A Class Apart

by Stephen Henning

  Chapter 2 – Awakenings

  Friday 10 June

  Samantha Blake opened her puffy, painful eyes, saw her mum and dad’s faces looking down worriedly at her and wondered what was going on.

  Like all the victims of the car bomb, she had been rushed to Brent Valley General Hospital.

  Sam had no idea where she was; she felt sick and drowsy, and at the edge of her consciousness she was aware of a pain in her stomach and legs. Mum looked as though she’d been crying for a week. Dad was looking at her with haunted eyes like somehow he’d let her down.

  She saw her mum lean closer and felt her own hand being stroked gently. It was comforting. Sam saw another movement in the corner of her eye as a woman in a white coat came closer. Sam fell asleep again.

  Sam dreamed the strangest, most vivid of dreams. She dreamed she was in her bedroom at home. She was sitting up in bed, wearing her pyjamas, and looking out of the window. Her mum was standing by the bedroom door, wishing her goodnight and turning the light out. But she wasn’t looking at her mum. She was staring out of the window.

  The room itself seemed to be moving, as if it were driving down the road like a car. She was looking at the streets, houses and cars that the room was overtaking. The room was taking her to school for an exam. She could see the school in the distance. Then the school suddenly exploded and a ball of flame slowly but steadily rolled down the road towards her.

  She saw her brother James tumbling through the air in slow motion. He froze for a few seconds in front of the window, looking in at her and reaching out his hand. Philip Randerson floated up to the window and pushed James aside. He started knocking on the glass and, although Sam could not hear what he was saying, she could see he was mouthing “Let me in”. Then the fireball caught up with them. James and Philip were engulfed in the fire and a second later it came crashing through the window.

  Sam woke up in the hospital bed and found she could not move. She could hear screaming and was half aware that the sound came from her. She was soaked in sweat, it was pitch black and she was scared. Nurses rushed around her and she felt the cool, soothing hand of a girl who seemed not that much older than Sam herself. She was pretty, she was smiling and she stroked Sam’s forehead. She spoke, but Sam didn’t really know what she was saying. Seconds later and Sam had drifted back to sleep.

  Saturday 11 June

  Brent Valley General was one of the tallest hospitals in the world. Built in 1976, it stood 150 metres and 36 storeys tall – taller than the Guy’s Hospital tower in Southwark and only 94 metres shorter than One Canada Tower at Canary Wharf. It was a rather ugly slab of a building that somehow looked like it was trying to muscle in on nature and take its place in the sky. It stood incongruously within the relatively low-rise skyline of West London, dwarfing all the office blocks, apartments and shops that surrounded it. The majesty of its supreme height was offset by the ugly aesthetics of its 1970s’ origins. Any grandeur it might have had when it was new had long since been tarnished by time and the British weather.

  PC O’Brien of the Metropolitan Police trudged up and down the long corridor on floor 16 of the hospital. He was not happy. Twenty or so survivors had been brought in from that coach bomb, and the guv’ wanted an eye kept on all of them. All very well, but why didn’t they put them in one big ward, rather than scattered around the building?

  The whole operation was stupid, in O’Brien’s opinion. They’d been doing this for days now. The poor kids had been caught in a terrorist bombing. Horrible, but it wasn’t as though the terrorists had deliberately targeted them, was it? That wasn’t the way it worked. These things were always random. The terrorists weren’t likely to come strolling in here to try again. Although O’Brien wished they would, so he could personally beat the living daylights out of the sick–

  “Excuse me,” said a well-spoken, confident young voice from behind him, startling him out of his fantasy.

  PC O’Brien turned around. There was a tall, prim and pretty young girl standing behind him. She looked like she was about 16. She had long black hair, swept back in a ponytail, and she was dressed in a smart green school uniform, which suggested to O’Brien one of the expensive private schools. However, he raised a disapproving eyebrow when he saw the length of her skirt. There was no way he would allow his daughter to go anywhere in something that short.

  “Yes, Miss?”

  “There seems to be some sort of fight in the next corridor,” said the girl helpfully. There was something slightly mocking in the girl’s cat-like blue eyes that O’Brien found unnerving. The way she delivered the line, so cool and confidently, made O’Brien think she had made it up.

  “What?” he asked.

  The girl nodded enthusiastically.

  “One of the doctors was being attacked.” She pointed down the corridor. “Quite badly,” she added.

  ‘Perhaps the guv’ was right,’ thought O’Brien. He had no choice but to investigate, and he sprinted off in the direction the girl was pointing. Heaven help her if she was lying.

  Lolly smiled to herself. She had made up the story about the fight, but she wanted the policeman out of the way. She walked in the opposite direction along the corridor to room seven – Samantha Blake’s room. She strode in. It was a private room, with an adjoining bathroom. The girl was asleep. She looked battered and bruised. Both legs were in plaster.

  Lolly approached the girl and peered closer. The girl was pretty, Lolly would concede that. Although not as pretty as herself.

  Was she worth the effort that Daddy had gone to? There were some minor bruises on the girl’s face. They seemed to be healing nicely, but the girl was definitely in a bad way. Time to find out if Daddy was right.

  She took ‘the gadget’ from her green blazer pocket. It was a small black device, the same size as a mobile phone. Daddy had a poncey name for it but, to her, it was just ‘the gadget’. Technology didn’t really interest Lolly, but she knew it had its uses.

  She plucked out a small transparent bag from her other pocket and removed a perspex slide and a razor blade. She made a small cut on Samantha’s arm, near her elbow. No one would notice another injury among all the others. Sam immediately started bleeding and started to stir slightly. Lolly quickly rubbed the perspex slide onto the blood and placed the slide into a slot at the back of the black device. She checked Sam. The girl wasn’t properly awake and had no idea what was going on. Probably the medication. Lolly looked at the small cut she had made on the girl’s arm. It had already stopped bleeding.

  Lolly pressed the ON button on the gadget. A screen on the front lit up. A progress bar started running across the screen. The screen changed quickly to report Analysis complete, then Range 60–80%. Lolly was impressed. The brother, James, had tested with the same result. Daddy was absolutely right, as usual. She placed the items back in her pocket.

  Lolly then walked round to the other side of the bed and looked in Sam’s locker. She found her mobile phone. Lolly picked out a small USB stick from her pocket and attached it to the phone. Instantly, specialised spy software started installing itself on the mobile. The whole process took less than a minute.

  “Get well soon, Samantha,” said Lolly, replacing the phone and putting the USB stick back in her pocket. “I’ll be seeing you again when you’re better.”

  She turned to leave, but heard voices in the corridor. The name ‘Sam’ was used. The girl in the bed started stirring. Quickly, Lolly hid in the private bathroom.

  Roger and Yvonne Blake were delighted to find their daughter opening her eyes and looking around her as they entered the room. It was a hot, glorious summer’s day and Yvonne Blake couldn’t help but reflect on how her children should be outside playing with their friends.

  “Oh Sam!” Her mum could not hold back and she rushed forward to give her daughter the biggest and yet gentlest cuddle that she could. Her dad came and kissed her on the forehead and took her hand in his.

  “Sweetheart, we’re so relieved,” he
said, his voice nearly failing him. His daughter looked smaller, younger, so vulnerable, but she had colour back in her cheeks. He stroked her beautiful blonde hair, now matted with sweat and falling lankly over her face. She looked bewildered.

  “How are you feeling, poppet?” her mum asked.

  “I feel hungry,” said Sam, without really thinking. And she was. She was ravenous. Yvonne exchanged glances with Roger, who raised an eyebrow but said nothing.

  Yvonne helped prop her daughter up in bed. She had noticed how Sam had been looking a little thinner every day and, in her opinion, Sam had precious little weight to lose.

  “Your mother has been bringing food in every day, just on the off-chance you woke up,” said Roger Blake. “She’s been giving it to the nurses. And some of them really don’t need any more fattening up. They should build these hospitals with bigger corridors.”

  “Roger!” snapped Yvonne Blake.

  “Sorry luv.”

  Sam smiled weakly. Ordinarily her dad’s cringey, un-PC comments and loud voice would make her want to curl up and die. Now she couldn’t be more grateful to hear his terrible jokes and she just wanted to uncurl and live happily ever after with them.

  Yvonne Blake reached into a freezer bag that she’d been carrying and produced a quiche, stored in tupperware, and already cut up. She trundled the food tray over to Sam’s bed, took the quiche out of the tupperware and put it on a plate.

  “Perhaps I should wash this up in the bathroom,” she wondered, holding the tupperware.

  In the bathroom, Lolly tensed up. She would kill the girl’s parents if she had to. She could hear footsteps approaching. Lolly stayed hidden behind the door.

  “Just put it in your bag, babe,” said Roger, firmly. “Wash it up when we get home.”

  The footsteps receded. Lolly relaxed slightly. There was a small window set into the wall to her left. An escape route if she needed it, but for the time being she wanted to stay and listen.

  Sam ate with growing confidence and had soon finished her plate. Food had never tasted so good! She took a moment to collect her senses and look around her. She had cards, flowers, some of her running trophies from her bedroom at home and sitting on top of her bedside locker was her teddy bear Johnny – which was a bit embarrassing.

  “What happened?” she asked finally, and then as her thoughts cleared a little further, she looked momentarily panicked.

  “Where’s James?”

  Her mother moved a little closer to reassure her.

  “James is fine, sweetheart. He’s in a ward on the floor above. He’s been awake for two days and he’s already out of bed. He broke an arm and his collarbone. But you’re both fine and you’re going to be ok.” Her mother was crying a little now, but her voice stayed strong.

  “How did I get here?” Sam asked shakily. “There was a noise... we were on the coach, was it a bomb? What about Nina? Where’s Nina?”

  Her father sat down in the chair next to her.

  “Yes, sweetheart. There was a car bomb. It blew up just as your coach went past. Some... people were killed. I’m so sorry. But Nina is fine, she’s fine. She was released from hospital yesterday afternoon. Her parents have taken her to stay with grandparents in India.”

  Roger looked into his daughter’s eyes to see what effect his words were having. Sam just felt numb. She heard the words but they didn’t seem to mean anything. People killed? Surely not people on the coach? Not her friends? Mrs Cutts and Mr Stark? The nice driver Mr Hacker, who knew her mum and who always asked her how she was getting on in her athletics competitions? Emma Venton?

  “Can I see James?” she asked. Her father looked at her mother and then nodded.

  “He’s been in to see you. He sat with you yesterday, reading his guitar magazine out to you until the nurses made him go back to his ward. He said it would make you wake up to tell him to shut up.”

  Sam laughed, and Roger’s heart leaped to see his daughter’s face come to life. The laughter turned to a convulsion of coughing and she had to hold her ribs.

  “You’ve taken a heck of a knock, sweetheart,” he said, as he stroked her arm. “Just take it easy. Be a while before you’re back on the running track. But you’ll get there.”

  Yvonne Blake threw her husband a look but said nothing. There was a knock on the door and a woman in a white coat came in, with an air of brisk efficiency.

  “As you can see she’s doing very well,” the woman said, without seeming to direct the comment at anyone in particular. She picked up Sam’s medical chart from the end of the bed and gave Sam a warm smile.

  “Morning, Doctor,” said Yvonne Blake. “How is she doing?”

  There was a brief silence as the doctor studied the chart.

  “Remarkably well,” she murmured. She looked at Sam again. “Hello Samantha, I’m Dr Okocha. I hadn’t expected you to be awake. How are you feeling?”

  “All right, I think,” muttered Sam, looking a little bewildered again.

  “I’m very pleased with your progress Samantha.” She looked closer at Sam’s face. “You’re in no danger, although you have two broken legs, broken ribs and burns on your stomach and chest. There was damage to your lungs but they healed very quickly. The swelling and the bruising on your face has mostly gone.” She sounded quite surprised, thought Roger. Dr Okocha carefully looked at the bandages around Sam’s stomach.

  “We’re going to give you some X-rays tomorrow, and we’ll also take a proper look under the dressings to see how things are coming along. But so far you’ve been healing very well. A bit like your brother. You must be a very healthy family. Did you give them a lot of greens when they were younger?” She smiled at Yvonne, who smiled gratefully back.

  “What about her burns?” asked Roger.

  “We’ll have a better idea about that when we change the bandages. The only other concerns I have at the moment are her weight and her temperature. She seems to have lost quite a lot of weight since she was brought in.”

  Roger and Yvonne nodded but didn’t really know what to say.

  “Well,” said Roger, clearing his throat and hearing his voice sound slightly awkward. “She’s had her lunch today.”

  “Oh, it’s nothing to worry about,” Dr Okocha reassured them.

  “What about her temperature?” asked Roger.

  Dr Okocha looked at Sam and nodded thoughtfully. She produced a thermometer and took Sam’s temperature again. It read 39.8 degrees Celsius.

  “She’s very hot at the moment. In fact, she should be feverish with that kind of reading. Do you feel hot, Sam?”

  Sam shook her head. Her mother put her hand on her daughter’s forehead. She felt cool.

  “We’ll keep monitoring it,” Dr Okocha promised. “Do you have any questions Samantha?”

  Sam realised she had only been half listening to her medical report. She had been thinking about the itch on her left leg inside the plaster cast. She looked up, realising she had just been asked another question.

  “What time is dinner? I’m hungry.”

  In the bathroom, Lolly had heard enough. It sounded like everything was on course. There was no more to do for some time now. Besides, all this talk of food was making her ravenous. She decided to take her leave. She opened the bathroom window, jumped up on to the sink, slid her legs through the gap and the rest of her body followed gracefully.

  “What was that?” asked Sam. Everyone had heard a noise from the bathroom.

  Roger Blake went to investigate. The room was empty. The small window was open. He shrugged, and came back into the room.

  “Nothing to worry about,” he said, uneasily.

  James Blake was on Uxbridge Ward on the 17th floor, one level up from his sister’s room. Seven of his other classmates were on the same ward, all with a variety of injuries which ranged considerably in severity.

  James had been dozing fitfully for the past two hours and was awoken by the sound of raised voices. It took him nearly a minute to work out where
he was. He could feel a pain in his left arm and his collarbone as he shifted his position slightly. He’d been having a strange dream, which he now couldn’t remember. Something about the accident.

  James’s whole body felt weird. He tried to ignore the feeling. His phone was in his right hand, where presumably he’d been holding it when he fell asleep. He looked at the screen. It read 14:11. Visiting time. His parents would be in soon. They would have stopped in at Sam’s room first to see if she had woken up yet. He hoped today would be the day that she did. These last few days had felt very strange indeed. In their whole life he and Sam had not spent more than one week apart and even in that time they had been able to either talk or text each other. Seeing Sam in her hospital bed, immobile and silent, not knowing what she was thinking, made him feel very... lonely. Yes, that was it; for the first time in his life he felt vulnerable and isolated.

  He winced as a shrill voice pierced through the background noises that he’d become accustomed to in the hospital. In the bed next to him was Philip Randerson. Philip was in a very bad way. He’d suffered severe head injuries, two broken legs and goodness knows what else. He was in a coma and on life support. James did not really know Philip, but he felt a strange attachment to him. A literal attachment, according to the doctor. Apparently when the ambulances had arrived at the blast scene he had been lying on top of Philip, both of them covered in blood. He had no memory of this, but it sounded gross. Because of their burns, part of his skin had actually been stuck to Philip’s and the doctors had had to separate them. James felt sick at the thought of it. He looked at his own right shoulder. There were bandages on it to cover the burns, but it didn’t hurt.

  Philip’s parents stood around his bed. James had never met Mr and Mrs Randerson before yesterday, but they weren’t easily forgotten. Mr Randerson was tall, thin, grey and silently authoritative. Mrs Randerson was shorter than James, thinner than her husband, with a voice like a knife. James felt that they seemed strangely out of time. Like they should be Philip’s grandparents, rather than his parents.

  Dr Soames, as far as James could work out, was the main doctor in charge of all the patients on the ward. James had seen more doctors than he could count in the last couple of days but he was fairly sure Dr Soames was the boss man, the head honcho, the doc-meister general. It had amused James the way that all the nurses seemed to fancy the white coat off Dr Soames. In fairness, Soames seemed cool. James had no idea how old he was, probably about the same age as his dad. Forty-something? But he had a reassuring manner, never seemed flustered, always appeared to be in control and when he spoke he used a hushed tone that made you listen harder and give every word your full attention.

  James was intrigued to see if Dr Soames had met his match in Mrs Randerson, because she was totally going for it.

  “We’re just going around in a big circle, Mr Soames,” she said, in a way that made James think she was banging out each syllable with a hammer and chisel.

  “Philip should be in a private room. The standard of care that he is receiving here is not acceptable. It took three days just to be able to speak to you to find out how he is. How are we supposed to know what to do, or what to think?”

  “Mrs Randerson, I do understand your concern. Philip’s injuries are very serious and he is being given priority treatment. But, as I’m sure you will appreciate, this is an exceptional emergency. The hospital’s facilities have been stretched by the severity of this incident. There are no private rooms available and Philip is receiving round-the-clock care.”

  “You seem unable to answer a simple question, Doctor. What we want to know is, will Philip wake up, and is he brain damaged?”

  “We simply cannot say whether Philip’s injuries will result in permanent brain injury,” began Dr Soames.

  “Then can’t you operate on him to make him better?” Mrs Randerson cut in.

  “And I do feel you should move him to a private room to aid him in his recovery,” added Mr Randerson.

  Poor Philip. James wondered if he could hear the furore around his bed. James had sat by Philip’s bed yesterday and tried talking to him, to see if he would wake up. He didn’t really know what to say because he had barely spoken to Philip before, despite being in his class. He had found Philip a bit odd, but basically harmless. He had felt sorry for him on occasion as he’d often seen Philip being picked on, usually by Emma Venton.

  Tuning back into the argument, it didn’t seem to be going well for either side.

  “You’re absolutely right about one thing, Mr Soames.”

  James was amused by the deliberate use of “mister” rather than “doctor”.

  “This is an extraordinary incident,” continued Mrs Randerson, “and I’m sure you are aware that the eyes of the world are on this hospital right now. We have had many reporters telephoning the house over the last few days and, although I have not spoken to any of them so far because I have been too upset, I may decide that the British public, and people around the world, have a right to know how my son is being cared for. I suspect that the board of this NHS trust will not be pleased with you if I reveal that conditions in this hospital are practically third world.”

  Dr Soames visibly bristled, but he was still a long way from losing control.

  “I can see that you have an itch that needs to be scratched, Mrs Randerson,” he said, coolly. “I’m sure the hospital can help you stop itching.”

  The Randersons looked nonplussed.

  James smiled, and felt the phone buzz in his hand. They weren’t supposed to have mobile phones on the ward, but so far no one had stopped him using it. He had received a text message – from his sister! It said: ‘I bet u caused all this! :-)’

  James smiled. She was awake! Thank goodness. He’d never doubted she would be ok, but it was a relief to hear from her. He would go and see her soon. He replied:

  ‘Already told m and d that it was u. Damage comin out of ur pocket money!’

  He got a reply quickly.

  ‘They’ve been in to see me. On way 2 u now. I hear my room better than urs LOL’

  He texted back.

  ‘Weirdy girl :-)’

  ‘Freakoid!’ came back the instant reply.

  Another text came through. This one from his best mate Steve.

  ‘Is ok mate. Am lookin after ur xbox while ur in hospital.’

  James laughed, but before he could reply, another one came through.

  ‘And I got ur bike. And I dragged ur wallet clear from the coach. Stay as long as u need to in hospital.’

  James chuckled. He really wanted to see Steve and just have a laugh. He replied:

  ‘ur dead sunshine.’

  No sooner had James sent the text than his mum literally bounded onto the ward.

  “She’s awake! She’s awake! We’ve just been to see her!” She kissed James on the forehead. His dad came in seconds later.

  “Hello, Son. How are you feeling?”

  James grinned. “I’m ok Dad. Sam just texted me.”

  His parents groaned.

  “You two and those phones,” said Roger. “I thought twins were supposed to be telepathic. If you were it might save us a fortune in mobile bills!”

  Dr Soames, grateful for the distraction, walked over to James’s bed and picked up his chart.

  “Good afternoon Mrs Blake, Mr Blake,” he murmured. “You’ll be delighted to know James is making excellent progress. Quite excellent.” Dr Soames seemed to be inspecting the chart closely, as though he was dubious of the veracity of the information.

  It was like watching a repeat of Dr Okocha with Sam, thought Roger Blake.

  “Yes,” murmured Dr Soames. “Remarkable. Tell me James, how are you feeling today?”

  James thought for a second. The pain in his arm and collarbone had pretty much disappeared, although he did still have a strange, sickening sensation sweeping his body, which he put down to his medication. But there was also another feeling.

  “I feel hungry,” he
said. “What time is dinner?”

  Lolly had felt no fear, hanging from the window outside Sam’s bathroom, 16 floors up. She had used the smallest of handholds to manoeuvre from window to window until she found another one that was open. She slipped into another private bathroom. It was identical to Sam’s. She then strode through the bedroom, much to the surprise of the old lady in the bed, and out into the corridor. She paused to straighten her blazer and skirt. It was important to look smart at all times.

  “Excuse me, Miss!” said a stern voice from behind her. PC O’Brien was marching down the corridor. He didn’t look happy at being tricked. A bit of bad luck running into him again, but fun nonetheless. Lolly ignored him and pushed her way through the doors leading to the stairwell. PC O’Brien ran after her.

  Lolly braced herself and placed a hand on the stair rail. It was finally time to leave. But the Blakes would be hearing from her again – very soon.

  She looked over her shoulder. PC O’Brien was looking at her through the glass of the big wooden doors that separated the stairwell from the corridor. She winked, gripped the stair rail with both hands and sprung over the top of it. PC O’Brien rushed through the doors and looked over the rail, down at the endless twisting, turning flights of stairs. The girl was dropping down the dizzying gap, using the various rails and handholds like an Olympic gymnast to aid her descent. Within a few seconds she had dropped out of sight.