A DEATH TO DIE FOR (10 page)

I woke up and used the facilities but as explained previously the mirror above the sink in the shower room was a small oblong in which I could only really see my head and shoulders so I was completely oblivious to any problem as I waited for Helen to arrive.

I had stayed in my night clothes as she had promised to wash my back with the shower today because it was something I was finding difficult to accomplish on my own.

She had only just entered the room and given me a kiss when she suddenly stood back and with a concerned look on her face asked what had happened to me, I raised my eyebrows and shrugged my right shoulder in as much as to say I didn’t understand what she meant.

Helen started pulling my dressing gown open and then looked down the front of my night shirt and round the back of my neck, she told me that I was covered in blotches, she asked me to stand and then pulled my nightshirt up and I could see that my torso was patterned like a leopard skin with dark red blotches that also went down the front of the top of my thighs, Helen then pulled the leg of my underpants to one side which exposed the even greater horror of an elongated blood blister in the crease of my groin and further investigation showed another equally long blister on the other side.

I was worried at what I saw and asked what she thought it might be, she said that she would go and bring the nurse back to have a look at it, when she arrived the nurse wasn’t sure what it was either and went off to locate the duty doctor, some minutes past during which Helen gave me a further close inspection.

When the duty doctor got there he almost immediately understood the situation, he stated that he was sure that what I had suffered was a sever reaction to the doses of penicillin I had been receiving and that I probably had now become allergic to it, he said that he would contact the consultant and sort out some different antibiotics and that in the meantime he would arrange for someone to come a couple of times a day and apply steroid cream to help clear up the skin blotches and blood blisters.

The panic was over now that we knew what the problem was, the first thing that happened was a nurse returned with a red wrist band which she clipped onto my arm to note my new allergy to penicillin.

About an hour later someone did arrive to apply some cream, it was a very tiny man of Asian abstraction who spoke hardly at all, I suspect mostly because he didn’t much like the job he had been given, so that you some idea as to how diminutive he was, normally when medics put on nitrile gloves they have to stretch them to get them on but on this chap they were as wrinkled as Nora Batty’s stockings and he was probably no more that 4’-3” tall in his stocking feet so that the blue disposable polythene apron he had on almost reached to his ankles.

He brought two tubes of cream with him and with very little conversation between us he applied the contents to the affected skin, as this was going to take some time Helen said that she would like to go and catch up with some of her work colleagues to see how things were going in her department and to keep them abreast of what was happening to me.

It must have taken the tiny chap a good half hour or more to cover me in steroid cream  which was made all the more difficult for him because of my hirsuteness, when he had finished he lobbed the empty tubes, apron and spent gloves into the waste bin, I asked what time he would be back, but because of my roupy voice he must have thought I said ‘same time tomorrow’  because he nodded, smiled brightly and just said ‘Yes’.

So much for my back wash I thought as I now felt greasy all over so I decided to put my towelling robe back on, I plugged the food pump back onto the NG tube switched the pump on and lay on the bed.

When Helen came back she was accompanied by our solicitor whom she had met in the corridor, he had just come back from holiday, on the way to the room she had briefed him of the seriousness of my current condition and as he already knew he was coming to assist me with a new will he approached the bed and gave me a subdued and quite formal greeting saying how sorry he was that this was happening to me.

He sat in the chair and took out a notepad from his briefcase, Helen sat on the edge of the bed and held my hand, I explained that I had written a will around the time Helen and I had got married some eleven years ago but that it was fairly irrelevant now that my demise had been forecast within the next two to three weeks, I felt my knuckles being squeezed tightly, I tried to give Helen a reassuring look and failed abysmally, she dabbed at her eyes with a tissue.

I confirmed that I just wanted a simple statement in the will leaving everything to Helen, he said that this would not be a problem but that there may be some tax advantage depending on how the property was divided and he would look into this and come back after the weekend with a document for agreement and if I was satisfied, for me to sign.

I thanked him and he left.

Helen and I were both feeling deflated after having such a solemn discussion and rather than stay in the room and reflect on it I asked her if she fancied another walk down the corridor, careful not to drag on my NG tube I pulled on my track suit bottoms and slipped my feet into my slippers but left my towelling robe on and then with my right hand pushing the wheeled drip stand and Helen supporting my left arm in the crook of hers we once more stepped out into the corridor.

We shuffled on until we reached the double doors, Helen asked did I feel tired at all, but not wanting to return to the room just yet I said that I would like to wander a little further this time, so we turned right into the adjoining corridor and passed the nurses station, one nurse looked up from her work and smiled and although it was a friendly smile I somehow still got the feeling that she knew she was looking at a dead man walking.

We arrived at the next set of double doors at the entrance to the ward, Helen stepped ahead and opened them and I shuffled through into the main corridor, I hadn’t been this far from the room for over two weeks, it did feel that I was on a bit of an adventure.

I could see to my left that the corridor came to an end not too far away and that there were windows that we could see out of and as I hadn’t seen the world in general since my admission into hospital I persuaded Helen to let us walk to the end of the corridor so that we could take in the view.

Our progress was slow but eventually we arrived at the end of the corridor I looked out onto the world and things that would not normally be of any interest such as how people parked their cars took on an unusual significance and from one angle we could look along the side of the hospital to a high level canopy which was a design feature of the building.

I held Helen close and said that it reminded me of the time we had taken a cruise on the Oriana and could look along from our balcony to the bridge of the ship, she agreed with me that there was a certain resemblance and we spent some time reminiscing about what we had done on the cruise, I reminded her that I had given her a china thimble for our ‘cotton’ wedding anniversary and that she had collected sea salt in it from the balcony rail each morning which she confirmed that she still had at home wrapped in Clingfilm.

Rested enough to attempt the return journey, we took our time in retracing our steps as we were in no particular hurry to get back to the room however as we rounded the corner through the doors and passed the nurses station we could see the ‘little man’ with his blue gloves and blue disposable polythene apron standing in the distance looking this way and that and we suddenly remembered that I was to have a second coating of steroid cream, so we tried to speed our shuffle and as we got close he told us that we needed to hurry as he had left this to be the last job before he went home and he only had half an hour left now.

As he started slapping on the cream Helen said that it was about time she went home anyway and that she would see me later, so she craned her neck in over the top of the little man who was stooped in front of me and gave me a kiss before she left smiling at the scene she was leaving behind.

He hurriedly applied the second coat and then quickly divested himself of his protective garments and left, I felt a twinge of jealousy that at least he could go home at the end of the day.

Evening visiting came and went, before she left Helen said that she would come in a bit earlier tomorrow so that she could help me have a proper shower before the next cream application, I told her that I would look forward to it.

After they had gone I lay on the bed and watched some telly while I waited for the nurse to come and administer the necessary drugs before settling down for the night, there was a bit of a clunk as the drugs trolley collided with the door frame and I looked across to see that it was not the usual nurse so I assumed that she was an agency nurse because of the different uniform.

As she came close to administer the new antibiotic and diazepam through the cannula I noticed, as I had done once or twice before, that some of the night nurses must nip out for a quick cigarette during their shift as when close by they smelt strongly of tobacco smoke, however tonight there was the distinct sweet smell of an added smoking ingredient on this nurse and she had the long look of someone who is not really focused on what they are doing and when she spoke it was in quick almost excited short sentences.

She came round the other side of the bed to administer the atropine injection, she took a pinch of skin and drove the needle in, it felt a little more sore than the previous night but I didn’t think a lot about it, she wiped the area with a swab tidied the syringes into the sharps box and left the room still chattering as she went.

I tried to get off to sleep but I found my throat clagging up a bit more than it had done over the past couple of nights which caused me to have a little clearing cough every so often but eventually I must have drifted off.

The ‘early’ nurse went through her usual routine and the noise of her progress woke me, I felt rough this morning, I hadn’t slept very well at all and I also had a feeling of being unclean from not having had a shower the day before and because I knew that Helen was coming in early to help me take a shower this morning I just couldn’t be bothered to move from the bed until she got there.

When she arrived she took off her coat and came towards the bed from the right hand side chiding me for being a lazy bones but as she got close she gasped, “Oh! my God what have they done to you now?”, not having looked in the mirror yet this morning I thought that she must be seeing some further manifestation of the recently acquired allergy to penicillin, but she started tugging at the sheet under me and tried to move my right shoulder, I twisted my head round and saw what she was looking at, there was a large pink patch on the bed linen next to me.

Not knowing the cause she went and got hold of a nurse who came hurriedly into the room to look at the problem, Helen watched as she bent close and rubbed my shoulder and then left without saying anything so Helen had another close look herself and discovered two puncture marks in my skin, seemingly one entry and one exit as if the nurse on the previous evening had pushed the syringe needle right through the pinch of skin and emptied the atropine directly onto the bed and then my arm must have bled a bit and soaked into the wettened bed linen which had coloured the damp patch pink, it would explain the coughing during the night.

The nurse came back accompanied by the senior nurse who also had a close look and a little embarrassed confirmed our suspicion, she said a report of the incident would be made and that if I could get out of the bed she would get someone to change the sheets, I suspect this was mostly due to the consultants visit expected later in the morning.

As I wanted to get properly washed and shaved today before the next coating of steroid cream I made my way to the shower room with Helen in tow, while a bed changing team arrived and removed the evidence.

I was scrubbed up and fresh as a daisy for the consultant’s visit and therefore not too keen when the little man in his blue plastic pinny and gloves turned up to recoat me, Helen smiled and said that she would go and get a cup of tea while I was being turned into a butterball.

While she was away the consultant called in briefly, I had only been coated on one side at the time, so working around the cream applicator he picked up my file and reading the notes said that the request for me to have a PET scan had been put forward to the management team in Birmingham and a decision would be made on Friday or at the latest Monday and then I could be moved on the Tuesday.

The little man finished rubbing in the cream and was just dropping his gloves etc. in the bin when Helen came through the door with a covered cardboard cup in hand and I told her of the consultants visit and that all being well I could be going to Birmingham next Tuesday.

However by the time Helen returned to the room I was already starting to have doubts about the move, firstly if it achieved nothing I would have left this nice private room for a large hospital ward which would not be as pleasant a place to be and also it would be a lot more difficult for her to visit me as it would be 150mile round trip.

Helen always looking for the positive said that anything that might lead to us being together for longer would be worth trying and she was sure that with the help of family and friends the travelling would not prove too much of a problem, so it was left that if the Birmingham hospital agreed to the PET scan then I would go for it and see where it lead.

The duty doctor looked in through the corridor window and seeing we were on our own came into the room, he said that he had been in touch with the hospice coordinator and knowing about my life expectancy she had rearranged her diary so that she could come and see us tomorrow morning around 11.00am and he hoped that Helen could be there too, she replied that it would not be a problem.

This information soured the mood somewhat particularly as we knew Alan(P) would be returning this weekend and that we had promised him the details of the funeral arrangements, this was a subject we had skirted around but I didn’t want Helen left with the task of sorting it all out afterwards and although it would be a difficult matter to discuss I felt that it would be better dealt with while I was still fully compos mentis and we were on our own. 

Although reluctant to air this subject Helen came and sat side by side with me on the bed, she placed her writing pad on her lap and I put my arm round her shoulder as we started, she sighed and said that she would like the service to be carried out at the local village church where the people we knew could come to say their goodbyes, I agreed but insisted that the one thing I didn’t want was to have a vicar who I had never met telling everyone at the funeral the few facts that he had managed to glean from her as if he had known me a long time.

Alan had already said that he would speak for me therefore that part of the proceedings was easily settled, so it really came just came down to whether there would be any readings and what music I wanted to be remembered by, Helen wrote down the details as we discussed them and then placed the pad and pen on the bed, she turned and put her arms around my shoulders and through the sobs she whispered thankyou.

In this current mood of reflection I felt that I needed to make some kind of gesture, possibly a lasting physical personal reminder of me for her to keep into the future, but what?

I gently took hold of her hand and in that moment of tenderness a thought came to me and I put it to her that she might like to have a lock of my hair, her hand tightened on mine and with eyes wet with tears she was unable to respond save a trembling smile and nod of her head, I said that being the case I would rather she received it as a living gift than have her take it from my cold body.

We embraced and with her head on my shoulder she said quietly that she would bring in some scissors when she visited later with Kate and Jim.

I realised that in all the mornings hullabaloo regarding the bed sheets we had forgotten to have the cranberry ice which we found had now melted in the flask so Helen said she would see if any was left in the freezer and bring it back with her this evening.

On my own again I decided to try and get some rest after the fractious sleep of last night, I was just beginning to dose off when I was abruptly woken by noise of a trolley crashing into the double doors across the corridor just outside my room, I rolled over to see that the porters had tried to push a strange looking bed trolley through the doors but that something must have been on the other side as they could not get through.

The trolley looked like a normal bed but it had a box on the top that seemed to have a solid metal top and canvas sides, after a bit of to-ing and fro-ing they managed to sort themselves out and they continued through the doors.

I turned on my side again facing away from the door, there was another knock and I turned to find a familiar figure from the village standing in the doorway.

I had over the years found that many small villages in Herefordshire have an incumbent  retired professional such as a banker, solicitor or military person who by general consensus tend to evolve into the unelected de facto mayor and here was ours, bespectacled, well spoken, a keen gardener and genuinely interested in village matters.

Dressed in a pair of corduroy trousers with a tweed jacket that had leather patches on the elbows and with his cap rolled up in his hands like a baton which made his knuckles go white he looked every bit the country gentleman, he did not sit at first but stood some way from the bed.

In a less than firm voice he said that many of the villagers had made contact with him since hearing of my illness but because they did not want to bother Helen at this difficult time they had wanted through him for both of us to know that we were being thought of and prayed for and if there anyway in which they could help us and he had come along today on behalf of village to see what could be done.

I thanked him and motioned for him to sit in the chair, I said that Helen wanted to have the funeral service at the local church but as we were not members would he as one of the church wardens be able to assist, I then went on to mention that at some future period the house would have to be put on the market and although she probably would not ask for it herself I would be grateful if he could rally the villagers to help her as it would be a considerable task for her to undertake on her own what with the family living so far away..

He told me that neither matter would be a problem and after further assuring conversation I asked him if he would pass on my thanks to the villagers for their concern and for anyway in which they might assist Helen in the future, he said he would and then reached out and shook my hand in farewell, as he turned to leave he took his hanky out of his trouser pocket, he lifted his glasses off of his nose so that he could wipe his eyes and as he walked away down the corridor I could hear the metal heels of his shoes clicking on the floor and heard him blow his nose loudly.

Time had moved on and although I really could have done with some sleep my evening visitors started arriving and as if by means of reward Kate had managed to find some of the cranberry ice left in the freezer so having been suitably adorned with protective tea towels against the inevitable coughing fit I was pleased to be able to perform my ice swallowing trick to this captive and I might add appreciative audience.

Tired from the exertion I got back onto the bed and told Helen of my afternoon visitor and she said that it was nice of everyone to be thinking of us, I then mentioned the earlier commotion in the corridor outside, her expression tensed slightly and she said that someone on one of the wards must have past away and it would have been the mortuary trolley, it was difficult for us to try and keep our spirits up for very long when the finality of death was about us all the time.

As the evening visiting came to a close Kate and Jim said that they would leave us alone for a while and once they had gone Helen produced a small pair of scissors and a short length of what turned out to be embroidery wool, she asked me from where she should take the lock of hair, I smiled and said preferably not a grey bit.

Gently taking a small amount of my hair she secured it tightly with the length of wool and I could feel the crunching of the strands as she proceeded to cut through the lock of hair, once the deed was done she showed me the result, I took it from her in my right hand, kissed it and gently laid it in the open envelope she held in front of me which she then closed and  placed in her bag along with the scissors.

We held each other for what seemed the longest time before she left to take the others home.

Later I was quite pleased to see that I had a different nurse to the night before to administer the injections and once done it did not take long for me to get of to sleep.