by Abbie Taylor
Looking back, Dawn did not regret one second of it. She had loved Dora, and Dora wouldn’t have hesitated – had not hesitated – to do the same thing for her. But she was gone now, and for the first time in three years there was a gap in Dawn’s life. A gap which she could fill with work – very easily, if she chose. Or she could take Francine’s advice and fill it with something else. The question was – with what?
Back at number 59, Milly didn’t come trotting to greet Dawn at the gate as she usually did. She made an attempt at wagging her tail as Dawn lifted the latch but stayed where she was, sitting outside the porch, her tongue out, her head drooping towards the step.
‘What’s wrong, Mill?’ Dawn came up the path. ‘Is it your arthritis again?’ The recent rain had been hard on Milly’s joints. Some mornings she was barely able to climb out of her basket. But today was far from damp. The small garden was a heat trap, the sun beaming directly over the front of the terrace. The only real shade came from the porch, which as Dawn discovered when she slid back the glass door, was even hotter than outside. Milly’s breath smelled like a sewage plant. Her nose was pale and dry.
‘You poor thing. You’re thirsty, aren’t you? Come and have some water.’
But the plastic bowl in the porch was upended, the terracotta tiles long dry. Milly must have stood on the edge of it and flipped it over.
‘Oh no.’ Dawn was horrified. ‘Poor Milly.’
She took the bowl through to the kitchen and ran the tap until it was cold. She filled the bowl to the top. Milly planted herself in front of it and lapped noisily. Minutes later, the bowl was empty. Dawn refilled it and the dog drank again.
‘Oh Milly.’ Dawn crouched beside her. ‘I feel so bad.’ She stroked Milly’s broad, furrowed head. In recent months, the fur had grown stiffer and coarser. ‘What are we going to do? I can’t leave you out there all summer by yourself.’
It was a worry. Milly was used to being with people. She hated being on her own. As a pup, she had been found starving and covered in sores in a garden shed, left there by her owner to die. She had been pathetically grateful to be rescued, crying with joy and clinging to the RSPCA girl, so desperate to be petted and spoken to that she had ignored even the food and drink they had tried to give her. For years, everywhere Dora had gone, to the shops, to church, to her friends’ houses, Milly had stuck close behind her like her short, hairy shadow. Even when Dora had been ill and unable to go anywhere, she had been there, and there had been people in the house all day, coming and going. Now Dawn sensed that the long hours alone were a misery for Milly. What did she do all day, by herself in that tiny garden? It was no life for a sociable animal.
Milly continued to lap at the water. Her ear brushed off Dawn’s arm. The softness of it reminded Dawn of something. That little boy’s hair in the café, brushing over her skin as his mum pulled him away.
You saved that boy’s life. You should be very proud.
Will …
Dawn stood up and went to her bag. The napkin was still there, tucked away in the side pocket. She took it out and unfolded it. Coombs. Will Coombs. He had offered to walk Milly.
A spur-of-the-moment suggestion? People often said, ‘Call me,’ and didn’t really mean it. Will had seemed pleasant but a little odd, as if he wasn’t quite used to humans. Dawn looked again at the squiggles on the napkin. Will might not be too good with people but he’d had a definite rapport with Boris. The two had seemed quite happy in each other’s company. And the way he had offered to walk Milly – it had sounded as though she’d be doing him a favour. He had said how nice it would be to have a dog in London.
Aloud, she said, ‘He can only say no.’ For Milly, it was worth a try.
She dialled the number on the napkin. The phone purred. Then a click.
‘Hello?’ A slow, deep, cautious voice.
‘Hello. Is that Will?’
‘Ye-es?’
‘This is Dawn. From the café on Saturday—’
‘Dawn Torridge! I remember.’
Ah rememba. The misty fell-sides again, and the row of wellies by the back door.
Dawn said, ‘It really was lovely to meet you again after all this time.’
‘Yes. Yes, it was.’
Will’s tone was still cautious, as if he was wondering what on earth she was doing phoning him up out of the blue like this. Dawn got to the point. ‘The reason I’m calling is because you mentioned that you might like to walk my dog, Milly.’
‘Yes. I did say that.’
Silence. Dawn waited for him to add something like ‘I’d be delighted,’ or ‘When would you like me to start?’ but nothing seemed to be forthcoming.
‘Was it a genuine offer?’ she asked, uncertain now. ‘Because if so, I think Milly would really enjoy it. But if you’ve changed your mind, there’s no—’
‘No,’ Will said. ‘No, it was a genuine offer. If Milly would like it, then I’d be very happy to do it.’
From the formality of his speech, he might have been engaged in a professional job interview rather than a casual conversation about dog-walking.
‘Well – great,’ Dawn said. ‘Great. If you’re sure it’s OK. She’s not as young as she was. Sometimes she’s up for a long walk but other times she’s only able to go for a potter. Her hips bother her quite a bit.’
‘I understand,’ Will said. ‘I won’t push her.’
Dawn guessed he wouldn’t. She remembered how he had been with Boris, the patient way he had stepped over the puddle to let the red setter sniff at the bin. More confidently, she said, ‘What way would it work? I mean … how would you …?’
‘I work from home mostly,’ Will said. ‘With Boris, when I feel like a break, I just go round and collect him.’
‘Oh, I see.’ As simple as that. ‘Yes, that would work. Milly’s in the garden during the day so you’d just have to open the gate.’ But she hesitated. Much as Milly would enjoy the company, would she be happy to leave her territory and go off with someone she didn’t know?
‘Should I meet you the first time?’ she asked. ‘Just so Milly can see us together. The only thing is, I work most days during the day so evenings are the best times for me.’ She paused. She had no idea what Will did with his evenings. Partners? Children? The priesthood? Their conversation in the café hadn’t quite got around to that level. ‘Or,’ she remembered, ‘I’ve got a half day tomorrow? If that would suit you better?’
Will said, ‘Tomorrow would be fine.’
‘Wonderful.’ Dawn gave him her phone number and address. They arranged to meet outside her house the following afternoon.
‘See you then,’ she said.
She hung up and wiped her forehead. Criminy! Will was hard work, there was no doubt about it. He had a very odd habit of leaving a gap at the start of each sentence, as if he was pausing to consider what to say. It was like trying to communicate with someone by satellite millions of light years away instead of just up the road in Streatham. But he had relaxed a bit towards the end, and Milly had seemed to like him that time they’d met in the café. It was better than her having to spend the whole day on her own.
After her two bowls of water, Milly was looking much happier. Her nose was wetter, her eyes brighter and more alert. She stuck her tongue out and grinned her Labrador grin up at Dawn. Dawn gave her a pat. ‘That’s sorted,’ she said.
Chapter Eight
‘What the hell is he doing here?’ Mandy hissed.
Dawn looked up from her desk where she had been ploughing through the recurrent headache of compiling the following month’s off-duty rota. The break was far from unwelcome.
‘What’s who doing here?’ she asked. ‘Him.’ Mandy jerked her chin towards the doors. Standing outside the stock room with his hands behind his back was Dr Coulton. His white coat folded in long creases down his shoulders, like the wings of a giant, pallid vulture.
‘He’s been hanging about here all morning,’ Mandy complained. ‘Just staring in at the feeding tubes o
r whatever. It’s getting on my nerves. He’s just waiting for us to go over there and ask him what he wants so he can be rude.’
Dawn remembered the last time she had seen Dr Coulton. In the canteen that day, when she had dumped her tray and rushed off in the middle of their conversation. She must have left a rather strange impression of herself. It would do no harm for her to try to reverse it. She put the cap back on her pen and stood up from the desk.
‘I’ll go and talk to him,’ she said. ‘See if he’s all right.’
Dr Coulton had his back to her as she approached. He did seem to be unusually interested in something in the stock room, standing with his head tipped back, staring down his nose at all the cupboards and shelves. Dawn looked into the room herself but all she could see was the latest delivery of urinary catheters, sitting in a box in the middle of the floor. It was only when she had almost reached Dr Coulton that she realized it wasn’t actually the stock room he was looking at but the new patient in the side room next door.
She came up beside him. ‘Good morning.’
Dr Coulton turned, jerking his hands apart. The unflattering overhead light cast deep shadows under his cheekbones and in his temples, giving his long head a skull-like appearance. Like he lives underground, Mandy had said unkindly. Dawn wouldn’t have gone that far, but he did look as if he could do with a week on a beach somewhere.
‘You look lost,’ she said. ‘Can I help?’
Dr Coulton’s condescending expression had returned.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘as a matter of fact, you can. I was wondering what—’
He broke off. Dawn heard a footstep on the tiles behind her. Mandy, coming up to hear what was going on.
She said encouragingly to Dr Coulton, ‘Yes? You were wondering?’
Dr Coulton looked again at the side room. ‘I was just checking on the patient,’ he said. ‘He looks a bit behind on fluids. Your nurses really should keep an eye on his intake.’
The tail of his white coat whipped between the doors of the ward as he left.
‘What did he say? What did he say?’ Mandy had missed it.
Dawn looked thoughtfully at the doors. ‘He said we need to keep an eye on the patient’s fluids.’
‘His fluids?’ Mandy was indignant. ‘I told you, didn’t I? I said he’d have some rude comment to make. Implying we’re not doing our jobs. I was just in there with Lewis a few minutes ago. Does he look to you like he’s got a problem with fluids?’
Dawn looked through the glass pane in the door of the side room. The patient, eighteen-year-old Lewis Kerr, was sitting up in bed, swigging from a giant bottle of coke.
‘No,’ Dawn had to admit. ‘He seems to be managing pretty well.’
‘That patient’s not even his,’ Mandy said. ‘Rude Ed covers general surgery. Lewis is orthopaedics. Why’s he up here hanging around an orthopaedic patient’s room?’ She tutted and shook her head. ‘I’m telling you, Dawn, there’s something funny about that man. Sinister. Whenever I see him, I always expect to hear that creepy duh duh duh music, like in a horror film. He’s always in the hospital, prowling around at night, even when he’s not on call.’
‘Prowling around this ward?’
‘Well – prowling everywhere. Clive said yesterday he caught him staring at him in the canteen. Gave him the creeps, he said. He was queuing up for his lunch and he suddenly got this really weird feeling down his back, like he was being watched, so he turned around and there was Rude Ed, sitting at a table on his own, just staring over at him. And Daphne from Orthopaedics said she was fetching a chart from Records in the basement the other evening and she turned a corner and ran straight into him. Just loomed up out of nowhere, he did. When she asked him what he was doing there, he claimed he was doing after-hours work in the lab. Something to do with that research conference that was on here last week.’ Mandy said darkly, ‘I just hope he’s being supervised. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s developing some new disease to unleash on us all.’
She added, ‘By the way, Dawn, I forgot to tell you: we’re out of paracetamol.’
‘Already? I only checked the stock yesterday.’
‘Yes, but all the patients keep on asking for extra. Everyone’s in pain lately for some reason. Must be something in the water. Shall I send the student down to Pharmacy?’
Dawn considered. ‘No. I’ll nip across and get some from ITU.’
The wards often did that: borrowed drugs or equipment from each other, then paid it back when they were re-stocked. Dawn hadn’t seen Francine for a while. She’d take the chance to see if she was free for a quick cuppa.
Before she left, she looked again through the window of the side room. Why had Dr Coulton been up here, checking on a patient who wasn’t even his? There was nothing remarkable about Lewis, aside from his badly smashed tibia. His right leg was propped up on a pillow, temporarily immobilized in a fixator, like a spiky metal cage around his calf. He was waiting to have major surgery to repair it, but apart from that he was perfectly healthy. He was able to mobilize and feed and wash himself; he needed minimal nursing care. The room was cluttered with his belongings: a pair of jeans with one leg cut off flung over a chair, the Mirror sports pages spread out on the bed, lurid get-well cards everywhere. The character of the room had been transformed, the essence of any previous patient well and truly exorcized. Dawn could go in there now.
She gave up wondering about Dr Coulton and pushed the door open to the corridor. The hall was filled with visitors and staff hurrying up and down between the various wards. Dr Coulton had disappeared. Dawn’s shoes made a soft snip snip sound as she walked towards the ITU. The tiled floor was striped with sunlight from the windows all down one side. The sky was clear, the only clouds a few puffy wisps high in the blue. Milly and Will would be in luck for their walk this afternoon.
The ITU was filled with the odours Dawn always associated with these sicker patients: Chlorhexidine, Pseudomonas, Vitamin B. Most of the patients were unconscious in their high beds, their closed eyes protected by strips of gel across the lids. In the middle of the room, Francine was helping two other nurses to roll a man who must have weighed twenty stone so that they could change his sheets. One nurse’s job was just to hold all his lines and drips and catheters, making sure nothing got pulled out as they moved him.
‘Just stealing some paracetamol.’ Dawn waved the box she’d taken at Francine. ‘I’ll put it back later.’
‘OK.’ Francine straightened, touching her arm to her forehead. She looked tired, less sleek and groomed than usual. Her chignon had come loose. A hank of blonde hair hung down over one ear.
‘Coffee?’ Dawn raised her eyebrows.
‘Go on then. I’ll be there in a minute.’
Dawn filled the kettle in the ITU kitchen. In the cupboard over the sink, she found Francine’s purple mug with the slogan ‘World’s Best Mum’ and a plain white mug for herself with a patient ID bracelet marked ‘Visitor’ looped around the handle. Francine appeared with a couple of hair-pins in her mouth, redoing her chignon.
‘Busy today?’ Dawn asked.
‘So-so,’ Francine said through the pins. ‘Three sick laparotomies arrived a couple of hours ago all at the same time, so we’ve been kept going.’ She finished with her hair and took the purple mug from Dawn. ‘Thanks.’
She sipped the coffee, leaning against the sink, gazing in a preoccupied way at the lino.
‘Everything all right?’ Dawn asked.
Francine looked up. Then she sighed. ‘Not really. Vinnie’s firm’s in trouble again. The owners have been over-investing elsewhere and now they’re threatening wholesale redundancies to save their own skins.’
‘Oh no, Fran.’
‘It’s so corrupt.’ Francine’s fingers whitened on the handle of her mug. ‘Vinnie and the others have been loyal to them for years and this is how they repay them. The shareholders’ll be all right; they’ll just declare themselves bankrupt and walk away and start up again under a different na
me. I saw one of them the other day, sailing down Streatham High Road in a brand new Mercedes. If looks could kill, I swear, the old fart would have driven into the Thames and sunk straight to the bottom.’
It was rare to see Francine so agitated. Normally she was the epitome of the serene ward sister, placid and unruffled amidst the chaos. It was a bad time to have a husband out of work. Vinnie, a builder, and Francine had a large mortgage and two expensive teenage boys to support. Dawn wasn’t the only one, it seemed, with her own private troubles to worry about. Everyone had their problems.
‘I feel better already,’ Francine said after a while. ‘Even just having a moan about it helps. Don’t say it around, though, will you, Dawn? I wouldn’t have told anyone but you.’
‘Of course I won’t.’
Francine grinned suddenly. ‘Anyway, that’s the thing about nursing, isn’t it? We moan during the good times, when everyone else is earning more than us, but it is recession-proof. You can always do a few extra shifts if you’re stuck.’
‘That’s true. And if there’s anything I can do …’
‘I know,’ Francine said. ‘Thanks, Dawn.’
It being early afternoon, the journey to Silham Vale took half its usual time. By three o’clock, Dawn was walking down Crocus Road. On the street outside number 59 was parked an unfamiliar red Honda with dried mud on the wheels. A man was waiting by the car, looking up and down the pavement, his arms hanging awkwardly by his sides as if he didn’t quite know where to put them. The shambling posture was unmistakeable. The sun glinted on his glasses, turning the lenses opaque. All that could be seen of his eyes were two bright yellow squares. Dawn couldn’t decide if it made him look mysterious or just slightly gormless.
‘Hello.’ She waved to attract his attention as she approached.
Will turned. The two yellow opacities turned with him. ‘Hello.’
The bright squares made his face look like a microchip. Dawn wanted to laugh, but she kept the friendly smile on her face. ‘Lovely day, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
Will’s hands still dangled at his sides. Under his navy jacket today he wore a plain grey T-shirt. Dawn noticed again how tall he was. She was five feet eight but he stood a good head higher than her. Milly puffed and snuffled, struggling to push her nose through the bars of the gate.