7
Spring arrived overnight, as if winter, like some unwanted guest, had abruptly
shrugged its way into its coat and vanished, without saying goodbye. Everything
became greener, the roads bathed in watery sunshine, the air suddenly balmy.
There were hints of something floral and welcoming in the air, birdsong the
gentle backdrop to the day.
I didn’t notice any of it. I had stayed at Patrick’s house the evening before. It
was the first time I had seen him for almost a week due to his enhanced training
schedule, but having spent forty minutes in the bath with half a pack of bath
salts, he was so exhausted he could barely talk to me. I had begun stroking his
back, in a rare attempt at seduction, and he had murmured that he was really too
tired, his hand flicking as if he were swatting me away. I was still awake and
staring at his ceiling discontentedly four hours later.
Patrick and I had met while I was doing the only other job I have ever held,
that of trainee at The Cutting Edge, Hailsbury’s only unisex hairdresser’s. He
walked in while Samantha, the proprietor, was busy, asking for a number four. I
gave him what he described afterwards as the worst haircut not only that he had
ever had, but the worst haircut in the history of mankind. Three months later,
realizing that a love of fiddling with my own hair did not necessarily mean that I
was cut out to do anyone else’s, I left and got the job at the cafe with Frank.
When we started going out, Patrick had been working in sales and his
favourite things could have been listed as beer, garage chocolate, talking about
sport and sex (doing, not talking about), in that order. A good night out for us
would probably comprise all four. He was ordinary-looking rather than
handsome, and his bum was podgier than mine, but I liked it. I liked the solidity
of him, the way he felt when I wrapped myself around him. His dad was dead
and I liked the way he acted towards his mother; protective and solicitous. And
his four brothers and sisters were like the Waltons. They actually seemed to like
each other. The first time we went out on a date, a little voice in my head said:
This man will never hurt you, and nothing he had done in the seven years since
had led me to doubt it.
And then he turned into Marathon Man.
Patrick’s stomach no longer gave when I nestled into him; it was a hard,
unforgiving thing, like a sideboard, and he was prone to pulling up his shirt and
hitting it with things, to prove quite how hard it was. His face was planed, and
weathered from his time spent constantly outdoors. His thighs were solid
muscle. That would have been quite sexy in itself, had he actually wanted to
have sex. But we were down to about twice a month, and I wasn’t the kind to
ask.
It was as if the fitter he got, the more obsessed by his own shape he became,
the less interested he was in mine. I asked him a couple of times if he didn’t
fancy me any more, but he seemed pretty definite. ‘You’re gorgeous,’ he would
say. ‘I’m just shattered. Anyway, I don’t want you to lose weight. The girls at the
club - you couldn’t make one decent boob out of all of theirs put together.’ I
wanted to ask how exactly he had come to work out this complex equation, but it
was basically a nice thing to say so I let it go.
I wanted to be interested in what he did, I really did. I went to the triathlon
club nights, I tried to chat to the other girls. But I soon realized I was an anomaly
- there were no girlfriends like me - everyone else in the club was single, or
involved with someone equally physically impressive. The couples pushed each
other on workouts, planned weekends in spandex shorts and carried pictures of
each other in their wallets completing triathlons hand in hand, or smugly
comparing joint medals. It was unspeakable.
‘I don’t know what you’re complaining about,’ my sister said when I told her.
‘I’ve had sex once since I had Thomas.’
‘What? Who with?’
‘Oh, some bloke who came in for a Vibrant Hand-Tied,’ she said. ‘I just
wanted to make sure I still could.’
And then, when my jaw dropped, ‘Oh, don’t look like that. It wasn’t during
working hours. And they were funeral flowers. If they had been wife flowers, of
course I wouldn’t have touched him with a gladioli.’
It’s not that I was some kind of sex maniac - we’d been together a long time,
after all. It’s just that some perverse bit of me had begun to question my own
attractiveness.
Patrick had never minded the fact that I dressed ‘inventively’, as he put it. But
what if he hadn’t been entirely tmthful? Patrick’s job, his whole social life now
revolved around the control of flesh - taming it, reducing it, honing it. What if,
faced with those tight little tracksuited bottoms, my own suddenly seemed
wanting? What if my curves, which I had always thought of as pleasantly
voluptuous, now seemed doughy to his exacting eyes?
These were the thoughts that were still humming messily around my head as
Mrs Traynor came in and pretty much ordered Will and me to go outside. ‘I’ve
asked the cleaners to come and do a special spring clean, so I thought perhaps
you could enjoy the nice weather while they’re all in there.’
Will’s eyes met mine with the faintest lift of his eyebrows. ‘It’s not really a
request, is it, Mother?’
‘I just think it would be good if you took some air,’ she said. ‘The ramp is in
place. Perhaps, Louisa, you might take some tea out there with you?’
It wasn’t an entirely unreasonable suggestion. The garden was beautiful. It
was as if with the slight lifting of temperatures everything had suddenly decided
to look a little bit greener. Daffodils had emerged as if from nowhere, their
yellowing bulbs hinting at the flowers to come. Buds burst from brown branches,
perennials forcing their way tentatively through the dark, claggy soil. I opened
the doors and we went outside, Will keeping his chair on the York stone path. He
gestured towards a cast-iron bench with a cushion on it, and I sat there for some
time, our faces lifted to the weak sunshine, listening to the sparrows squabbling
in the hedgerow.
‘What’s up with you?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You’re quiet.’
‘You said you wanted me to be quiet.’
‘Not this quiet. It alarms me.’
‘I’m all right,’ I said. And then, ‘It’s just boyfriend stuff, if you really want to
know.’
‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Running Man.’
I opened my eyes, just to see if he was mocking me.
‘What’s the matter?’ he said. ‘Come on, tell Uncle Will.’
‘No.’
‘My mother is going to have the cleaners running around like lunatics in there
for at least another hour. You’re going to have to talk about something.’
I pushed myself upright, and turned to face him. His house chair had a control
button that elevated his seat so that he could address people at head height. He
didn’t often use it, as it frequently made him dizzy, but it was working now. I
actually had to look up at him.
I pulled my coat around me, and squinted at him. ‘Go on, then, what do you
want to know?’
‘How long have you two been together?’ he said.
‘Bit over six years.’
He looked surprised. ‘That’s a long time.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Well.’
I leant over and adjusted a rug across him. It was deceptive, the sunshine - it
promised more than it could actually deliver. I thought of Patrick, up at 6.30
sharp this morning to go for his morning run. Perhaps I should take up running,
so that we would become one of those Lycra-clad couples. Perhaps I should buy
frilly underwear and look up sex tips online. I knew I would do neither.
‘What does he do?’
‘He’s a personal trainer.’
‘Hence the running.’
‘Hence the running.’
‘What’s he like? In three words, if it makes you uncomfortable.’
I thought about it. ‘Positive. Loyal. Obsessed with body fat ratios.’
‘That’s seven words.’
‘Then you got four for free. So what was she like?’
‘Who?’
‘Alicia?’ I looked at him like he had looked at me, directly. He took a deep
breath and gazed upwards to a large plane tree. His hair fell down into his eyes
and I fought the urge to push it to one side for him.
‘Gorgeous. Sexy. High maintenance. Surprisingly insecure.’
‘What does she have to be insecure about?’ The words left my mouth before I
could help myself.
He looked almost amused. ‘You’d be surprised,’ he said. ‘Girls like Lissa
trade on their looks for so long they don’t think they have anything else.
Actually, I’m being unfair. She’s good with stuff. Things - clothes, interiors. She
can make things look beautiful.’
I fought the urge to say anyone could make things look beautiful if they had a
wallet as deep as a diamond mine.
‘She could move a few things around in a room, and it would look completely
different. I never could work out how she did it.’ He nodded towards the house.
‘She did this annexe, when I first moved in.’
I found myself reviewing the perfectly designed living room. I realized my
admiration of it was suddenly slightly less uncomplicated than it had been.
‘How long were you with her?’
‘Eight, nine months.’
‘Not that long.’
‘Long for me.’
‘How did you meet?’
‘Dinner party. Areally awful dinner party. You?’
‘Hairdresser’s. I was one. He was my client.’
‘Hah. You were his something extra for the weekend.’
I must have looked blank because he shook his head and said softly, ‘Never
mind.’
Inside, we could hear the dull drone of the vacuum cleaner. There were four
women in the cleaning company, all wearing matching housecoats. I had
wondered what they would find to do for two hours in the little annexe.
‘Do you miss her?’
I could hear them talking amongst themselves. Someone had opened a
window, and occasional bursts of laughter filtered out into the thin air.
Will seemed to be watching something in the far-off distance. ‘I used to.’ He
turned to me, his voice matter-of-fact. ‘But I’ve been thinking about it, and I’ve
decided that she and Rupert are a good match.’
I nodded. ‘They’ll have a ridiculous wedding, pop out an ankle biter or two, as
you put it, buy a place in the country, and he’ll be shagging his secretary within
five years/ I said.
‘You’re probably right.’
I was warming to my theme now. ‘And she will be a little bit cross with him
all the time without really knowing why and bitch about him at really awful
dinner parties to the embarrassment of their friends, and he won’t want to leave
because he’ll be scared of all the alimony.’
Will turned to look at me.
‘And they will have sex once every six weeks and he will adore his children
while doing bugger all to actually help look after them. And she will have
perfect hair but get this kind of pinched face -’ I narrowed my mouth ‘- through
never saying what she actually means, and start an insane Pilates habit or maybe
buy a dog or a horse and develop a crush on her riding instructor. And he will
take up jogging when he hits forty, and maybe buy a Harley-Davidson, which
she will despise, and every day he will go to work and look at all the young men
in his office and listen in bars to who they pulled at the weekend or where they
went on a jolly and feel like somehow - and he will never be quite sure how - he
got suckered.’
I turned.
Will was staring at me.
‘Sorry,’ I said, after a moment. ‘I don’t really know where that came from.’
‘I’m starting to feel just the tiniest bit sorry for Running Man.’
‘Oh, it’s not him,’ I said. ‘It’s working at a cafe for years. You see and hear
everything. Patterns, in people’s behaviour. You’d be amazed at what goes on.’
‘Is that why you’ve never got married?’
I blinked. ‘I suppose so.’
I didn’t want to say I had never actually been asked.
It may sound as though we didn’t do much. But, in truth, the days with Will were
subtly different - depending on his mood and, more importantly, how much pain
he was in. Some days I would arrive and I could see from the set of his jaw that
he didn’t want to talk to me - or to anyone - and, noting this, I would busy
myself around the annexe, trying to anticipate his needs so that I didn’t have to
bother him by asking.
There were all sorts of things that caused him pain. There were the general
aches that came with loss of muscle - there was so much less holding him up,
despite Nathan’s best attempts at physio. There was stomach pain from digestive
problems, shoulder pain, pain from bladder infections - an inevitability,
apparently, despite everyone’s best efforts. He had a stomach ulcer from taking
too many painkillers early on in his recovery, when he apparently popped them
like Tic Tacs.
Occasionally, there were pressure sores, from being seated in the same
position for too long. A couple of times Will was confined to bed, just to let them
heal, but he hated being prone. He would lie there listening to the radio, his eyes
glittering with barely suppressed rage. Will also got headaches - a side effect, I
thought, of his anger and frustration. He had so much mental energy, and nothing
to take it out on. It had to build up somewhere.
But the most debilitating was a burning sensation in his hands and feet;
relentless, pulsing, it would leave him unable to focus on anything else. I would
prepare a bowl of cold water and soak them, or wrap cold flannels around them,
hoping to ease his discomfort. A stringy muscle would flicker in his jaw and
occasionally he would just seem to disappear, as if the only way he could cope
with the sensation was to absent himself from his own body. I had become
surprisingly used to the physical requirements of Will’s life. It seemed unfair that
despite the fact he could not use them, or feel them, his extremities should cause
him so much discomfort.
Despite all this, Will did not complain. This was why it had taken me weeks to
notice he suffered at all. Now, I could decipher the strained look around his eyes,
the silences, the way he seemed to retreat inside his own skin. He would ask,
simply, ‘Could you get the cold water, Louisa?’ or ‘I think it might be time for
some painkillers.’ Sometimes he was in so much pain that his face actually
leached colour, turning to pale putty. Those were the worst days.
But on other days we tolerated each other quite well. He didn’t seem mortally
offended when I talked to him, as he had at the start. Today appeared to be a
pain-free day. When Mrs Traynor came out to tell us that the cleaners would be
another twenty minutes, I made us both another drink and we took a slow stroll
around the garden, Will sticking to the path and me watching my satin pumps
darken in the damp grass.
‘Interesting choice of footwear/ Will said.
They were emerald green. I had found them in a charity shop. Patrick said
they made me look like a leprechaun drag queen.
‘You know, you don’t dress like someone from round here. I quite look
forward to seeing what insane combination you’re going to turn up in next.’
‘So how should “someone from round here” dress?’
He steered a little to the left to avoid a bit of branch on the path. ‘Fleece. Or, if
you’re my mother’s set, something from Jaeger or Whistles.’ He looked at me.
‘So where did you pick up your exotic tastes? Where else have you lived?’
‘I haven’t.’
‘What, you’ve only ever lived here? Where have you worked?’
‘Only here.’ I turned and looked at him, crossing my arms over my chest
defensively. ‘So? What’s so weird about that?’
‘It’s such a small town. So limiting. And it’s all about the castle.’ We paused
on the path and stared at it, rising up in the distance on its weird, dome-like hill,
as perfect as if it had been drawn by a child. ‘I always think this is the kind of
place that people come back to. When they’ve got tired of everything else. Or
when they don’t have enough imagination to go anywhere else.’
‘Thanks.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with it per se. But... Christ. It’s not exactly dynamic,
is it? Not exactly full of ideas or interesting people or opportunities. Round here
they think it’s subversive if the tourist shop starts selling place mats with a
different view of the miniature railway.’
I couldn’t help but laugh. There had been an article in the local newspaper the
previous week on exactly that topic.
‘You’re twenty-six years old, Clark. You should be out there, claiming the
world as your own, getting in trouble in bars, showing off your strange wardrobe
to dodgy men ... ’
‘I’m happy here,’ I said.
‘Well, you shouldn’t be.’
‘You like telling people what they should be doing, don’t you?’
‘Only when I know I’m right,’ he said. ‘Can you adjust my drink? I can’t quite
reach it.’
I twisted his straw round so that he could reach it more easily and waited
while he took a drink. The faint cold had turned the tips of his ears pink.
He grimaced. ‘Jesus, for a girl who made tea for a living you make a terrible
cup.’
‘You’re just used to lesbian tea,’ I said. ‘All that lapsang souchong herbal
stuff.’
‘Lesbian tea!’ He almost choked. ‘Well, it’s better than this stair varnish.
Christ. You could stand a spoon up in that.’
‘So even my tea is wrong.’ I sat down on the bench in front of him. ‘So how is
it okay for you to offer an opinion on every single thing I say or do, and yet
nobody else gets to say anything at all?’
‘Go on, then, Louisa Clark. Give me your opinions.’
‘On you?’
He gave a theatrical sigh. ‘Do I have a choice?’
‘You could cut your hair. It makes you look like some kind of vagrant.’
‘Now you sound like my mother.’
‘Well, you do look bloody awful. You could shave, at least. Isn’t all that facial
hair starting to get itchy?’
He gave me a sideways look.
‘It is, isn’t it? I knew it. Okay - this afternoon I am going to take it all off.’
‘Oh no.’
‘Yes. You asked me for my opinion. This is my answer. You don’t have to do
anything.’
‘What if I say no?’
‘I might do it anyway. If it gets any longer I’ll be picking bits of food out of it.
And, frankly, if that happens I’ll have to sue you for undue distress in the
workplace.’
He smiled then, as if I had amused him. It might sound a bit sad, but Will’s
smiles were so rare that prompting one made me feel a bit light-headed with
pride.
‘Here, Clark,’ he said. ‘Do me a favour?’
‘What?’
‘Scratch my ear for me, will you? It’s driving me nuts.’
‘If I do you’ll let me cut your hair? Just a bit of a trim?’
‘Don’t push your luck.’
‘Shush. Don’t make me nervous. I’m not great with scissors.’
I found the razors and some shaving foam in the bathroom cabinet, tucked well
back behind the packets of wipes and cotton wool, as if they hadn’t been used in
some time. I made him come into the bathroom, filled a sink with warm water,
got him to tilt his headrest back a little and then placed a hot flannel over his
chin.
‘What is this? You’re going to be a barbershop? What’s the flannel for?’
‘I don’t know,’ I confessed. ‘It’s what they do in the films. It’s like the hot
water and towels when someone has a baby.’
I couldn’t see his mouth, but his eyes creased with faint mirth. I wanted to
keep them like that. I wanted him to be happy - for his face to lose that haunted,
watchful look. I gabbled. I told jokes. I started to hum. Anything to prolong the
moment before he looked grim again.
I rolled up my sleeves and began to lather the shaving foam over his chin, all
the way up to his ears. Then I hesitated, the blade over his chin. ‘Is this the
moment to tell you I’ve only ever done legs before?’
He closed his eyes, and settled back. I began to scrape gently at his skin with
the blade, the silence broken only by the splash as I rinsed the razor in the
basinful of water. I worked in silence, studying Will Traynor’s face as I went, the
lines that ran to the corners of his mouth, lines that seemed prematurely deep for
his age. I smoothed his hair from the side of his face and saw the telltale tracks
of stitches, perhaps from his accident. I saw the mauve shadows that told of
nights and nights of lost sleep, the furrow between his brows that spoke of silent
pain. A warm sweetness rose from his skin, the scent of the shaving cream, and
something that was peculiar to Will himself, discreet and expensive. His face
began to emerge and I could see how easy it must have been for him to attract
someone like Alicia.
I worked slowly and carefully, encouraged by the fact that he seemed briefly
at peace. The thought flashed by that the only time anyone ever touched Will
was for some medical or therapeutic procedure, and so I let my fingers rest
lightly upon his skin, trying to make the movements as far from the
dehumanized briskness that characterized Nathan’s and the doctor’s interactions
with him as possible.
It was a curiously intimate thing, this shaving of Will. I realized as I continued
that I had assumed his wheelchair would be a barrier; that his disability would
prevent any kind of sensual aspect from creeping in. Weirdly, it wasn’t working
like that. It was impossible to be this close to someone, to feel their skin tauten
under your fingertips, to breathe in the air that they breathed out, to have their
face only inches from yours, without feeling a little unbalanced. By the time I
reached his other ear I had begun to feel awkward, as if I had overstepped an
invisible mark.
Perhaps Will was able to read the subtle changes in my pressure on his skin;
perhaps he was just more attuned to the moods of the people around him. But he
opened his eyes, and I found them looking into mine.
There was a short pause, and then he said, straight-faced, ‘Please don’t tell me
you’ve shaved off my eyebrows.’
‘Only the one,’ I said. I rinsed the blade, hoping that the colour would have
drained from my cheeks by the time I turned round. ‘Right,’ I said, finally. ‘Have
you had enough? Won’t Nathan be here in a bit?’
‘What about my hair?’ he said.
‘You really want me to cut it?’
‘You might as well.’
‘I thought you didn’t trust me.’
He shrugged, as far as he could. It was the smallest movement of his
shoulders. ‘If it will stop you moaning at me for a couple of weeks I figure it’s a
small price to pay.’
‘Oh my God, your mum is going to be so delighted,’ I said, wiping a stray dob
of shaving cream.
‘Yes, well, we won’t let that put us off.’
We cut his hair in the living room. I lit the fire, we put on a film - an American
thriller - and I placed a towel around his shoulders. I had warned Will that I was
a bit rusty, but added that it couldn’t look worse than it did already.
‘Thanks for that,’ he said.
I set to work, letting his hair slide through my fingers, trying to remember the
few basics I had learnt. Will, watching the film, seemed relaxed and almost
content. Occasionally he told me something about the film - what else the lead
actor had starred in, where he had first seen it - and I made a vaguely interested
noise (like I do with Thomas when he presents me with his toys), even though all
my attention was actually focused on not mucking up his hair. Finally, I had the
worst of it off, and whipped round in front of him to see how he looked.
‘Well?’ Will paused the DVD.
I straightened up. T’m not sure I like seeing this much of your face. It’s a bit
unnerving.’
Teels cold,’ he observed, moving his head from left to right, as if testing the
feel of it.
‘Hold on,’ I said. ‘I’ll get two mirrors. Then you can see it properly. But don’t
move. There’s still a bit of tidying up to be done. Possibly an ear to slice.’
I was in the bedroom, going through his drawers in search of a small mirror,
when I heard the door. Two sets of brisk footsteps, Mrs Traynor’s voice, lifted,
anxious.
‘Georgina, please don’t.’
The door to the living room was wrenched open. I grabbed the mirror and ran
out of the room. I had no intention of being found absent again. Mrs Traynor was
standing in the living-room doorway, both hands raised to her mouth, apparently
witnessing some unseen confrontation.
‘You are the most selfish man I ever met!’ a young woman was shouting. ‘I
can’t believe this, Will. You were selfish then and you’re worse now.’
‘Georgina.’ Mrs Traynor’s gazed flicked towards me as I approached. ‘Please,
stop.’
I walked into the room behind her. Will, the towel around his shoulders, hair
in soft brown fronds at the wheels of his chair, was facing a young woman. She
had long dark hair, pinned into a messy knot at the back of her head. Her skin
was tanned, and she was wearing expensively distressed jeans and suede boots.
Like Alicia, her features were beautiful and regular, her teeth the astonishing
white of a toothpaste commercial. I knew they were because, her face puce with
anger, she was still hissing at him. ‘I can’t believe it. I can’t believe you would
even think of it. What do you -’
‘Please. Georgina.’ Mrs Traynor’s voice lifted sharply. This is not the time.’
Will, his face impassive, was staring straight ahead of him at some unseen
point.
‘Um ... Will? Do you need any help?’ I said, quietly.
‘Who are you?’ she said, whipping round. It was then that I saw her eyes were
filled with tears.
‘Georgina,’ Will said. ‘Meet Louisa Clark, my paid companion and shockingly
inventive hairdresser. Louisa, meet my sister, Georgina. She appears to have
flown all the way from Australia to shriek at me.’
‘Don’t be facile,’ Georgina said. ‘Mummy told me. She’s told me everything .’
Nobody moved.
‘Shall I give you a minute?’ I said.
‘That would be a good idea.’ Mrs Traynor’s knuckles were white on the arm
of the sofa.
I slid out of the room.
‘In fact, Louisa, perhaps now would be a good time to take your lunch break.’
It was going to be a bus shelter kind of a day. I grabbed my sandwiches from
the kitchen, climbed into my coat and set off down the back path.
As I left, I could hear Georgina Traynor’s voice lifting inside the house. ‘Has
it ever occurred to you, Will, that believe it or not, this might not be just about
you?’
When I returned, exactly half an hour later, the house was silent. Nathan was
washing up a mug in the kitchen sink.
He turned as he saw me. ‘How you doing?’
‘Has she gone?’
‘Who?’
‘The sister?’
He glanced behind him. ‘Ah. That who it was? Yeah, she’s gone. Just skidding
off in her car when I got here. Some sort of family row, was it?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I was in the middle of cutting Will’s hair and this
woman came in and just started having a go at him. I assumed it was another
girlfriend.’
Nathan shrugged.
I realized he would not be interested in the personal minutiae of Will’s life,
even if he knew.
‘He’s a bit quiet, though. Nice work with the shave, by the way. Good to get
him out from behind all that shrubbery.’
I walked back into the living room. Will was sitting staring at the television,
which was still paused at the exact moment I had left it.
‘Do you want me to turn this back on?’ I said.
He didn’t seem to hear me for a minute. His head was sunk in his shoulders,
the earlier relaxed expression replaced by a veil. Will was closed off again,
locked behind something I couldn’t penetrate.
He blinked, as if he had only just noticed me there. ‘Sure,’ he said.
I was carrying a basket of washing down the hall when I heard them. The annexe
door was slightly ajar and the voices of Mrs Traynor and her daughter carried
down the long corridor, the sound coming in muted waves. Will’s sister was
sobbing quietly, all fury gone from her voice now. She sounded almost childlike.
‘There must be something they can do. Some medical advance. Can’t you take
him to America? Things are always improving in America.’
‘Your father keeps a very close eye on all the developments. But no, darling,
there is nothing ... concrete.’
‘He’s so ... different now. It’s like he’s determined not to see the good in
anything.’
‘He’s been like that since the start, George. I think it’s just that you didn’t see
him apart from when you flew home. Back then, I think he was
still... determined. Back then, he was sure that something would change.’
I felt a little uncomfortable listening in on such a private conversation. But the
odd tenor drew me closer. I found myself walking softly towards the door, my
socked feet making no sound on the floor.
‘Look, Daddy and I didn’t tell you. We didn’t want to upset you. But he
tried ... ’ she struggled over the words. ‘Will tried to ... he tried to kill himself.’
‘What?’
‘Daddy found him. Back in December. It was ... it was terrible.’
Even though this only really confirmed what I had guessed, I felt all the blood
drain from me. I heard a muffled cry, a whispered reassurance. There was
another long silence. And then Georgina, her voice thick with grief, spoke again.
The girl ... ?’
‘Yes. Louisa is here to make sure nothing like that happens again.’
I stopped. At the other end of the corridor, from the bathroom, I could hear
Nathan and Will talking in a low murmur, comfortably oblivious to the
conversation that was going on just a few feet away. I took a step closer to the
door. I suppose I had known it since I caught sight of the scars on his wrists. It
made sense of everything, after all - Mrs Traynor’s anxiety that I shouldn’t leave
Will alone for very long, his antipathy to having me there, the fact that for large
stretches of time I didn’t feel like I was doing anything useful at all. I had been
babysitting. I hadn’t known it, but Will had, and he had hated me for it.
I reached for the handle of the door, preparing to close it gently. I wondered
what Nathan knew. I wondered whether Will was happier now. I realized I felt,
selfishly, a faint relief that it hadn’t been me Will objected to, just the fact that I
- that anyone - had been employed to watch over him. My thoughts hummed so
busily that I almost missed the next snatch of conversation.
‘You can’t let him do this, Mum. You have to stop him.’
‘It’s not our choice, darling.’
‘But it is. It is - if he’s asking you to be part of it,’ Georgina protested.
The handle stilled in my hand.
‘I can’t believe you’re even agreeing to it. What about your religion? What
about everything you’ve done? What was the point in you even bloody saving
him the last time?’
Mrs Traynor’s voice was deliberately calm. ‘That’s not fair.’
‘But you’ve said you’ll take him. What does -’
‘Do you think for a moment that if I said I refuse, he wouldn’t ask someone
else?’
‘But Dignitas? It’s just wrong. I know it’s hard for him, but it will destroy you
and Daddy. I know it. Think of how you would feel! Think of the publicity! Your
job! Both your reputations! He must know it. It’s a selfish thing to even ask.
How can he? How can he do this? How can you do this?’ She began to sob
again.
‘George ... ’
‘Don’t look at me like that. I do care about him, Mummy. I do. He’s my
brother and I love him. But I can’t bear it. I can’t bear even the thought of it.
He’s wrong to ask, and you’re wrong to consider it. And it’s not just his own life
he will destroy if you go ahead with this.’
I took a step back from the window. The blood thumped so loudly in my ears
that I almost didn’t hear Mrs Traynor’s response.
‘Six months, George. He promised to give me six months. Now. I don’t want
you to mention this again, and certainly not in front of anyone else. And we
must... ’ She took a deep breath. ‘We must just pray very hard that something
happens in that time to change his mind.’
Thursday, July 11, 2019
Wednesday, July 10, 2019
me before you, 06.2
I felt a sudden instinctive panic at the idea that it would be just Will and me in
the house all night. I was afraid of getting something fundamental wrong again,
of jeopardizing Will’s health. ‘Should I call Mrs Traynor, then?’
There was a short silence on the other end of the phone. ‘No. Best not.’
‘But -’
‘Look, Lou, he often ... he often goes somewhere else when Mrs T stays over
in town.’
It took me a minute or two to grasp what he was saying.
‘Oh.’
‘It’s just good that you’re there, that’s all. If you’re sure Will’s looking better,
I’ll be back first thing in the morning.’
There are normal hours, and then there are invalid hours, where time stalls and
slips, where life - real life - seems to exist at one remove. I watched some
television, ate, and cleared up the kitchen, drifting around the annexe in silence.
Finally, I let myself back into Will’s room.
He stirred as I closed the door, half lifting his head. ‘What time is it, Clark?’
His voice was slightly muffled by the pillow.
‘Quarter past eight.’
He let his head drop, and digested this. ‘Can I have a drink?’
There was no sharpness to him now, no edge. It was as if being ill had finally
made him vulnerable. I gave him a drink, and turned on the bedside light. I
perched on the side of his bed, and felt his forehead, as my mother might have
done when I was a child. He was still a little warm, but nothing like he had been.
‘Cool hands.’
‘You complained about them earlier.’
‘Did I?’ He sounded genuinely surprised.
‘Would you like some soup?’
‘No.’
‘Are you comfortable?’
I never knew how much discomfort he was in, but I suspected it was more
than he let on.
‘The other side would be good. Just roll me. I don’t need to sit up.’
I climbed across the bed and moved him over, as gently as I could. He no
longer radiated a sinister heat, just the ordinary warmth of a body that had spent
time under a duvet.
‘Can I do anything else?’
‘Shouldn’t you be heading home?’
‘It’s okay,’ I said. ‘I’m staying over.’
Outside, the last of the light had long been extinguished. The snow was still
falling. Where it caught the porch glow through the window it was bathed in a
pale-gold, melancholy light. We sat there in peaceful silence, watching its
hypnotic fall.
‘Can I ask you something?’ I said, finally. I could see his hands on top of the
sheet. It seemed so strange that they should look so ordinary, so strong, and yet
be so useless.
‘I suspect you’re going to.’
‘What happened?’ I kept wondering about the marks on his wrists. It was the
one question I couldn’t ask directly.
He opened one eye. ‘How did I get like this?’
When I nodded, he closed his eyes again. ‘Motorbike accident. Not mine. I
was an innocent pedestrian.’
‘I thought it would be skiing or bungee jumping or something.’
‘Everyone does. God’s little joke. I was crossing the road outside my home.
Not this place,’ he said. ‘My London home.’
I stared at the books in his bookshelf. Among the novels, the well-thumbed
Penguin paperbacks, were business titles: Corporate Law, TakeOver, directories
of names I did not recognize.
‘And there was no way you could carry on with your job?’
‘No. Nor the apartment, the holidays, the life ... I believe you met my ex¬
girlfriend.’ The break in his voice couldn’t disguise the bitterness. ‘But I should
apparently be grateful, as for some time they didn’t think I was going to live at
all.’
‘Do you hate it? Living here, I mean?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is there any way you might be able to live in London again?’
‘Not like this, no.’
‘But you might improve. I mean, Nathan said there are loads of advances in
this kind of injury.’
Will closed his eyes again.
I waited, and then I adjusted the pillow behind his head, and the duvet around
his chest. ‘Sorry,’ I said, sitting upright. ‘If I ask too many questions. Do you
want me to leave?’
‘No. Stay for a bit. Talk to me.’ He swallowed. His eyes opened again and his
gaze slid up to mine. He looked unbearably tired. ‘Tell me something good.’
I hesitated a moment, then I leant back against the pillows beside him. We sat
there in the near dark, watching the briefly illuminated flakes of snow disappear
into the black night.
‘You know ... I used to say that to my Dad,’ I said, finally. ‘But if I told you
what he used to say back, you’d think I was insane.’
‘More than I do? 5
‘When I had a nightmare or was sad or frightened about something, he used to
sing me ... ’I started to laugh. ‘Oh ... I can’t. 5
‘Go on.’
‘He used to sing me the “Molahonkey Song”.’
‘The what?’
‘The “Molahonkey Song”. I used to think everyone knew it.’
‘Trust me, Clark,’ he murmured, ‘I am a Molahonkey virgin.’
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and began to sing.
I wi-li-lished I li-li-lived in Molahonkey la-la-land
The la-la-land where I-li-li was bo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lorn
So I-li-li could play-la-lay my o-lo-lold banjo-lo-lo
My o-lo-lold ban-jo-lo-lo won’t go-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo.
‘Jesus Christ.’
I took another breath.
I too-lo-look it to-lo-lo the me-le-lender’s sho-lo-lop to
See-lee-lee what they-le-ley could do-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo
They sai-lai-laid to me-le-le your stri-li-lings are sho-lo-lot
They’re no-lo-lo more u-lu-luse to you-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-loo.
There was a short silence.
‘You are insane. Your whole family is insane.’
‘But it worked.’
‘And you are a God-awful singer. I hope your dad was better.’
‘I think what you meant to say was, “Thank you, Miss Clark, for attempting to
entertain me.’”
‘I suppose it makes about as much sense as most of the psychotherapeutic
help I’ve received. Okay, Clark,’ he said, ‘tell me something else. Something that
doesn’t involve singing.’
I thought for a bit.
‘Um ... okay, well... you were looking at my shoes the other day?’
‘Hard not to.’
‘Well, my mum can date my unusual shoe thing back to when I was three. She
bought me a pair of bright-turquoise glittery wellies - they were quite unusual
back then - kids used to just have those green ones, or maybe red if you were
lucky. And she said from the day she brought them home I refused to take them
off. I wore them to bed, in the bath, to nursery all through the summer. My
favourite outfit was those glitter boots and my bumblebee tights.’
‘Bumblebee tights?’
‘Black and yellow stripes.’
‘Gorgeous.’
‘That’s a bit harsh.’
‘Well, it’s true. They sound revolting.’
‘They might sound revolting to you, but astonishingly, Will Traynor, not all
girls get dressed just to please men.’
‘Bullshit.’
‘No, it’s not.’
‘Everything women do is with men in mind. Everything anyone does is with
sex in mind. Haven’t you read The Red Queen?’
T have no idea what you’re talking about. But I can assure you I’m not sitting
on your bed singing the “Molahonkey Song” because I’m trying to get my leg
over. And when I was three, I just really, really liked having stripy legs.’
I realized that the anxiety that had held me in its grip all day was slowly
ebbing away with every one of Will’s comments. I was no longer in sole charge
of a poorly quadriplegic. It was just me, sitting next to a particularly sarcastic
bloke, having a chat.
‘So come on, then, what happened to these gorgeous glittery wellies?’
‘She had to throw them away. I got terrible athlete’s foot.’
‘Delightful.’
‘And she threw the tights away too.’
‘Why?’
‘I never found out. But it broke my heart. I have never found a pair of tights I
loved like that again. They don’t do them any more. Or if they do, they don’t
make them for grown women.’
‘Strange, that.’
‘Oh, you can mock. Didn’t you ever love anything that much?’
I could barely see him now, the room shrouded in the near dark. I could have
turned the overhead light on, but something stopped me. And almost as soon as I
realized what I had said, I wished I hadn’t.
‘Yes/ he said, quietly. ‘Yes, I did/
We talked a bit longer, and then Will nodded off. I lay there, watching him
breathe, and occasionally wondering what he would say if he woke up and found
me staring at him, at his too-long hair and tired eyes and scraggy beginnings of a
beard. But I couldn’t move. The hours had become surreal, an island out of time.
I was the only other person in the house, and I was still afraid to leave him.
Shortly after eleven, I saw he had begun to sweat again, his breathing
becoming shallower, and I woke him and made him take some fever medication.
He didn’t talk, except to murmur his thanks. I changed his top sheet and his
pillowcase, and then, when he finally slept again, I lay down a foot away from
him and, a long time later, I slept too.
I woke to the sound of my name. I was in a classroom, asleep on my desk, and
the teacher was rapping a blackboard, repeating my name again and again. I
knew I should be paying attention, knew that the teacher would see this slumber
as an act of subversion, but I could not raise my head from the desk.
‘Louisa.’
‘Mmmhghh.’
‘Louisa.’
The desk was awfully soft. I opened my eyes. The words were being spoken
over my head, hissed, but with great emphasis. Louisa.
I was in bed. I blinked, letting my eyes focus, then looked up to find Camilla
Traynor standing over me. She wore a heavy wool coat and her handbag was
slung over her shoulder.
‘Louisa.’
I pushed myself upright with a start. Beside me, Will was asleep under the
covers, his mouth slightly open, his elbow bent at right angles in front of him.
Light seeped in through the window; telling of a cold, bright morning.
‘Uh.’
‘What are you doing?’
I felt as if I had been caught doing something awful. I rubbed at my face,
trying to gather my thoughts. Why was I in here? What could I tell her?
‘What are you doing in Will’s bed?’
‘Will ... ’ I said, quietly. ‘Will wasn’t well ... I just thought I should keep an
eye
‘What do you mean, he wasn’t well? Look, come out into the hall.’ She strode
out of the room, evidently waiting for me to catch her up.
I followed, trying to straighten my clothes. I had a horrible feeling my make¬
up was smeared all over my face.
She closed Will’s bedroom door behind me.
I stood in front of her, trying to smooth my hair as I gathered my thoughts.
‘Will had a temperature. Nathan got it down when he came, but I didn’t know
about this regulating thing and I wanted to keep an eye on him ... he said I
should keep an eye on him ... ’ My voice sounded thick, unformed. I wasn’t
entirely sure I was making coherent sentences.
‘Why didn’t you call me? If he was ill you should have called me
immediately. Or Mr Traynor.’
It was as if my synapses had suddenly snapped together. Mr Traynor. Oh Lord.
I glanced up at the clock. It was a quarter to eight.
‘I didn’t ... Nathan seemed to ... ’
‘Look, Louisa. It’s really not rocket science. If Will was ill enough for you to
sleep in his room then that is something you should have contacted me about.’
‘Yes.’
I blinked, staring at the ground.
‘I don’t understand why you didn’t call. Did you attempt to call Mr Traynor?’
Nathan said not to say anything.
I -’
At that moment the door to the annexe opened, and Mr Traynor stood there, a
newspaper folded under his arm. ‘You made it back!’ he said to his wife,
brushing snowflakes from his shoulders. ‘I’ve just fought my way up the road to
get a newspaper and some milk. Roads are absolutely treacherous. I had to go
the long way to Hansford Corner, to avoid the ice patches.’
She looked at him and I wondered for a moment whether she was registering
the fact that he was wearing the same shirt and jumper as the previous day.
‘Did you know Will had been ill in the night?’
He looked straight at me. I dropped my gaze to my feet. I wasn’t sure I had
ever felt more uncomfortable.
‘Did you try to call me, Louisa? I’m sorry - I didn’t hear a thing. I suspect that
intercom’s on the blink. There have been a few occasions lately where I’ve
missed it. And I wasn’t feeling too good myself last night. Out like a light.’
I was still wearing Will’s socks. I stared at them, wondering if Mrs Traynor
was going to judge me for that too.
But she seemed distracted. ‘It’s been a long journey home. I think ... I’ll leave
you to it. But if anything like this happens again, you call me immediately. Do
you understand?’
I didn’t want to look at Mr Traynor. ‘Yes,’ I said, and disappeared into the
kitchen.
the house all night. I was afraid of getting something fundamental wrong again,
of jeopardizing Will’s health. ‘Should I call Mrs Traynor, then?’
There was a short silence on the other end of the phone. ‘No. Best not.’
‘But -’
‘Look, Lou, he often ... he often goes somewhere else when Mrs T stays over
in town.’
It took me a minute or two to grasp what he was saying.
‘Oh.’
‘It’s just good that you’re there, that’s all. If you’re sure Will’s looking better,
I’ll be back first thing in the morning.’
There are normal hours, and then there are invalid hours, where time stalls and
slips, where life - real life - seems to exist at one remove. I watched some
television, ate, and cleared up the kitchen, drifting around the annexe in silence.
Finally, I let myself back into Will’s room.
He stirred as I closed the door, half lifting his head. ‘What time is it, Clark?’
His voice was slightly muffled by the pillow.
‘Quarter past eight.’
He let his head drop, and digested this. ‘Can I have a drink?’
There was no sharpness to him now, no edge. It was as if being ill had finally
made him vulnerable. I gave him a drink, and turned on the bedside light. I
perched on the side of his bed, and felt his forehead, as my mother might have
done when I was a child. He was still a little warm, but nothing like he had been.
‘Cool hands.’
‘You complained about them earlier.’
‘Did I?’ He sounded genuinely surprised.
‘Would you like some soup?’
‘No.’
‘Are you comfortable?’
I never knew how much discomfort he was in, but I suspected it was more
than he let on.
‘The other side would be good. Just roll me. I don’t need to sit up.’
I climbed across the bed and moved him over, as gently as I could. He no
longer radiated a sinister heat, just the ordinary warmth of a body that had spent
time under a duvet.
‘Can I do anything else?’
‘Shouldn’t you be heading home?’
‘It’s okay,’ I said. ‘I’m staying over.’
Outside, the last of the light had long been extinguished. The snow was still
falling. Where it caught the porch glow through the window it was bathed in a
pale-gold, melancholy light. We sat there in peaceful silence, watching its
hypnotic fall.
‘Can I ask you something?’ I said, finally. I could see his hands on top of the
sheet. It seemed so strange that they should look so ordinary, so strong, and yet
be so useless.
‘I suspect you’re going to.’
‘What happened?’ I kept wondering about the marks on his wrists. It was the
one question I couldn’t ask directly.
He opened one eye. ‘How did I get like this?’
When I nodded, he closed his eyes again. ‘Motorbike accident. Not mine. I
was an innocent pedestrian.’
‘I thought it would be skiing or bungee jumping or something.’
‘Everyone does. God’s little joke. I was crossing the road outside my home.
Not this place,’ he said. ‘My London home.’
I stared at the books in his bookshelf. Among the novels, the well-thumbed
Penguin paperbacks, were business titles: Corporate Law, TakeOver, directories
of names I did not recognize.
‘And there was no way you could carry on with your job?’
‘No. Nor the apartment, the holidays, the life ... I believe you met my ex¬
girlfriend.’ The break in his voice couldn’t disguise the bitterness. ‘But I should
apparently be grateful, as for some time they didn’t think I was going to live at
all.’
‘Do you hate it? Living here, I mean?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is there any way you might be able to live in London again?’
‘Not like this, no.’
‘But you might improve. I mean, Nathan said there are loads of advances in
this kind of injury.’
Will closed his eyes again.
I waited, and then I adjusted the pillow behind his head, and the duvet around
his chest. ‘Sorry,’ I said, sitting upright. ‘If I ask too many questions. Do you
want me to leave?’
‘No. Stay for a bit. Talk to me.’ He swallowed. His eyes opened again and his
gaze slid up to mine. He looked unbearably tired. ‘Tell me something good.’
I hesitated a moment, then I leant back against the pillows beside him. We sat
there in the near dark, watching the briefly illuminated flakes of snow disappear
into the black night.
‘You know ... I used to say that to my Dad,’ I said, finally. ‘But if I told you
what he used to say back, you’d think I was insane.’
‘More than I do? 5
‘When I had a nightmare or was sad or frightened about something, he used to
sing me ... ’I started to laugh. ‘Oh ... I can’t. 5
‘Go on.’
‘He used to sing me the “Molahonkey Song”.’
‘The what?’
‘The “Molahonkey Song”. I used to think everyone knew it.’
‘Trust me, Clark,’ he murmured, ‘I am a Molahonkey virgin.’
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and began to sing.
I wi-li-lished I li-li-lived in Molahonkey la-la-land
The la-la-land where I-li-li was bo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lorn
So I-li-li could play-la-lay my o-lo-lold banjo-lo-lo
My o-lo-lold ban-jo-lo-lo won’t go-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo.
‘Jesus Christ.’
I took another breath.
I too-lo-look it to-lo-lo the me-le-lender’s sho-lo-lop to
See-lee-lee what they-le-ley could do-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo
They sai-lai-laid to me-le-le your stri-li-lings are sho-lo-lot
They’re no-lo-lo more u-lu-luse to you-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-loo.
There was a short silence.
‘You are insane. Your whole family is insane.’
‘But it worked.’
‘And you are a God-awful singer. I hope your dad was better.’
‘I think what you meant to say was, “Thank you, Miss Clark, for attempting to
entertain me.’”
‘I suppose it makes about as much sense as most of the psychotherapeutic
help I’ve received. Okay, Clark,’ he said, ‘tell me something else. Something that
doesn’t involve singing.’
I thought for a bit.
‘Um ... okay, well... you were looking at my shoes the other day?’
‘Hard not to.’
‘Well, my mum can date my unusual shoe thing back to when I was three. She
bought me a pair of bright-turquoise glittery wellies - they were quite unusual
back then - kids used to just have those green ones, or maybe red if you were
lucky. And she said from the day she brought them home I refused to take them
off. I wore them to bed, in the bath, to nursery all through the summer. My
favourite outfit was those glitter boots and my bumblebee tights.’
‘Bumblebee tights?’
‘Black and yellow stripes.’
‘Gorgeous.’
‘That’s a bit harsh.’
‘Well, it’s true. They sound revolting.’
‘They might sound revolting to you, but astonishingly, Will Traynor, not all
girls get dressed just to please men.’
‘Bullshit.’
‘No, it’s not.’
‘Everything women do is with men in mind. Everything anyone does is with
sex in mind. Haven’t you read The Red Queen?’
T have no idea what you’re talking about. But I can assure you I’m not sitting
on your bed singing the “Molahonkey Song” because I’m trying to get my leg
over. And when I was three, I just really, really liked having stripy legs.’
I realized that the anxiety that had held me in its grip all day was slowly
ebbing away with every one of Will’s comments. I was no longer in sole charge
of a poorly quadriplegic. It was just me, sitting next to a particularly sarcastic
bloke, having a chat.
‘So come on, then, what happened to these gorgeous glittery wellies?’
‘She had to throw them away. I got terrible athlete’s foot.’
‘Delightful.’
‘And she threw the tights away too.’
‘Why?’
‘I never found out. But it broke my heart. I have never found a pair of tights I
loved like that again. They don’t do them any more. Or if they do, they don’t
make them for grown women.’
‘Strange, that.’
‘Oh, you can mock. Didn’t you ever love anything that much?’
I could barely see him now, the room shrouded in the near dark. I could have
turned the overhead light on, but something stopped me. And almost as soon as I
realized what I had said, I wished I hadn’t.
‘Yes/ he said, quietly. ‘Yes, I did/
We talked a bit longer, and then Will nodded off. I lay there, watching him
breathe, and occasionally wondering what he would say if he woke up and found
me staring at him, at his too-long hair and tired eyes and scraggy beginnings of a
beard. But I couldn’t move. The hours had become surreal, an island out of time.
I was the only other person in the house, and I was still afraid to leave him.
Shortly after eleven, I saw he had begun to sweat again, his breathing
becoming shallower, and I woke him and made him take some fever medication.
He didn’t talk, except to murmur his thanks. I changed his top sheet and his
pillowcase, and then, when he finally slept again, I lay down a foot away from
him and, a long time later, I slept too.
I woke to the sound of my name. I was in a classroom, asleep on my desk, and
the teacher was rapping a blackboard, repeating my name again and again. I
knew I should be paying attention, knew that the teacher would see this slumber
as an act of subversion, but I could not raise my head from the desk.
‘Louisa.’
‘Mmmhghh.’
‘Louisa.’
The desk was awfully soft. I opened my eyes. The words were being spoken
over my head, hissed, but with great emphasis. Louisa.
I was in bed. I blinked, letting my eyes focus, then looked up to find Camilla
Traynor standing over me. She wore a heavy wool coat and her handbag was
slung over her shoulder.
‘Louisa.’
I pushed myself upright with a start. Beside me, Will was asleep under the
covers, his mouth slightly open, his elbow bent at right angles in front of him.
Light seeped in through the window; telling of a cold, bright morning.
‘Uh.’
‘What are you doing?’
I felt as if I had been caught doing something awful. I rubbed at my face,
trying to gather my thoughts. Why was I in here? What could I tell her?
‘What are you doing in Will’s bed?’
‘Will ... ’ I said, quietly. ‘Will wasn’t well ... I just thought I should keep an
eye
‘What do you mean, he wasn’t well? Look, come out into the hall.’ She strode
out of the room, evidently waiting for me to catch her up.
I followed, trying to straighten my clothes. I had a horrible feeling my make¬
up was smeared all over my face.
She closed Will’s bedroom door behind me.
I stood in front of her, trying to smooth my hair as I gathered my thoughts.
‘Will had a temperature. Nathan got it down when he came, but I didn’t know
about this regulating thing and I wanted to keep an eye on him ... he said I
should keep an eye on him ... ’ My voice sounded thick, unformed. I wasn’t
entirely sure I was making coherent sentences.
‘Why didn’t you call me? If he was ill you should have called me
immediately. Or Mr Traynor.’
It was as if my synapses had suddenly snapped together. Mr Traynor. Oh Lord.
I glanced up at the clock. It was a quarter to eight.
‘I didn’t ... Nathan seemed to ... ’
‘Look, Louisa. It’s really not rocket science. If Will was ill enough for you to
sleep in his room then that is something you should have contacted me about.’
‘Yes.’
I blinked, staring at the ground.
‘I don’t understand why you didn’t call. Did you attempt to call Mr Traynor?’
Nathan said not to say anything.
I -’
At that moment the door to the annexe opened, and Mr Traynor stood there, a
newspaper folded under his arm. ‘You made it back!’ he said to his wife,
brushing snowflakes from his shoulders. ‘I’ve just fought my way up the road to
get a newspaper and some milk. Roads are absolutely treacherous. I had to go
the long way to Hansford Corner, to avoid the ice patches.’
She looked at him and I wondered for a moment whether she was registering
the fact that he was wearing the same shirt and jumper as the previous day.
‘Did you know Will had been ill in the night?’
He looked straight at me. I dropped my gaze to my feet. I wasn’t sure I had
ever felt more uncomfortable.
‘Did you try to call me, Louisa? I’m sorry - I didn’t hear a thing. I suspect that
intercom’s on the blink. There have been a few occasions lately where I’ve
missed it. And I wasn’t feeling too good myself last night. Out like a light.’
I was still wearing Will’s socks. I stared at them, wondering if Mrs Traynor
was going to judge me for that too.
But she seemed distracted. ‘It’s been a long journey home. I think ... I’ll leave
you to it. But if anything like this happens again, you call me immediately. Do
you understand?’
I didn’t want to look at Mr Traynor. ‘Yes,’ I said, and disappeared into the
kitchen.
me before you, 06.1
me before you, 06
6
The snow came so suddenly that I left home under a bright blue sky and not half
an hour later I was headed past a castle that looked like a cake decoration,
surrounded by a layer of thick white icing.
I trudged up the drive, my footsteps muffled and my toes already numb,
shivering under my too-thin Chinese silk coat. A whirl of thick white flakes
emerged from an iron-grey infinity, almost obscuring Granta House, blotting out
sound, and slowing the world to an unnatural pace. Beyond the neatly trimmed
hedge cars drove past with a newfound caution, pedestrians slipped and squealed
on the pavements. I pulled my scarf up over my nose and wished I had worn
something more suitable than ballet pumps and a velvet minidress.
To my surprise it wasn’t Nathan who opened the door, but Will’s father.
‘He’s in bed,’ he said, glancing up from under the porch. ‘He’s not too good. I
was just wondering whether to call the doctor.’
‘Where’s Nathan?’
‘Morning off. Of course, it would be today. Bloody agency nurse came and
went in six seconds flat. If this snow keeps on I’m not sure what we’ll do later.’
He shrugged, as if these things couldn’t be helped, and disappeared back down
the corridor, apparently relieved that he no longer had to be responsible. ‘You
know what he needs, yes?’ he called over his shoulder.
I took off my coat and shoes and, as I knew Mrs Traynor was in court (she
marked her dates on a diary in Will’s kitchen), I put my wet socks over a radiator
to dry. A pair of Will’s were in the clean-washing basket, so I put them on. They
looked comically large on me but it was heaven to have warm, dry feet. Will
didn’t respond when I called out, so after a while I made him up a drink,
knocked quietly and poked my head round the door. In the dim light I could just
make out the shape under the duvet. He was fast asleep.
I took a step backwards, closed the door behind me, and began working my
way through the morning’s tasks.
My mother seemed to glean an almost physical satisfaction from a well-
ordered house. I had been vacuuming and cleaning daily for a month now, and I
still couldn’t see the attraction. I suspected there would never be a point in my
life when I wouldn’t prefer somebody else to do it.
But on a day like today, when Will was confined to bed, and the world seemed
to have stilled outside, I could also see there was a kind of meditative pleasure in
working my way from one end of the annexe to the other. While I dusted and
polished, I took the radio from room to room with me, keeping the volume low
so that I didn’t disturb Will. Periodically I poked my head round the door, just to
see that he was breathing, and it was only when we got to one o’clock and he
still hadn’t woken up that I started to feel a little anxious.
I filled the log basket, noting that several inches of snow had now settled. I
made Will a fresh drink, and then knocked. When I knocked again, I did so
loudly.
‘Yes?’ His voice was hoarse, as if I had woken him.
‘It’s me.’ When he didn’t respond, I said, ‘Louisa. Am I okay to come in?’
‘I’m hardly doing the Dance of the Seven Veils.’
The room was shadowed, the curtains still drawn. I walked in, letting my eyes
adjust to the light. Will was on one side, one arm bent in front of him as if to
prop himself up, as he had been before when I looked in. Sometimes it was easy
to forget he would not be able to turn over by himself. His hair stuck up on one
side, and a duvet was tucked neatly around him. The smell of warm, unwashed
male filled the room - not unpleasant, but still a little startling as part of a
working day.
‘What can I do? Do you want your drink?’
‘I need to change position.’
I put the drink down on a chest of drawers, and walked over to the bed.
‘What... what do you want me to do?’
He swallowed carefully, as if it were painful. ‘Lift and turn me, then raise the
back of the bed. Here ... ’He nodded for me to come closer. ‘Put your arms
under mine, link your hands behind my back and then pull back. Keep your
backside on the bed and that way you shouldn’t strain your lower back.’
I couldn’t pretend this wasn’t a bit weird. I reached around him, the scent of
him filling my nostrils, his skin warm against mine. I could not have been in any
closer unless I had begun nibbling on his ear. The thought made me mildly
hysterical, and I struggled to keep myself together.
‘What?’
‘Nothing.’ I took a breath, linked my hands, and adjusted my position until I
felt I had him securely. He was broader than I had expected, somehow heavier.
And then, on a count of three, I pulled back.
‘Jesus,’ he exclaimed, into my shoulder.
‘What?’ I nearly dropped him.
‘Your hands are bloody freezing.’
‘Yes. Well, if you bothered to get out of bed, you’d know that it’s actually
snowing outside.’
I was half joking, but now I realized his skin was hot under his T-shirt - an
intense heat that seemed to come from deep within him. He groaned slightly as I
adjusted him against the pillow, and I tried to make my movements as slow and
gentle as possible. He pointed out the remote control device that would bring his
head and shoulders up. ‘Not too much, though,’ he murmured. ‘Abit dizzy.’
I turned on the bedside light, ignoring his vague protest, so that I could see his
face. ‘Will - are you okay?’ I had to say it twice before he answered me.
‘Not my best day.’
‘Do you need painkillers?’
‘Yes ... strong ones.’
‘Maybe some paracetamol?’
He lay back against the cool pillow with a sigh.
I gave him the beaker, watched him swallow.
‘Thank you,’ he said afterwards, and I felt suddenly uneasy.
Will never thanked me for anything.
He closed his eyes, and for a while I just stood in the doorway and watched
him, his chest rising and falling under his T-shirt, his mouth slightly open. His
breathing was shallow, and perhaps a little more laboured than on other days.
But I had never seen him out of his chair, and I wasn’t sure whether it was
something to do with the pressure of lying down.
‘Go,’ he muttered.
I left.
I read my magazine, lifting my head only to watch the snow settle thickly around
the house, creeping up the window sills in powdery landscapes. Mum sent me a
text message at 12.30pm, telling me that my father couldn’t get the car down the
road. 'Don’t set out for home without ringing us first,’ she instructed. I wasn’t
sure what she thought she was going to do - send Dad out with a sledge and a St
Bernard?
I listened to the local news on the radio, the motorway snarl-ups, train
stoppages and temporary school closures that the unexpected blizzard had
brought with it. I went back into Will’s room, and looked at him again. I didn’t
like his colour. He was pale, high points of something bright on each cheek.
‘Will?’ I said softly.
He didn’t stir.
‘Will?’
I began to feel the faint stirrings of panic. I said his name twice more, loudly.
There was no response. Finally, I leant over him. There was no obvious
movement in his face, nothing I could see in his chest. His breath. I should be
able to feel his breath. I put my face down close to his, trying to detect an out
breath. When I couldn’t, I reached out a hand and touched his face gently.
He flinched, his eyes snapping open, just inches from my own.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, jumping back.
He blinked, glancing around the room, as if he had been somewhere far from
home.
‘It’s Lou,’ I said, when I wasn’t sure if he had recognized me.
His expression was one of mild exasperation. ‘I know.’
‘Do you want some soup?’
‘No. Thank you.’ He closed his eyes.
‘More painkillers?’
There was a faint sheen of sweat on his cheekbone. I put my hand out, his
duvet felt vaguely hot and sweaty. It made me nervous.
‘Is there something I should be doing? I mean, if Nathan can’t get here?’
‘No ... I’m fine,’ he murmured, and closed his eyes again.
I went through the folder, trying to work out if I was missing something. I
opened the medical cabinet, the boxes of rubber gloves and gauze dressings, and
realized I had no idea at all what I should do with any of it. I rang the intercom
to speak to Will’s father, but the ringing sound disappeared into an empty house.
I could hear it echoing beyond the annexe door.
I was about to ring Mrs Traynor when the back door opened, and Nathan
stepped in, wrapped in layers of bulky clothing, a woollen scarf and hat almost
obscuring his head. He brought with him a whoosh of cold air and a light flurry
of snow.
‘Hey,’ he said, shaking the snow off his boots and slamming the door behind
him.
It felt like the house had suddenly woken from a dreamlike state.
‘Oh, thank God you’re here,’ I said. ‘He’s not well. He’s been asleep most of
the morning and he’s hardly drunk anything. I didn’t know what to do.’
Nathan shrugged off his coat. ‘Had to walk all the way here. The buses have
stopped running.’
I set about making him some tea, as he went to check on Will.
He reappeared before the kettle had even finished boiling. ‘He’s burning up,’
he said. ‘How long has he been like this?’
‘All morning. I did think he was hot, but he said he just wanted to sleep.’
‘Jesus. All morning? Didn’t you know he can’t regulate his own temperature?’
He pushed past me and began rummaging around in the medicine cabinet.
‘Antibiotics. The strong ones.’ He held up ajar and emptied one into the pestle
and mortar, grinding it furiously.
I hovered behind him. ‘I gave him a paracetamol.’
‘Might as well have given him an Opal Fruit.’
‘I didn’t know. Nobody said. I’ve been wrapping him up.’
‘It’s in the bloody folder. Look, Will doesn’t sweat like we do. In fact he
doesn’t sweat at all from the point of his injury downwards. It means if he gets a
slight chill his temperature gauge goes haywire. Go find the fan. We’ll move that
in there until he cools down. And a damp towel, to put around the back of his
neck. We won’t be able to get him to a doctor until the snow stops. Bloody
agency nurse. They should have picked this up in the morning.’
Nathan was crasser than I’d ever seen him. He was no longer really even
talking to me.
I ran for the fan.
It took almost forty minutes for Will’s temperature to return to an acceptable
level. While we waited for the extra-strong fever medication to take effect, I
placed a towel over his forehead and another around his neck, as Nathan
instructed. We stripped him down, covered his chest with a fine cotton sheet, and
set the fan to play over it. Without sleeves, the scars on his arms were clearly
exposed. We all pretended I couldn’t see them.
Will endured all this attention in near silence, answering Nathan’s questions
with a yes or no, so indistinct sometimes that I wasn’t sure if he knew what he
was saying. I realized, now I could see him in the light, that he looked really,
properly ill and I felt terrible for having failed to grasp it. I said sorry until
Nathan told me it had become irritating.
‘Right,’ he said. ‘You need to watch what I’m doing. It’s possible you may
need to do this alone later.’
I didn’t feel I could protest. But I found it hard not to feel squeamish as
Nathan peeled down the waist of Will’s pyjama bottoms, revealing a pale strip of
bare stomach, and carefully removed the gauze dressing around the little tube in
his abdomen, cleaning it gently and replacing the dressing. He showed me how
to change the bag on the bed, explained why it must always be lower than Will’s
body, and I was surprised at how matter-of-fact I was about walking out of the
room with the pouch of warm fluid. I was glad that Will wasn’t really watching
me - not just because he would have made some sharp comment, but because I
felt that me witnessing some part of this intimate routine would in some way
have embarrassed him too.
‘And that’s it,’ Nathan said. Finally, an hour later, Will lay dozing, lying on
fresh cotton sheets and looking, if not exactly well, then not scarily ill.
‘Let him sleep. But wake him after a couple of hours and make sure you get
the best part of a beaker of fluids into him. More fever meds at five, okay? His
temperature will probably shoot up again in the last hour, but nothing more
before five.’
I scribbled everything down on a notepad. I was afraid of getting anything
wrong.
‘Now you’re going to need to repeat what we just did, this evening. You’re
okay with that?’ Nathan wrapped himself up like an Inuit and headed out into the
snow. ‘Just read the folder. And don’t panic. Any problems, you just call me. I’ll
talk you through it all. I’ll get back here again if I really have to.’
I stayed in Will’s room after Nathan left. I was too afraid not to. In the corner
was an old leather armchair with a reading light, perhaps dating from Will’s
previous life, and I curled up on it with a book of short stories that I had pulled
from the bookcase.
It was strangely peaceful in that room. Through the crack in the curtains I
could see the outside world, blanketed in white, still and beautiful. Inside it was
warm and silent, only the odd tick and hiss of the central heating to interrupt my
thoughts. I read, and occasionally I glanced up and checked Will sleeping
peacefully and I realized that there had never been a point in my life before
where I had just sat in silence and done nothing. You don’t grow up used to
silence in a house like mine, with its never-ending vacuuming, television blaring,
and shrieking. During the rare moments that the television was off, Dad would
put on his old Elvis records and play them at full blast. A cafe too is a constant
buzz of noise and clatter.
Here, I could hear my thoughts. I could almost hear my heartbeat. I realized,
to my surprise, that I quite liked it.
At five, my mobile phone signalled a text message. Will stirred, and I leapt
out of the chair, anxious to get it before it disturbed him.
No trains. Is there any chance you could stay over tonight?
Nathan cannot do it. Camilla Traynor.
I didn’t really think about it before I typed back.
No problem.
I rang my parents and told them that I would stay over. My mother sounded
relieved. When I told her I was going to get paid for sleeping over, she sounded
overjoyed.
‘Did you hear that, Bernard?’ she said, her hand half over the phone. ‘They’re
paying her to sleep now.’
I could hear my father’s exclamation. ‘Praise the Lord. She’s found her dream
career.’
I sent a text message to Patrick, telling him that I had been asked to stay at
work and I would ring him later. The message came back within seconds.
Going cross-country snow running tonight.
Good practice for Norway! X P.
I wondered how it was possible for someone to get so excited at the thought of
jogging through sub-zero temperatures in a vest and pants.
Will slept. I cooked myself some food, and defrosted some soup in case he
wanted some later. I got the log fire going in case he felt well enough to go into
the living room. I read another of the short stories and wondered how long it was
since I had bought myself a book. I had loved reading as a child, but I couldn’t
remember reading anything except magazines since. Treen was the reader. It was
almost as if by picking up a book I felt like I was invading her patch. I thought
about her and Thomas disappearing to university and realized I still didn’t know
whether it made me feel happy or sad - or something a bit complicated in
between.
Nathan rang at seven. He seemed relieved that I was staying over.
‘I couldn’t raise Mr Traynor. I even rang their landline number, but it went
straight through to answerphone.’
‘Yeah. Well. He’ll be gone.’
‘Gone?’
6
The snow came so suddenly that I left home under a bright blue sky and not half
an hour later I was headed past a castle that looked like a cake decoration,
surrounded by a layer of thick white icing.
I trudged up the drive, my footsteps muffled and my toes already numb,
shivering under my too-thin Chinese silk coat. A whirl of thick white flakes
emerged from an iron-grey infinity, almost obscuring Granta House, blotting out
sound, and slowing the world to an unnatural pace. Beyond the neatly trimmed
hedge cars drove past with a newfound caution, pedestrians slipped and squealed
on the pavements. I pulled my scarf up over my nose and wished I had worn
something more suitable than ballet pumps and a velvet minidress.
To my surprise it wasn’t Nathan who opened the door, but Will’s father.
‘He’s in bed,’ he said, glancing up from under the porch. ‘He’s not too good. I
was just wondering whether to call the doctor.’
‘Where’s Nathan?’
‘Morning off. Of course, it would be today. Bloody agency nurse came and
went in six seconds flat. If this snow keeps on I’m not sure what we’ll do later.’
He shrugged, as if these things couldn’t be helped, and disappeared back down
the corridor, apparently relieved that he no longer had to be responsible. ‘You
know what he needs, yes?’ he called over his shoulder.
I took off my coat and shoes and, as I knew Mrs Traynor was in court (she
marked her dates on a diary in Will’s kitchen), I put my wet socks over a radiator
to dry. A pair of Will’s were in the clean-washing basket, so I put them on. They
looked comically large on me but it was heaven to have warm, dry feet. Will
didn’t respond when I called out, so after a while I made him up a drink,
knocked quietly and poked my head round the door. In the dim light I could just
make out the shape under the duvet. He was fast asleep.
I took a step backwards, closed the door behind me, and began working my
way through the morning’s tasks.
My mother seemed to glean an almost physical satisfaction from a well-
ordered house. I had been vacuuming and cleaning daily for a month now, and I
still couldn’t see the attraction. I suspected there would never be a point in my
life when I wouldn’t prefer somebody else to do it.
But on a day like today, when Will was confined to bed, and the world seemed
to have stilled outside, I could also see there was a kind of meditative pleasure in
working my way from one end of the annexe to the other. While I dusted and
polished, I took the radio from room to room with me, keeping the volume low
so that I didn’t disturb Will. Periodically I poked my head round the door, just to
see that he was breathing, and it was only when we got to one o’clock and he
still hadn’t woken up that I started to feel a little anxious.
I filled the log basket, noting that several inches of snow had now settled. I
made Will a fresh drink, and then knocked. When I knocked again, I did so
loudly.
‘Yes?’ His voice was hoarse, as if I had woken him.
‘It’s me.’ When he didn’t respond, I said, ‘Louisa. Am I okay to come in?’
‘I’m hardly doing the Dance of the Seven Veils.’
The room was shadowed, the curtains still drawn. I walked in, letting my eyes
adjust to the light. Will was on one side, one arm bent in front of him as if to
prop himself up, as he had been before when I looked in. Sometimes it was easy
to forget he would not be able to turn over by himself. His hair stuck up on one
side, and a duvet was tucked neatly around him. The smell of warm, unwashed
male filled the room - not unpleasant, but still a little startling as part of a
working day.
‘What can I do? Do you want your drink?’
‘I need to change position.’
I put the drink down on a chest of drawers, and walked over to the bed.
‘What... what do you want me to do?’
He swallowed carefully, as if it were painful. ‘Lift and turn me, then raise the
back of the bed. Here ... ’He nodded for me to come closer. ‘Put your arms
under mine, link your hands behind my back and then pull back. Keep your
backside on the bed and that way you shouldn’t strain your lower back.’
I couldn’t pretend this wasn’t a bit weird. I reached around him, the scent of
him filling my nostrils, his skin warm against mine. I could not have been in any
closer unless I had begun nibbling on his ear. The thought made me mildly
hysterical, and I struggled to keep myself together.
‘What?’
‘Nothing.’ I took a breath, linked my hands, and adjusted my position until I
felt I had him securely. He was broader than I had expected, somehow heavier.
And then, on a count of three, I pulled back.
‘Jesus,’ he exclaimed, into my shoulder.
‘What?’ I nearly dropped him.
‘Your hands are bloody freezing.’
‘Yes. Well, if you bothered to get out of bed, you’d know that it’s actually
snowing outside.’
I was half joking, but now I realized his skin was hot under his T-shirt - an
intense heat that seemed to come from deep within him. He groaned slightly as I
adjusted him against the pillow, and I tried to make my movements as slow and
gentle as possible. He pointed out the remote control device that would bring his
head and shoulders up. ‘Not too much, though,’ he murmured. ‘Abit dizzy.’
I turned on the bedside light, ignoring his vague protest, so that I could see his
face. ‘Will - are you okay?’ I had to say it twice before he answered me.
‘Not my best day.’
‘Do you need painkillers?’
‘Yes ... strong ones.’
‘Maybe some paracetamol?’
He lay back against the cool pillow with a sigh.
I gave him the beaker, watched him swallow.
‘Thank you,’ he said afterwards, and I felt suddenly uneasy.
Will never thanked me for anything.
He closed his eyes, and for a while I just stood in the doorway and watched
him, his chest rising and falling under his T-shirt, his mouth slightly open. His
breathing was shallow, and perhaps a little more laboured than on other days.
But I had never seen him out of his chair, and I wasn’t sure whether it was
something to do with the pressure of lying down.
‘Go,’ he muttered.
I left.
I read my magazine, lifting my head only to watch the snow settle thickly around
the house, creeping up the window sills in powdery landscapes. Mum sent me a
text message at 12.30pm, telling me that my father couldn’t get the car down the
road. 'Don’t set out for home without ringing us first,’ she instructed. I wasn’t
sure what she thought she was going to do - send Dad out with a sledge and a St
Bernard?
I listened to the local news on the radio, the motorway snarl-ups, train
stoppages and temporary school closures that the unexpected blizzard had
brought with it. I went back into Will’s room, and looked at him again. I didn’t
like his colour. He was pale, high points of something bright on each cheek.
‘Will?’ I said softly.
He didn’t stir.
‘Will?’
I began to feel the faint stirrings of panic. I said his name twice more, loudly.
There was no response. Finally, I leant over him. There was no obvious
movement in his face, nothing I could see in his chest. His breath. I should be
able to feel his breath. I put my face down close to his, trying to detect an out
breath. When I couldn’t, I reached out a hand and touched his face gently.
He flinched, his eyes snapping open, just inches from my own.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, jumping back.
He blinked, glancing around the room, as if he had been somewhere far from
home.
‘It’s Lou,’ I said, when I wasn’t sure if he had recognized me.
His expression was one of mild exasperation. ‘I know.’
‘Do you want some soup?’
‘No. Thank you.’ He closed his eyes.
‘More painkillers?’
There was a faint sheen of sweat on his cheekbone. I put my hand out, his
duvet felt vaguely hot and sweaty. It made me nervous.
‘Is there something I should be doing? I mean, if Nathan can’t get here?’
‘No ... I’m fine,’ he murmured, and closed his eyes again.
I went through the folder, trying to work out if I was missing something. I
opened the medical cabinet, the boxes of rubber gloves and gauze dressings, and
realized I had no idea at all what I should do with any of it. I rang the intercom
to speak to Will’s father, but the ringing sound disappeared into an empty house.
I could hear it echoing beyond the annexe door.
I was about to ring Mrs Traynor when the back door opened, and Nathan
stepped in, wrapped in layers of bulky clothing, a woollen scarf and hat almost
obscuring his head. He brought with him a whoosh of cold air and a light flurry
of snow.
‘Hey,’ he said, shaking the snow off his boots and slamming the door behind
him.
It felt like the house had suddenly woken from a dreamlike state.
‘Oh, thank God you’re here,’ I said. ‘He’s not well. He’s been asleep most of
the morning and he’s hardly drunk anything. I didn’t know what to do.’
Nathan shrugged off his coat. ‘Had to walk all the way here. The buses have
stopped running.’
I set about making him some tea, as he went to check on Will.
He reappeared before the kettle had even finished boiling. ‘He’s burning up,’
he said. ‘How long has he been like this?’
‘All morning. I did think he was hot, but he said he just wanted to sleep.’
‘Jesus. All morning? Didn’t you know he can’t regulate his own temperature?’
He pushed past me and began rummaging around in the medicine cabinet.
‘Antibiotics. The strong ones.’ He held up ajar and emptied one into the pestle
and mortar, grinding it furiously.
I hovered behind him. ‘I gave him a paracetamol.’
‘Might as well have given him an Opal Fruit.’
‘I didn’t know. Nobody said. I’ve been wrapping him up.’
‘It’s in the bloody folder. Look, Will doesn’t sweat like we do. In fact he
doesn’t sweat at all from the point of his injury downwards. It means if he gets a
slight chill his temperature gauge goes haywire. Go find the fan. We’ll move that
in there until he cools down. And a damp towel, to put around the back of his
neck. We won’t be able to get him to a doctor until the snow stops. Bloody
agency nurse. They should have picked this up in the morning.’
Nathan was crasser than I’d ever seen him. He was no longer really even
talking to me.
I ran for the fan.
It took almost forty minutes for Will’s temperature to return to an acceptable
level. While we waited for the extra-strong fever medication to take effect, I
placed a towel over his forehead and another around his neck, as Nathan
instructed. We stripped him down, covered his chest with a fine cotton sheet, and
set the fan to play over it. Without sleeves, the scars on his arms were clearly
exposed. We all pretended I couldn’t see them.
Will endured all this attention in near silence, answering Nathan’s questions
with a yes or no, so indistinct sometimes that I wasn’t sure if he knew what he
was saying. I realized, now I could see him in the light, that he looked really,
properly ill and I felt terrible for having failed to grasp it. I said sorry until
Nathan told me it had become irritating.
‘Right,’ he said. ‘You need to watch what I’m doing. It’s possible you may
need to do this alone later.’
I didn’t feel I could protest. But I found it hard not to feel squeamish as
Nathan peeled down the waist of Will’s pyjama bottoms, revealing a pale strip of
bare stomach, and carefully removed the gauze dressing around the little tube in
his abdomen, cleaning it gently and replacing the dressing. He showed me how
to change the bag on the bed, explained why it must always be lower than Will’s
body, and I was surprised at how matter-of-fact I was about walking out of the
room with the pouch of warm fluid. I was glad that Will wasn’t really watching
me - not just because he would have made some sharp comment, but because I
felt that me witnessing some part of this intimate routine would in some way
have embarrassed him too.
‘And that’s it,’ Nathan said. Finally, an hour later, Will lay dozing, lying on
fresh cotton sheets and looking, if not exactly well, then not scarily ill.
‘Let him sleep. But wake him after a couple of hours and make sure you get
the best part of a beaker of fluids into him. More fever meds at five, okay? His
temperature will probably shoot up again in the last hour, but nothing more
before five.’
I scribbled everything down on a notepad. I was afraid of getting anything
wrong.
‘Now you’re going to need to repeat what we just did, this evening. You’re
okay with that?’ Nathan wrapped himself up like an Inuit and headed out into the
snow. ‘Just read the folder. And don’t panic. Any problems, you just call me. I’ll
talk you through it all. I’ll get back here again if I really have to.’
I stayed in Will’s room after Nathan left. I was too afraid not to. In the corner
was an old leather armchair with a reading light, perhaps dating from Will’s
previous life, and I curled up on it with a book of short stories that I had pulled
from the bookcase.
It was strangely peaceful in that room. Through the crack in the curtains I
could see the outside world, blanketed in white, still and beautiful. Inside it was
warm and silent, only the odd tick and hiss of the central heating to interrupt my
thoughts. I read, and occasionally I glanced up and checked Will sleeping
peacefully and I realized that there had never been a point in my life before
where I had just sat in silence and done nothing. You don’t grow up used to
silence in a house like mine, with its never-ending vacuuming, television blaring,
and shrieking. During the rare moments that the television was off, Dad would
put on his old Elvis records and play them at full blast. A cafe too is a constant
buzz of noise and clatter.
Here, I could hear my thoughts. I could almost hear my heartbeat. I realized,
to my surprise, that I quite liked it.
At five, my mobile phone signalled a text message. Will stirred, and I leapt
out of the chair, anxious to get it before it disturbed him.
No trains. Is there any chance you could stay over tonight?
Nathan cannot do it. Camilla Traynor.
I didn’t really think about it before I typed back.
No problem.
I rang my parents and told them that I would stay over. My mother sounded
relieved. When I told her I was going to get paid for sleeping over, she sounded
overjoyed.
‘Did you hear that, Bernard?’ she said, her hand half over the phone. ‘They’re
paying her to sleep now.’
I could hear my father’s exclamation. ‘Praise the Lord. She’s found her dream
career.’
I sent a text message to Patrick, telling him that I had been asked to stay at
work and I would ring him later. The message came back within seconds.
Going cross-country snow running tonight.
Good practice for Norway! X P.
I wondered how it was possible for someone to get so excited at the thought of
jogging through sub-zero temperatures in a vest and pants.
Will slept. I cooked myself some food, and defrosted some soup in case he
wanted some later. I got the log fire going in case he felt well enough to go into
the living room. I read another of the short stories and wondered how long it was
since I had bought myself a book. I had loved reading as a child, but I couldn’t
remember reading anything except magazines since. Treen was the reader. It was
almost as if by picking up a book I felt like I was invading her patch. I thought
about her and Thomas disappearing to university and realized I still didn’t know
whether it made me feel happy or sad - or something a bit complicated in
between.
Nathan rang at seven. He seemed relieved that I was staying over.
‘I couldn’t raise Mr Traynor. I even rang their landline number, but it went
straight through to answerphone.’
‘Yeah. Well. He’ll be gone.’
‘Gone?’
me before you, 06
6
The snow came so suddenly that I left home under a bright blue sky and not half
an hour later I was headed past a castle that looked like a cake decoration,
surrounded by a layer of thick white icing.
I trudged up the drive, my footsteps muffled and my toes already numb,
shivering under my too-thin Chinese silk coat. A whirl of thick white flakes
emerged from an iron-grey infinity, almost obscuring Granta House, blotting out
sound, and slowing the world to an unnatural pace. Beyond the neatly trimmed
hedge cars drove past with a newfound caution, pedestrians slipped and squealed
on the pavements. I pulled my scarf up over my nose and wished I had worn
something more suitable than ballet pumps and a velvet minidress.
To my surprise it wasn’t Nathan who opened the door, but Will’s father.
‘He’s in bed,’ he said, glancing up from under the porch. ‘He’s not too good. I
was just wondering whether to call the doctor.’
‘Where’s Nathan?’
‘Morning off. Of course, it would be today. Bloody agency nurse came and
went in six seconds flat. If this snow keeps on I’m not sure what we’ll do later.’
He shrugged, as if these things couldn’t be helped, and disappeared back down
the corridor, apparently relieved that he no longer had to be responsible. ‘You
know what he needs, yes?’ he called over his shoulder.
I took off my coat and shoes and, as I knew Mrs Traynor was in court (she
marked her dates on a diary in Will’s kitchen), I put my wet socks over a radiator
to dry. A pair of Will’s were in the clean-washing basket, so I put them on. They
looked comically large on me but it was heaven to have warm, dry feet. Will
didn’t respond when I called out, so after a while I made him up a drink,
knocked quietly and poked my head round the door. In the dim light I could just
make out the shape under the duvet. He was fast asleep.
I took a step backwards, closed the door behind me, and began working my
way through the morning’s tasks.
My mother seemed to glean an almost physical satisfaction from a well-
ordered house. I had been vacuuming and cleaning daily for a month now, and I
still couldn’t see the attraction. I suspected there would never be a point in my
life when I wouldn’t prefer somebody else to do it.
But on a day like today, when Will was confined to bed, and the world seemed
to have stilled outside, I could also see there was a kind of meditative pleasure in
working my way from one end of the annexe to the other. While I dusted and
polished, I took the radio from room to room with me, keeping the volume low
so that I didn’t disturb Will. Periodically I poked my head round the door, just to
see that he was breathing, and it was only when we got to one o’clock and he
still hadn’t woken up that I started to feel a little anxious.
I filled the log basket, noting that several inches of snow had now settled. I
made Will a fresh drink, and then knocked. When I knocked again, I did so
loudly.
‘Yes?’ His voice was hoarse, as if I had woken him.
‘It’s me.’ When he didn’t respond, I said, ‘Louisa. Am I okay to come in?’
‘I’m hardly doing the Dance of the Seven Veils.’
The room was shadowed, the curtains still drawn. I walked in, letting my eyes
adjust to the light. Will was on one side, one arm bent in front of him as if to
prop himself up, as he had been before when I looked in. Sometimes it was easy
to forget he would not be able to turn over by himself. His hair stuck up on one
side, and a duvet was tucked neatly around him. The smell of warm, unwashed
male filled the room - not unpleasant, but still a little startling as part of a
working day.
‘What can I do? Do you want your drink?’
‘I need to change position.’
I put the drink down on a chest of drawers, and walked over to the bed.
‘What... what do you want me to do?’
He swallowed carefully, as if it were painful. ‘Lift and turn me, then raise the
back of the bed. Here ... ’He nodded for me to come closer. ‘Put your arms
under mine, link your hands behind my back and then pull back. Keep your
backside on the bed and that way you shouldn’t strain your lower back.’
I couldn’t pretend this wasn’t a bit weird. I reached around him, the scent of
him filling my nostrils, his skin warm against mine. I could not have been in any
closer unless I had begun nibbling on his ear. The thought made me mildly
hysterical, and I struggled to keep myself together.
‘What?’
‘Nothing.’ I took a breath, linked my hands, and adjusted my position until I
felt I had him securely. He was broader than I had expected, somehow heavier.
And then, on a count of three, I pulled back.
‘Jesus,’ he exclaimed, into my shoulder.
‘What?’ I nearly dropped him.
‘Your hands are bloody freezing.’
‘Yes. Well, if you bothered to get out of bed, you’d know that it’s actually
snowing outside.’
I was half joking, but now I realized his skin was hot under his T-shirt - an
intense heat that seemed to come from deep within him. He groaned slightly as I
adjusted him against the pillow, and I tried to make my movements as slow and
gentle as possible. He pointed out the remote control device that would bring his
head and shoulders up. ‘Not too much, though,’ he murmured. ‘Abit dizzy.’
I turned on the bedside light, ignoring his vague protest, so that I could see his
face. ‘Will - are you okay?’ I had to say it twice before he answered me.
‘Not my best day.’
‘Do you need painkillers?’
‘Yes ... strong ones.’
‘Maybe some paracetamol?’
He lay back against the cool pillow with a sigh.
I gave him the beaker, watched him swallow.
‘Thank you,’ he said afterwards, and I felt suddenly uneasy.
Will never thanked me for anything.
He closed his eyes, and for a while I just stood in the doorway and watched
him, his chest rising and falling under his T-shirt, his mouth slightly open. His
breathing was shallow, and perhaps a little more laboured than on other days.
But I had never seen him out of his chair, and I wasn’t sure whether it was
something to do with the pressure of lying down.
‘Go,’ he muttered.
I left.
I read my magazine, lifting my head only to watch the snow settle thickly around
the house, creeping up the window sills in powdery landscapes. Mum sent me a
text message at 12.30pm, telling me that my father couldn’t get the car down the
road. 'Don’t set out for home without ringing us first,’ she instructed. I wasn’t
sure what she thought she was going to do - send Dad out with a sledge and a St
Bernard?
I listened to the local news on the radio, the motorway snarl-ups, train
stoppages and temporary school closures that the unexpected blizzard had
brought with it. I went back into Will’s room, and looked at him again. I didn’t
like his colour. He was pale, high points of something bright on each cheek.
‘Will?’ I said softly.
He didn’t stir.
‘Will?’
I began to feel the faint stirrings of panic. I said his name twice more, loudly.
There was no response. Finally, I leant over him. There was no obvious
movement in his face, nothing I could see in his chest. His breath. I should be
able to feel his breath. I put my face down close to his, trying to detect an out
breath. When I couldn’t, I reached out a hand and touched his face gently.
He flinched, his eyes snapping open, just inches from my own.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, jumping back.
He blinked, glancing around the room, as if he had been somewhere far from
home.
‘It’s Lou,’ I said, when I wasn’t sure if he had recognized me.
His expression was one of mild exasperation. ‘I know.’
‘Do you want some soup?’
‘No. Thank you.’ He closed his eyes.
‘More painkillers?’
There was a faint sheen of sweat on his cheekbone. I put my hand out, his
duvet felt vaguely hot and sweaty. It made me nervous.
‘Is there something I should be doing? I mean, if Nathan can’t get here?’
‘No ... I’m fine,’ he murmured, and closed his eyes again.
I went through the folder, trying to work out if I was missing something. I
opened the medical cabinet, the boxes of rubber gloves and gauze dressings, and
realized I had no idea at all what I should do with any of it. I rang the intercom
to speak to Will’s father, but the ringing sound disappeared into an empty house.
I could hear it echoing beyond the annexe door.
I was about to ring Mrs Traynor when the back door opened, and Nathan
stepped in, wrapped in layers of bulky clothing, a woollen scarf and hat almost
obscuring his head. He brought with him a whoosh of cold air and a light flurry
of snow.
‘Hey,’ he said, shaking the snow off his boots and slamming the door behind
him.
It felt like the house had suddenly woken from a dreamlike state.
‘Oh, thank God you’re here,’ I said. ‘He’s not well. He’s been asleep most of
the morning and he’s hardly drunk anything. I didn’t know what to do.’
Nathan shrugged off his coat. ‘Had to walk all the way here. The buses have
stopped running.’
I set about making him some tea, as he went to check on Will.
He reappeared before the kettle had even finished boiling. ‘He’s burning up,’
he said. ‘How long has he been like this?’
‘All morning. I did think he was hot, but he said he just wanted to sleep.’
‘Jesus. All morning? Didn’t you know he can’t regulate his own temperature?’
He pushed past me and began rummaging around in the medicine cabinet.
‘Antibiotics. The strong ones.’ He held up ajar and emptied one into the pestle
and mortar, grinding it furiously.
I hovered behind him. ‘I gave him a paracetamol.’
‘Might as well have given him an Opal Fruit.’
‘I didn’t know. Nobody said. I’ve been wrapping him up.’
‘It’s in the bloody folder. Look, Will doesn’t sweat like we do. In fact he
doesn’t sweat at all from the point of his injury downwards. It means if he gets a
slight chill his temperature gauge goes haywire. Go find the fan. We’ll move that
in there until he cools down. And a damp towel, to put around the back of his
neck. We won’t be able to get him to a doctor until the snow stops. Bloody
agency nurse. They should have picked this up in the morning.’
Nathan was crasser than I’d ever seen him. He was no longer really even
talking to me.
I ran for the fan.
It took almost forty minutes for Will’s temperature to return to an acceptable
level. While we waited for the extra-strong fever medication to take effect, I
placed a towel over his forehead and another around his neck, as Nathan
instructed. We stripped him down, covered his chest with a fine cotton sheet, and
set the fan to play over it. Without sleeves, the scars on his arms were clearly
exposed. We all pretended I couldn’t see them.
Will endured all this attention in near silence, answering Nathan’s questions
with a yes or no, so indistinct sometimes that I wasn’t sure if he knew what he
was saying. I realized, now I could see him in the light, that he looked really,
properly ill and I felt terrible for having failed to grasp it. I said sorry until
Nathan told me it had become irritating.
‘Right,’ he said. ‘You need to watch what I’m doing. It’s possible you may
need to do this alone later.’
I didn’t feel I could protest. But I found it hard not to feel squeamish as
Nathan peeled down the waist of Will’s pyjama bottoms, revealing a pale strip of
bare stomach, and carefully removed the gauze dressing around the little tube in
his abdomen, cleaning it gently and replacing the dressing. He showed me how
to change the bag on the bed, explained why it must always be lower than Will’s
body, and I was surprised at how matter-of-fact I was about walking out of the
room with the pouch of warm fluid. I was glad that Will wasn’t really watching
me - not just because he would have made some sharp comment, but because I
felt that me witnessing some part of this intimate routine would in some way
have embarrassed him too.
‘And that’s it,’ Nathan said. Finally, an hour later, Will lay dozing, lying on
fresh cotton sheets and looking, if not exactly well, then not scarily ill.
‘Let him sleep. But wake him after a couple of hours and make sure you get
the best part of a beaker of fluids into him. More fever meds at five, okay? His
temperature will probably shoot up again in the last hour, but nothing more
before five.’
I scribbled everything down on a notepad. I was afraid of getting anything
wrong.
‘Now you’re going to need to repeat what we just did, this evening. You’re
okay with that?’ Nathan wrapped himself up like an Inuit and headed out into the
snow. ‘Just read the folder. And don’t panic. Any problems, you just call me. I’ll
talk you through it all. I’ll get back here again if I really have to.’
I stayed in Will’s room after Nathan left. I was too afraid not to. In the corner
was an old leather armchair with a reading light, perhaps dating from Will’s
previous life, and I curled up on it with a book of short stories that I had pulled
from the bookcase.
It was strangely peaceful in that room. Through the crack in the curtains I
could see the outside world, blanketed in white, still and beautiful. Inside it was
warm and silent, only the odd tick and hiss of the central heating to interrupt my
thoughts. I read, and occasionally I glanced up and checked Will sleeping
peacefully and I realized that there had never been a point in my life before
where I had just sat in silence and done nothing. You don’t grow up used to
silence in a house like mine, with its never-ending vacuuming, television blaring,
and shrieking. During the rare moments that the television was off, Dad would
put on his old Elvis records and play them at full blast. A cafe too is a constant
buzz of noise and clatter.
Here, I could hear my thoughts. I could almost hear my heartbeat. I realized,
to my surprise, that I quite liked it.
At five, my mobile phone signalled a text message. Will stirred, and I leapt
out of the chair, anxious to get it before it disturbed him.
No trains. Is there any chance you could stay over tonight?
Nathan cannot do it. Camilla Traynor.
I didn’t really think about it before I typed back.
No problem.
I rang my parents and told them that I would stay over. My mother sounded
relieved. When I told her I was going to get paid for sleeping over, she sounded
overjoyed.
‘Did you hear that, Bernard?’ she said, her hand half over the phone. ‘They’re
paying her to sleep now.’
I could hear my father’s exclamation. ‘Praise the Lord. She’s found her dream
career.’
I sent a text message to Patrick, telling him that I had been asked to stay at
work and I would ring him later. The message came back within seconds.
Going cross-country snow running tonight.
Good practice for Norway! X P.
I wondered how it was possible for someone to get so excited at the thought of
jogging through sub-zero temperatures in a vest and pants.
Will slept. I cooked myself some food, and defrosted some soup in case he
wanted some later. I got the log fire going in case he felt well enough to go into
the living room. I read another of the short stories and wondered how long it was
since I had bought myself a book. I had loved reading as a child, but I couldn’t
remember reading anything except magazines since. Treen was the reader. It was
almost as if by picking up a book I felt like I was invading her patch. I thought
about her and Thomas disappearing to university and realized I still didn’t know
whether it made me feel happy or sad - or something a bit complicated in
between.
Nathan rang at seven. He seemed relieved that I was staying over.
‘I couldn’t raise Mr Traynor. I even rang their landline number, but it went
straight through to answerphone.’
‘Yeah. Well. He’ll be gone.’
‘Gone?’
I felt a sudden instinctive panic at the idea that it would be just Will and me in
the house all night. I was afraid of getting something fundamental wrong again,
of jeopardizing Will’s health. ‘Should I call Mrs Traynor, then?’
There was a short silence on the other end of the phone. ‘No. Best not.’
‘But -’
‘Look, Lou, he often ... he often goes somewhere else when Mrs T stays over
in town.’
It took me a minute or two to grasp what he was saying.
‘Oh.’
‘It’s just good that you’re there, that’s all. If you’re sure Will’s looking better,
I’ll be back first thing in the morning.’
There are normal hours, and then there are invalid hours, where time stalls and
slips, where life - real life - seems to exist at one remove. I watched some
television, ate, and cleared up the kitchen, drifting around the annexe in silence.
Finally, I let myself back into Will’s room.
He stirred as I closed the door, half lifting his head. ‘What time is it, Clark?’
His voice was slightly muffled by the pillow.
‘Quarter past eight.’
He let his head drop, and digested this. ‘Can I have a drink?’
There was no sharpness to him now, no edge. It was as if being ill had finally
made him vulnerable. I gave him a drink, and turned on the bedside light. I
perched on the side of his bed, and felt his forehead, as my mother might have
done when I was a child. He was still a little warm, but nothing like he had been.
‘Cool hands.’
‘You complained about them earlier.’
‘Did I?’ He sounded genuinely surprised.
‘Would you like some soup?’
‘No.’
‘Are you comfortable?’
I never knew how much discomfort he was in, but I suspected it was more
than he let on.
‘The other side would be good. Just roll me. I don’t need to sit up.’
I climbed across the bed and moved him over, as gently as I could. He no
longer radiated a sinister heat, just the ordinary warmth of a body that had spent
time under a duvet.
‘Can I do anything else?’
‘Shouldn’t you be heading home?’
‘It’s okay,’ I said. ‘I’m staying over.’
Outside, the last of the light had long been extinguished. The snow was still
falling. Where it caught the porch glow through the window it was bathed in a
pale-gold, melancholy light. We sat there in peaceful silence, watching its
hypnotic fall.
‘Can I ask you something?’ I said, finally. I could see his hands on top of the
sheet. It seemed so strange that they should look so ordinary, so strong, and yet
be so useless.
‘I suspect you’re going to.’
‘What happened?’ I kept wondering about the marks on his wrists. It was the
one question I couldn’t ask directly.
He opened one eye. ‘How did I get like this?’
When I nodded, he closed his eyes again. ‘Motorbike accident. Not mine. I
was an innocent pedestrian.’
‘I thought it would be skiing or bungee jumping or something.’
‘Everyone does. God’s little joke. I was crossing the road outside my home.
Not this place,’ he said. ‘My London home.’
I stared at the books in his bookshelf. Among the novels, the well-thumbed
Penguin paperbacks, were business titles: Corporate Law, TakeOver, directories
of names I did not recognize.
‘And there was no way you could carry on with your job?’
‘No. Nor the apartment, the holidays, the life ... I believe you met my ex¬
girlfriend.’ The break in his voice couldn’t disguise the bitterness. ‘But I should
apparently be grateful, as for some time they didn’t think I was going to live at
all.’
‘Do you hate it? Living here, I mean?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is there any way you might be able to live in London again?’
‘Not like this, no.’
‘But you might improve. I mean, Nathan said there are loads of advances in
this kind of injury.’
Will closed his eyes again.
I waited, and then I adjusted the pillow behind his head, and the duvet around
his chest. ‘Sorry,’ I said, sitting upright. ‘If I ask too many questions. Do you
want me to leave?’
‘No. Stay for a bit. Talk to me.’ He swallowed. His eyes opened again and his
gaze slid up to mine. He looked unbearably tired. ‘Tell me something good.’
I hesitated a moment, then I leant back against the pillows beside him. We sat
there in the near dark, watching the briefly illuminated flakes of snow disappear
into the black night.
‘You know ... I used to say that to my Dad,’ I said, finally. ‘But if I told you
what he used to say back, you’d think I was insane.’
‘More than I do? 5
‘When I had a nightmare or was sad or frightened about something, he used to
sing me ... ’I started to laugh. ‘Oh ... I can’t. 5
‘Go on.’
‘He used to sing me the “Molahonkey Song”.’
‘The what?’
‘The “Molahonkey Song”. I used to think everyone knew it.’
‘Trust me, Clark,’ he murmured, ‘I am a Molahonkey virgin.’
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and began to sing.
I wi-li-lished I li-li-lived in Molahonkey la-la-land
The la-la-land where I-li-li was bo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lorn
So I-li-li could play-la-lay my o-lo-lold banjo-lo-lo
My o-lo-lold ban-jo-lo-lo won’t go-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo.
‘Jesus Christ.’
I took another breath.
I too-lo-look it to-lo-lo the me-le-lender’s sho-lo-lop to
See-lee-lee what they-le-ley could do-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo
They sai-lai-laid to me-le-le your stri-li-lings are sho-lo-lot
They’re no-lo-lo more u-lu-luse to you-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-loo.
There was a short silence.
‘You are insane. Your whole family is insane.’
‘But it worked.’
‘And you are a God-awful singer. I hope your dad was better.’
‘I think what you meant to say was, “Thank you, Miss Clark, for attempting to
entertain me.’”
‘I suppose it makes about as much sense as most of the psychotherapeutic
help I’ve received. Okay, Clark,’ he said, ‘tell me something else. Something that
doesn’t involve singing.’
I thought for a bit.
‘Um ... okay, well... you were looking at my shoes the other day?’
‘Hard not to.’
‘Well, my mum can date my unusual shoe thing back to when I was three. She
bought me a pair of bright-turquoise glittery wellies - they were quite unusual
back then - kids used to just have those green ones, or maybe red if you were
lucky. And she said from the day she brought them home I refused to take them
off. I wore them to bed, in the bath, to nursery all through the summer. My
favourite outfit was those glitter boots and my bumblebee tights.’
‘Bumblebee tights?’
‘Black and yellow stripes.’
‘Gorgeous.’
‘That’s a bit harsh.’
‘Well, it’s true. They sound revolting.’
‘They might sound revolting to you, but astonishingly, Will Traynor, not all
girls get dressed just to please men.’
‘Bullshit.’
‘No, it’s not.’
‘Everything women do is with men in mind. Everything anyone does is with
sex in mind. Haven’t you read The Red Queen?’
T have no idea what you’re talking about. But I can assure you I’m not sitting
on your bed singing the “Molahonkey Song” because I’m trying to get my leg
over. And when I was three, I just really, really liked having stripy legs.’
I realized that the anxiety that had held me in its grip all day was slowly
ebbing away with every one of Will’s comments. I was no longer in sole charge
of a poorly quadriplegic. It was just me, sitting next to a particularly sarcastic
bloke, having a chat.
‘So come on, then, what happened to these gorgeous glittery wellies?’
‘She had to throw them away. I got terrible athlete’s foot.’
‘Delightful.’
‘And she threw the tights away too.’
‘Why?’
‘I never found out. But it broke my heart. I have never found a pair of tights I
loved like that again. They don’t do them any more. Or if they do, they don’t
make them for grown women.’
‘Strange, that.’
‘Oh, you can mock. Didn’t you ever love anything that much?’
I could barely see him now, the room shrouded in the near dark. I could have
turned the overhead light on, but something stopped me. And almost as soon as I
realized what I had said, I wished I hadn’t.
‘Yes/ he said, quietly. ‘Yes, I did/
We talked a bit longer, and then Will nodded off. I lay there, watching him
breathe, and occasionally wondering what he would say if he woke up and found
me staring at him, at his too-long hair and tired eyes and scraggy beginnings of a
beard. But I couldn’t move. The hours had become surreal, an island out of time.
I was the only other person in the house, and I was still afraid to leave him.
Shortly after eleven, I saw he had begun to sweat again, his breathing
becoming shallower, and I woke him and made him take some fever medication.
He didn’t talk, except to murmur his thanks. I changed his top sheet and his
pillowcase, and then, when he finally slept again, I lay down a foot away from
him and, a long time later, I slept too.
I woke to the sound of my name. I was in a classroom, asleep on my desk, and
the teacher was rapping a blackboard, repeating my name again and again. I
knew I should be paying attention, knew that the teacher would see this slumber
as an act of subversion, but I could not raise my head from the desk.
‘Louisa.’
‘Mmmhghh.’
‘Louisa.’
The desk was awfully soft. I opened my eyes. The words were being spoken
over my head, hissed, but with great emphasis. Louisa.
I was in bed. I blinked, letting my eyes focus, then looked up to find Camilla
Traynor standing over me. She wore a heavy wool coat and her handbag was
slung over her shoulder.
‘Louisa.’
I pushed myself upright with a start. Beside me, Will was asleep under the
covers, his mouth slightly open, his elbow bent at right angles in front of him.
Light seeped in through the window; telling of a cold, bright morning.
‘Uh.’
‘What are you doing?’
I felt as if I had been caught doing something awful. I rubbed at my face,
trying to gather my thoughts. Why was I in here? What could I tell her?
‘What are you doing in Will’s bed?’
‘Will ... ’ I said, quietly. ‘Will wasn’t well ... I just thought I should keep an
eye
‘What do you mean, he wasn’t well? Look, come out into the hall.’ She strode
out of the room, evidently waiting for me to catch her up.
I followed, trying to straighten my clothes. I had a horrible feeling my make¬
up was smeared all over my face.
She closed Will’s bedroom door behind me.
I stood in front of her, trying to smooth my hair as I gathered my thoughts.
‘Will had a temperature. Nathan got it down when he came, but I didn’t know
about this regulating thing and I wanted to keep an eye on him ... he said I
should keep an eye on him ... ’ My voice sounded thick, unformed. I wasn’t
entirely sure I was making coherent sentences.
‘Why didn’t you call me? If he was ill you should have called me
immediately. Or Mr Traynor.’
It was as if my synapses had suddenly snapped together. Mr Traynor. Oh Lord.
I glanced up at the clock. It was a quarter to eight.
‘I didn’t ... Nathan seemed to ... ’
‘Look, Louisa. It’s really not rocket science. If Will was ill enough for you to
sleep in his room then that is something you should have contacted me about.’
‘Yes.’
I blinked, staring at the ground.
‘I don’t understand why you didn’t call. Did you attempt to call Mr Traynor?’
Nathan said not to say anything.
I -’
At that moment the door to the annexe opened, and Mr Traynor stood there, a
newspaper folded under his arm. ‘You made it back!’ he said to his wife,
brushing snowflakes from his shoulders. ‘I’ve just fought my way up the road to
get a newspaper and some milk. Roads are absolutely treacherous. I had to go
the long way to Hansford Corner, to avoid the ice patches.’
She looked at him and I wondered for a moment whether she was registering
the fact that he was wearing the same shirt and jumper as the previous day.
‘Did you know Will had been ill in the night?’
He looked straight at me. I dropped my gaze to my feet. I wasn’t sure I had
ever felt more uncomfortable.
‘Did you try to call me, Louisa? I’m sorry - I didn’t hear a thing. I suspect that
intercom’s on the blink. There have been a few occasions lately where I’ve
missed it. And I wasn’t feeling too good myself last night. Out like a light.’
I was still wearing Will’s socks. I stared at them, wondering if Mrs Traynor
was going to judge me for that too.
But she seemed distracted. ‘It’s been a long journey home. I think ... I’ll leave
you to it. But if anything like this happens again, you call me immediately. Do
you understand?’
I didn’t want to look at Mr Traynor. ‘Yes,’ I said, and disappeared into the
kitchen.
The snow came so suddenly that I left home under a bright blue sky and not half
an hour later I was headed past a castle that looked like a cake decoration,
surrounded by a layer of thick white icing.
I trudged up the drive, my footsteps muffled and my toes already numb,
shivering under my too-thin Chinese silk coat. A whirl of thick white flakes
emerged from an iron-grey infinity, almost obscuring Granta House, blotting out
sound, and slowing the world to an unnatural pace. Beyond the neatly trimmed
hedge cars drove past with a newfound caution, pedestrians slipped and squealed
on the pavements. I pulled my scarf up over my nose and wished I had worn
something more suitable than ballet pumps and a velvet minidress.
To my surprise it wasn’t Nathan who opened the door, but Will’s father.
‘He’s in bed,’ he said, glancing up from under the porch. ‘He’s not too good. I
was just wondering whether to call the doctor.’
‘Where’s Nathan?’
‘Morning off. Of course, it would be today. Bloody agency nurse came and
went in six seconds flat. If this snow keeps on I’m not sure what we’ll do later.’
He shrugged, as if these things couldn’t be helped, and disappeared back down
the corridor, apparently relieved that he no longer had to be responsible. ‘You
know what he needs, yes?’ he called over his shoulder.
I took off my coat and shoes and, as I knew Mrs Traynor was in court (she
marked her dates on a diary in Will’s kitchen), I put my wet socks over a radiator
to dry. A pair of Will’s were in the clean-washing basket, so I put them on. They
looked comically large on me but it was heaven to have warm, dry feet. Will
didn’t respond when I called out, so after a while I made him up a drink,
knocked quietly and poked my head round the door. In the dim light I could just
make out the shape under the duvet. He was fast asleep.
I took a step backwards, closed the door behind me, and began working my
way through the morning’s tasks.
My mother seemed to glean an almost physical satisfaction from a well-
ordered house. I had been vacuuming and cleaning daily for a month now, and I
still couldn’t see the attraction. I suspected there would never be a point in my
life when I wouldn’t prefer somebody else to do it.
But on a day like today, when Will was confined to bed, and the world seemed
to have stilled outside, I could also see there was a kind of meditative pleasure in
working my way from one end of the annexe to the other. While I dusted and
polished, I took the radio from room to room with me, keeping the volume low
so that I didn’t disturb Will. Periodically I poked my head round the door, just to
see that he was breathing, and it was only when we got to one o’clock and he
still hadn’t woken up that I started to feel a little anxious.
I filled the log basket, noting that several inches of snow had now settled. I
made Will a fresh drink, and then knocked. When I knocked again, I did so
loudly.
‘Yes?’ His voice was hoarse, as if I had woken him.
‘It’s me.’ When he didn’t respond, I said, ‘Louisa. Am I okay to come in?’
‘I’m hardly doing the Dance of the Seven Veils.’
The room was shadowed, the curtains still drawn. I walked in, letting my eyes
adjust to the light. Will was on one side, one arm bent in front of him as if to
prop himself up, as he had been before when I looked in. Sometimes it was easy
to forget he would not be able to turn over by himself. His hair stuck up on one
side, and a duvet was tucked neatly around him. The smell of warm, unwashed
male filled the room - not unpleasant, but still a little startling as part of a
working day.
‘What can I do? Do you want your drink?’
‘I need to change position.’
I put the drink down on a chest of drawers, and walked over to the bed.
‘What... what do you want me to do?’
He swallowed carefully, as if it were painful. ‘Lift and turn me, then raise the
back of the bed. Here ... ’He nodded for me to come closer. ‘Put your arms
under mine, link your hands behind my back and then pull back. Keep your
backside on the bed and that way you shouldn’t strain your lower back.’
I couldn’t pretend this wasn’t a bit weird. I reached around him, the scent of
him filling my nostrils, his skin warm against mine. I could not have been in any
closer unless I had begun nibbling on his ear. The thought made me mildly
hysterical, and I struggled to keep myself together.
‘What?’
‘Nothing.’ I took a breath, linked my hands, and adjusted my position until I
felt I had him securely. He was broader than I had expected, somehow heavier.
And then, on a count of three, I pulled back.
‘Jesus,’ he exclaimed, into my shoulder.
‘What?’ I nearly dropped him.
‘Your hands are bloody freezing.’
‘Yes. Well, if you bothered to get out of bed, you’d know that it’s actually
snowing outside.’
I was half joking, but now I realized his skin was hot under his T-shirt - an
intense heat that seemed to come from deep within him. He groaned slightly as I
adjusted him against the pillow, and I tried to make my movements as slow and
gentle as possible. He pointed out the remote control device that would bring his
head and shoulders up. ‘Not too much, though,’ he murmured. ‘Abit dizzy.’
I turned on the bedside light, ignoring his vague protest, so that I could see his
face. ‘Will - are you okay?’ I had to say it twice before he answered me.
‘Not my best day.’
‘Do you need painkillers?’
‘Yes ... strong ones.’
‘Maybe some paracetamol?’
He lay back against the cool pillow with a sigh.
I gave him the beaker, watched him swallow.
‘Thank you,’ he said afterwards, and I felt suddenly uneasy.
Will never thanked me for anything.
He closed his eyes, and for a while I just stood in the doorway and watched
him, his chest rising and falling under his T-shirt, his mouth slightly open. His
breathing was shallow, and perhaps a little more laboured than on other days.
But I had never seen him out of his chair, and I wasn’t sure whether it was
something to do with the pressure of lying down.
‘Go,’ he muttered.
I left.
I read my magazine, lifting my head only to watch the snow settle thickly around
the house, creeping up the window sills in powdery landscapes. Mum sent me a
text message at 12.30pm, telling me that my father couldn’t get the car down the
road. 'Don’t set out for home without ringing us first,’ she instructed. I wasn’t
sure what she thought she was going to do - send Dad out with a sledge and a St
Bernard?
I listened to the local news on the radio, the motorway snarl-ups, train
stoppages and temporary school closures that the unexpected blizzard had
brought with it. I went back into Will’s room, and looked at him again. I didn’t
like his colour. He was pale, high points of something bright on each cheek.
‘Will?’ I said softly.
He didn’t stir.
‘Will?’
I began to feel the faint stirrings of panic. I said his name twice more, loudly.
There was no response. Finally, I leant over him. There was no obvious
movement in his face, nothing I could see in his chest. His breath. I should be
able to feel his breath. I put my face down close to his, trying to detect an out
breath. When I couldn’t, I reached out a hand and touched his face gently.
He flinched, his eyes snapping open, just inches from my own.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, jumping back.
He blinked, glancing around the room, as if he had been somewhere far from
home.
‘It’s Lou,’ I said, when I wasn’t sure if he had recognized me.
His expression was one of mild exasperation. ‘I know.’
‘Do you want some soup?’
‘No. Thank you.’ He closed his eyes.
‘More painkillers?’
There was a faint sheen of sweat on his cheekbone. I put my hand out, his
duvet felt vaguely hot and sweaty. It made me nervous.
‘Is there something I should be doing? I mean, if Nathan can’t get here?’
‘No ... I’m fine,’ he murmured, and closed his eyes again.
I went through the folder, trying to work out if I was missing something. I
opened the medical cabinet, the boxes of rubber gloves and gauze dressings, and
realized I had no idea at all what I should do with any of it. I rang the intercom
to speak to Will’s father, but the ringing sound disappeared into an empty house.
I could hear it echoing beyond the annexe door.
I was about to ring Mrs Traynor when the back door opened, and Nathan
stepped in, wrapped in layers of bulky clothing, a woollen scarf and hat almost
obscuring his head. He brought with him a whoosh of cold air and a light flurry
of snow.
‘Hey,’ he said, shaking the snow off his boots and slamming the door behind
him.
It felt like the house had suddenly woken from a dreamlike state.
‘Oh, thank God you’re here,’ I said. ‘He’s not well. He’s been asleep most of
the morning and he’s hardly drunk anything. I didn’t know what to do.’
Nathan shrugged off his coat. ‘Had to walk all the way here. The buses have
stopped running.’
I set about making him some tea, as he went to check on Will.
He reappeared before the kettle had even finished boiling. ‘He’s burning up,’
he said. ‘How long has he been like this?’
‘All morning. I did think he was hot, but he said he just wanted to sleep.’
‘Jesus. All morning? Didn’t you know he can’t regulate his own temperature?’
He pushed past me and began rummaging around in the medicine cabinet.
‘Antibiotics. The strong ones.’ He held up ajar and emptied one into the pestle
and mortar, grinding it furiously.
I hovered behind him. ‘I gave him a paracetamol.’
‘Might as well have given him an Opal Fruit.’
‘I didn’t know. Nobody said. I’ve been wrapping him up.’
‘It’s in the bloody folder. Look, Will doesn’t sweat like we do. In fact he
doesn’t sweat at all from the point of his injury downwards. It means if he gets a
slight chill his temperature gauge goes haywire. Go find the fan. We’ll move that
in there until he cools down. And a damp towel, to put around the back of his
neck. We won’t be able to get him to a doctor until the snow stops. Bloody
agency nurse. They should have picked this up in the morning.’
Nathan was crasser than I’d ever seen him. He was no longer really even
talking to me.
I ran for the fan.
It took almost forty minutes for Will’s temperature to return to an acceptable
level. While we waited for the extra-strong fever medication to take effect, I
placed a towel over his forehead and another around his neck, as Nathan
instructed. We stripped him down, covered his chest with a fine cotton sheet, and
set the fan to play over it. Without sleeves, the scars on his arms were clearly
exposed. We all pretended I couldn’t see them.
Will endured all this attention in near silence, answering Nathan’s questions
with a yes or no, so indistinct sometimes that I wasn’t sure if he knew what he
was saying. I realized, now I could see him in the light, that he looked really,
properly ill and I felt terrible for having failed to grasp it. I said sorry until
Nathan told me it had become irritating.
‘Right,’ he said. ‘You need to watch what I’m doing. It’s possible you may
need to do this alone later.’
I didn’t feel I could protest. But I found it hard not to feel squeamish as
Nathan peeled down the waist of Will’s pyjama bottoms, revealing a pale strip of
bare stomach, and carefully removed the gauze dressing around the little tube in
his abdomen, cleaning it gently and replacing the dressing. He showed me how
to change the bag on the bed, explained why it must always be lower than Will’s
body, and I was surprised at how matter-of-fact I was about walking out of the
room with the pouch of warm fluid. I was glad that Will wasn’t really watching
me - not just because he would have made some sharp comment, but because I
felt that me witnessing some part of this intimate routine would in some way
have embarrassed him too.
‘And that’s it,’ Nathan said. Finally, an hour later, Will lay dozing, lying on
fresh cotton sheets and looking, if not exactly well, then not scarily ill.
‘Let him sleep. But wake him after a couple of hours and make sure you get
the best part of a beaker of fluids into him. More fever meds at five, okay? His
temperature will probably shoot up again in the last hour, but nothing more
before five.’
I scribbled everything down on a notepad. I was afraid of getting anything
wrong.
‘Now you’re going to need to repeat what we just did, this evening. You’re
okay with that?’ Nathan wrapped himself up like an Inuit and headed out into the
snow. ‘Just read the folder. And don’t panic. Any problems, you just call me. I’ll
talk you through it all. I’ll get back here again if I really have to.’
I stayed in Will’s room after Nathan left. I was too afraid not to. In the corner
was an old leather armchair with a reading light, perhaps dating from Will’s
previous life, and I curled up on it with a book of short stories that I had pulled
from the bookcase.
It was strangely peaceful in that room. Through the crack in the curtains I
could see the outside world, blanketed in white, still and beautiful. Inside it was
warm and silent, only the odd tick and hiss of the central heating to interrupt my
thoughts. I read, and occasionally I glanced up and checked Will sleeping
peacefully and I realized that there had never been a point in my life before
where I had just sat in silence and done nothing. You don’t grow up used to
silence in a house like mine, with its never-ending vacuuming, television blaring,
and shrieking. During the rare moments that the television was off, Dad would
put on his old Elvis records and play them at full blast. A cafe too is a constant
buzz of noise and clatter.
Here, I could hear my thoughts. I could almost hear my heartbeat. I realized,
to my surprise, that I quite liked it.
At five, my mobile phone signalled a text message. Will stirred, and I leapt
out of the chair, anxious to get it before it disturbed him.
No trains. Is there any chance you could stay over tonight?
Nathan cannot do it. Camilla Traynor.
I didn’t really think about it before I typed back.
No problem.
I rang my parents and told them that I would stay over. My mother sounded
relieved. When I told her I was going to get paid for sleeping over, she sounded
overjoyed.
‘Did you hear that, Bernard?’ she said, her hand half over the phone. ‘They’re
paying her to sleep now.’
I could hear my father’s exclamation. ‘Praise the Lord. She’s found her dream
career.’
I sent a text message to Patrick, telling him that I had been asked to stay at
work and I would ring him later. The message came back within seconds.
Going cross-country snow running tonight.
Good practice for Norway! X P.
I wondered how it was possible for someone to get so excited at the thought of
jogging through sub-zero temperatures in a vest and pants.
Will slept. I cooked myself some food, and defrosted some soup in case he
wanted some later. I got the log fire going in case he felt well enough to go into
the living room. I read another of the short stories and wondered how long it was
since I had bought myself a book. I had loved reading as a child, but I couldn’t
remember reading anything except magazines since. Treen was the reader. It was
almost as if by picking up a book I felt like I was invading her patch. I thought
about her and Thomas disappearing to university and realized I still didn’t know
whether it made me feel happy or sad - or something a bit complicated in
between.
Nathan rang at seven. He seemed relieved that I was staying over.
‘I couldn’t raise Mr Traynor. I even rang their landline number, but it went
straight through to answerphone.’
‘Yeah. Well. He’ll be gone.’
‘Gone?’
I felt a sudden instinctive panic at the idea that it would be just Will and me in
the house all night. I was afraid of getting something fundamental wrong again,
of jeopardizing Will’s health. ‘Should I call Mrs Traynor, then?’
There was a short silence on the other end of the phone. ‘No. Best not.’
‘But -’
‘Look, Lou, he often ... he often goes somewhere else when Mrs T stays over
in town.’
It took me a minute or two to grasp what he was saying.
‘Oh.’
‘It’s just good that you’re there, that’s all. If you’re sure Will’s looking better,
I’ll be back first thing in the morning.’
There are normal hours, and then there are invalid hours, where time stalls and
slips, where life - real life - seems to exist at one remove. I watched some
television, ate, and cleared up the kitchen, drifting around the annexe in silence.
Finally, I let myself back into Will’s room.
He stirred as I closed the door, half lifting his head. ‘What time is it, Clark?’
His voice was slightly muffled by the pillow.
‘Quarter past eight.’
He let his head drop, and digested this. ‘Can I have a drink?’
There was no sharpness to him now, no edge. It was as if being ill had finally
made him vulnerable. I gave him a drink, and turned on the bedside light. I
perched on the side of his bed, and felt his forehead, as my mother might have
done when I was a child. He was still a little warm, but nothing like he had been.
‘Cool hands.’
‘You complained about them earlier.’
‘Did I?’ He sounded genuinely surprised.
‘Would you like some soup?’
‘No.’
‘Are you comfortable?’
I never knew how much discomfort he was in, but I suspected it was more
than he let on.
‘The other side would be good. Just roll me. I don’t need to sit up.’
I climbed across the bed and moved him over, as gently as I could. He no
longer radiated a sinister heat, just the ordinary warmth of a body that had spent
time under a duvet.
‘Can I do anything else?’
‘Shouldn’t you be heading home?’
‘It’s okay,’ I said. ‘I’m staying over.’
Outside, the last of the light had long been extinguished. The snow was still
falling. Where it caught the porch glow through the window it was bathed in a
pale-gold, melancholy light. We sat there in peaceful silence, watching its
hypnotic fall.
‘Can I ask you something?’ I said, finally. I could see his hands on top of the
sheet. It seemed so strange that they should look so ordinary, so strong, and yet
be so useless.
‘I suspect you’re going to.’
‘What happened?’ I kept wondering about the marks on his wrists. It was the
one question I couldn’t ask directly.
He opened one eye. ‘How did I get like this?’
When I nodded, he closed his eyes again. ‘Motorbike accident. Not mine. I
was an innocent pedestrian.’
‘I thought it would be skiing or bungee jumping or something.’
‘Everyone does. God’s little joke. I was crossing the road outside my home.
Not this place,’ he said. ‘My London home.’
I stared at the books in his bookshelf. Among the novels, the well-thumbed
Penguin paperbacks, were business titles: Corporate Law, TakeOver, directories
of names I did not recognize.
‘And there was no way you could carry on with your job?’
‘No. Nor the apartment, the holidays, the life ... I believe you met my ex¬
girlfriend.’ The break in his voice couldn’t disguise the bitterness. ‘But I should
apparently be grateful, as for some time they didn’t think I was going to live at
all.’
‘Do you hate it? Living here, I mean?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is there any way you might be able to live in London again?’
‘Not like this, no.’
‘But you might improve. I mean, Nathan said there are loads of advances in
this kind of injury.’
Will closed his eyes again.
I waited, and then I adjusted the pillow behind his head, and the duvet around
his chest. ‘Sorry,’ I said, sitting upright. ‘If I ask too many questions. Do you
want me to leave?’
‘No. Stay for a bit. Talk to me.’ He swallowed. His eyes opened again and his
gaze slid up to mine. He looked unbearably tired. ‘Tell me something good.’
I hesitated a moment, then I leant back against the pillows beside him. We sat
there in the near dark, watching the briefly illuminated flakes of snow disappear
into the black night.
‘You know ... I used to say that to my Dad,’ I said, finally. ‘But if I told you
what he used to say back, you’d think I was insane.’
‘More than I do? 5
‘When I had a nightmare or was sad or frightened about something, he used to
sing me ... ’I started to laugh. ‘Oh ... I can’t. 5
‘Go on.’
‘He used to sing me the “Molahonkey Song”.’
‘The what?’
‘The “Molahonkey Song”. I used to think everyone knew it.’
‘Trust me, Clark,’ he murmured, ‘I am a Molahonkey virgin.’
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and began to sing.
I wi-li-lished I li-li-lived in Molahonkey la-la-land
The la-la-land where I-li-li was bo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lorn
So I-li-li could play-la-lay my o-lo-lold banjo-lo-lo
My o-lo-lold ban-jo-lo-lo won’t go-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo.
‘Jesus Christ.’
I took another breath.
I too-lo-look it to-lo-lo the me-le-lender’s sho-lo-lop to
See-lee-lee what they-le-ley could do-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo
They sai-lai-laid to me-le-le your stri-li-lings are sho-lo-lot
They’re no-lo-lo more u-lu-luse to you-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-loo.
There was a short silence.
‘You are insane. Your whole family is insane.’
‘But it worked.’
‘And you are a God-awful singer. I hope your dad was better.’
‘I think what you meant to say was, “Thank you, Miss Clark, for attempting to
entertain me.’”
‘I suppose it makes about as much sense as most of the psychotherapeutic
help I’ve received. Okay, Clark,’ he said, ‘tell me something else. Something that
doesn’t involve singing.’
I thought for a bit.
‘Um ... okay, well... you were looking at my shoes the other day?’
‘Hard not to.’
‘Well, my mum can date my unusual shoe thing back to when I was three. She
bought me a pair of bright-turquoise glittery wellies - they were quite unusual
back then - kids used to just have those green ones, or maybe red if you were
lucky. And she said from the day she brought them home I refused to take them
off. I wore them to bed, in the bath, to nursery all through the summer. My
favourite outfit was those glitter boots and my bumblebee tights.’
‘Bumblebee tights?’
‘Black and yellow stripes.’
‘Gorgeous.’
‘That’s a bit harsh.’
‘Well, it’s true. They sound revolting.’
‘They might sound revolting to you, but astonishingly, Will Traynor, not all
girls get dressed just to please men.’
‘Bullshit.’
‘No, it’s not.’
‘Everything women do is with men in mind. Everything anyone does is with
sex in mind. Haven’t you read The Red Queen?’
T have no idea what you’re talking about. But I can assure you I’m not sitting
on your bed singing the “Molahonkey Song” because I’m trying to get my leg
over. And when I was three, I just really, really liked having stripy legs.’
I realized that the anxiety that had held me in its grip all day was slowly
ebbing away with every one of Will’s comments. I was no longer in sole charge
of a poorly quadriplegic. It was just me, sitting next to a particularly sarcastic
bloke, having a chat.
‘So come on, then, what happened to these gorgeous glittery wellies?’
‘She had to throw them away. I got terrible athlete’s foot.’
‘Delightful.’
‘And she threw the tights away too.’
‘Why?’
‘I never found out. But it broke my heart. I have never found a pair of tights I
loved like that again. They don’t do them any more. Or if they do, they don’t
make them for grown women.’
‘Strange, that.’
‘Oh, you can mock. Didn’t you ever love anything that much?’
I could barely see him now, the room shrouded in the near dark. I could have
turned the overhead light on, but something stopped me. And almost as soon as I
realized what I had said, I wished I hadn’t.
‘Yes/ he said, quietly. ‘Yes, I did/
We talked a bit longer, and then Will nodded off. I lay there, watching him
breathe, and occasionally wondering what he would say if he woke up and found
me staring at him, at his too-long hair and tired eyes and scraggy beginnings of a
beard. But I couldn’t move. The hours had become surreal, an island out of time.
I was the only other person in the house, and I was still afraid to leave him.
Shortly after eleven, I saw he had begun to sweat again, his breathing
becoming shallower, and I woke him and made him take some fever medication.
He didn’t talk, except to murmur his thanks. I changed his top sheet and his
pillowcase, and then, when he finally slept again, I lay down a foot away from
him and, a long time later, I slept too.
I woke to the sound of my name. I was in a classroom, asleep on my desk, and
the teacher was rapping a blackboard, repeating my name again and again. I
knew I should be paying attention, knew that the teacher would see this slumber
as an act of subversion, but I could not raise my head from the desk.
‘Louisa.’
‘Mmmhghh.’
‘Louisa.’
The desk was awfully soft. I opened my eyes. The words were being spoken
over my head, hissed, but with great emphasis. Louisa.
I was in bed. I blinked, letting my eyes focus, then looked up to find Camilla
Traynor standing over me. She wore a heavy wool coat and her handbag was
slung over her shoulder.
‘Louisa.’
I pushed myself upright with a start. Beside me, Will was asleep under the
covers, his mouth slightly open, his elbow bent at right angles in front of him.
Light seeped in through the window; telling of a cold, bright morning.
‘Uh.’
‘What are you doing?’
I felt as if I had been caught doing something awful. I rubbed at my face,
trying to gather my thoughts. Why was I in here? What could I tell her?
‘What are you doing in Will’s bed?’
‘Will ... ’ I said, quietly. ‘Will wasn’t well ... I just thought I should keep an
eye
‘What do you mean, he wasn’t well? Look, come out into the hall.’ She strode
out of the room, evidently waiting for me to catch her up.
I followed, trying to straighten my clothes. I had a horrible feeling my make¬
up was smeared all over my face.
She closed Will’s bedroom door behind me.
I stood in front of her, trying to smooth my hair as I gathered my thoughts.
‘Will had a temperature. Nathan got it down when he came, but I didn’t know
about this regulating thing and I wanted to keep an eye on him ... he said I
should keep an eye on him ... ’ My voice sounded thick, unformed. I wasn’t
entirely sure I was making coherent sentences.
‘Why didn’t you call me? If he was ill you should have called me
immediately. Or Mr Traynor.’
It was as if my synapses had suddenly snapped together. Mr Traynor. Oh Lord.
I glanced up at the clock. It was a quarter to eight.
‘I didn’t ... Nathan seemed to ... ’
‘Look, Louisa. It’s really not rocket science. If Will was ill enough for you to
sleep in his room then that is something you should have contacted me about.’
‘Yes.’
I blinked, staring at the ground.
‘I don’t understand why you didn’t call. Did you attempt to call Mr Traynor?’
Nathan said not to say anything.
I -’
At that moment the door to the annexe opened, and Mr Traynor stood there, a
newspaper folded under his arm. ‘You made it back!’ he said to his wife,
brushing snowflakes from his shoulders. ‘I’ve just fought my way up the road to
get a newspaper and some milk. Roads are absolutely treacherous. I had to go
the long way to Hansford Corner, to avoid the ice patches.’
She looked at him and I wondered for a moment whether she was registering
the fact that he was wearing the same shirt and jumper as the previous day.
‘Did you know Will had been ill in the night?’
He looked straight at me. I dropped my gaze to my feet. I wasn’t sure I had
ever felt more uncomfortable.
‘Did you try to call me, Louisa? I’m sorry - I didn’t hear a thing. I suspect that
intercom’s on the blink. There have been a few occasions lately where I’ve
missed it. And I wasn’t feeling too good myself last night. Out like a light.’
I was still wearing Will’s socks. I stared at them, wondering if Mrs Traynor
was going to judge me for that too.
But she seemed distracted. ‘It’s been a long journey home. I think ... I’ll leave
you to it. But if anything like this happens again, you call me immediately. Do
you understand?’
I didn’t want to look at Mr Traynor. ‘Yes,’ I said, and disappeared into the
kitchen.
Tuesday, July 9, 2019
me before you, 05.2
‘Oh, for Christ’s sake. It’s hardly a state secret, your social life, is it?’ He had
begun to look irritated.
‘I don’t know ... ’ I said. ‘I go for a drink at the pub. I watch a bit of telly. I go
and watch my boyfriend when he does his running. Nothing unusual.’
‘You watch your boyfriend running.’
‘Yes.’
‘But you don’t run yourself.’
‘No. I’m not really -’ I glanced down at my chest ‘- built for it.’
That made him smile.
‘And what else?’
‘What do you mean, what else?’
‘Hobbies? Travelling? Places you like to go?’
He was beginning to sound like my old careers teacher.
I tried to think. ‘I don’t really have any hobbies. I read a bit. I like clothes.’
‘Handy,’ he said, dryly.
‘You asked. I’m not really a hobby person.’ My voice had become strangely
defensive. ‘I don’t do much, okay? I work and then I go home.’
‘Where do you live?’
‘On the other side of the castle. Renfrew Road.’
He looked blank. Of course he did. There was little human traffic between the
two sides of the castle. ‘It’s off the dual carriageway. Near the McDonald’s.’
He nodded, although I’m not sure he really knew where I was talking about.
‘Holidays?’
‘I’ve been to Spain, with Patrick. My boyfriend,’ I added. ‘When I was a kid
we only really went to Dorset. Or Tenby. My aunt lives in Tenby.’
‘And what do you want?’
‘What do I want what?’
‘From your life?’
I blinked. ‘That’s a bit deep, isn’t it?’
‘Only generally. I’m not asking you to psychoanalyse yourself. I’m just
asking, what do you want? Get married? Pop out some ankle biters? Dream
career? Travel the world?’
There was a long pause.
I think I knew my answer would disappoint him even before I said the words
aloud. ‘I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it.’
On Friday we went to the hospital. I’m glad I hadn’t known about Will’s
appointment before I arrived that morning, as I would have lain awake all night
fretting about having to drive him there. I can drive, yes. But I say I can drive in
the same way that I say I can speak French. Yes, I took the relevant exam and
passed. But I haven’t used that particular skill more than once a year since I did
so. The thought of loading Will and his chair into the adapted minivan and
carting him safely to and from the next town filled me with utter terror.
For weeks I had wished that my working day involved some escape from that
house. Now I would have done anything just to stay indoors. I located his
hospital card amongst the folders of stuff to do with his health - great fat binders
divided into ‘transport’, ‘insurance’, ‘living with disability’ and ‘appointments’.
I grabbed the card and checked that it had today’s date. A little bit of me was
hoping that Will had been wrong.
‘Is your mother coming?’
‘No. She doesn’t come to my appointments.’
I couldn’t hide my surprise. I had thought she would want to oversee every
aspect of his treatment.
‘She used to,’ Will said. ‘Now we have an agreement.’
‘Is Nathan coming?’
I was kneeling in front of him. I had been so nervous that I had dropped some
of his lunch down his lap and was now trying in vain to mop it up, so that a good
patch of his trousers was sopping wet. Will hadn’t said anything, except to tell
me to please stop apologizing, but it hadn’t helped my general sense of
jitteriness.
‘Why?’
‘No reason.’ I didn’t want him to know how fearful I felt. I had spent much of
that morning - time I usually spent cleaning - reading and rereading the
instruction manual for the chairlift but I was still dreading the moment when I
was solely responsible for lifting him two feet into the air.
‘Come on, Clark. What’s the problem?’
‘Okay. I just... I just thought it would be easier first time if there was
someone else there who knew the ropes.’
‘As opposed to me,’ he said.
‘That’s not what I meant.’
‘Because I can’t possibly be expected to know anything about my own care?’
‘Do you operate the chairlift?’ I said, baldly. ‘You can tell me exactly what to
do, can you?’
He watched me, his gaze level. If he had been spoiling for a fight, he appeared
to change his mind. ‘Fair point. Yes, he’s coming. He’s a useful extra pair of
hands. Plus I thought you’d work yourself into less of a state if you had him
there.’
‘I’m not in a state,’ I protested.
‘Evidently.’ He glanced down at his lap, which I was still mopping with a
cloth. I had got the pasta sauce off, but he was soaked. ‘So, am I going as an
incontinent?’
‘I’m not finished.’ I plugged in the hairdryer and directed the nozzle towards
his crotch.
As the hot air blasted on to his trousers he raised his eyebrows.
‘Yes, well,’ I said. ‘It’s not exactly what I expected to be doing on a Friday
afternoon either.’
‘You really are tense, aren’t you?’
I could feel him studying me.
‘Oh, lighten up, Clark. I’m the one having scalding hot air directed at my
genitals.’
I didn’t respond. I heard his voice over the roar of the hairdryer.
‘Come on, what’s the worst that could happen - I end up in a wheelchair?’
It may sound stupid, but I couldn’t help but laugh. It was the closest Will had
come to actually trying to make me feel better.
The car looked like a normal people carrier from outside, but when the rear
passenger door was unlocked a ramp descended from the side and lowered to the
ground. With Nathan looking on, I guided Will’s outside chair (he had a separate
one for travelling) squarely on to the ramp, checked the electrical lock-down
brake, and programmed it to slowly lift him up into the car. Nathan slid into the
other passenger seat, belted him and secured the wheels. Trying to stop my
hands from trembling, I released the handbrake and drove slowly down the drive
towards the hospital.
Away from home, Will appeared to shrink a little. It was chilly outside, and
Nathan and I had bundled him up into his scarf and thick coat, but still he grew
quieter, his jaw set, somehow diminished by the greater space of his
surroundings. Every time I looked into my rear-view mirror (which was often - I
was terrified even with Nathan there that somehow the chair would break loose
from its moorings) he was gazing out of the window, his expression
impenetrable. Even when I stalled or braked too hard, which I did several times,
he just winced a little and waited while I sorted myself out.
By the time we reached the hospital I had actually broken out into a fine
sweat. I drove around the hospital car park three times, too afraid to reverse into
any but the largest of spaces, until I could sense that the two men were beginning
to lose patience. Then, finally, I lowered the ramp and Nathan helped Will’s
chair out on to the tarmac.
‘Good job,’ Nathan said, clapping me on the back as he let himself out, but I
found it hard to believe it had been.
There are things you don’t notice until you accompany someone with a
wheelchair. One is how rubbish most pavements are, pockmarked with badly
patched holes, or just plain uneven. Walking slowly next to Will as he wheeled
himself along, I noticed how every uneven slab caused him to jolt painfully, or
how often he had to steer carefully round some potential obstacle. Nathan
pretended not to notice, but I saw him watching too. Will just looked grim-faced
and resolute.
The other thing is how inconsiderate most drivers are. They park up against
the cutouts on the pavement, or so close together that there is no way for a
wheelchair to actually cross the road. I was shocked, a couple of times even
tempted to leave some rude note tucked into a windscreen wiper, but Nathan and
Will seemed used to it. Nathan pointed out a suitable crossing place and, each of
us flanking Will, we finally crossed.
Will had not said a single word since leaving the house.
The hospital itself was a gleaming low-rise building, the immaculate reception
area more like that of some modernistic hotel, perhaps testament to private
insurance. I held back as Will told the receptionist his name, and then followed
him and Nathan down a long corridor. Nathan was carrying a huge backpack that
contained anything that Will might be likely to need during his short visit, from
beakers to spare clothes. He had packed it in front of me that morning, detailing
every possible eventuality. ‘I guess it’s a good thing we don’t have to do this too
often,’ he had said, catching my appalled expression.
I didn’t follow him into the appointment. Nathan and I sat on the comfortable
chairs outside the consultant’s room. There was no hospital smell, and there were
fresh flowers in a vase on the windowsill. Not just any old flowers, either. Huge
exotic things that I didn’t know the name of, artfully arranged in minimalist
clumps.
‘What are they doing in there?’ I said after we had been there half an hour.
Nathan looked up from his book. ‘It’s just his six-month check-up.’
‘What, to see if he’s getting any better?’
Nathan put his book down. ‘He’s not getting any better. It’s a spinal cord
injury.’
‘But you do physio and stuff with him.’
‘That’s to try and keep his physical condition up - to stop him atrophying and
his bones demineralizing, his legs pooling, that kind of thing.’
When he spoke again, his voice was gentle, as if he thought he might
disappoint me. ‘He’s not going to walk again, Louisa. That only happens in
Hollywood movies. All we’re doing is trying to keep him out of pain, and keep
up whatever range of movement he has.’
‘Does he do this stuff for you? The physio stuff? He doesn’t seem to want to
do anything that I suggest.’
Nathan wrinkled his nose. ‘He does it, but I don’t think his heart’s in it. When
I first came, he was pretty determined. He’d come pretty far in rehab, but after a
year with no improvement I think he found it pretty tough to keep believing it
was worth it.’
‘Do you think he should keep trying?’
Nathan stared at the floor. ‘Honestly? He’s a C5/6 quadriplegic. That means
nothing works below about here ... ’ He placed a hand on the upper part of his
chest. ‘They haven’t worked out how to fix a spinal cord yet.’
I stared at the door, thinking about Will’s face as we drove along in the winter
sunshine, the beaming face of the man on the skiing holiday. ‘There are all sorts
of medical advances taking place, though, right? I mean ... somewhere like
this ... they must be working on stuff all the time.’
‘It’s a pretty good hospital,’ he said evenly.
‘Where there’s life, and all that?’
Nathan looked at me, then back at his book. ‘Sure,’ he said.
I went to get a coffee at a quarter to three, on Nathan’s say so. He said these
appointments could go on for some time, and that he would hold the fort until I
got back. I dawdled a little in the reception area, flicking through the magazines
in the newsagent’s, lingering over chocolate bars.
Perhaps predictably, I got lost trying to find my way back to the corridor and
had to ask several nurses where I should go, two of whom didn’t even know.
When I got there, the coffee cooling in my hand, the corridor was empty. As I
drew closer, I could see the consultant’s door was ajar. I hesitated outside, but I
could hear Mrs Traynor’s voice in my ears all the time now, criticizing me for
leaving him. I had done it again.
‘So we’ll see you in three months’ time, Mr Traynor,’ a voice was saying.
‘I’ve adjusted those anti-spasm meds and I’ll make sure someone calls you with
the results of the tests. Probably Monday.’
I heard Will’s voice. ‘Can I get these from the pharmacy downstairs?’
‘Yes. Here. They should be able to give you some more of those too.’
A woman’s voice. ‘Shall I take that folder?’
I realized they must be about to leave. I knocked, and someone called for me
to come in. Two sets of eyes swivelled towards me.
‘I’m sorry,’ said the consultant, rising from his chair. ‘I thought you were the
physio.’
‘I’m Will’s ... helper,’ I said, hanging on to the door. Will was braced forward
in his chair as Nathan pulled down his shirt. ‘Sorry - I thought you were done.’
‘Just give us a minute, will you, Louisa?’ Will’s voice cut into the room.
Muttering my apologies I backed out, my face burning.
It wasn’t the sight of Will’s uncovered body that had shocked me, slim and
scarred as it was. It wasn’t the vaguely irritated look of the consultant, the same
sort of look as Mrs Traynor gave me day after day - a look that made me realize
I was still the same blundering eejit, even if I did earn a higher hourly rate.
No, it was the livid red lines scoring Will’s wrists, the long, jagged scars that
couldn’t be disguised, no matter how swiftly Nathan pulled down Will’s sleeves.
begun to look irritated.
‘I don’t know ... ’ I said. ‘I go for a drink at the pub. I watch a bit of telly. I go
and watch my boyfriend when he does his running. Nothing unusual.’
‘You watch your boyfriend running.’
‘Yes.’
‘But you don’t run yourself.’
‘No. I’m not really -’ I glanced down at my chest ‘- built for it.’
That made him smile.
‘And what else?’
‘What do you mean, what else?’
‘Hobbies? Travelling? Places you like to go?’
He was beginning to sound like my old careers teacher.
I tried to think. ‘I don’t really have any hobbies. I read a bit. I like clothes.’
‘Handy,’ he said, dryly.
‘You asked. I’m not really a hobby person.’ My voice had become strangely
defensive. ‘I don’t do much, okay? I work and then I go home.’
‘Where do you live?’
‘On the other side of the castle. Renfrew Road.’
He looked blank. Of course he did. There was little human traffic between the
two sides of the castle. ‘It’s off the dual carriageway. Near the McDonald’s.’
He nodded, although I’m not sure he really knew where I was talking about.
‘Holidays?’
‘I’ve been to Spain, with Patrick. My boyfriend,’ I added. ‘When I was a kid
we only really went to Dorset. Or Tenby. My aunt lives in Tenby.’
‘And what do you want?’
‘What do I want what?’
‘From your life?’
I blinked. ‘That’s a bit deep, isn’t it?’
‘Only generally. I’m not asking you to psychoanalyse yourself. I’m just
asking, what do you want? Get married? Pop out some ankle biters? Dream
career? Travel the world?’
There was a long pause.
I think I knew my answer would disappoint him even before I said the words
aloud. ‘I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it.’
On Friday we went to the hospital. I’m glad I hadn’t known about Will’s
appointment before I arrived that morning, as I would have lain awake all night
fretting about having to drive him there. I can drive, yes. But I say I can drive in
the same way that I say I can speak French. Yes, I took the relevant exam and
passed. But I haven’t used that particular skill more than once a year since I did
so. The thought of loading Will and his chair into the adapted minivan and
carting him safely to and from the next town filled me with utter terror.
For weeks I had wished that my working day involved some escape from that
house. Now I would have done anything just to stay indoors. I located his
hospital card amongst the folders of stuff to do with his health - great fat binders
divided into ‘transport’, ‘insurance’, ‘living with disability’ and ‘appointments’.
I grabbed the card and checked that it had today’s date. A little bit of me was
hoping that Will had been wrong.
‘Is your mother coming?’
‘No. She doesn’t come to my appointments.’
I couldn’t hide my surprise. I had thought she would want to oversee every
aspect of his treatment.
‘She used to,’ Will said. ‘Now we have an agreement.’
‘Is Nathan coming?’
I was kneeling in front of him. I had been so nervous that I had dropped some
of his lunch down his lap and was now trying in vain to mop it up, so that a good
patch of his trousers was sopping wet. Will hadn’t said anything, except to tell
me to please stop apologizing, but it hadn’t helped my general sense of
jitteriness.
‘Why?’
‘No reason.’ I didn’t want him to know how fearful I felt. I had spent much of
that morning - time I usually spent cleaning - reading and rereading the
instruction manual for the chairlift but I was still dreading the moment when I
was solely responsible for lifting him two feet into the air.
‘Come on, Clark. What’s the problem?’
‘Okay. I just... I just thought it would be easier first time if there was
someone else there who knew the ropes.’
‘As opposed to me,’ he said.
‘That’s not what I meant.’
‘Because I can’t possibly be expected to know anything about my own care?’
‘Do you operate the chairlift?’ I said, baldly. ‘You can tell me exactly what to
do, can you?’
He watched me, his gaze level. If he had been spoiling for a fight, he appeared
to change his mind. ‘Fair point. Yes, he’s coming. He’s a useful extra pair of
hands. Plus I thought you’d work yourself into less of a state if you had him
there.’
‘I’m not in a state,’ I protested.
‘Evidently.’ He glanced down at his lap, which I was still mopping with a
cloth. I had got the pasta sauce off, but he was soaked. ‘So, am I going as an
incontinent?’
‘I’m not finished.’ I plugged in the hairdryer and directed the nozzle towards
his crotch.
As the hot air blasted on to his trousers he raised his eyebrows.
‘Yes, well,’ I said. ‘It’s not exactly what I expected to be doing on a Friday
afternoon either.’
‘You really are tense, aren’t you?’
I could feel him studying me.
‘Oh, lighten up, Clark. I’m the one having scalding hot air directed at my
genitals.’
I didn’t respond. I heard his voice over the roar of the hairdryer.
‘Come on, what’s the worst that could happen - I end up in a wheelchair?’
It may sound stupid, but I couldn’t help but laugh. It was the closest Will had
come to actually trying to make me feel better.
The car looked like a normal people carrier from outside, but when the rear
passenger door was unlocked a ramp descended from the side and lowered to the
ground. With Nathan looking on, I guided Will’s outside chair (he had a separate
one for travelling) squarely on to the ramp, checked the electrical lock-down
brake, and programmed it to slowly lift him up into the car. Nathan slid into the
other passenger seat, belted him and secured the wheels. Trying to stop my
hands from trembling, I released the handbrake and drove slowly down the drive
towards the hospital.
Away from home, Will appeared to shrink a little. It was chilly outside, and
Nathan and I had bundled him up into his scarf and thick coat, but still he grew
quieter, his jaw set, somehow diminished by the greater space of his
surroundings. Every time I looked into my rear-view mirror (which was often - I
was terrified even with Nathan there that somehow the chair would break loose
from its moorings) he was gazing out of the window, his expression
impenetrable. Even when I stalled or braked too hard, which I did several times,
he just winced a little and waited while I sorted myself out.
By the time we reached the hospital I had actually broken out into a fine
sweat. I drove around the hospital car park three times, too afraid to reverse into
any but the largest of spaces, until I could sense that the two men were beginning
to lose patience. Then, finally, I lowered the ramp and Nathan helped Will’s
chair out on to the tarmac.
‘Good job,’ Nathan said, clapping me on the back as he let himself out, but I
found it hard to believe it had been.
There are things you don’t notice until you accompany someone with a
wheelchair. One is how rubbish most pavements are, pockmarked with badly
patched holes, or just plain uneven. Walking slowly next to Will as he wheeled
himself along, I noticed how every uneven slab caused him to jolt painfully, or
how often he had to steer carefully round some potential obstacle. Nathan
pretended not to notice, but I saw him watching too. Will just looked grim-faced
and resolute.
The other thing is how inconsiderate most drivers are. They park up against
the cutouts on the pavement, or so close together that there is no way for a
wheelchair to actually cross the road. I was shocked, a couple of times even
tempted to leave some rude note tucked into a windscreen wiper, but Nathan and
Will seemed used to it. Nathan pointed out a suitable crossing place and, each of
us flanking Will, we finally crossed.
Will had not said a single word since leaving the house.
The hospital itself was a gleaming low-rise building, the immaculate reception
area more like that of some modernistic hotel, perhaps testament to private
insurance. I held back as Will told the receptionist his name, and then followed
him and Nathan down a long corridor. Nathan was carrying a huge backpack that
contained anything that Will might be likely to need during his short visit, from
beakers to spare clothes. He had packed it in front of me that morning, detailing
every possible eventuality. ‘I guess it’s a good thing we don’t have to do this too
often,’ he had said, catching my appalled expression.
I didn’t follow him into the appointment. Nathan and I sat on the comfortable
chairs outside the consultant’s room. There was no hospital smell, and there were
fresh flowers in a vase on the windowsill. Not just any old flowers, either. Huge
exotic things that I didn’t know the name of, artfully arranged in minimalist
clumps.
‘What are they doing in there?’ I said after we had been there half an hour.
Nathan looked up from his book. ‘It’s just his six-month check-up.’
‘What, to see if he’s getting any better?’
Nathan put his book down. ‘He’s not getting any better. It’s a spinal cord
injury.’
‘But you do physio and stuff with him.’
‘That’s to try and keep his physical condition up - to stop him atrophying and
his bones demineralizing, his legs pooling, that kind of thing.’
When he spoke again, his voice was gentle, as if he thought he might
disappoint me. ‘He’s not going to walk again, Louisa. That only happens in
Hollywood movies. All we’re doing is trying to keep him out of pain, and keep
up whatever range of movement he has.’
‘Does he do this stuff for you? The physio stuff? He doesn’t seem to want to
do anything that I suggest.’
Nathan wrinkled his nose. ‘He does it, but I don’t think his heart’s in it. When
I first came, he was pretty determined. He’d come pretty far in rehab, but after a
year with no improvement I think he found it pretty tough to keep believing it
was worth it.’
‘Do you think he should keep trying?’
Nathan stared at the floor. ‘Honestly? He’s a C5/6 quadriplegic. That means
nothing works below about here ... ’ He placed a hand on the upper part of his
chest. ‘They haven’t worked out how to fix a spinal cord yet.’
I stared at the door, thinking about Will’s face as we drove along in the winter
sunshine, the beaming face of the man on the skiing holiday. ‘There are all sorts
of medical advances taking place, though, right? I mean ... somewhere like
this ... they must be working on stuff all the time.’
‘It’s a pretty good hospital,’ he said evenly.
‘Where there’s life, and all that?’
Nathan looked at me, then back at his book. ‘Sure,’ he said.
I went to get a coffee at a quarter to three, on Nathan’s say so. He said these
appointments could go on for some time, and that he would hold the fort until I
got back. I dawdled a little in the reception area, flicking through the magazines
in the newsagent’s, lingering over chocolate bars.
Perhaps predictably, I got lost trying to find my way back to the corridor and
had to ask several nurses where I should go, two of whom didn’t even know.
When I got there, the coffee cooling in my hand, the corridor was empty. As I
drew closer, I could see the consultant’s door was ajar. I hesitated outside, but I
could hear Mrs Traynor’s voice in my ears all the time now, criticizing me for
leaving him. I had done it again.
‘So we’ll see you in three months’ time, Mr Traynor,’ a voice was saying.
‘I’ve adjusted those anti-spasm meds and I’ll make sure someone calls you with
the results of the tests. Probably Monday.’
I heard Will’s voice. ‘Can I get these from the pharmacy downstairs?’
‘Yes. Here. They should be able to give you some more of those too.’
A woman’s voice. ‘Shall I take that folder?’
I realized they must be about to leave. I knocked, and someone called for me
to come in. Two sets of eyes swivelled towards me.
‘I’m sorry,’ said the consultant, rising from his chair. ‘I thought you were the
physio.’
‘I’m Will’s ... helper,’ I said, hanging on to the door. Will was braced forward
in his chair as Nathan pulled down his shirt. ‘Sorry - I thought you were done.’
‘Just give us a minute, will you, Louisa?’ Will’s voice cut into the room.
Muttering my apologies I backed out, my face burning.
It wasn’t the sight of Will’s uncovered body that had shocked me, slim and
scarred as it was. It wasn’t the vaguely irritated look of the consultant, the same
sort of look as Mrs Traynor gave me day after day - a look that made me realize
I was still the same blundering eejit, even if I did earn a higher hourly rate.
No, it was the livid red lines scoring Will’s wrists, the long, jagged scars that
couldn’t be disguised, no matter how swiftly Nathan pulled down Will’s sleeves.
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