Never Too Old for Love

by Rosie Harris

  ‘How is he?’

  ‘He has regained consciousness and is in Intensive Care. If you wish you can come and see him, but you will only be allowed to do so for a few minutes. We don’t want him stressed or excited.’

  ‘I’ll be there, probably within the hour,’ Mary told her. As soon as the line was clear, she phoned Bill and told him the news.

  ‘Are you going to pick me up?’ Bill asked.

  ‘Very well, I’ll phone for the taxi in about twenty minutes. I need to get properly dressed.’

  ‘Phone for the taxi now and tell them to pick you up in twenty minutes,’ Bill advised. ‘I’ll be ready and waiting.’

  Mary tried to concentrate on what she had to do next. She had never felt so relieved, so anxious, or so flustered in her life. She phoned for the taxi as Bill had suggested and then started to get herself ready. The face that was reflected back at her as she put on her make-up was so lined and drawn that she shuddered. She must stop worrying. Richard would be worried if he saw her looking so anxious. She forced herself to lighten up and smile as she completed putting on her make-up. Then she picked up her light summer coat and handbag, locked the front door and walked down the garden path to the gate to wait for the taxi.

  The warm July air refreshed her. She tried to console herself that the worst was over now and Richard would probably be sitting up in bed, ready to relate all the details about his crash by the time she arrived at the hospital. The taxi arrived on time and she asked the driver to go via Coburn Road in order to pick up Bill. He was waiting at his gate and climbed into the taxi greeting her with a wide smile. The journey was uneventful; along familiar roads and lanes to Wexham Hospital, which was on the outskirts of Slough.

  As they went into the hospital, Mary headed straight for the reception desk and to her relief found that the same girl they had seen the previous day was attending her. The girl recognised them immediately and smiled brightly.

  ‘You’ve come to see your son, Mrs Wilson. Well this time I can tell you where he is. He has just been moved into ward six. If you follow the signs along the corridor turn left, then turn left again and you’ll see more signs guiding you directly to the ward.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Mary said. ‘Thank you for arranging for them to phone me and for all your help yesterday.’

  ‘Just doing my job,’ the girl said brightly, but she looked pleased that someone had recognised her hard work.

  Their footsteps clattered along the tiled corridor as they made their way in the direction she had told them. When they finally reached it, Mary stopped and took a deep breath. She was so relieved that everything was all right. She didn’t want to look anxious when she met Richard. Bill took her arm and propelled her forward, pushing open the double doors to let her through and smiling at her encouragingly.

  Mary stood just inside staring round the ward looking for Richard. She had expected to see him sitting up, waiting to see her, but all the patients seemed to be lying down. Perhaps it was their afternoon siesta. Bill was also looking around, searching for Richard.

  A nurse came hurrying up to them frowning slightly. ‘Yes who are you looking for?’

  ‘Richard Wilson.’

  The nurse looked at her rather doubtfully.

  ‘You’re not going to stop me seeing him are you?’ Mary said sharply.

  ‘No, you can see him but only for a few minutes and only one at a time.’

  ‘That’s all right I’m just a friend,’ Bill said quickly. ‘I’ll wait here.’

  The nurse nodded and indicated a chair in the corner. ‘Perhaps you wouldn’t mind sitting there or out in the corridor?’ she said.

  Mary noticed that all the time she spoke she kept her voice quite low and she wondered why. Perhaps it was because all the men appeared to be asleep, she thought as she followed the nurse down the ward. They stopped at the first bed, which had screens around it and Mary took a quick deep breath to try and stop her heart racing. This couldn’t be Richard!

  The person lying prone in the bed was white faced and his shallow breathing was strained.

  Once again she thought this can’t be Richard. She had expected to find him sitting up ready to welcome her and laughing about the silly thing that had happened to make him crash. The man lying there looked almost a shell. Tentatively, she approached the bed and she could see from the man’s hair colouring and features that it was Richard. There was no mistake about that, but he looked so ill and so fragile.

  The nurse looked at her watch. ‘Right I can give you ten minutes and please don’t say anything to upset him or excite him.’

  ‘No, of course not. I understand,’ Mary said in a low voice. She sat down in the chair at the side of the bed, reached out and took one of the limp hands that were lying on top of the covers. The man in the bed didn’t even stir. ‘Richard, Richard,’ she said softly. Then when it had no effect she repeated his name again this time a little louder, bending her head so that her lips were quite close to his ear

  Slowly his eyelids fluttered then gradually, very gradually, he opened his eyes. He stared at her for a moment, then recognition lightened his features.

  ‘Mother,’ he said but his voice was weak and little more than a whisper.

  ‘Richard, I didn’t expect to find you like this,’ she said sadly.

  ‘No,’ he said his voice so weak she could barely hear him. ‘It was a nasty accident. I’m not sure what happened but I am sure that someone will tell me. I had only just taken off when it happened. I’d done all the checks on my glider beforehand so I don’t know what it was … I’m not even sure if my legs will work.’ He added in a despairing whimper.

  ‘Richard, don’t say that please. I’m sure the operation will have put everything right. It’s simply a case of resting and recovering.’

  He gave a faint smile. ‘I hope so. At the moment I feel completely washed out.’ He closed his eyes again and seemed to sink into unconsciousness. Mary didn’t know what to do. She squeezed his hand and once more his eyelids fluttered then he looked up at her.

  ‘Is George all right?’

  Mary nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said positively, George is all right. We told him that you had an accident and that you were in hospital. He wanted to come and see you, of course, but we had to tell him he would have to wait a day or two until you were stronger.’

  ‘Good. Does Megan know?’

  Mary hesitated. How could she tell him how Megan had received the news? Yet somehow she had to do so. She took a deep breath.

  ‘Yes, Megan knows. I rang her last night and told her you had an accident. I couldn’t give her any details because I didn’t have them.’

  ‘She’s coming home?’

  ‘Well, yes, but not immediately. She said it was impossible to do so.’

  Mary didn’t know how to explain, but it didn’t seem to matter because Richard had drifted away again. She bent closer, trying to see if she could rouse him when the nurse appeared. This time there was a man with her.

  ‘Good afternoon, Mrs Wilson. I am Mr Dancer, the surgeon who operated on your son last night. He has quite a nasty injury. It may be some time before he’s up and back to normal.’

  ‘He will walk again?’ Mary said anxiously

  Mr Dancer looked thoughtful. ‘We hope he will. With skilled nursing and also plenty of physiotherapy, exercise and a determination to get better he should be all right,’ Mr Dancer stated.

  ‘Try not to worry,’ he added as he turned and pulled aside the curtain and left.

  ‘I think you’ve been here long enough; you’ve had your ten minutes and we don’t want to tire him do we,’ the nurse said briskly. ‘Your son needs every ounce of strength to get better.’

  Mary stood up, ‘Yes, of course. I understand.’ She hesitated. ‘Can you tell me a little bit more about what happened? As far as I understand his glider crashed on take-off.’

  ‘So we were told when he was brought in,’ the nurse affirmed. ‘He has damaged a couple of the vertebr
ae in his back, they will take time to heal but as Mr Dancer explained, with plenty of physiotherapy he should regain full use of his legs in due course.

  ‘You don’t know why his glider crashed?’ Mary persisted.

  ‘I’m afraid not. I am sure someone who witnessed the accident will be able to tell you more about that,’ the nurse said dismissively.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Mary Wilson felt in a daze as she left Wexham hospital. She couldn’t put the sight out of her mind of Richard lying prone in his hospital bed and the fear that he might never walk again. As she sat alongside Bill Thompson in the taxi taking them back home, she tried to sort out in her head how badly injured Richard was. Sam had never had an accident in the whole of his flying career and she had no idea what actual damage Richard had done to his back.

  The nurse had said something about damage to some of the vertebrae, which she knew meant the bones in Richard’s spine. In that case he might not be able to walk again. The thought of that terrified her. How on earth would he earn a living, look after George and generally lead a normal life if that was the case?

  Bill sat beside her, holding her hand and saying nothing; there was really nothing he could say. He understood to a degree what had happened to Richard and he was extremely worried. Richard was a comparatively young man and to be incapacitated to such an extent as not being able to walk was unthinkable. Did it mean he would be in a wheelchair? These days, of course, there were all sorts of mechanical means of getting around other than a wheelchair, so perhaps he would be able to adapt to that type of substitute for walking. It was still a dreadful burden for a young man to bear. He might easily live for another thirty or forty years. He didn’t know what to say to Mary.

  He’d taken several sideways glances and each time he could see that the news had greatly disturbed her, from the deep furrows down either side of her cheeks and the way she kept dabbing at her eyes, although she was not actually crying. Someone would have to tell Megan and he didn’t think that that she would respond in a very conciliatory way. He was sure that she would only be concerned insofar as it affected her life. She was elegant and beautiful on the outside but hard as a dried up nut on the inside.

  Lucia had to be told exactly what the situation was and probably have arrangements made so that she could manage to run Richard’s home in his absence, so they called on her on their way home. Lucia accepted the news stoically, but little George’s reaction brought tears to Mary’s eyes.

  For a moment she couldn’t answer when he asked ‘Is my daddy with you?’

  ‘No,’ Mary told him her voice shaky with emotion, ‘your daddy is in hospital.’

  ‘Oh!’ George looked taken aback. ‘Will he be coming home soon?’

  ‘No, dear, I’m afraid he will be in hospital for quite a long time.’

  Georges face crumpled. ‘I want him home now,’ he protested. ‘He always reads me a story when I go to bed before I go to sleep.’

  ‘Well I expect Lucia will read you a story,’ Mary said with a gentle smile.

  ‘She does but it’s not the same as when Daddy reads it. When he reads to me I fall asleep as soon as he has finished. I don’t do that when Lucia reads to me. Her voice is different.’

  ‘What about if I came round and read you a story before you went to bed?’ Bill volunteered.

  George looked at him in astonishment. ‘Can you really read stories?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ Bill assured him ‘I am very good at reading stories.’

  George looked at him doubtfully ‘It won’t be quite the same as when Daddy reads to me,’ he said, his voice trembling.

  ‘Well shall we give it a try,’ Bill suggested.

  George nodded. ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Well, in that case, shall I come around tonight?’

  Bill looked at Lucia as he spoke and she nodded her head in agreement.

  ‘Good! You had better tell me what time you want me to come round and I’ll be here, and you can choose whatever story you want me to read.’

  ‘OK. I go to bed at seven o’clock, can you be here at seven o’clock?’

  ‘I will do my very best,’ Bill told him.

  Mary smiled gratefully at Bill and then looked at her watch and drew in her breath sharply as she said, ‘We must be on our way home; the taxi is outside waiting. We’ve been out most of the day what with one thing and another.’

  She kissed George goodbye and told him to be a good boy and said she would make sure that Bill came round to read to him that night.

  ‘That was very kind of you to offer to read to George,’ she said as they got back into the taxi. ‘Are you sure you’re going to be able to manage to do it? If it is successful he may expect you to read to him every night!’

  ‘Well, I suppose I can manage to do that until Richard comes home if it helps,’ he said gruffly.

  Mary squeezed his hand. ‘Thank you, Bill.’

  ‘It will probably be a lot simpler than dealing with Megan,’ he mumbled.

  ‘I think telling Megan is going to be very difficult indeed,’ Mary admitted.

  When they reached her house and she had paid the taxi driver and he’d driven away, Mary braced her shoulders as they walked up the garden path.

  ‘Job number one is to ring Megan,’ she stated as she unlocked the front door.

  ‘I don’t think it is going to be very easy,’ she commented as they went inside.

  ‘I’m sure it won’t be,’ Bill agreed, ‘so why don’t you have a cup of tea first and prepare yourself for what you are going to say to her.’

  Mary’s call to Megan was every bit as difficult as she had imagined it would be. Megan was still very annoyed that Richard’s accident had been as a result of him going gliding.

  As Mary relayed what Mr Dancer had said Megan grew increasingly annoyed.

  ‘He really should listen to advice. He acts like a spoiled boy,’ she said snappily. ‘If I have told him once I’ve told him a dozen times to give it up. If he had done as I asked this would never have happened.’

  ‘No but he may well have had some other kind of accident,’ Mary defended.

  ‘Possibly, but certainly he wouldn’t have broken his back. How long is it going to take to get better? Were you told?’

  ‘No one knows,’ Mary said. ‘Mr Dancer the surgeon who operated said it may take a considerable time. He also advocated careful nursing and plenty of physiotherapy.’

  ‘He won’t be getting any nursing from me I can assure you on that point,’ Megan said quickly. ‘When he comes out of hospital he will have to go into a nursing home,’ she added sharply.

  ‘Don’t you think it would be better to wait and see what condition he is in when he does come home?’ Mary argued. ‘I am quite sure that they wouldn’t send him home from hospital until he is capable of walking. It may be with the aid of crutches or something, but I am sure they will not send him out of hospital in the condition he is in now. If you saw him—’

  ‘I’m not likely to see him for quite a while. I am certainly not coming home just to look at him lying in a hospital bed! Nor do I intend to sit by his side and hold his hand,’ Megan interrupted. ‘The very fact that he is in hospital is his own fault not mine.’

  ‘Do you want me to tell him that?’ Mary asked in a shocked voice.

  ‘You can tell him what you like, or whatever you think he wants to hear. You can certainly tell him that I am not changing my plans just to accommodate him.’

  ‘Shall I give you the address of the hospital so that you can write to him?’

  ‘Good heavens no! What is the point of me doing that?’

  ‘You could express sympathy and tell him how sorry you are that this has happened. I am sure it would make him feel better.’

  ‘I am much more likely to tell him how stupid he has been.’ Megan said scathingly. ‘For years I have told him to stop gliding, so I am unlikely to be sympathetic. He has behaved like a fool and I have no patience with him for such foolishness, especia
lly when I have asked him countless times to give it up.’

  Before Mary could make any retort the phone went down at the other end. With a sigh of regret, Mary hung up. There was nothing else she could do. Poor Richard would have to be told that Megan wasn’t coming home, but that could wait. The important thing was to get him better and, at the moment, he was barely conscious so what on earth could a piece of news like that do to him except set him back? For the next few weeks it would be up to her, Bill, and Lucia to do whatever they could to boost his morale, and encourage him to have patience and do whatever the hospital told him to do.

  Bill listened in silence when she told him what Megan’s reaction had been.

  ‘Did she ask after George? He asked.

  Mary shook her head. ‘No, come to think about it she never mentioned George or how Lucia was going to manage. I’ll leave it a day or two and then ring her again. By then we might have some fresh news.’

  Later that week there was news, but not the sort of news that Mary expected.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Mary felt that Richard’s progress over the next few days was agonisingly slow. Bill told her to have patience.

  ‘The doctor and nurses seemed quite satisfied by his progress and they’re the experts,’ he pointed out.

  Mary knew he was right but nevertheless she was impatient to see Richard sitting up and talking. As it was, each time she went in to see him he was still lying prone and although his eyes were open and he appeared to be looking around he said very little. Finally, she spoke to the nurse about it, telling her that she thought he ought to be sitting up by now.

  ‘Good heavens, no!’ the nurse said with a smile. ‘The longer he remains lying flat the quicker the damaged vertebrae will heal. He is doing extremely well, Mrs Wilson, and you must be patient.’

  Mary shook her head. ‘So everyone tells me but I can’t help feeling anxious about him. He says so little.’

  ‘He is probably feeling extremely exhausted and remember that whenever he moves, no matter how slight it may be, he feels pain. We are as careful and as gentle as we can be when we wash and feed him, but we know it is still a trauma for him.’