Competition

Third Prize

At First
by Jessica Wood
West Moreton Anglican College, Karrabin, Qld

I thought she was just playing
some sick kind of mind game
or pretend,
like I used to play with the boys –
fighting dragons
and putting on silly hats.
Only this time
it wasn't funny.

At first,
I thought she had seen
someone she knew
looking over my shoulder
(eyes wide and shining)
but when I turned around
there was no one there
only an old plastic chair
with a polka dot cushion.

At first,
I thought she was trying to
tell me something,
talking agitatedly.
I tried to keep up
thinking she had something
important to say,
thinking she was going to
tell me what to do
like a mother should.

But after "at first" had passed
I didn't know what to think
so I phoned 000.

My brothers

are sweet, really.
Declan, being six, is a mess
and always arrives home covered in
spaghetti
and play-dough
and flour
and sparkles
and vegemite
and texta squiggles
and that sticky stuff that no one can ever identify.

Jared, being eleven, is a tough guy
walking five metres in front
on the way home from school,
pretending that he doesn't need anyone
but secretly, during the night,
he reads his way through the works of Roald Dahl
under the covers
with a flashlight.

When we visited mum

Declan cried,
Jared walked out
and I didn't say anything.
The doctor explained that mum had suffered from
an anxiety attack
but would be back home soon
and was our dad able to look after us until then?

When our dad left

there was no shouting
or doors slamming,
no ''I'II see you in court!"
or custody arguments.
He just picked up his briefcase,
kissed us goodbye
and walked out the door.

I remember staring blankly out the window
at the blue sky
and thinking
Shouldn't it be raining?

On the way home from the hospital

the air crackled
with unsaid questions.
They filled the car,
making it harder
and harder
to breathe
with every passing minute.

What had happened to her?
Was it our fault?

How would we tell our friends that our mum had gone crazy?

The next morning

the house was unusually
quiet.
The beds were made,
the bathroom tidy
but where no eye could see,
emotional monsters raged.

Jumbled thoughts
crashed through hallways,
whistled round comers.
Confusion slid
over glossy white laundry tiles,
creeping into the washing machine
and dryer .
The flowers on the kitchen table
shook their heads
in a cheerless dismay.

As we walked out of the house
it seemed to turn grey,
locked in time,
being eaten up
by the hole
that wasn't our mother .

Every day

for three weeks
I made my way to the hospital
to visit my mother.

Every day
for three weeks
I listened to the doctors arguing
about why she wasn't responding
to their treatment.

Every day
for three weeks
I stared into space
helplessly
wondering what had gone so wrong.

Sometimes

Mum was talkative
racing from subject
to subject
without needing input from me.

Sometimes
she was quiet,
eyes ringed with deep purple,
blankets pulled up to her chin

and sometimes
she was a raving lunatic,
screaming at me
to get rid of the voices in her head,
saying that I was the devil,
come to make her stray
from the path of righteousness.

One day
I received a call from the hospital.
I drove in,
swinging into an illegal park
outside the back storage area.

Reaching my mother's room,
I stopped in the doorway.
Her eyes were tired
but focused
and when she looked at me
She smiled.

The doctor looked at me.
"She has Bipolar. I….
We're sorry that we didn't
recognize it earlier."
He told me that
she had been prescribed
lithium
and that it would not cure
but it would control
her illness.

I walked toward my mum's bed
and hugged her
tentatively.
She put her arms around me
and hugged me to her chest.
As I put my head on her shoulder,
dissolving into tears -
a month of
responsibility and worry
leaked onto my face
and clogged up my throat.