After a minute or two of weaving left and right, which had the other three passengers completely lost and forced the boys in the rear to grab hold of any fixture they could find to keep their balance, Wayne brought the van to a halt at a red light. His was the first car waiting and this gave him a view back along the stretch of road he had bypassed. He let out a triumphant ‘Yabool’ and pointed. The others followed his gaze: sure enough, two hundred metres along the main road, a team of policemen was herding cars to the roadside while others stood bent over at the drivers’ windows.
‘You beat them, Dad! You’re a genius!’ called Luke.
‘A genius,’ echoed CT, and he slapped Luke on the back.
Luke was so proud of his father. The sharpest tongue in the footy crowd, the most powerful gun and now he had outsmarted the coppers; and CT was here to see it. He was so happy he thought he would burst.
Over by the window, still with her arms folded and an expression fit to freeze the sun, sat Danielle. ‘They’ll get you one day, Wayne Aldridge,’ she said ominously, but the other three were too swept up in their success to take any notice.
four
Wayne dropped CT home first then pulled up outside Luke’s house, the home that was once his as well. Though it was now dark enough for street lights, the Aldridge’s house was unlit.
‘Mum must be sleeping again,’ explained Luke.
‘Oh well, no need for me to come in then.’
‘No, s’pose not.’ This was a laugh because all three of them knew how Wayne hated facing Alison and took the slightest opportunity to avoid her.
Luke used his front-door key to let himself in then moved quietly into Alison’s bedroom. Even before his eyes had adjusted he could see that Alison lay in the bed just as she had been when he had left many hours earlier, but as the details of the room outlined themselves, his body became tense. The jug on the bedside table was overturned; the water had dripped slowly onto the worn carpet. The carton of yoghurt he had left there was untouched, the spoon still lying neatly beside it.
Luke knew something was wrong. He flicked on the light and moved swiftly to his mother’s side. He barely glanced at her face: his gaze was immediately seized by the sight of her arm. Alison had unravelled and discarded the bandage which Sally had wrapped loosely over the dressing. Luke could plainly see why. He had heard many people describe how some part of the body had ‘blown up like a balloon’ after a fracture or sprain. His mother’s forearm was swollen to double its normal thickness, the skin stretched so tight it must surely split open at any moment. And from wrist to elbow was a deep, angry crimson.
Without waiting a second to consider his action, Luke hurried into the kitchen where the phone hung on the wall. His finger flashed round the telephone dial then returned slowly, so slowly, all the way back again. Three times and he was through.
‘What service do you require, Police, Fire Brigade or Ambulance?’ inquired a calm voice.
‘Ambulance,’ croaked Luke.
The line went dead momentarily then another detached but efficient voice asked him for details, and assured him that the ambulance would arrive within minutes.
Luke ran back to his mother. The panic within him made an ordinary walking pace seem too slow. Every second seemed delayed in ticking over. He wanted help now, this very instant.
The harsh light in her eyes and Luke’s frightened voice on the phone had roused Alison. She half-opened her eyes.
‘I’ve rung for an ambulance, Mum. They’ll be here in no time.’
His mother spoke weakly. ‘My arm’s really bad. All swollen. Can’t move my hand.’ She looked gingerly at her arm as she spoke then turned her head towards her son. ‘Luke,’ she breathed, ‘where were you?’
‘Oh, Mum. I’m sorry.’ He couldn’t say any more for the tears, and the vice that seemed to clamp shut his throat.
Alison slumped back against the pillow, drifting in and out of consciousness as they waited for the ambulance. Luke imagined he would hear the siren faintly in the distance, growing ever louder until, amid flashing red lights, it bounced onto the front lawn. And those lights would show to the world, to the neighbours and friends who lived around them, that Luke Aldridge had deserted his mother when she needed him so that he could watch a football game. He began to cry softly, his head in his hands.
In the event, the ambulance pulled quietly into their driveway and the first Luke knew of their arrival was the gentle knock at the front door. He led the ambulance men to his stricken mother.
‘Ooh, nasty,’ commented the first man as he knelt by the bed and inspected Alison’s arm. He was small and thin. He turned immediately to his mate, a much taller and stronger man whose face had been badly scarred by acne years before. ‘Better get the stretcher straight away, Merv.’
Merv disappeared and Luke heard him descending the front stairs — more accurately, he felt it as the whole house shuddered.
‘Just as well you called us, young fella. There’s something gruesome in those cuts,’ continued the first ambulance man. ‘What happened?’
Luke explained as briefly as he could. It was difficult to control the urge to break into tears once more.
‘A cat! Never heard of anything like it. But it explains this mess. God knows what’s deep inside there.’
The two men lifted Alison onto the stretcher with the expertise born of experience, covered her with their own blankets and toted her to the ambulance. The frail, bony man climbed in to see to his patient while the larger man grasped the door handle ready to close it. ‘Well, what are you going to do, mate?’ he asked. ‘Stay or come?’
‘I have to come with her,’ Luke replied without hesitation. He wasn’t going to leave her a second time. He heaved himself inside and perched on the second bed opposite his mother. The door thudded shut; in moments they were speeding towards the hospital.
In the ambulance on the way to the hospital, Alison Aldridge began to rise quickly into the land of light and sound and movement she knew to be life. But there, a monster waited for her, a relentless throbbing creature called pain. It roared and writhed and worried at her arm. She clamped together the teeth at the back of her jaw and shifted slightly on the bed to examine her surroundings. She could see Luke, perched unhappily on a narrow bed a few feet from her head, and a skinny man in a white shirt who cooed that she would be all right, they would be at the hospital soon. ‘My arm’s killing me,’ she managed to gasp.
‘I can imagine,’ sympathised the attendant. ‘But I’ve given you the only pain relief I can. A pethidine injection a few minutes ago. It will start to take effect very soon. After that it’s up to the doctors. For all I know they may operate on your arm, so they’ll want as little medication in your bloodstream as possible.’
Alison threw her head back onto the pillow in exhaustion. The painkilling drug calmed her as it beat away the worst of her agony. Still, she had to muster all her strength and concentration to defeat the urge to groan and cry. She didn’t speak again until they reached the casualty ward of the Royal Hospital.
At the hospital, Alison was immediately placed on a large trolley and wheeled through the doors down a long corridor lined with curtains. Luke was told to go over to an official desk from where he could just see his mother disappear into a cubicle before a curtain was wrenched across the opening. The ambulance men emerged immediately and made their way back to their vehicle. The smaller man halted for a moment, smiled at Luke and murmured a few reassuring words which the boy could barely take in. He heard himself force out a ‘Thank you’ and they were gone.
A nurse began to ask Luke a series of questions about his mother — her name, age, their address, which she entered on a green form. Luke answered mechanically, still peering down the corridor. ‘What’s going to happen?’ he asked finally. Riding in the back of the ambulance with his mother, staying with her, refusing to let his contact with her be broken, he had let some of his guilt recede. He had begun to feel that he was in charge, taking re
sponsibility once again for her care. But now he couldn’t even see her. He sensed panic surge into his blood. ‘Can I go down there to be with her?’
‘No,’ said the nurse bluntly — then, detecting his uneasiness, she found a smile. She was really very pretty, Luke thought. ‘The doctor is with your Mum, assessing what needs to be done. No admittance until that’s over. The doctor may want to speak to you about what happened, to help him decide the treatment. Come on,’ she said, for the first time realising how young Luke actually was. ‘Best sit down over here. The doctor could be a while. You look a little tired,’ she added.
‘Tired,’ thought Luke to himself. He felt exhausted, as though he had missed a night’s sleep. He looked up at the digital clock on the wall of the vast waiting room. It had just clicked over to 6.00.
When the same clock showed 6.15, a young woman, wearing a white coat over jeans and a scarlet sweater appeared at the inquiries counter, where the nurse who had dealt with Luke pointed him out. In a few strides the white-coated woman stood above Luke.
‘You’re Luke Aldridge, is that right?’ she began briskly.
Luke nodded, getting to his feet.
‘We’ve had a good look at your mother, Luke. She will be fine, but for the moment she is very ill. The wounds extend right down to the bone, possibly even scraping the bone itself. It looks as though your Mum will have to undergo a small operation tonight. Did a cat really do all that damage?’
Luke nodded again and told her of the bewildered animal and how he had coaxed it to release his mother.
‘Well, you certainly saved your mother and us, and the cat for that matter, a lot of bother. Imagine if you’d arrived here with the cat’s claws still embedded! I shudder to think about it. Anyway, the important thing is that there doesn’t appear to be any permanent damage, and Mrs Aldridge will quickly regain full use of her arm.’ This said, the doctor clearly felt she had delivered her message, and turned to walk away.
‘But what happens now?’ asked Luke. He wished his voice had contained a note of demand: instead, he worried that he sounded frightened and complaining.
The doctor seemed surprised he should ask such a question. ‘Your mother is having some X-rays at the moment. Then we will have a better idea of the treatment needed.’
The doctor disappeared behind the inquiries desk and Luke returned to his seat. His mind began to slow down now, the panic and fear easing away from his body. He was able to take in his surroundings for the first time. He sat in a row of moulded plastic seats, all bolted to the floor. A number of large television sets hung from the ceiling and Luke noticed painfully that one of the screens was showing a replay of the football match he had watched with his father while his mother’s condition worsened at home. There were more than a dozen people waiting for treatment, but while none of them seemed to take the least notice of Luke as he sat amongst them, he felt that his shame must be obvious to all. He wanted to cry, but the release of tears wouldn’t come.
At seven o’clock, the noise and movement about the inquiries desk increased sharply. There seemed to be twice as many nurses and attendants milling about, chatting happily to one another and consulting their clip-boards. The day shift had finished and the night time staff were beginning their work. Luke watched the nurse who had quizzed him about his mother as she buttoned her red cardigan, then, swinging her handbag over her shoulder, hurried out of the casualty ward, walking briskly towards the carpark. He wished he was going home as well, with his mother recovered and in the car beside him.
Not long after the change of shift, one of the nurses newly on duty came over to Luke. ‘Can I help you?’ she asked. ‘Do you wish to see a doctor?’
‘Oh, no thanks,’ Luke assured her. ‘I’m just waiting for my mother.’
The nurse, satisfied with his response — she heard the same phrase twenty times a day—moved on to check other patients. People came and went, a steady stream of bleeding gashes, broken bones and occasionally an hysterical victim screaming in pain or fright.
Luke was hungry by now, but when he felt in his pockets, he found that he had no money at all. He stood up and wandered around the enormous waiting room. An old man was sitting by himself, away from the rest of the waiting patients. Then Luke saw why. The old man had a thermos flask and some sandwiches out on the seat beside him. He smiled at Luke. ‘Would you care for a sandwich and a cup of tea?’ he asked.
With embarrassment Luke realised that he must have been staring at the man’s feast with obvious envy. He felt he should shake his head, hungry as he was, but the old man insisted, his unshaven cheeks stretching in a friendly grin. Luke sat beside him and took the sandwich.
The old man began to talk. ‘It’s best to come in and see the doctors about this time. Not too busy. Later there’ll be a bigger crowd. Only trouble is, it’s about tea time, so I always bring a little snack to tide me over.’
Luke was glad of it. He talked to the old man, telling him about the attack on his mother, and watched the incredulity sweep across the tired face. While he was speaking, his companion poured a cup of tea and handed it to him.
‘So what are you going to do now?’ asked the old man.
‘Wait,’ replied Luke quickly. ‘Until they decide what to do with Mum.’ He sat back in his chair as though to demonstrate how a person should perform this task called waiting.
‘But your mother won’t still be here. This is just the first stage, for emergencies. No one stays here very long. They whisk you round for X-rays, maybe do a few temporary things, then they take you to the operating theatre or to a ward upstairs. You’d better go and ask the nurse where your mother is.’
Luke was aghast. He had been determined not to leave his mother again and now this man seemed certain Alison had been spirited away without his knowledge. She could be sitting alone in some dark ward, angry and hurt that her son had deserted her for the second time that day.
Luke almost ran to the inquiries desk and in his haste began interrogating the nurse there before she had even looked up from her clip-board. The dark frown on her face showed that she was not pleased about this. She responded none the less, checking the forms on the counter.
‘Mrs Aldridge. Yes. She has been moved to Ward 4F to await surgery.’
‘How do I get there?’ snapped Luke.
‘You can’t. Mrs Aldridge will be under sedation, in any case.’ The nurse was about to say more but Luke beat her to it.
‘I have to see her. I’ll just sit with her until she goes for the operation.’
The nurse had had enough. ‘Now you listen to me,’ she exploded. ‘The first thing you’re going to do is find some manners. Then you’re going to tell me who you are, and then we’ll work out exactly what you will and won’t do in this hospital. Is that clear?’
The outburst startled Luke and helped to calm him. He apologised, and after a little quiet explanation on both sides, one thing was clear. Luke would not be allowed to see his mother until tomorrow.
‘Really, I think you should go home,’ were the nurse’s final words.
But that was a problem. There was no one to take him home and he didn’t have a single cent in his pockets. He pointed this out to the nurse. She put on the mask of those who work daily with the helpless, the hopeless and the demanding, then pulled the telephone over towards Luke.
He rang his father’s number. This would solve the problem. His dad could take him home, then make arrangements for the next few days — which, Luke dimly started to realise, would be chaotic. But the voice which answered was female.
‘Hello, Danielle. It’s Luke here. Can I speak to Dad, please?’
‘No, you can’t, Luke ’cause he’s not home.’
‘But I thought… ’
‘I know, I know. We came straight home after the footy, but we had an argument and now your father’s stormed off in a huff. God knows when he’ll be back.’ Luke did not have to see Danielle’s face to know it was tight with anger.
‘Wou
ld he be at Jacko’s, do you think?’ Luke was already plotting the necessary moves. He would need Jacko’s phone number from Danielle, and, damn it, he would have to ask the nurse if he could make a second call.
‘What’s so important that you have to speak to him tonight?’ demanded Danielle irritably.
‘I need him to drive me home from the hospital,’ said Luke.
‘The hospital! What’s happened?’ Immediately worry and concern drove the anger from her voice.
Luke explained as best he could.
This news brought Danielle to life. ‘Look, I’ll come and get you instead.’ She didn’t give Luke a chance to protest, or refuse her offer, just made sure she understood where to collect him, and hung up quickly.
Damn, thought Luke. It was good of Danielle to do this for him but why couldn’t his father be at home?
Danielle would be at least half an hour, and in his restlessness, Luke began exploring the wider environment of the waiting room. He ventured out to the ambulance arrival area and observed the visitors shuffling into and away from the hospital.
He was watching an ambulance man check the equipment in the rear of his vehicle when the distant drone of a siren drew his attention like a circling mosquito. The insistent sound quickly grew and the staff began to emerge anxiously from behind the inquiries desk. The siren became deafening as the ambulance entered the parking bay beyond the glass doors, then died in mid-wail, causing Luke to suck in a sudden breath. Without realising it, he had crept over towards the entrance to watch the attendants wheel in the trolley. He could see the head of a young woman protruding from the sheet as they rushed past him; instantly he forced his eyes away. One side of the girl’s face was crushed to a red pulp and the pillow and the sheets all round were saturated in blood. Luke knew immediately. Everyone there knew as well. The girl was dead.
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