Before I Met You

by Lisa Jewell

  ‘Great.’ He passed her a crumpled note and in return she slid the single into a paper bag and handed it to him. He tucked it lovingly into a flight bag slung over his shoulder and scuttled away.

  Betty watched John’s pitch from her front window for a while after she got upstairs. She made herself some lunch and ate it by the kitchen window, peering down every minute or two. Then she sat and wrote a note that said: ‘John, I sold a single to some guy for a fiver. Ring the bell when you get back and I’ll give you the cash.’

  She ran downstairs and tucked the note under the leg of a display stand on the table and then went back upstairs to smoke a cigarette, leaving both doors open so she could hear the doorbell.

  She glanced across at Dom’s house. There were no signs of life. Dom had either crashed out in his clothes or he was out somewhere getting up to no good. She thought of the two of them, sitting framed together in that window three nights ago, she thought of him telling her that he wished he’d met her first. She thought of how she’d felt, filled with longing, and then the shock of his soft lips against hers. And then she thought of the scene in Amy’s kitchen just now, and shuddered.

  There was still no sign of John when she looked out of her window again a few minutes later, so once more she headed downstairs and spoke to the man who ran the pitch next door, selling toiletries.

  ‘Excuse me,’ she began.

  The man looked at her with annoyance, before his face softened into a lecherous smile. ‘What can I do for you, beautiful?’

  Betty pointed a thumb at John’s stand. ‘Any idea where John is?’

  ‘Bloke in the hats?’

  ‘Yes, you know, he’s here every day.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I know who you mean. Far as I know he just popped over the road, you know, call of nature.’

  He gestured at the scruffy pub opposite, the heavy metal pub that Betty had never ventured into and always walked past very quickly with her head down.

  ‘Right,’ she said. ‘OK.’ She decided to give him five more minutes, then she would try to find him. She sat on his stool and counted down the minutes and then, when he had still failed to reappear, she took a deep breath and headed across the road to the pub.

  The pub was quiet on this sunny Friday lunchtime and she headed straight for the bar, ignoring the curious gazes of the handful of solitary men in denim waistcoats, the line of tattooed arms propping up the bar. She smiled at the unhappy-looking barmaid and said, ‘A guy from the market came in here about half an hour ago. Hasn’t been seen since. Would you mind just checking the men’s toilets for me?’

  The barmaid raised a pencilled-in eyebrow and said, ‘Go and look yourself. I can’t leave the bar.’

  ‘Fine,’ said Betty, ‘good.’

  She followed the signs to a scruffy door at the back and breathed in. She knocked once, quietly, and then twice, louder, and she pushed open the door and found John collapsed on the floor, half in and half out of the solitary cubicle, his arms spread out in front of him as though he’d been trying to catch himself. There was a trickle of dark brown blood running from his hairline to the floor.

  Betty shouted out and dropped to her knees. There was a slight sheen of sweat on John’s forehead. He felt very hot, almost feverish and his breath sounded laboured.

  ‘John! Oh my God, John! Help!’ she called out towards the door. ‘Someone help! Call an ambulance!’ But it was pointless, the jukebox was booming out heavy metal. Then she remembered her mobile phone in her bag. She pulled it out and dialled in 999, her other hand touching John’s throat, feeling for breath. She answered the operator’s questions: yes, he was breathing; no, he wasn’t blue; yes, there was a head wound; no, it didn’t seem to be deep. In under a minute she heard the faint sound of sirens outside on the street.

  ‘It’s OK, John,’ she whispered, stroking his hair, that thick dense hair she’d dreamed about touching so often in the past. ‘It’s OK. The ambulance is here. We’re going to the hospital now. They’ll make you better, don’t you worry. Don’t you worry, John Brightly.’

  The door flew open and a female paramedic appeared. ‘Betty?’ she said.

  ‘Yes, yes.’

  She got to her knees next to John. ‘And this is John?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Betty, ‘John Brightly.’

  ‘And you’re his friend?’ She put a hand to his throat for a pulse.

  Betty nodded.

  ‘I’m Jackie,’ she said, feeling his forehead. ‘He’s very hot.’ She put a thermometer into his ear and stared at it. ‘Fever,’ she said. ‘Has he been unwell?’

  Betty shrugged. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘He wasn’t the last time I spoke to him.’

  ‘And when was that?’

  ‘Wednesday,’ she said. ‘Although I saw him this morning and he looked OK. But I didn’t really talk to him.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Jackie put the thermometer back in her pack and called through the door to another paramedic waiting outside. ‘We’re going to need a stretcher, patient concussed. And also high temperature, 42.2 Celsius, he’ll need something to bring it down.’

  The male paramedic disappeared.

  Betty said, ‘What do you think happened?’

  Jackie sat back on her heels and said, ‘I think he fainted. Cracked his head on the sink there.’

  ‘Do you think he’ll be OK?’

  ‘Hard to say. I don’t know how long he’s been like this.’

  ‘About half an hour,’ said Betty, anxiously. ‘Maybe longer.’

  Jackie winced. ‘That’s a long time to be out. But he hasn’t lost much blood.’ She sucked in her breath. ‘We’ll run some tests. We’ll see.’

  A stretcher arrived and Betty waited outside the toilets while the two paramedics strapped John onto it.

  ‘Can I come?’ she asked, following beside them, John’s hot floppy hand held in hers.

  ‘Of course you can.’

  ‘Where are you taking him?’

  ‘UCH.’

  In the back of the ambulance they took John’s temperature again and covered him over with a metallic blanket. It seemed remarkable to Betty that someone so extraordinarily warm could feel so lifeless. She kept his hand in hers and talked to him. ‘Sold a single for you,’ she said, ‘an Ultravox picture disc. I mean, seriously, who wants an Ultravox picture disc in 1995? I thought maybe he was going to make a wall clock out of it. Or maybe mould it into a fruit bowl, or something. Anyway, he was really happy. And I’ve got your fiver. Which I will give you when you wake up. Which you must do very soon, please.’ She smiled at him and squeezed his hand. ‘And I’ve told the toiletries guy to keep an eye on your pitch, so don’t worry about that. And I have your hat safe in my bag.’ She pulled open her bag to show him his hat. ‘So now all you have to do is open your eyes and say something. OK?’

  The ambulance squealed around a corner and Betty held onto her seat. A moment later they were pulling up at the back end of the UCH and John was being put onto a trolley.

  The trolley was pushed down corridor after corridor, through sets of flapping plastic doors until he was taken away from sight into a cubicle behind curtains and Betty suddenly found herself alone, on a plastic chair, staring at a poster about tetanus injections.

  Betty sat on that chair for nearly fifty minutes before finally a doctor appeared.

  ‘I’m his friend,’ she said, jumping to her feet, ‘the man, in there. Is he OK?’

  The doctor smiled and said, ‘He will be.’

  ‘Can I see him?’ she asked.

  ‘No,’ he replied. ‘Not yet. He’s conscious now, but he’s got a very bad infection. We think it might be legionnaire’s disease. We’re waiting for the bloods to come back. If it is we’ll need to keep him in overnight, get some heavyweight antibiotics into him. And also keep an eye on him after the concussion.’

  ‘But does he seem all right? Can he remember what happened?’

  ‘Yes, he appears to be fully compos mentis. But we’ll keep an eye o
n him anyway, just to be sure.’

  ‘And the legionnaire’s disease – I mean, how would he have got that?’

  ‘Similar to flu,’ said the doctor, ‘similar to pneumonia.’

  ‘Could he have got it from living in a damp flat?’

  The doctor shrugged and put his hands into his trouser pockets. ‘Definitely,’ he said, ‘yeah. In extreme circumstances, when the damp’s really bad, the spores from the mildew can cause all sorts of health problems.’

  Betty nodded. ‘Does he know I’m here?’

  ‘Er, yeah, I think so. I think he knows there’s someone here. Once he’s settled on a ward, you can go and see him. We’re just waiting for a bed. Shouldn’t be too long.’ He smiled and then turned as if to leave before turning back and saying, ‘My name’s Richard, by the way, and you are ...?’

  ‘I’m Betty,’ she said.

  The doctor fixed her with a look set somewhere between delight and desire and said, ‘That is a truly awesome name. Good to meet you, Betty,’ before tucking his hands back into his pockets and sauntering away.

  Betty blinked after him in surprise. She felt unsettled and not at all happy that John Brightly was being treated and diagnosed by a man who used the word ‘awesome’ and hit on his patient’s friends.

  The next hour ticked away slowly and incessantly. Betty fiddled with her phone and managed to work out how to send a text message. She sent it to the only other friend she knew with a mobile phone, Joe Joe.

  ‘I’m in the hospital with John from downstairs. He knocked his head. How are you?’

  A message appeared thirty seconds later. ‘I am good, baby, how are u. And poor John, kiss him from me! We all miss U!!’

  Betty imagined Joe Joe in his Wendy’s uniform, typing to her from the staffroom with a large Pepsi in his spare hand and someone else sitting opposite him eating chips and reading the Sun. Another world, she thought, another life.

  ‘Miss you too,’ she replied, ‘xxx.’

  She found a game on her phone, Patience, which she played until the battery started flashing at her. Then she read a copy of Take a Break magazine, got herself a bag of crisps from a vending machine, and had a cup of tea in a polystyrene cup. Finally John appeared in the corridor, being pushed in a wheelchair, looking sheepish and shell-shocked.

  ‘Hello, trouble,’ he said croakily.

  ‘You can talk,’ she replied.

  John laughed.

  ‘My first day off this week and I’ve spent most of it in A&E,’ she said.

  ‘Then you’re a fool,’ he said.

  Betty laughed then, and before she’d thought about what she was doing she’d taken his hand in hers. ‘I must be,’ she said. ‘Felt sorry for you.’

  He had a row of stitches on his temple and was attached to a drip that followed them on wheels up the corridors towards the lift.

  ‘You look good,’ she said, as the lift doors closed and they started their ascent to the ward.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said, ‘I bet I do.’

  ‘No, I mean it, you do. Compared to how you looked two hours ago.’

  ‘When I was spread-eagled on a toilet floor, covered in blood and sweating profusely, you mean?’

  ‘Yeah.’ She squeezed his hand and smiled. ‘Exactly.’

  ‘How did you find me?’ he asked.

  ‘Toiletries man.’

  ‘Micky.’

  ‘If you say so.’

  ‘Good old Micky.’ The lift doors opened and the porter pushed John down another corridor.

  ‘You know that’s it now, don’t you? You have to move. You cannot live in that flat for a minute longer.’

  John shrugged. ‘Usual issues. No time.’

  ‘Well, then stay with me.’ The words were out of her mouth before she’d even thought it through. ‘I’m hardly there. You’re hardly there. It’s so convenient.’

  ‘Er, Betty, you live in a studio flat.’

  ‘Yes, I do. But I have a sofa.’

  ‘I’m six foot two.’

  ‘Well, then I’ll call your sister, you can stay with her.’

  ‘No way!’

  ‘Then stay with me. My flat is small, but it is very warm. And very dry. And I can get you things, you know, glasses of water. And bowls of soup.’

  ‘You’re mad,’ he said.

  ‘Of course I am,’ she said. ‘But I’m also practical. And this makes total sense.’ The porter stopped at the nurses’ station on the ward and talked to the nurse behind the desk. Then John was taken to a bed in the corner of the ward where Betty and the porter helped him onto the bed.

  ‘I’ll think about it,’ he said, patting her hand slightly patronisingly. ‘But listen, for now, while I’m stuck here, I need to ask you a really big favour. Could you pack up my pitch? Micky will help. The keys to my van are in my jacket pocket.’

  ‘Where’s your jacket?’

  ‘On my pitch. Under the table.’

  ‘Right, and where’s your van?’

  ‘Underground car park on Brewer Street. I’m really sorry. This is all a fucking hassle.’

  ‘No. It’s fine. It’s not a hassle. I can sort it all out. I’ve got nothing else to do. Honestly.’

  John looked at her and then he patted her hand again, fondly this time.

  ‘I could store your stuff in my place.’

  ‘And again, I remind you, you live in a studio flat.’

  ‘There’s room,’ she said. ‘I can make room.’

  John paused for a moment and then smiled weakly. ‘Why are you being so nice?’ he asked.

  ‘Why wouldn’t I?’ she replied. ‘I think we already ascertained that we hold each other in high regard. I’m just being a friend.’

  He looked at her curiously, as if he was trying to work out a puzzle. Then he smiled again and nodded. ‘That would be brilliant,’ he said. ‘Totally brilliant. Thank you.’ He squeezed her hand and Betty felt her stomach roll over unexpectedly.

  ‘You’re welcome,’ she said.

  ‘And talking of being friends, I did something for you earlier. I went to the library. Did some research. I was going to tell you about it when you got back from work. But I decided to faint in a public toilet and split my head open instead, so –’

  ‘What?’ said Betty, excitedly. ‘What did you find?’

  ‘I found Gideon Worsley’s nephew.’

  ‘What. How?’

  He shrugged. ‘It was easy. I looked up Gideon in the Encyclopaedia Britannica and saw that he had a brother called Toby who was a major-general, brought a battalion through the Battle of the Somme, and it said that he had a son called Jeremiah. I thought, well, how many Jeremiah Worsleys could there be in the world, so I looked him up in the phonebook and there he was, running an antiques shop in World’s End.’

  Betty stared at him.

  ‘The address is in my jacket pocket.’

  ‘Under your pitch?’

  ‘Under my pitch.’

  ‘Have you spoken to him?’

  ‘No. I thought I’d leave that treat for you.’

  A nurse appeared inside the curtained cubicle and took John’s temperature. She consulted a clipboard at the foot of his bed and smiled and said, ‘Much better. It’s right down to normal.’

  ‘Go,’ said John.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Go home. Sort my pitch. Get down to World’s End. He’ll be shutting up his shop soon.’

  Betty looked anxiously between John and the nurse. ‘Is he going to be all right,’ she asked. ‘I mean, if I go?’

  The nurse nodded. ‘He’s going to be absolutely fine. Someone’s bringing up the anti-bs. We’ll keep him in until they’ve done their job, and to monitor his temperature, but then he’ll be fine to go home.’

  ‘So, what, tomorrow?’

  ‘Yes,’ said the nurse. ‘Maybe. Probably.’

  Betty squeezed John’s hand one more time. ‘You’ve got my mobile phone number. Call me, if you need me. But I’ll be back later. At visiting hours.’
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  ‘Don’t be daft.’

  ‘I’m not being daft.’ She kissed his forehead, firmly, maternally. ‘I’ll see you later.’

  ‘I won’t be expecting you.’

  She left the cubicle then, through the curtains, and was halfway to the door when she heard the nurse say to John, ‘She’s very pretty, your girlfriend.’ And then she heard John reply, ‘She’s not my girlfriend.’ Betty stopped, to hear what he would say next, but he said nothing, so she carried on towards the door.

  Jeremiah Worsley’s antiques shop at World’s End was the most enchanting shop Betty had ever set foot in. It still had its original ornate Victorian shop front and was filled in every square foot with beautiful objects: tables made from swirling green marble and gleaming gold, oversized chandeliers, candlesticks held aloft by pewter ladies, exquisitely detailed marquetry cabinets, and immense oil paintings of bosomy gentlewomen posed with spaniels. It reminded her, almost, of Arlette’s boudoir and the atmosphere was complemented by a crackling 78 playing quietly on a gramophone player, a cut-glass English voice singing a sweet song about swallows and swifts and sweethearts.

  Behind a large mahogany and marble desk sat a man who looked a little like a toad, or possibly a sea lion. He was large – very large – his girth straining against a striped waistcoat, his hair a mass of oily white curls, his face a terrifying scarlet boil. He was humming gently along with the music and slowly turning the pages of a book about Edith Piaf.

  He glanced up at Betty as she entered and said, ‘Good afternoon’ in a booming drawl that pulled out the last syllable to an almost comical extent.

  She approached his desk and he eyed her again from over the top of his book. He sighed, almost imperceptibly, and laid the book down on the desk top. ‘Yes, dear lady, can I help you? I’m not hiring at the moment. In fact, I’m probably going to have to sell up and then throw myself from a bridge onto a motorway, given the current economic climate. So ...’

  Betty smiled, glad that she was not about to add to his woes. ‘No,’ she said, ‘I’m not looking for a job, I’m looking for Jeremiah Worsley.’

  ‘You have found him.’ He smiled, a touch facetiously.

  ‘Good. Excellent. My name’s Betty.’

  ‘Oh,’ he smiled, ‘a Betty. I have not met a Betty in a very long time. The last Betty I knew was my char. Back in the days when I could afford a char.’ He raised a bushy eyebrow. ‘So, Betty, what can I do for you?’