In Denial: A Relapse Story

Chapter 8
Chapter Eight - Daddy Adam

Chapter Description: The end of the road for Rachel’s maturity and Adam’s indecision. Thank you so much for reading!

Adam had weighed up his options for an hour or so before he resolved to pursue Rachel. He knew she wouldn’t have wanted him to give chase, preferring that he stay back and allow her to process all that was going on before she came home. But, in the state he imagined she was likely in, it seemed negligent to just let her run off like that. When the one hour mark came and went without Sheila picking up the phone to ask why her daughter had gone completely baby-brained, he thought the worst. Maybe she had turned on the way there? Maybe she was toddling about on an Underground platform with nobody to help? Maybe she’d gotten hurt? 

The uncertainty gnawed at him and he gave in to his protective instincts soon after. He called and called while making his way to the station, though there was no answer every time he rang. Eventually, the calls stopped going through at all. When he came out of the other side of the Tube, he changed tactics and went for his mother-in-law instead. The first two times, he heard it ring the entire time and then cut off at the end. He was about to give up until he tried for the third time and Sheila Buckland answered.

“What?!” she cried, her voice barely audible above the thumping techno music in the background.

He shouted down the phone to be heard over the music, pleading with her to let him know that Rachel was safe. She mumbled some words that sounded like “what”, “patriarchy”, and “fuck off”, though Adam could hardly be sure for all the synths and drums creating a cacophony on Sheila’s end. A few seconds passed, the ambience dimmed to quiet chatter, and Adam finally hear Sheila clearly.

“What the fuck do you want, Adam? I’m in the middle of something I need to get back to, so make it quick and I’m sure I can pass on whatever grovelling message you have,” Sheila spat with bitterness. 

“So you’ve seen her? Thank god, I was so worried. Is she safe? Is she at your flat?”

“She’s fine,” Sheila sighed. “She’s fine and she doesn’t want you or want to see you or anything. Okay? Is that okay with you? Does Rachel need to check with a man every time she wants to see her own family now, is that it?” Adam ignored the prodding questions and thanked Sheila for her honesty, if not her manners. By the sounds of it, Rachel was still at her mother’s and Adam couldn’t wait a second longer to go and find her. 

He made good progress on foot to the building that contained Sheila’s flat. He looked up at the foreboding red brick tower and just knew that she was up there, probably toddling about without any knowledge of where she was or who she was. Adam had never wanted it to come to this, but he had to do everything in his power now to make sure she was safe. That meant - as the only option left to him as her spouse and the only person sober or considerate enough to care - getting the police involved. 

He pulled out his phone.

“Hello? Yes, my name is Adam Wright and I’m calling about my wife. Yes. She’s relapsed and is held at her mother’s place. Yes. Under Section 12 of the Regressive Care Act, I am requesting entry and police support.” He then gave the address and was told to wait for twenty minutes while a local police car was called in to observe and assist. He knew the law well and wouldn’t let his uncertainty get in the way of helping Rachel.

Under Section 12 of the RCA (1999), concerned relatives of relapsed individuals had the right to request police assistance to gain entry to a property - but only if neglect was credibly suspected or there was a threat of imminent danger. If the claim of neglect turned out to be false or no danger was present, the person who invoked Section 12 could themselves end up fined or even imprisoned for a maximum of eighteen months. Adam’s career, dignity, and freedom hinged on Sheila being a negligent mother… which wasn’t entirely outlandish, come to think of it. Such an accusation would sound very believable to a jury, not least one composed predominantly of men.

When the police finally arrived after half an hour, they were quick to take down Adam’s details and ensure there was nothing spurious about the facts he’d laid out over the phone. Fake claims of spousal relations just to get access to other people’s properties were more common than one would think. Such sweeping legislation always had its downsides. In this moment, however, Adam was exactly the sort of man the act was made for: a concerned and loving husband trying to get his wife the best care she could possibly receive.

The officers - both men - rang the buzzer for the flats below Sheila’s but none of them answered. They returned to their vehicle for a small battering ram, which they promptly took to the door of the building. One officer stood in front of the door to allow his colleague and Adam to get to Sheila’s floor. Adam was shivering with nerves, his heart pounding like a drum in his chest.

The officer turned to him and placed a hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t worry, you’re not liable for the door - unless you lied to us. You didn’t lie, did you?”

“Erm, no. No. I wouldn’t do that.” Adam’s reply stuttered out of his mouth, betraying the shock with which he greeted the question.

“Good. No lie, no liability,” the officer chuckled as if the phrase was even halfway to being witty. 

At Sheila’s door, Adam was allowed to knock first. He cried out Rachel’s name again and again, softening his voice so as to seem kind and almost fatherly. 

“Rachel! Rachel… sweetheart, it’s Adam. Do you remember? Are you okay in there, my lovely?”

The officer, unbeknownst to Adam, rolled his eyes and checked his watch. 

“Mate, if you don’t mind, I’d rather do the door in than wait all day.” Adam obliged and awkwardly stepped to the side while the ram smashed out the lock and sent the door flying backwards.

“After you,” he said, stretching out his arm. 

Adam crept carefully, speaking Rachel’s name with every step. There was no sign of her in her mother’s bedroom, nor in the bathroom. He had been most worried about finding her rifling through Sheila’s medicine cabinet and swallowing some strange unlabelled pills, but there was no sign of any disturbance in there. The hallway cleared, he stepped into the living room and immediately heard some babbles: soft, high-pitched babbles that sounded faintly ridiculous coming from an adult woman’s lips. Yet, there an adult woman sat on the floor of her mother’s kitchen: her eyes glassy, her lips wrapped around the corner of a soft cushion she’d clearly plucked from the sofa for comfort, and her pyjama bottoms soaked in urine.

Rachel Buckland, thirty-five years of age in body, was now about eighteen months of age in mind. Once a confident and serious woman, driven by her career and her love of knowledge, Rachel was now laid low by the relapse in full view of her teary-eyed husband and some random police officer. She had no idea of “husband” or “police officer” in her mind, which was now zapped to infantile mush for at least the next nine months. Adam said a little unconscious prayer to himself that it would be quicker than that and she would not have to face such a long period of indignity.

In the months that followed, everything changed. Adam and Rachel’s house had to be baby-proofed, work went by the wayside, and Adam had to go into debt to keep them both afloat while the welfare system slowly creaked into gear to give him support. Sheila Buckland was tried for negligence and sentenced to a year in prison, causing protests outside the courtroom by her more militant friends that ended up with the judge who sentenced her being egged on the way to work one morning. It did little for stereotypes of women’s emotional instability. It did, however, put Sheila back in the news after many decades and the letters she received from all over the world calling out the justice system as a “male-dominated conspiracy” warmed her heart between cold showers and shifts in the prison kitchen. 

“Baby Rach” was no less a handful than adult Rachel, with her tendency to crawl away whenever Adam’s back was turned and stripping off in public places. The first nursery he signed her up to had to cancel his payments after the first visit after Rachel had been caught pulling another relapser’s pigtails  and giggling about it. The second one was a bit of a blessing, as Rachel became fast friends with another relapsed girl in there called Zoe and soon calmed down. He’d get daily reports of Rachel and Zoe’s antics: cuddling together during naps, sharing their dummies, and even playing some rudimentary form of party-cake on each other’s bare breasts. Adam squirmed at the explicit silliness of it all, knowing the Rachel he married would have died of embarrassment at the sight of her rubbing her hands all over another baby-brained woman’s body. Still, at least she found a friend. God knows that Adam needed one too, which led the nursery assistant, Miss Worley, to pass on Zoe’s husband’s details (with his consent). 

“I think you two would get on, definitely. A playdate would be good. For the girls, that is, not you two, haha!” Miss Worley laughed nervously, like she’d made some excusable yet obvious faux pas. “Maybe you’ll get to the bottom of why Rachel and Zoe are so good together.”

Adam smiled. 

“Yeah… yeah, that would be good,” he replied, as he stroked Rachel’s pigtailed hair as she snoozed comfily in her stroller. Her dummy bobbed in her mouth with the rhythm of her gentle snores… only, it wasn’t her dummy at all. This one had a green mouth guard with a white handle and Adam had never bought her one like it. 

“Come on, little one, let’s get you home.”