by Judi Curtin
Now Hazel smiled the most evil smile of all. Her eyes narrowed as she spoke.
‘Don’t believe me, do you?’
I shook my head.
‘No. Actually I don’t.’
‘Well believe this then,’ she said. ‘Alice told me all your little secrets. She told me about your mother the crazy hippy. She told me how your house is like something from an ancient history book. She said you live life like it was still the time of the dinosaurs. She told me how your mother goes on and on and on about the environment, and how you’re never allowed to do anything fun. Alice said that everyone in your family is a total loser.’
At last she stopped talking.
I didn’t know what to say.
Why would Alice betray me like that?
Why would she tell Hazel, of all people, about my mum?
Maybe what Hazel said was true.
Maybe Alice had never really liked me at all.
Maybe she just hung out with me because I was handy, because I lived next door.
I could feel tears coming to my eyes. Everything went bright and blurry. I soooo did not want Hazel to see that she had made me cry. I shook my arm until she let go of it. Then I pushed past her, and took a few more steps.
Hazel called after me.
‘Now you know the truth. Alice has hated you for years. Get over it, why don’t you?’
Now rivers of hot tears were pouring down my face. They were dripping down my cheeks and into my mouth. I had to get away from Hazel. I just had to. I had to find someone to help me. I had to find Gloria, Sarah, Sam, or even Alice – anyone who could make Hazel stop.
I started to run down the stairs. Hazel was running after me, taunting me, saying even more horrible things about Alice and me.
It was a huge curving staircase, (the one Alice had slid down on our first day at camp – that day long ago when I had been so happy). The stairs seemed to go on forever, like an enchanted stairs in a fairy-story.
I was almost half-way down, when my foot missed a step, and I stumbled. I reached out and grabbed for the banister. My fingers brushed the smooth wood, but couldn’t grip it. I lurched forwards and lost my balance. My shoulder hit the edge of a step. I rolled once, and gave a small scream as my elbow cracked hard against the wall. Things seemed to be happening slowly. One of my shoes fell off, and I could feel my back getting grazed as it slid over a step. I heard a voice calling ‘Megan!’ and then I rolled again, and hit the tiled floor with a dull thud.
I felt a sudden sharp pain in my head, and then everything went black.
Chapter twenty-four
I was lying on a couch in one of the television rooms when an ambulance pulled up outside. I could see the blue flashing light, and hear the sharp sound of the siren. I wished it would stop – the light was hurting my eyes, and the siren was really hurting my head. For a minute, I wondered who the ambulance was for, then I looked at all the concerned faces gathered around me, and realised that it was for me.
Alice was sitting on the floor next to me, holding my hand so tightly that it hurt. Mrs Duggan was flapping around the room like a demented chicken; Gloria was standing next to me looking very worried. There was no sign of Hazel.
An ambulance man and woman rushed in with a big stretcher on wheels. My head hurt badly, and my elbow was sore, but the stretcher seemed a bit OTT. The men let me sit up on it instead of lying down. On the way out, the stretcher crashed into the door-frame, and bumped my leg, and Gloria said,
‘Be careful, isn’t she bad enough already?’
The ambulance man laughed, but stopped quickly when he saw Mrs Duggan’s face.
Outside in the driveway, Alice clung on to my hand. She pleaded with Mrs Duggan.
‘Please let me go with her. Pleeeeease. I have to go with her. She needs me. She’s my very best friend in the whole world.’
I was glad to hear her say that, but the truth was, my head was hurting so much by then, all I wanted was to be somewhere dark and quiet, and I didn’t really care who went with me.
In the end, Mrs Duggan led a crying Alice away, and Gloria came in the ambulance with me. I think Gloria knew that I didn’t feel like talking, so as soon as she saw that I was comfortable, she and the ambulance woman had a big long chat about the weather, and holidays in Kerry, and how Gloria managed to keep her hair so shiny.
In the hospital, I was put onto another trolley, and brought into a quiet room. A nice doctor looked into my eyes and ears and asked me loads of questions. After a while he asked me if I knew what date it was.
I thought carefully, before replying.
‘No,’ I said.
The doctor looked really worried, and I felt as if I had somehow let him down.
‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘I didn’t know what date it was before I bumped my head either.’
He smiled then.
‘You’re probably fine,’ he said. ‘But just to be on the safe side, I think we’d better do a CAT scan.’
Gloria said,
‘What does she want a cat scan for – she’s a human?’ but the doctor didn’t seem to think it was very funny. I thought it was funny enough, but didn’t dare to laugh in case it would make my head hurt even more.
I had to wait ages and ages for the CAT scan.
‘Must be a lot of sick cats in today,’ joked Gloria while we were waiting. I felt sorry that no-one was laughing at her jokes, so I laughed a bit even though it made my head hurt.
At last my name was called, and a porter wheeled me into another part of the hospital. The CAT scan was really weird. I was put on a trolley, and told to lie very still. Then the trolley was wheeled into a big metal tube thing, and there were funny noises and lots of bright lights. And just because I’d been told to lie still, I found it very hard to do. Suddenly I felt all fidgety and jumpy, and I badly wanted to scratch my knee. I had headphones on though, and a nice nurse with a lovely soft voice talked to me and tried to distract me until the whole thing was over.
When I was wheeled out of the x-ray room, Mum and Dad and Rosie were there waiting for me. They all raced over, and Mum and Dad kissed and hugged me as well as they could since I was still lying down. Rosie didn’t kiss or hug me – she was too busy making funny faces at her reflection in the shiny wheels of the trolley.
Mum started crying then, and saying she should never have let me go to camp, that I was too young, and that girls my age were safer at home where their parents could keep an eye on them.
Dad hugged her though and said that most accidents happen in the home anyway.
Then Mum put her hand over her mouth and said she thought she’d left the iron on, as she’d been ironing when the call came that I’d had the accident. Then there was a big panic, and she had to phone her friend, who lives up the road from us, and tell her where the spare key was hidden, and ask her to make sure that the house wasn’t burning down. And Dad said she wouldn’t need the key to see if the house was burning down or not. And Mum got cross and said Dad could never see the bigger picture. (Whatever that means.) Then Rosie’s finger got caught in one of the trolley wheels, and she screeched for ages, and all the nurses made a big fuss of her, because she’s so small and cute. And every time the nurses lost interest in her she screeched some more, just so they’d come back. After a while a nurse brought in a big box of coloured plasters, and said Rosie could choose one, and Rosie got so excited she accidentally knocked the box out of the nurses hand, and the plasters went all over the floor making it look like there had been some kind of explosion. And in the end, I felt a bit left out of things, lying on my trolley, until I felt like shouting Hey, I’m the patient here, is anyone going to pay me any attention?
I was brought back down to the nice doctor. He put on his glasses, and looked at the chart, which was clipped on to the end of my trolley.
‘Hmmm,’ he said after a while. ‘Everything looks fine, but I think you’d better stay in hospital overnight, for observation.’
I didn’t much l
ike the sound of that. Was someone going to sit next to me all the time, watching me?
In the end, it wasn’t so bad. I was just put into a nice room with just one bed in it, and a nurse peeped in and checked on me every hour or so. All the nurses were really nice to me, and made a big fuss of me, which was just what I needed after so many days of feeling sorry for myself.
Mum insisted on staying with me. I thought that was a bit stupid. She’s always imagining bad things, but what on earth did she think was going to happen to me in a hospital? And after all, I was twelve years old. Mum had that look in her eye, though, and I knew there was no point in arguing.
Mum wouldn’t leave me, even for a minute, so Dad and Rosie went to find a shop to buy me night clothes and a toothbrush. Dad somehow managed to buy me pyjamas that fitted me, and were nice. The toothbrush had Barbie on it. Rosie smiled.
‘I picked it specially for you,’ she said.
Dad bought me loads of books too. My head still hurt, and I couldn’t possibly read, but I didn’t like to hurt his feelings by saying so. Then we all sat and looked at each other and talked about stupid stuff until the nurse came in and said, ‘bed-time,’ which I thought was a bit strange, as I was the only patient, and I was in bed already. Then Dad stood up, and he and Rosie kissed me, and went to stay the night with one of Dad’s old friends from college.
The nurses kept telling Mum that there was a spare bed in the family room, up the hall, but Mum wouldn’t hear of using it.
‘If my daughter needs me during the night,’ she said. ‘I intend to be right here by her side. I’m not taking any chances.’
I thought that was a bit stupid, and I felt kind of guilty tucked up in a big, high, comfortable bed with starchy sheets and loads of blankets, while Mum was curled up uncomfortably on an arm-chair next to me. Still though, I woke up loads of times during the night, and it was nice to look over, and see that Mum was by my side, minding me.
Chapter twenty-five
In the morning a nurse I hadn’t seen before came into the room.
‘Well, you’re looking all bright and breezy,’ she said in a friendly voice.
She read my chart, checked my temperature and smoothed out my sheets, humming as she did so. Just then, Mum uncurled herself from her armchair, and stood up. As usual, her hair was sticking out everywhere, and her dress looked like it had never been within a hundred metres of an iron.
The nurse looked at her.
‘Oh my God,’ she said. ‘Look at the state of you. Why don’t you run along to the family room and tidy yourself up?’
I felt really bad, because the nurse was trying to be nice, and how could she possibly know that Mum always looks like that?
Poor Mum didn’t say anything, but she politely went off to the family room as the nurse had instructed. When she came back, looking exactly the same as before, the nurse sighed and said,
‘Oh, well. Can’t be helped. A night at home will do you all a world of good, I’m sure.’
I was glad when her beeper beeped, and she had to go out before she hurt Mum’s feelings any more.
By this time, my head-ache was better, so I had time to examine my other injuries. My back was all scraped, and my elbow and my ankle were badly bruised. Nothing hurt too badly though.
After a while, the nice doctor came in. He read my chart, and looked into my eyes.
‘Good news – no real damage,’ he said to Mum. ‘A few days rest and she’ll be as good as new.’
‘What a wonderful doctor you are,’ said Mum. She looked so happy, I thought she was going to kiss him. He must have thought so too, because he left the room very quickly, muttering something about an emergency in another part of the hospital.
A few minutes later, a nurse came in with a big bundle of forms for Mum to sign. While Mum was doing the paperwork, I got dressed. It felt a bit strange, putting on the same clothes that I’d put on the day before, all ready for my last full day at camp.
When we were ready, Mum phoned Dad and asked him to come and pick us up, and my unexpected visit to hospital was over.
Before going home, we had to go out to the summer camp to pick up my stuff. On the way, Mum and Dad kept asking me stuff about the camp.
‘Did you enjoy it?’
‘Were the other kids nice?’
‘Did you make any new friends?’
‘Are you sorry it’s over?’
I didn’t know how to answer all these hard questions. After all the drama of the fall down the stairs, and the trip to hospital, the fight with Alice seemed very trivial and very long ago. It seemed like it had happened in a different world.
Anyway, there was no way I was telling Mum and Dad about the row. Anyone who thinks that it’s only elephants who never forget obviously hasn’t met my mum, and she’s a world champion at holding grudges.
When I was in senior infants, a boy in my class kicked me, and now, more than six years later, Mum still gives him evil looks whenever we pass him in the street.
So I just smiled and half-answered their questions, and because I’d been in hospital they smiled back and didn’t give me a hard time.
* * *
When we got to the camp, we met Gloria in the hallway. She gave me a big hug that really hurt my scraped back and my sore elbow. She whispered in my ear.
‘Would you like me to tell your folks about all that bad stuff between you and Alice?’
I shook my head as hard as I could, considering that I felt like I was being hugged by a large and very friendly bear.
Gloria let me go, and looked at me a bit doubtfully.
‘Maybe it’s something they need to know,’ she suggested. ‘I needn’t tell them all the details. I could just say there was a bit of a row.’
That would have been a total disaster. If Mum heard that her precious daughter had ‘a bit of a row’ with her best friend, it would have been a very, very big deal. She wouldn’t have stopped digging until she knew every detail of who had said what, and when, and even what they were wearing when they said it.
Just then I was rescued by a huge shriek.
‘Meg! You’re back! Are you OK?’
It was Alice, who came racing down the stairs almost as fast as I had fallen down it the day before. She grabbed me and gave me a huge hug. I tried not to cry out in pain – too many more of those hugs and I’d be back with the nice doctor, getting my sore back treated.
When Alice finally let me go, Gloria grinned at me.
‘Looks like everything’s OK again.’
I nodded happily.
‘Yes, Gloria,’ I said. ‘Everything’s just fine.’
Mrs Duggan appeared then. She went over to Mum and Dad and shook their hands and smiled. I’d never seen her smile before, and was surprised that the muscles in her face knew what to do.
‘Mr and Mrs Sheehan,’ she said. ‘So nice to meet you. And poor little Megan. Such an awful thing to happen. It was a complete accident, you know that, don’t you?’
Mum didn’t answer Mrs Duggan.
‘Is this where you fell, Megan?’ she asked me.
I nodded.
‘Almost from the top,’ I said proudly, exaggerating a bit.
Mum went so pale, I had to correct myself.
‘Well, not really almost the top. It was more like half way down.’
Mum still didn’t look very well.
‘Well, actually, it was only the last few steps,’ I lied, and at last Mum looked like she wasn’t going to faint.
I could see that she was looking at the stairs to see if there were any dangers that she wouldn’t have allowed in her own house. She seemed happy though, as there were no fraying carpets, or bumpy steps or shaky banisters.
She smiled at Mrs Duggan.
‘Of course it was a complete accident,’ she said. ‘It could have happened anywhere.’
Now that it looked like Mum and Dad weren’t planning to sue her, Mrs Duggan relaxed a bit, and she actually smiled again.
‘A
nd Megan’s such a sweet girl,’ she said. ‘Everyone loved her here. She’s a credit to you. She got on so well with the other girls, you just wouldn’t believe it.’
Mum and Dad smiled, enjoying the praise. Luckily they didn’t see Gloria winking at me behind their backs. I winked back.
Dad looked at his watch.
‘I really ought to show my face at work some time today,’ he said. ‘Maybe we could move along a bit here.’
Mum nodded.
‘OK. Megan, do you want a hand with packing up your things?’
Before I could answer, Alice stepped forward.
‘It’s OK,’ she said. ‘I’ll help her.’
Mrs Duggan turned to Mum and Dad.
‘Why don’t you join me for a cup of tea while you’re waiting?’
Mum smiled at her.
‘That would be lovely. Do you have any white tea? Or even green would do.’
Mrs Duggan shook her head.
‘Actually, no, Mrs Sheehan,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid I have neither green nor white tea.’
‘Oh well,’ Mum said. ‘Don’t worry. I have loads.’
She put her ugly patchwork handbag down on the floor. (I noticed with horror that the bag was made from a few of Rosie’s old summer dresses.) She rooted around inside it, pulling out all kinds of embarrassing rubbish, and spreading it around the floor. At last she said,
‘Here it is,’ as she held up a raggy old bag of teabags that looked as if it had been in her bag for a few hundred years.
Mum smiled at Mrs Duggan.
‘And there’s plenty. Lots of lovely healthy anti-oxidants for everyone.’
Mrs Duggan gave her a weak look, and led the way to her study.
Alice and I grinned at each other, then she took my good arm and we went up the camp stairs for the very last time.
Chapter twenty-six
When we got into our room, Alice closed the door behind us. She gave me another big hug. Then we both sat on my bed.