True, Lilith hadn’t actually toppled yet, but she didn’t look so far off as she grabbed at the back of the nearest chair, simultaneously giving me the death-glare and pulling in meagre air with an unearthly squeak.
I must have stood and stared like a complete fuckwit for a good ten seconds before I figured out what was happening. ‘Oh shit, asthma!’
Lilith managed a nod. She started to pat at the pockets of her track pants, each move becoming a little more desperate as whatever she was searching for failed to materialise.
‘Your inhaler. You can’t find your inhaler,’ I realised, the second-best mind reader in the room.
Another frantic nod, and more of that noise that sounded like something being strangled.
I shoved my guilt back into its box – I could always do the self-loathing thing later, once Lilith had decided not to die on me – and moved to her side, crouching so that my face was level with hers. ‘Okay, sweetheart – try to stay calm and let me help you. Is it in this room?’
A shake of the head.
‘Your room?’
Nod.
‘Good woman.’ I tried to think where Lilith’s organised mind would put the bloody thing – imagined her waking up, maybe, and reaching out for it. ‘By your bed?’
One last nod.
‘I’ll be back before you know it,’ I yelled, already halfway down the corridor.
*****
‘Thank fuck for that.’
If it were my room, I’d have been long-dead by the time anyone found anything under three years of accumulated shite. But this was Lilith Bresson’s corner of the planet, and sure enough, the blue plastic inhaler was set neatly parallel to the edge of her bedside table. I grabbed it and hurtled back towards the studio, hoping that my efforts wouldn’t be too late.
*****
I handed the inhaler over and Lilith grabbed at it with both hands. The cylinder hissed twice and she gulped back the spray as best she could. She didn’t resist as I put a guiding arm around her rigid shoulders and brought her to the floor. I was terrified that maybe she was too far gone for this to work, that her lungs had shut down and refused to allow the drug into her system.
All I could do was kneel beside her and wait. Despite the risk, I found myself running the flat of my palm from the nape of her neck, between her shoulder blades and down the length of her spine in slow regular strokes. I couldn’t remember the last time I had voluntarily touched anyone, and I half-expected her to shrug away from me. Instead, as I watched, her lips returned to their usual hue and her breath came back, mercifully slow and steady. I stopped my stroking, suddenly aware that it might not be the most appropriate of moves.
‘No. Don’t stop,’ Lilith’s eyes were tightly shut as she focused on regaining control. ‘Helps. Lots.’
So I kept going, feeling each muscle release its grip as the minutes passed. Finally her eyes opened, bright and blue if slightly unfocused. ‘Well that was fun. Well done.’
‘Yeah, genius, huh? Sending you over a cliff on a wild horse didn’t work, so I decided to asthma you to death instead.’
‘Interesting verb,’ Lilith smiled.
‘Yeah, it’s about to be made into a new offence. Asthma-ing an artist to death. Automatic life sentence.’
‘Wasn’t being sarcastic for once. Meant it. Well done. For not panicking. Doing what you did. Spot on. Did it once when I was a boarder. French mistress hit the floor with me. The moment my face turned indigo. Thought I was. Dead.’
‘I can understand that.’ I tucked my hands into my pockets. ‘So. Shall we give this another go?’
Lilith
‘No we shall not,’ I got to my feet and feeling the world spin beneath me. I rested my hands on the back of the chair. ‘I am not bloody well dying. For my art. Especially. Not here.’
I was furious with myself. For missing the tell-tale struggle to pull in a full breath and the vice that had been tightening around my ribs since my altercation with Coyle, but mainly for this obvious, terrifying regression. I resigned myself to using the dull brown steroid inhaler every day until my escape, consoled by the thought of the velvet warmth of the Spanish autumn that would soothe away the resurgent curse of asthma as soon as I managed to escape.
‘What would you have been doing if you weren’t with me?’ I asked.
‘Dunno,’ Finn shrugged. ‘Fuckin’ about in the gardens, probably. Weeding. Shit like that.’