Secret To Mixing Purple
Secret to Mixing Purple -a short story
Sunday, 13 November 2005
I couldn't get her suicide note out of my head. I was in my car, on the way home after my regular session with Annie. I was tired and looking forward to switching off.
Yes, my life had become routine, responsible and wed to the point of us both eating breakfast in silence, but it was my routine and I dearly needed to collapse into it. Tonight, however, I already knew that this was going to intrude.
I pictured the girly writing filling the foolscap page. It would now be sitting in her room where her father had meticulously replaced it, after reading it and making a copy to bring to me.
I don't know what made him go in there. He said the door was open and he just wanted to check it was tidy. And there it was, half meant to be discovered, matter-of-factly stating
"...it was time to die".
I reckon he knew what he was looking for. He knew he had over stepped the mark the night before, -been overbearing and cruel towards Annie.
And I had just sat there in our session, like a self-congratulating chump, oblivious to her annihilating despair, -buying the charm and bounce, while her suicide note was sitting in her room. "I'm feeling a lot more mature...I haven't had anxiety in ages. Jake and I are so close now..." she sat telling me. I had been seeing Annie for nearly six months. The daughter of an unmothered mother, who couldn't love her enough and was no longer there, Annie had spent most of her young life simply surviving it.
She resembled her mother, they shared the same skin, seemingly formed but really paper thin and translucent, like that of a premature baby in an incubator.
She had worked out how to be cute and funny and extracted the best from those around her.
But not quite enough.
When the desolation engulfed her, she would cut her skin to distract from the pain inside. "At least skin can heal", she would whisper.
And that was how we met. I was the local healer, zoned to her district. When her number came up, she copped me.
She could have done worse. As a healer I've had my moments. But with Annie I really wanted to get it right. I listened as carefully as I could and did my best to gain her trust. Any skill I'd cobbled together, I tried to use with her.
She would sit in my room, legs crossed on the chair, heavy eyeliner obscuring her fragile features, two-toned hair and always some quirky twist to disguise her school uniform.
She would fidget and pick up toys and strenuously avoid talking about her feelings.
Annie was easy to like. I'd wait and wait for a pause in the banter, to let her know that she had registered and was thought about -but it never came.
We never got to talk about her, or her dark cavernous space inside. It had been there nearly all her life:
As her tiny baby fingers had reached up all those years before, to trace the contours of her mother's face, they had recorded every expressive crease -smile and laugh lines, but also the grimaces, blank looks and the etched in pain. It had been imprinted on her baby soul like a hieroglyphic record telling her of her mother's emotional life but also her view of her.
In her distress her mother would turn away from her, again and again and again -too engulfed in her own black space. Annie had only this imprint to turn to. Not comforting enough, not wise enough, not hopeful enough.
And so she would float alone, in that dark and empty place, terrified, suspended, dissipating.
I had to find another way to reach this girl, and I had a week to work out how.
***
I headed down the freeway straight to my bead shop. It was the morning of Annie's next appointment; I'd finished drawing big, hairy spider pictures with my arachnophobe and had the rest of that day free.
The bead shop was in the funky, dinghy part of town where I uncharacteristically bothered to lock my car. I'd been there once before -a time where I had been looking for a cure for my own particular oblivion: young kids, not enough sleep, a constant churning chaos that I was trying to wrangle into some kind of order.
I had gone in looking for bright shining colours that I could arrange around my wrist or neck, to act as some kind of attracting beacon out of my stupor. The promise of finding this for Annie made me seize the rattling door handle and push my way inside.
I loved this shop, from the bowing worn floorboards to the pressed tin ceiling.
As I craned my neck to see the top shelves of draws, I felt like a young kid again, expecting my cheek to brush against my mother's skirt.
In the middle of the shop was a quadrangle of old glass display cases. Customers would peer closer and closer, hands behind their back, to study the sparkling arrangements displayed beneath. Groovy arty chicks stood around, behind the display cases, counting beads, nonchalantly talking to each other and serving customers.
I always loved looking at the myriad colours of the minute flat-backed diamantes. They had been carefully crafted somewhere in Austria, thousands of them all twinkling in their tray. They were just sitting there, glinting patiently, waiting for a brooch to pin the feathers of a peacock or speckled guinea fowl to a felted hat.
I had mused over these treasures before, but today I had no time. My purpose was more direct and urgent. Maybe Annie and I could sit together without speaking, inaudibly humming, heads bent, threading the beads and baubles in a code of colour, a visual song line, that told of her path in, but also coded her path through and out of her danger, -even a charm to keep her safe. I just wanted to keep death away from this sweet kid. The idea of her not coming out the other side, lying dead beside her next suicide note haunted me.
I have been taught that suicide is a supreme act of enraged violence, not just the despair and hopelessness that most people understand it to be.
But when I spoke to Annie about her disappointments and pain, she just said, "I don't care", looked blank and changed the subject.
And so it was locked away inside, to fester and corrode only later to cut through in perilous intensity.
Not knowing where to start I stared ahead and my eyes fell on a delicate lavender colour. It was the kind that lines ivory clouds at sunset. I pulled on the draw and grabbed a handful.
I found the pale green of rain fed shoots, the deeper grass green that hummed a new spring. I found the blushing pink of my mother's lipstick and the more delicate hews of pink spring blossoms. I grabbed fistfuls of beads, like a child gathers lollies.
I came to the blues and faltered. What was clear sky to others was a cold and dangerous sea to me. All my nightmares of sunken ocean liners, of drowning in icy bottomless depths encroached. I quickly moved on.
The women in the shop knew not to interfere. They saw me standing, in an almost trance state, staring ahead, eyes brimming with tears and hands cupped full of beads. One stepped up to me, the redhead, and held out a container to empty them into, then, without catching my eye, stood back and let me get on with it.
I could feel myself sliding into my own kind of black space.
"Where's the grey?", I thought, "the bloody washed out grey, because that's my colour, damp, miserable, ... and what about bogged down beige and mediocre mushroom?"
I felt terrible. This wasn't fun anymore.
I took my collection to the counter and the redhead started to tally it all up. At that moment a gaggle of schoolgirls burst into the shop -melodramatic and annoying.
'Look at this...it's gorgeous!" they were all pulling out trays and loudly admiring different beads. I was not the only one irritated by this intrusion. The redhead looked up and paused.
"Bridget" she called to the other assistant "do you want to see if they need a hand?" meaning, "move them on".
Bridget seemed to understand. She had been returning some diamantes to the tray, which she'd left on the counter next to me. Sparkle, twinkle "remember how it was to be a kid?" they glinted at me "full of promise, sparkling, irresistible?"
The redhead gave me the final price and I handed her the money. I looked again at the diamantes: they looked so beautiful, so sure; they held a joy and secret that could make the difference.
In my fractured state I was drawn to them, yearned for them.
I was putting my packages in my shoulder bag. One of the schoolgirls had dropped a container of beads and Bridget was madly chasing them around the floor.
An idea had popped into my head, I looked around, no one was looking...
"Hey ladies, I think your tram's arrived" the redhead said in a firm voice.
I put my last package in my bag, checked to see Bridget and the redhead were still occupied, snatched the whole tray of diamantes, shoved them in my bag, turned, put my head down and strode straight for the door.
Suddenly I was surrounded by the swarm of schoolgirls. The tram had arrived, and they were all trying to push past me.
Oh no! Get out of here. Run. No, don't run. Walk. Push.
I held my ground and pushed my way out the door. Just turn and walk.
The girls were running past me. Some were jumping onto the tram.
"Shit, shit, what have I done?" my heart was thumping so hard and fast I thought I would vomit. I turned down the first side street.
"Where's the car, where's the car?"
I darted into a back alley to pause and think. "Where've you parked the bloody car? What have you done? You could get struck-off for this?"
I poked my head out of the back alley and peered down the side street to view the main road and try and get my bearings.
" Car...parked it...where did I walk...shit...the redhead!" I drew in my breath sharply, eyes popping, "She must have seen me?"
The redhead was in the main street frantically looking back and forth, carefully studying the faces of passers by. She started to head down my side street.
I had to hide. I pulled my head back into the alley. It was bare, I'd be found.
There was a tatty wooden gate slightly ajar. I pushed it and slipped in.
It looked like the back yard of a share house -disused and a mess. I bobbed down, closed the gate.
There was no one in the yard, but I could hear noises in the lean-to kitchen, and if they came out I'd be in full view. I wedged myself between the rubbish and recycle bin, feeling my knees sinking into the mud.
I didn't move`, kept listening for footsteps. Surely she'd find me, just from the roar of my heavy breathing?
Was this a breakdown? A nightmare? I peered inside my bag to check. It looked like the inside of a pirate's chest, heaped with spilt jewels of every colour, covering everything. I closed it with a gasp.
I stayed perched, listening to the sounds of the street and the alley -so far, so good. I just wanted to get out of here. What was I thinking? Being mediocre was surely better than this?
I could see it now: The locally admired and respected health professional had become a mud-soaked, grey suited, shamed, wailing kleptomaniac.
Oh dear God, I couldn't be caught.
I had to remember where I parked the car. I stood up, crept into the alley and furtively found my way to the car, heart always thumping.
***
I pulled up just in time to struggle in the back door as Annie was coming in the front.
"My God look at you!" she exclaimed as she eyed my crazy hair and muddied skirt. "Are you alright?"
It was easier not to answer. Her dad sat in the waiting room and I ushered her into my office. "We're doing something different today, -arranging beads"
"How cool is that!" Annie exclaimed, joining me on the opposite chair on the kiddy table.
We started arranging the beads. I used the time to try to gather my thoughts. My mind was still racing: the diamantes were in the room, still in my bag. What was I going to do with them?
I could post them back anonymously, go to a country town, wear gloves and write the address with my left hand.
I started lining up random combinations of beads.
Maybe I could hide them at home, proof of my wickedness, waiting to be discovered.
I messed up my beads and started again.
Why not cover myself in the diamantes. Then do the "dance of the seven veils" with a final sparkling reveal. I could just imagine the knuckles whiten on my husband, as he sat up in bed reading his Range Rover magazine -just like the last time, when I had mysteriously slipped into bed in purple pyjamas.
I had to focus; after all, this entire escapade had started in the name of helping Annie. I cleared my throat and started slowly:
"Annie, how could you sit there last week, telling me how great things were, when you had written this?" I showed her the copy of her letter.
Annie was angry about her father's intrusion, but that was partly to mask feeling so exposed.
"Why didn't you say anything?" I asked.
"I dunno, I just came in and felt bad, and I didn't know what to say..."
"Well, how about saying just that?"
" But I feel like killing myself most of the time, nearly every day"
"Then tell me?
"There was nothing to tell...maybe the letter wasn't for me..." Annie paused and looked at me, her eyes narrowing, then slowly and purposefully. "I started off feeling like killing myself...and then I got angry, and I decided to write a suicide note ...for someone else..."
I raised my eyebrow; anger is good, I thought, I guessed she wrote it for her father or maybe her mother?
Annie continued. "I've been coming here for 6 months, and you keep telling me that I'm getting better. You sit there in the same suit every week and I sit here in the same shit." She paused." I wrote it for you." Her eyes were suddenly alive with anger.
She looked down and started fiddling with the beads.
I kept looking ahead. I was shattered, shocked. She'd dug the knife in and twisted it around.
The day's events flashed in front of my eyes and I shook my head. I'd done everything I could for this girl and it wasn't enough...then I realized, that that was exactly how she always felt with her mum.
" Hey I'm not that bad" I countered, trying to make light, "I mean, at least you want to knock me off instead of yourself- sounds like an improvement from where you sit?
Annie laughed, immediately relieved.
"I just got so sick of her telling me off -my mum, shouting at me. I wonder what she sees when she looks at me, -am I that horrible?"
Annie paused and continued in a quieter voice, her hard shell now discarded." All I've ever wanted is for her to look at me and think I'm great....so great. As if...as if..." her voice trailed off.
"So great that you sparkle and shimmer?'
That must have been why I took the diamantes
Annie looked up. The colour had drained from her face, she nodded, eyes big with unshed tears. She looked almost winded.
Bullseye.
It was a moment where something changed. Not a cure, not happily ever after. But in that moment Annie no longer floated in that space, a soul lost of its body. She was connected to another human being. This alien and hostile space was known and shared, and through those words and understanding she had been linked to another human, and indeed the whole human race. The link was silk-thread tenuous, but it had been made.
We said nothing, just sat there, surrounded by the truth, newly delivered, with both understanding and grief.
After some time Annie's hand came across the smoky amethyst purple beads and arranged and rearranged them.
"They're beautiful aren't they" I whispered.
She toyed with them a bit longer.
You know purple is the colour of passion! I read it in a magazine.They say you wear it if you want to seduce someone."
"Don't believe everything you read", I muttered.
"No, no." she continued, happy to change the subject, ‘the secret to a real seduction is to mix just a tiny bit in. Just enough purple to notice the colour... Then you mix it with something really soft, like expensive oyster satin -to show how delicate you are..."She rolled her eyes and made a face.
Bullseye.
It was my turn to blanche and look winded.
Annie misread my startled reaction.
"Don't worry-Jake and I aren't planning to do anything" she lied.
We both looked down again. Annie finished her arrangement of colours and strung them up and knotted both ends securely. Nothing else was said, but there was an ease and calm to the work.
The hour came to a finish and we both stood up.
"Take care of yourself", I said, looking at her intently.
Annie nodded. "Same time next week?"
I smiled and nodded.
***
Another sunrise, another day. The hard and desperate shift shuffled off, the trams rattled by, and the funky-groovers opened up the shops for another day's trade.
Bridget slipped the key in the old lock of the bead shop and flipped the sign. The redhead turned on the lights and fired up the till.
The Australia Post lady strode in,
" Delivery", she sang out, and plonked a parcel on the glass counter.
The redhead turned it over, for, apart from a shaky-handed delivery address, it was unmarked.
"I don't believe it, the flat-back diamantes!"
Bridget looked up quizzically.
"You remember?" she continued, "the ones that got swiped last week when all the school kids were in?"
Bridget came over to inspect the tray, with all it's blinking, winking contents meticulously arranged by colour, and covered in 3 tightly applied layers of Glad Wrap.
"One of their mum's must have discovered it and sent them packing", mused Bridget. "Are they all there?"
The redhead marked them off against the re-order sheet."...Ottoman Rose, Sangria Crush, Sherwood Forrest Green...Yep, yep, yep. There's just one missing -Deep Evening of Sheherazade. Which colour is that?"
Bridget had a think.
"That's purple..."
Deeta Kimber