by Alison Bond
She stroked his back because she didn’t know what else to do and tried to concentrate on the early part of the evening when everything had felt so entirely right. Now it all felt horrible.
Melanie and Davey lay there for so long that Melanie started to fall asleep. It was the only thing that could bring her peace. The insistent buzz of a mobile phone roused her.
Davey seemed to come out of a trance and wiped his hands across his face, stretching his jaw while he reached for the phone. ‘It’s a message,’ he said.
Melanie sat up.
‘It’s Mary Ann.’
‘Has she forgiven you?’ said Melanie. ‘Does she want you back?’
‘No, I mean it’s about her. Mary Ann’s in the hospital. She took an overdose.’
Serena was on the best date of her life. It was the first date with a man she truly cared about and she had the whole night to show him just how much. She didn’t know when Fabien was going to make his move so she was in a constant state of anticipation. He was a perfect gentleman in the car on the way back to his house. He talked about this and that but she wasn’t really listening. She was thinking about what was to come. She imagined candles and roses. White sheets and open windows so that they could see the stars. She would tell Fabien it was her first time and he would take it nice and slow to make it special for her.
Maybe by the morning he would tell her that he loved her.
The car pulled into his gravel driveway and they rushed to the front door hand in hand, trying to dodge the rain that poured down with renewed vigour. As they walked in the front door she discreedy checked her face in the mirror. Her cheeks were flushed. Still gorgeous.
Inside Fabien went across to the stereo and the latest Jay-Z came thumping out. Serena would have preferred something more romantic. ‘Make yourself comfortable,’ he said.
Here? she thought. Down here?
‘My housekeeper’s gone to bed, I think. I don’t want to wake her up again, but we should be okay. Maybe we can barbecue steaks or something. There’s plenty of chips and beer. Here.’ He threw over a bumper bag of potato chips and they flew across the room into her lap.
Food?
‘Help yourself to anything you want. I’ll be right back.’
Serena sat holding the bumper bag of potato chips and was bewildered. But she had very little experience for comparison. Maybe they were going to talk first and go to bed later. That didn’t feel right. She’d seen all the movies. Wasn’t he supposed to be ripping off her clothes around now? He hadn’t even kissed her.
She lay back on the couch in what she hoped was a seductive fashion. She tugged the front of her dress down as far as it could go without showing off her nipples and slipped one strap off her shoulder. She kicked off her shoes and then changed her mind and put them back on, which entailed hitching her top up so she didn’t fall out when she bent over. Then she reassumed the position all over again. She had thought it would feel more natural than this. She licked her lips so that they glistened and pulled all her hair over to one side to reveal her creamy naked shoulder.
The doorbell rang.
Fabien came thundering down the stairs and opened the front door.
Serena could hear spirited voices. In walked a man she’d never seen before holding aloft two bottles of Cristal champagne. ‘Hello!’ he said.
She readjusted the straps on her dress and sat up sharply. This was all wrong.
The champagne cork popped and in walked Fabien, with a sultry-looking brunette draped on his arm.
A small crowd came in behind him. Someone turned up the music and threw open the French windows so that they could see the rain splashing up on the terrace. A sharp breeze whistled through the room and Serena shivered. Who were these people? What was going on?
‘Serena, meet Julia,’ said Fabien. The way he looked at Julia was different to the way that he looked at her. She saw that immediately.
‘This is Serena,’ he said. ‘She’s the one who forced me to have a party so you have her to blame for all my actions.’ He smiled and the smile was completely different too.
Slowly she realized she had been a fool.
Julia starting kissing Fabien’s neck. He responded by squeezing her ass. They turned away from Serena and disappeared out of the room.
Serena struggled to hold back tears. Her face was the same magenta colour as the dress she’d worn especially because she thought Fabien would think it was sexy. Her lower lip trembled and a sob caught in her throat.
I have to get out of here.
Lynsey was fast asleep and in the middle of a dream when the phone rang.
‘Lynsey?’
‘Serena?’ Serena was crying. ‘Serena, calm down. What is it?’
‘I, uh, I… will you come get me?’
‘Where are you? What’s happened?’
‘I’m at Fabien’s. Please.’
Lynsey was out of bed and pulling on her jeans. ‘Serena, what is it? Did he hurt you?’
Serena started crying again.
Lynsey was out of the door and in her car by the time she could make out Serena’s words.
‘I thought he loved me.’
The weather was crazy. The rain lashed against the windscreen and the traffic was backed up all over the city. The drive took Lynsey longer than she expected.
She pulled up at the open front gates and was about to turn into the driveway when she saw the pathetic figure cowering in the rain. She crunched to a halt and ran out.
‘Serena! You’re freezing. Get in the car, come on, get in the car.’
Serena collapsed onto her and Lynsey half carried her to the car. She was soaked to the skin. Once inside she rubbed Serena’s arms to try and bring some warmth back into them. Serena was shaking uncontrollably, but whether from the cold or from her constant sobs it was hard to tell.
‘Are you mad?’ said Lynsey. ‘What the hell are you doing out here?’
‘Just go,’ said Serena in a strangled voice.
Lynsey turned up the heater in the car, switched off the radio and fastened her seatbelt. She glanced sideways at Serena. ‘Do you want to talk about it?’ She pulled the car around and back out to the main road, heading down into the city.
There was no reply.
Lynsey concentrated on the road ahead. Then, to her alarm, Serena started hitting herself on the forehead. The flat of her palm impacted with considerable force. ‘Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!’ said Serena.
‘Don’t!’ said Lynsey, taking one hand off the wheel to restrain her.
Serena pushed her aside.
In front of them half the hillside fell away, weakened by the relentless rain.
Lynsey looked up just in time to see the angry brown avalanche rushing down the hill right towards them. A torrent of rocks and mud that would be on top of them in seconds.
She pulled sharply on the steering wheel and braked, trying to bring the car to a halt and take the landslide side-on, but the car went into a wild skid and she veered helplessly out of control directly into its devastating path.
Lynsey thought of Lois Lane at the end of Superman, stuck in her car facing certain death until Superman flew backwards around the earth to reverse time.
Serena screamed and Lynsey thought that this was it. She was going to die. And all she could think of was Superman.
Never Give Up
This is not the same as changing your mind. We have to learn from our mistakes. Only a fool travels the wrong path twice from the same crossroads.
32
Lynsey didn’t die. Instead she woke up in a strange bed feeling as if she had the mother of all hangovers. She tried to lift her head off the pillow and groaned in pain. She looked around to confirm that she was in a hospital and took a mental inventory of her body.
Everything ached.
She stared up at the ceiling and remembered that last terrifying moment in the car. She pulled herself upright, her head pounding and fumbled for the call button at the side of her bed.
A moment later a nurse came in. ‘How are you feeling?’ she asked.
Lynsey tried to speak and was surprised when her voice didn’t come out. How odd.
The nurse passed her a glass of water with a straw and Lynsey took a sip but felt dizzy and pushed it away, sinking back onto her pillow. She croaked out a ‘thank you’.
‘The doctor will be in to see you,’ said the nurse. ‘Try to rest until then.’
The next time Lynsey woke up she had forgotten this exchange completely.
Lynsey escaped with cuts and bruises and a nasty bump on the head where she had slammed against the window when the car rolled over. Apparently if she hadn’t been wearing her seatbelt she would have died.
‘My friend?’ she asked.
‘She’s in surgery,’ said the nurse. ‘She’s not in any danger,’ she added when she saw Lynsey’s stricken expression. ‘Try to rest.’
Of all the stupid things she had done in her life this was the worst. If Serena was not in danger then why was she in surgery? If anything happened to that girl it would be all her fault. Sure, the landslide was a natural occurrence but her eyes hadn’t been on the road and she knew it. People would tell her that she wasn’t to blame but how did they know for sure? She’d always been too easily distracted. Would it take a near-death experience to make her tame her reckless ways? Shouldn’t she take this as a sign that something had to change? People who experienced brushes with death often spoke of the enlightenment that followed, maybe this was her chance to transform her life.
She was tired. Maybe she’d change tomorrow.
She slept right through the following day and it was mid-afternoon when the nurse reappeared. ‘You have a visitor,’ she said.
Toby stood in the doorway with a bunch of daisies. ‘Hey,’ he said. ‘How ya doing?’
The nurse left them alone.
‘How did you know I was here?’ she asked.
‘I saw it on the news.’
‘On the news? Really? We were on the news? Did they mention me by name?’
‘Just Serena’s. And it was only local, so don’t go getting big-headed on me now.’
‘Don’t,’ she said. ‘It hurts to laugh. Did you tape it?’
‘I set the machine for the next loop but by eleven o’clock you’d been bumped by a fire in the valley.’
Lynsey shrugged and almost laughed again. She felt a twinge in her shoulder but only a little one.
‘Is there anyone you’d like me to call?’ he said.
She shook her head.
‘You can sit down, you know,’ she said.
He did, and placed the daisies on her bedside table. ‘I was scared,’ he said.
That was sweet.
She reached out for his hand. Glad that he was there.
‘They asked me a few questions about you,’ he said. ‘Don’t you carry ID?’
‘Not really.’
‘Do you have insurance?’
‘Someone asked me that earlier. Why? I think I had travel insurance but that’ll have run out by now. I said yes anyway, just in case, and they gave me all those forms.’
‘No, Lyns,’ he said as gently as he could. ‘They mean medical insurance.’
‘Oh right, of course. We’re in America. I forgot.’ She’d never considered medical insurance. How were you supposed to know you might need these things? Well, to be fair, she had thought about it once when she saw a commercial but the thought was fleeting at best.
‘Do you think it will be very expensive?’ she said, trying to remember how much money she had.
‘Maybe,’ he said, knowing that she couldn’t possibly afford it. ‘But don’t worry about that now. I’ll speak to the nurse and say you made a mistake and then we’ll go from there.’
‘Okay, thanks.’
Toby looked across at the daisies that were already beginning to wilt. They’d put Lynsey in a terrible semi-private room. It had a tiny window with no view, noisy air-con and had taken him ages to find. He could hear machinery nearby, like a generator or something. But it wasn’t too bad for a girl who turns up without ID and without insurance.
‘What is it?’ said Lynsey.
‘Nothing.’
‘No,’ she said. ‘You looked pissed off. Like there’s something you’re dying to say. What?’
‘It’s just that, well, who doesn’t have medical insurance?’ he said.
‘Obviously, I see now that getting insurance would have been a smart move but what good can that do? Lesson learnt, right?’
‘No insurance, no ID, no fixed address. I mean, you live in a motel. There’s not even anyone you want me to call. I don’t know, to me that just sounds… sort of sad. Empty.’
‘Oh come on, Toby. I feel pretty shitty right now, there’s no need to try and make me feel worse. I don’t have insurance, fine. Point taken. The reason I don’t carry ID is because I don’t have loads of credit cards or a snazzy little US driving licence, I have the tatty little paper thing they give you in England. My passport is in the safe back at Flamingo Park where, just so’s you know, I’ve been living for a year, which sounds pretty fixed to me and, what’s more, I like it. And as for not having anyone to call…’ She paused, slightly breathless, this being by far the longest speech she had made in the last forty-eight hours.
‘There’s no need to worry my parents with a phone call from a stranger. That would scare them witless. I’ll tell them. I’ll call them later, as soon as I feel strong enough to move, and I’ll persuade them that they don’t need to fly out to my bedside on a mercy dash they can’t afford. And it’s not like I’m dying, is it? I’m going to be fine.’
‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘You’re going to be fine. That’s the main thing.’
‘Thank you,’ she said.
Just who did he think he was to say her life was empty? The guy was an estate agent, for pity’s sake. But still, it was sweet of him to come. ‘Now make yourself useful and find something to put these daisies in before they lose the will to live completely. And find out what’s going on with Serena.’
‘I already did.’
‘What is it?’
‘The windscreen shattered on impact. It’s her face.’
When Serena cried the saltwater hurt her scars. She didn’t know how bad it was but she had noticed that there were no mirrors in the room. When she’d asked for one the nurse had smiled and said that she would check with the doctor. That was hours ago.
Her face felt as though it was too small for her skull. Every movement, from blink through to scream, was painful. Her temple screamed out in protest, straining against her bone and leaving her breathless. When she put a straw to her bruised lips to sip ice water her face felt numb. Gently she would touch the new contours of her cheeks trying to imagine how hideous she looked. Then she would bite her tongue to stop herself from crying.
She refused visitors. She didn’t need pity. What she needed was a new career.
A doctor entered her room looking down at his clipboard instead of meeting her eyes. He was the third doctor who had been in to see her that morning. She felt like an exhibit.
‘How are you this morning?’ he said. He didn’t wait for a response but scrutinized her face and made a note on her chart. He pulled back the sheets to look at her leg, broken in four places from the crushing impact.
‘We’re making good progress. Has the plastic surgeon been in to talk to you?’
Serena shook her head no.
‘He’ll be round shortly. I also want to send someone down from psych, just to chat, okay? I’ll check in on you later today.’
And he left
Serena tried to sleep. Nurses checked in on her periodically but otherwise she was alone with her feelings of failure. Of all the stupid things to do.
She could remember seeing Fabien draped over that girl, then calling Lynsey and waiting for her in the rain, then urging her to drive away fast. Then nothing, until she woke up here with bandages around her face
so tight she couldn’t use her nose to breathe and a mouth that felt as if it was full of nails. And all the doctors said she was lucky.
A nurse walked in. ‘Do you feel up to visitors today? There’s quite a crowd gathering.’
Serena couldn’t think of anyone who might want to see her. Maybe they were fans.
‘And your brother’s here.’
‘Bobby?’
‘He flew in. He’s pretty worried about you. Five minutes would probably put his mind at rest.’
‘What do you think?’ said Serena. ‘Do you think he could bear to look at me?’
The nurse stared at her frankly. ‘I won’t lie to you. It’s bad. But apart from your eyes the bandages cover most everything else.’
‘What’s wrong with my eyes?’
‘They’re black.’
‘Both of them?’
‘Yeah. But it’s just bruising. Honey, he came through the night for you and he’s all on his own. I don’t think he’s gonna care what you look like.’
‘Okay. Five minutes,’ said Serena.
The nurse smiled like a proud parent. ‘Good girl.’ She paused in the doorway. ‘You know, you’re very lucky.’
‘I know.’
Bobby walked in with a fake smile that dissolved when he saw her. He’d used every penny he had to get to her side and he was tired and scared.
He had grown so big. Serena looked upon the little face that she still thought of as ten years old. When it crumpled she had to fight to keep from breaking down. ‘Pretty gruesome, hey?’ she said.
Bobby ran over to the bed and held her hand. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m just glad to see you, that’s all.’ He sniffed. ‘On the news they said that you were gonna die.’
‘Yeah? I guess I didn’t.’
She opened her arms to him. ‘C’mere,’ she said.
He leant gingerly against her, not wanting to hurt her, but she held onto him. ‘I missed you so much,’ she said.
