by Emma Glass
I Didn’t Hear You
I leave my scream behind, the echo of it chases me as I run past open carriage doors. Passengers sleep, don’t see me running, don’t hear my panic. I reach the front of the train as the driver signals departure. I bang my bunched fists against the metal carriage. The driver peers at me through the dirty glass with narrow eyes, a puzzled frown.
‘STOP!’
My voice is hoarse, thick with morning, dulled by the hum of the rumbling engine. The driver holds his hands up to me. He looks confused and scared, is he surrendering? Why is he moving so slowly? Why isn’t he rushing to help or call someone? I unclench my fists. My hands are filthy and cold. Cold is creeping up on me. The driver opens the door, inching with caution.
‘What’s going on? I need to move the train. What are you doing?’ His voice is deep and quiet with fear. Why is he afraid of me?
I am shaking, sweating, shivering, dishevelled.
‘There was someone on the edge. They must have fallen on the track. Please help.’ Doubt creeps up on me, a pinching finger of shame on my shoulder.
‘Didn’t you see?’ He must have seen.
My forehead is pouring water but my mouth is dry and the words stick. He’s not afraid now. He looks cross, his brow crinkles.
‘What? What are you talking about? Why have you stopped my train?’ His voice is now loud and sure.
‘I saw someone. Standing on the edge. They went over.’ They fell over. They jumped over.
His eyes widen, his stare follows the streams of sweat that wash horror over my face.
‘You should take the next train, or go home. Do not get on my train.’
He closes the door, the metal slams and clacks as he locks it, his eyes still on me, still staring spotlights through the filthy window. The signal sounds and all the carriage doors close.
I Am Extremely Late Now
When the train pulls away, I grit my teeth, my body tenses, I wait to hear the squelch and crunch of a body breaking. But the sound of the engine is loud and I hear nothing but metallic shrieking. When the train is gone, I walk close to the edge of the platform, stoop low and peer over to see bloodied chunks of remains, but there is nothing but grit and tracks in blackness. Could the body have been thrown? Are they in there?
A cracking sound from overhead snaps me back out of the tunnel and I am surprised to find myself balancing unsteadily, rocking, a wisp of wind could blow me over the edge. A voice emerges from the cracking, crackling with panic, ‘Passengers are reminded to remain behind the yellow line at all times,’ a cough, a croak, ‘Please step away from the platform edge. The next train will arrive in one minute.’ I rise, carefully, disoriented, confused, and step backwards and keep walking until my back is against the wall. I saw them. I saw their face. But no one else saw. No evidence. No remains. There must be a camera, video footage, something. But the driver saw nothing – no, the driver saw trouble. Troubled me.
The train pulls in, more passengers line the carriages. There are people on the platform, lots of people now that I didn’t see or hear arrive. We wait for the carriage doors to open and step inside. I find a seat far away from others. I put my backpack on my lap and rest my head. The white face rolls around when I close my eyes. Did I imagine the whole thing? Yes, possibly, probably, I am tired, already on my last legs, and the day hasn’t even started yet.
No time to think. I step off the train into a sea of people, I think of you as we surge towards the exit and sweep through the gate. I think of you rushing away as quickly as you can from me.
For the Next Twelve Hours, I Am Here
‘I’m sorry I’m late,’ I say, as I push through the swing doors, zipping up my crumpled uniform. She doesn’t turn around, her shoulders slacken slightly, her head tilts, she looks at me sideways, her smile is small, her voice is quiet, ‘It’s okay, I’ll let you off the hook, just this once.’ She lifts her eyes and watches me tie my hair up into a knot on top of my head. She finishes writing the allocation on a sheet of paper, puts her pen in her pocket and hands the paper to me, turning to look fully at my flushed face. She puts a hand on my shoulder, straightens out my collar. ‘You look tired,’ she says, searching my face with her shiny kind eyes. ‘You mean, I look like crap?’ I ask. She just smiles. She taps the paper with her finger. ‘I’ve given you the same as yesterday, is that going to be okay?’ She brings her face close to mine. ‘I’m so glad you came in, Sylvie called in sick overnight, again, but Rudy is here and the student is here and she’s not bad.’ She gives me a little poke, her eyes shimmer. ‘She’s working with Rudy, he’ll keep her busy,’ she says in a whispering chuckle. ‘We’ll be fine,’ I say but I can’t manage a smile. I need water, I need coffee. I wish I didn’t have to be here.
I reach into my pockets and realise I’m wearing yesterday’s uniform. I try to discreetly sniff the collar, raise my shoulder and twist my neck to smell under my arm. Not sweaty. But not fresh. I feel grim. I hate starting the day this way. I dig into the pockets for surprises. My name badge, a pen (bonus), a crumpled hand towel with a phone number scrawled on it (X-ray), a handful of saline ampoules (shit, thank goodness I didn’t take home actual medication) and a single piece of chewing gum with a little coat of dust. I wipe the dust off and pop the gum in my mouth and let my teeth sink in. Glorious saliva pours, the tingle of strong mint floods my tongue. A small spurt of joy.
I see a silhouette in the frosted glass of the drug preparation room door. Dark blue and stretched, headless. I open the door on Rudy’s tall form, head on his shoulders where it should be, almost touching the ceiling. He is hunched and crammed into the tiny room, squinting at his allocation sheet through thick specs, paper pressed to his palm, scribbling times and drawing lines.
‘You’re here. I’m glad,’ he says. ‘Jennifer is a fucking lunatic.’
I hand him the ampoules. ‘Jennifer is okay,’ I say, ‘she’s nice to me.’
‘She’s nice to you because you don’t complain and you always look so …’
‘So?’
‘So, so – I don’t know, with your big fucking eyes. I don’t know, you always look innocent.’
‘Earnest?’
‘Too fucking good.’
Don’t swear, I don’t say to him.
‘Can we do our pain meds together later?’ I say. He takes his glasses off and puts his thumb and finger into the deep red ridges above his nose. He shuts his eyes and yawns. His mouth is huge and the smell of coffee and toothpaste drift out in a mist of moist breath. He nods with the yawn and reluctantly closes his mouth. The yawn looks like it feels good, warm and easy. I want to fold into it with him.
‘Yes, but it’s a long time until then.’ He puts his hands on my shoulders and spins me around, navigating me through the doorway, around a drip stand and to the nurses’ station. ‘Here she is,’ he says to Harriet.
Her eyes are bloodshot and wet, her lips are flaking. She grabs my wrist with rock-skinned hands, her knuckles are raw, sore, red tracking up her wrists, dotted with drying crusts of blood.
‘Harriet, your hands!’
‘It’s okay, I’m off for the next five days, I just need to rest.’ She pulls me down on to a chair beside her.
‘We’ve had a bad night,’ she lowers her voice and lowers her head towards the desk. She points a thin, splitting-skinned finger to the notes.
‘Our baby is back in oxygen, but the cannula is rubbing the skin under his nose, it’s so sore, I’ve kept him uncovered, he has cried all night. The doctor upped his morphine, fentanyl is going in, he desperately needs a pain review today. They want to do a scan but he’s probably not safe for transfer. They should take him down to intensive care but intensive care won’t take him because he’s managing his airway, just. Mum has been awake with me most of the night. She wanted to change him but I did it, I told her to rest. She’s shattered. He’s shattered, he’s settled now but keep an eye on him, Laura, the consultant wants you in the meeting today to make a plan. It’s not look
ing good for our little mate. He needs weighing twice today, he’s puffed up like a little piece of popcorn. Oh, and the dressing on his central line is peeling and needs changing. He’s got morphine and some fat bolus doses, I’ve pushed that button all night long. Have you had a coffee? You look as rough as I feel. Have you got little Bud next door too? He’s been easy overnight, slept and dreamt. He’s cute. Dad snores and smells a bit. But he shouldn’t give you much trouble. They want him to try an oral feed. I’m not sure if Dad will help much. He didn’t get up once in the night to try and feed, just left me to tube it.
‘Oh, that’s a shame. Where is his mama?’ I ask.
‘She was with him when he was admitted but she got completely freaked out in the cubicle. She said it was spooky and claustrophobic so she’s at home with the other children,’ she says, nodding. ‘But she is right, it is spooky and claustrophobic, I couldn’t stay in there. Okay, have fun! See you next week!’
She slides her chair back and stands. She gives my shoulder a little squeeze on her way out. ‘Thanks, Harriet,’ I say, sinking in my chair. Sinking in. Everything else is sucked up and stored, in space, somewhere, suspended outside of this endless day. Tiredness falls off like shrivelled snakeskin, it will hang over the doorway and wait for me until the end of the day. Hang and wait to engulf my withered body, wrap me up and crush.
I draw out my day in twelve long lines. It helps to know where the end is. Jennifer turns the lights up and the room glows, synthetic sunshine. The student stretches her arms out, I see her peering over the top of the raised desk, she is looking at the lines I chase out with drugs and dressings and doctors. ‘That looks complicated,’ she says. I look up at her. She looks fresh and young and hopeful.
‘Can I help you today, Laura?’
Yes.
‘I only have bed 6.’
‘You mean you only have Florence today.’
Blush rushes through her cheeks.
‘I only have Florence today,’ she whispers. ‘I could help you.’
‘Yes, I have to bath and weigh my baby first thing. If you get your safety checks done and you’ve written up your meds for Rudy, then I could really do with an extra pair of hands. Thank you.’
She nods, her perky ponytail whips. I manage a tiny smile of encouragement and she smiles back, beaming, she bounces away.
Poor baby, poor baby, what will happen today? I fold the paper and put it in my pocket. No time, so time to start. I stand at the window, put my face close to glass and cup my hands around my eyes to block out the light. The baby is a small mound in the cot. His skin is silvery in the shadowy room. Ghastly tentacles of gleaming plastic flow out of his nose and his chest, leads leading to lines on the monitor, furious, frenzied blue lines tracing signs of life, the sign of a heart trying hard, running across the black face of the monitor and dropping off the screen into oblivion. Mother is a big mound in deeper shadows sleeping on the bed by the window. She is bound in blankets, glowing green from the light of the television.
I turn away from the window. Jennifer is looking through notes at the desk. ‘Harriet thinks they’ll make an end-of-life plan for Danny,’ I say, tilting my head towards the window. She nods. She looks up at me, her face full of sadness. ‘Do you think he’ll last long enough to make it home?’ she asks. It’s hard to tell. She stands next to me. I point to the monitor. ‘Look how tired he is.’ We both stare at ourselves sharply reflected in the glass. I can see the black circles around my eyes, swirling pools, muddy ponds. I’d better make a start. I leave Jennifer looking and quietly open the door to the cubicle.
This Will Never Be Too Much for Me
The antechamber is lit only by the red flashing sensor in the ceiling and the light from the corridor dropping through two inches of glass running the length of the door. The red light blinks, signalling the filtering of the air I brought in with me. The red light signals the beginning of my ritual. I peel back the corner of an apron and pull it from the roll. The flashing red looks like blood splattering across the shiny white plastic. I tear it from the perforated line and put it over my head, tying it tightly around my waist. The plastic scores the skin on my neck which will be sore later. I run my hands under scorching water. It cools after a few seconds and I squeeze the soap dispenser. Fifteen seconds of scrubbing, wrist to tips, thinking of the filth on the train carriage door I touched this morning. A speck could infect Danny. I wash my hands again and dry them with rough paper towels that tear across my skin. When they are dry I put on the blue vinyl gloves that fit tightly. I feel my hands begin to sweat and re-wet themselves.
When the red light stops blinking, I open the door silently, squeeze through a tiny gap and close the door, guiding the handle until it clicks quietly. I tiptoe to the cot, my apron swishes but the sound is lost in the hissing, whistling flow of oxygen. There is a low dip-dip-beep, dip-dip-beep from the monitor, dip-dip-beep, dip-dip-beep. Danny has wriggled his fat little foot and loosened the grasp of the sensor probe on his toe. I silence the alarm and lower the side of the cot, the metal shrieks and I pause and hold my breath and hope it hasn’t woken Danny’s mum. I listen for her quiet sleep breathing and slowly let the side all the way down, controlling the shriek to a mouse’s squeak.
This moment, this silent morning when mums and dads are sleeping, I am here, I am working in the dark. I slip in, I ease myself between them and the crushing weight of their worry. I spread my palms, my dry skin cracks, but I gladly take the weight and I brace myself. I spread my arms, my tired arms tremble. But it’s never too much, I can take more.
These early hours are precious. Peace is present, but wrinkled like the foreheads of the drifting dreamers. Drifting, unsteadily shifting from exhaustion to the recognition and relief of rest. I wish it could be longer. I wish I could smooth out the wrinkles, let the peace be permanent and true.
This moment, this small moment, is for a mother whose son won’t heal. She wants to be awake for it all, she wants to spend time while she has it, with him, but really there is no time. I try not to think about the conversation we need to have when she wakes.
I position myself at the head of the cot, Danny’s face is puffy and white, his tiny nose is turned upwards, with the pressure of the nasal cannula and the feeding tube filling his nostrils. His lips are dusky pink, his mouth puckered and open.
His pale eyelashes lie flat like trampled cornfields against a blue sky of blistered eyelids. I unbutton his too-big Babygro. Sadness slows my motions as I realise the suit won’t ever fit him, he won’t ever fully grow into it. The skin beneath the soft cotton is almost translucent, thinly stretched over his curved ribcage and bulbous belly. I place my hand lightly on his stomach and count the breaths he takes. The heat of his little body barely meets mine through the thickness of my glove. His chest is slow to rise, his two little lungs are rubber balloons never blown.
I place two fingers in the crook of his elbow and press to feel his pulse. His skin here is too dense and oedematous, I can’t feel anything so I trace my fingers along the bone to his wrist. His pulse is bold and bounces too fast. I count for a minute. I work my eyes down his tiny body. His toes are cold and the colour of dust. I rub each one between my thumb and forefinger to warm them. They are so tiny. When blood begins to flow back into them, I reattach the probe and watch the numbers on the monitor rise and sink and settle. I put a blanket over his feet to keep them warm.
I pull my pen-torch out of my top pocket and point the light over the peeling dressing. I bend closer to see the white coiled tube, white shining plastic lost against his porcelain skin. I follow the coil with my eyes, turning turning in, a line into a tiny red ring of skin, and if I follow it further the redness of internal flesh, the pink and squelching red, darker, more muscular, into a big vein and there it sits. Blood out, drugs in.
I lift his body gently, my gloves slip against the moisture on his skin, tricky to grip. He is soaking wet, his Babygro feels damp. I bring a gloved hand to my nose to smell, to check he has not w
et through his nappy, although I know Harriet would have changed him during the night. The smell of peaty outdoor dampness wafts towards me. Last night’s dream floats upwards, tries to resurface; I press it down, push it back under. I inhale again, and smell mud mixed with chemicals. Toxicity drips out of him and I’ll pour more into him. I wonder if the doctors will reduce some of his medication. He doesn’t smell one tiny bit like a baby.
I tilt his body again to look at his back. There are two pink rectangular indentations where the ends of the line have sat snug and comfortably in his bloating flesh. Morphine slides down the line, feeding him a low slow trickle. There is an ‘S’ shape on his skin where the line has snaked up his back and nestled, nested. I rub the redness gently and shake my head. He is marked now and will be for a while. Poor baby. Okay. I settle him back and button up his Babygro, threading the line through a buttonhole. I feel its thinness with my fingers and feel it all the way to the pump. My fingers are stopped by a Perspex shield. Big plastic monstrous machinery, grey and whirring, all locks and corners, lines and blinking lights. The big green button hangs down from the metal stand on a thick black lead. The light is not lit and the morphine is locked out, I watch the timer tick on the grimy display screen. I note down on my folded paper how much is left in the syringe and when it will need changing. I wipe down the screen with a wet wipe, scrub away ancient crusted drips and sticky spills.
As I begin to slide the cot side back into place, his eyes scrunch up, lines crease his swollen eyelids, his breath rasps and creaks as he cries. I have unsettled him. His chest rattles with loose mucus. ‘Shh,’ I say, placing one hand on his stomach and reaching for the suction tube on the wall behind the cot. I flip the switch and tug the tube, freeing the suction catheter from the plastic wrapping. I look at the canister and see floating green foam that has collected through the night. I changed the canister yesterday, his secretions are increasing. I place the catheter gently in his open mouth and clear the collections of spittle and mucus. The whooshing sound of the vacuum sucks up his cracking cry. I flip the switch again and the sound stops. His cry subsides, his breaths return to soft chugs. The oxygen saturations on the monitor rise slightly. I tap his tummy and shush hush him back to sleep.
