Sides

by Denis Vaughan

kept insisting on,

  “We should get in touch with a big celebrity that he liked and get them to come here. There’s been loads of cases where that’s helped people like Uncle Frankie wake up!”

  Inside he smiled. Everything that was once physical was now done ‘inside’. He often thought to himself, “why haven’t I gone mad?” It would seem that whatever way the mind and body worked, when such a catastrophic failure of the system occurred, the mind closed out that part of it that would cause the immense frustration and torment that should have been felt. Still, it did sadden him when his mother would slowly start to whimper as she was half way through reading out the newspaper headlines of the day. It was hard for her to do this every day since.

  There were times when he really wished he could let them know how much he appreciated the visits, the news, pictures and music they kept bringing him. His mother, sister, nephews and nieces, maybe a little less now than in the beginning, but they still came sometimes. If only he could show them something. After two years, the doctors were pretty much saying he was unaware of anything going on around him. How wrong they were. He had no control over any movement at all. He blinked when necessary, closed his eyes when tired and opened them when awake, but he couldn’t tell his eyes or eyelids to move when he wanted them to.

  But someone knew he was there. Once a week Nurse Catherine would come in after her shift, sit down at the end of the bed where he could see her, and read from her book of short stories. Well at this stage mini-library, as she seemed to have a new book every time a collection was complete. Always short stories, great, as he didn’t have to wait for a ‘next instalment’. She must have known. She must have wondered or even guessed what life was like through his eyes.

  He really wasn’t aware of what happened on that last morning. Normally his brain would tell his eyes that it was time to open around seven. Light or darkness didn’t matter, they just opened. But it happened before then. He did wake, but his eyes would not open. He felt a pressure on his breathing he hadn’t in years, and then a dizzy sensation, again, just like in his memories, and it was over. He was gone.

  There was great sadness at Frankie’s passing. All the family rallied as when the accident had happened. But it was even sadder this time.

  Everyone sympathized with his mother. She had ensured the daily visits to the hospital and finally it had just been too much to take. She had arrived early on the morning, probably six. She looked with watery eyes at her Frankie, kissed him on the forward and then gently placed the pillow across his face. She didn’t need any great pressure and held it there for nearly twenty minutes. Without movement, it was impossible to tell when it was over so she wanted to make sure he was gone.

  The courts were lenient and she received a sentence that was primarily treatment in nature.

  Frankie’s grave continued to receive visits for many years, and each year, a new waterproof bag containing a book of short stories could be found.

  Could have been us, could it?

  Martin stood at the bedroom window staring out, his hands supporting him on the window sill. It was a glorious morning, the sun was heating his bare chest through the glass and making his eyes stay half-open. From here he could see the length of his medium size garden and the lower half of next door’s.

  Next door, he thought. Mary and Joe. They were about the same age as them. They had arrived two years after Martin and Helen had bought their house. Nice couple, they hit it off straight away. Martin and Joe would go for a drink the odd time, a bit of golf, Mary and Helen would meet up probably every day for coffee and chats. Neither couple had children yet. Things had been great, Martin had a very good job in the IT world, and Joe had taken over his father’s construction company. There was a lot of money around, no limits.

  Martin heard movement in the bed behind him, and then silence again. He remembered the parties and both couples had spoken about going on holidays, always the next year. But next year never came, or each made their own plans, probably just as well. The good days were great!

  But suddenly it had changed, much quicker than anyone had expected. Within six months of the gloom talk, Martin’s job looked shaky, and he was delighted when the result was simply a 20% pay-cut, that was good fortune suddenly. They had to adjust a few things, but only the cosmetic excesses, the real things were still safe and they were just re-adjusting to a way that had once been fine. Things had not been so lucky for Joe and Mary. Within a year Joe’s manner had changed as the stress of debt in the business had started to show. He would frequently lose his temper and had even started to go grey. The casual drinks out vanished and the golf was never spoken of.

  After a while the fights between Joe and Mary grew worse. In the evening it was often possible to hear them through the walls, and if windows were open it was terrible. Doors would bang, sometimes things would break and if Joe stormed off into the Garden, Mary had stopped trying to be discreet and would shout at him from the back door. The business was collapsing and there seemed nothing that could be done to save it.

  Helen moved again in the bed behind him.

  “Did you hear it last night? It was worse than ever and went on so long,” she strained.

  “Yep, I heard it. Was still going on at 4am.”

  “You’re going to have to talk to him,” she suggested delicately.

  “I already have, there’s no point, he’s just not aware of anything now.”

  “Yep, I bumped into him in the shop at lunch time, the smell of drink off him was terrible.”

  “They took the car yesterday, I think it was the final straw,” announced Martin.

  He kept staring out the window. What did it feel like for your whole world to suddenly collapse and disappear in a matter of a year. He didn’t really want to know. Every time he turned on the radio there was more gloom, more reason to feel somewhat hopeless.

  “When is this going to end?” he asked the sun.

  “We’re ok, aren’t we?”

  He hadn’t moved in ten minutes. His back was hurting him from the tension he had felt as he stood staring out the window. It eased a bit now, his shoulders slowly lowered.

  “We’re fine, there’s even talk of things starting to improve,” he said as he slowly turned and faced her, leaning against the window and letting the sun warm his back.

  “You seem so sad, if things are going to improve then we’ve made it and we’re lucky. On a day like this, you should be happy.”

  She had pulled herself up and gradually turned until she was kneeling on the bed. She tried to look either side of him to appreciate the bright day, but he gently moved the same way and kept the view blocked.

  She laughed a bit.

  “We’re in one of those moods are we?” she smiled.

  For once Martin didn’t smile back as he normally would. He slowly looked over his shoulder and then back again. She was puzzled.

  “You’re being very mysterious, what’s up? Have you bought me something nice for the garden? Been a long time since I had a surprise!”

  He looked down towards the floor.

  “No,” he paused, “we are good, we’re better than good, and no matter what happens we’ll be fine, as long as we don’t turn on each other.”

  Helen nodded, “I know, I hear them every night, it’s so sad. I don’t understand how people can be so awful to each other. I know things are bad but they were so good together. Helen won’t even call in now.”

  Martin nodded, “they’ve lost everything, and so quickly.”

  There was silence in the room now and a stray light cloud passed over the sun casting a shadow across the gardens behind Martin.

  “Helen,” started Martin.

  “Yes?”

  “You need to call the police.”

  “What? Why? Look, you talk to Joe and I’ll talk to Mary, we’ll try to get them see sense.”

  “No, it’s too late, you need to call the police.”

  Helen started to look worried.


  “What’s wrong?”

  “Joe, and Mary, they’re,” he paused and seemed to swallow as if trying to stop the words coming out, “they’re both hanging from the tree at the end of their garden.”

  As the last word left Martin ‘s lips tears started to roll down his cheeks. Helen put both her hands to her mouth and was soon in a blubbering and trembling state. He reached across and picked up the phone, still trying to block the view, although he knew where she was it was unlikely she could see.

  He dialled the number and murmured a few comments before hanging up.

  “Could have been us, could it?” he asked in a whisper.

  “Never,” she sobbed.

  He slowly sat on the bed and cradled her as she wept.

  The Window

  That tingling feeling was in his stomach now. People were already standing up and starting to pull at their luggage on the racks. He just leaned harder against the window watching as the platform appeared. He could feel the brakes fighting the train wheels as people started to lurch forward trying to balance bags and avoid hitting each other. Finally the train stopped, throwing a few inexperienced passengers around.

  He waited a moment as the aisle cleared and then jumped up, grabbed his bag and headed out to the door. Once there he stood looking both ways at the old station, paint peeling off the wooden pillars that stood to attention supporting the winter leaking shelter. At least he was here in summer. His eyes stopped on the mid-sized, well built (or maybe now a