Anthem for Jackson Dawes (15 page)

‘Howlongwillittake?' There was a hesitation. Megan gazed up to see Dad brushing something out of his eyes.

Mum answered. ‘A few hours maybe.'

‘But you …' Dad gave her another nudge, ‘will think it only lasted a minute. Honestly. You won't know a thing about it till you wake up.'

Megan closed her eyes. It was easier than trying to keep them open, but all of a sudden tears began to ooze out of them and there was no way to stop it happening. Maybe it was relief at seeing Dad, maybe fear of the operation, but she was helpless.

‘Now then, sweetheart. Don't worry.'

Dad found a tissue and dabbed it at her eyes, but Megan couldn't stop. Tears drained down her cheeks, on to her pillow, seeping through to the plastic cover under the pillowcase. They streamed into her ears. It was like a tap turned on full.

‘They know where the tumour is,' Mum said, ‘and the operation's going to take a bit of time … but it isn't over-complicated … They'll make sure you'll have plenty of stuff to keep you comfortable afterwards, stop you hurting.'

Dad's voice came, gentle, persistent. ‘Injections, into your tube. Probably. That's what you'll have. They won't let you hurt.'

The words weren't helping because it was out of her hands, this crying. Mum squeezed her hand. ‘It'll be fine, love.'

‘Come on, give us a hug,' Dad said. ‘And as soon as you're back on the ward, we'll ring Grandad. He says he'll wait by the phone.'

Notes and X-rays were balanced on her stomach. They felt heavy, solid. Siobhan was there, and Mum, with her arm through Dad's. Everyone looked upside down. The ceiling drifted past. They were going along a corridor. The man pushing the trolley was chatting to Mum and Dad. He said he was from Poland. Sounded like that footballer. Who was it? She shifted her head to see the man from Poland, but he was upside down like everyone else. That couldn't be right.

Pictures. Poppies in fields. Landscapes. A child with big dewy eyes. A horse. Signs for places Jackson would have gone. They all sailed slowly past her. Mum and Dad were talking to her now. Saying it wouldn't be long before she'd be coming back up the corridor. Then a turn, and through two doors.

‘Dad?'

‘I'm here, sweetie. And Mum. We can come with you till you get the anaesthetic.'

‘Thassgood.'

They were in a room. All glass cupboards, all lights and full of people in green.

‘Hello. Megan, isn't it? Do you remember me? Dr Singh. I'm the anaesthetist. I came to see you on the ward. Do you remember?' She had a high voice full of
laughter, full of smiles. There was a red mark in the middle of her forehead.

‘Yesss,' Megan answered.

‘Now then, dear, I'm going to put this needle in your hand and give you something to make you go fast to sleep.'

‘We'll just be waiting outside,' Mum said, her voice a whisper, like a secret just for her. ‘Just outside that door. Once you go to sleep. We'll be there, me and Dad, and you'll see us in no time.'

‘Yessss,' Megan said.

‘Now, dear, I'm putting the needle in, just a little scratch.' Just a little scratch. There was a click, a snap.

A nurse came over with a syringe full of something milky-looking. She smiled at Megan who blinked up at her but couldn't make her mouth move.

‘Now,' the anaesthetist said. ‘I want you to count to ten for me. Will you do that, dear? Count for me now. One … two …'

‘Three …'

Cool fingers on her wrist, just sitting there, gently. A slight pressure. ‘Pulse eighty-four.'

Something on her arm, a hiss and a wheeze, growing tighter until her hand ached and all the blood stopped. Then slowly back, thump, thump, thump. Another hiss and the tightness disappeared.

‘BP a hundred over sixty.'

Awake. Almost. Asleep. Almost. A drowsy delicious
in-between thing drifting around like mist. She couldn't catch it. Nothing belonged. Sleep came but wouldn't stay. She wanted it to stay, wanted to keep her eyes closed, to stop them shivering open, but sleep went away again, wakefulness came.

Words. All around her. She recognised them but not the voices.

Where was she? Ah, what did it matter? It was a nice feeling, this. In and out of clouds and sleep and waves and warmth.

Lovely. Lovely.

She half opened her eyes to see the lights hanging in strips above her. Too bright. Eyes closed again. The lights stayed there like pictures.

Something around her head. A band. She couldn't feel her ears. Maybe they'd gone away, somewhere else. No, that wasn't right.

‘Megan … hello, Megan. Time to wake up.' A warm hand took hold of hers. ‘Come on. Open your eyes, Megan.'

She tried but they were glued shut.

‘Squeeze my hand. Come on.'

Squeeze.

‘And again, come on.'

Squeeze again.

‘She's fine. You can take her back to the ward.'

All a dream. Just a dream.

But there was Dad.

A miracle.

Megan remembered nothing about the time after her operation. It was just a blank space. She'd been very ill, spiked a fever they told her later, showing her the temperature chart, the line shooting up like an arrow to the sky. It was touch and go, they said, really touch and go.

It wasn't until the line began to make its jittery way down the chart that Megan began to feel better and the blank space began to fill up with words, only they were like random pieces of a puzzle, all there but in no order at all. It took for ever to sort it out, and when it was complete, Jackson wasn't there. Neither was Siobhan or Sister Brewster. Where were they all? The questions tumbled about in her head.
Where am I? Am I in the right place?

All around her were strange nurses, checking her, tidying her, washing and drying her, because she could hardly lift a finger to help herself.

When, finally, she was able to sit up, all shaky and weak, she was in her old room and there was talk of going home, that being the best place, now that her operation was all over and she was on the mend. But she didn't want to go home, not if Jackson was coming back.

She had to see him.

Relentlessly, the days moved on till it was her last one, and still Jackson wasn't back. Or maybe he was, and they didn't want her to know. That was it. Of course it was. They didn't want them to be together. Someone must have seen them that day in her room. They'd put him on the adult ward to keep them apart.

Megan wandered, a little unsteadily, around the place, looking for Jackson but all she found were children. They were so young. One had a mask over his face attached to the oxygen line behind his bed. He looked very pale, apart from his cheeks, which glowed like small red apples.

There were parents playing with their children, or reading to them, some just holding hands. One boy vomited into a bowl. He looked at the contents in complete surprise. His head was as bald as an egg.

A little girl lay flat on her back with a drip attached to her arm. She was fast asleep. Maybe she'd had an
operation. Maybe she was waiting for one. Whatever it was, her mum looked very tired, leaning into the bed, eyes closed, her hair in rats' tails.

There was the octopus, sitting in the corner. There were the dolphins, swimming up walls. On the windows, pretty starfish, shells, mermaids, sea horses. How hadn't she seen these things before? Maybe she'd been too fed up to notice when she first came in, so long ago.

She wandered past Jackson's old room and found someone else lying in his bed. It was a girl about the same age as him. Somehow that was shocking. The girl turned her head, looked at Megan. She was pale, wispy, her arms like twigs, eyes huge. Her body hardly made a lump under the sheet.

The Nurses' Station. Sister Brewster was there, talking to one of the ward auxiliaries.

‘Where's Jackson?' Megan said, interrupting, not caring.

Sister Brewster exchanged a look with the auxiliary who picked up some charts and bustled away with them. ‘I was busy talking, Megan. You could see that.'

‘Yes, but where is he?' She felt weak now, after all that walking, and wanted to sit down, but she wouldn't. Not till she knew.

Sister Brewster gathered together some pieces of paper, straightening them up as if it was vitally important they be straightened. A young doctor
Megan didn't recognise rushed up to the desk, grabbed a stethoscope and rushed off.

‘Forgot this,' he said. ‘Hi, Megan. You're looking good! Home today, hey?'

He tore down the ward, not waiting for an answer.

Megan turned back to Sister Brewster, determined to stay until there was an answer. A baby cried a weak little note from a nearby room. Someone shushed it gently.

‘He went home, Megan. You know that already. You've asked every single nurse,' Sister Brewster said with a sigh. There was something in her voice now, softness perhaps.

‘I thought he had some more treatment to get,' Megan persevered. ‘He said he did, before he had his operation.' She stood and waited. Sister Brewster looked down at the papers studying them for a few seconds.

‘Yes, that's right, but … there are some treatments you can have at home. It's a better place really. More comfortable. No restrictions. Most people prefer it, really …'

Megan waited to hear something about rules, about breaking them, about haircuts, razors, mortuaries, staying up too late. There was nothing. Sister Brewster merely cradled the papers against her chest.

‘Will he be coming back?'

‘No, Megan, he won't.'

Megan stared down at her slippers. Mum had bought them specially. She hated slippers, hated having to wear them. They made her feel like a baby.

‘Is he never coming back?'

‘No,' came the reply, gentle, final. ‘He isn't.'

But how could that be right? Jackson wouldn't have gone without saying something. He would have said goodbye.

Megan raised her eyes to meet Sister Brewster's. She held them, determined not to look away first, determined to hear a different answer. She didn't care how busy the ward was, she didn't care that somewhere, very close, the weak-sounding baby was still crying and wouldn't be comforted.

She wanted a different answer.

It didn't come.

Dreaming. Everything fuzzy, falling apart. A puppet with no strings. Too early, too dark. Trying to catch hold of something, but it was sliding away.

‘Megan, love. I have to get going soon.' Everything a whisper, like secrets. ‘Come on, love, up you get. I want to be on the road – soon as the traffic dies down. It'll take me a good two hours.'

Grandad's birthday. Oh no. The party she didn't want to go to. And didn't know how to say it.

Mum's cool hand on her forehead. ‘Are you feeling all right?'

How could she ever feel
all right
again? ‘Course, Mum. Just forgot to set my alarm.'

It had been a long time since she'd had to.

‘You do feel better, don't you?'

It was three months since she'd left hospital. Megan smiled, so that Mum would know she was OK. Keeping bright. Keeping cheerful. Letting her know it was all right. Easy-peasy. ‘Stop fussing, Mum.'

Mostly she did feel better. Really. And she was glad to be away from the ward and elephants on curtains, and octopus beanbags and little ones, and Sister Brewster.

Only.

Megan slid her fingers under the pillow … just in case … just to see if everything was still there. And of course it was. Nothing had
magicked
them away. Nothing could.

Mum opened the curtains and sunlight swept in. She was wearing Dad's dressing gown. Blue towelling. And just a short thing but it swallowed her up, bunching around her waist, making her look fat. Her hair was wet from the shower, her cheeks pink.

Why was she still standing there if everything was such a rush?

‘What's wrong?'

‘I was just wondering, if you wanted to … change your mind about … the hospital …? I could make a detour. The new unit's so special and you've been invited.'

Not
this
again.

‘Just to say hello. Sister Brewster said she'd love to see you there.'

‘Mum!'

‘But it's the
opening ceremony
. It's important. There's an MP going, someone from London, and that X Factor person – what's her name? Oh, I can't remember. You know.'

‘Mum …'

‘And the newspapers. TV. It's a big thing.' The words came out in one long line. ‘It's on my way and there's a direct bus back here for you. It's a new service.'

Would she never, ever, give up?

‘I don't
want
to, Mum. I've told you. Every time you ask. I don't care if it's a stupid opening ceremony. Going on about it's not going to make me change my mind.'

Mum looked frustrated.

She was going to be even more frustrated when she found out that Megan wasn't going to Grandad's either. Upsetting all the careful plans – Mum going on ahead, taking everyone's stuff, while Megan waited for Dad to come home so she could travel down with him.

But … one disappointment at a time.

‘All right. If that's what you want.' Mum sighed, shook her head.

‘It is. You know it is.'

Megan refused to look at her, refused to even look in that direction, not until she could hear the door open, hear it close and know that Mum was on the other side.

But she hadn't gone. ‘You know, love, I'm here if you want to talk about it …'

Megan didn't answer, didn't try to tell Mum the thing she'd been putting off. She just listened for the door to close and Mum's footsteps to pad away.

Under her pillow lay the picture, which she loved, and the letter, which she hated. All folded up into tight little squares. Everything about her squeezed into them. The Megan she once was, back in the hospital. She tried not to think about it. But it was like a pain that nothing could stop and nothing could take away.