This Is Where I Am (31 page)

Me too. Except I’ve seen him already, of course. The day they took him in.

I’d been on my way to the supermarket of all places when I got the call.

‘Is that Debs?’

‘Who’s speaking?’

‘It’s Sam at Morrisons.’

‘Who?’

‘I work with Abdi. You’re a pal of Abdi’s, right?’

‘Yes. Is everything OK?’

But it wasn’t. The supermarket called me because I was first in Abdi’s phonebook. Took me twenty-five minutes to get there, head buzzing with:
Just went fucking mental. Chibbing butcher-knives an all sorts
. By the time I arrived, an ambulance was there too. As was a police car. Me, wedging through the slow yawn of the automatic doors, running past startled shoppers, on into the back-shop. Calling Richard on my mobile as I ran, because he was the boss of them all, and could stop this. When I didn’t even know what
this
was.

Abdi was cooried under a metal table. Bloody hands nursing his head. I could see an empty wooden knife-block, its contents scattered and a cleaver grinning. I think he was still holding one knife at that stage. By the blade. A grey-haired cop was on all-fours, pushing his nose right in, while a paramedic crouched behind him. Full in his vision, all Abdi would see was metal and knives and uniforms. The place went quiet as I barrelled in. Just the hum of the fridges and Abdi keening.

‘What’s going on? Is he hurt?’

The cop looked up. ‘You the girlfriend?’ Wary as he said it, not waiting for my answer, but swivelling again to fix on Abdi.

‘No, I’m Abdi’s mentor.’ I went to move forward, but the paramedic straightened. Raised his hand, John Wayne style. ‘Whoah there, lady. I’d keep your distance if I were you.’

‘Abdi,’ I called. ‘It’s me, Debs. Are you OK?’

No reply.

‘Is he hurt?’ I asked the paramedic.

‘He’ll no let me near him, hen.’

‘Will someone tell me what happened? Has he hurt anyone?’

‘It’s like he canny see.’

‘He’s a breach of the peace for starters.’

‘Oh, for God’s sake. He’s terrified.’

I doubled over, trying to see Abdi’s face. Or let him see me, at least.

‘Just stay back, please. Liaison Psychiatry Team’s been alerted.’

‘What?’

‘We canny get near him,’ said the paramedic. ‘How long you known him? Has he a history of mental-health issues, d’you know?’

‘Of course he hasn’t.’

A voice outside shouted: ‘You canny go in –’

A suited man pushed through the plastic sheeting separating the back-shop from the store. It looked like he was carrying a laptop case. ‘Can I help? Dr Gallagher.’

‘You from Psychie, doctor?’

‘No. My surgery’s across the street. Saw you guys’d been in here a while.’

‘Dr Gallagher?’ The cop was still on his knees, but backing slowly in the direction of the doctor. ‘I’m thinking we maybe need to –’

While they were talking, I started shuffling a wee bit closer. Kicked a blade by accident, and it slid and struck the table leg, and the clunk reverberated, became roaring, Abdi roaring, spewing and screaming insane phrases: ‘
Isk gotta! Itsgatah!
’

‘What’s got who?’ I raised my voice, not shouting.

‘ISKA DAA!’ His spine bucked, the table rose. The cop scrambled to his feet behind where I had sneaked in.

‘Right, we’re gonny have to use the CS spray.’ Hauling me away, reaching for his belt.

‘NO!’ Me, pushing the polis who was pulling me, and my arm kept going, was seized, twisted.

‘Enough! Now get back!’

Did I mean to rugby-tackle him? I don’t know what my body intended, but I fell on the fronts of my thighs, my belly coming with me, and we went for a slither across the manky floor. Boot-scuffs and mud, splats of gore. A gobbet of bone joint. No. It was the white of Abdi’s eye. I held out my hand.

‘Here you, come on. Come on out and see me.’

Keeping it to a murmur, noticing the doctor was prepping a syringe. I’d rather have a dopey collapse than Abdi screaming his face was on fire. What Sam had said was true, though. There was no blink to him, no register. Me, the black boots, the hard beige floor. We were ghosts. My inching hand was simply not there.

Clean and soft, the needle entered him. A vague pucker on his face, as if his finger had caught a thorn. I crawled out again, let the doctor do his job. The policeman was on his radio.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said when he was finished.

‘It’s OK,’ he said. ‘You’ve ripped your tights, by the way.’

‘I know.’

They got Abdi strapped on to a stretcher, the kind where the torso’s propped upright. Blanket whipped on and round, deft fold beneath the knees. His poor head lolling, all the pinkness of his gums spilling.

‘Can someone please tell me what happened?’

Sam, the guy who’d phoned, spoke first. ‘Christ, I don’t know. Frankie here was butchering up some silverside and Abdi just fucking flipped. But it was the cow he was punching, no any of us –’

‘Naw, he wisny,’ said Frankie. ‘He was cuddling it, so he was. So I couldny cut it.’

‘Miss?’ The cop had his pen out.

‘
Mrs
Deborah Maxwell.’

‘Mrs Maxwell. You say Abdi has no history of mental health issues. Does he have a history of violence, then?’

‘No. Absolutely not – sorry.’ The paramedics, two of them now, were wheeling Abdi’s stretcher past. ‘Sorry – where is it you’re taking him?’

‘Southern General. A&E probably, take a look at they hands. They’re all cut to shreds. Then Psychie’ll want . . . well . . . maybe a – I dunno.’ The medic turned to the cop. ‘Are yous planning on jailing him?’

‘Wait, please. Look, before anyone does anything: this man is a refugee, OK? He’s come from Somalia, where he lost his wife. He lost his whole family in really violent circumstances. Frankie: you said he was cuddling the cow?’

‘Aye. That’s what it looked like.’

‘And he was fine till you started cutting it up?’

‘Aye. Brand new.’

Addressing myself to the policeman. ‘This is Abdi’s first day in this job. He’s been in the UK for nearly two years. He’s a lovely man – got a wee girl –’

‘A wee girl? And where’s she at the moment?’

‘With her childminder.’

‘Excuse me interrupting,’ said the GP. ‘I’d better get back to surgery – you’ve got my details. I’ll phone the Southern anyway, speak to the receiving team. You can get a statement from me later, yes?’

‘Sure. Many thanks again, doctor.’ The cop, shifting from the doctor to Frankie and Sam. ‘You say he wasn’t directly aggressive with anyone?’

‘No really.’

‘He was fucking swinging a bloody great machete at me.’

‘Was he fuck. He was waving it round his head – high up, know? Like he was stopping stuff falling on him.’

The babble of conflicting accounts got louder, another man hurried in – Maloney, who seemed to be in charge – then Richard appeared, colliding with the paramedic who was packing up his bag, Abdi rumbling past me –

‘Can I come with him?’

‘No,’ said the cop. ‘I need to get a statement.’

‘Can you not take it later?’

The paramedics were trundling out the door, the fragile slump of Abdi, shrinking. He was going to fade, disappear if I didn’t keep a hold of him. Richard took the cop aside, vouching for me, for Abdi, I’m not sure, but he gave a kind of wave, like a shoo, and I disappeared after the ambulance guys.

‘ ’Scuse me. EX-cuse me! Can I –’

‘Best no go in the back, case he gets . . . you know.’

‘Can I follow in my car?’

‘Sure.’

We were ages at the Southern. They took Abdi off, while I sat in a draughty space. He was waking up, there would be a psychiatric assessment later. When later? Nobody knew.

Is he talking yet? He’ll be very scared
.

He’s fine
.

I didn’t want to leave him, but it was past five by this time, and I’d no number for Mrs Coutts. I phoned Abdi’s flat, on the off-chance she’d be there, and she was, she was, which was just as well, because next minute the same policeman turns up, muttering about ‘child protection issues’.

‘Are you stalking me?’ I said.

‘What if I was?’

Pleasant-looking guy, when he turned down the dourness.

‘So is a mentor like a sponsor? Does he have many “issues”, your pal?’

‘No more than the rest of us would, if you’d seen your family hacked to death.’

‘Point taken.’ And he bought me a coffee, and then he left.

Eventually, Abdi was admitted here, to this place we are visiting today. Leverndale. He came on his own. The doctor, psychiatrist?, was an identikit of the many composite
chaps
Callum and I used to deal with: bools-in-their-mooth when they mumbled their name, a dollop of jargon in place of a prognosis. But it was made very clear that Abdi needed no distractions.

‘Best he gets some rest just now. Are you his wife?’

‘No.’

‘Next of kin?’

‘No.’

The most they would tell me was that he was displaying signs of a ‘dissociative disorder’.

‘They tend to be quite common following traumatic events. I think what we may be seeing is a fractured presentation between the past and present events – what you might term hysterical psychosis.’

‘Like post-traumatic stress, you mean?’

The doctor had smiled benignly. ‘Something like that.’

I park the car beside the dustbins. Rebecca and I climb out. Low modern buildings, and the housing scheme beyond; there’s not much left of the old estate but the tower which dominates, vaguely Italianate, a pointed spire above its cupola.
Leverndale
. Just the name gives you the willies. Say it to anyone in Glasgow and watch them shiver. It’s a universal for ‘the loony bin’. Same as Bedlam. Dark, uncompromising. Leverage, doom. Castles and dungeons; there’ll be a grey lady hidden in these walls. I’ve told Rebecca that Aabo’s been staying at a nice place, to
get a wee rest cause he was awful tired
. Smart sloe eyes that do not buy this. But she colludes with me, placing her hand in mine as we leave the car park to search for Abdi’s ward.

Rebecca has been amazing. On the day of Abdi’s admission, she followed me home, uncomplaining after I sat her down with Mrs Coutts and asked if she’d like to stay at mine. Just for the night, I promised. Then the next night, then the next. Unblinking, she watched as I took the damp sheets off her bed each morning, put them in the machine, made her lunch. I explained I’d love to make some cakes, but I wouldn’t know what kind unless she told me.

‘Chocli.’

‘Yeah? Well, how about we walk to the shop and buy some
Buttons
?’

‘ ’K.’

At first, she hardly spoke at all. Followed me everywhere, though, copying my movements as I read the paper, did the housework. Coming a wee bit closer every day. I was careful to be quiet and steady, telling her what I was doing, offering her a wee shot of the Hoover now and then. I know, child labour. Social Work would have a fit – and they were actually monitoring me. Was I a fit and proper person? According to my respectable sister, and the Refugee Council – and that steely-grey policeman – I was. I bought her a dolly at the corner shop; a cheap, plastic fashion doll, but we were sticking close to home at that point, so it would have to do. Found it in my garden the very next day: clothes off, head planted, arse on show to the world.

‘Lovely. OK then. Would you rather do gardening?’

Her wee face had screwed up.

‘Planting? Digging? Would you like to plant some nice bulbs instead of Cindee?’

I’d a load of snowdrop bulbs rotting in the shed. A friend had suggested I might like to plant them in memory of Callum.

‘Yes, Debba!’

That then led to a trip to the garden centre, to buy a mini-trowel, and some carrot seeds, and lettuce and – basically everything Rebecca could tell me the names of.

‘Uh-huh. No pointing. You have to say what it’s called or we won’t buy it.’

The flowers got ignored, it was the packets with the pictures of vegetables that she went for, sometimes saying the name in what I assume was Somali, sometimes English. She knew her plants, this girl. I hadn’t gardened since Callum had gone in the wheelchair, had forgotten the scent of earth cracking, its gritty friable soil and the good damp underneath. We spent hours digging furrows – I don’t mean we dug acres, just that it was a slow and laborious process. You have to pause, you see, whenever you find a worm, or when a thrush pours out a song, or a squirrel bobs across the wall. Apparently they have
very
comical tails. Mornings became a quick drink, then out into the garden to see what had appeared. Were there slugs? Had the foxes come? Rebecca began to hum wee tunes, potter by herself while I got on with stuff in the kitchen. And – in the space between the patient ploughing and the rush to get outside – the bed wetting stopped.