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As I walk into the ward, the nurse on duty recognises me and waves at me from her glass fronted office, beckoning me to step in.
“Andrew isn’t it?” she enquires, half-smiling and waving me to a chair.
“Yes. Well remembered,” I reply. “You must meet thousands of different people here.”
“Oh,” she says, pointing to a diary-daybook on the table. “I take notes. I couldn’t do it otherwise.”
“How’s Sal?” I ask.
“She’s stable. There’s been no real change. But I wanted to talk to you about her fiancé. He’s taking it rather hard. He won’t leave her bedside and he’s crying an awful lot. We let him sleep in a spare bed last night, but we can’t really let him do it again tonight. And I don’t think he has eaten anything all day long. I was hoping you could persuade him to go home this evening and get some proper rest,” she says. “It does the patient no good if the relatives kill themselves in the process of looking after them. It may sound harsh, but Sally won’t be going anywhere by herself for a while, so her fiancé should make sure he looks after himself properly and tries to establish a regular, comfortable regime of visiting. I think that Sally would prefer to have visits from a cheerful boyfriend, rather than one that hasn’t eaten or slept for days…”
“I know. I’ll try talking to him. It’s just that he really loves her and …”
“Please don’t apologise. We understand. Anyway, let me know if I can help at all, or if you have any questions…In the meantime, would you both like a cup of tea?”
I smile. What would we do without tea? “Yes, please. Tea would be really nice.”
We both get up and I walk back out onto the ward. There are four occupied beds in the room, and tonight three sets of curtains are drawn, with relatives or friends inside doing what they can to keep their loved ones comfortable.
I stop outside of the curtain surrounding Sal’s bed. From inside I can hear the sound of Guy crying, his soft sobs interspersed with gentle conversation and words that I cannot quite make out. A shiver runs down my spine and I brace myself, take a deep breath and step inside the curtain.
Guy is huddled over the bed, cradling one of Sal’s hands in both of his, his face only centimetres from Sals. His eyes are red from crying, and he doesn’t seem to notice me as I come in. He looks terrible. Sal, on the other hand, looks just the same: peaceful, healthy and serene, her looks mocking the condition she is really in.
“Guy, are you alright?” I say, asking a really stupid question.
He looks up at me then, the look on his face a picture that tells it all.
“What do I do if she dies?” he asks.
Guy places Sal’s hand gently back onto the bed, stands up and comes over towards me. I wrap my arms around his shoulders, and hold him tight, and he begins to cry, letting loose a torrent of tears.
I am silent, letting him release it all. It only lasts a minute or two, and then I feel him pull back and straighten up. He coughs a few times, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a handkerchief. After blowing his nose he looks at me and laughs half-heartedly.
“Sorry about that buddy. I didn’t mean to…”his voice tapering off into silence.
“No problem, amigo. I know where you’re coming from. It’s understandable,” I say, offering him my hand, which he takes in both of his, and squeezes hard in thanks.
“Thanks for coming,” he says.
“I thought I’d better bring you a change of clothes and make sure you eat something. I also promised the nurse that I’d send you home. You need to rest, Guy. Sal needs you to be strong for her now. You have to look after yourself as well as her.”
“I know,” he replies weakly, “but I don’t want to leave her, and I can’t stand the thought of her lying here all alone.”
There is the sound of footsteps and then the nurse appears at the curtain with two very welcome mugs of tea.
“A lady called Mandy was just on the phone,” she says as she hands us the mugs. “She said she is Sally’s flatmate and was wondering if she could come in and visit just now. I told her that Andrew has just arrived, and suggested it would be better if she left it until tomorrow. Actually, I think that it may be good if Sally was left alone for a while. We don’t know if she can hear you or not when you speak to her, but if she can, even though she may be in a coma, having constant attention may be quite tiring for her. I think that it might be a good idea if Andrew were to take you home, Guy. Get some rest, come back refreshed tomorrow? What do you think?” the nurse asks in a friendly manner, but not really leaving an option for not agreeing with her.
“I think you’re right. Actually, I probably won’t make it in during the day,” Guy replies. “I have to go up and see her mother tomorrow to try and tell her what has happened. She’s in a home and she might not understand what I have to say to her, but I think she has the right to know. Unfortunately, there’s no one else that can tell her…” his voice starts to quiver again, and he turns to me. “Andrew, if Mandy comes in in the morning, can you be here in the afternoon…you know, just to hold her hand until I get back?”
“No problem,” I reply, “…but only if you let me drag you out of here right now. Let’s go and get a meal somewhere. I think it would be good if we talk.”
Guy looks at me. “What about?” he asks.
“About Sally… ”, I reply, hesitating.
Fifteen minutes later, Guy has changed his clothes into the fresh ones that I brought with me, and we are walking out of the hospital en-route to a café that the nurse has recommended.
We walk in silence, Guy lost in his thoughts, and I in mine. Inside my head there is a question going round and around and demanding an answer. “Do I tell Guy what I saw and if so, is now the right time to tell him…?”
Chapter Twenty Nine
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The train into London the next day is almost as busy as usual and in spite of the threat of more terrorist attacks, life seems to be getting back to normal. Given a choice, most people would probably prefer not to have to travel by train, bus or tube, but unfortunately for those that live and work in London, there is no other choice but to take the risk and climb back onto the saddle. Otherwise life would simply come to a grinding halt, and then the terrorists would have won.
Unlike most Londoners, I never had to live here during the years the IRA were terrorising the city, and whereas having lived with terror bombings in the past may be helping most local people to overcome their fears and adapt quickly to a renewed terror threat, I have no such previous experiences to help me acclimatise. I am not from London. I am a northerner, used to living in tranquillity and peace and lots and lots of rain. So, I am not adapting as quickly as Londoners are. Each time I step on to a train, a bus or a tube it is with an increasing sense of great trepidation and fear, a fear which I do my best to suppress, but which is now ever present.
If I am lucky, over the months to come this fear will dissipate and disappear and one day I will be able to travel again without giving the terror threat a second thought. In the meantime though, I know that I have no choice but to try and grin and bear it.
For the past three weeks I have almost always caught the same train into work, leaving my flat punctually at 8.30 a.m. and arriving on the platform just in time to step on board the 8.42 am train to Waterloo.
It’s only 8.45am but already the train is hot and humid. As I push through the first few carriages, I think back to last night and the conversation I had with Guy. I wasn’t exactly planning to tell him last night about Sal and what happened with the other man, -it was just a spur of the moment idea that came to me while we were in the hospital-, but as soon as I sat down opposite him in the cafe and he began to talk about much he loved Sal, and how hard it was for him to accept everything that had happened to her, I realised that just then wasn’t the time to tell him.
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&nbs
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By the time we pass through Vauxhall I have found a seat in the first carriage and I sit down and reach into my bag. Apart from people-watching, there is one other activity that all other Londoners seem to engage in while commuting: as soon as anyone finds a free seat on a train or a carriage, most commuters either immediately start to read one of the various free London newspapers, or they pull out a book and disappear into another world, which is instantly conjured up for them by the likes of John Grisham, Jill Mansell, or Dan Brown. And today, I too join their hallowed ranks by pulling out my very own copy of “Marrying Slovakia”, and in a feat of spectacular pure indulgence, literary self-gratification, and an attempt to momentarily forget the events of the past few days, I chalk up another five pages.
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The Monday morning marketing meeting has been cancelled. The board of Euro.com are having a meeting today, security at Euro.com being the main topic of discussion. James sends us all out an email, setting some goals for this week and pointing out that we will probably be having a short conference call later on during the week to replace the marketing meeting this morning. I have a ton of work to get on with, so I am quite relieved the team meeting has been cancelled. I want to get as much as possible done before lunch, so that I can get away early this afternoon and off to the hospital.
Early this morning Guy left to head up north and visit Sal’s mum. It’s a task I am not envious of, and I feel sorry for him that he has to be the one to do it. The only conciliation being, -if it can be classified as one- that her mother probably won’t even understand what he has to tell her. This thought in itself is however also rather depressing, and I think just how sad it is that Sal is lying on the edge of life in a lonely hospital ward and she has no real relatives to worry about her. All she has got in the world, is Guy, Mandy, her other friends, …and me.
I phone Mandy on her mobile, and thankfully I manage to catch her before she walks into the hospital and has to switch her mobile off. We talk for a while, and I fill her in on what to expect and how to try and help Sal. She promises to spend the whole day with her if the nurses allow, and I tell her that I will probably be there about five o’clock. We talk about Sal’s other friends, and Mandy agrees to contact everyone she knows, and to try and arrange some visits from them over the next few weeks, hopefully trying to get some sort of rota organised to keep Sal company. There is one question that I am dying to ask, and it keeps coming to the tip of my tongue, but each time the words start to form in my mind, I chicken out. Asking Mandy if she knew about Sal’s other man is perhaps something that I need to do discreetly with her face-to-face and not over the phone. What happens if she knows nothing about him? Should I say anything to her at all? Perhaps I should just rely upon her common sense: if she did know about Sal having an affair with some other man, then surely she would apply discretion in whether she should tell him or not, and if she did, she would hopefully be clever enough to make sure that he would never visit Sal while Guy was there?
About ten o’clock, Gail emails me, asking me out to lunch, and I agree to meet her in the café around the corner. When she walks in, I am already sitting down reading a newspaper someone left on one of the tables. Almost half the paper is full of details on the bombings, and who is suspected of being behind them. Some of the pictures are quite horrific, and as I read a few of the stories from the survivors as they describe what happened and what it was like, I begin to wonder if I should ever travel by tube again. The most ominous quote of all is that the police expect that it is only a matter of time before something like that could happen again, “Please be vigilant, and report any suspect packages.”
I look across the café, and in the corner, sitting on one of the tables and resting against the wall there is a large plastic yellow bag with no obvious owner. I shift uncomfortably in my seat, wondering if I should get up and say something to the café owner. I’m still pondering what to do when a woman walks out of the toilet, picks up the bag and walks out of the café passing Gail in the doorway as she walks in.
“Hi,” Gail says, bright and breezy.
“So?” I ask… “How did it go? I’m guessing you’re in love and planning your wedding. I haven’t heard from you in days.”
“Are you jealous?” she asks, sitting down beside me.
“Absolutely. You know I am. So, give me the details,” I press.
“First things first, let’s order lunch.”
We both order fish and chips, and some mushy peas, the speciality of the house. With a cup of tea.
I look around me, perhaps for the first time, at the café itself, noticing the classic green glazed tiles on the walls, and the scenes of fishing boats that form an interesting relief on a band of green and white tiles that ring the café at head height. The café is a throw-over from yester-year, something from the thirties or forties that has withstood the test of time, surviving the German bombing raids and the Doodlebugs intact. A typical English café. Full of character. Charm. And jellied eels and winkles.
“It’s good.” She finally says, drawing me back to the conversation. “He’s a really sweet guy.” She is blushing.
“Sweet?”
“Yeah…caring, sensitive, you know what I mean.”
“Nope. Details please.”
“Can’t. I’m not the kiss-and-tell kind-of-woman. But, it’s great.”
“So, is it serious?”
“Could be.”
“Wow. So what did you do at the weekend.”
“Lots. He took me to the theatre and dinner on Saturday, and we went for a long walk at Kew Gardens on Sunday….so, how was your weekend?”
“I spent most of it in hospital…”
“Ouch. Sorry, I forgot. Oh dear, what sort of friend am I? I completely forget about my friends when they are going through hell….Andrew, I’m sorry. Honestly. Tell me about it. Please.”
“Don’t worry about it. There’s nothing wrong with you finding a piece of happiness and enjoying it. After last week, I think we all owe it to ourselves to grab any piece of happiness that we can and savour every last minute of it.”
She reaches across the table and places her hand on mine. “Tell me all about it. How is Guy?”
So I tell her, and once again, I am glad to have met someone like Gail. She sits there and listens, and without realising how or why, she helps.
“So what am I going to do?” I ask, coming to the most important question of all. “Should I tell Guy?”
“No. Not just now. You can’t. I think that for now, you just have to be there for them both. I don’t think you should say anything at all, at least, not until Sal wakes up.”
“And what then?” I ask.
“I don’t know. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
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It is three twenty-five in the afternoon. My mobile phone rings.
“Andrew, it’s Gail. Are you mad or what?” she demands to know.
The brevity and tone of her question takes me by complete surprise.
“What are you talking about?” I asked, rather sheepishly. What have I done now?
“Get yourself down stairs now. I’m around the corner, half-way to the café.”
Grabbing my cup, and feigning a visit to the tea-room, I head off downstairs, wondering what on earth is wrong. I walk out of the building, momentarily checking to make sure I have remembered my security pass- security has been doubled in the past few days, and now we have a security guard staring ominously at everyone who comes into the building. Gail is waiting for me around the corner. She screws her face up and come towards me, her finger up and pointing at me, pressing into my chest. I am almost scared.
“Are you insane? I can’t believe you did it again! Don’t you ever learn from your mistakes?” she asks, genuinely furious with me.
“What on earth are you talking about? Why are you so pissed off with me?
”
“Dianne. That’s what. You screwed her again didn’t you? And the whole office is talking about it!”
Oh, shit…
“You’re joking! How on earth did you find out? She promised me…”
“Andrew, everyone knows. Again.”
“I can’t believe she told anyone. We talked about it. She promised that no one would find out about it.”
“You’re a right tart aren’t you. I can’t believe you did it…”
Gail looks and me, shakes her head and walks around me, starting off in the direction of the office.
“Gail, please….wait,” I say, reaching out and grabbing her arm.
She spins around and stares at me, her mouth opening to say something, but thinking better of it.
“Why are you so bothered, anyway?” I ask. “You’ve got Ben now. Why do you care who I sleep with?”
She goes a little red and opens her mouth to speak again, but hesitates for the second time in a row.
“I…I…I just can’t believe you did it. I thought that…well,…” She coughs, looks up at the sky, clears her throat and then looks at me again. “I just hoped you weren’t like that.”
“Like what.”
“Like all the other men that just grab sex whenever they can get it. I really liked you. I thought you were better than that.”
“Gail, maybe it was wrong, but on Friday night I really, really needed to be with someone. I tried calling you, but Luke told me that you were out. Gail, I was really depressed, I needed to talk to someone, I needed company, but there was no one there for me…I don’t know that many people down here yet. Guy wasn’t around, you were busy, the pubs were full of people who are happy with their own lives and I was completely alone, and then there was Dianne, and she wanted me. It wasn’t even for the sex this time. She was just another human being who helped me to forget some things for a while, and she wanted to be with me, and right then at that moment, that made all the difference.”
The Sleeping Truth : A Romantic Thriller (Omnibus Edition containing both Book One and Book Two) Page 17
