One Last Love (4 page)

‘I quite like it,’ Danny said.

Bonnie laughed quietly. ‘Well, you puftas can have all the tripe to yourselves then.’

‘Oh Bonnie, can we?’ Danny laughed. ‘You know I get the feeling I’m just gonna have to get used to being called a pufta. Better than some names I’ve been called, I can tell you.’

‘Think of it as a term of endearment Danny,’ Bonnie said. ‘It’s not everyone I meet who gets one.’

‘So what about me?’ Angeline asked.’ Do I get one too?’

‘I’ll have to get to know you better I think. Perhaps after dinner.’

‘Ok then Bonnie, I’ll be expecting a lovely term of endearment from you by dessert.’

‘Have to put my thinking cap on now.’

‘Now you’re cornered Bonnie,’ Danny said.

‘And remember, I’m not gay!’ Angeline said with mock seriousness.

‘Damn. Added degree of difficulty then,’ Bonnie laughed.

Two more people entered the dining room and sat at another table just as small salads were being served at Bonnie’s table. ‘That’s Charlie and Henry. I’ll introduce you later if you like,’ Danny offered.

‘Thanks. Yes, perhaps after dinner.’

‘Pork roast or chicken with dumplings tonight,’ the lady serving the salad announced. Angeline and Danny choosing the chicken and Bonnie the pork.

‘So you both rabbis then? Love a good pork roast.’

‘Another prejudice Bonnie?’ Danny asked with a broad smile.

‘Would you like me to recite the whole list? Got hundreds of ‘em.’

‘We’ve all got hang ups I think,’ Angeline said seriously.

‘Agree with you on that,’ Danny said.

‘Know what you two mean. But you have to be tolerant sometimes. Look, I wasn’t all that keen on puftas up to a few hours ago, but look at me now. Having bloody dinner with one.’

‘Oh Bonnie, you’re so sweet. Give me a kiss,’ Danny mocked with a pucker of his lips.

‘Bloody puftas. Piss off,’ Bonnie smiled at Angeline.

‘Yeah Danny, what a tart you are,’ she said and the three laughed so loudly together that Charlie and Henry looked up from their salads. Laughter not being something they had heard in the dining room before tonight. Even the lady standing in the servery looked up from carving the roast to see what was happening.

‘And anyway, you can’t have Bonnie. He’s mine!’

‘Now we know Angeline.’ Danny said.

‘Know what?’

‘About your fetish for older men.’

‘Ha Danny, with my current choice in men, Bonnie wins hands down.’

‘Whoa, Whoa!’ Bonnie said through the laughter. ‘If it’s coming down to a choice, I’ve made up my mind.’

‘Yes?’ Angeline asked.

‘Neither of you. I much prefer hot roast dinners, and here comes one now.’

‘You lot seem to be having fun,’ the lady said as she served their main courses.

‘It’s all Bonnie’s fault,’ Danny replied.

‘Who me?’ Bonnie said with a look of innocence.

‘Well enjoy your meals,’ the lady said and left them to eat.

‘You were right Bonnie.’

‘Right Angeline?’

‘Yes. I should’ve ordered the pork roast. It looks scrumptious.’

As they ate, their conversation slowed except for Angeline asking Bonnie for some of his pork crackling. He mockingly slapped her hand lightly as she stole a piece from his plate. And another.

‘You are a little Nancy, aren’t you?’

‘Nancy?’

‘Yes, in Oliver Twist. Fagin’s little girl he had trained as a thief since birth.’

‘Oh no, you know who I am,’ Angeline said with hand to her mouth, still crunching on her stolen crackling.

‘Ha, And I always thought a little Nancy was a pufta Bonnie.’

‘Well there you go. What a pair of little Nancys you two are.’

By the time dinner was finished, Bonnie had fulfilled his promise and Angeline was very happy with her new nickname. Nancy. After bidding them goodnight, he wheeled his way back to his room. He didn’t get the opportunity to meet the other two in the dining room as they had finished eating and had left well before Bonnie and his two new friends. There would be time tomorrow or the next day. For now Bonnie was happy to sleep after a wonderful dinner with splendid and entertaining company. It was only as he waited for sleep to come that he found himself thinking about how young they both were and the unfairness of it all, and about his own bigotry.

Had it been at another time and place, he would have avoided both of them like the plague. Angeline simply because she was young – with a stud in her nose, another through her eyebrow and several in her right ear; it would have been enough for him to have decided to steer clear of a young troublemaker. He would have been suspicious of anyone looking like her and probably would have felt threatened with being robbed in the street. The young kids Bonnie had seen in the streets in his neighbourhood always had the look of unemployed layabouts and petty criminals. But he’d never spoken to any of them of course, he just lumped them into the same stereotypical pot. Young, useless and foulmouthed. As they probably did with him – just one more of the old intolerant bastards.

If he’d ever spoken to a homosexual before, he couldn’t recall. Maybe he had and didn’t know they were but if he had known he would have ridiculed them, then told them to get lost. Nobody liked faggots. If Danny had walked in on him while he was drinking with his pub mates, even just a few weeks ago, he would have been met by silent glares of disapproval and if that didn’t move him out the door, he would’ve been told in no uncertain manner that puftas weren’t welcome in the their bar. He spent the minutes waiting for sleep wondering if his attitude today was a result of feeling pity – on them, or for himself. Whoever they were, and whatever they’d done, neither of them deserved to be here with him.

When sleep finally arrived, so did Carol. ‘You want to torment me until my last breath, don’t you.’

Day Two

Dark clouds and rain greeted Bonnie as he woke. Another orderly, who introduced himself as Robert arrived a little later and brought Bonnie’s breakfast to his room, placing the tray on his sliding bed table.

‘Looks like we’re in for a bit of rain,’ Robert said and reminded Bonnie immediately of one of his favourite songs. Strangers Talk Only About The Weather by Tom Waits.

‘Well, it’s been a bit dry.’

‘Might clear up by this afternoon I heard.’

‘At least it’s warm though. When I lived down south, I hated those cold wet days.’

‘Oh, so when did you move up here?’

‘Must be six or seven years now. Time flies.’

‘Certainly does. I moved up here from the South around the same time.’

‘You worked here long?’

‘Only started a couple of months back. Used to be a brickie’s labourer but did my back in.’

‘Tough job. I did it for a while when I was young. Near bloody killed me it did.’

‘Well, I’ll leave you to have your breakfast Mr. Mayfield.’

‘Thanks. And everyone calls me Bonnie.’

‘Alright Bonnie. So, how’d you get the name?

‘My mum bless her heart. My name’s Charles, but she rabbited on for so long about me being her little Bonnie Prince Charlie that the name finally stuck.’

‘Could’ve been worse. My mum still calls me Tinks. Luckily no one else does.’

‘Yep. Don’t think that would’ve gone down well when you were a brickie’s labourer.’

‘You bet. Now no telling anyone here huh Bonnie. Our secret.’

‘Safe with me Robert.’

‘Thanks. I’ll be back later to collect your tray. Anything you need?’

‘No. Thanks Robert. Got everything I need. Might have my breakfast then read for a while. Not much else to do in weather like this.’

After a heavy dinner the night before, Bonnie’s appetite only managed a few mouthfuls of his breakfast. He pushed his bed table away and tried to get up. After a bit of effort and a bout of coughing, he plopped his backside into his wheel chair and wheeled himself to the bathroom. He returned to his room and looked out at the greyness of the day and the drizzle that was starting to settle in. He thought about the two he’d had dinner with the night before and how young they were. Angeline’s baldness and sickly pallor robbing her of the young and beautiful femininity she deserved. The unfairness of her fate heavy on his mind. Of Danny. A young man being cut down in his prime. Bonnie contemplated his own bigotry towards homosexuals that he had felt all his life, but faced with the reality of a young man dying in front of his own eyes, how could he justify this now? Bonnie couldn’t bring himself even close to understanding homosexuality, but that said, he didn’t believe it deserved Danny’s fate. He thought about the mistakes he had made in his own life and the wrongs he had committed. Probably far worse that Danny had probably ever even contemplated. Yet here he was, dying at a respectable age.

And of Angeline, or Nancy as he’d christened her. The unfairness hung heavily on him. While he had struggled to accept his own impending death when Dr. Phillips had told him just a couple of days ago, it seemed to fade into total unimportance now. What was happening to him was natural and something he was slowly coming to accept. He just had to wait for his suffering to end and no one would care when it came. But for the families of Nancy and Danny, the suffering, blame and guilt would last for a very long time for them. He watched the rain fall – grey, dark and mournful. Not a great way to start one of one’s last remaining days.

There was a knock at his door. ‘Come in.’

‘Hello. I’m Mary. I’ve come to help you have a shower,’ she said with a warm smile. Much younger than Odele, Bonnie assumed she was a junior nurse. Quite tall, with very short dark spikey hair, she had a tomboy look about her.

‘Do I smell that bad huh? Get a whiff from your nurses’ station did you?’

‘Oh no, certainly not Mr. Mayfield.’

‘I prefer to be called Bonnie if it’s ok with you.’

‘Yes, I’d been told that but thought I would be polite to start with.’

‘Well, if you’re gonna scrub my back in the shower, we’d best get onto a first name basis in a hurry.’

‘Ok Bonnie it is then.’

‘It was always a bloke in the hospital.’

‘A bloke?’

‘A man who helped me shower.’

‘Would you prefer a man? I can go and ask for….’

‘Na, it’s ok. Long time since I had a woman in the shower with me.’

‘If it’s a problem Bonnie, I can….’

‘I don’t think there’ll be any problems Mary. Just keep your clothes on alright.’

‘You’re a bit of a card I’ve been told.’

‘Can’t understand why. Just say what I think.’

‘I can handle that.’

Mary helped Bonnie into the bathroom and readied him for his shower. Sitting him on the plastic chair in the shower recess.

‘Too hot?’

‘Fine, thanks.’

‘I hear you had everyone laughing last night at dinner.’

‘Have I become infamous already?’

‘Sounds like it. Not often we have people laughing in the dining room, so the news travelled fast.’

‘I’ll try and behave myself. … Ouch, it’s gone a bit hot!’

‘Sorry,’ Mary said as she adjusted the temperature of the water. ‘Better?’

‘Yes, thanks.’

‘So what was so funny last night?’

‘I really can’t recall. I don’t know. I was a bit, well, off balance I s’pose. Danny and Angeline are so young. Never had it slammed in my face before. I mean, young people like that.’

‘It’s never easy,’ Mary said as she sponged Bonnie’s back.

‘I lost my son in an accident when he was eleven. But at least I didn’t have to suffer watching him slowly die over years. So unfair.’

‘Sometimes you just have to accept Bonnie.’

‘Maybe, but I’m having a problem doing so. If there’s such a thing as a god, he can obviously be a real bastard at times I think.’

‘Are you religious?’

‘Yes. I’m a cricketer,’ he said with a wry smile.

‘Point taken,’ she said as she turned the water off. ‘Can you stand and I’ll dry you off.’

Bonnie grabbed the hand rail and managed to pull himself up with a little help from Mary and stood while she towelled him down, then she slipped a bathrobe around him, combed his hair and helped him shave. Then without a further word between them, helped him dress in fresh clothes.

‘All done I think Bonnie. Feel fresher?’

‘Yes, thank you. I probably smell better too hey?’

‘Like a million dollars,’ she smiled as she helped him to his sofa. ‘Anything I can get you?

‘A new pair of legs wouldn’t go astray.’

‘I’ll check in the spare parts store. See what I can rustle up.’

‘I can make a list of new parts I need if you like.’

‘Good idea. Never know what I’ll find.’

‘If you find beer, I’ll take that instead.’

‘If you ask nicely in the dining room, you just might get lucky on that score.’

‘Thanks for the tip Mary.’

‘Alright Bonnie. Better be off.’

‘Thanks.’

The rain was heavier now as he looked out from his window. Bleak and grey, with the trees in the distance showing their displeasure by snapping branches back and forth in anger at the wind. He watched them as they lashed out like a child’s legs throwing a tantrum. Wishing he could express his anger as violently at those who had blown in, and then out of his life. Bringing with them gusts of mistrust and bitterness. Then leaving, yet their invisible spite remained. Bonnie grit his teeth to control his anger. He took a reflexive deep breath that his mind had ordered and not his lungs, and then the tightening in his chest added its message of anxiety.

He heard the whispered chatter and measured footsteps of visitors passing in the hall outside his door. Coming perhaps to say their goodbyes, or more likely, to ignore reality. But at least they came to see their friends or loved ones. Bonnie didn’t expect there would be any coming to see him. What family he knew of all lived down south, and his friends up here were pub friends. You drink, laugh, swear and tell one another dirty jokes, but you don’t get closer than that. His neighbours were very polite and always said hello, but even after six years he didn’t know their names. He didn’t really want to either. When people got too close it just got messy he had justified to himself in recent years. Better to keep to yourself.