Chapter 8
8
Lijah had tried to persuade Nick that all he needed was a couple of plasters and a bit of Savlon, but his old friend was having none of it.
‘I know you don’t think you want to perform again at the moment Lij, but do you really want to let your hand get into such a state that the option is taken away from you? And if it drops off altogether, I’m not volunteering to wipe your bum.’
‘What if I put it in your job description?’ Lijah couldn’t help smiling despite the pain in his hand.
‘Didn’t know I still had a job.’ Nick frowned and Lijah felt a stab of guilt. Walking out on the tour didn’t just affect him, it had an impact on so many people. But Lijah had felt like he was drowning. He couldn’t think too much about the ripple effect of his decision, otherwise he might never get back on track. Whatever happened, Nick would be okay, Lijah would make sure of that.
‘Of course you have. If I do decide to quit, I’ll think of something else we can do together. Maybe we could start a little landscaping business.’ Lijah widened his eyes, anticipating Nick’s response before it came, but the truth was he was only half joking. The thought of facing life without his best friend by his side seemed impossible, even if it would be incredibly selfish to ask Nick to stay.
‘Lij, I love you, but you were not made for manual labour. You’re far too delicate for that. I mean, Christ, we go for a walk and look at the state of you.’
‘At least I know I’ve got one real friend who isn’t paid to hang out with me because they’d sugarcoat the truth.’
‘You don’t have to pay anyone to hang out with you, buddy, they’re queuing at the door.’
‘It’s not me they want to hang out with, it’s…’ He still cringed at using the word celebrity, or pop star. Somehow, despite all the fame and his undeniable success, he still felt like the same old Lijah deep down, the kid busking for bottle tops in the harbour. ‘It’s the lifestyle that appeals to them, the smoke and mirrors. None of them know the real me.’
It had become so hard to trust anyone over the past few years and to know whether the people who gravitated towards Lijah were genuine. Some of them just wanted to raise their own profile. When his second album had come out and the PR team at his record label had been determined it should exceed the success of his first, he’d been put in touch with the manager of another singer, Lucillia Rodriguez, who’d asked if he’d be interested in staging a faux romance over the summer. He’d been so gobsmacked, he hadn’t been able to respond at first. Lucillia’s manager had clearly taken that as the green light to outline the specifics. According to him, it was simple. They needed to be photographed together as much as possible over the summer, including some sufficiently intimate moments to fool the press and the public that their romance was real. An early denial of the romance would help add fuel to the fire. It would raise both their profiles, the manager said, perhaps even more so when they went their separate ways after a few months.
It was such a cynical idea and he didn’t want to raise his profile, he wanted to be as anonymous as it was possible for a successful singer to be, so that he had the chance of making a genuine connection with someone again one day, because the truth was he did want a relationship. He wanted someone he couldn’t wait to get back to. As it stood, the only person who fitted that bill was Nick and he couldn’t keep expecting his old friend to put his own life on hold forever. Nick was great at what he did, and he’d had other performers approaching him over the years, but he’d never taken them on, so that he could be at Lijah’s beck and call. This could be his opportunity to branch out, maybe meet someone new too, but Lijah knew Nick wouldn’t even contemplate doing that until he was confident that Lijah would be okay without him. Part of him wanted to tell Nick that he didn’t need to hang around for his benefit, except they’d both have known it wasn’t true. He just needed a bit of time, that was all, but Nick needed to know it wouldn’t be forever.
‘I’m going to work out what I really want from life, that’s the point of all of this.’ Lijah gestured around him, indicating the reason why he’d rented the house that was three times the size of some of the venues he’d played in the early days. ‘But you’ve got to work out what it is you really want, too.’
‘I know exactly what I want to do.’ Nick’s expression was serious and nerves gripped Lijah. He desperately wanted his best friend to have the life he deserved, but the thought of not seeing him any more was already making his stomach churn. He forced himself to ask anyway.
‘Really, what’s that?’
‘I want to get you to the hospital. After that we can work out the rest.’
‘Okay.’ Lijah nodded. His hand was still throbbing with pain, and he could tell how hot it was without even touching it. He could have called a private doctor, or gone to the nearest private hospital, but if he was going to try and build a new life for himself and learn to blend into the background the way he wanted to, he might as well start as he meant to go on.
* * *
Amy gave the woman who’d approached her to complain about waiting times a tight smile. Summer in Port Kara meant that the emergency department was busier than ever, but it had been a surprisingly quiet morning and the reason the woman had needed to wait slightly longer was because she’d been triaged as not needing urgent care. Amy was tempted to tell the patient, whose name was Chantelle, that she could make an appointment to see her GP to get some antibiotics for her problem if she didn’t want to wait. Chantelle had an infected piercing in her ear, which she’d had done by a friend using a sewing needle and an ice cube when they’d had ‘a few too many’. She was next to be seen, and Amy had been just about to call her name when Chantelle had come barrelling towards her, firing out her dissatisfaction so close to Amy’s face that she could smell the stale booze on the other woman’s breath.
‘This place is a joke. You could drop dead before you got seen, what’s the hold up for God’s sake? It’s like a morgue out here.’
‘It is quiet today, but we still have to triage patients based on urgency and unfortunately there were other patients who needed to be seen in front of you, but I’m ready to see you now. If you’d like to come through, we can?—’
As she spoke, Chantelle’s phone began to ring, and she held up a finger to silence Amy.
‘Hi hun!’ There was a pause as the person on the other end of the line spoke, before Chantelle started again. ‘Yeah it’s a freaking nightmare, still waiting to be seen… I know, I know, what the hell do we pay our taxes for? I bet if I’d just turned up in the country I’d be seen straight away.’
Amy could feel the blood pulsing through her veins. It wasn’t like this was the first time she’d heard a line like that, but it never made it any easier to hear. She was even more tempted now to tell Chantelle to go home and stop using an emergency department for something that could easily be dealt with in the community. There were other things she wanted to say too, like the fact that there would be no NHS without the many staff who came to the UK from other countries to work in an organisation that would grind to a halt without them. Sometimes it was really hard to treat all patients the same.
Amy had cared for an elderly widower just the day before, whose eyes had filled with tears when he’d talked about how lonely he was since the death of his wife. She’d wanted to take Albert home with her and look after him. He’d been so grateful to everyone and after one of the porters, Darius, had exchanged a joke with him, he’d told Amy it was the most fun he’d had in weeks. It had made her so sad that Albert felt that way and she’d spoken to Esther to see if there was anything they could do. Esther’s mum, Caroline, volunteered for a befriending service in the community and by the time Albert left A Lijah had supported her dreams every bit as much as she’d supported his, but then again, most people would argue that it was far easier to become a nurse than it was a successful musician. When she looked up at him, he was still holding her gaze. ‘I always knew it was the right decision for you to choose nursing, but when we were together, I couldn’t help wishing that you wouldn’t.’
‘We were so young, it would never have lasted either way.’ She gave him a half smile, her words coming out with far more conviction than she felt, because there was a huge part of her that couldn’t help wondering what might have happened if she’d taken a leap of faith when he’d left for London, just like she had on the night of the party. She’d had to take the risk of losing their friendship, so that they could become so much more and, despite how it ended, she wouldn’t have traded their three years together for anything.
One of the things she’d loved most about Lijah was that he’d never been afraid to let people see just how much his mum and his aunt meant to him. He hadn’t been remotely embarrassed at the fact that the two women had spent most of the night on the dancefloor at his sixteenth birthday party. Lijah had happily joined them and watching him up there Amy could no longer pretend she just liked Lijah, her feelings for him were much bigger than that. But she was realistic enough to know she didn’t stand a chance with someone like him, or at least that’s what she’d thought. Even when he’d come to her at the end of the party to thank her for helping his mother organise it, she had no idea what was about to happen. It was probably for the best, because if she’d thought he was going to kiss her she might have freaked out. When Lijah had suddenly leaned forward and tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear, her heart had been thudding so hard she was sure he must be able to hear it.
‘You’re the best girl here, Ames. You know that, don’t you?’ His voice had been low. ‘I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed tonight, and it was all because of you.’
‘It was mostly your mum, I just helped with?—’
‘I didn’t mean organising it.’ Lijah had cut her off, putting a hand on her bare arm, his touch lighting her up from the inside and she hadn’t trusted herself to speak. ‘I like you Amy, and there’s no one I enjoy spending time with more than you.’
She’d frozen to the spot then, not wanting to risk making a fool of herself by taking a step forward if she’d somehow misread the signs. Instead Lijah had closed the gap between them and, when he kissed her, it was everything she thought it might be and more. She knew they were risking their friendship, but it had been a chance she’d needed to take and, in that moment, she wasn’t sure she could have stopped herself, because it was something she’d wanted for so long. There hadn’t been a moment when she’d regretted that kiss, not even in the aftermath of their breakup when even saying his name had hurt more than she’d ever have believed. Torturing herself with what ifs would be a whole new form of torture, and it wasn’t a path she was going to allow herself to go down, especially when Lijah would almost certainly disappear from her life again just as quickly as he had reappeared.
‘We didn’t give ourselves a chance to find out whether or not it would last.’ There was something in his eyes she couldn’t quite read, but the corners of his mouth were twitching, as if he might be trying not to laugh. She was the girl who’d loved him from afar, for years before he’d even noticed her, and now here she was again, going all gooey eyed over the memory that probably meant far less to him than it had to her, despite what he might have said. Either way, she wasn’t here to amuse Lijah Byrne, she had a job to do, one she was very good at. Withdrawing her hand from his, Amy took a step back. He spent his whole life with people fawning over him, but she wasn’t about to become one of them. He needed medical attention, not to have his ego inflated even further by the thought that she’d never got over him.
‘It wouldn’t have worked and thankfully I figured that out pretty quickly.’ Her tone was cool and his mouth turned downwards in response, but he didn’t have a chance to reply, as Nick yanked back the curtain of the cubicle and came in.
‘Coffee’s up.’
‘Perfect timing, thanks Nick.’ Amy arranged her face into what felt like a smile, but she couldn’t be sure. She’d lowered her guard with Lijah by reminiscing about the night of his party, but she was already wishing she hadn’t. Nothing about his lifestyle seemed genuine to her and it was almost impossible to believe that anyone who pursued that kind of life could be genuine either. Only a fool would think the last decade hadn’t changed him beyond all recognition. ‘I’ve cleaned Lijah’s wound, but I want the surgeons to take a look at it to see if any of the tendons or ligaments need surgical intervention. Then we’ll have to work out if he needs a tetanus shot, or if he’s already up to date.’
‘Where does that go, in his bum?’ Nick laughed and Amy responded with a genuine smile this time.
‘It can be arranged.’ She tried to look more serious for a moment. ‘For you too, if you don’t behave yourself.’
‘I’ll be good I promise.’ Nick grinned again, and inclined his head towards the coffees he was holding. ‘I even tracked you down a mocha, I’m assuming you’re still a chocaholic, Amy?’
‘Guilty as charged. You must be used to Lijah’s every wish being your command.’ There was an edge to her voice that she couldn’t stop from creeping in. She was on the defensive, but she didn’t want Lijah to think he impressed her. He probably hadn’t got a coffee for himself in years, but that didn’t make him any more special than her other patients.
‘He’s pretty low maintenance actually, although he’s still a teabag snob and it’s always got to be Yorkshire.’ If Nick was offended by her jibe about his job he didn’t show it. ‘You’d never believe he was born and bred around here the way he goes on about it.’
‘It is pretty hard to believe.’
‘Why do I get the feeling that isn’t a compliment?’ Lijah asked, but before she could respond Nick thrust a family sized packet of Maltesers in her direction.
‘I’m glad you still like chocolate, because my decision to buy these for you must make me almost as big a hero as Lij. Although I just took a call from Dolly.’ Nick turned towards Lijah and Amy caught her breath at the sound of the familiar name. ‘And I don’t think buying any amount of chocolate could compete with your heroics. The vet’s confident the dog will make it, because of you.’
‘Did you say Dolly?’ Amy took a step closer to Nick, willing him to shake his head.
‘Yes, do you know her?’ Nick frowned and nausea swirled in her stomach. It couldn’t be Monty. Dolly would have let her know. She asked the question all the same.
‘The dog that got attacked… do you know what breed it was?’
‘A little Jack Russell, wasn’t it?’ Nick turned towards Lijah again and he nodded.
‘Yes, such a sweet little thing. His name’s Monty.’
‘Oh my God, are you sure?’ Amy was desperate for Lijah to say something to convince her she’d got it wrong, but he was already nodding.
‘Are you okay? Do you know whose dog it is?’
‘Monty’s mine.’ Tears were brimming in her eyes as she looked at him again, and he took hold of her hand for a second time.
‘I’m so sorry, but it sounds like the news from the vet is positive.’
‘He doesn’t deserve this.’ Amy couldn’t stop the tears sliding down her face, and she didn’t even try. ‘When his old owner was really sick, he lay on her bed for two weeks, only getting up when he absolutely had to. It was like he was making sure she wasn’t on her own at the end. He’s such a good boy.’
‘He’ll be okay, I promise. We’ll do whatever we need to, and take him wherever he’ll get the best treatment.’ Lijah’s eyes met hers and despite her doubts from just moments before, suddenly she knew she could trust him, just like she’d always been able to. Lijah had never once given her cause to doubt him, despite the numerous opportunities he’d had to go behind her back when they were together. She knew she’d been unfair to him by getting defensive after they’d reminisced about the party, but it came from the same sense of self-preservation that had made her push him away in the first place. Lijah was a good guy, he always had been, and if he said he’d get Monty whatever treatment he might need, she knew he’d keep his word.
‘Thank you.’ Amy wanted to lean on him for support, as she had so many times before. Lijah had been there through the toughest weeks of her life, after her father had suffered a heart attack, and he’d promised her that everything would be okay then too. He’d been right, and she just hoped to God he was right now, because she’d never forgive herself if anything happened to the little dog she’d promised Joan she’d look after.