Composing Amelia (30 page)

Amelia returned to the bedroom and uncapped the bottle. The minty smell made her eyes water as she brought the bottle closer to her face. She held her nose and began to drink. It took a few minutes to get the entire bottle down, but once she did, the calm she’d felt after downing the Motrin returned, even though her gut was churning. She felt it in her bones—this was going to work.

The elder meeting was over, and Marcus couldn’t get out of the church fast enough. He’d felt like a fraud giving input to their discussions, but until he had a chance to talk to Ed, he had to keep up the illusion that he still belonged there. He’d almost called the elder a handful of times, but every time he picked up the phone he chickened out. He didn’t know how to talk about his struggles without setting himself up to be fired, and he couldn’t afford to lose his job, not with the baby coming. But it was going to be a long five months playing this game.

Marcus was almost to his car when he heard Ed call his name. He winced, stopped, and turned to see him crossing the parking lot. This was not good timing. He was anxious to get home, knowing now what Amelia was capable of. The lengths he’d gone to that morning while she slept were probably enough, though he hadn’t had time to double-check his efforts, and he still wasn’t about to leave her alone any longer than he had to. He waited until Ed had caught up with him, then said apologetically, “I can’t really stay, Ed, I need to get home.”

“I won’t keep you long, Marcus. I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

“Um … make sure I’m okay?”

Ed gave him a look. “I’m concerned about you.”

Marcus glanced over his shoulder in the direction of the apartment, then back at Ed, arms crossed. “Oh?”

“Forgive my boldness, but … you haven’t quite been yourself these last couple weeks. I know I don’t know you well, but I’m usually a pretty good judge of these things.”

Marcus ran a hand through his hair, torn between spilling his guts before he lost his courage and glossing over things so he could get home. “You’re right,” he said, trying to walk a middle ground. “There’s a lot going on with me right now, I admit that. Right now isn’t the best time to talk about it, though—I need to get home to Amelia.”

Ed frowned. “Is she all right?”

“Um … Yes, she’s fine. Just … struggling still, with the adjustment.”

Ed nodded. “I understand. But listen, Marcus, I hope you know you can talk to me about anything. I’m a good confidant. And just because you’re the senior pastor doesn’t mean you don’t need a listening ear or some guidance now and then.”

The words gave Marcus hope. He’d feared that admitting he needed help would immediately send the elders into doubt over their decision to hire him. “Thanks, Ed.”

“You’re welcome. Now, let me pray for you before you go.”

Marcus hoped his impatience didn’t show on his face. The elder placed a hand on Marcus’s shoulder and began to pray, then stopped midsentence. “Marcus, you need to get home.”

“What?”

Ed’s face was troubled. He nodded toward Marcus’s car. “Get home. I feel like God wants you to get home.”

C
HAPTER 11

Marcus’s stomach leapt into his throat. Without a word he ran to his car.
Please don’t take Amelia. Please, God, protect her.

He sped down the residential streets, berating himself for his stupidity. He should have confronted her when he’d figured out what she’d done. He should have called … someone. Her doctor. Even Ed. But he’d been embarrassed for her, hadn’t wanted to focus any attention on something so desperate as trying to kill herself. She hadn’t seemed so bad off; he’d figured she was over it.

“Don’t let her die,” he prayed aloud as he rolled through a four-way stop. “Please, God. I’m sorry I didn’t do anything. I can’t believe I was that stupid—how could You let me be that stupid, God?”

He pulled into the parking lot and into the first spot he saw. He jabbed the elevator button until the doors opened, then did the same to the third-floor button, breathing hard with fear. As he ran down the hall to their door, he pulled his phone from his pocket in case he had to call 911, then let himself in as quickly as he could. “Amelia?”

There was no answer. He ran for the bedroom.

An older woman, not wearing scrubs or a doctor’s coat, walked over to Marcus, offered a hand to shake, and introduced herself as the hospital’s social worker. “I’ve spoken with Amelia, and she gave me permission to discuss her situation with you.” She sat beside him and folded her hands over the chart in her lap. “Amelia admitted to having attempted suicide.”

Despite expecting this, the words were a knife in his heart. He rubbed a hand slowly over his face, not knowing what to say.

“Based on her personal history and the fact that she’s still feeling suicidal, I’m recommending an inpatient program. We don’t have one here, unfortunately; the nearest hospital I’d recommend is in Omaha.”

“Omaha?” He groaned. “That’s over an hour away. There isn’t anything here in Wheatridge?”

“I’m afraid not. She needs to be given a full psychological examination and placed somewhere where she can be monitored 24/7.”

“I can take off from work—”

“Mr. Sheffield, I understand how difficult this is. Unfortunately, by law she has to be committed. And given the severity of her depression, she’ll likely require medication, and it will be helpful to have her monitored while that is being adjusted and we wait for her mood to stabilize.”

“But—she’s been on antidepressants. Are they just not working?”

The social worker gave him a sympathetic look. “Actually, she told me she’d never started them.”

“Oh.” He rubbed a hand over his eyes, overwhelmed. “Okay then.”

“When she’s been cleared for discharge, I’ll come talk to you about transferring her to Omaha.” With a sympathetic smile and another handshake, the social worker left. Marcus dropped his head into his hands and continued to pray.

The next morning Marcus arrived at the hospital to learn Amelia was ready to be discharged. As she had promised, the social worker returned to explain the details of the transfer, and after a ridiculous amount of paperwork, Amelia went on a gurney to an ambulance, which Marcus followed in his car.

The drive was agony. He wanted to be with Amelia, not driving alone. The social worker had assured him he’d get the chance to spend some time with her once they arrived, but he couldn’t shake visions of her being torn away from him by thug-like orderlies and dragged down the hall through lockdown doors. He tried to convince himself such things only happened in movies, but the dubious side of his brain reminded him that the idea for those movie scenes had to come from somewhere.

When they reached the hospital, he parked in the visitors’ lot and ran to the admissions desk. “My wife was brought in as a transfer from Wheatridge Medical,” he said. “She’s being admitted to the psych unit. Where would she be?”

The attendant pointed him down the hall, and again he ran at full tilt, afraid she’d be hidden away before he could say good-bye. But no, there she was with a nurse at her side, sitting in a small waiting room outside the psych ward entrance.

Marcus helped complete the admission papers, then the nurse stood aside so they could say their good-byes.

Marcus pulled her into his arms and kissed her hair. “I love you, Amelia. I’m so sorry for whatever I might have done that contributed to all of this.”

“It’s not your fault,” Amelia said, her voice muffled against his shoulder. “It’s me. I’m the one who’s broken.”

Marcus sighed. “You’re not broken, babe.”

“Of course I am.” The words were empty of emotion, spoken as simple fact. Marcus wanted to counter them but knew nothing he said would make a difference.

“I’ll come up for visiting hours tomorrow.”

“You have to work.”

“I know. I’ll figure it out.”

They stood, silent, until the nurse cleared her throat. “Amelia?” A note of sympathy underlined her tone. “We should get going.”

“I love you.” Marcus released his wife and watched her walk through the door. Stuffing his hands into his pockets, he walked back to the car to start the lonely drive home.

That afternoon Amelia met with a psychologist who made her detail again her family history and the events of the last few months. More questions followed, and by the end of the interview Amelia felt like her brain had been wrung out. The doctor completed his notes in her chart and then dropped the bombshell.

“Amelia, I think you may have bipolar disorder.”

She frowned. “Wait—like, manic depression?”

“That’s a common term for it, yes.”

“But … I didn’t have mania, did I? I mean, I thought people who were manic were all … I don’t know … giddy and thought they were God or something?”

“That’s one way a mania manifests. But it’s not the only way. The period of time where your energy came back and you started meeting friends and getting involved at your church was the beginning of it.”

“But that was a good time for me.”

“Yes, but it devolved to a period of chronic irritation, binge shopping, and insomnia, among other things. It’s what we’d call a hypomanic state. It wasn’t as severe as a typical mania, but it was a mania nonetheless. The fact that you dropped into depression immediately after is another indicator.”

Amelia’s already foggy head was spinning. “But … isn’t that sort of thing genetic? My mom wasn’t bipolar, or my dad.”

The doctor’s eyebrows raised slightly. “Given the description you provided of your mother, I am fairly confident she would have been diagnosed as such had she sought help.”

Not lazy. Not “creatively jammed.” Not just starved for attention. None of the things Amelia, or even Amelia’s father, might have guessed. Her view of her childhood took on a new cast. She’d come to terms with being the daughter of the town crazy. But having the label of “bipolar” applied to her mother’s condition created a significant shift in her heart. There really wasn’t anything she could have done, short of medication, to change herself. Her father’s demands that she grow up, snap out of it, and stop being so self-centered hadn’t stood a chance against the forces warring in her mother’s head. How different could things have been if she’d been evaluated? Could she have made her way back to the stage? Would her parents have stayed together? Would she still be alive? The thought of her mother’s lost years made Amelia want to cry.

“We’re going to start you on a mood stabilizer and see how that works for you. Our options are limited, given the pregnancy, but we’ll work with what we have and focus as much as we can on behavioral therapy.”