by Paula Daly
‘Get back!’ I screamed helplessly. ‘George, get back!’
He was too young, of course. He didn’t yet know. He didn’t know that pavements were dangerous places. That sometimes cars mounted pavements when the driver was drunk. Or old. Or having a stroke. Or young and stupid and reckless. Or heartbroken and attempting to drive through the tears.
He didn’t know that, and so he remained unaware of the Range Rover until it flew past me and I was close enough to see his face just begin to flicker with worry. A small frown appeared as he looked from his mother running to the approaching car.
If I’d been next to him, I would have thrown him out of harm’s way. But I wasn’t. And as the small Fiat reversed out of the driveway diagonally opposite, its driver blissfully unaware – loud music audible through the sunroof, the jaunty uke of George Formby – the Range Rover had to swerve to avoid his bumper.
There was the thin sound of brakes, tyres skidding and crunching metal.
And glass. There was so much glass.
Then silence. No sound at all. Just me, alone, in the silence.
37
HERE IS AN odd fact: There are more road deaths in rural areas than on city streets. The reason? The greater distances from the nearest hospital.
It can take over an hour to get to the nearest A&E department from Hawkshead, and that’s not including the time it takes for the emergency services to reach the casualty in the first place.
Which is why we rely on the charity-funded air ambulance. And why, at that moment, my son was being transported, along with the driver that hit him, in the Great North Air Ambulance, as I followed in the car.
Later, I would remember nothing of that journey to Furness General Hospital. Which route I took, whether the Friday-afternoon traffic was abysmal, if I bought a ticket at the hospital car park. Later, I would have trouble recollecting anything of that day. Snippets would return in the coming months, fleeting memories that I would try to grasp hold of, but mostly, all I remember thinking was:
If only I’d run faster along the street. If only I’d left the hotel a moment earlier. If only I’d never agreed to Scott Elias’s proposal in the first place.
This is what the brain does. It looks for a way out rather than face the appalling truth. It searches out rabbit holes it may have missed. Finds weak spots in reality. It goes back over events as though they are happening for the first time, as though it may actually alter the course of those events.
Your conscious mind tells it to stop. This is pointless, it says. But it’s unstoppable.
If only I’d transferred money for Winston’s train fare, he would have made it back in time. George would have been with him, safely in Outgate, instead of with Celia and Dennis. If only we hadn’t split up in the first place, George would still have his own dog and he wouldn’t have been walking Foxy. If only I’d married someone more reliable. If only…
‘Mrs Toovey?’
I stood.
‘Come with me,’ the nurse said. She was in ICU whites, a tiny-framed woman you could bet could lift twice her own body weight. They’re like that in ICU.
‘Is he alive?’ I asked.
‘Come with me, we can talk through here. You’re a physio, right?’
‘Is he alive?’ I repeated, rooted to the spot.
‘He’s alive.’
‘Conscious?’
She dropped her gaze. ‘Not yet. He’s just being transferred from Emergency through to the unit.’
‘What else? What other injuries?’ I asked.
I barked my words at her, but she was unoffended. She held my gaze and ticked off George’s problems on her fingers.
‘Double pneumothorax,’ she said. ‘Fractured tib and fib on the right – those are compound fractures. Irrigation and debridement already done, and the fractures have been stabilized. Skin loss; he’ll probably need a graft. We may need to CT his tummy later, but we had to get the drains into his lungs first. No sign of an abdominal bleed, though. BP’s okay for now. Distal pulses all okay below the leg fracture.’
‘The loss of consciousness? A head injury?’
‘We don’t know. No evidence of trauma to the head, but we don’t know. You know how it is at this stage. Is there anyone with you? Anyone you’d like to accompany you?’
‘My sister’s on her way. His father is stuck in Cornwall. I can’t get hold of him. My parents are coming, but it will take them a couple of hours to get here.’
She nodded and asked for my sister’s name. Said she’d leave word at Admissions that she should be accompanied through to ICU on arrival. Petra was out of her mind. She couldn’t speak, let alone drive. And Vince had been drinking, so…
The nurse said, ‘The lady who was brought in with him in the air ambulance? The driver? Is she—’
‘We’re not related,’ I said coldly.
‘Oh.’
‘Is she alive?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘She’s conscious. I got the impression she knew your son.’
‘She drove over my son,’ I said.
She nodded. ‘She’s very upset.’
‘I suppose she would be,’ I said. ‘Can I see him now?’
She turned, and I followed her. Her steps were quick across the floor and when we reached ICU she punched in a six-digit code on the keypad. Nothing happened, and she sighed. ‘I keep using the old code,’ she explained. She tried again and, before we entered, she turned to me. ‘Do I need to tell you he won’t look like he usually does?’
I shook my head.
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Let’s go.’
There were six beds. Three were occupied. Nadine in one, George in the next one along and another patient opposite. He was a young guy with a tracheotomy tube in his throat, meaning he’d been here a while. I was later told he’d developed Guillain-Barré syndrome, his breathing muscles were paralysed and he had been in the ICU for five weeks. His mother would visit and weep gently for an hour before leaving.
The nurse explained that George may be transferred to a paediatric ICU at another hospital, as long as he was stable enough to move. For now, though, he would stay here. With Nadine.
I didn’t look at her. I had to walk past her bed. I was aware of movement, an arm being raised, a gurgling noise. She gave a low, agonizing kind of groan, like an animal trapped in a snare.
I kept my eyes in front and went to George. I knelt by the side of his bed and kissed his hand. He was stripped down to his underpants. His tiny, broken body was smeared with bits of dried blood, and the two chest drains were monstrous, snaking from between his ribs. ‘I’m here, baby,’ I whispered.
Instinctively, I checked the monitors. His oxygen saturation was a little low. I repositioned the pulse ox on his index finger and exhaled as the numbers climbed steadily.
There was a tent over his right leg. A compound fracture is an open fracture, meaning the skin had been torn off. An external fixator was fitted around his leg, but couple that with skin grafts and we were looking at about a year for recovery.
I twisted around to Nadine. Her eyes went wide when she saw my face, and she began shaking her head, trying to convey something important to me. Her expression was urgent and desperate. I turned away.
I got to my feet and drew the curtain across, cutting her off. I was aware of her crying without sound.
She had come looking for me. She had driven through Hawkshead looking for my house. And now we were here.
I kissed George’s hand again and whispered that I loved him. Over and over, I told him he was okay, that he would wake up soon and he would be okay. I told him not to be scared. I was here. I wouldn’t leave him alone.
He was so beautiful. His skin so smooth. There was a little dried blood around his ear. I asked if I could dab it away, and a nurse brought me a wad of cotton wool and a metal kidney dish half filled with tepid water. George didn’t stir. The intubation tube was tied in place with a length of fabric and it pulled downwards on his mouth, making him
appear to grimace. I asked if they would adjust it slightly, and they did. The nursing staff tended to him like he was their own child. And it was this, watching the tenderness and care they bestowed upon him, that would cause me to unravel.
I’d held it together okay until then.
38
NADINE REMAINED IN intensive care for twenty-four hours before being moved to the High-dependency Unit. She had a chest injury. In the time she was in ICU, Scott didn’t visit. Her children did, and I heard their hushed voices behind the curtain. By then, word had spread amongst the staff of the unit and they were aware of ‘our situation’. They dealt with us in a detached, professional way, granting my request that the barrier be kept between us – which I knew from my time in training on ICU was not strictly allowed. It wasn’t until Nadine had moved wards that a gossipy, camp male nurse by the name of Kyle made reference to the curtain, saying, ‘I think we can do away with the Wall of Jericho now. Don’t you?’
My parents came and went. Winston came and went. He came back with provisions and stayed.
The police arrived, and that was all quite straightforward. There were witnesses to say Nadine had lost control when the old guy opposite reversed into her path. Her blood alcohol level was tested on admission and she was found to be under the limit – although she had been drinking; she admitted that. She also told them she had just found out that her husband had been having an affair, so her responses may have been affected. She told them she was very sorry.
We were all very sorry.
Petra came, and stayed. And cried. And cried some more. She sat sniffling at George’s side for three full days, begging him to wake up, wringing her hands. Occasionally, she would shoot me a look and I would see the muscles on either side of her throat grow taut.
‘Say it,’ I said eventually, after a few more hours of this.
‘Say what?’ she asked.
‘Say what it is you want to say.’
She went back to smoothing the hair away from George’s forehead. ‘I have nothing to say.’
‘You think I caused this.’
And she turned to me sharply. ‘I would never say that.’
‘You don’t have to, Petra.’
She put her hand to her mouth to stifle the beginnings of another sob. Then she screwed her eyes up tight and took one deep inhalation, before grabbing hold of the metal frame of the bed for stability. ‘I am not blaming you,’ she said. Her words were measured, steady, but like vinegar in her mouth.
‘I’m blaming me,’ I told her, and I looked at her straight. ‘I caused this. There. It’s said. Now you don’t have to.’
‘Don’t be so flippant,’ she flared.
‘I’m not being flippant. Of course this is my fault! Of course it is! I know that. But I don’t want you here with all that anxiety, all that repressed bloody condemnation inside of you. Not while you’re hovering above my unconscious son, anyhow.’
‘Your son,’ she said tonelessly.
‘Yes, my son. For better or worse, Petra, I am his mother. Now you either say all that shit you want to say, or else you let it go. Because I can’t stand it like this.’
She stepped away from George. She walked to the end of the bed and gestured with her finger for me to follow.
Her face was hard. ‘You are a stupid, reckless woman who I am ashamed to know,’ she said. ‘Who I am ashamed to be associated with, never mind related to.’
‘Go on.’
‘Again, you proved that you take the easy way out. Always the easy way out with you. You never think what you do will hurt other people. You never think of the consequences.’
She was holding back somewhat. Her choice of words was almost business-like, I suppose out of respect for our surroundings.
She shook her head as she spoke. ‘I can’t believe you were sleeping with him. I can’t believe you had an affair—’
‘It wasn’t an affair.’
‘I can’t believe you had an affair with my friend’s husband. Of all the things.’ Her eyes brimmed with tears. She batted the air in front of her as though this might send them back. ‘You are a disgrace, Roz, and you have embarrassed me deeply. I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to—’
George opened his eyes.
He was looking at us with a puzzled expression. He tried to say something, and couldn’t understand why the words were not coming out as they should.
Trying to lift his hand to his mouth, he was aware there was something alien there. He frowned when he made contact with the intubation tube.
I rushed to him. ‘Don’t try to talk, sweetheart,’ I said. ‘Are you okay?’ and he nodded.
He wasn’t scared. He just looked pleased to see me, as he would when waking as a baby. He would open his eyes to see me standing next to the cot and give a big, contented, sleepy smile. As though to say, You’ve been here the whole time?
‘George, do know where you are?’ Petra demanded, her voice shaking. ‘Do you remember anything?’ I rolled my eyes at her and told her to give him a minute to get his bearings. Her face fell.
George blinked, and you could see him trying to figure out what was going on. He glanced down and tilted his head upon seeing the fixator around his leg.
I whispered to Petra, ‘Tell the nursing staff he’s awake,’ and she nodded, before scurrying off.
I crouched by his side George. ‘You’re in hospital. That tube in your mouth is to help you breathe. See?’ And I followed the tube with my finger, slowly, to where it was attached to the ventilator. ‘This thing breathes for you. Can you hear it?’ George smiled, and I said, ‘I know. Cool, eh?’ He watched for a moment and then returned his gaze to me. ‘You’ve hurt your leg pretty bad. That’s what all that metal is. It’s to hold the break together. Does it hurt?’
He stared at his leg, as though trying to figure out if it was painful or not. Then he looked back at me and communicated it didn’t. ‘They’ve given you medicine for that,’ I said, ‘to take away the soreness.’
I told him I was glad he was awake. Told him I’d been a bit lonely without being able to chat to him. I told him his dad would be along later but had had to nip home to fetch some more bits and pieces I needed. ‘He’ll be back soon,’ I said. George was pretty doped and passive, and I hoped he’d stay that way.
‘Well, hello there!’ came a voice from my left. Kyle, the nurse, stood at the end of the bed, all smiles, and told George he was way more handsome now that he had his eyes open. George went sheepish.
‘Can he come off the ventilator?’ I asked, and Kyle said yes, now that he was conscious, though it was likely he’d be on oxygen until the chest drains came out. I tousled his hair and told George again I was glad he was back, and that’s when I saw his face change.
‘You okay?’ I asked.
He stared at me, wild-eyed and fearful, before making an attempt to move.
‘What is it?’ I said. ‘George, you’ve got to stay still. What is it? Are you hurting somewhere?’
Petra was trying to pacify him, saying, ‘It’s okay, it’s okay,’ over and over but George went rigid in the bed. My first thought was the head injury. His brain was swelling and we were seeing the beginnings of a fit. I turned to the nurse, but he didn’t seem unduly worried. ‘Are you remembering what happened, George?’ he said softly, and George nodded repeatedly, growing more and more afraid by the second.
I moved in closer. ‘You had an accident,’ I said.
No response.
‘George, you were injured by a car.’
And he shook his head as though he couldn’t remember that. He seemed in equal parts frustrated and terrified.
Then he tried to speak.
Foxy.
39
I HAD SIX missed calls from DS Aspinall, along with two text messages asking me to make contact with her as soon as possible. I don’t use voicemail. Don’t know how. You may as well write your message on a scrap of paper and throw it in the lake.
Winston had ret
urned to the hospital, and I had left him and Petra alone with George, while I stood in the corridor and called Celia to find out the latest on Foxy.
As far as I knew, the dog was fine. I couldn’t remember seeing her crushed or injured immediately after the accident, but then, I couldn’t remember seeing her at all.
Pacifying George with this was not enough. He couldn’t settle, quickly becoming distressed and tearful, to the extent that the registrar pointed out that might it just be easier to ‘Call the dog’s owner? Check the dog is actually okay?’
The corridor was busy. Two young male medics walked towards me, fresh -aced and full of enthusiasm. There is an unwritten rule inside the hospital whereby medics wear their stethoscopes around their necks, on display, but everyone else who requires a stethoscope – respiratory-care physiotherapists, nurses, and so on – must keep theirs inside their pockets. Just so everyone is clear where they stand in the whole scheme of things. The medics stopped conversing as they passed, smiled gravely, an acknowledgement of my position right next to the ICU. Which was considerate, I thought.
Celia picked up on the third ring.
‘Celia?’
‘Roz! What are you doing calling? How is he? Is he all right? Please God, let him be all right. How is his leg? Did they manage to save his leg?’
‘You were there?’ I asked her, a little stunned. I couldn’t remember.
‘Yes, we were there. How is he? How is George? Good Lord, Roz, tell me.’
‘He’s okay. The leg will be okay, we hope. It’s pretty smashed up. He’s just come round and … Celia? … Well, he’s asking about Foxy.’
‘Oh, she’s fine.’
‘Is she really?’
‘She tore her cruciate ligament in her knee whilst frantically trying to run home faster than she’s run in years, but don’t tell George that. He’ll only worry. She’s fine, Roz. Honestly.’
I exhaled.
I brought Celia up to speed and was about to get in touch with the detective and lay it on really thick about George, as it was apparent from her messages that she didn’t know about the accident – do the police not talk to one another? – when I saw Henry Peachey coming from the other direction. He had a bunch of flowers in one hand and a thick paperback in the other. He must have been on his way to visit Nadine.