Take the A-Train (2 page)

Gumshoe, I ask you!

‘So you just popped in to see me? You’re lucky they didn’t toss you out on your backside,’ I said.

‘I spoke to a doctor, and he said visitors were good for you. You think too much.’

‘Let me guess,’ I interrupted. ‘In your maidenly way you convinced him that you were a defrocked nun bringing some comforts to my bed of pain.’

‘I don’t know about the defrocked bit,’ she said, ‘but I was visiting my dad and I thought I’d come and see you too.’

‘Your dad’s in hospital?’

‘No, he lives in one of the prefabs over the road, so I thought I’d look you up.’

‘I’m glad you did,’ I said. And I really was. So would you have been, believe me.

We kicked some conversational crap around the room as if we were old pals, which we weren’t, and even though she was an asset to the surroundings I kept wondering why she’d bothered. When we calmed down, and I started to get used to her thighs, she got to the real nitty gritty. ‘So tell me what happened,’ she said.

‘I’d rather not,’ I said back.

‘Modest?’

‘Hardly. It wasn’t one of my finest hours.’

‘You did all right, I heard.’

‘Not really.’

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘It was a dumb thing to do, coming here. Christ, I feel like a fool now. I think I’d better go.’

‘No, don’t do that.’

She fiddled around with one of the metal buttons on her jacket and I drank some more beer and the sun moved further down towards the city skyline.

‘Is it bad?’ she asked.

‘What?’

‘The leg.’

‘No problem,’ I said, and gave her the benefit of my best profile as I put the beer bottle on the edge of the wheeled trolley parked at the side of my bed. ‘I fuck one of them up every couple of years just to get a month or two in bed.’ I rescued the Moosehead and put on a brave, nonchalant face.

I gave her my best profile again and assumed an expression that I hoped teamed steely resolve and boyish charm with just the hint of a sexy twinkle in my eyes. Macho and dependable was the impression I was trying to put over, but my leg chose that moment to give me a reminder that it was still there. I felt a grinding, stabbing agony shoot up my thigh, breathed out sharply, bit down on my lip and spilled the last of the beer down my clean PJs.

‘Shit!’ I said.

Fiona looked a bit worried and held my arm tightly. ‘Shall I call a nurse?’

I squeezed her fingers and the pain went as quickly as it had come. She smelled fresh and sweet. ‘No,’ I said. ‘It’s not as bad as it was. I’ll be OK.’

‘Does that happen often?’

‘Not as much as it did, thank God.’

‘You’ve got beer all down yourself,’ she said, as if I needed telling.

‘There are some clean T-shirts in the cupboard over there. Would you mind?’

I wrestled my wet jacket off and rippled some muscles at her but I don’t think she noticed. She hopped off the bed and went over and got me a pale yellow T-shirt from on top of a pile of clean clothes. I slipped it on.

‘I brought you something for the pain,’ she whispered.

‘What?’

She was carrying a black leather shoulder bag just about big enough to take a kitchen sink and all the plumbing. She undid the flap and brought out an old tin cigarette box, so battered that the illustration of a sailor on the lid had worn off in places. I opened it. Inside were six neatly rolled joints. I could smell the dope in the heated air of the room. ‘Well, this is a pleasant surprise,’ I said.

‘Just a little gift.’

I stuck the box into my drawer under some paper tissues then leant over and kissed her on the cheek. Her skin was as soft as a May morning. I could have kissed her all day and half the night. She pushed me away. ‘Don’t get carried away, Sharman,’ she said. ‘It’s just a bit of dope, not the beginning of a better life.’

‘You might be surprised.’

‘I’m always prepared to be surprised,’ she replied, ‘but I’m usually disappointed.’

‘You and me both.’

‘So surprise me, and offer me a drink.’

I pulled a bottle of Becks from the wine cooler and she wedged the top against the metal bed post and popped the cap off with the palm of her right hand, catching the froth with her left thumb. She picked some scraps of silver paper from around the rim of the bottle and took a long swallow. ‘That’s great.’

I got myself one of the same and opened it in rather less spectacular fashion, using a bottle opener.

‘So what’s happening, Fiona?’ I asked.

‘Usual thing, earning a crust.’

‘Keeping in shape?’

‘That’s for you to say.’

Take my word for it, she was in shape. ‘Being good?’ I asked.

She shrugged. ‘Good-bad, but not evil.’

‘Same old grind?’ I asked.

‘You got it.’

‘It’s a wonderful life.’

‘Fuck me, Sharman, don’t tell me you’re coming down with a severe case of the moral vapours. I couldn’t stand that. After what you’ve done, showing off my tits is very small potatoes. I may come on like an airhead, but just because I didn’t finish my A-levels don’t take me for one, OK? I do all right.’

I looked at her in a different light after that little diatribe. And I think I liked her better too. She was right, after all.

She looked a bit miffed for about half a minute and sucked on her bottle like an alcoholic baby, but she soon relented.

‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t mean to take your head off.’

‘My fault,’ I said. ‘You were right.’

The atmosphere warmed up a bit after that.

‘So what do you do around here for laughs?’ she asked finally.

‘For laughs?’ I said. ‘Fiona, this is Saint Tommy’s, not the WAG Club.’

‘Oh, come on, you must do something.’

‘Well, the in-crowd gather in the day room and sometimes we organise a big card school.’

‘Heavy stakes?’

‘Major league. It’s been known for a whole box of matches to change hands in a single evening.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Now and again the anaesthetists have parties, down in the basement. The bloke who plastered my leg up took me down on a trolley.’

‘What goes on?’

‘The anaesthetists sample their own merchandise. They’re well out of order that lot. They’re all downer freaks.’

‘What happens at these parties then?’

‘The one I went to,’ I said, ‘they poured twelve bottles of Sainsbury’s cheap gin into a hip bath and passed ether through it until it turned blue. Mix it with juice to kill the taste and you’ve got a dynamite cocktail. Makes a Killer Zombie look like choccy milk. I fell off the trolley on the way back and the geezer who was pushing me never noticed.’

‘Sounds good. Are they going to have another one soon, I’d like to go?’

‘Don’t know about that,’ I said. ‘Anyway, I’m not sure that I can trust the medical staff of this establishment with a girl like you.’

‘Why not?’

‘The junior doctors don’t get enough sleep as it is.’

‘Get out of here, Sharman,’ she said, but I knew she liked it.

‘It’s true.’

‘Flattery – I knew I was right to come! Shall I come again?’

‘I don’t know about that,’ I said, ‘I’m kind of exclusive these days. But you could, I suppose.’

‘Your enthusiasm kills me.’

‘Infectious, isn’t it?’

‘So shall I come by and see you again?’ she persisted.

‘Of course, I was only kidding.’ Sure I was. How many other topless models were dropping in? If you’ll excuse the expression.

‘As long as I don’t ask questions about the sisters of mercy.’

I nodded.

‘So you do want me to come back?’

‘Yeah, I give in. You’ve got me, Fiona. I’m hooked.’

‘It never fails. I just wear this dress and men drop like flies.’

We had another bottle of lager each and after a while she asked me if I was married, and I told her that I wasn’t. Then I asked her if she was, and she told me that she wasn’t either, and did she look like she was? And I told her that she didn’t and asked her if I did, and she told me that I had the look, and bit by bit I told her the whole sorry story and felt better for it.

‘So there you go. I’m all alone now with no one to call my own,’ I said at the end.

‘Tough.’ I was glad she didn’t give me any fake sympathy.

‘Especially on long cold nights,’ I said.

‘So advertise in the lonely hearts column.’

‘I did already.’

‘No good, huh, Sharman?’

‘The worst. They all wanted to make an honest man out of me,’ I said.

‘Impossible, I’d say.’

And we smiled at each other, then laughed out loud. I felt good for the first time in months.

‘When are you getting out of here?’ she asked after a bit.

‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘A month, six weeks maybe.’

‘Where do you live?’

‘Tulse Hill.’

‘How are you getting home?’

I shrugged. ‘I don’t know,’ I said again. ‘I’ll get a lift somehow, there’s plenty of time.’

‘I’ve got a car.’

‘Are you volunteering?’

‘Maybe.’

‘I’ll owe you one if you do.’

‘One what?’

‘Dinner, maybe.’

‘A date?’

‘If you like.’

‘Jesus, Sharman, but you’re hard work. I’ve been angling for a date since I came in here. I thought I was going to have to do handstands to get your attention.’

‘Hardly,’ I said. ‘But I warn you, if you go out with me you have to be careful.’

‘Why?’

‘It’s a walk on the wild side every night with me.’

‘Sounds interesting.’

‘Stick around and I’ll show you.’

‘Like when you get your Zimmer frame delivered.’

‘The minute it arrives.’

We talked for a bit longer, then she told me that her old man was expecting her for something to eat. All of a sudden I felt lonely for the first time since I’d come into hospital, and in a way resented her for making me so.

‘Something wrong?’ she asked.

‘I’m sorry you’re going.’

‘I’ll be back.’

‘Soon?’ I asked, and felt pathetic as soon as I said it, but she looked pleased.

‘Sure.’

‘Great.’

‘So get some sleep,’ she said.

‘Sure,’ I said again.

She leant over and kissed me and it went on longer than it should have done. I got a faceful of hair that smelt of Silvikrin and made me think of being out of hospital and all sorts of other things I thought I’d stopped thinking about.

When she pulled away her face was pink, my favourite colour. She jumped down off the bed and got her things together.

‘Hey!’ I said as she was leaving. She paused in the doorway, holding the handle and sort of halfway out of the room.

‘What?’

‘Thanks for the visit. I appreciated it, really.’

‘My pleasure,’ she said, and blew me a kiss with her free hand.

She went out and the door closed behind her and the room wasn’t as bright as it had been when she was there.

I
 smoked the joints, and they did help the pain, fleetingly, but that’s the way life goes, I’ve discovered.

Fiona came and visited me a lot after that. I really didn’t know what the attraction was, and didn’t care much either. Then in the first week of November my consultant deigned to grant me an interview.

He stood over me, his acolytes behind him: the female doctor who’d looked after me, a houseman, a couple of vague students and several nurses with different shades of uniform and shapes of hats. ‘We’re going to let you out early,’ said my consultant. ‘We’ve done all we can here. Stay in bed for three weeks at home then come back and we’ll take the plaster off. It’s just healing time you need now.’

‘And you could use the bed,’ I pointed out.

‘Of course we can always use an empty bed. It’s just a waste of your money staying here. Have you got someone to look after you?’

I shrugged as much as you can in traction. ‘I guess.’

‘Fine.’ He rubbed his perfectly clean and manicured hands together. ‘As soon as we’ve cleared you out, a physio will come up and teach you how to use the crutches, then you’re free to leave.’

I interrupted. ‘I know about crutches.’

‘The physio will have to be convinced.’

I tuned him out and lay back. ‘Bring on the physios then.’

Fiona came to visit that evening and I told her I was free to go home.

‘Great!’ she said. ‘Do you still want a lift?’

‘Yes, please.’

Wanda had cleaned up and closed down my flat and brought my keys back. I gave them to Fiona and she went off to check the place out and get some food in and put the heating on. She was back within a couple of hours.

‘You can’t stay there,’ she said briskly.

‘Why not?’ I asked. ‘I live there.’

‘There are too many stairs for you to get up and down for a start, and there’s no bath. You can’t be in plaster and use a shower. And if you stay there someone will have to come and look after you, and the place is far too small for two.’

‘So?’

‘Come and stay at my place. It’s got three bedrooms and I can look after you with no bother.’

‘Haven’t you got anything to do? No work, I mean.’

‘Sure, but it’s not nine to five. I can fit you in.’

‘Sounds good.’

‘Unless the lift breaks down.’

‘What?’

‘I’m on the twenty-seventh floor.’

‘How many?’

‘Twenty-seven,’ she said proudly.

‘Where the hell do you live then?’

‘Tower block. Top floor, babes, but it’s great when you get there.’

‘Does the lift break down often?’

‘Often enough.’

‘And if it does?’

‘Piggy back for you, son, but don’t worry – I’m sure it’ll be all right.’

‘Not a good idea. I’d sooner be home.’

‘Cooking for yourself and drowning in your own dirt?’

I thought about it for a moment, the advantages and the disadvantages. ‘OK, Fiona,’ I said. ‘You’ve talked me into it.’

‘There goes that old enthusiasm again.’

‘Sorry, I was just thinking.’

‘Dangerous thing to do, Sharman. Cut it out, will you?’

‘I’ll try.’

The next morning she picked up my suitcase and an overnight bag and a couple of plastic carriers. You stay in hospital for sixteen weeks and you start to acquire stuff you don’t want to leave behind. Clothes, books, all sorts of shit people had brought me and I wasn’t about to dump. Fiona was dressed in a thick brown leather jacket with a fur collar over a big sweater that reached halfway down her thighs, and woolly leggings tucked into high-heeled boots. Around her neck she wore a long scarf striped black and white. ‘Christ!’ she said as I passed her the bags and stuff, ‘this lot weighs a ton.’