by Kate Hardy
‘You’re an amazing woman, Anna Maskell,’ he said. ‘It’s impressive that you can have such a positive attitude towards something so painful and difficult.’
She shrugged. ‘It isn’t all me. I had counselling, and my counsellor showed me that all the “why me” pity-party stuff isn’t at all helpful. She taught me to spin it round and think, “someone has to have this happen to them, so why not me?”’
Jamie didn’t have an answer to that. He’d done the ‘why me’ himself so many times. And he’d refused counselling, despite being offered it. Maybe that had been a mistake. Maybe that was something he needed to do to move on. Or maybe not—because Anna was really helping him see a different side to things.
‘So are you on any treatment?’ he asked. Then he grimaced. ‘Sorry. That’s intrusive. Ignore it. I was being nosy and rude. You don’t have to answer.’
‘No, I’m fine talking about it, and actually that’s one of the reasons I don’t hide it away. I’m not the only woman in the world who’s gone through a super-early menopause, and maybe I can pay things forward a bit and help someone who’s struggling to deal with a similar situation, the way other people have helped me. Obviously at thirty-four I’m a couple of decades younger than most women with the menopause.’ She smiled at him. ‘So, yes, I’m having treatment. I’m on hormone replacement therapy to help keep up my bone density and avoid the risks of cardiovascular disease.’
‘But doesn’t HRT...?’ He stopped.
‘Put me at higher risk of breast cancer? No, actually, because of my age. It’s fine. I need to be careful with my calcium intake, which is why I drink hot chocolate rather than tea and I take my coffee very milky, and I do a five-kilometre run twice a week because it’s good weight-bearing exercise and helps with bone density. I have a DEXA scan every year to keep an eye on my bone density. So, as far as I’m concerned, everyone’s looking after me. And I’m not letting my premature menopause or my infertility define me.’
‘You’re the sort of person who makes lemonade when life gives you lemons.’
‘No—I make lemon drizzle cake and lemon meringue pie, actually. They’re much nicer and slightly better for my teeth,’ she said with a grin, making him laugh.
Even though she made him feel so light of spirit, at the same time Jamie felt guilty. Anna had been through a lot and she’d pushed herself to move on, whereas he was still wallowing in what had happened to him.
Then again, she was helping him move on now. Maybe he should tell her about Hestia and Giselle, explain why he found Christmas so hard. He opened his mouth to start that conversation, but the words stuck in his throat and refused to come out.
‘So, anyway, now you know that you’re totally safe with me,’ she said. ‘We can be friends.’
‘Friends,’ he agreed.
‘And I hope you’ll continue our Christmas bargain, because I really do want you as our ward’s Father Christmas.’
‘OK,’ he said. ‘What do you suggest next?’
‘Maybe we could try a Christmas movie,’ she said.
‘That’s fine. When?’
He was half expecting her to suggest watching a DVD at either his place or hers, but then she said, ‘There’s a special screening at the Alexandra Palace theatre on Monday night. First come, first served for seating, so if we get there early enough we’ll get a decent seat. We could maybe go and get a pizza somewhere first.’
‘Sounds good,’ he said. ‘OK. Let me buy the tickets.’
‘How about I buy the tickets and you buy the pizza?’ she suggested.
‘That works for me,’ he said. ‘Thank you. Monday night it is. And it’ll be a good way to decompress after Lily’s surgery. I meant what I said earlier, by the way. If you want to observe any part of the operation, you’re very welcome—as is anyone on our team who might find it useful.’
‘I might just take you up on that.’
Weird how her sea-green eyes made his heart skip a beat. But, after what she’d just told him, Jamie knew how inappropriate the reaction was. Anna had made it very clear that she wasn’t interested in anything more than friendship. So he’d stuff the feelings back inside rather than let them out to bloom.
CHAPTER SIX
ON MONDAY MORNING Jamie met Lily Brown outside the operating theatre.
‘All ready?’ he asked.
‘I think so.’ She gave him a nervous smile.
‘Good.’ He smiled at her; he noticed that her mother looked just as nervous, and patted Heather’s arm. ‘She’ll be fine. I’m going to take my time over this so I get it right and Lily gets the best possible outcome.’
Heather nodded. ‘I know. I just...’
He knew what she wasn’t saying. ‘Of course you’re going to worry. You’re her mum. Have you got someone who can wait with you during the op?’
‘My friend’s coming as soon as she’s dropped her daughter off at school,’ Heather said.
‘Great. You can stay with Lily while she’s having the anaesthetic, until she goes to sleep, but then I’m afraid we’ll have to send you out for a cup of tea.’ He smiled at her again. ‘I’m going to go and scrub in—which means washing my hands super-thoroughly—and I’ll see you on the other side, OK?’ He turned to Lily. ‘And I’ll see you in Theatre, Miss Brown.’
The operating theatre was just how he liked it: quiet, with a Bach piano piece playing softly. He’d already managed to establish a good working relationship with his team, and thankfully they were happy with his choice of music to operate to.
‘Good morning, everyone. I’ll just run through what we’re doing this morning and make sure everyone’s happy with their roles,’ he said.
Once that was done, he settled down to make the first incision and to make a huge difference to Lily Brown’s spinal column.
* * *
Anna knew that Lily’s operation was complex and would take at least four hours. She managed to get enough time to go and observe the operation during her lunch break, and saw for herself that despite the gentle teasing of her sister Jamie Thurston was really good with his hands.
He was also really nice with the rest of the team, just like Nalini was, treating everyone as a valued colleague; it was the total opposite of the arrogant surgeons who had been around when Anna had been a student. They’d viewed themselves as superior beings and considered any questions to be a personal attack on their abilities. She noticed that Jamie explained exactly what he was doing as he went along and why he’d chosen to use one particular method over another, and he was clearly happy to use any questions as a teaching point.
She really hoped that he’d agree to stay at Muswell Hill Memorial Hospital for a bit longer than his scheduled three months and cover the rest of Nalini’s maternity leave, because he was a real asset to the team. And also, if she was honest with herself, because she liked him being around—even though she knew it was ridiculous and there was absolutely no possibility of a relationship between them. She was doing just fine on her own, and Jamie clearly wasn’t ready to move on from whatever had broken his heart.
She lingered in Theatre for as long as she could, enjoying watching the procedure, then headed back to her clinic.
At the end of the day, she popped into the High Dependency Unit to see Lily. ‘How are you doing?’ she asked.
‘OK.’ But Lily’s lower lip was wobbly, she noticed.
‘I brought you something,’ she said, and handed over a tube of lip salve. ‘Just in case you forgot yours or you might like a different flavour for a change. This one’s cocoa butter and it’s really nice.’
‘That’s so kind of you.’ Lily started to cry and scrubbed the tears away with the back of her hand. ‘Sorry. I don’t know why I’m crying. I should be happy because my back is going to be better and that means they’re going to stop calling me Quasimodo at school.’
‘You, honey,
are an Esmeralda if ever I saw one, not Quasimodo,’ Anna said, sitting on the side of her bed and exchanging a glance with Heather that told her Lily’s mother had had no idea how bad the teasing had been and was horrified to learn what had been said to her daughter. ‘You’ve been worrying about the operation and now it’s all over and you’re filled with relief, so that’s probably why you’re feeling a bit weepy—plus sometimes people react like that to the anaesthetic. It’s absolutely fine and it’s perfectly normal, so you don’t need to apologise. The good news is that after a night’s sleep you’ll feel an awful lot better.’
Lily didn’t look convinced, and Anna hated to think how terrible the poor girl had been feeling at school. But maybe there was something she could do to help. ‘Actually, there are a lot of really kick-ass people with scoliosis. You know Usain Bolt?’
‘No way,’ Lily said, her eyes widening in surprise. ‘But he’s a famous sprinter.’
‘Yup. The fastest man in the world has scoliosis—and it hasn’t stopped him, has it?’
‘That’s incredible,’ Heather said. ‘I had no idea either.’
Anna went on to list half a dozen actresses and singers who had scoliosis—some of the most famous and beautiful people in the business, all of whom she hoped Lily might have looked up to.
‘And they all have scoliosis?’ Lily asked. ‘Really?’
‘Really,’ Anna confirmed. ‘Not all of them needed an op—some had a brace like the one you used to wear and that worked for them. But they all have scoliosis. So, next time anyone says anything horrible to you, just tell them those names. Show them that scoliosis is simply one part of you and it doesn’t define you. You’re awesome, Lily Brown, and don’t let anyone ever tell you otherwise.’
‘Anna’s absolutely right,’ Jamie said from the doorway. ‘Though I didn’t know that about Usain Bolt.’
‘You do now,’ Anna said with a smile. ‘He’s a great ambassador for the condition. And Princess Eugenie. She was a year older than you are when she was diagnosed, Lily.’
Lily nodded. ‘I remember seeing the pictures in the paper. Her wedding dress was low at the back so you could see her scar. I thought she was so brave.’
‘So are you. It’s who you are inside that counts, and how you deal with life,’ Anna said.
* * *
Who you are inside... How you deal with life.
And Anna herself was brave, Jamie thought. She had no scars on the outside to show how her life had been turned upside down by a medical diagnosis, but there were definitely scars on the inside. Yet she carried on and made the best of things. He rather thought he could learn a lot from her.
More visitors arrived to see Lily, and Anna smiled. ‘We’ll go now and let you catch up with everyone. I’ll see you on the ward tomorrow.’
‘Yes, and I want to see you on your feet—even if it’s only for two steps,’ Jamie said. ‘You’re doing brilliantly. It’s good to see you smiling.’
‘Thank you. Thank you so much for everything you did for me,’ Lily said.
‘Pleasure. That’s why I do this job—so I can make people better,’ he said.
Anna and Jamie headed for the high street to grab a pizza before the show started at the cinema.
‘So how do you know all that stuff about famous people with scoliosis?’ he asked.
‘I looked it up,’ she said. ‘Actually, I do the same for some of the conditions I know really get our patients down, and it kind of makes the kids feel a bit better that someone famous, someone whose name they actually recognise, has managed to deal with having that same condition. And I guess it makes them feel a little bit less alone.’
‘It’s a really good idea,’ he said.
‘I managed to observe the op for a few minutes during my lunch break,’ she said, ‘and it was fascinating. I don’t often get to see surgeons at work.’
‘Maybe we could look at some kind of formal enrichment process on the ward,’ Jamie said. ‘Your team can see what we do and ask us whatever you like, and we can learn from you about the kind of things our patients face post-op and see if there’s anything we can tweak to make their recovery easier for them.’
‘Good idea,’ Anna agreed. ‘Let’s talk to Robert about it.’
When they’d eaten, they walked together up the hill to the Alexandra Palace; the massive building with its iconic transmission mast loomed up from the far side of the park.
‘I really didn’t expect to see so much of the City of London from here,’ Jamie said when they were at the top of the hill next to the palace. ‘It’s a bit like Primrose Hill—the skyline’s instantly recognisable, with the Shard and the Walkie-Talkie. It’s gorgeous.’
‘It’s a great view. It’s also brilliant for watching fireworks,’ she said.
They went into the complex and took their seats in the theatre.
‘This is amazing,’ Jamie said, looking around the room. ‘Is it as old as it looks, or is it a clever modern interpretation of something that used to be here?’
‘It’s an original Victorian theatre,’ she explained. ‘It was closed to the public for eighty years and it’s only just been restored and reopened. They do all sorts of things here—stage plays, the odd pop-up cinema, concerts. During the restoration, my parents made a donation for each of us for Christmas, so our names are all on a board in the foyer.’ She smiled. ‘It’s so nice to feel we’ve been part of that.’
‘Does your family live locally?’ he asked.
She nodded. ‘My parents still live in the house where we grew up, though we’re trying to persuade them to move to something a little bit smaller and easier to manage. We all love it around here, so we all ended up moving back after we’d finished uni. I trained at the London Victoria, but I’ve worked at Muswell Hill Memorial Hospital ever since I qualified.’
The more Jamie heard about Anna’s family, the more he liked the sound of them; and the more guilty he felt for pushing his own family away. His parents and sisters would love this place, he knew.
He looked up at the ceiling. ‘That’s stunning. I had no idea this was even here. Thanks for organising this.’
‘My pleasure.’ She looked slightly awkward. ‘Um, I hope you don’t mind that the film’s a bit on the girly side.’
Love, Actually. He’d seen the posters for it in the foyer. ‘I haven’t actually seen it in full,’ he admitted, ‘though it’s my sisters’ favourite Christmas film.’
‘Mine, too. I had a massive crush on Hugh Grant and years ago my best friend made me a life-sized cardboard cut-out of him,’ she said with a smile. Then her smile faded. ‘It got damaged when I moved in with Johnny and it couldn’t be repaired. Looking back, I think the damage probably wasn’t an accident. It should’ve made me see then that Johnny might not have been a keeper.’
Her ex had broken her cardboard cut-out—a gift from her best friend that had been a bit of fun to make Anna smile? How mean-spirited, Jamie thought. ‘You weren’t tempted to name your goldfish after Hugh?’ he asked. ‘Or even Grant the Goldfish, if you wanted to keep the alliteration.’
‘Nope. George is named after my first love.’
‘You named him after your ex-boyfriend?’ Jamie asked, surprised.
‘First love,’ she corrected. ‘George Michael. Mum used to play Wham! all the time when we were kids. I listen to Wham! now if I’m in a bad mood. Dancing around the kitchen and singing into my hairbrush is the quickest way to get me smiling again. And it’s even better if I’ve got a niece or nephew with me. We all love singing and bopping around the room together, hairbrushes in hand.’
He could just imagine it. Anna Maskell would throw herself into the singing whole-heartedly—just as she did with everything else. And he could just see her with her nieces and nephews, encouraging them and spending time having fun with them.
She would’ve made a brilliant mother
. What a shame she hadn’t had the chance.
He was sitting very close to her and it would be, oh, so easy to reach out and take her hand. To hold her hand throughout the film. Every nerve in his body told him to do it.
But he remembered what she’d told him: she wasn’t looking for a relationship. So it wouldn’t be fair to put that kind of pressure on her. Even though he thought her ex had been utterly selfish, and her infertility wasn’t a problem for Jamie in the way it clearly had been for her ex. In an odd way, it kind of made her safe to date, because it meant there was absolutely no way he could lose her in the way that he’d lost Hestia—but he rather thought that made him just as selfish as Anna’s ex. And that wasn’t who he was.
Anna was really family-orientated; although on the surface she seemed to have come to terms with her infertility, Jamie had a feeling that underneath maybe it wasn’t so clear-cut and she still really wanted a family of her own. In his experience, pregnancy meant taking a huge risk. It had cost him everything—the love of his life, his baby, his peace of mind—and he wasn’t sure he had the courage to take that kind of risk again. So he really wasn’t the right one for Anna. Even though he wanted her, he needed to be unselfish about this.
He tried to concentrate on the film, but he found himself glancing at Anna every so often. He could see her face clearly in the light from the screen, and she was obviously enjoying the film hugely. He thought it was a bit daft, and it was probably more the sort of film she would’ve enjoyed more with her female friends, but he didn’t really mind it.
Until they got to the scenes with the school Christmas concert.
Until the girl came on the stage and sang That Song. The one that always broke his heart. Although the young actress’s performance was brilliant, the song just brought back so many memories for him that he felt as if he was drowning.