Our Song

by Dani Atkins

  ‘I’m sorry Mrs Williams, I’m going to have to ask you to—’ A nurse, one who had been attending to Joe earlier in the night, broke off in confusion as she walked in and saw me holding the hand of the only other patient on the ward that night. The one who wasn’t my husband.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ she said, her voice trailing away, as she glanced at our hands, and then looked back down the corridor towards Joe’s room. She was so comically perplexed at finding the wrong woman at David’s bedside, that she addressed the rest of her comments to the clipboard in her hands. ‘We need to prepare Mr Williams for some further tests that Mr Beardsworth has ordered, so I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to say your goodbyes and step outside.’ She backed out of the doorway, still looking confused.

  David smiled. ‘What’s the betting she’s now hot-footing it down the corridor to see if Charlotte is sitting by Joe’s bedside, holding his hand?’

  I wanted to laugh, but even more than that, I wanted to cry. Perhaps it was something to do with the nurse telling me to say my goodbyes to David. Perhaps it was finally acknowledging that those had been said many years earlier.

  ‘Get better,’ I said, rising to my feet and squeezing his hand one last time before laying it back down on the mattress.

  ‘I’ll try,’ David assured.

  ‘Don’t die,’ I told him, trying to make him smile with black humour, and ruining it all by sounding as though I was about to cry.

  ‘Going to do my very best not to,’ he promised. ‘Take care of Charlotte,’ he asked again, as I reached the doorway to the corridor.

  I turned around for one last look, before quietly repeating his own words. ‘I’ll try.’

  My phone vibrated against my hip bone as I headed back down the corridor. I glanced through the glass into Joe’s room, and saw his parents were still with him, so I pulled the device from my pocket and headed for the stairwell to take the call. The word ‘Home’ was illuminated on the screen.

  ‘Jake, honey, is that you?’ I asked in a panic, glancing at the wall clock and seeing it was only a little after six in the morning. Alice wouldn’t be calling at this hour unless something was wrong. But Jake might.

  ‘No, Ally, it’s Mum,’ said the reassuring voice of my mother. Her presence in my home at this ungodly hour made no sense, unless Alice had summoned her in an emergency.

  ‘Is Jake alright? Is anything the matter?’

  ‘Jake’s fine,’ soothed my mother, and just hearing her familiar placating tones brought me closer to breaking down than I’d been all night. I hadn’t realised how much I needed her with me until this very moment. ‘I couldn’t sleep, well not just me, your father too,’ she said, her own voice sounding a little more hoarse than usual. ‘Eventually we gave up trying and just piled into the car and drove to your place. I’ve sent that lovely neighbour of yours back home to get some sleep. The poor woman spent the entire night sitting awake in a chair outside of Jake’s room, in case he woke up and needed her.’

  That was so typically Alice, that a small smile of gratitude found its way to my lips.

  ‘So fill me in, sweetheart. What’s the news on Joe?’

  ‘None,’ I said sadly. ‘There’s been no change yet.’

  ‘Oh,’ said my mother, summoning up a thousand alarm bells in that one small word. Suddenly it wasn’t a parent at the end of the line. It was an experienced ex-nurse, one who had spent many years working in intensive care wards.

  ‘That’s bad, isn’t it?’ I questioned anxiously. ‘They’re not giving me any information. They keep talking about waiting and giving things time. But what is it they’re not saying? Mum, you have to tell me.’

  ‘Ally calm down. The doctors can tell you far more than I can. I don’t know anything at all about Joe’s condition, and it’s been years since I last worked on the wards. Don’t go getting yourself into a panic now.’

  It was probably a good twelve hours too late for that particular piece of advice.

  ‘Is Jake awake yet? How is he? Has he asked about Joe? What do you think we should tell him? Can you and Dad stay at home with him today, because I don’t think he should go to school, do you?’ The words came tumbling out of my mouth like boulders in a landslide. If I could hear the strain and anxiety in my voice, then it was an absolute certainty that my mother could too.

  She did. ‘Ally, take a breath and slow down.’ I tried to do as she instructed, but my panic was like an escaped pony that had been tethered up tightly for so long, it didn’t want to be reined back in. ‘Jake is fine. He’s with your father right now, they’re making some toast for all of us before we leave.’

  ‘Leave? Where are you going?’

  ‘We’re coming up to the hospital. Jake’s worried and he needs to see his Daddy, and he needs to see you too.’

  ‘Oh Mum, I’m not sure that’s such a good idea. I don’t think they even allow little kids to visit patients on this ward, and if Jake saw Joe like this it’s really going to frighten him.’

  ‘Ally,’ said my mum, her voice soothing and patient, ‘he’s already frightened. Terrified, in fact. He’s an intelligent little boy, and his imagination is running riot. However scary you think it might be for him, it’s important that he sees it with his own eyes. It will help him process everything.’

  Suddenly it felt very much like I was talking to an experienced nurse, rather than a loving grandma. ‘But he’s only seven years old. What if it’s all too much for him to cope with? Joe’s in a coma, Mum, he’s hooked up to a ton of machinery. He’s not even breathing by himself yet.’ I’m surprised she managed to decipher the end of my sentence, because it was lost in muffled broken sobs.

  ‘I think that’s precisely why he has to be there, why we all should be. For Jake, for you and also for Joe. And don’t worry about their visiting rules. In cases like this, it’s important to allow children to visit their parents, if they want to.’

  It was hard to know what scared me most: my mother’s quiet insistence that our family should reunite, or hearing her refer to her much-loved son-in-law as a ‘case like this’. The need to shield your child from anything that could hurt them is inbuilt in every mother. And when shielding alone isn’t enough, then it’s a mother’s job to try to prepare them for the worst of all possible outcomes. I was doing that. And so too, I realised, was my mother.

  ‘How soon can you get here?’

  I passed Frank in the doorway to the ward. He was wiping his eyes with the back of his hand, and hadn’t noticed me doing exactly the same thing, as I headed back to Joe’s room.

  ‘I’m just going to fetch us all some tea,’ Frank explained gruffly. ‘The nurse said we can use the staff canteen.’ I nodded, recognising his need to be doing something, anything. ‘We’ll all feel better with a hot cup of tea inside us.’ As much as I wanted to believe in its curative powers, I knew there was only one thing in the world that was going to make me feel better. And it wasn’t tea. Frank nodded, as though confirming his own words. ‘Yes, well, three cups it is then.’

  I had taken two steps away from him before I paused and called back after him. ‘Actually Frank, could you make that four?’

  Kaye looked up with a sad smile as I slipped back into the room. ‘How are you holding up?’ I asked, gently squeezing her shoulder. Joe’s mother gave a tired shrug, the fragile bones undulating beneath my hand. Her eyes were fixed on her son’s face, as she replied. ‘I don’t know, Ally. Better than Frank is doing, I guess. He’s not coping very well. He’s like Joe, he needs to be doing something, helping in some way. It’s hard for him, just having to watch and wait.’

  ‘I just spoke to my parents. They’re on their way here, and they’re bringing Jake with them.’

  His other grandmother turned towards me then, her eyes softening with love. ‘That’s good. Good for Jake, and good for all of us.’

  I sighed, and went around to the other side of the bed and bent to kiss Joe’s cheek. It felt warmer than it had done all night. That
had to be an encouraging sign, didn’t it? Was this the first indication of improvement that the doctors had been waiting for?

  ‘Did you hear that, Joe? Jakey’s on his way. You don’t want to still be asleep when he gets here, do you? Wake up now, sweetheart. Please wake up.’

  ‘Maybe when he hears his little voice . . .’ Kaye sounded as though even she was struggling to believe her own words. I reached across the bed and squeezed her hand. ‘He’d do anything for that boy. If there’s anything in the world that can reach him, it’s Jake.’

  Charlotte

  I took the tea she gave me gratefully. The news . . . well, I didn’t take that quite so well.

  ‘Here? Do you think that’s a good idea? For him, I mean.’

  Ally bristled physically, like an indignant porcupine, and I could hardly blame her for that. After all, what did I know about children? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

  ‘I think, as his mother, I’m the best judge of that.’

  I bit my lip on all kinds of rejoinders that would blow our current truce to smithereens, as most of them would have brought into question her ability to determine what should – or should not – be told or kept secret.

  ‘He needs to see his dad. Joe,’ she added, quietly emphasising the name. Ally wasn’t being exactly subtle. ‘Don’t worry,’ she continued, ‘I have no intention of letting David see him, or know he’s here.’

  I nodded. I wasn’t about to start an argument, but I was worried. Because if Jake looked as much like David in real life as he did in the photograph I’d seen, Ally was fooling herself if she thought she’d be able to keep his parentage secret. Somehow I didn’t think she’d even considered that.

  ‘Well, I just thought you should know, that’s all.’

  ‘Thank you for telling me.’

  I waited until she had reached the door before I found the courage to ask her the one question that was burning through me like corrosive acid. It had been, since the moment she had disappeared into my husband’s room. ‘How did things go, with David I mean? Was it alright?’

  She turned slowly, and looked at me for a long time, as though she were replaying their entire conversation in her mind. A small furrow appeared between her brows at the memory and part of me was dying to know what he had said to her, and the rest of me was far too scared to ask. Had he told her how he felt about her? How he’d always felt? I looked around the Relatives’ Room in the bleak early morning light. It was a hell of a place to learn that you were ‘the other woman’ in your own marriage.

  ‘It was fine. He was fine . . . well, obviously not fine physically. This operation he needs, it sounded serious. Is it?’

  There was little point in lying. She could just as easily overhear a member of the medical team talking about it. ‘Yes. Very serious.’

  Ally looked shocked, and I realised then that David must have played down the severity of his illness. For her protection? Possibly. Old habits always were the hardest to break.

  Chapter 12

  Ally

  He smelled of peanut butter, toast and little boy. I inhaled it deeply, drinking it in like an addict.

  ‘Mum, you’re squishing me,’ he complained. Reluctantly I released him. I leant back on my haunches, keeping us at eye level.

  ‘Sorry, sweetie. I’m just happy to see you, that’s all.’

  He grinned back, then seemed to remember himself, for his smile faltered a little. ‘When Grandma said Granddad and I had to wait here, I thought maybe you were going to come down with Daddy?’

  The wind was bitter, and although it had finally stopped snowing, it was really far too cold to be in a children’s playground. But when my mum had suggested it would be better for Jake if I met him there, rather than inside the hospital, I hadn’t questioned her judgement.

  ‘I thought maybe it was going to be a big surprise, that Daddy had got all better.’

  I exhaled slowly and heavily, looking up into my father’s eyes, as he stood protectively behind his grandson. Where did I begin? How could you prepare a small child for something like this? It was wrong on so many levels. I wasn’t equipped for this.

  ‘Oh honey, Daddy’s still not feeling very well.’ My own dad looked down at me, and the sympathy on his face almost ripped apart the stitches that were holding me together. ‘He’s still . . . he’s still asleep at the moment.’

  ‘Still?’ shrieked my seven-year-old to the empty playground. ‘But it’s getting light now and everything. He’s always up first, before everyone. Has he been asleep since yesterday?’

  I nodded, and watched the thought process flicker behind his eyes. As young as he was, Jake clearly realised that what I was saying was far too peculiar to be okay or normal.

  ‘Yes, he has. You see, he did a very brave thing yesterday and he helped a little boy who was in trouble, but it kind of hurt him, because he was in really cold water. So his body has gone into a very, very deep sleep.’

  ‘So it can get better?’ Jake prompted, putting forward the only solution his mind was capable of supplying.

  I hesitated for just one second too long, I don’t think Jake noticed, but my father did, because he quickly interjected for me. ‘That’s right, my lad. You got it.’

  I looked away, anxious that those perceptive blue eyes wouldn’t read what was hiding in mine. I focused my attention on the tall, snow-covered slide, staring so intently that my eyes began to water from the effort. At least that’s what I hoped Jake would think.

  Finally I took a steadying breath and rose from my crouched position, taking hold of Jake’s thickly mittened hands. ‘Grandma explained to you that there’s all sorts of funny machines in Daddy’s room?’

  Jake nodded impatiently, anxious for the first and only time in his short life, to leave a playground. ‘I know all that, Mummy. Grandma says he looks like an astronaut in a rocket ship. Like he was going into deep space to another galaxy.’ I sent up a silent prayer of thanks to my mother, with her ability to demystify an ICU ward to a child, and to Star Wars for making it something they could understand.

  There was nothing left to say. No more preparations were going to make what was coming any easier. ‘Let’s go and see your dad then, shall we?’

  Jake nodded happily, hopping eagerly from foot to foot as we stood at the pedestrian crossing waiting to go back through the hospital gates.

  There was a lot to take in in those moments when we arrived back at Joe’s room. To begin with, his parents and my mother were no longer in the room beside him, but were waiting in the hallway. Two doctors were examining Joe, their faces poker-player blank as they spoke. The tape had been removed from Joe’s eyelids, and in turn both doctors gently lifted a lid and shone a light directly into his eyes. The nurse said something to them and they glanced back through the glass, noticing Jake, who was still busily greeting his other grandparents and had not yet seen we were already at his father’s room.

  I didn’t like the unreadable expressions on the doctors’ faces as they nodded solemnly to each other. But even more than that, I didn’t like the one on my mother’s, who had been carefully watching their examination through the wall of glass.

  ‘Mrs Taylor?’ said the tallest of the white-coated doctors as he exited Joe’s room. Both I, and the woman who had held that title for even longer, looked towards the medics anxiously.

  ‘Yes. That’s me.’

  ‘We’re going to come back in a little while to re-examine your husband, and then we will hopefully have some more information for you and your family.’

  More stalling. More not telling me anything. Had it not been for Jake tugging impatiently on my hand I would have challenged them for answers straight away. But right at that moment my priorities were elsewhere.

  ‘Daddy!’ cried Jake, breaking free from my hand and bulleting into the room like a greyhound on a track. He got within half a metre of the bed and screeched to a halt, so abruptly that his plastic-soled sneakers squeaked noisily on the linoleum floor. His blue eyes
widened as he looked at Joe, then at the tubes, wires and instruments, then finally at the bellows-like machine, undertaking the task his lungs had temporarily forgotten how to do.

  None of the adults spoke as we silently filed back into the room behind him. We watched his small dark head turn to study each strange and alien object in turn, trying to make sense of something no child should ever have to see. I turned in anguish to my mother, suddenly not at all sure that she’d been right about this. Her gentle nod of confirmation showed no such doubts. I guess she’d seen this all before.

  ‘See, Jake,’ she said gently, laying her hand upon his shoulder. ‘Just like I told you. It’s like The Enterprise or The Millennium Falcon.’ He nodded solemnly, and I don’t think I have ever been more impressed by my own mother. Jake had the coolest grandma ever.

  Jake took tiny pigeon steps until he reached the side of the bed. Very tentatively he extended his arm and laid his hand upon the foot-shaped pinnacle hidden beneath the blanket. His small hand clasped Joe’s ankle and he gently shook it backwards and forwards.

  ‘Shake a leg, Daddy,’ he whispered, repeating the words Joe roused him with each morning. ‘It’s time to get up.’ He repeated the action several times, muttering the words under his breath like a precious litany. Finally Jake raised his head, looking at the faces of the people who loved him most in the world, before settling on mine. ‘It’s not working. I was so sure that’s what he was waiting for.’

  His eyes fell to his own cuddly toy, still sitting like a sentry at the foot of the bed. In a rare display of anger, my usually sweet-tempered child pushed the toy over, toppling it to the floor. ‘Stupid Simba,’ he muttered in disgust. I bit my lip, because that was the only way I was going to keep the sobbing from starting.

  Jake gripped hold of the tightly tucked-in blanket covering his father, and slipped his fingers through its open-weave holes. Before any of us could stop him, he hauled himself up onto the mattress, wriggling like a worm up the bed towards Joe.