The Hypnotist's Love Story (45 page)

Ellen dreamed.

Her dreams were vivid and endless and exhausting. She knew she was dreaming and she kept trying to wake up properly so the dreams would stop, and every now and then she would find herself back in the reality of the dark room, turning over to readjust her pillow, nudging Patrick to stop him snoring, but then before she could stop herself, she’d find herself falling asleep again, toppling headfirst into a canyon of swirling thoughts and faces and sounds.

Her mother and her godmothers were running along a beach, naked, laughing in that schoolgirl way that always made her feel left out.

“They’re showing off,” she said to her father, who was sitting on the beach next to her, fully dressed, thankfully, in his suit and tie. He had sauce from his Moroccan chicken wrap on his lip.

Ellen said, “The daughter’s relationship with her father is the model for all her future relationships.” She felt proud, as if she was making some sort of incredibly subtle, ironic, witty point.

Her father was reading the newspaper now. He glanced up at her with an expression of pure disgust on his face. “This article is about you,” he said.

“It’s not true,” said Ellen, filled with shame and hurt beyond belief.

“It is true,” said a girl who was sitting in front of Ellen patting a sandcastle into shape with a yellow spade.

“Colleen!” said Ellen. She was going to be extremely nice to her because that was the sort of person she was. “How
are
you?”

She tried to think of a topic of conversation that would interest Colleen. “I hear that you sewed your own wedding dress,” she said. “You must be so
talented
!”

“You’re being condescending,” said Julia. She was sunbaking on her stomach and lifted her head from her towel to speak.

“She should never have got pregnant,” said Colleen to Julia. “That was unethical of her.”

“Probably,” yawned Julia. “But she means well.”

“It was unethical because he’s still in love with me,” said Colleen complacently.

“But you’re dead!” cried Ellen, suddenly remembering and filled with the injustice of her accusation.

“You’re a very pretty girl,” said Ellen’s father to Colleen.

Colleen tilted her head. “Thank you, David.”

“Well, I’m so sorry for getting pregnant,” said Ellen. She knew she was acting petulantly because she was jealous of her father complimenting Colleen, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself. She began to fling handfuls of sand at her own face. “How can I redeem myself? What can I do to make it up to you?”

“Ellen. Stop it. You are making an absolute fool of yourself,” said Madeline, who was sitting on the old couch they had when they shared a flat.

“Did you hear something?” said Patrick. Ellen woke to see Patrick sitting up next to her in bed, rubbing his eyes.

“It’s just the wind, I think,” said Ellen.

Outside, the wind was howling, making the windows rattle. She sat up and reached for the glass of water on the bedside table.

“Sorry,” said Patrick. He lay back down.

Ellen tipped back her water glass. It was empty. She didn’t remember drinking it. She looked at the clock: only four a.m. This night would never end.

“I’m having all these peculiar dreams,” said Ellen.

There was a bang as a branch or something landed on the roof.

“Me too,” said Patrick. “It’s the wind.”

“You said something when I was doing your relaxation,” said Ellen.

“Mmmm?” said Patrick.

“About Colleen.”

She waited. Patrick snored.

Ellen lay back down and instantly dreamed again.

This time she was walking down the aisle on her wedding day, wearing her grandmother’s
dress. She was carrying the baby in the palm of her outstretched hand. The baby was the size of a bead and it was rolling back and forth across her palm.

“Keep your hand flat! You’ll drop it!” said one of the wedding guests. Ellen turned her head to see that it was her client Luisa, wearing a big hat. “You don’t even know how to look after a baby! I should be the pregnant one! Give it to me!”

“I gave you your money back,” said Ellen briskly. “There is nothing more I can do. I am a good person.”

She kept walking. She could see Patrick at the end of the aisle, facing away from her. He turned around to look at her, and Ellen smiled at him, but his face changed.

“Stop following me!” he yelled. His voice echoed throughout the whole church. “It’s
over
! Can’t you understand? I never loved you!”

Ellen was mortified. “Patrick, it’s not Saskia, it’s me!” she called out. She tried to keep her voice light and cheery, because it was a wedding after all, but loud enough for Patrick to hear right down the other end of the aisle, which had become as long as an airport runway.

“Leave me alone!” shouted Patrick.

“Darling, I don’t think he loves you anymore,” said her mother. She and the godmothers were dressed up like bridesmaids from the eighties, in pink taffeta dresses with giant puffed sleeves.

“Men!” said Pip. “Who needs them? Let’s get drunk.”

“You’ll meet someone else,” said Mel.

“I never really liked him much anyway,” sniffed Ellen’s mother.

“He thinks I’m Saskia,” said Ellen. “I’m sure it’s just a mix-up.”

But actually, she wasn’t sure. Had
she
been the one stalking Patrick all along?

“You hypnotized me into moving those boxes!” shouted Patrick. “You manipulated me!”

“I’m sorry!” cried Ellen. He was breaking up with her. This relationship was going to end just like all her other relationships. She was going to have
to bring up this baby on her own and it was so teeny-tiny! She closed her hand carefully around the baby-bead and began to run, but as soon as she did her legs lurched sickeningly, as if she’d run off a cliff.

She opened her eyes.

She couldn’t tell if it was morning or night; the bedroom seemed to be filled with a strange, eerie orange-yellow light.

It was like there’d been a fire, except there was no smell of smoke. She could hear Patrick’s rattley breathing that was not quite snoring, and the hollow, rhythmic sound of waves crashing on the beach.

And she could hear or sense something else. Something not right.

There was a long, dark shape at the end of the bed. Ellen stared, her heart hammering, waiting for her eyes to adjust and for the shape to become a familiar object, like a chair or a dressing gown hanging on a door.

It moved.

Ellen’s lungs filled with air.

A woman was standing in their bedroom, at the foot of their bed, watching them sleep. Ellen scrabbled back so fast that her head banged painfully against the headboard.

Colleen. Colleen back from the dead to claim her husband.

“
What is it?” said Patrick sleepily.

He sat up and rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. Then suddenly he flung back the covers and crawled straight across the bed.

“Get out!” he roared. “Get
out
!”

It wasn’t Colleen. It was Saskia. She was wearing pajama pants with a football jersey over the top. Her hair was wet and plastered to her head; her feet were bare.

“Patrick,” she said. She stepped back to avoid his grasp. “I just wanted—”

Patrick fell out of the bed and onto the floor in an ungainly sprawl.

Ellen saw that Saskia was holding something in her hand. It was the ultrasound pictures that they’d left on the kitchen table.

“Hey!” She’d never heard her voice sound like that before: as if it had been scraped raw. “Give those back!”

She got out of bed and moved toward Saskia. “They’re
mine
!”

There was a terrified shriek from down the hallway. “Daddy!”

“Jack,” said Saskia. She half turned toward the door.

Patrick got to his feet and grabbed Saskia by both arms. He lifted her up into the air as if he was going to slam her against the wall. The ultrasound photos fell from her hand onto the floor. Ellen saw that Patrick was trembling all over, his eyes wild and crazed.

He’s going to kill her, she thought. It’s my job to stop him killing her. She grabbed for the back of Patrick’s T-shirt.

“I just want to explain!” Saskia tried to drape her arms around Patrick’s neck. He shoved her away and she fell to her knees.

“Dad!” screamed Jack. “Ellen! What’s happening?”

“Get out!” Patrick dragged Saskia to her feet. “Get out now.”

“I’m sorry,” sobbed Saskia. She fell against Patrick’s chest again, and with Ellen still clutching the back of his T-shirt, they shuffled out into the hallway in a strangely intimate dance.

Dawn was breaking, and through the open door of her office opposite their bedroom, where Ellen would normally see the beach and the ocean, all she could see was a haze of apocalyptic orange. Yellow light poured into the house. She let go of Patrick’s T-shirt and stared.

What was going on? Was it war?

“
Daddy! It’s
Armageddon
!”

Ellen turned her eyes back in time to see Patrick shove Saskia away from him just as Jack came pounding down the hallway in his pajamas, his eyes gigantic with fear.

Saskia slipped on the hallway runner and she flung out an arm to save herself.

Her flailing hand clutched at Jack’s pajama top and the two of them fell together, toppling, crashing, rolling.

F
or one long, endless, silent moment Ellen and Patrick stood at the top of the staircase, their hands gripped on the landing banister, their eyes fixed on Jack and Saskia below.

Saskia was on her back. One leg was bent at a sickeningly strange angle. Her head lolled; her face was obscured by her hair.

Jack was flat on his stomach, his legs straight, his palms down on the floor as if he was asleep in bed.

They’re both dead, thought Ellen with certainty, and she was seized by the terrifying revelation that this actually happened, exactly like this, all the time, every day. People died,
children
died, in clumsy, stupid accidents that took only a few seconds, and afterward you kept breathing, and your heart kept pumping, and everything was still exactly the same. The unacceptable happened and you were expected to accept it.

Patrick made a sound like a dog’s whimper.

Then Jack moved, and Patrick reacted instantly. He went clattering down the stairs so fast that as Ellen ran behind him she called out, “Careful!”

Jack sat up on his haunches cradling his arm. His face was dead white.

“I think I broke it,” he said in a matter-of-fact tone, and then he turned his head and was sick all over the floor.

Ellen and Patrick fell to their knees on either side of him.

“Oh, darling,” said Ellen. She lifted the sleeve of his pajamas and saw that his arm was already starting to swell and looked oddly deformed.

“You’re OK, mate,” said Patrick unconvincingly. He looked like he might faint.

Jack lifted his head and wiped his hand across his mouth. He stared at them with streaming, baffled eyes.

“What’s happened? I don’t understand. Why is Saskia here?”

“Don’t worry about that,” said Patrick. He went to reach for Jack as if to pick him up. “I’m going to take you to emergency.”

“No, you mustn’t move him,” said Ellen. “He might have a back or head injury. Just lie him down and keep that arm still. I’ll call an ambulance. Let me just check on Saskia.”

“Forget Saskia,” hissed Patrick.

“Why is she here?” said Jack again. His eyes widened as he saw her over Ellen’s shoulder. “Is she all right?”

“Just forget about her,” said Patrick.

“No!” yelled Jack. His voice was unexpectedly loud in the silent house.

Patrick blanched. “It’s all right, mate.”

Jack pulled away from him. “You can’t just
forget
about her! Stop saying that! Just because
you
don’t like her. It’s not fair!”

“Everything is OK,” said Patrick soothingly.

“Check on her!” Jack’s face went from white to bright red, his small chest heaved beneath his pajama top and his eyes glittered with fury. Ellen stared; she’d never seen a small child experiencing such grown-up emotions.

She said, “I’ll make sure she’s OK, Jack.”

There are some parts that I know I’ll never forget, and some parts that I expect I’ll never remember.

Like, I don’t remember calling a taxi, but I do remember pulling up in front of Ellen’s house and paying the driver. I gave him a ten-dollar tip and we talked about the wind. It was howling. I remember the trees swaying back and forth, like women lamenting their dead children.

I felt exhilarated and wild, a woman in the forest embracing my inner something-or-other. I remember touching my hair and realizing it was dripping wet and being confused because it wasn’t raining. I must have stepped straight out of the shower and called a cab.

At least I didn’t drive when I was drunk. Some rational part of my mind knew enough to call a cab.

I don’t remember why I decided to go to Ellen’s house, but I can guess my train of thought. I was probably standing in the shower and imagining Ellen and Patrick getting ready to go to bed at the same time, and how they would have been talking about their day, about how exciting it was to see the baby for the first time, and I would have thought, I wish I could see them.