Authors: Ros Seddon
‘How do you feel?’
‘Like I was hit by a train. I…… I don’t understand …..
What
happened?
I…… I went to bed and then……….Where’s Ollie?’
‘He’s fine. He’s with my Mother.’
‘How long have I been……….?’
‘Two days.’
‘My leg…… Oh………’ Ellie tried to sit up by leaning on her right arm and found
that she couldn’t. S
he could barely move and both
her right
arm and her right leg were in plaster and they hurt really badly.
‘Don’t try to move Ellie. You’ve broken your arm and your leg is broken in three places. You need to keep still and rest.
You’re going to be here some time I’m afraid.’
‘But how? …… I don’t understand. I don’t remember.’
‘So you don’t know what happened? How you came to be lying there in the garden at
eleven
o’clock
at night barely alive?’
‘What? In the garden? No. I don’t…… I don’t remember.’
‘Shush dear and try not to move’ the little dark haired nurse with the accusing eyes that was hovering at the other side of her bed adjusted the drip that was attached to her left arm. ‘Try to rest.’
He wanted to have it out with her right then and there. Ask her why she was so unhappy and why she hadn’t told him
how she felt
. Was it the new house? He’d
thought it was what they both wanted
. Was it post natal depression? Was it him?
In the four years they had been together he had always done his best for her, given her everything he could. She had always seemed so happy and when little Ollie came into their lives he was like the icing on the cake. Their lives were complete. It had been her idea to upgrade from their little flat to a house with a garden and he had agreed. It made total sense to have a garden for Ollie and when the house on
Rose Lane
came on the market at such a steal she had been just as excited as he was. All their spare time was spent painting and decorating, getting it ready for the big move. Ellie had made curtains and they had hung them together.
None of this made any sense……..
The nurse gave him a discouraging glance. It was his cue to leave.
‘I’d better get back to Ollie.
I’ll be in to see you in the morning.’
‘Oh no don’t go…..’ Ellie tried to pull herself up in the bed once more but the sharp eyed nurse was ready for her.
‘I have to go Ellie. Mum’s had Oliver ….. ever since it happened. Now that you’re back with us and you’re on the mend……… and anyway, the nurse is right. You need to rest. I’ll be here in the morning.’
He kissed her
forehead
beneath the bandage
and then he left.
‘He thinks I did this to myself.’ She sighed
.
‘And di
d you?’ the nurse took her left
hand
and injected morphine into the
IV Cannula
.
‘No; o
f course not. I would never do that.
I… don’t …… know what…….
’
As the morphine kicked in her eyelids became heavier and heavier until she drifted into a deep sleep. The dark haired nurse left the room and went to the desk.
‘Has she said anything?’ The duty doctor asked.
‘No. I really don’t think she remembers anything…….. yet.’
‘We’ll need to keep her sedated tonight and we’ll see how she is tomorrow.
’
‘Yes Doctor’.
Felicity had picked up the receiver several times and replaced it on the handset. This was silly. The guy was probably happily married. You didn’t get to look like that and not have already been swept off your
feet. Her fingers traced the keys,
seven
….
seven…...three two
four. This time she pressed the call button. The call
went straight to his answer
ing machine
.
‘Hi, this is Felicit
y Breen. I believe you have my filo f
ax. Thank you for your call…er….and for your help at the station. I shall be in town tonight if you’d like to meet up….. or perhaps you could call again and we’ll arrange to meet. Thank you.’
She replaced the receiver and cursed herself.
I shall be in town if you’d like to meet? Oh great now he’ll think I’m a complete
floozy. Whatever possessed me?
She touched up her mascara and checked herself in the bedroom mirror. The little black dress clung to her body like a sec
ond skin. It was sexy; r
eally sexy. Felicity unzipped it and let it fall to the floor, and then she took out her beige skirt and a red strappy top and checked herself in the mirror once more. Half an hour later dressed in her jeans and a cropped top she threw an overnight bag into the back seat of her
mini
and set off for the city lights. She parked in the courtyard at the back of Sandra and Mark’s flat and rang the bell.
‘Hi h
un, come on up.’ The buzzer sounded and Felicity opened the heavy oak door and went inside. The flat was a cacophony of activity with two of Sandra’s workmates
sprawled on the sofa giggling and a young couple in the armchair beside the fire who barely looked up from each others gaze.
Duran Duran
was blasting out from Mark’s incredibly large speakers and all the girls seemed to be dressed to kill. As Mark came into the room followed by a dark hai
red hunk waving a can of
lager
Felicity wished she had stayed in the little black dress.
‘Hi Flick. Er, this is James. Y
ou know Marcie and Jane and these two love birds are Carl and Susanne. They’re babysitting. I doubt you’ll get any conversation out of them tonight though.
Sandy
’s in the Kitchen. Drink?’
‘Er thanks Mark. I b
r
ought a bottle of w
hite. It’s chilled so if anyone wants some….?’
She
went through the hall into the k
itchen. Sandra was wearing
a
pretty
chocolate brown dress and she saw the look of disdain on her friends face.
‘Hi Flick. You okay love?’
‘
Yes I’m sorry, I should have phoned. Here’s me in my jeans and you guys are all dressed up. You look amazing Sand. Are you going to the club?’
‘No, well we haven’t really made any plans yet. We’ll probably just head down to the F
ox and anyway, you look lovely h
un.’
Half an hour later dressed in
Sandy
’s black skirt and black sling backs the girls were ready to hit the town. In two groups they set off to town, girls in front, and the guys, already quite merry tripping along beh
ind them. Three pints of
lager
seemed to have the desired effect on James’ loose tongue and Felicity could see the boy about town beneath the handsome exterior so when Sandra honed in on him dragging her along and tried her hand at matchmaking Felicity agreed to dance with him, but that was all and, true to her word after one dance she walked away and spent the rest of the night avoiding him and his advances.
‘Hey Flick; y
ou’ve made a bit of an impact on young James.’ Mark w
as beside her at the Bar. ‘W
hat’s the story? You playing hard to get or have you met someone else?’
‘What?’
‘He’s really keen to get to know you better if you know what I mean.’ Mark
raised his hand to attract the
barmaid’s
attention. ‘So….. What do you think?’
‘I think he’s wasting his time Mark. I’m just not interested,
I’m sorry.’ Felicity left the b
ar and made her way
across the dance floor to the ladies t
oilets.
At a table in the corner of the room she saw a very pretty girl with long blonde hair having a
tete a tete
with a dark haired man who looked vaguely familiar although she couldn’t see his face clearly, then the sound of raised voices took her attention away from them.
There was a disturbance at the b
ar. A short stocky man pushed another hard on the shoulder and shouted some obscenity and then all hell seemed to break loose. T
wo
b
ouncers appeared and after a little heaving and pushing one
man
was escorted to the door and normality was res
tored
. Felicity
resumed
her route to the l
adies just as the couple at the corner table stood up to leave. Her heart skipped a beat as she now saw the face that had been hidden from full view
a few seconds earlier. It was b
lue
e
yes
. He was standing a few feet away from her holding a long red coat with both hands at arms length. He looked stunning in a black silk shirt open at the neck showing just enough of his broad tanned chest. Then the blonde bombshell snuck into the red coat that he held out for her and seemed to linger there for just a little too long as he wrapped the collar around her. Felicity had side stepped into the shadows. Had he seen her? If he had then he hadn’t acknowledged her. He turned and made a path through the crowded bar for his woman who stayed very close to his heels.
Felicity sighed and checked her watch. It was only
9.40pm
.
Sandra and Mark were locked in an embrace as they slowly swayed along to
Phyliss Nelson’s
‘
Move closer
’ and even Jane had a dance partner and was playing the vamp in time to the music.
Felicity returned to their table to find that James had turned his attentions to Marcie. Oh and he had her
f
ull
attention.
Ellie felt as though she hadn’t slept at all. There had been a new admission in the night; a young woman in the window bay opposite her. Nurses had been coming and going pulling the curtains back and forth around her bed; their whispering voices constant into the night as she drifted in and out of sleep. When it wasn’t the voices that woke her it was the pain in her right leg or the erratic breathing and deep echoing cough of the new arrival. She’d been aware too, of the dark haired man who came with her. Refusing to leave her
, he had slept in the chair beside her bed. Ellie couldn’t see him clearly but she knew he was there by the gentle rise and fall of the white cellular blanket staff nurse had wrapped around him in the night and his constant shuffling in the chair, trying to find a more comfortable position; his movement casting eerie shadows on the dimly lit vinyl floor.
Now Ellie was awake; her eyes wide and even in the semi-darkness she could clearly see the bed opposite
had become
vacant; its pristine sheets lying flat, the curtains pulled back flat against the wall as if the new patient had never been; never existed and she wondered if she had dreamed it all. Then she saw them in the corridor rushing the new patient along on a trolley; their urgent voices calling for the crash team and she saw the man with dark hair following close behind and heard his heart-wrenching cries,
‘Sarah! Oh please God! No!’
She watched as a young nurse put out her hand stopping him in his tracks and saw devastation in his eyes as he slumped onto the cold hard chair in the corridor and hung his head in despair. Ellie shook her head, closed her eyes and pondered the existence of God.
As the first shafts of daylight began to spread across the room and her eyes flickered open she could feel their presence. Sure enough the curtains were pulled around the bed opposite and the dark haired man was there again watching over his loved one.
Thank God
, thought Ellie.
They had saved her
.
The girl was about the same age as her, although it was hard to tell in this light; then the clock struck six and the auto timer kicked in illuminating the room and bringing it into full focus for the day ahead.
Soon the ward was awash with the new shift; orderly’s and auxiliary’s scuttling this way and that; nurses with trolleys of medication and the comforting aroma of breakfast making its way up from the ground floor.
Why had they brought the girl back onto the ward?
Ellie’s mind was racing. They must be pretty confident of her condition.........
or very short of space
............
On Sunday morning the light was flashing on
Felicity’s
answering machine.
‘Miss Breen, Hi.
David Wilson here. I’m sorry
I
’ve
only just got your message and had to rush off to a meeting last night so would have been unable to meet you in town but I…….. have Monday lunch free so perhaps
we could meet at the Bad Rock c
afé at say,
one o’clock
? Oh and by the way i
n case you don’t know you have an appointment Monday AM at the Fortescue Arms at
ten o’clock
. Please let me know if you can’t make lunch. Goodbye for now.’