot to care.

I did have a bit of a breakthrough—I finally understood what’s wrong with the Jesus picture. Why it’s not working. The problem isn’t with the composition—Jesus on the cross—the problem is it’s not a picture of Jesus at all. It doesn’t even look like Him—whatever He looked like. Because it’s not Jesus.

It’s Gabriel.

Incredible that I didn’t see it before. Somehow, without intending to, I’ve put Gabriel up there instead. It’s his face I’ve painted, his body. Isn’t that insane? So I must surrender to that—and do what the painting demands of me.

I know now that when I have an agenda for a picture, a predetermined idea how it should turn out, it never works. It remains stillborn, lifeless. But if I’m really paying attention, really aware, I sometimes hear a whispering voice pointing me in the right direction. And if I give in to it, as an act of faith, it leads me somewhere unexpected, not where I intended, but somewhere intensely alive, glorious—and the result is independent of me, with a life force of its own.

I suppose what scares me is giving in to the unknown. I like to know where I’m going. That’s why I always make so many sketches—trying to control the outcome—no wonder nothing comes to life—because I’m not really responding to what’s going on in front of me. I need to open my eyes and look—and be aware of life as it is happening, and not simply how I want it to be. Now I know it’s a portrait of Gabriel, I can go back to it. I can start again.