Flyaway

by Lucy Christopher

  Granddad glances at me. Something flickers over his face, an emotion I can't quite read.

  ‘The swans again,’ he murmurs. I don't know why.

  He opens the fridge and starts rooting around. He pulls out some frozen fish fillets from the small freezer section. ‘These do?’

  Jack rolls his eyes, then slopes off to stroke Dig.

  I fold my arms. ‘That all you got?’

  ‘I'm afraid so.’

  We find some fairly soft broccoli and several large potatoes that look like they've been sitting under the sink for years. But there's vanilla ice cream too. I help him chop the potatoes into chip-sized chunks, cutting around the green and knobbly bits, and put them in the fryer. Granddad's hands shake as he places the broccoli into a pot of boiling water.

  We eat sitting on the couch, with the news on. There are car bombings and floods and a kid who has been abducted. I just feel numb, watching it all. I don't care about all these bad things happening to other people. I just care about Dad, about the bad things happening to us. Jack pushes his fish to the side of his plate and hides bits of broccoli underneath it. I don't eat much of mine either. Only Granddad manages his whole fish; he stares straight ahead at the telly and shovels it in. Maybe vets aren't good with emotions. Maybe illness and emergencies are just pretty standard to him.

  Mum calls when we're eating the ice cream. She speaks to Jack first, but I get close to the receiver and listen. I hear her thin, high voice telling Jack that Dad's still stable but that she hasn't been in to see him yet. She says that we might be able to visit in the morning. She's staying there overnight.

  ‘Why can't I take the bus back and wait with you?’ Jack says. ‘Anything's better than waiting here.’

  Granddad looks up from his armchair then, and Jack shuts up. When I speak to Mum, she sounds so tired. I keep asking her again and again how Dad is. It's horrible being here in Granddad's quiet house when Dad's just down the road, needing us. As I'm talking to Mum, my ice cream pools into milk. I don't feel like eating it after that. When I hang up, I let Dig lick the bowl.

  Granddad pulls out some sleeping bags from a cupboard and asks us where we want to sleep. ‘There's the spare room, or the couch,’ he says. ‘Or you could stay in the cottage.’

  I remember the last time I was in that cottage, with Dad and Granddad and the swan. I wonder if it died there, wonder where it is now. The freezer room out back? Is it stretched out, cold and stiff? I shudder suddenly.

  ‘I've got the spare room,’ I say.

  Jack glares daggers. ‘Fine. I'll have the cottage.’

  But I know he won't really sleep in there by himself. Not with all those animal ghosts. He'll end up on the couch.

  When the telly switches to some programme about air disasters, I decide to go to bed early. I take the stairs up to my room. I lay the sleeping bag on the bare mattress and put my glass of water on the bedside table. There's a layer of dust, thick as moss, and the room smells of old clothes and emptiness.

  Here, it's not like where we live in the middle of the city. I can't hear the main road or the drinkers in the pub on the corner, or police sirens. I lie really still, but there's only the wind moving the tree branches about. I can't even hear the muted murmur of the television anymore. Perhaps Granddad and Jack have gone to bed already.

  I watch the moonlight making patterns on the carpet. It doesn't make me sleepy. I just keep thinking of the swans in that field and Dad falling down. So I do what I always do when I can't sleep.

  I shut my eyes and imagine that I'm young enough to be read a story to. I imagine Dad is beside me with the fat book of Hans Christian Andersen tales on his lap. He knows the one I want, even before I say. ‘The Wild Swans’. I lie back against the pillow as Dad reads the words I know by heart. It's the story of the brothers who are turned into swans. Only it's not a good thing, it's a punishment. Their sister has to rescue them by knitting magic shirts for them to wear. The pictures are beautiful, all pastel-shaded and dreamy-looking; the swans have silver- and gold-edged wings. Dad always lowered his voice when he read the part about the sister weaving stinging nettles into the shirts. He always looked a little disappointed at the end though, almost as if he didn't want the swan-brothers to turn back into humans again.

  I roll over, thump the musty-smelling pillow. I wonder if Dad's awake now, if he feels any better. I clasp my hands together and silently hope that nothing happens in the night. I take my phone from my bag and place it on my pillow, just in case Mum calls. I turn up the ring volume. Still, I don't want to sleep.

  I shut my eyes and wait. I stretch my arm out across the pillow so that it brushes the phone; this way I'll feel it if it goes off. I remember Harry and the bag of fluid attached to him and the tubes going up his arm. I imagine there's a bag attached to me, too. Only it's not saline seeping into me, but sleep, turning me heavy.

  CHAPTER 13

  I dream of swans. There are hundreds of them, flying on and on, swiftly and straight in two long, long lines.

  I stand below them and count each bird as it passes. 1, 2, 3 . . . But as soon as I give the birds numbers, they stop beating their wings. They drop from the sky. Twist and tumble into the water below. I try to stop counting. Shake my head and try to shut my mouth. But I keep saying the numbers.

  The birds keep falling.

  I'm killing them. I know I am. It's my fault they're all dying. But I can't stop.

  CHAPTER 14

  I’m really hot when I wake up. The sleeping bag is all tangled around my legs. I lie back and look at the ceiling, try to get rid of the images of the swans falling from the sky. For a second I don't know where I am. Then I remember.

  Dad.

  I'm at Granddad's.

  I look at the phone on the pillow. There's a message from Mum. Suddenly I feel sick. My hands are shaking as I pick up the phone.

  Call me when you get up sweetheart. Dad's a bit better. Love Mum xxx

  I breathe out slowly. Check the time. 7.30 am. This time last week I was getting up to watch the swans with Dad. It feels like a lifetime ago.

  I get dressed in yesterday's muddy clothes. Comb my fingers through my hair, which is tangled with bits of grass and dirt. I pad downstairs and shake Jack awake. His eyes blink to focus on me and then widen when he remembers about Dad too. I nod at him.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘You didn't dream it.’

  Granddad's already in the kitchen, making coffee in a small silver pot on the stove.

  ‘Your mother called,’ he says. ‘I'll drop you off there soon. Your father got a bit better in the night, apparently.’

  Dig's trying to sit on Granddad's feet, getting in the way. Granddad hands me a cup. It smells so strong. I never have coffee at home, only hot chocolate or maybe tea.

  ‘Sugar, yes?’ Granddad pushes across the sugar container. The sugar has stuck together in clumps, but I manage to get a spoonful. I hover there, unsure whether I should be saying something. I want to know if Granddad is worried about Dad; if this is like what happened with Nan. But I just stir the sugar into my cup and stare out of the window at the fields behind Granddad's house. I can see the dip in the land where the field turns into Granddad's lake.

  I squint as I see something, then sort of choke on what I'm swallowing. There are birds there. They're swan-shaped. Whoopers? Without even thinking about it, I glance around the kitchen for a pair of binoculars. Of course there aren't any; Granddad hasn't been interested in birds for years. But he does come over to the window and stand beside me, looking out at where I'm staring.

  ‘They're just geese,’ he says.

  I look carefully, waiting for the light to glint onto their feathers and show me that they're white. But it doesn't and Granddad's right. The birds are geese, not swans. Canadas probably.

  ‘Scavenger birds,’ Granddad mutters. ‘Farmers shouldn't sow winter crops if they're not going to protect them.’

  He shakes his head quickly, his fingers tightening around his coffee cup
. I'm surprised by the anger in his voice. He used to like birds, whatever kind they were. The first bird I ever remember watching was when I was with Granddad. It was only a robin, but Granddad made it seem so special. He stopped us mid-footstep and made us stand so quiet, finger to his lips. The robin turned its head and looked right at me. I didn't breathe out until it flew away.

  Today, Granddad's not interested in watching geese. He goes into the living room, stops beside Jack to shake him awake again. But Jack's not asleep, he's just lying there. I go in and sit next to him, give him the coffee Granddad's made me. He takes it without a word. He's got a crease mark from the couch down the side of his face.

  ‘It's hot,’ I say.

  He gulps it down without tasting it. It doesn't look like he's slept a wink.

  CHAPTER 15

  Granddad drives us to the hospital. I watch the fields all the way, hoping for a glimpse . . . something to tell Dad. There are no swans. The sky is grey and empty of all birds except seagulls. Granddad keeps his eyes fixed on the road in front.

  He doesn't park the car, just hovers near the entrance.

  ‘Aren't you coming in?’ I ask.

  Granddad shakes his head. ‘Next time. I don't like hospitals, remember?’

  Jack slams the back door. Granddad and I watch him stomp to the entrance. I unclick my seat belt slowly, then pause with my hand on the door handle.

  ‘Do you want me to give Dad a message from you?’

  ‘Yes, if you want.’ But he doesn't say what.

  Granddad squints as the sunlight comes in through the windscreen. I'm angry with him for a moment, like Jack is. He can't hate hospitals for ever just because Nan died in one. Besides, being a vet, at least he's had practice with operations and blood and all those yucky things.

  ‘I'll see you next time then,’ I murmur.

  I run to catch up with Jack. We don't go through A and E, and I'm glad about that. Instead we go through to the huge entrance hall that I found last time. It feels different today, not as busy. There's a sign I didn't notice before saying ‘Hospital Concourse’. I look at the line of blue plastic seats near the fake palm trees, checking for Harry. There are two elderly ladies sitting there and a man with a walking frame. No boys with drip stands and bright chestnut eyes. I scan the rest of the chairs. Perhaps I just imagined him. I mean it does seem pretty odd that he just came up to me like that.

  Jack's waiting in a corridor under a sign that says ‘To All Departments’. He's got his arms crossed. ‘If you're any slower, Dad will have died by the time you get there,’ he says. Then he looks away immediately, guilty at what he's just said.

  He turns, takes a flight of stairs two at a time, then dashes into a lift. He holds the doors for me. I glance at the list of hospital departments on a board outside: Urology, Oncology, Phlebotomy.

  ‘How do you know where to go?’ I ask.

  ‘Mum told me.’

  We get out at Floor Three, and Jack leads me down more wide, shiny corridors. There are signs leading off each side, pointing to departments with more long words. I have no idea what they all mean.

  Jack hesitates at a closed door. The wall beside it has a sign saying ‘Coronary Care Unit’.

  Mum comes bursting through the doors. She hugs us to her then leads us through. She pauses by a big desk in the circular entrance space. There are three rooms with beds in them leading directly away from the desk, and nurses everywhere.

  ‘I'm only allowed to take one of you at a time,’ she says, looking from me to Jack. ‘Dad's still quite sick.’

  ‘I'm first,’ I say. ‘I have to be.’ I was the one who was with Dad when it happened, after all.

  Jack folds down one of the plastic seats attached to the wall and stares straight ahead at the desk.

  ‘Don't be long,’ he mutters.

  Mum takes my hand. ‘You ready?’

  We walk into a long thin room. There are blue curtains on each side, hanging from the ceiling and wrapped around some of the beds. There are machines everywhere, things beeping and whirring. But it's still quieter in here than the rest of the hospital. Mum stops at the last bed on the right-hand side. She pulls back the curtains slowly and quietly.

  ‘Graham? I've brought Isla,’ she says.

  I crane around her to see. And there's Dad, with his eyes shut and his head on the pillow and with tubes coming out of his nose. Wires lead out from under his sheets too and plug into some sort of monitor.

  ‘Is he OK?’ I ask. ‘He still looks sick.’ I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't this. I was hoping he'd look a little more normal by now at least.

  Mum nods. ‘He's OK. He's gone off to sleep, he was awake just now.’

  She puts an arm around my shoulders and hugs me to her. She smells of coffee and stale clothes. She must be tired, after being here all night.

  ‘Where did you sleep?’ I ask.

  Mum nods at the stiff-looking chair beside the bed. ‘Believe me, you had the better deal at Granddad's.’

  She tries to smile. Her eyes are like slits. I lean down and touch Dad's hand. His skin is warm and dry, not damp and cool like it was yesterday.

  ‘What happens now?’ I ask Mum. ‘Is he coming home?’

  Mum shakes her head. ‘The doctors want to monitor him. What happened yesterday . . . it was pretty serious. His heart stopped beating regularly, went into a different rhythm entirely. They need to fix that before they can let him out.’

  ‘He'll be OK though?’ I ask, my eyes fixed on his chest, which is rising slightly then falling. ‘I mean, he's not going to . . .’

  My words crack and fade. Mum grasps my shoulders tighter.

  ‘We'll know more in a few days,’ she whispers. ‘Don't worry, he's not going anywhere.’

  I want to believe her, but Dad looks so sick. His eyelids flutter as he starts to wake up. I lean towards him.

  ‘Don't smother him,’ Mum warns.

  Dad smiles slightly as he focuses. He looks from me to Mum and back to me again.

  ‘Sorry I gave you a scare, Bird,’ he whispers. His voice is soft as a dandelion head.

  I lean closer. ‘You OK now?’

  ‘Getting there.’ Again, there's a wisp of a smile on his lips before he speaks again. ‘Did you find the swans?’

  I let out a burst of noise that sounds a bit like a laugh. ‘If you remember, I was more worried about you.’

  Dad holds my gaze. ‘I'm glad. You did well.’

  He tries to say more then, tries to talk about what happened. But his words float away before he's finished proper sentences. It's not long before Mum squeezes my shoulders again.

  ‘Let's bring Jack in before Dad's too tired,’ she says softly. ‘I'll meet you in the cafe in twenty minutes or so?’

  I nod. Touch Dad's hand again. I don't want to leave him. I'm scared that the moment I do, something will happen. I hesitate with my hand on the curtain, not wanting to take my eyes off him.

  ‘I'll be OK,’ he murmurs. ‘Promise you won't worry?’

  But how can I promise that when it feels like it's all my fault? If I hadn't agreed to go looking for the swans, this might never have happened.

  Mum gently presses my back. ‘Go and get Jack,’ she says again. ‘Dad's in the best place.’

  Each step I take away from Dad feels wrong. It's as if my feet are made of magnets and they're pulling me back to him.

  CHAPTER 16

  Jack stands when he sees me. His chair flips back with a thud.

  ‘How is he?’ he asks.

  I stare at him blankly, my hands still feeling like they're grasping the curtain. ‘He's kind of quiet.’

  ‘But better?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  I walk away in a daze. Push open the doors to the rest of the hospital and just stand in the corridor. I can feel the wave in my throat again, trying to gush out. I want to curl up in a ball right there in the middle of the corridor and cry. But there are people everywhere and there's nowhere to hide. I
concentrate on placing one foot in front of the other. I don't know where I'm going, and I don't want to walk away from Dad, but I know Mum's right. Dad's in the best place. All those machines and tubes have to be helping somehow.

  I walk until I can feel the wave sinking down a little. I brush my hand against the pale peach walls and look into the rooms I'm passing. Most of them are just waiting rooms, or more corridors leading off to somewhere else. But there are a few wards that I can see right into.

  I pause beside one of them and look. The people in these beds are sitting up and watching telly . . . a few of them reading. They don't have tubes in their noses, or curtains around the beds. No other patient looks even half as sick as Dad does. None of them come close. I wonder then whether Dad is the sickest person in the hospital.

  I turn the corner. The floors are just as shiny here, but the walls are light blue this time. I don't know how I'll find my way to the cafe, but a part of me likes the walking around.

  Then I see him. Though I don't recognise him at first because he doesn't have the drip stand. But I can tell by the scruffy reddish hair that it's him. It's Harry. It's weird but I am almost relieved. I take a step down the corridor, towards him. He doesn't turn around.

  He's leaning up against a doorway, looking in. His expression somehow reminds me of what I was just doing in the other doorways: watching the patients to see who's the sickest. As I get closer, I see that he's looking into some sort of general waiting room. I hover just behind him, but he hasn't got a clue that I'm here.

  ‘Hey,’ I say softly, then worry he hasn't heard me because it takes him a while to turn around.

  But he does. He looks almost embarrassed when he sees it's me.

  ‘You keep turning up,’ he says.

  ‘It's because my dad's in . . . ’

  ‘Coronary Care. Of course. Just down the corridor.’

  I bite my lip, silent, then look back at the waiting room. ‘What are you doing?’

  Harry looks too. ‘Dunno really. Guess I just like watching other people.’