Helping Janet sleep
“Janet, are you OK?”
“Yeah…no… I’m fine. I can’t get to sleep.”
There is a brief silence at the end of the phone. That warm, heart-melting smile. A little teasing laugh. Bianca’s breath. And already Janet feels quieter. She knows what she wants to say: “Come up here and help me sleep. Come up here and stroke my hair softly. Make me safe. Make me forget this pain. Bring me back to earth.”
Then Bianca’s voice. Lilting. Comforting. Grounding. That light in her eyes. “Have you got any chamomile?”
“Uhh, I’m not a tea person.”
And it’s all Bianca can do not get out of the car – to go and lie in the dark with Janet, tracing her finger lightly down Janet’s graceful neck. But keeping Janet safe is Bianca’s job, and that is what she is going to do. So she does the other thing she does so well. She talks. She soothes.
“You just haven’t found the right tea…. Iced rose and hibiscus on a hot day? Come right at me!”
And Bianca’s voice IS iced rose and hibiscus on a hot day. Chamomile on a hot, sleepless, angst-filled night. Janet turns over in bed, smiling, holding the phone to her ear. She just wants to hear her.
And the soft tendrils of Bianca’s warmth pull her downwards into calm. “You are strong – resilient…” says Bianca’s chamomile voice. “You’ll get through this. You’ll have the kids back soon. Life will start to get better.”
And as Janet starts to breathe more deeply, she understands that Bianca is where Janet wants to be.