Patience

by Victoria Scott

  She had turned around and walked over to where he was sitting, and pulled out a chair. ‘That’s fine, love. Pray away. If it helps.’

  ‘Grandpa taught me how to do it. You know, when we used to visit him.’

  ‘Yes, I suppose he did.’

  ‘You didn’t like Grandpa, did you?’

  ‘No, not very much. He never thought I was good enough for your mum. And… well, he wasn’t a nice man, really.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, he said something horrible once. Something your mum and I have never forgiven him for.’

  ‘Was it something about Patience?’

  ‘Oh no. He was very nice about her. Although neither he nor your gran were very helpful, in practical ways. But they said nice things, at least.’

  ‘Then who was it about?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ He swung his head around to look directly at her. ‘Love, your mum told me about your news.’

  Pete registered a look of panic in her eyes.

  ‘About Ed leaving,’ he carried on. ‘Well, as your mum said, we had our doubts about him. As did you, I think? And you definitely don’t want to marry someone if you have doubts.’

  ‘But what about the money you’ve lost?’

  ‘We’ll get some of it back. And of course Great-Auntie Maud will be grumpy that she won’t be able to debut her peach fascinator, but she’ll just have to cope, won’t she?’

  Eliza laughed, and then looked at her dad in wonder.

  ‘Don’t look at me like that,’ he said. ‘You’re human. Humans make mistakes. Why did you expect us to be so disappointed in you?’ For heaven’s sake, he thought, I’ve made enough mistakes for all of us.

  ‘I just thought that you wanted me to do things properly,’ she said. ‘You’ve always wanted me to do things properly. Uni, proper career, good salary, pick a man with prospects, get married, have babies…’

  ‘When did I ever say those things?’

  He could see her thinking about it.

  ‘Well, not exactly those words. But you did push me into going to uni. And wanted me to get a good job.’

  ‘That wasn’t for me, sweetheart, it was for you. I wanted you to be happy. And not make the mistakes that I did.’ Pete looked down at his shoes, which were splattered with paint and dust.

  ‘But you’re a globetrotter, Dad. You work all over the world, see all sorts of stuff, meet all sorts of people. You have an exciting job.’

  ‘Do you really think that? Love, I hate it.’

  Eliza looked at her father in silence. Pete realised that he’d never really spoken to her about his own feelings, about anything. Their conversations had always been loving and caring, but practical, never emotional. He could tell that this shift had been noted.

  ‘If you hate it, you should stop doing it.’

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because we need the money.’

  ‘But Mum’s working now.’

  Pete visibly sank, his shoulders and chin dropping. Then he gripped the bridge of his nose with his finger and thumb, cast his eyes down, and sighed. ‘Oh, it doesn’t matter now, does it,’ he mumbled.

  ‘Sorry, Dad? What doesn’t matter? I don’t understand.’

  Pete looked around and made for a row of chairs to their right.

  ‘Sit down, pet. Sit down and listen.’

  Eliza did as he asked.

  ‘So. Money,’ he said, facing the altar, looking away from her. ‘You’ll be wondering why we’re still hard up, given the work I’ve been doing abroad. The thing is, we did have a nice nest egg saved up. I’d worked hard on lots of foreign contracts and I had it squirrelled away. We were all set up for a nice retirement. And then, I met Chris.’

  ‘Chris?’ Eliza turned towards her father and he shifted slightly, meeting her gaze.

  ‘She was another expat in Doha, a Brit.’

  ‘Chris was a woman?’

  ‘Yes, short for Christina, I think. I met her at the rugby club one night. She was friendly. Very friendly.’ He remembered, with shame, that he’d allowed her to flirt with him. He’d even enjoyed the attention. ‘We got on, you know? And she got me and my mates tickets for the golf via her firm. And we’d always wanted to go.’

  ‘Oh?’ Eliza’s eyes had widened.

  ‘It’s not what you’re thinking, pet, I promise. I’d never do that to your mum.’

  Pete was worried enough about how this revelation would affect his daughter’s view of him; good heavens, he didn’t want her thinking he would cheat on Louise, too. He’d had offers over the years – it happened, when you were away from home – but he’d never acted on it.

  ‘Anyway. When we were there, she told me about this amazing investment opportunity she was working on, a new hotel they were building out there. Luxury development, beach-side property, all the bells and whistles. She said that if I invested in it, I could double my money. So I did, didn’t I? I invested all of our life savings, all fifty thousand bloody pounds of them, in a hotel which never got built. Chris disappeared a few months later and I haven’t been able to track her down. I have no idea if I even know her real name.’

  Pete’s eyes were brimming with tears. He had worked so hard over the years, not just to provide for his family, but also to present a strong, confident figure for them all. He had tried never to show any weakness, never to reveal how he was feeling inside. But now they knew the truth, he thought.

  ‘Oh, Dad!’

  ‘You know that saying? A fool is easily parted from his money? I am that fool.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, Dad. You thought you were investing. You were trying to do your best for Mum.’

  ‘That’s all I’ve ever wanted to do,’ he said. ‘And just look at the mess I’ve made of that.’

  They sat in silence for a few more seconds, before Pete sprang up and began to walk towards the door. The less said about all of this, the better.

  ‘We’d better get back, don’t you think?’ he said, beckoning for her to follow, and she was about to do so when a woman walked in.

  ‘Can I help you?’ she asked, with a gentle smile.

  ‘We’re looking for the priest, love,’ he answered. ‘My daughter is in ICU.’

  ‘That’s me,’ said the woman, who Pete assessed to be in her early forties. She was wearing low heels, a knee-length patterned skirt, a white shirt – which he now noticed had a white clerical collar – and dangly silver earrings. Her highlighted hair was sleek and well-brushed. She did not look like any priest Pete had ever met before. ‘I’m one of the hospital chaplaincy team,’ she said. ‘I’m a Church of England priest. What flavour of priest were you looking for?’

  Pete’s mouth twitched. ‘We aren’t regular churchgoers, I’m afraid,’ he said. ‘But my wife – her father was a vicar. He was C of E too.’

  ‘OK, great. It doesn’t much matter, to be honest, as long as you are comfortable,’ the woman replied, her voice warm. ‘I’m Theresa, by the way.’

  ‘Nice to meet you,Theresa,’ said Eliza, who had now joined them by the door. She held out her hand. ‘I’m Eliza. Patience, my sister, is in ICU. She’s really poorly. Could we go there now, do you think? Right now?’

  32

  Eliza and Patience

  April

  The priest had followed them immediately, her heels tapping on the stairs behind them as they’d climbed up the two storeys to the wards. Eliza took a deep breath before pushing open the door into ICU, genuinely frightened about what she might find when she entered.

  She was relieved to find her mum and Serena sitting side by side, talking, a clear sign that Patience hadn’t taken a turn for the worse. Louise looked up as they entered, and then stood up when she spotted Theresa coming in their wake.

  ‘Thank you so much for coming,’ she said, walking towards her, holding out a hand.

  ‘Not at all,’ Theresa replied, slowly and quietly, shaking Louise’s hand as she did so. ‘Now – can you
tell me all about Patience?’ she said.

  The family made room for her beside the bed, and Theresa sat down so that she could look directly at Patience.

  ‘Patience,’ she called out, softly, carefully. ‘Patience, my name is Theresa. I’m a priest here and your mum and dad asked me to come to see you. You’re very poorly, but I wanted you to know that we are all rooting for you. That you are loved and watched over.’

  Golly, the sun is warm here. It feels like it’s closer to me than usual. It’s HUGE. The grass I’m lying on is lush and not at all scratchy, and I’m watching wind-whipped clouds scudding over my head.

  Eliza watched as the priest carried out her duty, offering comfort in the face of extreme fear. Her voice was incredibly soothing, and Eliza found that her own breathing – which she now realised had been rapid all morning – was easing.

  I raise my hands in front of my face and wiggle my fingers, marvelling at the invisible patterns I can make in the sky, like I’m conducting an orchestra of the elements.

  Eliza looked over at Patience’s face. She appeared serene, as if she was having a lovely sleep. She thought that her breathing might have got a little easier in the past hour, but it was quite possible that she was imagining that. She wondered what Patience would say about her predicament, if she could speak. Probably a whole list of expletives – and fair enough.

  ‘And what I’d like to do now is to say a prayer for Patience. If that’s OK?’ Theresa was now looking at Louise and Pete, seeking their approval. Louise nodded readily and a few seconds later so did Pete. Eliza looked at him closely and could not see any signs of discomfort in his face or body language. Theresa seemed to have had a calming influence on them all.

  ‘Dear Lord, please watch over Patience,’ she began, ‘and give her the strength to fight. But please also look over her family.’

  Eliza closed her eyes and, for the second time that day, pleaded with someone, anyone, to help her sister to continue to live.

  That sun is growing larger by the minute. Is it… Is it… coming to get me? To take me home?

  *

  Eliza retreated from ICU after that and left her parents talking to Theresa. They hadn’t asked her to leave, but there was something about their hushed tones and intense conversation that told her they would rather she didn’t hear what they had to say. She also realised that it was the first time in months that she had seen them talking calmly to each other and she had no desire to disrupt such a rare event.

  Hours spent in a hospital ward were definitely longer than ordinary hours, Eliza thought, as she walked out of the ward and into the corridor. At least twice as long. She had been taking turns with both her parents to sit beside Patience and talk to her, while they went to sit in the spring sunshine, or ate a meal in the on-site cafeteria. This time alone had given her plenty of time to think, not about Patience – she didn’t even want to go there, it was too painful to contemplate – but about the peripheral stuff in her life that needed sorting. She had to make some decisions, some plans.

  ‘Eliza?’

  Jimmy was walking towards her down the corridor. She smiled at him instinctively, despite her worries about Patience.

  ‘Oh, hi,’ she said. They hadn’t spoken since that morning, when they had found Patience delirious in bed at the respite care home.

  ‘I’ve just come off shift; I came straight here.’

  Eliza was puzzling over whether it would be acceptable to embrace him, and couldn’t think of anything remotely sensible to ask.

  ‘Look, I’m sorry. Do you blame me? I wouldn’t be surprised. We should have spotted it sooner. But we’re short-staffed and we really did think she was just tired…’ Evidently, Jimmy had misread her facial expression.

  ‘Shall we take a seat?’ she said, pointing to a bench further along the corridor. When they sat down, Jimmy’s knee brushed hers, and she took an involuntary sharp intake of breath. Her knee felt like it was on fire. She sprang away from him.

  ‘Actually, shall we get coffee? I’m gasping,’ she said, walking away briskly, hoping to regain her composure before he caught up with her. Despite her turn of speed, however, Jimmy joined her in seconds, and kept pace with ease, like a marine on a route march. Just a minute later, Eliza was beginning to sweat. They were almost jogging now, she thought, smiling to herself.

  ‘What’s so funny?’ Jimmy said, pursing his lips.

  ‘Do you run regularly?’ she replied. ‘Because I’m knackered and you seem to have just warmed up.’

  ‘It was your pace!’

  ‘I know, I know. My fault. I am obviously very thirsty. Ah, here we are,’ she said, grateful for a distraction. They had arrived at the café, a characterless white box furnished with uncomfortable metal chairs and white melamine tables, and decorated with posters advising visitors to wash their hands, get a flu jab, or check their cholesterol levels.

  ‘I’ll buy them,’ said Jimmy. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I’ll have a decaf cappuccino, if they’ve got some.’

  He turned around to look at her and made a face. ‘Decaf? Are you sure?’

  ‘Quite sure,’ she replied.

  ‘I’d have thought, given the day you’ve had, you’d be after all the caffeine you can get,’ he said as he placed her cardboard takeaway cup on the table.

  ‘Ah, well, there’s a tale,’ she replied, taking the lid off her coffee to see if the barista had sprinkled chocolate on top.

  ‘Do you want to tell it?’

  She considered this.

  ‘Shit, you know, I might as well. Today is utterly surreal. It can’t get any worse.’

  Jimmy removed his jacket. He was wearing a short-sleeved shirt and the muscles in his arms danced as he lifted his coffee up to his mouth for each sip. Eliza was momentarily mesmerised.

  ‘Eliza?’

  ‘Sorry!’ She tried to focus on her coffee instead. ‘So, firstly, I told Mum about the wedding being off, and apparently it’s no big deal. Can you imagine? I suppose that she’s so consumed by Patience at the moment, she can’t really get upset about anything else, can she? It looks like I picked a good day to bury bad news.’

  ‘Or it could just be that she’s really not that bothered.’

  ‘Surely you know my mother well enough by now to know that she’s never not bothered?’

  Jimmy shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘And then there’s the other thing. The big thing, really…’ In for a penny, in for a pound, she thought. ‘… I’m having a baby. In the autumn.’ She looked at him carefully as she said it, interested to see how he’d react.

  Jimmy put down his cup and a broad smile spread across his face.

  ‘You are? That’s amazing. Congratulations.’

  She realised she’d been holding her breath waiting for his response and let out a huge sigh.

  ‘Thank you. I’m excited. Petrified, and excited. It’s Ed’s. But he won’t be around, so it’s just… mine.’

  ‘I’m sure you’ll be a brilliant mother.’

  Eliza raised one eyebrow.

  ‘That just goes to show how little you know me, Jimmy.’

  ‘Oh, come off it. You’ll be great. Are your parents made up?’

  Eliza bit her lip.

  ‘You haven’t broken that bit to them yet, then?’ he said.

  ‘Nope. Not quite yet.’ Eliza stared down at her drink, which the barista had decorated with a heart.

  ‘About earlier,’ she said, looking up at him. ‘Of course I don’t blame you. There’s little point blaming anyone. Dad is blaming Mum for the trial, I blame myself for the trial, and Mum is blaming herself, of course, and the doctors are just blaming bacteria. It seems to me that we are where we are and there’s nothing that any of us can do, except wait.’

  ‘But if we’d spotted it earlier…’

  ‘The medics said it must have come on really quickly. Look, please, please don’t beat yourself up about it. To be honest, we’ve always known that this day would come.
Patience has been on borrowed time for decades.’

  ‘You’re talking like she’s going to die.’

  ‘Don’t you think she is?’

  Jimmy looked at Eliza, his eyes wide.

  ‘No. I’ve got to know P and she’s got a fighting spirit.’

  ‘No amount of fighting is going to make any difference to this, Jimmy. This is just about biology.’

  ‘I know that. But I refuse to give up. I’ve watched someone die and I have no desire to see that again any time soon.’

  ‘Fair enough.’ Eliza put the lid back on her coffee and pushed her chair back.

  ‘Hey, have you told P?’ Jimmy’s eyes were bright.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘The baby.’

  ‘She knows I’m pregnant.’

  ‘But does she know that you’re keeping it?’

  Eliza tapped her fingers against her cup. ‘No. I suppose not.’

  ‘Then you should tell her.’

  ‘Do you think? But she won’t understand it, will she?’

  ‘How can you be sure? I know you share all sorts with her. And she loves it, I can tell. Go and tell her.’

  Eliza didn’t need to think twice. ‘You know what? I will. Thanks. Thank you, Jimmy.’ She pushed her chair back and stood up. ‘OK, then. I’ll see you back there in a bit, shall I?’ she said, her head tipping in the direction of ICU.

  ‘Sure. I’ll hang out here, and come up in half an hour or so.’

  Eliza pulled on her coat and strode off down the corridor.

  *

  Louise was sitting with Patience and she looked pleased to see that Eliza had returned.

  ‘Your dad’s taken Serena back to the house,’ Louise said, sighing, patting the empty chair next to her, inviting Eliza to sit down. ‘It’s been difficult for her, seeing Patience like this. I think she needs to sleep.’

  Eliza nodded. Sleep would also have been her preference, too.

  ‘When did the priest go?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, about half an hour ago. She was wonderful. So caring, so interested in Patience – and in us. Your dad and I had a good chat with her.’