Chapter 7 - Crikey! Now That's What I Call A Suicide Attempt

Saturday morning we have chores. This is a new thing for me. I am not sure how I feel about it. I guess any thought of "can't the help do it" is killed when we get the choice of moving the lawns or cleaning the toilets.

I elect the clean up the admin area. I walk around with a cloth and pretend to be busy.

A new guy named with Grahame. Ginger Grahame with a lazy-eye and subsequently low self-esteem was cleaning the book shelves.
“How ya doin?” he asks
“I’m ok, u?”
“Good, not how I would normally be spending a Saturday Morning?”
“What would u normally be doing on a Saturday Morning”
“Getting fucked-up on ICE”
“ICE is fucked-up”
“Sure is, fun tho”
I looked at his lazy eye slipping back out of place as he said that.
“Yeah, fun for the first hour and then hell for the next week”
“I know man, I just like fantasizing about it when I have to do mundane shit like cleaning book shelves”
“I think maybe some people can smoke it and some people can’t” I say “For me I know with the history of mental illness is my family I just can’t smoke it”
There’s silence, uncomfortable silence.
“Um, Grahame…have u been into rehab before?”
“No, I went through the 12 Steps through Narcotics Anonymous tho. I couldn’t get past Step 5”
“What’s Step 5?”
“Dealing with difficult emotions. Drugs are my emotional blankie”
“Mmmm, I think I could be guilty of not facing difficult emotions as well”
“Mate, I was smoking $300 worth of ICE a day. I was rolling out of bed and sucking straight from the meth pipe. I used to deal with the shit as well. I have a business degree and put it all into dealing fucking drugs to other drug dealers. Hey have u ever injected Ice?” he asks me
“No, I don’t think my sanity would ever come back if I did that” I say
“See this” he says pointing to a massive burn scar on his arm in the shape of a creepy eye.
“I got it from injecting drugs""Your joking"“No I'm not. I was shooting up meth and I fucked up"
I wondered if he'd injected when his lazy eye was having a particularly slack day and that was the mess."I hit an artery instead of a vein. I got an abscess."I was surprised he didn’t loose his arm. It was ugly and on-display.

“I was captain of my School Football Team, I got into Law School and I was nominated for Young Queenslander of the Year…Now I shoot meth and deal drugs and have a fucking scar on my arm”

"What do you tell people when they ask you about the scar”"Just that I had abscess" he says.I couldn't decide whether Grant was a massive fucking hedonist or someone who would do anything to fit in. But either way the conversation loosened us up, suddenly we had that unspoken closeness that in my life I only get so quickly with other drug users.
I pick up a picture book about animals. I flick through it and stare at a picture of a Crocodile. It’s eyes are just poking out of the water. It’s ready to kill, I’m not sure why the picture captivates me so much.
Two of the older women start dusting around us. One was a red-haired woman of about 50 with a pale, life-weary face. She wore slim reading glasses and no make-up.
“Crocodiles, hey?” she says
“Yeah, killing machines”
“I hate the fucking things. I grew-up with my Dad who was a croc-hunter. We used to go out in the black of night on a small boat and go shooting them. I was fucking petrified”
“I can imagine why”
“The only thing that got me through was how much I hated them”
“Why do u hate them so much? I mean apart from the fact they are cold-blooded killers?
“They way they kill things, it’s awful. I’ve seen them kill Kangaroos and Wallabies. You would think it’s instant, it’s not. It takes hours for a Crocodile to kill them. It’s terrible. There is something I could never cope with seeing these horrible creatures destroy a beautiful innocent life""Its nature, isn’t it?" I say"You should always try and intervene when you see cruel things. Some animals are just nasty critters. I shoot Butcher Birds if I see them. We once had a lovely pet bird and one snipped off its head. They murder for the sake of murdering. They are evil" she sayI remember the time I saw two Butcher Birds tormenting a small possum in a tree.My friend said that we should throw rocks.'Its nature, yeah. Let them sort it" I said.

Lee walks in.

“Man I can understand the need to kill. The other day I was feeding the chickens and I was looking at Reggie the Rooster I thought ‘isn’t he cute’ and then boom all of a sudden I just wanted to slit his fucking throat”


To be honest, there people are freaking me out a little bit. I went outside and helped Penny in the garden.

"You like it here?" Polly asks me
"Yeah its good, u?”
"It’s excellent. We are treated like adults here"
"Have you been to rehab before?” I asked her, fishing for info.
"I’ve been to 8 different rehabs and none of them worked?"
"How long have you had the alcohol problem for?" I asked her, casually heaping a pile of leaves into a wheelie bin.
"My partner died in 1996. When my son got older he started talking about how much he missed his Dad. When that happened, I realised I hadn’t grieved. I felt to bits. I started drinking and drinking and drinking. Y'know the thing about grief is, the more you hold on to it - the worse it gets"

I watch Polly raking up the leaves. She's got a tough, focused, kind of worn-out expression. She seems so smart and so resilient. It's hard to imagine her getting drunk and out of control and fucked-up all the time. I thought about the time in feelings check she thanked * for 'making her feel beautiful again'.

I remember how disgusting I felt about myself when I ended my six year relationship. I didn’t just felt guilty, I felt ugly as a bulldog. I drowned in panic every time I looked in the mirror. I guess it had never occurred to me that the same sense loss and that same sense of ugliness would come if your partner died, but now it seems to make perfect sense. A loss of a relationship under any circumstances is a loss of self-worth, a feeling of interminable ugliness, guilt and grief. It adds up why had left clever little psychologist Penny empty and drunk.

It's Sunday morning. I'm still finding my place in the villa.

I retreat. I go to my room. I panic that I am withdrawing from everyone. I feel sick.

Breathe. Slowly, breathe. Breathe slowly.


'Our thoughts can kill us' I tell myself 'our thoughts can make us happy'.

I eventually fall asleep. I dream I am at an airport. I miss my flight and smash a security screen. I wear a disguise made of skull bandannas to hide my identity to the security guards who were after me. Then they disappeared. 'Maybe they weren’t after me at all?' I thought.

I wake up to Sam poking my leg.

"You missed all the drama!" Sam says.

There's a weird buzz in the air.

"Sandy and Danielle got kicked out cause they were having a lesbian relationship. And guess who ratted them out? Mel"
"Fucking Hell" I say "Do you know that for a fact?''
"Yes. She came down and told me they got kicked out and then said she would be blamed for it"
I felt relieved I had a reason to dislike Mel.
"Maybe she just wanted a bit of pussy herself" I say.
I'm mad. I go for a walk. I do a lap of the drive way, like a zombie.

I am tired of her strange behaviour and her guilt trips.

I see Penny sitting outside her villa. She's in tears. Not hysterical, just a bit teary.
"It makes me angry" she says "Those girls were great....but people go, people leave u, u have to deal with it and move on and tomorrow is a new day"

Penny had learnt that lesson the hard way. I'm not sure how close she was to those girls, but depression is always the absence of love.

Feelings check is tense; half the residents shoot death stares at Mel. Sometimes it feels like the community could erupt at any moment.
Sam says "He hoped the person who ratted them out, gets what they deserve"

This is semi-dysfunctional community in full flight. Damaged people need a scapegoat. We are all angry for our reasons and displaced anger feels just when you find a target. I stop speaking to Jess. I stare at her, I grease her off and she links at me disappointed as if to say 'you hate me as well'. I don’t speak to her. Mel it seems is a perfectly suitable scapegoat and it feels...good.

I spend the day working out and stealing smokes and going for walks.

I go to bed feeling a little different to normal. I'm not sure exactly what or why, but I am starting to feel different. I feel lucky. I feel lucky to have a great job and good friends and charisma and talents. I feel lucky that I am not Mel. I think that maybe for some reason those niggling little insecurities about myself might just fade. I think about my breathing.

I breath slowly and slowly and slowly.

I am calm and I don't wont to hurt myself.

I am calm and will not punish myself anymore.

I am calm and I needed to destroy my old life, to be here today.


Word had spread around our villa that Maree was here for Phenergan addiction. For people who were heroin users like Sam and meth addicts like Justin....the idea of a woman being here for abusing a drug intended for babies was a little absurd. The idea of a Phenergan habit soon became a running joke.
"Oh man, I really need my Phenergan"
"Hey dude, I've got some Phenergan, wanna get off"
"I once prostituted myself for some Phenergan"
"I once pushed in-line at the chemist to get some Phenergan"
Maree was a Phenergan addict. Maree was the scapegoat.
Sam summed up how everyone pretty much felt about it.
"She shouldn't be here. Phenergan addiction is not an addiction. It’s non-addictive. Essentially, that bitch is bored, she needs a fucking hobby"

A new guy arrived, Richard, a big scary Goth dude.

Richard is tall and at least 120 kilos. He's got long red hair and a long red beard. He wears nail-polish. He spent his first day in class making odd sexual comments. He asked Shirley to spank him. Shirley cautioned him for sexual harassment.

He walked passed our villa. We were sitting on the veranda. He farted.
"Better go drop the kids off at the pool I think" he said
"U r offending the gay guy" Sam said "He doesn’t like farting or talk about poo"
"Who is the gay guy?" Richard asked
"Me" I said
He came over and started looking me up and down.
"I kind of figured that” he said
"Why cause of my black nail polish" I said showing him clean nails and pointing to his nail polish.
"No it was the piercing in your cock"
Everyone laughed.
He stood staring at me like an axe murderer. It stopped being funny and became awkward. He just kept staring.
"Looking forward to exercise in the morning?" I said trying to negate the awkwardness with middle-class politeness.
"I can't exercise I've got an enlarged heart" he said.
"Oh why is it enlarged?"
"I tried to gas myself in a car two months ago"
"Really?"
I mean what are you supposed to say to something like that?
"Yeah man. I was off my head on speed; I just was really excited about the prospect of dying. I just wanted to die. I was unconscious, the neighbours found me. I don't remember any of it really. Apparently I went for a ride in Mr. Helicopter and they put me on life support"
"Fucking hell, so you fucked your heart up?'
"Yep and I can’t drink or take speed ever again. So I'm here"
"Well I reckon you've come to the right place" I said "that's motivation not to take drugs if ever I heard it"
I felt lame. Richard continued staring at me. I guess it was possible he was not always this weird. He may have had brain dam age from the suicide attempt.
Just when I was ready to go back inside, he kept talking.
"See this arm band" he said pointing to the black leather band around his wrist "I slashed myself here and one night I got on the gooey and sat there digging a big hole in my wrist with a knife"
Ok, now I'm really not sure what to say. Not because I was weirded out, but how do console someone who obviously has so much pain?
"At least your alive, Richard. You survived it all, that's what counts"
He stood there shuffling on the spot. I felt like some goody-gumdrops Oprah fan or something.
He was staring at me like an axe-murderer and then said "I think u are very cute, sweetheart" and then walked off, awkwardly as if he struggled with his own bulkiness.