The living room had a static chill to it, partly from the temperature, partly from tension. The five of us – Amber’s tribe – sat on the two floral sofas opposite one another, while she and Arthur ruled over us from high-backed wooden chairs. I felt anxious and trapped, consumed by the sagging sofa with its sharp springs that poked up through the threadbare cushions, Tim and Hannah either side of me. I couldn’t help feeling as if Hannah was using the sloppiness of the soft furnishings to slide into my personal space. Right now we were taking a ‘de ep, centring breath’, our eyes closed. Hannah’s was warm on my neck. ‘Lovely!’ chirped Amber, calling us back to full consciousness. ‘And before the day begins in earnest...’ – she cast a significant look at Arthur – ‘what delights we have in store... I wanted to appoint myself Secret Santa.’ She crossed to the sofa opposite ours and pulled out a cardboard box from behind it. ‘Someone might have to clarify the conc ept for you, Amber,’ said Arthur, in his de ep, sonorous voice. God, he was posh. ‘I don’t think you’re all that undercover.’ ‘Point taken,’ giggled Amber, handing him a package wrapped in shiny red paper. She continued on to Marco. ‘No opening these until everyone’s got one.’ People were already starting to pipe up with thanks and appreciation. ‘Your present’s upstairs,’ said Joanna and, while Amber protested, I could tell she was delighted. I cursed myself for not bringing her a gift – why had I taken her at her word when she’d said not to bring anything but myself? Of course, my gift was my maxed-out credit card, but it was still too early in my relationship with Amber for me to admit that to myself. I slipped my fingers under the sellotape. Hannah, a few seconds ahead of me, was already bouncing with delight beside me. ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you!’ she said, holding up the bubble bath we’d both received. Hers was lemongrass, mine was sea kelp. ‘You know I love lemongrass, don’t you?’ ‘I certainly do!’ Amber confirmed. I couldn’t help noticing they didn’t have labels, just red for the men, blue for the women. Her response was a kind indulgence, giving the painfully insecure Hannah a chance to feel special. ‘Thanks, Amber,’ I said, squirting a bit onto the back of my hand. It was a wobbly blob, sticky and synthetic. ‘Smells delicious.’ ‘Mine’s liquid fags,’ muttered Tim, showing me the tobacco label on the brown bottle of shower gel, and we both laughed. Amber’s eyes grazed us, and I beamed at her. I’d appreciated the moment of silliness, but now I had the feeling I was doing something wrong, failing at healing. I redoubled my vow to spend the day demonstrating how much I valued her. ‘Right,’ said Amber, circling the room with a frayed wicker bin. ‘Paper in here, and then we’ll get started.’ Was it excitement or dread that was curling its way upwards through my body like a plume of smoke? Marco was eager to go first, his hand waving above his head like a victory flag when Amber asked for a volunteer. He was an acting student, his rich Milan family paying for him to study in London: he had sweetness, but also a craving for the spotlight that you could see even when he was just pouring milk over his cereal or lighting a sneaky cigarette. ‘Brave boy,’ said Amber, as he took a comedy bow and crossed to the massage table that she and Arthur had wheeled into the centre of the room. ‘Make yourself comfortable.’ Marco took off his expensive white leather trainers and lay down on the bed. He rolled his eyes upwards towards Arthur, looming above him. ‘Now do you saw me in half?’ he said, making Hannah guffaw. It was nervous hysteria, I
could tell from the way that her limbs were compulsively twitching. I laid a calming hand on her knee and as I tried to take it away, she trapped it under hers. ‘No, Abandoned Peter Pan. But we might cut away your past,’ said Amber smoothly. She was subtly turning the energy, forcing a crackly kind of calm on the whole room. ‘Okay,’ said Marco, subdued now. ‘I want you to move backwards in time,’ intoned Amber, while Arthur laid two firm hands on Marco’s thin shoulders. ‘Take us back to a moment when you felt that abandonment, when you felt that de ep sense of being alone.’ ‘I don’t know...’ said Marco. ‘We’re all here with you, Marco,’ said Amber. ‘It’s safe to go on this journey. Just let your subconscious lead the way – it knows where you need to go.’ There was a pause. Then Arthur started to emit a de ep hum, his hands working Marco’s shoulders through his grey jumper. ‘Arthur’s performing some reiki on you now, Marco,’ said Amber. Marco’s body jerked, and then his internal motor seemed to kick in. ‘I was nine,’ he said, his Italian accent suddenly much more pronounced, his eyes firmly closed. My body prickled with unease: it felt as if he really was spiralling backwards in time, to a place where we might not be able to reach him. I longed now for one of his stupid jokes: it made me grateful for Hannah’s clammy palm, sitting heavily on my hand. ‘I am nine,’ whispered Amber. ‘I am nine,’ he r epeated. ‘I cannot sle
Ep I come down the stairs, and my father is in the lounge. He tidies them away, but I know there are drugs on the table, even if I don’t know what they are called.’ ‘And where’s your mother?’ asked Amber, her focus on him absolute. ‘She is working. She is in America. I have nobody but him.’ Marco’s body juddered. ‘She’s been gone for so long. I am scared.’ ‘Of course you’re scared,’ said Arthur. ‘I am so scared,’ said Marco, starting to cry. ‘I know I need to be his little man.’ ‘So of course you never grew up,’ said Amber triumphantly. ‘You never had the chance to be a child.’ ‘You’re our child today, Marco,’ said Arthur. I looked around the room, trying to catch someone’s eye, but everybody was staring intently at the tableau unfolding in front of us. Only Hannah responded, her flushed face full of emotion. ‘I love you,’ she mouthed. I smiled weakly back. ‘I ask him what he’s doing, and then I say I won’t tell Mummy. He is my best friend.’ ‘My poor little boy,’ said Amber, her voice soaked with sympathy. ‘You have to try so hard, don’t you? You have to work so hard to survive.’ ‘It’s so fuck-ing hard,’ yelled Marco, fists balled up like the frustrated child he once was, tears spurting. ‘He takes out a card, he lines up the drugs and I’m... I’m just waiting to see what he will do. It looks like sugar... from when we make the biscuits at school.’ The petty innocence of that detail pierced me, dragged me inside of Marco’s story and out of my own head. ‘But I know it’s something bad.’ ‘So what does he do to you, Marco?’ hisses Amber. ‘He...’ Marco’s profile was white, tears cascading down his cheeks. ‘He leans down, he snorts some up and then...’ Marco shuddered to silence, the whole room rigid as we waited for him. ‘He shows me how to do it.’ Our collective shock felt as though it curdled the air around us. It was me who squeezed Hannah’s hand this time. ‘Oh, Marco,’ said Amber, loving and wise. He looked up at her through wet eyes, gratitude and vulnerability shining out. ‘You’re safe now. We’ve got you. You’re not Abandoned Peter Pan anymore.’ My heart filled up watching them, watching all of us. I was part of something that felt so pure
and primal. It wasn’t just me, inside my own painful thoughts, hating myself for every petty thing from the sneaky packet of Marlboro Lights at the bottom of my handbag to the crinkly line that ran below my left eye. All of my loneliness, the petty ‘crimes’ I pinned my self-hatred on, felt like they were being burned away in this blazing circle of love. Tears were rolling down my cheeks now, and I momentarily took my hand away from Hannah’s, grinning at her with the open warmth I should have had from the first second I met her. I mopped them away with Sophie’s soft scarf, then pushed the thought of my sister aside and let my hand cover Hannah’s again. ‘We’re going to try and reach back now, Marco,’ said Arthur, his voice low and calm. ‘We’re going to try and reach back to where you and your father first found each other.’ Marco looked crumpled and exhausted, lying prone on the couch. ‘We’re with you, Marco!’ shouted Hannah. She giggled. ‘Is that allowed?’ ‘We are, though!’ I added, and Amber smiled over at us both like an indulgent mum. ‘Okay!’ said Marco, some of his familiar cheekiness poking through again. Arthur began his strange, guttural humming as Amber stalked around the couch, her gaze far away. She owned that room. She owned every single one of us. ‘Let yourself move backwards, Marco,’ she said, intense and focused. ‘Time is an illusion. It’s a construct. You can move beyond it. You can move beyond anything. You know that now.’ I watched Marco’s olive-skinned profile, the way his eyelids were flickering with de ep internal effort. Was it as simple as that? Would I never again stand outside Londis with my credit card slicing into my palm, hating myself in advance for the sour-tasting Rioja I knew would be sluicing down my throat until the bottle was empty? Amber had urged me to be compassionate with myself, told me that all I’d been doing in those moments was self-medicating. Would today be the final dose – all the medicine I’d ever need? ‘I am muddy,’ he said eventually. ‘I am in the mud.’ ‘You’re in the mud?’ said Amber. ‘How does it feel in your body?’ ‘I am wet. I am cold.’ I could see his thin frame was starting to shiver. Tim was watching intently, his bald head cocked to one side. I tried to smile at him, but his gaze was unwavering. Was he professionally fascinated by the way Marco’s body was mirroring the memory? ‘Where are you, Marco?’ said Arthur. ‘Tell us what you see.’ ‘I am... it’s a field.’ His shivering grew more pronounced. ‘It’s dangerous!’ ‘Is anyone with you, Marco?’ said Amber. ‘Is there anyone you can ask to help you?’ He paused, breath heavy and laboured, and then a smile spread across his face. ‘I am a soldier. But he is with me. We are together.’ Amber and Arthur locked eyes above his prone body, their satisfaction tangible. Marco’s eyes were still closed, but I registered their look for him, basking in the beautiful reminder of how much they cared about every one of us. ‘Who is he, Marco?’ said Amber. ‘Is he your best friend?’ ‘He is,’ said Marco, starting to cry again. The tears were different this time, infused with more love and less pain. ‘He is my best friend.’ ‘Your best friend,’ said Arthur. ‘Guys, I think we’ve found him!’ We all laughed, but then Marco’s face contorted with a new agony. ‘Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me behind!’ he wailed. ‘What’s happening?’ hissed Amber. ‘Where is he going?’ Marco’s body began to jerk around, and Amber laid her hands on his legs as Arthur encased his shoulders. ‘Ke ep talking, Marco, ke ep telling us where you are. We’re here with you.’ ‘I am...’ Marco’s words were getting stuck in his throat. I could hear the terror, and I gripped Hannah’s hand again. Safety and terror were fighting for me, too. Could I
really do this? ‘No!’ he wailed, thrashing about. ‘He’s... he’s gone from me.’ ‘He died, didn’t he?’ said Amber, quiet and sombre, as if it really was a funeral. ‘You lost your best friend, at least for a time. And then he came back to find you.’ She grabbed a handful of tissues from the nearby box, handing them to the sobbing Marco. ‘He was shot!’ said Marco. ‘He died there, in the mud. I couldn’t save him!’ ‘You’ve carried a great deal, Marco,’ said Arthur. ‘It’s no wonder life has been so hard for you,’ said Amber softly, stroking his blonde crop. ‘You’ve carried so much, this lifetime. And I think he came back to find you.’ ‘He did,’ agreed Marco fervently. ‘He came back for me.’ ‘But he was too young a soul to be a father,’ she continued. ‘He should have just been your friend.’ Marco’s whole body visibly relaxed, stretching out on the couch like a cat in the sunshine. His eyes opened, a peaceful smile wrapping its way across his pretty face. ‘Thank you,’ he said, utterly sincere. ‘You are...’ His hands went to his heart. ‘You will be here with me forever.’ Amber smiled down at him, her face pink and glowing. She wiped a tear away, gazing at Arthur with so much emotion that it was almost as if Marco was their newborn son. ‘No, Marco, thank you,’ she said. Everyone in the circle looked de eply moved. I slid across the floor towards the box of tissues: Hannah was crying in earnest, scrubbing at her cheeks with her sleeve. I landed almost at Amber’s feet. She looked down at me, eyes searching me, and just for a second, I couldn’t read her face. ‘Toxic Mummy’s Daughter,’ she said. ‘Are you volunteering?’ ‘Um...’ She laughed. ‘Either way, I think the universe just volunteered you.’ She clapped her hands authoritatively. ‘We’ll take a break now, discharge some of that beautiful energy. Then it’s back here for Toxic Mummy’s Daughter’s liberation!’ Everyone cheered and grinned, and I tried to return their enthusiasm. I wanted this, I really did, but a worm of fear was crawling around my stomach, eating me from the inside. Amber would ke ep me safe, though, surely?