Donna Douglas Digital Short

by Donna Douglas

  ‘Hark at her,’ she heard Katie O’Hara complaining as she walked away. ‘Someone’s full of the festive spirit!’

  They busied themselves for a couple of hours, then at ten o’clock Sister Parry summoned them all into her office for a cup of coffee and a nip of brandy. She distributed small gifts of soap and talcum powder to each of the nurses, and they in turn gave her the cigarette case they’d clubbed together to buy for her. Shortly afterwards, Mr Hopkins the Head Porter arrived on the ward dressed as Father Christmas, with yet more gifts for the children, generously donated by the Board of Trustees.

  ‘Look at them,’ Sister Parry whispered to Jennifer as they watched them excitedly tearing off wrapping paper and pulling at string. ‘Odd, isn’t it, that this might be the best Christmas some of the poor little beggars have ever had?’

  ‘Yes, Sister.’ Jennifer smiled. The brandy had made Sister Parry uncharacteristically sentimental. Once it wore off, she would be stalking down the ward, demanding that they clear up the mess.

  Jennifer was off duty from one until five, so she left the students trying to quieten down the thoroughly overexcited children in time for their Christmas dinner, and headed off to the dining hall. There was a festive mood here, too, as the assembled nurses, some of them wearing paper hats over their caps, watched Mr Cooper applying his surgical skills to a turkey. Matron and some of the Board of Trustees were with them, taking pride of place at the Sisters’ table, so the merriment was more subdued than it might have been.

  Afterwards, she was heading back to the nurses’ home to put her feet up when she spotted a familiar blue Wolseley parked outside. She stopped in her tracks and started to retreat back towards the main hospital building. But the driver had already seen her and was getting out of the car.

  ‘Jenny?’

  She stopped, hearing the crunch of her father’s approaching footsteps on the gravel drive. She couldn’t bring herself to look at him.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Can’t I come and visit you on your birthday?’ He sounded jovial.

  Jennifer’s hands balled into fists at her sides. ‘It’s not my birthday,’ she said in a low voice.

  ‘It’s what your mother and I always considered to be your birthday. The day you came to us. The days our lives together began.’

  ‘Yes, but it’s not my real birthday, is it? Just like you’re not my real parents.’

  ‘Jenny!’ She sensed him flinch. ‘How can you say that?’

  ‘It’s the truth.’ She allowed herself to look at him. He had aged in the year since her mother – or the woman who called herself her mother – had died. He was no longer the tall, strong man she remembered as a child. He was stooped, his face thinner. Jennifer had to steel herself not to reach out to him.

  He lied to you, she reminded herself. For twenty-five years, he has lied to you about everything – your name, where you came from, even your birthday is not real.

  ‘I’m your father,’ he said wearily. ‘I know it was a shock for you, finding out the way you did—’

  ‘A shock?’ A laugh escaped her. ‘You mean being told at your mother’s funeral by a relative you hardly know that you’re adopted?’

  Geoffrey Ryan took off his hat and ran his hand over his balding head. He’d lost more hair in the last year, too. The wintry sunshine gleamed on his pale scalp.

  ‘It was wrong of us,’ he sighed. ‘We meant to tell you, we truly did. But we thought it would be best to wait until you were older. And then, as time went on, it became harder and harder to find the right time.’ He looked up at her, his eyes full of appeal. ‘We were so afraid that when you found out you would turn against us—’

  ‘And so it was easier to go on lying to me?’ Jennifer lashed out. ‘You were so selfish, so concerned with what you wanted, you didn’t think for a moment about me!’

  ‘That’s not true. We thought about you all the time. You were the centre of our world, right from the moment we first held you in our arms…’ His voice trembled with emotion. ‘All right, perhaps your mother didn’t give birth to you. But you were our baby in every other sense of the word. We couldn’t have cared for you or loved you more if you had been our flesh and blood.’

  ‘But I’m not,’ Jennifer said coldly.

  Her father sighed. ‘Jenny, I wish you could find it in your heart to forgive us – to forgive me,’ he amended in a choked voice. ‘It’s not fair that you’re treating me like this. We need each other, especially now your mother has gone…’

  ‘You lied to me,’ Jennifer repeated. ‘My whole life has turned out to be a lie, and I can’t forgive you for that. I don’t think I’ll ever forgive you.’

  ‘Jenny—’

  ‘Leave me alone, will you? Just leave me alone.’

  She moved to step past him, but he held on to her arm. ‘Before you go, I want to give you this.’

  He opened the car, reached into the back seat and pulled out a parcel, wrapped up in flowery wrapping paper and topped off with a flamboyant silky bow. Jennifer regarded it warily. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Call it a birthday present.’

  ‘I don’t want it.’

  ‘Jenny, please—’

  ‘I told you, I don’t want it. I don’t want anything from you – except to be left alone!’ She shrugged him off and stomped off back towards the nurses’ home, slamming the door behind her.

  She stood at the door, watching him through the leaded panes of coloured glass. The way his shoulders slumped in defeat, the parcel still in his hands, nearly broke her heart. And when he brought his hand up to his eyes to rub away his tears, she had to turn away to stop herself crying too.

  She knew she was being harsh, but she was so hurt and angry she couldn’t help herself. A year ago her idyllic life had been turned upside down and she’d found out the people she loved and trusted most in the whole world had lied to her. Now, in the course of twelve months, she had become wary, suspicious and unable to trust anyone.

  How was she supposed to forgive something like that?

  Chapter 5

  ‘What are you doing here? You do realise the other staff nurses will give you hell if they find out you’ve been slumming it with us humble students?’

  Helen laughed off her friend Dora’s teasing. ‘Fine, if you don’t want your Christmas presents, I’ll just go and give them to someone who’ll appreciate them—’

  ‘Oh no, if there are presents then I suppose we can let you off. What do you reckon, Benedict?’ Dora winked at Millie.

  ‘As long as she doesn’t go straight off and report us to Matron for daring to speak to her,’ Millie agreed.

  It felt odd to be back in the attic room. The chill wind still whistled through the ill-fitting skylight window, and the floorboards still showed through a balding patch in the faded rug. But it was comforting to be back, and she settled cross-legged on her old bed in the corner, although the lumpy old mattress was bare on the iron bedstead.

  ‘You still haven’t been given a new room mate, then?’ she said.

  ‘No, thank God,’ Dora said with feeling, reaching up to open the skylight so she could light a cigarette. The Home Sister disapproved of smoking, and had once thrown a bucket of cold water over a student she had caught lighting up in her room.

  ‘We’re hoping Sister Sutton won’t remember we have a spare bed up here,’ Millie said. ‘It wouldn’t be the same sharing with anyone but you.’

  ‘I know what you mean,’ Helen replied gloomily. ‘My new room mate isn’t a bit like you.’

  ‘You mean she doesn’t leave her things lying all over the place like Benedict?’ Dora grinned, then dodged as Millie aimed a pillow at her.

  ‘What’s she like?’ Millie asked.

  ‘A bit odd, actually.’ Helen thought for a moment, trying to find the words to describe Jennifer. ‘Not unfriendly, exactly. Just very quiet.’

  ‘Sounds like bliss,’ Dora said, glancing at Millie.

  Dora and Millie smok
ed their cigarettes as they talked about their Christmas on the wards. Dora was the luckiest. She was working on Male Orthopaedics, which always tended to be a lark. The patients were mostly young men with sports injuries, very lively and always up for a laugh. The ward was also run by Sister Blake, who, unlike many of the other ward sisters, was known for her sense of humour and kindness to her nurses.

  ‘But we’ve still been busy,’ Dora said. ‘We had a few emergency admissions last night, passengers who were injured when their trolley bus hit that woman. There were a couple of broken bones and a dislocated hip. Very nasty.’

  ‘Not as bad as that poor woman who ended up in front of it,’ Millie shuddered. ‘She still hasn’t recovered consciousness yet. The consultant reckons she must have sustained a nasty head injury.’

  ‘Does anyone know who she is yet?’ Helen asked.

  Millie shook her head. ‘She had no bag or purse on her. No one has any idea who she is.’

  ‘It’s almost as if she didn’t want to be found,’ Dora remarked.

  Millie frowned. ‘Why wouldn’t she want to be found?’

  ‘That bus driver said she walked straight out in front of him, didn’t he? Perhaps she wanted to kill herself?’

  ‘Surely not!’ Millie looked genuinely shocked. ‘Not in her condition.’

  Dora and Helen exchanged glances. Millie was endearingly naive sometimes, Helen thought.

  ‘All the more reason, I’d say,’ Dora said. ‘She wouldn’t be the first pregnant woman to try to do something daft. Look at all those poor girls who end up in Gynae, half butchered by backstreet abortionists. Just so they can avoid the shame of having a baby out of wedlock.’

  ‘Yes, but this baby wasn’t born out of wedlock. The woman’s got a ring on her finger.’

  ‘That means nothing,’ Dora said knowingly. ‘What about that cheap ring Seb bought so you could sneak off to a guest house in Brighton?’

  Millie blushed. ‘That’s different. And besides, this woman looks married.’

  Helen laughed. ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘I don’t know … she just does. I’m certain she has a husband somewhere.’

  ‘So why hasn’t he come looking for her?’ Dora asked.

  Millie shrugged. ‘I wish I knew,’ she sighed.

  Chapter 6

  On Boxing Day, much to everyone’s relief, the woman finally regained consciousness.

  Millie was doing TPRs when the woman’s eyes flicked open.

  ‘Where … where am I?’ She looked around wildly, then caught sight of Millie in her uniform and her face filled with terror. ‘Who are you? What’s happening to me?’

  ‘Shh, it’s all right. You’re in hospital, but you’re quite safe.’ Millie put her hands on her shoulders, gently easing her back against the pillows. ‘Don’t try to move just yet. I’ll fetch Sister.’

  Sister Judd was a small, shy woman who rarely spoke above a whisper. But this time her gentle, soothing voice was just what was needed to calm the agitated woman.

  ‘You were in a nasty accident,’ she explained. ‘You’ve been asleep for two days.’

  The woman stared up at her blankly. ‘I don’t know … I don’t remember anything,’ she murmured. She spoke with an East End accent, but there was a foreign edge to her voice – Russian or some other Eastern European language, Millie guessed. That would match with her dark colouring and heavy features.

  ‘Can you tell me your name?’ Sister Judd asked.

  The woman’s face filled with panic. ‘I – I don’t know!’ she grabbed Sister Judd’s sleeve. ‘I’ve told you, I don’t remember anything! Oh God, I don’t even know my own name!’ She burst into noisy tears.

  ‘Shh, don’t worry about it. I’m sure it will all come back to you in a day or so,’ Sister Judd soothed. ‘In the meantime, just try to rest. I’ll send for the consultant and then we’ll try to find you something to eat. I daresay you’re hungry, aren’t you?’

  The consultant was summoned. He duly examined her, and declared that she seemed to be recovering well. Millie was then instructed to prepare some Benger’s Food for her.

  ‘I’m surprised she hasn’t asked about her baby,’ another student, Lucy Lane, commented as she joined Millie in the hospital kitchen.

  ‘She probably doesn’t remember anything about it,’ Millie said.

  Lucy Lane snorted with derision. ‘How can anyone forget they’re pregnant, for heaven’s sake?’

  ‘The poor woman can’t even remember her own name,’ Millie reminded her.

  Lucy folded her arms. ‘Well, I think someone should tell her,’ she declared.

  ‘I expect Sister Judd will break it to her gently, when she thinks the time is right,’ Millie said primly, stirring the contents of the beaker. ‘Do you think I’ve left this long enough?’ she asked. ‘Sister said at least twenty minutes, but I think it—’

  Before she could finish her sentence, a loud cry almost made her drop the beaker she was holding. It was followed closely by the most unearthly wailing sound.

  Lucy gave a twisted smile. ‘If you ask me, Sister’s just broken the news to her,’ she said.

  Chapter 7

  Little Gabriel was three days old, and the nurses were still fighting over who would have the pleasure of giving him his feeds. As Staff Nurse, Jennifer usually managed to pull rank over the students, but that didn’t stop them wandering in from the milk kitchen to sneak a peep at him as he suckled contentedly on his bottle.

  ‘Look at him, he’s such a sweetheart,’ Katie O’Hara sighed. ‘I wonder why his mother hasn’t been down to see him yet.’

  ‘She still doesn’t accept that she’s his mother,’ Jennifer replied, stroking his fluffy head. From what she’d heard, the mystery woman still couldn’t recollect her name, where she’d come from or anything that had happened before her accident. So the news that she had somehow given birth to a baby son while she was unconscious had come as a huge shock to her. Jennifer wasn’t surprised it was taking her a while to get used to the idea that she was the mother of a newborn.

  ‘All the same, you’d think she’d want to see him, wouldn’t you? If only out of curiosity.’

  ‘Why should she, if she doesn’t believe he’s hers?’

  ‘Perhaps if she saw him, she might have some kind of – I don’t know – motherly instinct?’

  Jennifer smiled down at the baby, who stared back up at her with unfocused eyes. One of his hands had come free of his shawl. It was like a tiny pink starfish, hardly bigger than her thumb. ‘I don’t think it works like that, O’Hara.’

  Katie shook her head. ‘It’s so sad. What will happen to him if she doesn’t accept him?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘I suppose if they can’t find the father they’ll put him up for adoption. That would be such a shame, wouldn’t it? The little angel deserves to grow up in a real family.’

  Jennifer stroked his tiny palm with the tip of her finger. His fingers immediately closed around hers, grasping her with surprising strength. A lump of emotion rose in her throat.

  ‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘Yes, he does.’

  Chapter 8

  The following day, up on Female Surgical, Millie and the mystery woman were talking about anything and everything except the baby.

  Sister Judd had warned them not to mention him for a while. ‘The consultant believes she’s been through enough emotional trauma over the past couple of days, and it’s not a good idea to tax her any further,’ she’d advised in her whispering voice, having gathered her nurses around her desk the previous morning. ‘We need to be gentle with her. But that doesn’t mean we can’t try to coax her memory in other ways. Try to talk to her as much as possible, ask her questions. Perhaps something might trigger a memory.’

  Which was why, as Millie washed the woman, she was chattering about her own forthcoming wedding.

  ‘We can’t get married until after I qualify, so the date is set for straight after my State Finals next October,’
she said as she sponged her down. ‘That’s if Seb – my fiancé – is back in England by then. He’s a journalist, you see. A foreign correspondent, based in Berlin,’ she added proudly.

  The woman didn’t react as she carefully soaped her limbs. Millie tried again.

  ‘What about your husband?’ she asked.

  The woman’s mouth was an obstinate line. ‘What husband? I don’t have a husband.’

  ‘You have a wedding ring.’

  The woman looked down at it, detached. ‘I don’t remember anything about him,’ she said flatly.

  Millie thought about it for a moment. ‘Aren’t you curious, though?’

  ‘Of course I’m curious!’ the woman snapped. ‘Do you think I like not knowing who I am, or where I come from?’

  ‘I suppose not.’ Millie bit her lip. ‘But we might be able to find him if you could remember something. A name, or what he looks like?’

  ‘Don’t you think I’m trying?’ the woman cut her off angrily. ‘Every morning I wake up hoping it will all come back to me. I lie here, hour after hour, thinking of names and faces, hoping something will fit. But it never does.’ She dashed away a tear with a soapy hand. ‘I don’t even remember that trolley bus hitting me, let alone what I was doing on the Mile End Road…’ She stopped, catching Millie’s look. ‘What? What are you staring at?’

  ‘How did you know you were on the Mile End Road?’ Millie asked.

  The woman frowned. ‘I don’t know, do I? One of you lot must have said something.’

  Millie shook her head. ‘None of us know where the accident happened.’

  ‘Then the police must have told me.’ She thought for a moment. ‘Yes, when that policeman came to see me yesterday morning, I’m sure he mentioned it. How else would I know something like that?’

  How indeed? Millie thought as she fetched a warm towel from the radiator.

  As she helped dry her down, the woman said, ‘How’s the baby?’

  Millie hesitated. ‘I thought you didn’t remember being pregnant?’