Lily Alone: A gripping and emotional drama

‘Harry?’

‘Yep. Same agency, ’cos I do have to try to get my moneys’ worth before I knock it on the head. But this one looks all right. Bit weedy, maybe. More sprat than shark, if you know what I mean. But he works in some city insurance place, so he’s bound to be minted. We’re meeting for cocktails, then dinner. No cut-price sarnies for me tonight. Well, if I play my cards right, anyhow. Little black dress, and condoms at the ready!’

‘Fiona, you are terrible. You will be careful though, won’t you?’

‘I told you. Condoms packed and ready to go. How much more careful do you want me to be?’

‘Oh, I don’t know. Life’s shit sometimes. He’s a stranger. Things happen. Just look after yourself, that’s all I’m saying. But you go and have fun. And eat yourself silly. Why not, if he’s paying? Don’t take any notice of me. I’m probably just jealous, that’s all.’

They screwed up their wrappers and walked them over to the overflowing bin where a couple of drowsy wasps were diving in and out among the leftovers.

‘See you tomorrow? You can tell me all about it.’

‘Yeah, sure. I might even persuade you to have a go yourself. Wish me luck, anyway.’ And Fiona was off, her high heels clacking noisily across the concrete, hastily checking her phone one last time before the sliding glass doors pulled her back inside and quickly swallowed her up.

Laura stood for a moment. Luck. That’s what it all comes down to in the end. Who you meet, what you look like, what happens to you. Did she choose this job, this friend, these hips? Or did they just happen? Fate. Destiny. Luck. Who knows what’s waiting around the corner?

She glanced at her watch, its overlarge face hanging upside down from a silver chain above her breast. Was there time before she was due back? Yes, there was.

There was a queue for the lifts. Sunday visiting, straight after lunch. Always a busy time. When the first one came, she squeezed inside, along with at least a dozen others. There was a smell of pungent flowers, lukewarm burgers, lots of sweat. A small boy eased his way to the front, his hand outstretched, eager to be the one to push the buttons. ‘Six, please,’ Laura said, when it was her turn to tell him where she wanted to go, and the lift rumbled its way upwards, stopping at just about every floor to let people out and a few replacement people in, several of them grumbling that it was going up when they really wanted it to go down and sending the boy into a frenzy of excited button-pushing, until the woman with him grabbed him by the sleeve and hauled him out at level five.

Intensive Care was always quiet. There was a rather sad air, a mixture of fear and expectation that hit her as soon as the doors opened to Laura’s push of the intercom. She went inside, closing the doors as silently as she could behind her.

‘You back again?’ the sister called across to her. It was the same one from earlier, the jolly black one with curly grey hair pulled back into a straggly bun. Cora Jenkins, according to her badge. Laura couldn’t remember ever seeing a black person with such grey hair before. It was very distinctive. Striking. Cora pushed the file she was writing in aside and beckoned her over. ‘Anyone would think you were family!’

‘No, but until one appears, I’ll have to do.’ Laura dunked her hands under the anti-bac dispenser on the wall and rubbed them hastily together before moving to the nurses’ station. ‘Still nothing?’

‘Not a thing. We’re no nearer to knowing who she is. There were just the keys in her pocket and a cross around her neck. Ordinary high street clothes, no bag, no tattoos or anything like that. Nothing to help ID her at all. The police are on to it, but nobody’s been. Seems like, wherever she’s come from, our mystery girl hasn’t even been missed. Sad, isn’t it?’

‘And how is she? Has she opened her eyes? Tried to talk? Anything?’

‘Not yet, I’m afraid. The leg’s been sorted, as you know. They’ve done what they can in theatre to relieve the pressure on her brain and her blood pressure is more or less back on track. Look, lovey, she’s as stable as she can be under the circumstances.’ She shook her head. ‘They want to keep her under a while longer, give her a chance to recover before they try to wake her up, so she won’t be back with us and talking just yet. It’s still early days …’

‘Can I go in?’

‘Course you can, my love. You know where I am if you need me.’ And she turned her attention back to her paperwork as Laura made her way along the corridor of little side rooms, each patient encased in their own private bubble, until she reached the right door.

She eased it open quietly, nodding to a nurse who was just replacing the clipboard at the end of the bed and was about to leave. ‘No change,’ she whispered, touching Laura’s arm. ‘We’re still doing the breathing for her, just for now anyway. To help her along while she rests, make things easier for her. She did take a very nasty bang to the head. The surgeons have done what they can, but there’s no knowing if there’s any lasting damage. Not until she … well, as it’s you, I’ll be honest and say …’

‘If she wakes up?’

The girl nodded and opened the door. ‘Let’s hope someone comes to claim her soon, eh?’

Before it’s too late, Laura thought, but quickly shook the idea away.

‘Oh, and there’s one more thing. I don’t know if I should tell you, but as you’re staff …’

‘Yes?’

‘She has a caesarean scar. At some time, not too long ago, she’s had a baby.’ And then the nurse was gone, her shoes clicking away into the distance along the corridor, and Laura and the girl were alone.

‘So, Lily …’ Laura moved towards the bed, surrounded by machinery, and looked down into the still, bruised face. There was a tube fitted into the girl’s mouth, a bandage wrapped around her head, wires attached to her chest, the incessant beeping of monitors, providing the background noise like crickets on a summer’s night in some Spanish holiday resort. ‘What are we going to do with you?’ she muttered, picturing this girl with a baby in her arms. And where was that baby now? ‘How are we going to find your family?’

She pulled a chair nearer to the bed and slid her hand over Lily’s, spotting the nibbled nails and noting again the absence of a ring.

‘Hello. Can you hear me?’

There was no response, which was no surprise, but that wasn’t going to stop her from talking.

‘They say coma patients can hear sometimes, you know. People wake up and say they’ve heard every word spoken while they’ve been asleep, family chatting, music, all sorts, but they just didn’t have the power to answer back. Maybe that’s happening with you? Maybe you’re hearing me now. Lying there scared and trapped, not understanding where you are, or what’s going on?’

Still nothing.

‘I want to help you, Lily. I don’t even know if that’s really your name, but I’ll call you Lily anyway. I’m Laura. I’m a nurse. I know you have nobody else here to talk to you, to tell you where or how you are; what the weather’s like outside. Would you like me to be that person, Lily? For now, anyway, just until someone comes?’

The girl just lay there. Not a flicker. Laura squeezed her hand and half hoped she might feel it move, that it might try to squeeze her back, but no. Just the beeps, marking out the seconds, one by one, and the sound of the ventilator breathing in and out, in and out, in and out.

‘You’re in the hospital. We don’t know what happened to you. Hit by a car that didn’t stop, so they say. Your leg’s broken, so that might hurt a bit. And your ribs. And your head’s going to feel sore. You’re being kept asleep, just until your brain decides to get better and start working properly again by itself. Don’t worry about that. Or the noise, or the tubes. It’s all here to help you. All perfectly normal. Don’t be afraid. All you have to do is lie there and sleep, and let yourself heal.’

Laura looked at the watch on her chest. It was time to get back to work already.

‘It’s a nice day, Lily. It’s rained a lot the last day or two, but the sun’s out now, and there are trees outside the window. Lovely, tall, green trees. I think I can even see a little nest. You’ll be able to see it for yourself when you wake up. And hear the birds. If you can’t already …’

She withdrew her hand, and resisted a sudden compulsion to lean over and kiss Lily on the cheek. No, that would be wrong. Crossing professional boundaries. But maybe she was doing that already, just by being here?

The lift was empty this time, depositing her back on the ground floor with a bump. She hurried back into A & E and checked the screen for new patients, any developments since she’d been gone. Nothing of any significance. Things were remarkably quiet. Until the Sunday afternoon football and rugby players started to roll in, the amateur ones with proper jobs who played just for the exercise, and the beer afterwards, and the fun – some fun! – with their split lips and bloodied noses and broken ankles. Three o’clock loomed. Kick-off time. It wouldn’t be long now.

CHAPTER SEVEN (#ulink_a2774530-79aa-530c-8e4a-79c3ea2a3c64)

Ruby

Michael is nice. More than nice. Michael is handsome, gorgeous, wonderful. Michael is the best thing ever to happen to me. Only he hasn’t happened to me. Not really. Not yet.

He did speak to me today. Only to say thank you. But he said it in such a lovely way. With his eyes, not just his voice. Like he really meant it.

Mrs Castle lets me run errands now. She says that a children’s home is for children and I’m not a child any more, that she is going to give me more responsibility, prepare me for the outside world. When she’s in her office she lets me help her sometimes. A bit of filing, answering the phone. All good practice for when I get a job, that’s what she says. I’m sixteen now, and I have always known I can’t stay here forever.

Today she sent me down to the bank. Not with tons of money. That would be too dangerous. I could get mugged or something. But she’d been collecting up coins in jars for weeks and she let me bag them up and walk them down to the bank to pay them in. Nobody robs you for ten pence pieces, do they? Not worth the effort.

Michael’s long fingers reached across the desk and hooked the bags in, under the see-through dip that separates him from the queue, lifting them one at a time, dropping them onto the scales, ticking them off on the slip with his pen. I know his name is Michael because he wears a badge. Michael Payne. He’s so much younger than the rest of the staff, who all have grey hair and bored faces and look like they’ve been there forever. He’s older than me though. Maybe twenty or twenty-one. So, not by all that much. Not enough to matter. And he has the most brilliant blue eyes. The eyes that said thank you, all by themselves.

In my mind, I can still feel his hand, touching the top of mine, ever so lightly, as he takes the coin bags, making the tiny hairs stand to attention all along my arm. And then, later, touching my cheek, touching my body under my clothes, touching with soft gentle strokes where nobody has ever touched me before. And then it’s gone again. The hand. And suddenly all I can hear is the sound of my own breathing struggling in my throat as the very thought of him stops me in my tracks, sends the blood rushing to my head, to my heart, and almost takes my breath away.

He could charm the birds out of the trees, that one. It’s one of Mrs Castle’s sayings, and it’s as if I can hear her still saying it now. Birds. Trees. My mind’s all over the place, whirling around like I’m in a spin dryer, but I know what I felt. In that one delicious moment at the bank, I felt it. The beginnings of love.

I am in love. Head over heels, birds in the trees love. With a man I don’t even know. And his name is Michael Payne.

CHAPTER EIGHT (#ulink_9eb64fda-804d-5905-ac25-850f7324652c)