The Feeler

‘Sometimes I wish a plane would crash into my flat.’

Theresa’s unbothered expression prevails as always, no matter how closely I watch her for a reaction. Since I started therapy with her, over three years ago, nothing about her has changed – nothing at all, from the way she plasters her hair to her scalp and her droopy eyes, right down to her pristine Mary Jane pumps. I often marvel at how she’s managed to keep her shoes unscuffed for so long: immaculate caretaking, or maybe she’s been buying new pairs without telling me? I thought our relationship was supposed to be built on trust.

‘Not hurting anyone, obviously. Just me,’ I clarify. Dutifully, albeit slightly delayed, Theresa’s pen scratches something on a page.

‘What makes you feel this way?’

Her blunted eyes meet mine. I delve into one, then its counterpart. Briefly I wonder whether she even bothers to reread her notes after our sessions, or if she just eats the paper whole the second I walk out of the room.

‘Hunger.’

---

Despite decades of feminist progression, popular discourse will still have you believing that a woman living alone at thirty-five is a travesty; if you asked me, I’d say it’s just about the only saving grace I have left. I can’t imagine other people infiltrating my little haven – dumping big dirty work boots on my freshly hoovered carpet or smearing Wotsit dust over my pristine eggshell walls.

It’s only natural if the silence becomes overwhelming sometimes, isn’t it? That’s what my radio is for. Even if barely it manages to scratch to life, it does the job. In a small flat, you don’t need much to fill the void: a constant loop of advertisements with intermittent music will do the trick.

At full volume, its noise can just about reach the bathroom. A bathroom can be a little slice of heaven, if looked after: clean between the tiles, invest in a hanging plant or two, put a diffuser in there… well, you might get so comfortable that you never want to leave.

There is so little left of the Pre-Raphaelite movement in our modern world – you have to look very hard to see it. One of the rare instances where you needn’t try at all is in a bathtub: any woman lying half-submerged can easily imagine herself as Millais’ Ophelia, despondent and begging for the world to let her go.

The only difference between us is that my flickering stars are patches of mould blooming around a half-open attic door.

Wait, half-open?

The last time I went up there must have been half a decade ago now, fishing out some Christmas decorations, but I know I closed it properly. I always close it properly, sso why is it now half-open?

The wooden door twitches, almost imperceptibly at first. When it shuffles again, I glimpse something in the pitch-darkness.

It’s just a slightly blacker smudge in the shadows, but as it slithers closer the flickering light of my candle illuminates an arm. Not a five-fingered, flat-palmed human arm, but more of a… feeler.

I jolt upright, a tidal wave of bathwater pouring over my body. I hunch over and watch in bewilderment as the feeler slides the attic door shut.

When it’s gone, I count to ten before allowing myself to exhale, laying back and spreading out my limbs, attempting to reclaim the room. I reach for a sponge to scrub my body, willing myself to believe I’ve finally gone mad.

That black ooze on my ceiling maintains a steady drip, drip, drip to remind me I have not.

---

I like boxes. Thinking in black and white, good and bad, makes the world so much easier, but unfortunately most things don’t work like that. My family is particularly difficult to categorise: no one quite fits into an archetype, which makes it difficult to decide how I feel about them.

My sister might be the hardest one to crack. Sister’s life is so perfect it should be boring, except it’s not and never will be. She will forever light up every room she enters, and she will always be there for absolutely everyone. She will run herself into the ground daily and dig herself out of her grave by 8 a.m. sharp the next morning. She will help you pick up the shards of your miserable life, will be the reason you cry yourself to sleep, and she will be the only star in your vast, empty sky. This is true because it always has been, and it always will be.

In theory, Sister should be a joy to be around – and she is, until you aren’t. The second that grey cloud rumbles above your head, you’ll want to hide from her until you’re ready to be your best self again, to save yourself the guilt of admitting your struggles to her.

After Christmas dinner, she catches me ransacking the kitchen for leftovers, literally red-handed with my fingers coated in cranberry sauce. Then she asks the dreaded question, in a tone not unlike a vet trying to soothe a dying cat:

‘How are you feeling?’

My lips are tight and red like a ventriloquist’s dummy, then the uncensored pours out:

‘The worst I’ve felt in a long time, actually. And it feels like everyone already knows that but they pretend they don’t so they never have to actually do anything to help. Everything’s being sucked away from me and I can’t scramble fast enough to hold onto anything. I feel like a magician drowning in the middle of an act, right in front of an audience who just keeps watching in morbid curiosity to see how it all ends up.’

When Sister finally blinks, her eyelashes flutter like a delirious fawn’s.

‘What?’

‘Oh, nothing. Just a bit under the weather, you know.’

Sighing, she picks up a nearby cloth to wipe invisible crumbs off of the nearest countertop.

‘How’s the baby?’ I ask. A coy smile creeps onto her lips; she glances down at her stomach, which is so rotund it makes her look like she’s smuggling a beachball under her mistletoe-embroidered jumper.

‘Much better, since that sickness stopped,’ she responds. Then, suddenly, it’s on me again. ‘Are you thinking of settling down any time soon?’

It’s the sort of question you hear disguised in many ways, but at least how she phrases it isn’t quite as aggressive as the alternatives. As I prepare to confess my singledom, I decide to have a little fun instead.

‘Actually… I’ve met someone.’

‘Really?’ She asks, bewildered, ‘Who?’

We both know what she really wants to ask is ‘where’, but this is a notoriously taboo question to ask a reclusive shut-in with minimal friends and even less romantic encounters.

‘He’s charming, very elusive,’ I manage to suppress my grin as I add, ‘He’s a real monster in the bathroom.’

‘Don’t you mean bedroom?’

I shrug. ‘That too, I’m sure, if he could find a way to get in there.’

Though she doesn’t understand, Sister laughs – a real laugh, not her usual faux giggle – and I feel like I’ve won an award when she pulls me in for a side-hug, deliberately avoiding her globe-sized belly.

‘I’m happy for you,’ she says, and I almost believe it’s true. ‘If you need anything, I’m always here for you.’

Discarding her dishcloth, she retreats from the kitchen back into the dining room where she will glow like Mother Mary herself, bewitching the party into her festive celebrations.

When I’m sure she’s not coming back, I slip a second turkey leg into a piece of kitchen roll as a reward for another interaction well-survived.

---

That evening, while running a bath, I can’t resist looking up.

The crack is back. The hairs on my arm are standing on end: I know something is observing me. At first I find it disturbing, almost predatory, but discomfort gives way to jealousy: why should it get to study me when I can’t even see it?

Determinedly squinting into the darkness, I imagine what it looks like. Maybe it’s got eight legs, like some sort of attic-dwelling octopus. Or maybe it’s just a regular squatter with one unfortunate limb. Whatever its appearance, I hope the creature is intimidated by our staring contest, that it knows who’s boss. But when a dull, distant whining starts up, something foreign and warm overtakes me.

Instinctively I retrieve my bag from the bedroom. Ignoring the deep sound of splashing indicating my tub about to overflow, I rummage through years’ worth of old lipsticks, softened chewing gum, and receipts. At the bottom, where everything you desperately need miraculously disappears to, is the kitchen roll, seeping grease.

With trembling hands, I pull the meat from my bag. Clutching the soggy tissue, I raise my hand and avert my gaze. The sound of dragging wood halts my breathing, then something begins to tug at the other end of my offering. I let go.

When I look up, the feeler has already withdrawn, and it’s hard to believe it was ever there at all. But I felt the pulling, heard its weeping, and the cold oil is still dripping down my arm, my open hand still held skywards.

---

My next stand-off with Theresa is on New Year’s Eve.

In the last ten minutes of every session, without fail, Theresa’s gaze is always fixed on the clock nailed to the wall behind my head. She must think I don’t notice, but it’s painfully obvious that she’d rather be anywhere other than in this room with me. To be fair, I feel the same way.

Sometimes, in these final ten minutes, I say things to try to shock Theresa; nothing has done the trick yet, but it’s fun to try. Now might be time to pull out the big guns – to drop something monumental, something she couldn’t possibly bypass by telling me to sleep earlier or take more hot baths. Something like–

‘I’m going to kill myself tonight.’

The words spew from my lips right on cue: the clock ticks loudly, signalling the end of our session. Theresa’s eye twitches and something sadistic, rooted deep within me, blossoms into scarlet-red pride. Sucking in a sharp breath, she empties all the air from the room, and her words reverberate in the vacuum between us.

‘Do you really mean that?’

She’s only worried about the extra paperwork with having me committed, but still the corner of my mouth twitches, and I smile sincerely for the first time in what feels like forever.

Bundling my satchel into my hands, I stand and turn to leave. ‘No, only kidding.’

‘Well, then, that’s not very funny,’ Theresa chastises, sounding like an amalgamation of all of the brutal women I grew up being told off by, but her sigh tells me she’s relieved to not have to deal with that mess.

I open the door, then wave half-heartedly without looking back.

‘See you next year.’

---

Back on the bathroom floor. I must have spent years of my life here by now, begging for purpose. Not even from something divine – I gave up on that a long time ago – but just something, anything, anyone. Like the second thief on the cross, alone after his two holy companions had been forgiven, I find myself yet again pleading with the sky for salvation.

Tears tumble over one another, streaming down my face, fighting to reach my chin first; I alternate between crying like a baby and howling like a wolf separated from the pack. This is another blessing of living alone: no one will knock on my bathroom door to check on me, saving me the embarrassment of vulnerability. Then again, no one will wrap a warm towel around my shivering shoulders, kiss my wet hair, or join me in my primal mourning, either.

Between sobs, my vision unblurs just enough to reveal the attic sliding open once again. Tentatively, that arm slithers out from the gap, hanging in the air, placid.

It takes a moment to regain control over my body, possessed by that dim, dark-blue demon, but the feeler waits patiently. When I manage to stand, I stumble forward and bump into the arm. It flinches, but soon we are both reaching out for each other.

Its length doubles around my waist. Allowing my tired eyes to shut, I feel myself rising into the attic, and am engulfed by the blackness. Distantly, I hear the hatch sliding shut.

Blindly I reach out, making contact with something firm and slimy and pulsating. Fear should devour me, but what I feel instead is an overwhelming sense of grief. I begin my wailing again. I begin to explain myself, to justify my sadness, but something stops me.

I know it’s just two creaks of an old home’s laboured bones, but it feels like an attempt at communication. The feeler envelops my shoulders and, tired of standing on broken baubles, my body relents. Surrounded by bags of moth-eaten clothes and discarded boxes, I fall inert, fixating on those two words I hear echoing around us:

‘I know.’