One Split Second: A thought-provoking novel about the limits of love and our astonishing capacity to heal

by Caroline Bond

  ‘Yeah. Harry wouldn’t do the drive-through. Said he didn’t want his car stinking of food, so we parked up and went in.’

  ‘At that time of night?’ Shazia wasn’t sure why she was questioning his story.

  ‘Yeah. It’s one of the twenty-four-hour ones.’ Mo stopped and looked round the kitchen. He registered his tea, picked it up and drained it in a series of long, deep swallows. Without a word, Nihal swapped the empty mug with his own full one. Mo drank half of that as well.

  Why was he so thirsty? Drinking made you thirsty. This doubting Mo’s word was a new and wholly horrible feeling. Shazia tried to concentrate on listening to, not mistrusting, her son.

  ‘Harry said he’d do the order. Tish and Jake stayed with him, at the self-serve machines. Jake kept changing his mind about what he wanted. Me and Jess went and sat down. It was all fine. Me and Jess talked about the party. Then I went to the loo.’ He stopped.

  ‘And?’

  ‘And when I came back, they’d gone.’

  ‘Gone?’

  He nodded. ‘Gone outside. I could see them in the car park.’

  In Shazia’s mind’s eye, she saw her son standing, abandoned, in the middle of the brightly lit McDonald’s. She felt his confusion and his sense of humiliation. Later she would feel some small bitterness at them excluding her son, but at that moment, deep within her bruised heart, she was grateful. But for their cruelty, Mo would have been in the car. He would have been in the crash. He would, at this very moment, be in hospital. Or worse. ‘They drove off and left you?’ Shazia’s voice held both her anger and her relief.

  Mo took another drink, then glanced at her, his expression unreadable. ‘No, not straight away.’

  Chapter 16

  IN THE hospital lobby Dom pushed his credit card into the machine to pay for his parking. He was tired and – though he didn’t want to admit it – stressed. He wanted to pick up Martha, get home, shut the door, then sit Harry down and get him to talk properly. They needed to talk. Silence was not a normal reaction, nor probably a wise one in the circumstances.

  As Dom entered his PIN number into the keypad, he got a call. He glanced at the caller ID, expecting a work call. It wasn’t. It was the police. With his phone clamped under his chin, Dom dealt with the payment, grabbed his validated ticket and stepped to the side. He turned his back on everyone milling around the lobby, not wanting his conversation to be overheard.

  They enquired after Harry, but that was only the warm-up. The real reason for the call was to ask – in fact, to insist – that Harry come to the station to be interviewed, as soon as possible. Dom wasn’t surprised, but he immediately went on the offensive: pointing out that Harry was badly shaken, sleep-deprived, and that his son needed some time to recover. As he talked, Dom started skimming through his mental Rolodex of friends and contacts, thinking who might be best to ask for advice about solicitors, and who, just as importantly, he could trust to handle such a request with discretion. He was so distracted by his thoughts that he nearly missed the comment about the test results.

  ‘Sorry, can you repeat that?’

  The officer didn’t react to his sharper tone. ‘I was saying that the blood-test results should be back in about a week.’

  ‘You took blood? From Harry?’

  ‘Yes. With his consent.’

  Dom’s heart rate kicked up a notch. The idiot! ‘Surely you should have waited for me to be present?’

  ‘No. There was no need for a parent to be present. Harry is eighteen.’

  ‘He was injured and in shock. He can’t possibly have given informed consent, in the state he was in.’

  The officer chose to ignore Dom’s objections and carried on regardless. ‘It is standard practice, Mr Westwood. Anyway, as I was saying, we need to book a time for the interview. I also want to remind you that Harry is still under caution.’ It went from bad to worse.

  The act of straightening his shoulders helped Dom recover some of his usual authority. He pushed back, in defence of his son. ‘I’m afraid I can’t confirm a time right now. Besides, it sounds like we need to sort out legal representation before we attend any interview.’

  The tone at the other end of the line remained resolutely professional. ‘That’s your call, Mr Westwood. But it is a matter of some urgency that we speak to Harry again, to take a formal statement. We’ve scheduled the interview for one p.m. tomorrow.’

  Dom refused to allow them to bounce him into agreeing anything. ‘You’ll have to leave me a number, and I’ll call back to let you know.’

  A number was provided, goodbyes were exchanged, then the officer repeated the time and the address of the station, and their expectation of attendance at the interview. The call ended.

  Dom took three deep breaths before turning round. They needed to get home, now. They needed to start preparing a defence, and the first step in that defensive strategy was going to be Harry telling him exactly what had happened.

  But Harry was not standing by the lifts, as they’d agreed. Dom’s heart rate ticked up another notch as he set off in search of him.

  Chapter 17

  HARRY WAS drifting aimlessly through the waves of patients, staff and visitors. When he came across a block of largely unoccupied plastic chairs near the cafe, he sat down. He didn’t want to leave, felt he couldn’t leave – not without knowing what was happening to the others. He would refuse to go. His dad couldn’t actually drag him away from the hospital, could he? Harry looked up at the boards listing all the different wards and wondered where his friends were. They were ‘badly hurt’, that’s all he’d been told. Where would they be being treated? Orthopaedics? Thoracics and General Surgery? The Intensive Care Unit? Major Trauma? It was a long, long list of terrible-sounding places.

  ‘Harry?’ He recognised Fran’s voice instantly.

  He had just enough time to stand up before her arms were around him, hugging him tight. So very tight. It was good to be held. He bent his head low and rested it on her shoulder. She smelt of sweat and stale perfume and something else – a medical, antiseptic smell. The wave of emotion that washed through him was strong and, for a moment, such a relief, after all the anxiety that had been coursing through him since the accident. He hid in her embrace, letting her take the strain. It was so good to feel love. But it only lasted for a few moments, then the balance shifted and she gently pushed Harry back onto his own two feet. She held him at arm’s length, studying him intently, and immediately the shame returned.

  ‘My God. I’m so glad that you’re all right. Are you? All right, I mean?’

  He nodded and felt his face flush red. She noticed. Of course she did. Fran was the one person who could see straight through him. That’s why he’d been staying away from the house lately. He hadn’t wanted her to look at him and see the lies; hadn’t been able to bear the scrutiny. Now it was a hundred times worse.

  Fran smiled, fleetingly. ‘I’m so relieved. The police wouldn’t tell us much’ She made him meet her eyes, reassuring him that she meant it. ‘Where’s your dad?’ she asked.

  Harry pointed across the lobby. Dom was on his phone, his back to them. The question was pressing against Harry’s skull, but now that he had the opportunity to ask it, he found that he couldn’t. His dad turned, phone in hand, and started scanning the concourse. Harry didn’t wave. Dom spotted them and starting walking over. Harry had to ask his question now, before his dad steam-rollered his way into the conversation. In his panic, it came out bluntly. ‘What about Jess? How’s Jess doing?’

  Fran let her hands drop from his arms. She sat down abruptly. Harry sat beside her. ‘She’s…’ She seemed unable to get any words out.

  Harry’s fear sharpened.

  Fran tried again, ‘She’s…’

  Dom arrived and broke into her answer. ‘Jeez, Fran. Are you okay? What’s going on with Jess?’ He laid a hand on her shoulder.

  Fran wilted in her seat. ‘She’s stable.’

  ‘That’s good.’ Dom asserted,
far too quickly. Harry was ashamed of his father’s brashness. It was the tone, as much as what he was saying. Dom was in business mode. Brisk. Polite. Assertive. ‘And she’s being properly looked after?’

  Fran shrank another few millimetres. ‘Yes.’

  Harry needed more, but his dad plainly thought that his social duties had been fulfilled. He obviously wanted to be off – as he had for the past fourteen hours. ‘Well, send her our love. And to Marcus, of course. We’ll keep in touch. If there’s anything we can do, let us know?’ He started edging away, looking at Harry, silently telling him to stand up.

  Harry stayed put. This was not adequate. No way. It was not enough. ‘How is she really, Fran?’

  Fran reached out and rested her fingertips on the top edge of his bandage, lightly, carefully. ‘She’s very poorly, Harry. They’re doing lots of tests. The damage is hard to assess apparently. So it’s just a case of waiting, and praying.’ Fran forced herself to sit a little taller. ‘But she’s calm and she’s not in any pain. I promise.’ Jesus, she was trying to make him feel better.

  Dom cut in again. ‘You are all in our thoughts. We’ll keep in touch. But I really think I need to get this young man home. It’s been a very long night, and day.’ As he bent down to kiss Fran on the cheek, Harry had the urge to shove his father away from her.

  ‘Can I come and see her?’ Harry asked.

  Fran said, ‘Maybe in a few days, Harry, when we know more. I’ll text you.’

  ‘You promise?’ He sounded like a child.

  ‘Yes, Harry. I promise.’

  Still Harry couldn’t leave. He had other people’s blood on his hands. ‘Have you heard how Tish is doing? And Jake? They wouldn’t tell me anything. They kept saying they weren’t allowed to, because of patient confidentiality.’

  Dom started running the parking ticket through his fingers. Harry tried to block him out.

  ‘Tish is on the same unit as Jess. I can’t lie, Harry; she’s not in a good way. There’s a lot of damage to her face and neck. Her jaw was broken in the crash. They’ve had to pin it back together. And she’s been having some breathing problems.’

  Harry thought he might as well curl up there and then on the floor.

  Fran looked at him, her face pale and drawn with tiredness, but then she did what good mums do – she tried to make it better. ‘They’re doing everything they can for them both. We have to trust in their skills. Give it some time. It’s amazing what people can recover from, Harry. We all just have to keep the faith.’

  He made himself smile in the face of her bravery.

  ‘And it is better news about Jake. Anita messaged me to say that the surgery on his leg went well. Apparently he’s already being cheeky with the nurses.’

  Dom was shifting from foot to foot. ‘Well, that’s good to hear. I really don’t want to be rude, Fran. But if it’s okay with you, we need to be going. We’ve got to get back…for Martha.’

  Fran ignored Dom and instead looked straight at Harry. A flash of the old Fran. He steeled himself; he knew what she was going ask. He had prepared himself for her asking it, thought about nothing else all night. She had the right to know. There was a beat of silence. ‘Harry, what happened?’

  The words clotted in his throat. ‘I’m so sorry. It was an accident.’

  Fran touched his arm again, sympathy and pressure in one gesture. ‘I know that, but I need to know what actually happened – what caused the crash.’

  A cacophony of images and sounds bubbled up inside Harry – too many, all clambering and competing, scrambling over each other in their awfulness. He struggled, trying to compose his answer into something as coherent and as close to the truth as possible, but before he managed to settle on one fact to begin with, Dom leapt in. ‘Fran. I’m sorry. But now really isn’t the time. He’s still in shock. He’s had virtually no sleep. None of us have. We’re all strung out by what’s happened. We will speak soon, I promise. But we really have to go now.’

  And, like the coward he obviously was now, Harry allowed himself to be dragged away – because he couldn’t face telling Fran the truth.

  Chapter 18

  FRAN WENT back up to the ICU shaken by her chance meeting with Harry and Dom. She was relieved that Harry had escaped with so little damage, but their encounter had rattled her. Their conversation had been so pressurised, so full of emotion, yet at the same time so devoid of information. She knew no more than she had fourteen hours ago. And Dom had been weird – itching to get away, seemingly anxious to stop Harry talking. But as she stepped out of the lift, Fran pushed the stirrings of disappointment and resentment to the back of her mind. She had other priorities. She buzzed to be allowed back onto the ward, wishing, with every fibre of her being, that Jess was anywhere else in the hospital or even – as Harry was lucky enough to be – going home with barely a scratch.

  For all the efforts of the staff to be compassionate and supportive, the ICU was an alien, frightening environment. White, bright, harsh – full of complex, high-tech machinery and inexplicable noises. The best of everything, staffed by the most qualified medical professionals, designed to care for the most critical cases.

  Jess and Tish were now two of those cases.

  The contrast between the two girls was profound.

  Jess looked unnervingly unchanged, except for the machine that was breathing for her and the absolute stillness of her body. A sleeping beauty: her face glacial, her eyes, beneath their paper-thin lids, motionless. The wound at the back of her head was neatly dressed. Her skin was clear and unblemished. She looked like she looked every evening when she came down to say ‘goodnight’: make-up free, their little girl once again. But it was what they couldn’t see – what was being scanned and measured by the sophisticated machines, minute by minute – that was the problem. Jess’s bruising and swelling and damage were all internal. It was her tender brain within her fragile skull that they were worried about.

  The damage to Tish’s body was much more obvious. Shockingly so. She looked like she’d been viciously beaten. She was barely recognisable beneath all the dressings and tubes. Only her hair and her hands seemed to have escaped being crushed. Though even from right across the room Fran could see the thin rims of black blood under her fingernails. Tish was not fighting her injuries quietly or calmly, like Jess. Despite the huge quantity of pain relief they were pumping into her, she was restless, her breathing loud and raspy, as she tried to vent the pain that had hold of her body. Every time they had to move her or re-dress her wounds, Fran and Marcus heard Tish cry out in protest. Sal – mirroring her daughter’s restlessness – was up and down, out of her seat every few minutes, stroking Tish’s hand, straightening her sheets, trying desperately to provide some comfort to the tiny slivers of her child that were still available to her.

  Every half-hour or so both women would walk the ten steps across the ward to meet each other in the middle; to touch base, to ground each other’s panic, to say ‘I’m here’ by a hand on an arm or simply by standing vigil by the girls’ bedsides while the other went to the toilet or to fetch a drink. Neither of them asked any direct questions about how each girl was doing any more. It was unnecessary, and it would have been cruel.

  Their daughters were in the ICU.

  Both girls were critically ill.

  Nothing could change that, except time.

  Chapter 19

  IT WAS gone 4 p.m. by the time they eventually got home, having picked Martha up from Cheryl’s. Dom had been deft and assertive in defending Harry from Cheryl’s understandable questions about the crash, insisting that the priority was to get his ‘children’ home. Walking into their house and pulling the door shut was a relief. No more strangers, no more noise – the feeling of having stepped outside the nightmare back into mundane normality was calming.

  But of course things weren’t normal. Martha was wired, fizzing with a desperate, oppressive need to offer affection. As they made sandwiches and drinks, she kept giving Harry little pats an
d squeezes on the back of his neck or top of his arm, touches that Harry knew were designed to be comforting, but in reality made him feel claustrophobic. And every time he looked up, Martha’s big eyes seemed to be there, following him around, pleading, worrying, seeking reassurances that he couldn’t give. He didn’t want touching. He didn’t want someone fussing over him. All he wanted was to be left alone.

  When he snapped and told her to give him some space, Martha froze, blinked and disappeared up to her room. Harry felt bad, but he hadn’t anything to offer her. He couldn’t tell her everything was going to be all right, because it wasn’t – it probably wasn’t going to be all right ever again. Dom had disappeared ‘to make some calls’, so he, thankfully, wasn’t around to witness Harry’s insensitivity towards his sister. God, it was such a mess: Martha upstairs, on her own, probably crying; him alone in the kitchen, not knowing what to do with himself; and his dad ensconced in his study – doing whatever it was that he found so much more interesting than his own kids. They really weren’t up to much, as a family.

  Harry was just about to escape to his room when the study door opened and his dad emerged. ‘We need to talk.’

  Harry desperately wanted to keep walking up the stairs, but Dom’s tone stopped him. ‘Dad, please, not now. I’m knackered.’ He went up another step.

  ‘No, Harry, this can’t wait. We need to have a conversation, and we need to have it now. You have the interview with the police tomorrow.’ Harry felt cold. ‘You’ll have to answer plenty of questions at that. It was a bad crash, Harry. People have been hurt. It was your car. You were driving. They’re going to blame you.’