All of Me by Kim Noble Page A

car park. The ledge was no deeper than two bricks. It was designed to keep people in. At shoulder height, it should have done the trick. What the hell was he doing balanced dangerously on top of it, legs dangling sixty or so feet above the ground? Gasping for air, he guided his fingertips until they found the back of the wall, then he dug his nails in for dear life. It wouldn’t stop him from falling but he felt better. He had to do something. After all, one sudden movement and the rest of him could follow his feet over the side.
    Ken suddenly remembered luxuriating in the spring breeze on his face a few seconds earlier.
    What if I’d leant forwards and not back?
    It was no use thinking about it. His stomach was churning fast enough as it was.
    Ken attempted to edge himself backwards. The obvious thing to do was swing his legs back up but the ledge was so narrow he was afraid the momentum would topple him in the other direction. But he couldn’t just sit there. A big gust of wind and he could be blown over. And in any case, who knew how strong this wall was? After a few nail-biting seconds he leant back as far as he dared over the car park floor and let himself fall. No sooner had he begun moving than his legs were able to swing upwards. He grabbed the top of the wall with both hands and lowered himself to safety.
    For a minute or so he couldn’t move. He just stayed there, hands and face pressed against the wall, covered in sweat and his heart threatening to burst through his shirt.
    Why had he been there? What on earth had he been thinking of? One false move and that would have been the end of Ken.
    He shook his head. It wasn’t the oddest thing that had happened to him but it was the most dangerous.
    Ah well, he thought, it’s over now, no harm done, and slowly he walked away, past the parked cars and unsuspecting shoppers. He couldn’t waste his time in a multi-storey car park.
    Ken had things to do.
    N obody told me anything. That was the story of my life. Friends didn’t tell me where they were going. Teachers didn’t tell me what homework had been assigned. Mum didn’t always call me for dinner. And no one told me when, why or how I kept ending up in Mayday Hospital surrounded by medics talking about stomach pump procedures. Completely out of the blue, it felt like I was trapped in a nightmare. I couldn’t help thinking, In a moment I will wake up and everything will be all right.
    But every time I woke up things were just as bad. If anything, they were getting worse.
    Mum had made perfectly clear her feelings on the whole involvement of social workers in our family business. In her eyes I’d brought shame on the family. She was more interested in what the neighbours thought than solving any problem. Dad did what she said or nothing at all. The less time they spent in each other’s company the better. I didn’t mind. Anything for a quiet life. That was our family motto.
    Neither of them spoke to me about the hospital visits. It was as if they were pretending nothing had happened – even though it kept happening. Dad did what he could but his main contribution was accusing me of taking his pills. Day after day it was the same stuck record.
    ‘What were you thinking, taking my distalgesics? They’re dangerous, Kim. When will you learn?’
    ‘I haven’t touched your distalgesics.’
    That was normally enough to shut him up. He hated confrontation, even with me. Unfortunately that also meant there was no way he would take the hospital to task, I knew that, not even when they were kidnapping me every other week for God knows what reason. Neither he nor Mum seemed to have any interest in helping me cope or trying to stop the stomach pumps happening. Why not? Why wouldn’t they step in? It was as if they were blaming me.
    I realised I had never felt so alone in my life.
    School was going from bad to worse as well. In class I struggled to keep up. I would stare at the blackboard, then at my textbook, then at