Lifesaving for Beginners

if the world has stopped. The world has stopped and everything is still and silent, and I get a sense of how ridiculous things are. Saying ‘God bless you’ when someone sneezes. Keeping a snake as a pet. Fascinators. And pseudonyms for crime novels. Crime novels, for fuck’s sake.
    ‘OhmyGodOhmyGodOhJesusOhmyGod.’
    ‘Let her sit down. Open a window. Kat?’ It might be Thomas. The voice is muffled. Faint.
    He said ‘well’.
    He said, ‘The procedure went well.’
    All of a sudden, I’m George Bailey in It’s a Wonderful Life and Clarence has just shown me what life would be without Ed and it takes my breath away. It does.
    ‘I’d say she’s having a panic attack.’ That’s Dr Collins. He sounds vaguely uninterested. I’d be offended if I didn’t feel so . . . peculiar.
    ‘Kat?’ Thomas again. I want to say something. There are things I need to say. Hands push against my shoulders and I’m sitting in a chair now and suddenly there’s a sharp crack and lovely cold air comes gushing into my mouth and down my throat, like water down a mountain after a thaw. I gulp it in, blow it out, gulp it in. It feels delicious to be alive. I’ve never noticed it before. How delicious it is. And it’s only then, after a few gulps and exhalations, that I realise that Thomas has hit me, with his open palm, right across the face.
    Afterwards, he denies it. ‘I smacked you, is all.’ My red, throbbing cheek pays testament to the truth.
    Apparently, you’re not supposed to hit people when they are having a panic attack. Dr Collins told Thomas that. Afterwards.
    In spite of this sage-if-untimely piece of free medical advice, it works. Thomas hitting me.
    I stop hyperventilating.
    Now I’m crying. Not discreet, delicate crying that people reserve for public places. It’s the real thing. There’s mascara. There’re secretions. There’s blotchy skin. Red, swollen eyelids. Minnie told me once that I wasn’t a pretty crier and she was right. It’s bad. It’s about as bad as it can be. I’m crying in public. Right in front of Thomas. And Dr Collins.
    I don’t think I can stop.
    Thomas puts his arms around me and says, ‘It’s all right, Kat. Ed is fine. The doctor said Ed is going to be fine. The procedure went well.’
    This has no impact on the weeping. It’s like I’m fifteen again. I’m in the changing room of O’Connor’s Jeans. Minnie has just told me. And instead of standing there and saying nothing, I’m crying. I’m weeping. I’m wailing. Like I’m fifteen all over again. Dr Collins says, ‘I’m afraid I’m going to have to go now.’
    Neither of us responds so he leaves.
    I’m crying so hard now, I can’t catch my breath. There’s a chance I might suffocate, which I suppose isn’t as bad as it could be, considering I’m at a hospital. If you’re going to suffocate anywhere, a hospital isn’t a bad place to go about it.
    It’s only afterwards I realise that I’m clinging to Thomas like a limpet on a rock. One entire section of his shirt is saturated with my tears. Later, I will notice a deep circular indentation on my forehead caused – I assume – by the gigantic wooden button on the lapel of his jacket. Buttons don’t usually appear on lapels of jackets but he insists on buying shop-soiled clothes. Seconds, he calls them. He has a thing about waste. He says somebody has to buy them. ‘Why does it have to be you?’ I often asked him.
    As suddenly as I began, I stop. I stop crying. Thomas, God love him, looks a little dazed. I suppose I can’t blame him. He’s never seen me crying. He has no idea what an ugly crier I am. Well, he knows now. I reach into my pockets for tissues but there are none. Why would there be? Thomas takes a gigantic piece of material out of his pocket and I hope it’s a clean handkerchief because he goes right ahead and wipes my face with it. He pats it. When he spreads his fingers, one of his hands can span my entire face. I remember that.
    And, just like that, I reach for him with my hand and sort of touch his cheek with my fingers. If I were writing it down in a romance novel, I might call the gesture ‘tender’. I can’t believe it. But instead of jerking my hand away like it’s been bitten by a dog, I hold my fingers there. Against his face. Here I am, standing in this barren room, touching Thomas’s face with my fingers, as if it’s nothing. As if it’s normal.
    The stubble scratches against my skin. Everything is so familiar. The