The Only Boy For Me

by Gil McNeil

  A very officious-looking ward sister wearing a facemask suddenly appears out of a side room and announces that they are going to do barrier nursing, and we must not hang about in the corridor. She also says we must not leave the side room under any circumstances because it is vital we do not infect the other children. The entire ward looks at us with horror as if we have some sort of plague, and Charlie begins to cry. This is the last straw. I tell her that Guy’s have said he is not infectious and have not done any barrier nursing at all. She gives me that look medical people give you which tells you that they have no interest whatsoever in your totally uninformed opinions, and you will do as you are told in their hospital.

  I get Charlie settled into our new room, and I’ve just started reading him a story when the sister sweeps in, still wearing her gown and mask, and says will I wait outside please while she takes Charlie’s temperature. I tell her I won’t. Charlie looks very frightened and holds my hand really tight. I tell her I think her behaviour is totally unacceptable, she’s scaring Charlie, and demand she gets the consultant immediately. She looks like she is about to mount a counter-offensive so I stand up, and luckily it turns out I am about a foot taller than her. I walk over to the door in silence and hold it open until she has left. She is shaking with fury. So am I. She goes straight over to the desk and picks up the phone. I assume she’s calling security and will have us thrown out. In fact she must have called Mr O’Brien because he suddenly appears looking thunderous, hurls the door open and strides into the room, obviously expecting some sort of riot. He takes one look at Charlie and says, ‘Why wasn’t I told this patient had arrived? I expressly asked to be informed.’ The sister mutters something, and then launches into a speech about the necessity for barrier nursing. He stares at her, says there is absolutely no need for barrier nursing, and insists she takes her gown and mask off immediately. Then he sits on the bed and strokes Charlie’s foot while chatting to him about Power Rangers and how vital it is to have a really good water pistol. This man clearly has a way with children.

  The sister meanwhile is standing in the corner of the room looking livid, and I can tell she’s longing for Mr O’Brien to leave so she can start her campaign for revenge. I feel close to tears and then Lizzie turns up, and somehow works out without being told what is going on. She glares at the sister and says we will ring if we need anything. Yet again the ward sister finds herself being thrown out of the side room. I cannot believe my little sister is being so bossy. Mr O’Brien looks at her admiringly, and she sits down and begins chatting to Charlie as if nothing had happened.

  Mr O’Brien seems reluctant to leave, and is obviously enjoying seeing Charlie looking so well. He says we can give him his drugs in medicine form now, and arranges for the hospital pharmacy to send up a bottle. We give Charlie the first dose together, and Charlie says it tastes like sick but is better than the injections. Mr O’Brien very gently removes the drip from Charlie’s hand, and gives him a special smiley-face sticking plaster to put over the spot where the needle went in. Charlie’s poor little hand is all red and swollen, but having the drip out seems very symbolic and I have to go and wash my hands at the sink in the corner so nobody will notice that I’m crying. Mr O’Brien strokes Charlie’s hair, and says he’ll come and check on us in the morning, but sees no reason why we can’t go home tomorrow if all is well.

  I actually kiss him, which embarrasses us both hugely. Charlie is now dancing on his bed, and despite Lizzie’s best efforts he manages to bounce off it straight on to the floor so we all make a huge fuss and the moment passes. Charlie calms down when Lizzie promises to see if she can track down a television, and Mr O’Brien leaves with a smile on his face. A young nurse brings in supper, not wearing a mask, and is extremely friendly. I have a sneaking suspicion that the sister may not be popular and they all relished seeing her being told off. She spends ages fiddling with the blankets on Charlie’s bed, and promises to get him ice-cream and find a television on a trolley for us.

  We have a celebration supper provided by Mum. The poor woman is turning into Meals on Wheels. I can’t really believe we can go home tomorrow, and I lie on the camp bed, which is much more comfortable than the other one, and try to sleep but I can’t. I watch the dawn come up, and feel totally drained of any emotion other than relief. Mr O’Brien turns up very early, and says we can definitely go home. I ring Mum and Dad and Lizzie and tell them the good news. Lizzie says she’ll ring everyone else and let them know, so no one turns up here to visit. Mum and Dad arrive, and they’ve filled the car with balloons, which Charlie thinks is marvellous. We get home to discover that Kate and Sally have cleaned the entire house from top to bottom, Mum has filled the fridge with food, and Dad has lit the fire and chopped tons of logs which are now piled up outside the back door. It’s lovely to be home, and apart from a couple of shaky moments we all cope and nobody cries. Mum and Dad finally leave; it takes me ages to persuade them that I’ll be fine on my own with Charlie. As soon as they’ve gone I feel a bit wobbly and wish I’d asked them to stay. Charlie is very happy, and wanders from room to room as if he can’t quite believe we are home. He’s soon exhausted, and after another dose of medicine he falls asleep in my bed – ‘Because I’ve been ill, you know, and I need to be in your bed in case it comes back.’ I sit by the fire and try to make some sort of sense of the last few days, but I can’t.

  Loads of cards have arrived from what seems like the entire village, and lots of drawings from school. Kate brought all the cards round with flowers and a large bottle of gin during the afternoon. She gave me a very emotional hug, and tried to hug Charlie but he wasn’t keen so she had to settle for a lot of patting. I pour myself a large gin from Kate’s new supply, and start to sob for what seems like hours. I feel sure I’ll go blind if I cry any more, the fire goes out, and finally I crawl into bed freezing cold. Charlie stirs, looks at me and says, ‘Oh, it’s you. Good, I thought it was one of those horrible nurses.’

  ‘No, darling, no more nurses,’ I snivel, trying not to launch into another round of sobbing.

  ‘Are you alright, Mummy? Your voice sounds funny.’

  ‘Yes, I’m fine, darling.’

  ‘Good. Mummy, you know the Power Rangers?’

  ‘Sort of.’

  ‘Yes, well, wouldn’t it be lovely to have them all?’

  ‘Yes. Now go back to sleep.’

  He sits bolt upright. ‘Really, Mummy, we can buy them all? That’s brilliant, James has only got four. Oh I love you, Mummy.’

  ‘I love you too, darling.’ Sniff, snivel.

  He snuggles down and is back asleep again in minutes. He’s taking up most of the bed, the entire duvet, and three of the pillows. But he has the trace of a smile on his face, and is breathing slowly and deeply. I lie watching him and finally drift off to sleep.

  Chapter Ten

  Picking up the Pieces

  We gradually get used to being back at home. I spend the entire week trying to cope with a whirlwind of visits from villagers and bad behaviour from Charlie. He has furious temper tantrums over the slightest thing, hurling toys about and swearing, and constantly tells me how ill he’s been. The old lady from three doors down comes round with a very oddly shaped sloping cake she’s made, with Charlie’s name on it in blue icing. This reduces me to tears, and she holds my hand for a very long time saying how sorry she was, is, and will be for ever that such a horrible thing could happen to such a lovely little lad. The lovely little lad is throwing a complete fit because he does not want cake, but she kindly ignores this. Then he manages to fall flat on his face, tripping over the rug in the hall, and screams so loudly that the windows rattle. She smiles and wanders off slowly back up the lane.

  Mum and Dad finally relax and stop visiting daily, which is a bit of a relief as Mum kept bringing round huge quantities of food and got very thin-lipped if it was not all eaten before she went home. It was very nice food, but of the build-you-up variety. If I build up any more I won’t fit into my black
velvet dress ever again. Mack drives down via a major spending spree in Hamleys, but luckily I spot his arrival before Charlie does, and make him hold on to some of the presents or Charlie will go into orbit and I may never get him down again. Part of me wants to give him every single thing he asks for, but apart from the potential for financial ruin I also know that in a weird way what he really needs is to get back to normal as quickly as possible. I check this out with Kate and Sally. Sally comes up with a very interesting theory about how buying too many presents for children is actually hugely threatening for them, and it’s far better to give them a bit of string, and lots of attention, than tons of toys and their own televisions. When I point out that William has his own television she says yes, but it was either that or kill him, and she did refuse to buy him a new Lego set last weekend, and he sulked for two days. I sympathise and say yesterday Charlie threw a total screaming fit that lasted for nearly an hour because I refused to buy him a shotgun.

  Mack has also brought food with him, and it feels churlish to tell him that Mum has already popped round with a three-course meal. He’s got to be in the office tomorrow and plans to leave at the crack of dawn, so we try to get Charlie settled early which backfires badly and he’s still running around singing and telling jokes at half past ten. Mack is great about this, and says he’ll read him a story and calm him down. I don’t think he stands a chance, but gladly accept. He comes back downstairs half an hour later and says very smugly, ‘Well, that didn’t take long. He’s fast asleep, and he looks like he’ll stay that way for at least a couple of hours.’

  ‘Good. Are you sure he wasn’t faking it? He did that last night and I was just about to creep out when he sat up and said, “Only joking.” I nearly had a heart attack.’

  ‘No, I checked.’

  ‘Brilliant.’

  ‘Yes, and cheap at half the price.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Oh bugger. I didn’t mean to say that. Um, well, we’ve got a deal. He goes to sleep and I slip him a fiver the next time I see him.’

  ‘Mack, that’s awful.’

  ‘No it’s not. I’ll save it for emergencies, like I do with Alfie and Daisy. Actually Daisy is really getting the hang of it; she asks for the cash up-front now.’

  ‘Well, more fool you; you’ll end up shelling out a fortune.’

  ‘Quite possibly. Speaking of which, I brought you a present too. It’s in the car.’

  He opens the kitchen door to the garden, peers out into the night and then says, ‘Christ, someone’s stolen the car.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Look, it’s gone.’

  I look down the drive and can see nothing, but then you never can because when it’s dark in the country it really is dark. I switch on the outside lights, and the car is revealed.

  ‘Oh, right, thanks.’

  He comes back in with a very expensive-looking box, and inside it are a pair of beautiful earrings, a bit like the ones Kate lent me, but nicer. Plain silver crosses, with green stones.

  ‘Mack, they’re beautiful. Thank you.’

  ‘Well, I thought you should have your own.’

  He looks a bit embarrassed, and I put them on and twirl about and say they are the nicest present I’ve ever been given, and he seems pleased, and then I give him a kiss which starts out as a thank-you kiss but rapidly turns into something quite different. The combination of lust and exhaustion somehow makes things even more perfect than usual. I feel oddly tearful, and then Mack very gently asks me to tell him the whole story of what happened right from the beginning, and I do, and end up sobbing in his arms. Eventually I calm down and we go up to bed, and then I get woken what seems like minutes later by Charlie who’s crying and says he’s had a horrible dream about injections. I comfort him, and then Mack wakes up and does the same, and starts telling him a very boring story about boats which is perfect because we all fall asleep and the next thing I know it’s five thirty and Mack is trying to get dressed quietly without waking anybody up.

  I go downstairs and make coffee.

  ‘Excellent boat story last night.’

  ‘Yes, it’s one of my specials. Guaranteed to bore the little buggers back to sleep; I’ve never had to do more than ten minutes.’

  ‘I can imagine. Do you want toast?’

  ‘No thanks, we’d better not risk the smoke alarm.’

  ‘Very funny.’

  I wave him off to work and for a moment have a fantasy of being a corporate wife seeing my breadwinner off for a day at the office. But I get over it very quickly, as apart from anything else I’m not wearing the right kind of slippers; in fact I’m not wearing slippers at all but horrible old gardening shoes which were by the door and are caked in mud. I go back to bed and am just dropping off again when Charlie wakes up.

  ‘Where’s Mack gone?’

  ‘To work.’

  ‘Bugger.’

  ‘Charlie, please stop saying that silly word.’

  ‘I didn’t get my money, and now he’ll forget.’

  I don’t want to get involved in Mack’s bribery deal, because if I do Charlie will insist I do the same tonight. But I also don’t want him to think Mack is unreliable.

  ‘Oh, he said something about tell Charlie I haven’t forgotten the deal and we’ll sort it out next time I see him, whatever that means.’

  Charlie gives a huge sigh of relief and says, ‘Oh, that’s alright then. Mummy, what’s for breakfast? I’m starving. I need to eat lots, you know; I’ve been very ill.’

  I’m chatting to Leila, and trying to get her to stop sending presents by special courier delivery because apart from anything else the garage is now full of the small white polystyrene pellet things that seem to come in every parcel. Every time I get them rounded up in bin bags Charlie rushes in and liberates them. The garage is now like a giant version of those little plastic things you shake and snow whirls about. Leila says she understands completely, and she’s found a marvellous book on post-traumatic stress, and apparently it’s vital to get back to normal routines as quickly as possible. She’s shopping as much as she can, and suggests I do the same, because it really takes your mind off things. I agree with her, but point out the difference in my case is that if I do indulge in any major shopping sprees, I’ll have the added bonus of having my mind taken off things twice: once when I do the shopping and then all over again when the bank manager writes one of his special rude letters.

  Charlie is getting slightly calmer, and his tantrums are now less frequent, though still blistering when he does launch into one. There are lots of unbearable moments when he’s sitting having a cuddle or I’m reading a story to him, and he suddenly asks why he got ill: did he do something wrong, and can I promise it won’t come back? We have long discussions about germs and how it was just bad luck, and he seems to accept this but I’m left shattered. I can’t bear seeing him so anxious and afraid. Sally has talked to her friend Mel, a child psychologist, who says it’s very common for children recovering from a serious illness to come up with all sorts of behaviour problems, and the only thing to do is just hang on in there. I can’t imagine how parents cope with long-term serious illness: it must be crucifying. I feel very lucky, but I also feel traumatised, and there is simply no space for this. I feel guilty that I let him down, and wasn’t able to protect him, and guilty that I keep thinking about how I feel instead of concentrating on him. I know this is going to be a long haul, and it seems awful to mind about his furious temper tantrums and anxiety attacks compared to what might have happened. But I do mind, more for him than for me, and seeing him raging away makes me feel like I’m letting him down all over again. I feel somehow things will never be quite the same: once your worst nightmares have started to come true you realise just how fragile everything really is. I’m going to have to work really hard not to be too over-protective. I’d like to wrap him up in blankets and keep him indoors for the next ten years, but realise this is not sensible, and anyway it’s probably illegal.<
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  The GP, Dr Bennett, arrives to check Charlie over, and is very friendly once it becomes clear that I’m not going to sue him for failing to come up with the right diagnosis during our first two appointments. Charlie is horrified that a doctor has turned up at the house, and throws Lego at him, and then insists the poor man empties out his bag and puts all the needles and syringes back into his car. Once he’s reassured that he’s not going to be given any injections, he calms down, a bit, but he’s still wary and clings to me and holds my hand very tight. The poor doctor tries his best to be friendly, and even attempts a little joke, but Charlie is having none of it, and narrows his eyes and watches his every move intently. He gives Charlie the all-clear to go back to school, and has a stab at another little joke, and then says he’d better be off.

  As I’m showing him out, he says, ‘Of course it’s a notoriously tricky thing to spot, and we do rely on parents to call us in before things go too far.’ I think this is unfair and tell him so.

  ‘So if something terrible had happened, it would have been my fault?’

  ‘No, no, of course not, that’s not what I meant at all.’

  ‘I know. But that’s how it feels.’

  ‘Oh, well, I really didn’t mean it like that. Actually I still feel pretty awful about it. I really am very sorry, you know.’ And he looks totally wretched.

  ‘Yes, well, it’s over now, and he’s fine.’

  ‘Fighting fit with the old Lego anyway.’

  ‘Yes, sorry about that.’

  ‘Oh not at all, not at all; I’ve had much worse, believe me. I once got a very nasty bite from a toddler, and he was only in with his mum to get a repeat prescription. Really, I can’t tell you how pleased I am to see him so well.’