The boyfriends said she was a head case, a nut case, a drama queen, a psycho. The therapists said she had ADHD or OCD, depression or anxiety or most likely both, a nervous disorder, a mood disorder, a personality disorder, maybe even a bipolar affective disorder. The word disorder was a popular one.
There was one guy who announced there was nothing at all wrong with her, she just needed stress relief, and then he texted her the following week and asked her out for a drink, which he said would be fine now he was no longer treating her. The fact that she said yes to the unethical sleazebag probably demonstrated that there actually was something very wrong with her.
“Medical diagnosis isn’t in my scope of practice,” the new guy, Roger, said anxiously when Amy asked, mildly interested, which particular diagnosis took his fancy. “I’m a counselor. I work alongside the medical profession, and I work alongside you.” Then he smiled and leaned toward her, confidentially, as if he were sharing a secret, no longer anxious, “You know, sometimes labels are a distraction. You’re not a label. You’re Amy.”
Hokey but sweet. It actually did feel like he was sitting shoulder to shoulder with her, on the same team, rather than simply observing her with the cool, professional eyes of some of his colleagues.
She liked him. For now, at least.
She only sometimes took the tablets the good psychiatrists prescribed, and she only sometimes took the pills the bad boyfriends offered.
Every now and then she pulled out the hopeful, obligatory “mental health plan” she and her GP had worked on together, and she did her best to keep up “strategies” and “techniques” that made her appear semi-normal to the world: Poetry. Journaling. Exercise. Mindfulness. Nature. Meditation. Breathing. Berries. Vitamins. Superfoods. Probiotics. Gratitude. Baths. Conversation. Sleep.
Sometimes they worked and sometimes they didn’t.
“It’s just that your feelings are too big,” her dad’s mother told her when she was a kid and cried for so long her parents lost their tempers. “You’ll grow into them. My feelings used to be too big too. Have a lemonade, sweetie.”
Apparently her grandmother didn’t so much grow into her feelings as flatten them with alcohol, but alcohol and lemonade only amplified Amy’s oversized feelings.
“Oh, Amy is just nervy,” she once overheard her other grandmother, her mother’s mother, say. “Like Auntie Edna. No need to get your knickers in a knot, Joy, she’s fine. Gee, those nervy types do get on your nerves, though. Should we ask her to cry somewhere else?”
Auntie Edna spent the last days of her sad nervy life tied to a chair, but no need to get your knickers in a knot.
“We won’t let you be tied to a chair, darling,” Amy’s mother used to say. “Anyway, I actually think you’re more like Auntie Mary, and she didn’t end up tied to a chair.”
Auntie Mary was killed after she stepped in front of a tram in the city, but she absolutely didn’t step out in front of that tram on purpose, no matter what some people implied. The truth, according to Amy’s mother, was that Auntie Mary got distracted trying to save a little girl’s panama hat when a southerly buster blew it straight from her head one summer afternoon a week before Christmas, which, according to Amy’s mother, was exactly the sort of reckless thing Amy would do, and if she did, Joy would never forgive her. Look both ways. Especially when Christmas is coming up. Make that one of your funny little rituals. Looking both ways.
Amy didn’t have any funny little rituals at the moment. Or none that people would notice. Anyway, they all had their rituals and superstitions, their strange little habits. Troy had to tap his nose three times before he served. Logan had to wear his lucky red socks whenever he competed, even when his feet grew too big for them. Brooke still had trouble getting out of the car whenever she arrived somewhere. Brooke thought no one knew that. Amy knew.
“There’s nothing wrong with you, sweetheart,” her father said. “It’s all in your head.”
All in your head. Her dad was so cute and clueless.
She lay still and breathed while she chatted with the spirits of Auntie Edna and Auntie Mary. She had never met either of her mad great-aunts, but she felt like they would have got along.
I’ve kind of got a bad feeling about this girl staying with my parents.
Me too, said Auntie Edna.
Me too, said Auntie Mary.
Get rid of her, said Auntie Edna, who was bossy.
The bad feeling intensified, took hold of her stomach, twisted. A car alarm started up down the street. Someone knocked on her bedroom door.
Amy grabbed at the sheets and pulled them up, covering her nakedness.
“Who is it?” she called out.
“Sorry!” said a deep, hoarse, male voice. “It’s just me.” He paused. “Simon.” He cleared his throat. “Simon Barrington.” As if there were several Simons living in the house.
She looked at the ceiling. She’d kind of known this might happen, and she’d told herself that under no circumstances should she let it happen.
“Are you awake?” he said through the door.
“No,” she called back. “I’m not awake, Simon Barrington.” Just lying here chatting to the spirits of my crazy dead aunts, Simon Barrington.
She wouldn’t say anything else. It was a mistake to sleep with your flatmates. Especially when they were still in their twenties, and you were on the cusp of leaving your thirties. Simon’s long-term girlfriend had recently dumped him while they were out at yum cha. He’d been going out with her since high school, and they were meant to be getting married next year, and he didn’t see it coming, and he loved yum cha, which his girlfriend knew, so that added an extra layer of tragedy.