After You, Page 32

  pecked out messages on my phone, strolled downstairs for too-strong hospital coffee on an overpriced concourse, worried about parking charges. Moaned without really meaning it about how long these things always took.

  Now I sat on a molded plastic chair, my mind numb, my gaze fixed on a hospital wall, unable to tell how long I had been there. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t feel. I just existed—me, the chair, the squeaky linoleum under my bloodied tennis shoes.

  The strip lighting overhead was a harsh constant, illuminating the nurses who walked briskly past, barely giving me a second look. Sometime after I had come in, one of them had been kind enough to show me to a bathroom so that I could clean my hands, but I could still see Sam’s blood in the dips around my nails, rust-colored cuticles that hinted at a not-so-distant atrocity. Pieces of him in pieces of me. Pieces of him where they shouldn’t be.

  When I closed my eyes I heard the voices, that sharp thwack of the bullet hitting the roof of the ambulance, the shot that had echoed into the silence, the siren, the siren, the siren. I saw his face, the brief moment when he had looked at me and there had been nothing—no alarm, nothing except perhaps a vague bemusement at finding himself there on the floor, unable to move.

  And I kept seeing those wounds—not neat little holes like gunshot injuries in movies, but living, pulsing things, pushing out blood as if they were trying maliciously to rid him of it. My jeans were still dark with it.

  I sat motionless on that plastic chair because I didn’t know how to do anything else. Somewhere at the end of that corridor were the operating theaters. He was in there right now. He was alive or he was dead. He was either being wheeled to some distant ward, surrounded by relieved, high-fiving colleagues, or someone was pulling a green cloth up over his—

  I sank my head into my hands and I listened to my breath, in and out. In and out. My body smelled unfamiliar, of blood and antiseptic and something sour left over from visceral fear. Periodically I would observe distantly that my hands were trembling, but I wasn’t sure if it was low blood sugar or exhaustion, and somehow the thought of trying to find food was way beyond me. Movement was beyond me.

  My sister had texted me some time ago.

  Where are you? We’re going for pizza. They are talking, but I need you here as United Nations.

  I hadn’t answered. I couldn’t work out what to say.

  He is talking about her hairy legs again. Please come. This could get ugly. She has a fearsome aim with a doughball.

  I closed my eyes and tried to remember what it felt like, a week ago, to lie on the grass beside Sam, the way his stretched-out legs were so much longer than mine, the reassuring scent of his warm shirt, the low rumble of his voice, the sun on my face. His face, turning toward mine to steal kisses, the way he looked secretly pleased after every one. The way he walked, slightly set forward yet his weight so centered, the most solid man I had ever met—as if nothing could knock him down.

  Where are you? Mum getting worried.

  I felt the buzz and pulled my phone from my pocket, read my sister’s message. I checked the time. 10:48 p.m. I couldn’t believe I was the same person who had woken that morning and dropped Lily at the station. I leaned back in the chair, thought for a moment, and began to type.

  I’m at the City hospital. There’s been an accident. I’m fine. I’ll be back when I know

  My finger hovered over the keys. I blinked and, after a moment, pressed send. And I closed my eyes and prayed.

  • • •

  I came to with a start at the sound of the swing doors. I looked up to find my mother walking briskly down the corridor, her good coat on, her arms already outstretched.

  “What the hell happened?” Treena was close behind, dragging Thom, in his pajamas with an anorak over the top. “Mum didn’t want to come without Dad and I wasn’t going to be left behind.” Thom looked at me sleepily and waved a damp hand.

  “We had no clue what had happened to you!” Mum sat down beside me, studying my face. “Why didn’t you say?”

  “What’s going on?” said Dad.

  “Sam has been shot.”

  “Shot! Your paramedic?” said Mom.

  “With a gun?” said Treena.

  It was then that my mother registered my jeans. She stared at the red stains, then turned mutely to my father.

  “I was with him.”

  My mother pressed her hands to her mouth. “Are you okay?” And then, when she realized the answer was yes, at least physically, “Is . . . is he okay?”

  The four of them stood before me, their faces immobilized by shock and concern. I was suddenly utterly relieved to have them there.

  “I don’t know,” I said, and as my father stepped forward to take me in his arms, I finally began to cry.

  • • •

  We sat for several years, my family and I, on those plastic chairs. Or something close to that. Thom fell asleep on Treena’s lap, his face pale under the strip lights, his battered cuddly cat pressed into the silky soft space between his neck and chin. Dad and Mum sat on each side of me and at any one time one of them would hold my hand or stroke the side of my face and tell me it was going to be okay. I leaned against Dad and let the tears fall silently and let Mum wipe my face with her ever-present clean handkerchief and then periodically she would head off around the hospital complex on a search for hot drinks.

  “She’d never have done that by herself a year ago,” Dad said, the first time she disappeared. I couldn’t tell whether it was said admiringly or with regret. We spoke little. There was nothing to say. The words repeated in my head like a mantra—Just let him be okay. Just let him be okay. Just let him be okay.

  This is what catastrophe does: it strips away the fluff and the white noise, the should I really and the but what if . . . ? I wanted Sam. I knew it with a stinging clarity. I wanted to feel his arms around me and hear him talking and sit in the cab of his ambulance and I wanted him to make me a salad with things he had grown in his garden and I wanted to feel his warm, bare chest rise and fall steadily under my still arm while he slept. Why had I not been able to tell him that? Why had I wasted so much time worrying about what was not important?

  And then, as Mum opened the doors at the far end of the corridor, bearing a cardboard holder with four teas in it, the doors to the theaters opened and Donna emerged, her uniform still dark, trailing her hands through her hair. I stood.

  She slowed as she reached us, her expression grave, her eyes red rimmed and exhausted. For a moment I thought I might pass out. Her eyes met mine. “Tough as old boots, that one.”

  And then as I let out an involuntary sob, she touched my arm. “You did good, Lou,” she said, and let out a long, shaky breath. “You did good tonight.”

  • • •

  He spent the night in intensive care, and was transferred to a high-dependency unit in the morning. Donna called his parents, and said she would stop by his place to feed his animals after she’d had some sleep. We went in to see him together shortly after midnight, but he was asleep; his face was still ashen, a mask obscuring most of it. I wanted to move closer to him but I was afraid to touch him, hooked up as he was to all those wires and tubes and monitors.

  “He really is going to be okay?”

  She nodded. A nurse moved silently around the bed, checking levels, taking his pulse.

  “We were lucky it was an older handgun. A lot of kids are getting hold of semiautomatics now. That would have been it.” She rubbed at her eyes. “It’ll probably be on the news, if nothing else happens. Mind you, another crew dealt with the murder of a mother and baby on Athena Road last night, so it’s possible it won’t be news at all.”

  I tore my gaze from him and turned to her. “Will you carry on?”

  “Carry on?”

  “As a paramedic.”

  She pulled a face, as if she didn’t really understand the question. “Of course. It’s my job.” She patted me on the shoulder and turned toward the door. “Get some sl
eep, Lou. He probably won’t wake up until tomorrow anyway. He’s about eighty-seven percent fentanyl right now.”

  My parents were waiting when I stepped back into the corridor. They didn’t say anything. I gave a small nod, and Dad took my arm and Mum patted my back.

  “Let’s get you home, love,” she said. “And into some clean things.”

  • • •

  It turns out there is a particular tone of voice that emanates from an employer who, several months earlier, had had to listen to how you couldn’t come to work because you had fallen off the fifth floor of a building, and now would like to swap shifts because a man who may or may not be your boyfriend has been shot twice in the stomach.

  “You—he has—what?”

  “He was shot twice. He’s out of intensive care but I’d like to be there this morning when he comes to. So I was wondering if I could swap shifts with you.”

  There was a short silence.

  “Right. . . . Uh. Okay.” He hesitated. “He was actually shot? With a gun?”

  “You can come and inspect the holes if you like.” My voice was so calm, I almost laughed.

  We discussed a couple more logistical details—calls that needed to be made, a visit from Head Office, and before I rang off, Richard grew silent for a moment. Then he said, “Louisa, is your life always like this?”

  I thought of who I had been two and a half years ago, my days measured in the short walk between my parents’ house and the café, the Tuesday-night routine of watching Patrick run or supper with my parents. I looked down at the rubbish bag in the corner, which now contained my bloodstained tennis shoes and jeans.

  “Possibly. Although I’d like to think it’s just a phase.”

  • • •

  My parents left for home after breakfast. My mother didn’t want to go, but I assured her that I was fine and that I didn’t know where I would be for the next few days so there was probably little point in her staying. I also reminded her that the last time Granddad was left alone for more than twenty-four hours he had eaten his way through two pots of raspberry jam and a tin of condensed milk in lieu of actual meals.

  “You really are all right though.” She held her hand to the side of my face. She said it as though it wasn’t a question, although it clearly was.

  “Mum, I’m fine.”

  She shook her head and made to pick up her bag. “I don’t know, Louisa. You do pick them.”

  She was taken aback when I laughed. It might have been leftover shock. But I like to think it was then that I realized that I wasn’t afraid of anything anymore.

  • • •

  I showered, trying not to look at the pink water that ran from my legs, and washed my hair, bought the least limp bunch of flowers I could find at Samir’s, and headed back to the hospital. Sam’s parents had arrived several hours earlier, the nurse told me as she led me to the door. They had gone over to the railway carriage with Jake and his father to fetch Sam’s belongings.

  “He wasn’t very with it when they came but he’s making more sense now,” she said. “It’s not unusual when they’re not long out of theater. Some people just bounce back quicker than others.”

  I slowed as we reached the door. I could see him now through the glass, his eyes closed, as they had been last night, his hand, strapped up to various monitors, lying motionless alongside his body. There was stubble on his chin and while he was still ghostly pale, he looked a little more like himself.

  “You sure I’m okay to go in?”

  “You’re Louisa, right? He’s been asking for you.” She smiled and wrinkled her nose. “Give us a shout if you get tired of that one. He’s lovely.”

  I pushed the door slowly and his eyes opened, his face turning slightly. He looked at me then, as if he were taking me in, and something inside me weakened with relief.

  “Some people will do anything to beat me on the scar front.” I closed the door behind me.

  “Yeah. Well.” His voice emerged as a croak. “I’ve gone right off that game.” He gave a small, tired smile.

  I stood, shifting my weight from one foot to the other. I realized I hated hospitals. I would do almost anything never to enter one again.

  “Come here.”

  I put the flowers on the table and walked over. He moved his arm, motioning for me to sit on the bed beside him. I sat, and then because it felt wrong to be looking down at him, lay back, positioning myself carefully, wary of dislodging something, of hurting him. I placed my head on his shoulder and felt the welcome weight of his head come to rest against mine. His lower arm lifted, gently hooking me in. We lay there in silence for a while, listening to the soft-shoe shuffle of the nurses outside, the distant conversation.

  “I thought you were dead,” I whispered.

  “Apparently some amazing woman who shouldn’t have really been in the back of the ambulance managed to slow my blood loss.”

  “That’s some woman.”

  “I thought so.”

  I closed my eyes, feeling the warmth of his skin against my cheek, the unwelcome scent of chemical disinfectant emanating from his body. I didn’t think about anything. I just let myself exist in that moment, the deep, deep pleasure of being there next to him, of feeling the weight of him beside me, the space he took up in the atmosphere. I shifted my head and kissed the soft skin on the inside of his arm, and felt his fingers trace their way gently through my hair.

  “You scared me, Ambulance Sam.”

  There was a long silence. I could hear him thinking, the million things he chose not to say.

  “I’m glad you’re here,” he said finally.

  We lay there for a bit longer, in silence. And when the nurse came in and raised an eyebrow at my proximity to various important tubes and wires, I climbed reluctantly off the bed and: obeyed her instructions to get some breakfast while she did her medical thing. I kissed him, a little self-consciously, and when I stroked his hair his eyes lifted slightly at the corners and I saw, with gratitude, something of what I was to him. “I’ll be back after my shift,” I said.

  “You might bump into my parents.” He said it as a warning.

  “That’s fine,” I said. “I’ll make sure I’m not wearing my Fuck Da Police T-shirt.”

  He laughed, and then grimaced, as if laughing were painful.

  I fussed around a little while the nurses were seeing to him, doing the things that people do at patients’ bedsides when they’re simply looking for an excuse to hang around: I put out some fruit, disposed of a tissue, organized some magazines that I knew he wouldn’t read. And then it was time to go. I had made it as far as the door when he spoke. “I heard you.”

  My hand was outstretched, ready to open the door. I turned.

  “Last night. When I was bleeding out. I heard you.”

  Our eyes locked. And in that moment everything shifted. I saw what I had really done. I saw that I could be somebody’s center, his reason for staying. I saw that I could be enough. I walked back and took Sam’s face in my hands and kissed him fiercely, feeling hot tears fall unchecked onto his face, his arm pulling me in tightly as he kissed me back. I pressed my cheek against his, half laughing, half weeping, oblivious to the nurses, to anything except the man before me. Then, finally, I turned and walked downstairs, wiping at my face, laughing at my tears, ignoring the curious faces of the people who passed.

  The day was beautiful, even under strip lights. Outside, birds sang, a new morning dawned, people lived and grew and got better and looked forward to getting older. I bought a coffee and ate an oversweet muffin and they tasted like the most delicious things I had ever had. I sent messages to my parents, to Treena, to Richard, telling him I would be in shortly. I texted Lily.

  Thought you might want to know Sam is in hospital. He got shot but he’s okay. I know he’d love it if you dropped him a card. Or even just a text if you’re busy.

  The answer pinged back within seconds. I smiled. How did girls that age type so quickly when they did ever
ything else so slowly?

  OMG. I just told the other girls and I’m basically now the coolest person they know. Actually shot?!? Seriously though give him my love. If you text me his details I’ll get a card after school. Oh and I’m sorry for showing off to him in my pants that time. I didn’t mean it. Like not in a pervy way. Hope you guys are really happy. Xxx

  I didn’t wait to respond. I looked at the hospital cafeteria and the shuffling patients and the bright blue day through the skylight and my fingers hit the keys before I knew what I was saying.

  I am.

  28

  Jake was waiting on the porch when I arrived at the Moving On Circle. It was raining heavily, dense clouds the color of heather abruptly unleashing a thunderstorm that overwhelmed gutters and soaked me in the ten seconds it took to run across the car park.

  “Aren’t you going in? It’s filthy out—”

  He stepped forward, and his lanky arms enfolded me in a swift, awkward hug when I reached the door.

  “Oh!” I lifted my hands, not wanting to drip all over him.

  He released me and took a step back. “Donna told us what you did. I just—you know—wanted to say thanks.”

  His eyes were strained, and shadowed, and I realized with a start what these last few days must have been like for him, so soon after having lost his mother.

  “He’s tough,” I said.

  “He’s bloody Teflon,” he said, and we laughed awkwardly, in the way British people do when they are experiencing great emotion.

  In the meeting Jake spoke unusually volubly, about the fact that his girlfriend didn’t understand what grief was like for him. “She doesn’t get why some mornings I just want to stay in bed with the covers over my head. Or why I get a bit panicky about things happening to people I love. Literally nothing bad has happened to her. Ever. Even her pet rabbit is still alive and it’s, like, nine years old.”

  “I think people get bored of grief,” said Natasha. “It’s like you’re allowed some unspoken allotted time—six months maybe—and then they get faintly irritated that you’re not ‘better,’ like you’re being self-indulgent hanging on to your unhappiness.”

  “Yes!” There was a murmur of agreement from around the circle.

  “I sometimes think it would be easier if we still had to wear widows’ weeds,” said Daphne. “Then everyone could know you were grieving.”

  “Maybe like learner plates, so, you know, you got a different set of colors after a year. Maybe move from black to a deep purple,” said Leanne.

  “Coming up all the way to yellow when you were really happy again.” Natasha grinned.

  “Oh, no. Yellow is awful with my complexion.” Daphne smiled cautiously. “I’ll have to stay a bit miserable.”

  I listened to their stories in the dank church hall—the tentative steps forward over tiny, emotional obstacles. Fred had joined a bowling league and was enjoying having another reason to go out on Tuesdays, one that didn’t involve talking about his late wife. Sunil had agreed to let his mother introduce him to a distant cousin from Eltham. “I’m not really into the whole arranged-marriage thing but, to be honest, I’m having no luck with other methods. I keep telling myself: She’s my mother. She’s hardly going to set me up with someone horrible.”

  “I think it’s a lovely idea,” said Daphne. “My mother would probably have spotted which tree my Alan barked up long before I did. She was ever such a good judge.”

  I viewed them as if I were on the outside of something looking in. I laughed at their jokes, winced internally at their tales of inappropriate tears or misjudged comments. But what became clear as I sat on my plastic chair and drank my instant coffee was that I had somehow found myself on the other side. I had crossed a bridge. Their struggle was no longer my struggle. It wasn’t that I would ever stop grieving for Will, or loving him, or missing him, but that my life seemed to have somehow landed back in the present. And it was with a growing satisfaction that I found, even as I sat there with people I now knew and trusted, that I actually wanted to be somewhere else: beside a large man in a hospital bed who I knew, to my utter gratitude, would even now be glancing up at the clock in the corner wondering how long it was going to take me to get to him.

  “Nothing from you tonight, Louisa?”

  Marc was looking at me, one eyebrow raised.

  I shook my head. “I’m good.”

  He gazed at me, perhaps recognizing something in my tone. “Good.”

  “Yes. Actually, I think I don’t need to be here anymore. I’m . . . okay.”

  “I knew there was something different about you,” said Natasha, leaning