In the Light of What We See

by Sarah Painter

  ‘Can’t stop, Jock,’ Grace said, tucking his sheets in as loosely as she dared.

  ‘Nurse!’ The ward sister’s sandpaper voice seemed alarmingly close and Grace spun around to face her. ‘I do hope the pans and bottles are properly put away.’

  ‘Yes, Sister,’ Grace said.

  ‘I won’t have slovenliness on my ward,’ the sister began, but before she could list all of the other things she absolutely would not tolerate and the accompanying litany of Grace’s deficiencies, footsteps began echoing down the ward from the outside corridor. Sister pulled herself to her full height and waddled off in the direction of the doors.

  ‘Hair,’ Barnes hissed. Grace’s hair had a tendency to resist tidiness and bits kept escaping throughout the day. She was for ever tucking stray strands back underneath her cap. She’d barely finished when the doors swung inwards and Dr Palmer arrived. As always, he was followed by a scurrying retinue of students and nurses. As he paraded around the ward, stopping at each bed and holding court, Grace dug her fingernails into her palm and prayed that he was satisfied. Any criticism of the ward was viewed as a direct attack on the ward sister and her ability to maintain order within her domain. When she discovered who was responsible it would result in the culprit – invariably a junior nurse – being sent to Matron’s office the following morning.

  Dr Palmer stopped at Jock’s bed and inclined his head, listening. Jock was speaking and Grace had the sinking feeling that he was complaining about his whatsit. She held her breath as she stood to attention on the other side of the ward. She could hear Jock’s voice rising and falling. He spoke in the deferential and diffident way of male patients to the doctors, to be sure, but he could be complaining nonetheless. Finally, the sister peeled back the bedclothes and Dr Palmer leaned forward, his head on one side, as though assessing a work of art, or a steak he was considering eating for supper.

  Jock pointed at Grace and she felt a clammy sweat break out on her neck. By the time the procession had made its way around the ward to the point at which she was standing, Grace felt as if she might faint. All work ceased on the ward while the doctor was in residence so she couldn’t rush off to busy herself with something. Couldn’t hide in the bathroom or the sluice.

  ‘Ah,’ Dr Palmer said. ‘Nurse Kemp, is it?’

  ‘Yes, Doctor,’ Grace said, her voice barely a whisper.

  ‘Do ensure that man has zinc oxide applied.’ And he winked at her. So quickly Grace thought she must have imagined it. No doctor would do anything as vulgar and familiar as wink. Especially not in the middle of rounds, with the ward sister on his left looking like she wanted to throttle someone and quickly.

  ‘Coo,’ Barnes said, once the esteemed party had left, the ward sister had exhausted herself shouting and retired to her room for a cup of tea, and they were back in the safety of the sluice. ‘He’s a bit of all right.’

  ‘Dr Palmer?’ Grace still felt sick.

  ‘I should say.’ Barnes fanned herself with her hand. ‘He could be an actor.’ Barnes was stockily built and had a permanently red face. She said that hospital life was making her fat, all the bread and marge and not enough fresh air, but Grace thought she looked well on it. Sturdy. Curvy. There was a nurse called Davies, who was so thin she looked like she would break at any moment. When you saw her lifting a patient you couldn’t help but hold your breath, waiting for the crack as the birdlike bones in her arm simply snapped under the pressure.

  ‘I hadn’t noticed,’ Grace said.

  ‘Ooh, yes. He’s gorgeous,’ Barnes said. ‘Lovely pink lips.’ And she cackled.

  ‘I don’t like him,’ Grace said, and Barnes looked at her as if she’d gone out of her mind. As if that had anything to do with anything.

  Grace closed her lips tight. Barnes was right, of course. It didn’t matter whether Grace liked him or not. In her experience, it didn’t matter what she liked or what she didn’t. At once, she wanted to cry and she turned away to tidy the linen cupboard, determined to hide her red eyes from Barnes.

  Grace had been a good baby; Mother said that she had slept like a little angel and always smiled at people when they peered into the pram. Then she’d been a good girl. She’d kept her clothes neat and washed her face morning and night. She said please and thank you and did as she was told. She’d been good even when a friend of her father’s didn’t seem to be quite the thing. She’d been polite all the while he had been quite the opposite, although – during – her clothes hadn’t remained quite as neat as usual.

  Later, when her stomach began to push against the waistband of her cotton circle skirt, and her chest hurt inside the strict confines of her clothes, her combination painfully digging in, she stopped being a good girl. Just like that.

  The very best thing about being a nurse, Grace thought, was that it was beyond all of those labels. Grace wasn’t naughty or nice any more; she wasn’t even a person. She was a nurse. However frightened or repulsed or tired she felt, she rejoiced inside her starched cocoon. Maybe one day, she’d emerge from it. A woman. A lady. Or, more likely, she’d remain Nurse Kemp for ever and ever, and that was just fine, too.

  Grace wanted to be like Sister Gilbert. She had never married and, if she hadn’t been a nurse, she’d have been called a spinster. She would’ve been something to be pitied, but as Sister Gilbert she was beyond all of that. She’d risen to a higher state of being. Sister Gilbert was so good at her job, so experienced and capable, that even the doctors inclined their leonine heads to listen to her. As if her words were worth listening to, almost as if she were a man.

  Grace followed the sister, mimicking the graceful way she moved around the ward. She was lightning fast but never seemed to hurry. She moved smoothly, as if on castors rather than clumpy feet and legs. She had a serene expression, like a nun, as if nothing in this mortal world could ever surprise or alarm her. Grace watched the way she spoke to people and tried to emulate her gentle, commanding tone. She studied hard for the exams and listened in the lessons, fighting her desperate tiredness and ignoring Evie’s attempts to distract her. She, Grace Kemp, was going to be a nurse. She was going to work so hard that nobody could ever be disappointed in her again.

  MINA

  I gripped the mobile phone and willed it to ring. If Geraint would just call and say ‘Hey’ or, more likely, ‘Stop ringing me all the fucking time, I’m busy’, then I’d be able to relax, to concentrate on the stuff that Mark (annoyingly) kept saying I should be concentrating on – getting better.

  Dr Adams said the same, to be fair, although it irritated me less coming from him as at least he was medically trained. When he’d scheduled my hydrotherapy session he’d mentioned counselling to help me deal with the trauma of the accident. He’d even used the words ‘holistic approach to recovery’. I’d given him my dead-eyed stare and said, ‘I don’t have any trauma from the accident. I can’t remember the accident.’

  He’d matched my stare with an impressive one of his own and said, crisply, ‘Point. Proved.’

  I closed my eyes and tried – again – to think about the accident. It was ridiculous that I couldn’t remember something so huge and, besides, the stubborn part of me wanted to prove Dr Adams wrong.

  Memories were shining threads in the dark and I followed them one by one. Mostly they merged into another thread, like the tangle in one of those mazes you got in puzzle books, but sometimes they ended with an image or a vignette. Moments from my past, my personality, nuggets of knowledge. I had to follow them patiently, though. If I tugged to try and pull the memory closer, the thread just snapped.

  A nurse bustled in, pulling my curtains back and leaving them half open in a way that I knew was going to bother me. Then she gave me something else to worry about, by taking the dressing off my leg, along with what felt like a layer of skin.

  ‘That’s looking good.’ She wagged a finger at me as if I were a toddler. ‘Now, no scratching.’

  I bit back a sharp retort and focused, instead, on not thinkin
g about the mess of my lower leg and how badly scarred it would be. I’d never considered myself especially vain, but I didn’t want to draw looks of disgust or, worse, sympathy, every time I wore skirt.

  ‘Can you close the curtains?’ I asked the nurse as she moved away.

  ‘You don’t want to block out this lovely sunshine,’ she said and I considered throwing something at her back.

  Then I had to stop myself from yelping out loud. My hallucination had returned. She was leaning over the end of the bed, peering at my burns and giving me an excellent view of her white cap. I could even see the hairgrips holding the edge of the material. I twitched the blanket over my legs and glared at her, wondering whether getting annoyed by a figment of my imagination was more or less futile than with the real-life nursing staff.

  She pursed her lips and reached out as if she wanted to move the blanket. I tensed, not sure I could cope with the sight of a ghostly hand moving through the fabric, but she stopped and smiled at me. She was so pretty it made me forget that she was a hallucination. There was something warm and very real about her expression. Calm poured through my body, making me almost drowsy.

  She produced something from the pocket in the front of her apron and moved it just above the bed sheet. It was a small metal train with flaking red paint, so detailed that I couldn’t believe it wasn’t really there. She smiled at me encouragingly, holding out the train as if I was supposed to take a turn. I reached out a finger to touch the train and the vision disappeared. There was nobody there. I took a deep breath and tried not to feel abandoned. The train had stirred a memory, though: Christmas shopping with Mark. We were in the toy department of John Lewis and I was trying to pretend I cared about gifts for his nieces and nephews. I winced as I remembered my off-hand tone as Mark showed me toys and books and asked my opinion.

  Later, we’d gone to a pub for a reviving drink and Mark had asked me relentless questions about my family. We’d argued, of course, when I wouldn’t answer him to his satisfaction. ‘I have ways of finding out,’ he had said then. His face was flushed with emotion and from the warmth of the pub. ‘You’re not as bloody mysterious as you like to make out.’

  His words made me feel sick. Then and now. I wasn’t trying to be mysterious. I wasn’t playing games. I just felt like everything was safer if things stayed in their correct zones: work, boyfriend, family.

  I explored my memories of Pat, Dylan and Geraint and tried to recall when we’d last been all together. Every time I thought of us as a group, my mind flickered to an early Christmas when Geraint and I got matching Aran sweaters in itchy wool. Or the Easter when Pat organised an egg hunt, but the weather was unseasonably warm and the eggs so well hidden that we spent days finding the misshapen melted chunks of chocolate.

  I couldn’t bring forward memories from after I’d left home. Not of my family, anyway. I assume I spoke to them, visited home, wrote emails, but I couldn’t conjure up a single specific incident. I could remember university; my friends and the shared houses I’d lived in. All those new and exciting experiences. Perhaps it was just a symptom of the self-involved selfishness of youth. Family receded as you launched from the nest, spreading your wings and, hopefully, flying.

  What was more worrying was that I couldn’t remember the time after university either. I tried to remember my birthday last year. Or job hunting, which I knew I must’ve done to get work at the hospital, but it was another terrifying blank.

  I clung to the things that I knew; I was twenty-nine, I’d completed a PhD in the research department at UCL, which meant maybe three or four years after that in the hospital job. Parveen had programmed her number into the mobile and I texted her. How long have I been working in radiology? It felt good. Proactive.

  A message came back quickly.

  3 yrs. Are you bored?

  I replied:

  Thanks. Yes. Very.

  Another text:

  Me, too. At least you’re in bed.

  I smiled. It seemed I had to have a car crash and a coma in order to make friends. I knew that I’d never taken the easy path, but even I had to admit this was a bit extreme. Still, I was grateful.

  When Mark came in to visit, I asked him how things were at work. I’d been planning to tell him about Parveen, to show off my new social skills, but once he was in front of me I just clammed up. No matter how good my mood, as soon as Mark appeared it seemed to turn black. I liked the idea of him, but once the reality showed up my chest got tight and I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong between us.

  After he’d talked about his day for a while, I used a gap in the narrative to ask: ‘Could you bring in my laptop?’

  Mark frowned. ‘What for?’

  ‘Just stuff. You know, email, internet.’

  He shook his head. ‘I don’t think that’s a good idea. If you’re getting bored I can bring you some more books. Do you want any magazines?’

  ‘No, thank you,’ I said between gritted teeth. ‘Why don’t you think it’s a good idea?’

  ‘I don’t want you stressed.’

  ‘I’m not stressed,’ I said, consciously unclenching my fists. ‘I just want a bit of normality.’

  ‘If it means that much to you, I’ll speak to your doctor.’

  His tone of patronising solicitude made me want to punch things. Instead I forced myself to smile. ‘That would be great. Thanks.’

  ‘Now,’ Mark said, chipper again. He produced a slim box from his jacket pocket. ‘How about a game of dominoes?’

  The next day, after Mark had visited with no mention of my laptop, Dr Adams appeared. The curtains were pulled around the beds, creating little bedrooms, and it felt strangely intimate. He threw himself into the chair and ran a hand through his hair. ‘Well, that was a boatload of crap.’

  My senses kicked up. It was ridiculously pleasing to be spoken to like a normal human being, not a patient. ‘Bad shift?’

  He shook his head. ‘Normal shift, stupid bloody meeting.’ He tipped his head against the high back of the chair. ‘God, I hate SM.’

  The phrase jogged something loose. Parveen and Paul complaining about senior management, calling them ‘S and M’ and making a whip-crack sound. Paul laughing with his mouth wide, showing his crooked bottom teeth . . .

  Dr Adams glanced at me. ‘Senior Management. Bunch of—’ He broke off, colour flooding his cheeks. ‘Christ. Sorry. Ignore me.’

  ‘That’s all right, vent away,’ I said. ‘I remember management problems. Sadly, even a coma isn’t enough to erase those.’

  ‘I guess they’re the same in every department. I know they’ve got a difficult job and that there are budgets to be balanced and so on. If only they weren’t such . . .’

  ‘Arseholes,’ I said, conveniently and deliberately forgetting that I’d been sleeping with my manager for over a year.

  Dr Adams smiled and told me a little about the meeting he’d just had. Something strange happened as he spoke, though; bits of my old life came back. I remembered Paul buying himself a Danish pastry every Friday and eating it slowly at his desk, spreading a wide circle of flaky crumbs. I remembered going out for a drink with a girl who’d worked in the department for a few months, and that Mark had shown up halfway through the night, sitting down at our table and being weirdly grumpy. I couldn’t remember why – or whether we’d had a fight that day – but I remembered the awkwardness of the moment with such force that I felt myself blushing.

  I pushed the memory away and tried to concentrate on Dr Adams. After a while, the details were running into one another, so I just lay back and enjoyed listening to his voice.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t be burdening you with this. And it’s dull. How are things with you? Are you in pain?’

  I opened my eyes. ‘I’m fine. Bored. Frustrated. But, as you’ve just reminded me, that’s not the preserve of the hospitalised, so thank you. At least I’m out of meetings for the foreseeable.’

  ‘Always a silver lining.’
/>
  ‘You know, it’s pretty easy to have a car accident if you ever get desperate.’

  He was suddenly alert. ‘Have you remembered something?’

  ‘Nothing important,’ I said. ‘But I am going crazy’.

  The alert look intensified and I realised I’d misjudged my tone. ‘Not crazy with a capital “c”, not “in need of sedation” crazy. Bored crazy. Sick of being sick crazy.’

  ‘Do you need more books?’

  I glanced at the teetering pile of paperbacks and shook my head. ‘I’ve actually got a project in mind. I think I must be missing work or something, but I need something to do. I asked Mark to get my laptop and he said he was going to speak to you about it.’

  He shook his head. ‘Not yet.’

  ‘He’s worried that I’ll overdo it, set back my recovery.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s likely,’ Dr Adams said. ‘What sort of project are we talking about?’

  I felt self-conscious. Which was silly given that the man in front of me had probably seen me naked – a singularly unhelpful thought.

  ‘Mina?’

  ‘I want to research the history of the hospital. I know it sounds daft but I can’t believe how little I know about this place. I mean, I’ve been coming here every day for years and now I’m sleeping here and it’s just kind of made me wonder about it.’ And I keep seeing a nurse in old-fashioned uniform and I’m wondering if she might be a real person.

  ‘The history of the hospital.’ He didn’t sound like he believed a word I was saying. He probably thought I wanted my laptop to watch kitten videos and I was just too embarrassed to admit it.

  ‘I’m so tired of trying to remember things about my own life I thought that if I concentrated on something else, maybe things would just pop back into place. You said I should relax and I’ve been trying but I can’t relax just lying around doing nothing. I know that sounds counter-intuitive—’