‘Do you have any idea how sexy that is?’ she murmured, and he chuckled.
‘Apparently not. Time to go home?’
And then he stopped in his tracks.
Home? Where had that come from?
It was all getting way too cosy, too comfortable, too looking like they had a future, and then when he got his diagnosis and it all blew up in his face, what then?
He removed his arm and straightened up. ‘Or maybe we should both get an early night,’ he added, and she turned to look at him and searched his eyes.
‘If that’s what you want,’ she said quietly, and he nodded.
‘It’s been a hectic week. I’m bushed. Maybe tomorrow.’
* * *
He’d said home.
And then he’d changed. It was like flicking a switch, and she felt sick.
What’s going on?
Because something was. Something must be, to make him change like that. She didn’t think it was to do with his eyes this time, either. Was it because of Karen and the way she’d treated him? Was he just wary because he’d stayed the night again and brought a washbag? Maybe, and that wouldn’t be a surprise. She was wary, too, after Pete, but maybe not wary enough. Maybe she should be less accommodating, less eager. Less available.
So the following day she invented a reason why she couldn’t see him that evening, and spent the whole of it wallowing in self-pity and calling herself a fool. She could have been with him, strengthening the bond between them, giving him the confidence to trust her. Instead she’d held him at arm’s length and pushed him away, and now she had a run of night duty coming up and she’d missed her chance.
Idiot.
* * *
He got his referral appointment, but it wasn’t for another three weeks and he wasn’t sure he could stand the suspense that long, so he rang them, explained that he worked at the hospital and could take a cancellation at minimal notice, and sat back to wait.
Which just made the suspense worse—on top of which Laura was being a bit funny with him.
Not distant, exactly, but maybe less—welcoming?
No. Wrong word. Less spontaneous. More guarded.
Maybe that was a good thing, because when—no, if—they told him he had RP, he’d need to cool things between them substantially, because he knew perfectly well that she’d brush her own needs aside and stick by him, and he couldn’t do that to her. Not so early in their relationship, and maybe never.
He didn’t want to be a burden on her. On anyone.
Don’t jump the gun. You don’t even know yet.
Except he did, in his heart of hearts, because he’d seen the images and done a ton of research, and he knew what he’d seen. And there was Great-Uncle George. What he didn’t know was how long it would take to lose his sight, and nobody could tell him that. He was going to have to find out the hard way.
* * *
Their shift patterns didn’t coincide for the next week because she was on nights and so he hardly saw her. They spoke on the phone and he’d been round to hers a couple of times, but he’d been plagued by his conscience and he’d deliberately avoided being in a situation where it would be natural for them to make love.
He just couldn’t do it, not while he was sitting on this. He hadn’t told her about George because he didn’t want to worry her, so it almost felt like he was living a lie, but what else could he do? Nothing, until he knew, and there was no sign of a cancellation appointment, so he stalled and avoided her, and then just after two on Friday afternoon, he had a call from the clinic to say they’d had a late cancellation, come now.
He told James he was leaving early without telling him why, walked out of the department and into a barrage of tests and investigations, and then they sat him down and took away any last hope he had that he’d been wrong.
He had retinitis pigmentosa, and there was every probability, given the history of his great-uncle George and his mother, that it was the hereditary X-linked type.
And just like that all his hopes and dreams for his career, for a family, for a future with Laura, crumbled into dust. He was going to go blind, and there was nothing anyone could do about it.
He walked home in a daze, arriving at the same time as his food order. He’d forgotten about it, forgotten that his parents were coming this weekend, forgotten everything.
He put the food away on autopilot, his mind numb. He’d already blitzed the house, but he cleaned it again for something to do, shifted his things into the spare bedroom and remade the bed for his parents, and then finally he rang Laura.
She’d finished her shift and now had a long weekend, so he phoned to check it was still OK for them to go round on Saturday after lunch for his mother to look at the books. Not that he really needed to remind her, but he just wanted to hear her voice.
‘I just wanted to remind you my parents are up this weekend. Is it still OK for us to come round?’ he asked her.
‘It’s fine. I was expecting you all. It’ll be lovely showing the books to someone who’ll appreciate them, and she may be able to tell me a bit more about some of them.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Absolutely. I’m looking forward to it. Just come whenever. I’ll be in.’
He wanted to go now. He was desperate to tell her, to get it over with, but it wouldn’t be fair, not with his parents coming. He’d do it after they left. Sit her down and tell her they had no future. But not now...
‘That’ll be great. Thanks. She’s really looking forward to it, too,’ he said, and hung up quickly before his voice cracked and betrayed him.
* * *
She made a lemon drizzle cake for them. It had always been her grandfather’s favourite, and since they were coming to look at his books it felt appropriate, if a little unsettling.
The last time she’d made one was for his funeral, and she ended up drizzling a little herself as she poured the syrup over it. Stupid, really. He was better off now, and she was just being sentimental and maudlin.
She put it on the windowsill out of Millie’s reach for the syrup to soak in, then went into the study, armed with a duster and the cobweb brush. Goodness knows how long it was since she’d even looked in there, far less sat in there talking to him as she had so many times since he’d died.
Because of Tom? Had his presence filled the yawning void in her life, or had she moved on? Maybe a bit of both, she acknowledged as she dusted, because the books just brought back fond memories now, not waves of aching loneliness.
Progress, she told herself, and once it was all clean and tidy she went and showered, had a bite of lunch and then went back in the study to look at the books again.
There were some she hardly remembered, some in boxes on the top shelves where they were most protected from the light, and they were the ones she was most curious about. Maybe she’d get Tom’s mother to look at those first.
The doorbell rang and she went and opened the door, and beside Tom was an older version of him and a tiny, delicate woman with the same beautiful slate blue eyes.
‘You must be Laura,’ she said, smiling at her with Tom’s smile as she shook her hand. ‘I’m Katherine, and this is Mike.’
‘Hi. It’s lovely to meet you both. Come on in.’
They stepped inside, and then Katherine looked past Laura, took a step forward and then hesitated. ‘May I?’
Laura laughed. ‘Of course. That’s why you’re here. Let’s go and have a look. Tom, I don’t suppose you could make tea?’
He nodded and the men left them to it, and his mother didn’t speak again for several minutes, just looked along all the shelves, shaking her head from time to time and smiling.
‘What an amazing, eclectic collection. He must have been a fascinating man.’
‘He was,’ she said, welling up a little. ‘He knew all of the books, and I must have
spent hours with him as a child poring over them.’
‘He let you look at them?’
‘Oh, yes. Well, lots of them. Not the ones in boxes, although he showed them to me once or twice, when I was older—maybe fifteen? There’s a Shakespeare one, if I remember rightly.’
Katherine looked at her keenly. ‘Would you mind showing it to me?’
‘No, of course not. It’s up here,’ she said, dragging a chair over to the shelves and climbing on it. ‘I think this is the one.’
She lifted down the heavy leather box and Katherine took it from her, laid it on the desk on top of a cloth she’d spread out there, and put on her gloves. Then she carefully opened the box, lifted out the old leather-bound book, placed it on the cloth and opened it.
And gasped softly.
‘Laura!’ she said, her voice hushed. ‘Do you have any idea what this is?’
‘Well—Shakespeare’s plays, I know that much, but no, not really. No more than that. He said it was rare.’
She bent over it beside Katherine, and noticed that her fingers were trembling slightly as they traced the name of the publisher.
Herringman. It meant nothing to her, but it meant something very significant to Katherine. She turned a few pages, then straightened up and met Laura’s eyes.
‘My dear girl, do you have any idea what this book is worth?’
She shook her head. ‘No, not really. A few thousand, maybe? I don’t know.’
‘Much more than that. Given the right auction house, this book would fetch somewhere in the region of a hundred and fifty to two hundred thousand, maybe more.’
She stared at her in astonishment. ‘What? How—why?’
Katherine laughed softly. ‘Because it’s a priceless first edition folio and it would be hugely sought after.’
Good grief. She sat down on the chair before her legs gave way. ‘I don’t believe it. I had no idea it was worth that much. He’s had it ages. I think his father bought it—and there are others, too, but this was his favourite and probably most precious.’
‘Does that mean you want to keep it? Because if so, it really, really ought to be stored in a controlled atmosphere.’
‘I—I...’
She looked up, dazed, and Tom was propped against the doorframe with a strange smile on his face.
‘I told you, you should have them valued,’ he murmured, and her eyes welled.
‘He said he was leaving them to me, and he made me promise that I’d look after them, and if I ever wanted to sell them, I’d have to be very careful who I sold them to. I can understand why now, but... Wow. So much money? That’s ridiculous.’
Tom chuckled softly and shook his head.
‘What’ve you done to her, Mum? I think she needs a cup of tea. I’ll put the kettle on again.’
She stared at the book, then back at Tom.
‘I think that would be a good idea. I can’t... That’s... I’m speechless.’
She heard Tom laugh again as he walked away. ‘That’ll be the day,’ he said, not unkindly, and she got up and followed him into the kitchen.
‘I don’t believe it,’ she said, and he took one look at her, wrapped his arms around her and pressed a kiss to her head.
‘You don’t have to sell them.’
She rested her head on his shoulder and sighed. ‘But—I can’t keep them. Not the ones like that. They’re too important, and I know nothing about them, they don’t mean anything to me. It would be wrong to keep them. They’re wasted on me.’
‘Then sell them, but you don’t have to do anything in a hurry, you know that. And you can trust my mother. She knows her stuff.’
She nodded, still stunned. ‘He was going to catalogue them, but he never got round to it and then he ran out of time because he couldn’t see...’
She felt his arms tighten a little in support, and blinked away tears she had no intention of shedding. ‘I had absolutely no idea they were worth anything like that amount. A few hundred, maybe some of them a few thousand—it’s crazy. And what about insurance?’
‘You will have to consider insurance,’ Katherine said from behind her, and she eased out of Tom’s arms and turned to his mother.
‘I will, won’t I?’ She rolled her eyes. ‘He’s up there laughing at me, I can hear him,’ she said, and reached for the kettle. ‘Tea, everyone?’
* * *
His mother spent the rest of the afternoon going through the books, and came back alone on Sunday morning, leaving the men tackling the garden at Tom’s cottage, and by lunchtime she’d compiled a list of books which were of particular value. The Shakespeare one was the jewel in the crown, but there were other minor gems, too, with much more modest estimates.
‘I know someone who could be interested in the Shakespeare book, if you ever decide to sell it,’ Katherine told her. ‘May I mention it to him?’
‘Um—I’m not sure. I don’t really know what to do.’
‘You don’t have to do anything, but it might be interesting to know what he’d be prepared to pay for it.’
It would. ‘OK, but just make sure he knows I haven’t decided.’
Katherine smiled. ‘I will. And don’t worry. It’s in good condition, and the climate in the room is obviously fairly well suited to it, so it’s not coming to any harm where it is, but you do need to consider insurance. I’ll send you a valuation. And now I think I’m going to have to stop, or Mike’ll go home without me.’
‘Oh, no, you must. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to take your entire weekend. I feel really guilty.’
‘Don’t feel guilty! I’ve had a wonderful time. And remember what I said. Here. You can ring me whenever.’
She put a business card on the desk, and Laura tucked it inside her address book.
‘Thank you. I will. And I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done this weekend. I’m still stunned.’
‘Laura, you’re welcome. And if you want any more advice, if you change your mind about anything, then ring me. I’ll always be happy to help you.’
‘Thank you.’
She gave Katherine a hug, waved her off and then closed the door, the dog at her side.
‘What do you think of that, Millie?’
Millie wagged her tail and whined, and she stroked the soft, gentle head. ‘You need a walk, don’t you? And so do I. My head’s a mess. And I might just set the burglar alarm.’
* * *
‘How did you get on?’
‘Oh, really well. She’s a lovely girl, Tom, and you could do a great deal worse. Well, you did. That Karen creature. But Laura—she’s perfect for you.’
He looked away, busying himself with the kettle, fighting with the lump in his throat because there was no hope for him and Laura now. ‘It’s not like that. We’re just friends, colleagues.’
‘Rubbish. She adores you. And I saw how you looked at her.’
‘I’m very fond of her—always have been. I’ve known her since uni. We’re just friends, you know that.’
‘Well, give yourselves time.’
‘Mum, it’s not going anywhere,’ he said firmly.
His mother made one of those noises, a little humph that told him quite clearly what she really thought, and he poured boiling water into the cups, stirred the teabags and lifted them out without a comment.
‘Right, you take the tea, I’ll bring the sandwiches,’ he said, and they went out into the garden.
‘Oh, this looks better.’
‘It should do, we’ve been working on it all morning. Dad’s in the shower, he’ll be down in a minute. We found a bench under that tree. Let’s go and sit on it and wait for him, it should be dry enough. Ah, here he is at last,’ he said with relief, only too ready to change the subject. ‘Dad, I’ve got a cup of tea here for you and some sandwiches. Come and join us.’
> His father sat down and ate his sandwiches, picked up the mug and eyed him thoughtfully over the top of it.
‘What’s going on, Thomas?’ he asked after an age. ‘You’ve been acting strangely all weekend.’
Tom swallowed and looked away. ‘No, I haven’t.’
‘Rubbish. What is it? Is it the eye thing?’
‘Mike—shh!’ his mother hissed, but Tom gave up, put his tea down on the grass and let out a slightly ragged sigh.
‘Yes,’ he said gently, ‘it’s the eye thing. I saw the specialist on Friday, and it turns out I’ve got retinitis pigmentosa. It’s a progressive deterioration of the rods and cones in the retina, and it starts with night blindness and poor peripheral vision, and then shrinks in until eventually you can be left with just minimal central vision or none at all.’
‘So what can they do?’ his father asked, ever practical.
He glanced up at him and then looked away again. ‘Nothing. Absolutely nothing. My eyes will deteriorate gradually and over the next decade or so I’m going to lose most of my sight, and there’s nothing anyone can do about it.’
‘Oh, Tom, no...’ His mother’s mug slipped out of her fingers and fell onto the grass, splashing him, and he heard a strangled sob. ‘It’s my fault, isn’t it?’ she asked, her voice cracking, and he didn’t know what to say. Nothing that would help.
‘No. No, it’s not your fault, Mum. You weren’t to know.’
She sat back, turned to face him and stared straight into his eyes, her own awash with grief. ‘It is inherited?’ she asked bluntly, and he gave a resigned sigh and nodded.
‘Yes. Yes, it looks as if it’s inherited. They think that’s probably what caused your uncle to crash. Going from bright light to dark is a classic. It’s likely he just didn’t see the bend.’
Healing Her Emergency Doc Page 13
