She goes out of the bedroom and shuts the door and it’s not fair. He did hit me and it hurted. Outside someone is shouting and it’s angry shouting and I think maybe the person who is shouting didn’t get to read their story too or maybe they also got bashed on their head. Then there’s more angry shouting and more and louder and I don’t like it. It’s scary. I want Mummy.
I get out of bed and open the bedroom door. Mummy spins round and says, ‘Bed, Jesika, please. I’ll come and see you in a minute.’
I go back into the bedroom and Mummy pulls the door shut again but I don’t go back to bed cos there’s still people shouting outside. I kneel down at the door and peep through the hole and I can see Mummy walking up and down and rubbing Toby’s back and whispering words in his ear and she walks one way and the other way again and again and after a long-a-long time Toby stops crying. That’s good. Now Mummy will come and put him in bed and I can have a cuddle.
Cept Mummy doesn’t come back to the bedroom. She walks over to the sofa, with Toby still cuddled on her front, and she sits down and I can only see the top of her head now. What is she doing? Why isn’t she coming to cuddle me? I wait and wait for a long-a-long time but Mummy stays on the sofa not even moving and I can’t sit still on the floor cos my shoulders and my back and my front and all over me won’t stop shivering.
I creep back into bed and pull the covers over my head to hide from the shouting. It’s not so cold under the covers. I curl up small, like a caterpillar in a cocoon. My breath is warm on my hands. I close my eyes cos that’s what caterpillars do while they wait to change into butterflies, but I’m not going to sleep. I’m going to stay awake til Mummy comes to cuddle me.
11
EYES OPEN.
Hurty light.
Hurty light and noisy.
Squeeze eyes shut.
Is it morning? Listen.
Zooming cars, thump-da-thump music, shouting, talking …
Not Mummy talking.
Eyes open again. Hurty bright!
Rub eyes, rub, rub. Rub again. Not so hurty.
The bedroom door’s open and light. That’s where light is.
Things moving – big and dark.
Monsters?
Mummy!
I roll over for a cuddle with Mummy, but she’s not there.
Sit up. Look.
Mummy’s not in bed.
Toby’s not in his cot.
‘I didn’t know what else to do!’ Mummy’s voice!
Mummy!
I push back the covers and slide off the bed and walk to the bedroom door, still rubbing the hurty out of my eyes. Mummy is standing next to the sofa and a big, green man is standing next to her and he has his hand on her shoulder.
He’s hurting her!
He’s hurting my Mummy! Stop him, Mummy! Use your Big Voice!
Mummy doesn’t. She twists her face away and the Green Man is still holding her shoulder. I remember Next-Door Lady shouted. Next-Door Lady shouted loud. I run and I run and I shout, ‘STOP IT! YOU LEAVE MY MUMMY ALONE!’ and I bash into the Green Man’s leg and he steps backwards away from Mummy and in the gap atween I see another person and it’s a lady and she’s all green too and she’s kneeling down in front of the sofa and Toby’s lying on it and she’s … SHE’S HURTING TOBY!
‘Jesika! Stop!’
My feet lift up and I’m wrapped up in Mummy’s cuddle and she’s pressing my face into her chest so I can’t see anything and I fight and fight cos the Green Lady’s hurting Toby. She’s holding something on his mouth so he can’t breathe and—
Mummy sits down with me on her knee and I’m twisting to see Toby but Mummy puts her hand on my cheek so I can’t see and says, ‘Jesika! Stop!’ and her voice is scary and her eyes are wet. My belly whooshes fast like I’m on a roundabout.
Mummy says, ‘Toby’s very poorly. He has to go to hospital and these people are helping.’
I look at the Green Man and he’s bending over the Green Lady and she’s saying something to him quiet and spiky and I say, ‘Are they ambulance people?’
Mummy says, ‘Yes, they are.’
The Green Man stands up and says, ‘Time to go. Are there things you need to bring for your daughter?’
Mummy stands up, putting me back on my feet, and she pushes her hands into her hair and looks all round the room and she says, ‘I don’t know, I don’t know, I can’t think,’ and her face is scary and my belly whooshes round and round.
The Green Man says, ‘Something warm to go over her pyjamas. It’s cold out,’ and I say, ‘My dressing gown!’ and I run into the bedroom and pull it from the hook and put it on and run back to the living room and Mummy’s already holding my slippers and she gives them to me and the Green Man says, ‘And a change of clothes,’ and Mummy picks up my preschool bag that always has extra clothes in it and then she grabs her handbag and the Green Man says, ‘All set?’ and Mummy says, ‘I think so.’ Her face is still scary and I say, ‘What are we doing, Mummy?’ and my voice is all shaky and that’s cos my whole body is all shaky and that’s cos it’s shivery-cold. Mummy doesn’t say what we’re doing and she doesn’t cuddle me and she doesn’t say it’s OK and I’m scared. Then the Green Man looks straight at me and he winks and my belly whooshes slow and stops, cos winking is happy and smiley and good. Mummy holds my hand and squeezes it tight.
The Green Lady is lifting Toby and the Green Man is helping her and they’re moving slow and slow. I try to peek at Toby’s face but I can’t see it proply cos the Green Lady is big like a giant and all I can see are Toby’s legs dangling over her arms and his legs are bare cos he doesn’t have his babygrow on. He’ll get cold outside, won’t he? Then the Green Lady and the Green Man go out of our door and me and Mummy follow and we’re outside the door and Mummy has to bang the door five times afore it shuts and she says, ‘Come on, come on!’ and it makes her cough and cough and the Green Man and the Green Lady carrying Toby have disappeared down the stairs and me and Mummy have to hurry to catch up but there’s a horrid eggy-yucky smell and I know what it is and I look over to Next-Door Lady’s door and she’s staring right at me and then Mummy says, ‘Hurry up, Jesika,’ and Next-Door Lady shuts her door fast and Mummy picks me up and she zooms me down the stairs and it’s like flying.
Outside there’s a light whizzing about and it’s blue and hurty in my eyes and it’s a real-life ambulance flashing its lights but not making the siren sound. The back doors are open and I think Toby and the Green Man and the Green Lady must be inside cos I can’t see them but we’re stuck on the steps cos there’s some big boys in our way and they’re shouting noisy things and laughing and pushing each other and bumping against the ambulance and I can smell yummy food and it remembers me that we’ve not had breakfast and I look at Mummy and say, ‘Do hopsipals do breakfast?’
Mummy doesn’t say. She holds my hand tight and tight and more tight and she’s staring past me and then the Green Lady is there and she’s saying shouty things and making the big boys go away and then she says, ‘Come on, lovies,’ and her voice is soft, not shouty, and she takes us to the back of the ambulance and I’ve never been inside an ambulance in my whole life and it’s a big step up so Mummy has to lift me and, oh, strange things! Machines and cupboards and wires and things and I don’t know what any of them are cept the seats and the bed. Toby! He’s on the bed on the Green Man’s knee and then the Green Man stands and now Mummy’s on the bed and Toby’s on her knee and the Green Lady is bending over him and what is that on his face? It’s like a pot, pressed onto his nose and his mouth, and it’s like a window pot cos I can still see his mouth and his nose, but it’s not a glass window cos it’s not shiny like glass, and it’s got a metal thing stuck to it that Mummy has to hold with the hand that isn’t holding Toby and I don’t know what any of it is but I think it might be making Toby sleepy cos he keeps opening and shutting his eyes slow as slow and …
Oh! The Green Man has lifted me right up and now I’m on the seat next to the bed and
he pulls a strap tight on my chest and my belly. I can’t see Toby! Toby? I twist and twist and the Green Man pushes his hand on my shoulder but not hard and he says, ‘Sit back while I get your seatbelt on, Jesika.’ I sit back and he says, ‘Your little brother’s doing just fine. We’ll soon get him properly looked at.’
I say, ‘What’s that on his face?’
The Green Man stands up and says, ‘It’s a special breathing mask that helps your little brother to breathe more easily.’ He turns to the Green Lady and says, ‘All set?’ and she nods and the Green Man goes away somewhere I can’t see and the Green Lady sits back on another chair and pulls her strap on and then the ambulance is moving and I say, ‘Where’s the Green Man gone?’ The Green Lady laughs and says, ‘You mean Max? He’s driving the ambulance!’
The ambulance zooms fast and fast, siren on then siren off then siren on and the Green Lady says that’s cos you’re not allowed the siren on at night-time cept when there’s something in your way cos it’s very noisy and night-time is apposed to be quiet and Mummy does a strange laugh that’s not a happy laugh and says, ‘It’s never quiet where we live,’ and we keep zooming with sirens on-off-on-off for a long-a-long time til my head and my eyes feel so so heavy …
I’m standing in the garden outside Tilly’s yellow house and I’m knocking on the red door, cept when I knock it turns green and it’s not Tilly at the door, it’s Paige and Lorna and they tell me to come in and we go into the kitchen and Paige keeps biting my shoulder and she won’t stop …
Eyes open.
The Green Man is shaking my shoulder and smiling at me and he says, ‘Hello, Jesika, we’re here now.’ Everything’s still and quiet. The Green Lady opens the back door and there’s cold and noise and lights. The Green Man helps me to take my straps off but something’s got stuck and he says, ‘Blasted thing needs fixing. I keep telling them,’ and the Green Lady is holding Toby and Mummy is off the bed and she’s got her handbag and my preschool bag and she climbs down out of the ambulance. Where’s Mummy gone? Where is she? The Green Lady climbs down too with Toby in her arms and now they’ve disappeared too! Where are they? I try to twist and look around the Green Man but he’s too big. Come back, Mummy! The Green Man says, ‘Don’t worry, Jesika, we’re right behind them.’ And then the strap pops off and the Green Man says, ‘At last!’ and he pulls the strap off and stands up and I run for the door and I shout, ‘Wait for me, Mummy!’ and then I stop cos right out of the back door is another ambulance and there’s a Green Lady driving it and it’s Emma and she’s staring right at me. I say, ‘I didn’t know …’ Then my feet fly right off the floor and the Green Man is carrying me and he jumps out of the back of the ambulance and he walks fast and fast and I’m bumping up and down and I look ahind to see Emma again but I can’t see her any more.
We get to magic doors like the ones on all the shops that slide away when you stand in front of them and I think the Green Man is going to crash right into them but they open just in time and there’s a room that stretches a long-a-long way in front of us. I say, ‘Ugh, smelly!’ cos it smells like toilets and lemons and there’s doors and doors and doors and I can’t see Mummy or the Green Lady. Are they ahind one of the doors? How do we know which door to choose?
I say, ‘Which door is it?’ and the Green Man says, ‘Just up here,’ so maybe he knows which door even though they all look the same as each other and there’s so many!
I count the doors that whizz past and the Green Man’s feet go squeak, squeak, squeak on the shiny floor and I say, ‘You need to buy a new pair of shoes.’
He laughs and says, ‘Why’s that?’ So I tell him about his squeaky feet and I say, ‘And that means your shoes must be broken.’
The Green Man laughs even more loud which is strange cos I’m not telling a joke. He really does need to fix his shoes.
We stop going so fast and get to a door and the Green Man turns round and pushes it open with his back and we’re in a big, noisy room with people rushing and I look and look but I can’t see Mummy or Toby anywhere. I can see people lying on beds and there’s a man right next to us and he’s got bleeding on his head and there’s people calling things out and beeping noises and someone’s crying and the floor is sparkly like those pebbles in the touching boxes at preschool and there’s blue and yellow swirly curtains all around us that swish about when we walk past them.
Then I spot something a bit different and I say, ‘I know where Mummy and Toby are!’ and I don’t have time to say why cos the Green Man has made giant steps right up to the teddy bear curtains and there’s Mummy right aside them and I knew she’d take Toby here cos Toby likes teddy bears and teddy bears aren’t for grown-ups, they’re for children, and now we’re there I can see pictures all over the walls and they’re just for children too. There’s a big oshun with turtles and rainbow fish and an octopus and above that a jungle with tigers and lions and elephants – and there’s even parrots flying across the ceiling!
Mummy’s talking to a Blue Lady and I can’t see Toby and I say to the Green Man, ‘Put me down, put me down!’ and he does and I run to Mummy and fling my arms around her legs and squeeze and squeeze and she picks me up and holds me so very tight and I still can’t see Toby but I can see machines and wires and a writing board like preschool that a man is scribbling squiggles on, and there’s other people and they’re all different colours and some don’t have a colour and there’s the Green Lady and she’s talking and everyone’s standing around something but I can’t see what it is but I think it must be Toby cos they’re saying Toby’s name. I wriggle til Mummy puts me down. The Blue Lady is still talking to her and I squeeze through all the people and it’s a bed they’re all standing round and now I can see Toby and he looks all cold cos he only has his nappy on and a man is sticking a huge metal stick into the back of his hand and it looks so hurty but Toby can’t tell him to stop cos he’s still got the breathing pot on his face so I shout, ‘Stop it! You’re hurting Toby!’
A lady turns and looks down at me and she shouts, ‘Get the child out of here NOW!’ And she looks so cross and I jump backwards from her shouty voice and I bump on my bottom on the floor and then Mummy folds her arms around me and lifts me up and the Blue Lady puts her arm around Mummy and we’re walking away from the teddy bear curtains and she’s saying things and Mummy’s saying things but I don’t know what they’re saying cos I’m looking back at the teddy bear curtains and I can see Toby in a gap atween all the people and he’s just lying there and people are putting hands on him and there’s wires and machines and the breathing pot and he’s not crying and he should be crying cos that’s what Toby does when something’s wrong and there’s got to be something wrong cos we came in an ambulance and all these people are putting things on him, so why is Toby not crying?
Mummy puts me down and squeezes my hands in atween hers and that makes me look at her and her eyes are all wet and she says, ‘I need you to be a very brave girl, Jesika. Can you do that for me?’
Mummy tells me I’m brave when I hurt myself and I don’t cry. Am I going to get hurt now? Does she want me to not cry? I try to look over her shoulder to where Toby is but I can’t see him. I need Mummy to lift me up again and I try to hold out my arms but Mummy squeezes my hands more tight and I say, ‘Hold me up, Mummy,’ but Mummy shakes her head and says, ‘Listen to me, darling,’ and she lets go of my hands and puts both her hands on my cheeks and she says, ‘Are you listening?’
I nod my head.
Mummy says, ‘A lady is going to take you into a waiting room and look after you, just for a little while so I can talk to the doctors about Toby.’
I don’t want to go with anyone else. I shake my head and I reach out to Mummy but she’s still holding my cheeks with her hands and she’s stroking her thumbs round and round and she says, ‘I need you to be brave, remember?’
The Blue Lady steps forwards and she says, ‘Jesika, this is Paulina, and it’ll be her job to keep you safe while your Mummy is looking af
ter your little brother.’
I look and there’s a new lady and she’s all violent like the violent on Stella’s rainbow nails and Mummy says, ‘Toby needs me and I need you to go with Paulina. I promise I’ll come and see you very soon.’
Mummy lets go of my cheeks and I push myself right into Mummy’s chest and wrap my arms tight as tight so she can’t make me go but she gently undoes my arms and moves me backwards and she says, ‘I won’t be long, I promise,’ and she stands up and the Violent Lady is holding out her hand to me and Mummy’s lips are pressed tight and she nods and she whispers, ‘Go on, poppet,’ and then the Blue Lady takes her back over to where Toby is and the Violent Lady’s hand feels warm and crinkly around mine.
She says, ‘I’ll show you some toys, OK?’ and she doesn’t try to pull me, she waits and she smiles and I look back at Mummy and Mummy’s not looking cos she’s talking to the cross lady that shouted.
I go back through the noisy-rushy room holding the Violent Lady’s hand and out into the long, stretchy room, and when the door thuds shut it’s so so quiet. Then the noise goes loud again cos the door opens and it’s the Green Man and he crouches down in front of me and says, ‘I almost forgot to give you this, Jesika. It’s specially for you for being such a brave girl,’ and he gives me a teddy in a plastic bag and the teddy is wearing green just like the Green Man and I say, ‘He’s just like you,’ and the Green Man says, ‘He’s a special Para-Ted. I don’t give him out to anyone, you know, just the really brave boys and girls.’
I want to tell him that green’s my fayvrit colour and I want to say thank you very much and I want to ask the Green Man what he’s called and I want to ask him if he can stay with me too cos I know he’s kind and nice but my mouth is stuck and there’s a hurty-pain right at the back where my food goes and afore I can make my mouth work, he’s standing up and he squeezes my shoulder and says, ‘You keep being brave for your Mummy and your brother, little lady,’ and then he’s walking back through the noisy door and the door shuts all the noise away again. Now it’s just me and Para-Ted and the Violent Lady.
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