humour darkened and sometimes it needed reeling in.
‘We’re supposed to be a team.’
‘Really?’ Sheila gave him a wide-eyed look. ‘Since when, Cort? You’ve been hell since you got back from your holidays. You do nothing to be a part of this so-called team. Look at yesterday with Jamelia—you just swanned in and took over …’ Her voice trailed off, because it wasn’t the best of examples. After all, without him the patient wouldn’t have even made it to ICU, so she tried a different tack instead. ‘I don’t see you at any of the staff functions—you didn’t come on the team-building exercise. I’ve worked with you for years and I don’t know anything more about you than I did on the first day we met.’
‘I’m talking about work,’ Cort said. ‘We don’t need to be in every aspect of each other’s lives to function as a team.’
‘Then I’ll try to ensure we function better.’ Sheila spat his chosen word back at him, and Cort knew she was right, knew he was asking more than he was prepared to give.
‘Okay,’ Cort said. ‘Point taken. I am trying to make more of an effort …’ He just hated the touchy-feely stuff, and a day shooting paint balls in a teambuilding exercise simply wasn’t him. ‘And I’ll work the roster and see if I can shadow Jamelia for a couple of weeks—maybe build up her confidence. What about you?’ Cort said, demanding compromise.
‘Fine,’ Sheila snapped. ‘I’ll have a word, keep an eye open …’ She gave a weary nod. ‘I was actually going to speak to Siobhan anyway. I know how she can come across at times, but her heart is in the right place. I’ll talk to them,’ Sheila offered.
‘Good,’ Cort said, and really he should have left it there, except as he turned, he couldn’t.
‘What about the student?’
‘Ruby.’ Sheila didn’t play games. ‘I think we both know her name.’
Cort chose not to dwell on whatever point Sheila was making. Instead, he tried to act as he always did. ‘As you said, the nursing staff are your concern.’
But weren’t they supposed to be changing how they did things around here? Cort thought as he went to walk out. Hadn’t Sheila demanded that he didn’t act as he always had, that instead he get more involved? For the second time he turned. ‘Maybe you could give her—’
‘I’ll think about it,’ Sheila said, without Cort having the chance to speak, because despite an exchange of words she respected him far too much to make him ask what he possibly shouldn’t. ‘I’ll ring Ruby later—I just hope she’s in the right frame of mind to listen.’
He hoped so too.
He really hoped so, as he walked to his car, which had been parked overnight in the hospital. Cort ached, not just for a bed that was a bit bigger than the small one he’d shared last night but space and a shower and clean socks and underwear and some beans on toast and some lovely silence.
He’d done all he could, Cort told himself, turning on the radio, because silence actually sent his mind back to her.
It was up to her now, Cort insisted.
So why on earth was he indicating to turn left?
Ruby had walked along the beach, backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards, looking at the waves that kept rolling in. A little child was gone and there was no point regretting her decision to flee from Emergency because absolutely she could not have gone in to her, could not have laid a little child out.
And if that made her a bad nurse, then she was one.
If this meant she had failed, so be it.
And now she’d head home to her friends who loved her and who would try to talk her out of it, who would do everything they could to encourage her to go back, which they might have succeeded in doing had she told them everything.
‘What are you doing here?’ Jess looked up as Ruby walked in. ‘I thought you were on a late.’
‘I had to come home.’ Ruby saw them all carefree and smiling and hated what her work would do to their evening. ‘There was a house fire …’
‘I heard about it on the radio,’ Ellie groaned. ‘I never even thought … Did they come in to you? Oh, Ruby …’ Ellie stood, but Ruby didn’t want to hear it and shrugged off Ellie’s words and her waiting hug and just headed to her room.
‘Leave her,’ Ruby heard Tilly say, and was grateful for it as she went to her room. The scarf was still on her door, but she knew Tilly would ignore it and felt the indentation of the bed a little while later when Tilly came in and sat down.
‘I don’t want to go back,’ Ruby said.
‘I know.’ Tilly did her best to be understanding. ‘Remember when I helped deliver that stillbirth?’ Tilly said gently. ‘I knew the mum was coming in for induction the next day and I honestly didn’t know if I was up to it, but you told me the mum would be better off for having me there.’
‘It’s not the same,’ Ruby said. ‘Because you’re good at what you do, whereas all I did today was stab myself with a needle when I was pulling up the drugs and yesterday, when I sat with the relatives, I couldn’t say even one single word. I’m useless …’
‘You’ll be a wonderful psych nurse.’
‘I’ll only be a wonderful psych nurse so long as the patients don’t go collapsing or fainting or getting sick.’ She closed her eyes. ‘And psych patients die too … Just leave me, Tilly,’ Ruby said.
‘I’m not leaving you.’
‘Aren’t you all going to the beach for a barbecue?’
‘I don’t want to leave you—I’m going to stay home.’
‘Please don’t,’ Ruby begged. ‘I just want to be on my own.’
She heard her friends leaving and lay there quietly. Her room was warm and she pushed the window wide open then pulled the drape and stripped down to her pants. She turned on the fan and lay on the bed and tried to work out what to do, if there even was something she could do now that she’d burnt all her bridges with Sheila.
She heard the doorbell and ignored it, just not up to speaking to anyone.
She turned on her soothing music and lay there but it didn’t soothe. Then there was a knock at her door.
‘Tilly, please.’ She just wanted to be alone with her thoughts. ‘Go out with them …’ Her voice trailed off, as standing there was a man who shouldn’t be back in her bedroom again. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘God knows,’ Cort said, because she was lying on top of her bed in just her knickers with a fan blowing.
She’d been crying, her eyelids were swollen, her nose and lips too, and there was a jumble of used tissues by the bed. But there were two other things he noticed as well and he couldn’t have this conversation with them there. ‘Don’t you cover up when your friends come in?’
‘My friends don’t come in
