Bloodletting Read Online Free PDF

scheduled. She was distraught.
    First the police turned up, motorbike helmets under their arms, followed by ambulance officers carrying a stretcher.Technically, Jessica was now under government ‘protection’ and proper procedures had to be followed. This meant that she had to have a police escort. But Jessica wasn’t mad or dangerous. She was just miserable and expressing it. It seemed to us that her behaviour had been seen by hospital authorities as attention-seeking and she was being punished for it. I heard later that she was spending her days curled up in the corner of a large common room like a scared animal. It was a warning for those of us who had signed the same agreements.
    It didn’t take more than a few days for the outside world to recede. I didn’t watch the news or listen to the radio or read any newspapers. I didn’t read at all, in fact. I couldn’t concentrate enough to do so. I gave up after the fourth attempt at the first chapter of a Jackie Collins novel. I felt as though I were in a bubble.We could have been on Mars for all that normal life mattered.
    There were few visitors. Rodney didn’t call,Alex didn’t call.Only Peter, one of the few people I was still in touch with from uni, dropped in. When I rang him to let him know where I was he wasn’t really surprised. Instead, he sounded relieved. He knew that things had been difficult for me, and had been doing his best to help. I didn’t tell him much about what was going on in my head but he guessed a lot of it, and was as supportive as I’d let him be. This meant that sometimes Iwould ring him at ten at night, frightened I’d use the fresh blade sitting on my desk. He’d always come over when I called. Often I didn’t ring him though. I couldn’t, or didn’t want to.
    Peter thought hospital sounded like an excellent place for me.
    I still remember him walking into the common room; it must have been on a Saturday afternoon because he was wearing tennis gear. He sat down on the plastic-coated couch and started chatting to the person next to him, gradually including others in the conversation. Everyone was charmed of course, and I was really pleased. It was the first sign of normality I’d seen for a while. He was behaving as if he’d been invited to afternoon tea at an aunt’s house. He was being considerate—which was more than I could say for my parents.
    My mother visited me once while I was in hospital. While she brought flowers and a pair of new pyjamas as a peace offering, we had little to say to each other. My admission to hospital was just another example of how weak I was.Hadn’t they taught me how to ‘rise above it’? Hadn’t they shown me how to hide and ignore my problems? My mother believed that I was choosing to be like this. Choosing not to cheer up, not to make an effort, and, finally, choosing to hurt myself.
    When I arrived in hospital, I agreed with her view. By the time I left a month later, I didn’t.There had to be a reason this was happening to me and I wanted to know what it was.
    I arrived home with antidepressants, what I assumed were tranquillisers, and another script that I’d put in my bag without even bothering to read.Hospital hadn’t cured me but it had given me a rest.As I walked in through the kitchen and up the stairs it dawned on me that despite the paint job, the flat was dark, dank and smelt of too many burned vegetarian curries. Rodney wasn’t home.
    My room was stuffy and I could hear the noise of the traffic as it roared past on the road out the front. Looking around I noticed that I hadn’t painted the walls very well.There were sections in the corners and near the ceiling where the underlying beige showed through. I also hadn’t bothered to tidy up before I left.A half-empty vodka bottle stood beside my futon with its hopelessly cheery red and white checked doona I’d made in preparation for my new life in Sydney.
    I remember being so excited about the move, and, when I’d first