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The lounge was tidy. Carpet clean, ornaments neat. I had a cursory rifle through the cabinet and drawers under the TV, the fridge-freezer and the oven, my mum’s favourite places to hide her vodka. Empty, the lot of ‘em. The thought of her being sober before she died jimmied into my gut as I took another swig of scotch straight from the bottle.
“Fucking hypocrite,” I spat, the words slurring as I mocked myself. Didn’t even know why I was doing it – drinking. I wasn’t like my mother. I didn’t need it. I just wanted it. I craved the distraction, the numbness. Even the sting in my throat and nausea in my stomach provided relief, gave my mind something else to focus on. No, I wasn’t an alcoholic. I was just a fucking moron.
Cancer. That’s what’d got her in the end. Cancer meant she’d known she was going to die for, what, weeks? Months? And I wasn’t worthy of a goodbye. I fell back on the couch, the same shit-brown couch that’d taken pride of place in this living room since before I was born, and thought back on what I’d done to make her hate me so much. It hadn’t always been bad. I had memories of her reading me stories, teaching me the time, letting me play with her hair because I liked the feel of it. She used to smile, my mum. Laugh. Her laugh made me feel good, especially when I’d caused it. I couldn’t remember when it changed, when I’d become too much for her.
It took a while for the hatred to set in, I knew that much. Even after she’d taken to drinking, she still proclaimed to love me. I’d been sitting in this exact spot, centre cushion on the couch, one day when Mrs Armstrong had shown up with an attitude my mum hadn’t liked. I’d missed yet another appointment with my psychiatrist that day thanks to my mother’s increasing fondness of alcohol, and Mrs Armstrong hadn’t managed to keep the professional cool she usually carried.
“Have you even noticed how badly Hugo needs this help? Do you even care?” Mrs Armstrong had asked at the front door.
My gaze had wandered to the coffee table, landed on the freshly poured drink. It was always the same. Smirnoff. Red. Coke, not Pepsi. That was all she cared about these days, I’d thought.
“Don’t you dare come here questioning my love for my son. I’d die for that boy!” I’d heard Mum yell. They’d sounded nice, the words. They didn’t mean anything though. I didn’t need my mum to die for me. I needed her to live, to take care of herself, take care of me. From that day on, Mrs Armstrong took me to all my appointments, and there were a lot of them. The hospital became a second home during my last couple of years in high school.
My autism diagnosis was supposed to help. I suppose it did, for a while. Until then, I’d always thought of myself as broken. I’d grown up knowing I was different, that something in my head wasn’t working properly, and I couldn’t understand why no one could fix it. How could they? I’d think. I couldn’t talk to people. Counselling, for me, was pointless. I’d just sit there. Rigid. Dying inside. Learning about autism felt like someone had handed me the puzzle piece I’d been searching for. After diagnosis, I explored it further, researched, and my brain lit up with excitement. I do that. That’s me. I have that. Being able to understand why I felt and reacted certain ways changed my entire outlook on life. I didn’t need to be fixed. There was nothing to fix. I wasn’t broken, and I wasn’t even different, because there were so many others like me out there.
Didn’t last, that relief. Turned out my problems weren’t only due to autism, but depression as well. Throw those into the mix with an anxiety disorder and you’re left with a hot fucking mess who’s destined to let everyone they love down over and over again, rinse and repeat. It didn’t help that, although autism didn’t cause my depression and anxiety, the condition predisposed me to them. I was four times more likely to become depressed over my neurotypical peers, apparently. The doctor who’d given me that statistic had said it like he was being reassuring, like I should feel grateful that it wasn’t just bad fucking luck.
“I’m sorry, Mum.” I spoke the words she’d never hear into the rim of my bottle of scotch. I hadn’t deserved an alcoholic mother, but she hadn’t deserved a son who couldn’t show her he loved her, either.
I started to wonder, as I stared blankly at the fireplace cluttered with cheap ornaments, whether she ever laughed again after I’d left. There was no evidence of another person living in her house, but I hoped she’d found people to bring her smile back. I couldn’t hate her, despite wanting to sometimes, just like I wouldn’t hate Helen if she gave up on me. Or…when. After all, a mother was the one person who was supposed to love you unconditionally and I’d managed to push mine away. Even though I’d adored her. Even though I’d hated watching her cry, seeing her frustrated and angry, while knowing I could stop it all if I could just control my emotions. But I couldn’t. The cloud in my head was too dark, the fear in my heart too strong. I couldn’t beat them, even for her.
