Jesus! I say You could have died. Should have, he says So when I opened my eyes in the hospital I was euphoric, what were the chances of that? Brain still in my skull. Spinal cord still intact. Quite a few other breaks but my heart hadn’t stopped. Even the doctors thought it was miraculous. For me, my survival was proof and at first that kept my spirits up — manoeuvring the heavens to point directly at me. But I wasn’t that euphoric after a couple of weeks of lying plastered to the eyeballs. I realised God didn’t exist and I was just another raving lunatic so I just let myself be that. It was easier than I thought. Then all that panic the drugs had held in check started unravelling all over the place. I just remember being constantly afraid and having panic attacks and hallucinations which meant by June — when the baby arrived — I was up in Friern Barnet strapped to a bed.
What’s that? A psychiatric hospital, he says But I was all worn out anyway so I was glad of the rest.
When they contacted her, she didn’t want to know and because I didn’t have anyone else I was mostly alone. Then a week or so after the baby was born there was a letter from her mother wishing to inform me I had a daughter and should have the decency to stay away. That kind of brought me round, reminded me to be ashamed, reminded me I was lonely and — once they let me — I called. Who do you think you are? she said You clearly don’t understand, I wish you were dead, that you had died, so I’d never have to tell my daughter what you’re like or the awful things you’ve done. And before I could even start to apologise she slammed the receiver down. After that I just sat staring at the wall, wishing I could get high, then realising it wasn’t that, it was also wishing I had died. But I was already beyond doing anything like that. Instead I thought If I stay where I am, and keep very still for the rest of my life, maybe everything will be fine. So that’s what I did. Wouldn’t talk. Wouldn’t eat. Lost more weight than I could afford to and became filled with the hope I’d stop waking up. And it should have ended there really, with a quiet starve to the death.
Why didn’t it? I ask, wrestling with how passive his face has become now. A visitor, he says Which was wondrous in itself. I mean, any mates I had were in much the same state. Then out of the blue there was this director I’d worked with in my final year. Big Scottish guy in his fifties. I’d liked working with him but he never let me get away with a thing. I thought he thought I was a tosser really but, one afternoon, there he was. I assumed it was for someone else so I slid down my chair and covered my face. But when he spoke to the nurse, she pointed me out so, as he approached, I slid further again. My God, is that really you? he said What the fuck have you done to yourself? And suddenly there were tears rolling down his face and that he wasn’t the crying type made me realise how far gone I must be. Anyway. Once he’d blown his nose we got a cup of tea. He said he’d seen in the paper about the film and tracked me down through a lad in my year. I think he could tell I was on the edge so he didn’t press and spent the hour talking about his work instead. When he got up to go he put his arms round me and it’d been so long since anyone had touched me like that I started to get upset. He didn’t make a thing out of it though, just patted my back and said You’re doing alright, I’ll be in again.
And he was good as his word, came back three times a week. Brought me newspapers. Books. Sweets. Started telling me about shows he’d seen, what was going on in the world and, honestly, to have the company was great. I began looking forward to his visits and they began thawing me out.
Then one day he said he’d seen my ex. My daughter too. How beautiful she was. How much he thought she looked like me. I wasn’t really able for it but suddenly she stopped existing in the abstract. I still couldn’t think of myself as someone’s Dad — the word itself just made no impact — but I began to wonder what she was like. Soon I was thinking about her all the time. He was a cunning bastard really. Scheherazaded me back to life. And by the time he offered me a room in his house, I was keen enough for out.
After a little wrangling I was released into his care and his amazing house up in St John’s Wood. Loveliest place I’ve ever lived. Packed to the ceiling with interesting paintings and books. But that first month he spent every day trying to keep me clean because, on leaving Friern, that’s all I was interested in. I gave him a pretty terrible time. Ate the contents of the medicine cabinet on the first day out. Found the drink on the next. Eventually he said Look, I’m not willing to spend my whole life at this so I’m going to tell you something — and not to make you feel like shit — but NO ONE is going to hire you again after what you did. You’re twenty-three now so think about what that means. Either you go back to frying your brains, finish off what’s left of your health, waste your talent, fuck your daughter up more than you already have — because even if she’s reared to think you’re a cunt, once you’re dead, that’s in stone. Or you can stay here and I’ll pay for a shrink. In six months’ time — IF you’re still clean — when I direct The Seagull in Manchester I’ll cast you as Konstantin. If you’re not though, I won’t, I promise you that. And believe me, if you don’t get this job — and do it fucking well — you’ll never work anywhere again. Then you can drink as much cough syrup as you like because no one — including me — will give a damn. What happens next is up to you. What do you want that to be?
So I went to the psychiatrist. And I stayed clean. Six months later he cast me as Konstantin and that gave me some life back again.
Getting up, he stretches. I’m going for a slash, and — with a kiss to the top of my head — Sorry, it’s turned into an epic night. I’m not, I say, wanting to touch him but knowing to wait. Instead go rummage in my bag.
When he comes back, he offers More wine? Drains the bottle between. It’s after midnight, I say Happy Birthday now! Thirty-nine years fucked, he laughs. But takes the present and kisses my hand. Sits to open it beside. This is great, he says Will you put it on? So I do, explaining I knew you had their first one but this one has the same name so I wasn’t sure but then I asked and I love it, he says Thank you, you shouldn’t have. Then swings his legs back on the bed. As the music starts, lights up, exhales. I drop the cover in between and ask When did you first see your daughter then?
About five months later, just before rehearsals began. He spoke to my ex — I couldn’t even get her on the phone — and after much persuasion she agreed to an hour once a month.
That first Sunday her father dropped her off, I hid, watching her come up the path. She looked different — still beautiful, elegant but all the spark was gone and whose fault was that? I almost went out the back door but A child needs a father, he said For better or worse you’re what she has so go open the door, and smile. When I did my ex wouldn’t look at me. Instead passed him the carry-cot with the baby, saying Tell him that’s his and I don’t want to see his face. He just placed it on the sitting-room table, then took her off to the kitchen for tea.
So I stood there, thinking I was about to have another cardiac arrest. I didn’t know what to do with a child. I could hardly look at her, never mind take her up. Mercifully she was asleep though so I inched the blanket back but she started to wake up and, suddenly, there were these big eyes wandering over me and I just froze. She was real and right there. Not just an idea or knowing she existed somewhere. But right in front of me and I just stood there trying not to leave.
After about fifteen minutes, he came in to check. Come on pick her up, he said You have to hold her. She’s your little girl. And I couldn’t. But I touched her on the hand. The little fingers went round mine and luckily then she closed her eyes and went back to sleep.