by Celia Bryce
‘Nah. They like having someone to complain about.’ He grinned at her. ‘Any sign of the cat?’
‘No.’ Megan yawned, not believing there’d ever been a cat, a Mr Henry, from the eighteen hundreds or whenever. She’d imagined the whole thing, that’s what it was. Maybe it was the chemo making her hear things.
Jackson settled into her room as if he owned the place. If he thought he could just turn up every time he liked, then he had another think coming. And just how was he so … cheerful all the time, so full of energy?
From outside her room came a noise rather like a large but muffled hairdryer. It was coming nearer and nearer.
‘What’s that?’
‘The buffer,’ Jackson answered. ‘They polish the floors with it. It’s got a brush and it spins round. Like one of those street cleaners. They won’t let me have a try on it, but I know where they keep them. All I need is the code to open the door …’
She should never have asked.
‘Do you want me to go?’ Jackson smiled at her. ‘I won’t talk too much, nothing about cats or rats. Promise. When your friends appear, I’m out of here. But while you’re waiting … can I stay?’ Megan tried to speak. Jackson just carried on. ‘What else are you going to do? Stare at walls?’
‘Draw. I like to draw. People.’ Megan gazed down at her hands, afraid that he might be right about her friends after all; that they wouldn’t come. But this was only the second day. There was time. And Gemma was texting her, sending rows of s to make her feel better, let her know she wasn’t forgotten. The Twins wanted to know if there was anyone nice to look at.
‘You need peace and quiet to draw,’ Megan said, giving him a pointed look. ‘I do, anyway.’ Her sketch pad, a present from Grandad, was still empty, the new pencils still unused, still in the packet, but he didn’t need to know that.
‘I haven’t spoken for at least five seconds,’ Jackson said. ‘I’m waiting to hear all about you. Or I can tell you all about me. You’ve met my mum.’ He made a face. ‘I’ve met yours. But there’s probably a lot more where they came from.’ Jackson pulled another face. ‘There’s hundreds in my family.’
Megan thought about hers. What was there to tell? It was so small. Everyone had got married late, is all she knew. Like missing a bus and catching the next one, or even the one after that. Grandad was past fifty when Mum was born, past eighty when she was born. Dad had one brother who had a wife and one son. The sum total of her family could be squeezed into one house and still leave room.
‘We don’t have to speak at all, if you don’t want to,’ Jackson said, twiddling his thumbs, shifting around in the chair. He was grinning like a maniac. ‘I’ll just sit here and think of when I get out. Don’t mind me. No need to say a word.’ Pulling down his hat, he stretched out in the chair as if about to go to sleep, the way parrots do when you cover their cages. ‘I’ll just wait for you to say something.’ He was watching Megan from under the brim of the hat, with that grin still on his face, his long legs twitching, feet tapping as if he was listening to music.
‘Jackson! Do you never just sit still?’
‘Me? No.’ Jackson smiled. ‘It’s the music, see? They say I take after my great-grandfather.’ He pushed his hat up a fraction. ‘You want to hear about him?’
‘No.’
‘This is his trilby …’
Megan made an exaggerated sigh.
The hat was pulled back down, but Jackson’s whole body still pulsed with rhythm, as if it ran right through his blood, like chemotherapy.
‘All right!’ Megan folded her arms and refused to look at him any more. He was so … She rolled her eyes … what was he, exactly? ‘Where do you live? Tell me that.’
Jackson shook his head. ‘Nah. Too late. You had your chance and blew it.’
From outside the open door came a familiar sound, giggly and high-pitched.
‘Hello,’ Megan said, her voice flat.
Two heads appeared. ‘We’re looking for Jackson.’
The girl called Laura was the first to speak. Becky gave her a nudge, as if she alone owned Jackson, as if only she had the right to enquire about him as it was her brother they were visiting.
‘Yes,’ Becky added, ‘we want to ask him Something Important.’
‘He’s here,’ Megan answered. There was an eruption of giggles.
‘He’s in her room …’ an astonished voice squeaked.
The two girls inched through the doorway, both wearing jeans and T-shirts, glittery slides in their hair, flashing trainers. They might have been sisters rather than friends, might have been dressed by the same mother, from the same wardrobe. They each wore a rucksack, one shocking pink, the other powder blue. Megan couldn’t stop herself smiling. Had she ever been like this? She glanced at Jackson as if to say, You deal with them, and busied herself looking for her tin of vaseline, opening the small side doors of her locker and there it was. She took it out, opened it and began to spread some on to her lips.
Jackson swivelled round in the chair in that lazy way of his. ‘Hi, you two! Come to see your brother, Becky?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s good. How is he, anyway?’
Something flashed across the girl’s face, a moment of doubt, indecision. Perhaps she didn’t really know. ‘He might be coming home soon. Tomorrow, maybe.’
Laura rolled her eyes. ‘She always says tomorrow, and he never does.’
Becky scowled.
‘And is he waiting to see you?’ Jackson said.
Becky nodded and exchanged a glance with Laura, seeming to come to some sort of silent understanding. They both turned to Jackson. With one voice the girls asked, ‘Are you going to be her boyfriend?’ They glanced meaningfully at Megan, who felt her face flush.
‘Hey, girls!’ Jackson replied, his face serious. They frowned. ‘The name is Megan, not her. Say hello …’
‘Hi, Megan,’ the girls chimed obediently, then turned to gaze at him once more. Despite everything, Megan found herself gazing too, taking in the whole relief of his face, from his long eyelashes to his full mouth – everything about him carved out like a statue, only walking, talking, smiling.
‘And I hardly know Megan,’ Jackson went on. ‘She hardly knows me, as she’s only been here a day and well, you wouldn’t want me to rush things now, would you? Rushing’s not good.’ The girls glowed with all the attention and stood in the doorway, eyes like owls. ‘Except when you need to rush to see your brother, Becky. Who’s been waiting to see his sister.’
Another look between the girls which seemed to say, Yes, it’s time to go, and they made to turn back. Yet, obviously, they weren’t finished.
‘Put your spooky face on, Jackson,’ Becky said. ‘Laura hasn’t seen it.’
Jackson shook his head.
‘Pleeease,’ begged Laura.
‘Spooky face, spooky face,’ they chanted.
Megan tried not to laugh.
‘OK, but then you have to go,’ Jackson said. ‘Close your eyes.’ The girls closed their eyes. Jackson beamed a smile at Megan then pulled a face like a grotesque mask. ‘O … p … en your eyesssss, girls …’
Becky and Laura did as he commanded and squealed, throwing their hands to their faces, hiding their eyes but for the gaps between their fingers. The mask fell and Jackson was back. The girls stopped squealing, laughter beginning to bubble up instead.
‘Now go,’ ordered Jackson with a grin. ‘Go on. Scat.’
‘See you later, Jackson. See you later, Megan.’ Off they went in a storm of giggles.
Megan replaced the lid of her vaseline, pushing it back into her locker, and tidying as she went along, determined not to look at Jackson. He just loved being the centre of attention, obviously. She wasn’t going to be stupid about him, like everyone else.
‘So … what?’ There was a grin in his voice.
Why did he always sound like he was laughing at her?
‘They’re like your own little fan club.’ Megan continue
d tidying. ‘You should give out badges. Mugs with Jackson all over them. Hats. You could sell them.’
Jackson began rifling through his pockets, then stopped. ‘And I thought I had badges in here. You could have had one for nothing, now that we’re almost going out and everything.’ His eyes were huge, shining. Megan tried not to look at him any more, her cheeks warm. ‘I mean, give it another few days, we’ll be engaged, if Laura and Becky have anything to do with it.’
Megan gaped at him, feeling her whole body blush. ‘Very funny, Jackson. So funny I could laugh myself to bits.’ But Megan couldn’t laugh, even if she’d wanted to. Tiredness was flooding over her, like some huge wave. She closed her eyes. If Jackson wanted to be part of a story made up by two little girls, then let him. No way was she joining in. And if she kept her eyes shut, maybe he’d get the hint.
‘Right, sleepyhead, I’m going.’
‘OK,’ Megan muttered.
‘Off, right now.’
She kept her eyes clamped shut. ‘So you keep saying …’
‘By the way …’
If only she had something she could throw at him. Something sharp. Or heavy. That would do. Only right then she didn’t have the energy, even if she had a whole line of things to chuck at him.
‘What?’
‘Vaseline.’ Leaning forward, Jackson touched her mouth, so gently that it might have been something delicate, something that might break. He dabbed at her bottom lip, concentrating so hard that this might have been the most important task ever. ‘You missed a bit,’ he said.
Megan couldn’t speak. He was so close to her that she couldn’t utter a word, so close she could hardly breathe. For that brief moment everything seemed to stop, as if the whole world, their world, on the ward, in the hospital, was put on hold and dared not move, because if it did, the moment might disappear.
At last, Jackson’s gaze met hers. There was no smile in his eyes, no mockery; just the window, opposite, the shape of it, mirroring in each one, perfect reflections of the day’s pale light.
Five
It was a silly game, one to be played when you’re lying in a hospital bed, not one that Gemma or the Twins would appreciate. It wasn’t like football with all of its rules and its time limits, or going out looking at boys in the shopping centre. There were no winners, no losers. It was more like Patience, that card game Grandad liked to play on his own.
All you had to do was close your eyes and listen, try to work out whose footsteps were going past the door, or who was laughing, or talking. You couldn’t cheat by opening your eyes. Not that anyone would know. You could make it as complicated or as simple as you liked, depending on how much time you had, or how bored or sick you were feeling.
There was too much time.
She was bored for most of it.
And now she was feeling sick.
Sister Brewster’s shoes squeaked. Megan had studied this. Siobhan’s shoes had a kind of clicky sound. It seemed to come from the heels. The cancer consultant, Frog-Man, dragged his feet as if he couldn’t lift them properly, or liked the sound they made, liked everyone to know who was walking past their door. Or maybe his job was too hard. Maybe it made his shoes heavier.
He had a huge laugh, which he must have kept for the ward, or maybe just the little ones. You could always hear him. Like everything was a joke. Like this wasn’t a ward full of cancer patients trying to dodge the bigger thing.
The bigger thing.
When they first told her she had cancer and would need to go into hospital, Megan just sat waiting for the words she’d just heard to go away, so that she wouldn’t have to think about it.
‘What if I say no,’ she said, because they refused to go away. ‘What if I don’t want to go to hospital?’
Mum and Dad had looked at her as if she’d stripped off all her clothes in front of a bus queue.
‘Well, Megan,’ Frog-Man said, ‘it’s a big thing, this. An important thing. The cancer, the treatment. If you don’t have the treatment, and let the cancer stay, you could die. And that’s a bigger thing altogether.’ He made a tent of his hands and twirled his thumbs round each other. ‘It’s about trying to help you dodge the bigger thing.’
Mum had cried then. She’d obviously been trying hard not to break down in front of Megan and make things seem much worse than they were, but after Frog-Man’s summing up of the situation, she must have thought they couldn’t get any worse at all.
Dad just sat there like a blank piece of paper on a noticeboard.
Megan knew she was beaten.
It was like going to the seaside and putting every last penny into that stupid machine where the best prize never gets pushed to the front. Every last penny. And wishing you had more to shove in and make it come to you. Only you stop there, because otherwise, it’s just mad. You had to know when you were beaten – at the Amusements and in a cancer specialist’s office.
‘OK, then,’ she said, gazing back into Frog-Man’s eyes, trying hard not to cry, or shake, taking it on the chin. As Grandad would say.
Sister Brewster was coming down the corridor and talking to Jackson in a brisk sort of way, sounding like a teacher with a naughty boy. There seemed to be a lot of that. Somehow or other he was always in trouble, and always being caught out. Which meant he wasn’t very good at it. Something about that made Megan smile, even though she was feeling absolutely rotten.
They weren’t wrong when they said she might feel unwell with the chemo.
‘So there’s this phone call, Jackson, telling me that you’re all the way down near X-ray. Correct me if I’m wrong, but you weren’t down for an X-ray this afternoon, were you?’
‘Not exactly.’
‘Not exactly. And as far as I’m aware you aren’t due an X-ray at all.’ There was a pause when, no doubt, Sister Brewster would be giving him one of her looks. ‘Jackson, you know how important it is that we have just a tiny clue about where you are. I had Kipper trying to get off the ward too. You know she watches you like a hawk.’
Sometimes Megan wished she could get off the ward. Even if it was with Jackson, even if it meant admitting she wouldn’t know where to go and having to follow him around.
But Jackson seemed to prefer to disappear on his own. Megan never quite knew if he was on the ward, or had gone home, or was just wandering about the hospital. For all his chattering, he didn’t tell her very much.
‘Someone phoned you to say where I was,’ Jackson was telling Sister Brewster. ‘No need to get so stressed. It’s not like I hopped on the 47 bus or anything.’
‘Jackson …’
He’d be standing there, brazening it out, as if he liked getting into trouble. They were past her room now, their voices less clear. It was no wonder Jackson wanted to escape to other places, to a change of scenery, no wonder he went walkabout. This hospital, this room, these walls and corridors, were it, were all there was, just as he’d said.
At least the little ones had a playroom. They even had a play specialist who let them mess about with toys and paints and clay. There were finger puppets and dressing-up clothes. If you were little, you could pretend to be a doctor or a nurse and stick needles in your doll.
Siobhan said it was to help children feel normal, to stop them thinking about bad things, to prepare them for all the tests. If they had some idea, it wasn’t so frightening for them.
‘It’s all right for you older ones,’ she said. ‘You can understand what’s happening. But the radiotherapy machines, they’re like some huge great monster when you’re a little person. It’s only for a few minutes, but it’s like an eternity to the wee ones.’
You didn’t have to be little to feel time dragging. Being stuck here was like an eternity. Too tired to move, not enough energy to draw, too wiped out to even text her friends. Not that she wanted to. What was there to tell? They were at school doing real stuff. She was here doing nothing, just listening to Jackson getting himself into trouble.
They wouldn’t understand.
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br /> She couldn’t even remember what she’d be doing now if she was at school. She couldn’t picture any of it. It was all outside the walls and she was inside. Like being trapped in a snow globe without the snow.
Megan blinked open her eyes. She hadn’t really been sleeping but it was easier to lie with her eyes closed than keep them open. She’d managed to draw some useless scribbles earlier, but it was as if the chemo had stopped her mind from working properly and her hand from drawing anything good. She tried to read her book. It was a great book. At least it had been when she started it at home. There was course-work she could be doing too. They’d sorted some out for her at school and Mum brought it in earlier, stowing it in her locker. She must have noticed the Don’t-Even-Think-I’m-Doing-Homework sort of look Megan gave her, so didn’t mention it. Besides, there were cards to put up on the wall behind the bed. Mum read out all of the names and all of the messages, every single one of them, so that the words spun around in Megan’s head.
It was a relief when Mum decided she had to post off a parcel to Dad and though, once she’d gone, there was still the busyness of the ward outside her door, there was peace in her room.
For a little while at least.
Now there was someone at her door.
Megan turned to see an alien standing there, or a princess. She wasn’t quite sure. A head as smooth as an egg. Big blue eyes. No eyebrows. And thin as a pencil. The pink frilly dress skimmed her shoulders and fell like a lacy sack around her. She had a fine tube coming from her nose and taped to her cheek. Her name bracelet looked two sizes too big. She was the most beautiful thing Megan had ever seen.
‘Hello … are you … Kipper?’ The alien nodded. Megan pulled herself to a half-sitting position and her book slid to the floor. ‘Are you looking for Jackson?’
A shake of the head.
‘I was talking to your mum the other night.’ Was it last night? Or the night before? She couldn’t remember. Not that it mattered. The girl didn’t say anything.
Megan wondered what she was doing there in her doorway and hoped that someone would come and take her away again. She shook herself. How horrible can you get? Did the chemo really make you that nasty?