A Doctor, a Nurse

by Carol Marinelli

  ‘It’s not like that.’

  ‘But it is. This house is like a shrine to Amanda—and you wonder why I feel uncomfortable. I’ll tell you why—because not for a minute am I allowed to forget that I’m second best.’

  ‘Molly—’

  Only she wasn’t listening. Tears streamed down her face as it all came out. ‘Oh, I’m good enough to have a laugh with, good enough to sleep with, good enough to drop the kids at kinder or pick them up if you’re busy. You’re probably quite fond of me, given I’m so nice. Hey, if things had kept going on I might have even made it as the next Mrs Williams—only I wasn’t the first! And it had nothing to do with timing and everything to do with that you didn’t want me enough, you wanted her!’

  ‘I told you—she was pregnant.’

  ‘I can never win, then…’ Her nose ran in lieu of tears as he shook his head in confusion. ‘I’m never going to win.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘This.’ Closing her eyes, she seared her heart with impossibility and found the voice to ask the most difficult questions of them all. ‘What if I’d been pregnant, Luke?’ She watched him swallow, watched his jaw clench as she posed the impossible. ‘What if that day, when you came to tell me we were over, I’d told you I was pregnant too?’

  And the answer was there in his silence, a loaded silence where nothing was the worst thing you could hear.

  ‘Thanks.’ She spat out the word.

  ‘You don’t understand.’

  ‘And I’m not even going to try to.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Meaning we’re finished.’

  ‘Because of something that happened five years ago.’

  ‘Because it’s still happening now!’ Molly rasped.

  ‘I’m crazy about you, Molly. I want you in my life—more of you, not less.’

  ‘Yes! Now—when you need a wife—it looks like I might just fit the bill!’

  ‘You’re never going to forgive me for it, are you?’

  ‘No!’ Molly shook her head, realised the truth—a little too late, perhaps, but it was here now and she was ready to face it. ‘No, Luke, you’re right. I’m never going to get past it.’

  Amelia and Angus were running down the garden towards the house, curls flying, bouncing a ball, and there was no reason to stay around to say goodbye—she’d be missed as much as she’d been made welcome—so, picking up her keys, Molly headed down the hall. And, childish as it was, she even poked her tongue out at a smiling photo of Amanda as Luke just stood there.

  And there was nothing that would have stopped her walking out, nothing she was needed for, except…

  Molly wasn’t sure what came first, the crack of glass breaking or the piercing sound of a child screaming out. The hall had never seemed longer. The couple of seconds it took her to run was enough time for Amelia to pick herself up, for her scream to subside. And there was a second of stunned silence, just one pause as the child stared down at her arm, her eyes bulging, frantically running with a different sort of scream now, hysterical, frantic screams as her arm pumped blood…

  Arterial blood, Molly acknowledged as she dashed forward. Arterial because it was spurting out. With every frantic heartbeat from Amelia she bled, spraying the walls with blood, just flailing and panicking, till Molly grabbed her.

  ‘It’s OK.’ Molly was shouting over her, holding her little arm high and pressing hard inside her elbow as Luke dashed over. ‘Get a teatowel,’ Molly shouted. ‘Something! It’s OK, honey.’ Over and over she said the words to Amelia, holding her terrified eyes. ‘It’s stopping. Daddy’s putting something on it.’

  Luke pressed the teatowel against the wound and held it, his face chalk-white, his breathing rapid and shallow as he tried to reassure his daughter, tried to shout over the screams. It took a moment for Molly to register that it wasn’t Amelia screaming now but Angus, still standing at the door where Amelia had fallen, his expression one of abject terror.

  ‘She’s OK, Angus.’

  ‘It’s happening again!’ He was running, screaming, chanting. ‘It’s happening again!’

  ‘Angus, she’s OK,’ Molly called. ‘She’s going to be just fine. Daddy’s going to call an ambulance.’

  ‘It will be quicker to drive—’ Luke started, but Molly spoke more firmly. There was no way they could get in the car, especially with Angus so hysterical.

  ‘Daddy’s going to call an ambulance, and we’re going to get Amelia to hospital and get her arm fixed.’

  Amelia was so brave, just staring at Molly and nodding, her little face white, shocked and terrified. She was close to fainting, leaning into Molly, who sat on the floor and pulled her onto her knee, still holding up her arm as Luke grabbed the phone.

  ‘Angus, it’s OK.’ Luke was trying to talk over him, but it was impossible. Angus’s petrified wailing just added to the chaos as Luke ran out into the hall to be heard.

  ‘Angus…’ Molly said helplessly, trying to calm him down, hearing Luke trying to get the details out to the operator.

  ‘Angus, I’m the one who’s hurt!’ It was Amelia’s indignant wail that halted him, just for a second, and as he opened his mouth to scream, it was Amelia who got there first. ‘Tell us a story, Molly.’

  Golly!

  ‘Molly’s going to tell us a story!’ Amelia said. ‘Like I did when Mummy wasn’t well.’

  So Molly did…about a little girl who’d cut herself, and the nice paramedics who would come. She pressed on Amelia’s arm, holding it high, as Luke came back. She told her about the ambulance that would take her to hospital as Luke tied another teatowel over the sodden one, then held Angus, who was quiet now but looked stunned, watching bewildered and scared as the paramedics came marching in, efficient and calming.

  ‘You’re so brave…’ Molly cuddled Amelia closer as a paramedic slipped on an oxygen mask, put in an IV and delivered a swift bolus of saline solution.

  ‘She’s getting some special medicine to help with the pain.’ Luke’s voice was thick from emotion as he sat beside them, stroking Amelia’s little face and holding Angus.

  Things were calmer now. The bleeding, which had been awful, had been stemmed by a blood-pressure cuff that would be released every few moments. As Amelia was lifted onto the stretcher, Luke rang his mother and the hospital to let them know they were on their way, but one look at the ambulance and Angus started crying again.

  ‘I’ll stay here with him,’ Molly offered. ‘You go. Your mum will be here soon.’ But Angus was inconsolable, screeching in terror as they approached the ambulance, his hands grabbing at his dad’s neck as Molly tried to take him from Luke.

  ‘Molly can come with me.’ Little and brave, and just so much older than her tender years, it was Amelia who took charge. ‘You stay with Angus, Daddy, till Nanny gets here. I’ll be fine with Molly.’

  And the saddest part for Molly was the devastation and helplessness on Luke’s usually strong face when he bent and kissed his daughter goodbye, the impossibility of the situation, having to let his sick child go to look after the other. The indecision, where nothing he could do was right.

  ‘Look after her.’ He screwed his eyes closed. ‘I didn’t mean it like that. I know you’ll look after her. I’ll be five minutes behind…’

  ‘We’ve got to go,’ Molly said as they clipped in the stretcher. ‘I’ll see you at the hospital. She’ll be OK.’

  She was!

  Despite morphine, despite losing a considerable amount of blood and the horrors of earlier, her suspicious, wary eyes remained open, frowning at everyone who came too close—everyone, that was, except Molly, almost as if they were in this together. Her little chin was set and defiant as they arrived at the hospital and were wheeled straight in. Mark Lawson, the trauma consultant, must have been alerted and was waiting for his colleague’s daughter.

  ‘Hello, Emily.’ He gave her a smile as he pulled on his gloves.

  ‘Amelia,’ Molly said.

  ‘Am
elia,’ he corrected himself. ‘I’m just going to have a very quick look. How long’s the cuff been up?’

  ‘Five minutes,’ the paramedic answered.

  ‘OK. Once I take the dressing down I want to have a look. Then release it when I say so. Can we have some better light here?’ There were people pulling lights, ripping open dressings, changing over the oxygen and IV poles, but even though Molly knew exactly what was going on, even though she’d done the same, or similar, on numerous occasions, today it was just too much. Today all she could see was Amelia, her little fairy wings poking out, staring up at the ceiling and trying not to cry.

  ‘Daddy will be here soon.’ Molly squeezed the fingers of Amelia’s good hand as she grimaced in pain. ‘You’re doing really well.’

  ‘Where is Luke?’ Mike frowned. ‘I want to get her straight up.’

  ‘Five minutes away,’ Molly answered, but she was only half listening.

  ‘Let’s prep her for Theatre and get her up as soon as Luke arrives.’ Which was quick, but wasn’t special treatment. Stemming the bleeding with the blood-pressure cuff wasn’t ideal, and Amelia needed the artery repaired as quickly as possible, but the fact it was Mark Lawson giving the order had everyone moving even more rapidly.

  ‘Hi, there, sweetie, I’m Karan. We’re just going to get you out of these clothes and pop you into one of our gowns.’

  ‘I can do that,’ Molly said, untying Amelia’s runners.

  ‘We’ll need some nail-polish remover,’ Karan called through the curtains.

  ‘You love your make-up, don’t you?’ Molly grinned, but it faded as Karan came over with scissors.

  ‘We’re going to have to cut your wings off, Amelia.’ She didn’t say no. What was worse was that she just seemed to shrink back into the pillow, her blue eyes blinking rapidly, then closing, only not enough to stop a big tear rolling down into her hair.

  ‘Can the wings stay?’ Molly’s hand came between the scissors and the elastic because, yes, they had to come off and, yes, with her arm seriously injured and a drip in the other, the only way was to cut them, but she knew the anguish it would cause Amelia. Knew that she’d worn them, slept in them, lived in them since her mother had died.

  ‘We need to get her top off and get her into the gown, and there’s the drip on her good arm.’

  ‘Cut off her top,’ Molly said, gently brushing back Amelia’s hair with her fingers. But her voice and eyes were firm as she addressed Karan. ‘The wings stay on.’

  And Karan gave her an eye-roll, because clearly the wings would have to come off—but they could be cut off once Amelia was under anaesthetic, and then Molly would get a needle and thread from somewhere and sew them up before Amelia woke up.

  ‘They’re staying on,’ Molly said firmly to Amelia, ‘and when you wake up they’ll still be on. But we might have to tape them to you for a while—does that sound OK?’

  Amelia nodded and stared up at the ceiling, then for the first time turned her eyes on Molly and looked at her without distrust, spoke to her without distaste. ‘My mummy bought them for me.’

  ‘I know she did,’ Molly said, ‘and they’re beautiful.’

  ‘My mummy was beautiful, too!’

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  ‘HOW’s Angus?’

  ‘Mum’s with him. She knows how to deal with him—he’ll be OK.’ Luke had his head in his hands, but every now and then he’d look up at the clock. ‘They’re taking a while.’

  ‘Microsurgery tends to,’ Molly said logically, but she was looking at the clock too. ‘Angus was…’ She tried to find a word that came close to even describing his reaction. ‘Devastated.’

  ‘He’ll be fine,’ Luke insisted, and she looked over at him, elbows on his knees, biting down on his knuckles, as ill and as grey as a healthy man could look. She knew that his angst wasn’t solely reserved for Amelia, knew that when he looked at her next he’d confirm what she was starting to know and hoping to God that she’d say the right thing.

  ‘When you asked what I’d do if I found out you were pregnant… Aside from what I wanted, I guess I knew you’d be OK—with or without me, that you’d do the right thing. But Amanda…’

  And finally he was ready to say it—and she was ready to hear it.

  ‘Amanda was ill.’ Green eyes awash with pain finally met hers, that talk he’d attempted taking place now, in the stark confines of a hospital waiting room. ‘Mentally ill. She wasn’t simply run over—she was in full-blown psychosis and she ran straight out into the street, or so I’m told. She’d been missing for a couple of days.’ He gave a tight smile that was utterly devoid of humour. ‘She went missing quite a lot. Look, I know I’m soft on the twins but, hell, if you knew what they’d been through…’

  ‘You should have told me.’

  ‘She was their mother.’ Luke swallowed. ‘And it’s something…I didn’t want to say it to someone who didn’t want to get involved.’

  And she could understand that, understand how private that pain was, because she had her own private pain too, that piece inside that had to be divulged carefully.

  ‘I know you don’t gossip, Molly. Hell, I’m not asking you not to tell anyone. It’s just not something I want everyone knowing—for the twins’ sake, more than anything. I tell them in my own way. They see a child psychologist and they’re starting to talk about it.’ He gave a wry smile. ‘Which is all too much information for a transition girl!’

  ‘How long was she ill for?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Luke said. ‘I think it must have been since medical school, from bits I’ve worked out. The problem was Amanda refused to accept she was ill, helped along by her parents. I didn’t know at first. You met her—she was charming, busy, high-achieving, stunning. She just blew me away. But it soon became obvious there was a problem—well, obvious to me. I called round one evening and I hardly recognised her. The flat was like a bomb had hit it, she wasn’t washed, wasn’t dressed, she wasn’t even speaking. I took her up to Sydney to her parents’. She was insistent that I couldn’t walk away from her, saying could we give it another go, that she was just tired, that work had just caught up with her. She’d just finished on the neonatal ward before she came to Melbourne, and I knew she’d found it tough, but I sort of knew it was more than that…’ He dragged a hand through his hair. ‘She was just so low. Of course I couldn’t just end it. Next thing I knew she was back, and for a while there I honestly thought I must have imagined the whole thing—you know, exaggerated it in my mind, because she was as bright and as vibrant as she had always been. I really thought it had just been a bad patch, and then…’ She could see the turmoil in his face, the pain, the confusion as he relived it, tried to put the craziness of the past few years into some sort of sensible order. ‘You know how busy she always was.’ He looked at Molly for confirmation and she nodded. ‘Sometimes it was much more than that. I’d find her in the study at three o’clock in the morning. She was going to go to Africa, she’d say, and then she’d decide she was going to go to India. She’d get all the brochures. Or she’d suddenly have this brilliant idea about a treatment…’ He shook his head in helplessness. ‘It just got crazier and crazier—shopping, ridiculous spending, designer shoes, dresses.’

  ‘This is when you were just going out with her?’ Molly checked.

  ‘And when I was married to her,’ Luke replied. ‘Not all the time, of course—there were pockets of normality.

  But when it happened the first time I ended it. Not just like that. I took her back to her parents’. Some journey that was. And again they insisted there wasn’t a problem. I knew that I couldn’t live like that, especially given Amanda was so reluctant to help herself. I came back and all I felt was relief—relief that it was over. I didn’t ask you out for a while. I figured if she came back and heard I was with someone else, it would just add fuel to the fire. But when I heard that she’d resigned…’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ Molly asked. ‘We were so close. Why did y
ou feel you couldn’t tell me?’

  ‘She was terrified of losing her job—or rather her parents were, if it ever got out. That’s why they tried to keep it quiet. They just refused to accept she had a psychiatric problem—just point-blank refused to accept it. And Amanda listened to them. She listened to them when they said it would affect her career if it got out, listened to all the rubbish they fed her. You know, I hate them more than I ever thought it possible to hate other human beings. Amanda had a treatable condition—sure, there would have been highs and lows, even with medication, but not like the ones we had to go through.’

  ‘That’s why you were upset with Carl’s mum?’

  Luke nodded. ‘The same way Carl needed his medication, Amanda needed hers—and by denying it, by assuming it would go away…well, in the end it killed her.’

  ‘Luke, it was Amanda’s fault too. She was a doctor, for goodness’ sake.’

  ‘She was ill, Molly.’ He halted her. ‘She had an illness. When I found out she was pregnant…’ He took her hand. Not in a romantic way, more as if he was holding on to stop himself falling apart. Molly could actually envisage it, the fear, the trapped feeling he must surely have had. ‘I didn’t know what to do. We’d been careful, but I guess careful doesn’t always work. If I had told you, what would you have said?’

  ‘I don’t know…’ Molly’s mind raced to the past, to a younger, less wise version of herself, dizzy with love and hope, and tried to imagine what she would have done. ‘I’d have tried to help. Even if you’d had to marry her, be with her, you could have had a friend—’

  ‘An out,’ Luke interrupted. ‘Molly, I was so hard on you that day because it had to be completely over between us. I couldn’t put you through what I knew I was going to go through. And, God help me, during those first couple of years of marriage, if I’d have known you were on the other end of the phone, if I’d have thought we had anything, anything we could have built on, I don’t know that I could have stayed.’