by Emily Elgar
She opens the front door and feels the darkness again pull her forward as she walks quickly down the drive and onto the lane, deep into the thick night. The air electrocutes her lungs with each icy inhale, and her legs feel slick, sure of their new direction. The stream bubbles jollily along by her side, while the branches from the silver birch trees creak above her. She doesn’t use her phone torch after all. The clouds have passed while she was inside, and the moon itself is extra shiny tonight, like it’s been polished, ready for the New Year. Surprising herself, she starts to hum, something made up, childlike; it’s a nonsense but she doesn’t care and she doesn’t feel ashamed.
Maisie’s scampered off, and her humming turns into a call for the little dog.
‘Maisie!’ She listens before she calls again, listens again. She keeps walking; Maisie will be scampering around in a field somewhere, lost to everything except the smell of rabbits. The bag’s digging into her shoulder. She lifts it, rolls her neck a couple of times.
The flash from the car lights behind her is a surprise at first, like they’re intruding on her private moment. As she turns, they blind her. The shape of the car looks familiar; it’s the car she sees every day, parked outside their cottage. It’s the car that drives Jack to work and home again. Shit, shit, shit. She has no choice; she waves at him, casting shadows on the tarmac, her arms preposterously long. He must be pissed, driving after her like this. Maybe Charlotte called him, told him about their row, that Cassie told her about Jack and Nicky. She decides to run to the passing point, but Jack must be livid, he must want to scare her, because instead of slowing, he starts driving faster. The car lights bounce up and down on the uneven surface. She waves again, screams his name, her bag falling from her shoulder. The car bites into her side, the impact making her spin, an insane pirouette to the edge of the stream. Her feet can’t keep up and she falls back, thorns shred her useless hands as she clutches the hedgerows for support. She hears herself scream, distant, as if it’s coming from someone else far away, her head sounds like a piece of meat as it hits something hard. The water, like a million freezing needles pierces her, but the stream fits her well. She opens her eyes, watches the white clouds of her breath disappear into the inky sky. She puts her hand between her thighs and raises it, but she can’t see any blood there. It’s still raining. Maisie barks and her leaden lips try and whisper her name to calm the little dog, but she doesn’t make a sound. Instead she hears the car door click open, and clipped footsteps above her. They pause for a moment. Relief crests over Cassie as she hears the click, click as the footsteps walk away again. The car roars into life above her once more and Cassie’s heart at last eases because now, finally she is on her own. She can rest. She is free.
25
Alice
Bob wakes up as I pull into our drive at last. I open the boot and, even though it’s started raining, I let him run around the garden for a while. He never did get the walk I promised. David still isn’t home, which is a relief; he’d know something was up as soon as he saw me. He’d be full of questions I wouldn’t be able to answer.
It’s just before 5 p.m. I go upstairs to find the business card Brooks gave me in the office and walk back downstairs, pour myself a glass of water and keep my eyes fixed on Bob as he gallops around the garden, delighted to be out of the car, as I dial her direct line. She answers on the second ring.
‘Brooks,’ she says her name like a reflex, as though she’s distracted by something else.
‘Hello?’ I say, unsure again how to address her.
‘Who is this?’ She doesn’t have time for civilities.
‘It’s Alice Marlowe, the nurse from Kate’s, looking after Cassie Jensen.’
‘Ah, yes. How are you?’ I have her full attention; it makes me feel more confident.
‘I know Jonny Parker’s charges are going to be dropped.’
‘Did Mr Jensen tell you that?’
I don’t answer her; where I heard it isn’t important now.
‘I have some information I need to share with you.’
‘OK,’ she says, ‘can you tell me over the phone?’
‘No, no, I want to see you in person, if that’s OK? Can I come to the station now?’
She pauses, weighing up perhaps if I’m worth postponing whatever else she had planned before she leaves for the day. I add, ‘I can be with you in an hour.’
‘OK, Nurse Marlowe, that’s fine. I’ll meet you at the station at six o’clock.’
‘Thanks,’ I say into the receiver, but she’s already hung up.
I bribe Bob inside with some leftovers from our curry last night, and ignore the pull on my heart as he whines from inside as he hears me locking the door. I’m just about to get back in my car when a strange buzzing from my bag makes me stop. It’s like someone has slipped their phone into my bag; the beep is persistent, unfamiliar, demanding attention. I dig around inside my bag and pull out my emergency work pager, flashing red and wailing. It’s never gone off before, reserved for critical use only, and I know immediately what it means; it means something has happened to Cassie.
‘Oh, god,’ I say to no one, staring at the pager, dumb for a second before I open the passenger door and, dropping my bag on the seat, start fumbling again in my bag, this time for my phone.
I start calling 9B as I sit in the driver’s seat and turn the key in the ignition. My heart floats up into my throat, and my mind starts to flip through images of what could have happened. Cassie in cardiac arrest, the baby’s heart rate dropping or speeding, a too-early emergency C-section.
No one answers the phone on 9B reception. I reverse to turn around, skidding the back wheels on the lawn and as I pull out of our drive I try 9B again. I don’t look properly before I pull out and another car screeches to an emergency stop to my left. ‘Dopey cow,’ the driver calls out of his window before he drives away shaking his head at me on my phone, but I don’t care; I hardly see him. Neither Mary or Carol answer their mobiles so I call the main hospital number, but they just put me through to 9B reception again.
‘Shit!’ I shout and throw my phone onto the passenger’s seat. All I can think about is Cassie, that she needs me – she needs me right now and I’m not there – so I keep my foot on the accelerator and ignore the beeps from other drivers as I barge my way through the rush-hour traffic.
I’m just a couple of minutes from Kate’s when my phone starts ringing. I grab it, hoping it’s Mary or Carol or at least someone from the hospital. But it’s David. I pause, think about not answering but I know he’ll be home now, wondering where I am. I know he’ll just keep calling until I answer.
‘David?’
‘Ali? Where are you? I thought you said you’d be—’
‘David, there’s been an emergency,’ I interrupt.
‘An emergency?’ he asks, immediately tense.
‘It’s Cassie. I’m driving to the hospital now. I don’t know when I’ll be home. Look, I’m almost there, I’ve got to go. I love you.’
I don’t wait for his response; I hang up the phone and turn it off. I know he’ll call back and I can’t bear to hear the worry in his voice, not now. I pull into a space in the car park and, leaving my bag and coat in the car, grab my hospital ID before I start to run across the car park, through reception, down the corridor towards the ward. My heart pounds around my body; it seems to spiral in my chest. I’m out of breath, I have to force myself to walk the final distance towards 9B. The little waiting area outside the ward is empty apart from one small figure, slightly hunched and rocking back and forth in one of the plastic chairs, like something driven mad from being caged for too long. She looks up at me, but I can tell even from a distance that Charlotte’s gaze is unseeing; I must be a blur to her. Where’s Jack? I think briefly about stopping to ask her what happened, but then I think of Cassie’s baby, and I know I have to find out for myself, and I start running again.
The ward reception is abandoned and all the curtains are drawn around the beds
. The lights are on their brightest, cruellest setting. The strip lights are on in the nurses’ room as well, but I can’t see anyone inside. The ward has never been so empty; it has the held, frozen quality of a recently abandoned space. My nerves grip, forcing me to slow to a walk.
I reach Frank’s bed; I want to see him first suddenly, as though a glimpse of him will give me courage. I pull his curtain back. His bed is still there but I see there’s just a twist of sheets on his bed. His letter board has fallen to the floor. His machines, which were so critical, stand by, suddenly useless, just clumps of metal and blank screens. His heart monitor blinks like it’s shocked by Frank’s sudden absence. I hold onto the end of his bed for a moment to stop the ward from spinning before I turn around towards Cassie’s bed and tug her curtain back in one motion. I hear myself cry out as my hands cover my mouth and I feel all my veins constrict because where Cassie’s bed should be there’s just a little halo of photos and another gaping empty space.
‘Alice?’
Lizzie is standing at the end of the ward, her face plump with sorrow, her hair made wild by the terrible demands of her shift. She’s walking towards me fast. She looks like she’s about to throw her arms around me, but instead I take hold of her wrists and force her to look at my face. I can’t comfort her now, not until I know what’s happened here.
‘Where are they?’ The words feel fragile in my mouth.
Lizzie’s face is blank, her eyes wide, as though she can’t believe what she’s saying.
‘Frank’s dead, Alice. We don’t know what happened: a complication with his tracheotomy; his infection must have got worse …’ Her voice trails away, the words too new, too difficult to say.
‘A new patient was admitted today, multiple organ failure. She kept crashing. Mary and I were so busy with her. It was Charlotte who raised the alarm, told us something was wrong with Frank. She was the last one to see him alive, him and his niece.’ Lizzie sniffs hard through her nose, before she says, ‘Sharma’s talking to the technicians now, trying to figure out exactly what happened.’
I stare at Lizzie; my legs feel watery, as though they could fall away any moment. I grip on tighter to Lizzie’s arm and force myself to ask. I have to know.
‘Cassie?’
Lizzie nods. The movement shakes more tears from her eyes.
‘She’s OK, she’s OK. Her blood pressure rose. Ms Longe thought they were going to do a C-section, which was when we paged you, so she’s down in the preparation room but as soon as she was taken away from here she levelled out again. They’re keeping her down there just in case, but she’s OK; they’re OK.’
At last, I loosen my grip on Lizzie’s arm and I stare at Frank’s empty bed. I want to feel someone alive, so I pull Lizzie in close and feel her shake in my arms as I hold her. There’s so much wrong; my brain wheels. Frank’s bed seems to pulse with his absence. He was here, just a short time ago. He was here, but he wasn’t alone. I pull Lizzie away from me, sharper than I meant to.
‘You said his niece was with him?’
Lizzie nods.
‘I checked her ID, Alice; it matched the name she gave. Nicola something. I was glad Charlotte was here—’ but I cut Lizzie off.
‘Was it Breton, Lizzie. Was her surname Breton?’
Lizzie nods vaguely, surprised at how my words slap. She starts to cry again, her hand shakes as she wipes her eyes.
‘She seemed nice, but then when I came back and saw her talking to Charlotte she left really abruptly. Charlotte just said she was upset at seeing her uncle so unwell.’
‘They were alone together, Charlotte and Frank?’
Lizzie nods, and the skin around her eyes wrinkles; she’s terrified she’s done something wrong.
‘Yes, but not for long, Alice, I promise. The new patient, she was arresting, I had to—’
I cut her off again. ‘Tell me what happened when you got back to them, Lizzie. Tell me exactly what happened.’
My urgency makes her widen her eyes in panic, but she takes a deep breath. Her eyes flicker as she tries to remember.
‘Frank’s niece, that Nicky woman, she left and, as I took Frank’s readings, I talked to Charlotte for a bit. She called me over because she saw Frank blink. I know he didn’t want people to know yet that he was getting better, but Charlotte guessed! So I told her that he hears everything.’
Lizzie looks like she’s about to crumple into sobs again as she corrects herself. ‘Heard everything.’
I hold onto her upper arms and will her to carry on.
‘What next, Lizzie? What happened next?’
‘The new patient started crashing again, so I left Charlotte with Frank and then a couple of minutes later Charlotte came running down the ward shouting that something had happened to Frank.’ Lizzie at last breaks into sobs and lifts her hand to her mouth. She starts mumbling something about Jack into a tissue in her hand.
‘I can’t hear … what are you saying, Lizzie?’
‘I was just saying, only this morning he blinked out Jack’s name.’
Lizzie’s shoulders start heaving again. Out of my peripheral vision the ward seems to shrink. I remember the morning. The cold look that replaced the usual playfulness in Frank’s eyes. Even though he must have been struggling to breathe from his infection, even though the drugs would have made him feel tired, he wouldn’t stop. He wanted to tell me something. I promised him I’d come back, but I hadn’t.
I can’t speak. My hands drop from Lizzie’s arms as she keeps sobbing into her tissue, the muscles raised in her neck. Behind her the ward seems to vibrate. I think of Frank’s face, twisting with the effort of each slow, painful letter. I could have saved him; I should have been here.
‘He heard everything.’ My voice sounds distant but it makes Lizzie look up from her tissue and nod at me.
‘I think he heard much more than the rest of us put together.’
Lizzie’s right; Frank knew Jack, and he knew Cassie, probably better than any of us.
I stare at Frank’s ruined bed, and picture him from the morning, how his eyes strained, how I got it wrong. He wasn’t blinking ‘L’; he was trying to blink ‘J’. Of course, he was trying to warn me. He was trying to spell Jack.
I have surprisingly few thoughts, as though the words I just heard are in a queue, waiting to move from my ear into my brain to be processed and assimilated into something coherent.
Frank knew it was Jack and Charlotte found out Frank was getting better.
I ignore Lizzie as she calls out, tears still thick in her throat.
‘Where are you going, Alice?’
But I’m running now, to the end of the ward, past Sharma’s room, past reception and left through the doors. The small, hunched figure from before is still rocking back and forth on the chairs.
Charlotte’s aged; the lines on her face like scars, and her hair hangs by her face in a limp curtain. Her eyes are red and the skin underneath puffed as though she’s been punched hard.
I stand in front of her and for the first time, we don’t smile to see each other. Her fingers twist her wedding ring, round and round her finger. I walk slowly towards her, my body heavy. I stand before her for a moment and then I hear myself say, ‘Frank’s dead, Charlotte.’
The words feel cold in my mouth. Her hands still and she raises her eyebrows towards me and she nods, like she was expecting those three words, before her shaky hands keep on with their work, twisting her ring round and round. They don’t pause as she whispers, ‘I’m sorry to hear that. I tried to get help.’
My eyes stay fixed on her pinched face; keeping my gaze on her seems to strengthen my resolve and stops the world speeding around me.
‘You were with Frank, weren’t you, Charlotte.’
Her lips quiver like she’s about to speak, but she doesn’t make a sound; she just keeps twisting her ring round and round.
‘You know, Jack’s name was Frank’s last word.’
She turns her eyes up slowly, but she
still doesn’t look at me. It’s as though my words are too heavy; she doesn’t have the strength to raise her eyes to me.
She knows.
Her hands, at last, still as I keep talking.
‘But he didn’t blink to prove he knew Jack’s name. I know now; he was trying to warn us.’
She lets her hands drop to her lap.
‘All this is her fault. Nicky. She lied to see Cassie. She can’t handle her guilt.’
But I won’t be distracted, not any more.
‘Jack hit Cassie,’ I say, feeling how strange it is that such short, simple words can change the way the world spins. ‘Frank knew it was Jack and you panicked.’
She stands up suddenly, her face set, a ferocious mask of the kindly face I thought I knew. She points her finger down the hallway, where Nicky would have walked, not long before.
‘All this is her fault. She tried to take what wasn’t hers. I was protecting my son.’ Charlotte frowns, then, as she looks at me, her face cracks into a frown. I know that look well; I see it in my family, my friends. Charlotte pities me: in spite of it all, she pities me.
‘This must be so hard for you to understand –’ her jaw clicks around her words ‘– the maternal instinct to protect is stronger than anything you could possibly imagine. You have no idea what it’s been like, coming here day after day, praying the baby is ours, my granddaughter, Jack’s daughter, but still not knowing for sure who her father is.’
Neither of us hears him approach; his voice is so small, our concentration so firmly fixed on each other, that it takes us both a moment to turn towards him when Jack says, ‘I’m Freya’s father.’
His voice shocks Charlotte like electricity. She turns, stronger on her feet suddenly, and moves towards her son, opening her arms to him. They beg to hold him. But Jack shakes his head; he takes a cautious step away from her.
‘Mum, what is this?’ Jack looks at his mum, at me. He sees the muscle twitch in Charlotte’s face and I know he senses the horror I feel in my chest. ‘Mum!’ he says again louder this time.
‘Jack. Nicky was here. She was telling lies, all sorts of lies about you. But it’s OK. It’s all going to be OK.’ She tries to make her words sound soothing but it doesn’t work.