sob caught in Nell’s throat. She wasn’t sure Cal had the first idea how she felt about Luke; their feelings about the importance of family hardly tallied. No, that was unfair. He did understand. And he did realise how important family was, which was why he was beating himself up about what they were doing.
Cal caught her arm suddenly, pulling her close. Their noses touched. ‘You know there has never been anyone else, don’t you? I’ve never done this before. It’s you … it’s only because of the way I feel about you.’
Nell nodded, feeling a flash of pleasure. She left Cal standing in his boxers clutching his cold, abandoned wedding band and started frantically combing the streets for a taxi.
‘Mum, calm down. He’s going to pull through.’
Nell tried to take a full breath but found that she couldn’t. She had tried hard to imagine how awful Luke might look on her taxi ride to the hospital, but this wasn’t what she had expected. The sticky, rust-brown blood, the machines, Luke’s dreadful pallor. It was shocking to see her brother, such a vital person, reduced to this.
‘How do you know that? How can you possibly know that Luke will pull through?’ Her mother was a mess, both physically and emotionally. Her hair was all over the place and she could barely string a sentence together. Pacing from one end of the room to another, she couldn’t sit still for a second and it was putting Nell’s nerves on edge, like someone stroking a cat the wrong way.
‘I don’t know, Mum,’ Nell admitted. They were both shell-shocked, but for some reason, she felt that she should be the one saying all the right things. She hadn’t cried yet, but she wanted to, just for the sheer release it would bring. ‘I’m just trying to think positively, is all.’
‘Where the hell have you been, anyway? Why didn’t you come as soon as I called you?’ Patricia’s tone was accusatory, but she probably didn’t realise how she sounded.
Nell’s opened her mouth then thought better of it. What could she say? That she’d been in bed with a married man – a professor at her college, no less? No. It was unthinkable, especially right at this moment.
Nell glanced at Luke. And to think she had waited to confide in him about Cal. Why had she waited? What was the point? Now it was too late. Not too late; what a stupid thing to think. Luke was going to come out of this, but Nell cursed herself for leaving it, for feeling the need to be secretive, even for a short while.
‘Lucy.’ Nell was stunned at the sight of her sister-in-law. She wore a grey Transfomers T-shirt and a pair of flowery flip flops. Her cheeks were as grey as her top and her legs, naked up to mid-thigh, looked pale and vulnerable.
Nell stared at her, thinking how young Lucy looked without make-up. She looked out of place, like a student who’d wandered downstairs for breakfast after a heavy night.
Catching sight of her, Patricia spun round. ‘Lucy. You must be distraught. Are you all right? And what are you wearing?’
Nell stared at Lucy. There was something strange about the exhausted slump of Lucy’s shoulders, about the empty look in her eyes. Something else had happened. Something terrible. Nell’s eyes dropped to Lucy’s stomach. It looked oddly deflated. Nell felt a cry rising up and she clapped a hand to her mouth to keep it in.
Lucy slid into the chair next to Luke’s bed, tiredly leaning her head against the wall. ‘I – I was pregnant. Nearly sixteen weeks.’ She wavered, clasping her knees with her hands.
‘Was?’ Patricia’s hands started to shake.
‘I’m afraid so.’ Tears slid down Lucy’s cheeks but her eyes seemed strangely glazed. ‘I lost the baby in the night. They don’t know why. They … they never know why.’
Patricia let out a strangled gasp.
‘IVF, last attempt,’ Lucy managed. ‘A … a little girl.’
‘No. Oh, Lucy, no.’ Patricia shook her head repeatedly, back and forth, back and forth. She made to step forward, but her movements were wooden.
Nell took Lucy’s hand. It was small and cold, like a child’s. She hated that she had been right, that Lucy had been pregnant. And worst of all that she wasn’t any more. Four months, four whole months. That only made the loss all the more tragic. And now Luke was in a coma. Poor, poor Lucy.
Nell felt something ripple up inside and she struggled to hold it back. Now wasn’t the time for a panic attack. That would be selfish and inappropriate. Lucy was suffering a double tragedy; she was only suffering one. She simply had to breathe. In, out, concentrate, focus. Wasn’t that what her therapist always used to say?
Nell saw her mother open her mouth, begin to say something. Almost in slow motion, Nell urged her to say nothing, to think before she spoke. Her mother wasn’t known for her tact and Lucy had already been destroyed.
‘Please don’t,’ Lucy said, before any words – right or wrong – could be uttered aloud. ‘Patricia. Please. Please. I … I can’t …’
Nell glanced at her mother, seeing the words freeze in her throat.
It was too much, too much for anyone to bear. Nell couldn’t imagine how Lucy must be feeling. Losing their final IVF baby and now this, Luke, in a coma. Nell wanted to say something, but the right words wouldn’t come.
Nell tried to ignore the sterile air that was permeating her nostrils, doing her best to put the image of Luke’s rust-stained head out of her mind. Luke was going to be all right. He had to be. They needed him. They all needed him. Nell’s thoughts shifted uncontrollably to her father and Ade. She had lost them, both of them. One had died, one had run away. Nell shrunk inside, transported to her teenage years. She was out of control, floundering, and now she was on the brink of losing another anchor.
Not Luke as well, not Luke as well …
Nell gritted her teeth. All she had to do was breathe. She couldn’t fall apart and she couldn’t act like this was worse for her than it was for anyone else. She simply had to breathe. Simple.
There hadn’t been much change to speak of. They said it was to be expected after such a severe accident and it was only the following day, so I shouldn’t be downhearted about Luke’s vitals looking pretty much the same.
Vitals. Vital signs. In Luke’s case, in the state he was in, the description seemed to underline how very … un-vital he was. His body was too still, as if his dynamic energy and spirit was being held down beneath the sheets.
The hours since discovering him in ICU had limped past with agonising, unremarkable slowness. Another trip to surgery, the promise of a CT head scan which would reveal any bleeds or larger blood clots, but no real change.
The kindly Dr Wallis had been replaced by another consultant, or rather, a surgeon; a man with enormous teeth like tombstones. Apparently, this was all very normal; patients in a state of trauma were dealt with by a team of people, the lead changing as each different issue was dealt with. And
