Or would it have been the same if Matt were still alive?
She’d never know now, she thought with a bitter dart. She stroked the cat too hard, so that it pushed off her lap with reproachful claws. It made Sarah think of trying to help three-year-old Patrick to unwrap a birthday gift – the way he’d squirmed away from her, and how she’d dug her fingers too deeply into his chubby little arm to keep him by her side.
But she’d lost him anyway.
And every Thursday she lost him again.
11
THE FLIRTING HAD worked. Now, whenever Mr Deal came to visit, he caught Tracy’s eye and gave a little smile – and she always made sure she was looking her best and being her kindest. It was quite an effort.
It was all a little strange, of course, because the flirting usually happened somewhere close to the bed where Mr Deal’s wife was lying comatose. Plus, it was not conventional flirting. Tracy had already resigned herself to the fact that she wasn’t going to be able to flash her boobs or slide her bottom provocatively against the front of Mr Deal’s trousers as he stood at the bar. No, this was secret flirting, using Mrs Deal as an unconscious conduit for their feelings.
‘I’ve been putting extra moisturizer on her hands. I notice they get very dry in here.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Her wedding ring is lovely. Did you choose it?’
‘We went together.’
‘That’s romantic,’ sighed Tracy. ‘Nobody’s romantic any more.’
Mr Deal just nodded, as if he didn’t have an opinion on romance one way or the other, so Tracy changed to a more professional tack.
‘Did you know that the doctor upped her morphine?’
‘No. Why?’
‘I noticed she was frowning a lot. We discussed it and thought it might mean she was in distress.’
Jean had noticed, actually; Tracy hadn’t noticed a thing.
‘Frowning?’
‘Yes. Like now. Look.’
‘Oh yes, I see.’
Mr Deal stared at his wife thoughtfully. ‘Does she ever say anything?’
‘Oh no,’ said Tracy. ‘But when they frown, it can be due to physical discomfort, so we turn her more often and we thought it best to increase the dosage. The doctor did, anyway.’
‘Which doctor?’
Tracy was irritated that Mr Deal wanted to know which doctor, when the point of her story was her own caring and observant nature, coupled with the life-or-death responsibility she bore as a nurse. She couldn’t show the irritation though; irritation was an unattractive trait and to be kept hidden until at least a few weeks into a sexual relationship, along with nagging, and farting in bed.
‘Oh, it begins with a B,’ she giggled. ‘There are so many doctors, and then there’s juniors and students too, and I’m new on this ward, so I haven’t learned them all yet.’
‘Where were you before?’
‘Paediatrics.’
‘Did you like that?’
Did she? What would he want to hear? Tracy could have kicked herself for not checking whether the Deals had children. Even then there was no right answer. If they had children, maybe he’d rather have someone who didn’t have baggage; if they didn’t, then maybe that was Mrs Deal’s fault, and he’d be keen to start a family with somebody new.
‘Oh yes,’ she enthused. ‘But I like this just as much in a different way.’ She hoped that covered both bases. He only nodded, which gave her no clue. But the next night, he brought a small box of chocolates and told her they were just for her. Sadly, they were truffles, but she was gushing in her thanks and promised to keep them a secret. She re-gifted them for her sister’s birthday that very weekend, but took heart from the fact that she and Mr Deal were making progress.
Unlike her patients.
The most annoying bad patient had died and everything was easier without his thrashing and crying. They were all very relieved, particularly Angie, whose crooked finger was the only sign now that he had ever been there.
Still, all Tracy seemed to do was put food and fluids in at one end of the patients and clean up at the other. They were less people than simple flesh tunnels for processing calories into shit. It repulsed her.
The few patients who could communicate were painfully slow at the process. Between all her other tasks, Tracy was often required to sit and interpret their weird stretched moans, or their long-winded attempts to spell out pointless messages on the little Possum spelling gadgets.
‘T… H. Is that an H? Or a G? Can you blink if it’s an H? Was that a blink or a twitch? Try to be accurate, OK? I’m going with H.’
T… H… God, it took for ever and they never said anything interesting. It didn’t help that one of the ward Possums was a bit dodgy and sometimes needed a good shake, or to be turned off and on again to avoid scrambling to gobbledegook.
While she waited for the patient to blink her way through the alphabet, Tracy’s eyes wandered to the TV on the opposite wall. It was Bargain Hunt and the blue team were considering a hideous green vase. Her mother had one just like it, and Tracy made a mental note to admire it next time she was home; maybe her mother would give it to her. When she looked back the patient had laboriously spelled out ‘T… H… I… R… S…’
Tracy smiled. ‘Thursday? Aw, bless! No, it’s Friday today, silly. TGIF! Off to Evolution tonight for a few drinks and a dance. Better get back to work now, though. No rest for the wicked.’
She put the Possum down beside the water jug, then went over to the nurses’ station and slumped in the swivel chair. The coma ward was boring yet difficult. Like golf.
Then Tracy sat up and dug about and found a hazelnut cluster in the lower layer of the latest Terry’s All Gold.
12
I SURGE UP from the depths of the well like a killer whale, with everything going from dark depths to bright white as I break the surface, and open my eyes on a pair of breasts encased in blue with white trim, almost touching my nose. Her enormous name tag says, ‘Tracy Evans, RN’.
She straightens up and looks at me and says, ‘Oh!’
Help me, Tracy! Someone killed the man in the next bed. But my ears hear only ‘Aaaaaaa waaaaa aaaaaaa,’ like an annoying sheep.
‘Oh,’ she says again, ‘you’re awake.’ Then she leans down close and looks into my eyes from about six inches away, so that I can see all the little flecks in her blue irises.
‘Are you?’ she says, suspiciously.
All I can do is blink slowly and hope she understands that I need to report a murder right now.
Instead she bustles away and I get so angry that I fall asleep…
I open my eyes again to find a woman old enough to be my mother, but who’s not my mother, weeping at my bedside. She wears blue gloves and a surgical mask. Her hair is greying and her eyes are red, and snot from her nose has made a dark patch on the front of the mask.
Why is she crying? Has something gone wrong?
For a horrible second I wonder if I’ve gone wrong.
‘Maaaaaa!’
She stops mid-sob and looks up, gasps, then chokes a bit. ‘Doctor!’ she croaks.
I flinch inside. A doctor is the last person I want to see, but what can I do? I have to show I’m awake and in one piece or they’ll let me just slip away…
My stomach rolls in fear as a set of blue scrubs walks into my vision and looks down at me over an armful of clipboards. He’s even younger than me.
‘You awake again, mate?’ he says – and this time I do cry with happiness – and relief – because that’s such a nice friendly thing to say; not sinister or frightening.