Chapter 8
‘Let’s get you out of bed today, flower,’ Nicki says to me after the ward rounds. ‘The doctor says you’re doing better, and you’re off the oxygen, aren’t you, so let’s get you to the bathroom.’
‘Okay.’
‘Don’t look so mournful! It’s a good thing.’ She flings back my blanket and takes my arm. ‘Here you go, just lean on me.’
I place my stockinged feet on the floor and drag myself off the bed. I weigh a thousand tons, my feet are made of concrete, my lungs of bricks, weighing down in my chest until I’m afraid they will shatter my ribcage and fall out of me.
Nicki steadies me. ‘Okay, now, take it slowly. I’m going to just get you a walker to make it easier for you.’
When she returns with the walking frame I’m flopped back on the bed, my breathing thick and laboured. Jodie sits on the edge of her bed, cheering me on. ‘You’re gonna do this! Just breathe slowly.’
Nicki helps me up and I lean on the walker. ‘Deep breaths now,’ she says. ‘No rush.’
Each step seems like a mile, the toilet door a hundred miles, stretching out into a whitewashed, bleach-stinking expanse in front of me. Impossible.
‘One step at a time.’
When I make it there Nicki gives a great big whoop and high fives me. ‘You did it!’ Jodie echoes her whoop from the corner.
I did it. I walked to the toilet. I laugh at the tininess of the achievement, thinking about my parents’ Christmas letter: Karen became a QC. Penny walked to the toilet.
Inside it smells faintly of cigarette smoke, and I wonder if Violet was having a crafty one during the night, avoiding the rain.
I try to avoid the mirror, but it drags my eyes, and I reel back at the sight of myself.
Greasy, ratty hair lying in lank strands on my shoulders.
My cheeks are white and hollowed out, my eyes haunted and darkened with pain.
My collarbones stand out more than they did, sawing through sallow skin.
‘Looking good, girl,’ I say to the mocking mirror, which snorts back at me.
I wonder if I will ever have the energy for a shower again.
‘Let me brush your hair,’ Nicki says when I’m back in my bed, shaking with the effort of it all. She brushes gently, in long soft strokes, then deftly gathers it into a bobble on my neck. It’s still lank and dark with sweat and filth, but I feel better, like I might be human again, sometime soon.
‘Harold was smoking in that toilet earlier,’ Amina says to Nicki as she goes to leave the bay.
Nicki blows her cheeks out. ‘That man thinks the world owes him everything.’
‘He should use his own toilet.’ It’s a real issue for Amina, I can see, that her dignity might be compromised by a man. ‘He might walk in on us. That lock doesn’t work very well.’
‘I’ll have a little word with him,’ Nicki says. ‘I’ll tell him what’s what, don’t you worry.’ She strolls out of the bay, humming a little tune.
Jodie perches on my chair with her phone in her hand. ‘You okay?’
‘Yeah. Bit worn out.’
‘You did good.’
I shrug. ‘One day at a time.’
Jodie scrolls through her phone, then stops, her face creasing up, dark shadows flickering in her eyes.
‘What’s wrong?’ I ask.
‘Just this.’ She shows me her phone. ‘On my Facebook. Some loser started a petition about disabled parking spaces.’
I take the phone and read through the post. It’s not fair on normal people, the post claims, all those spaces, too many of them. I look up at Jodie. ‘Normal people?’
‘Right? And about two thousand people have signed it, too.’
‘I bet whoever started it parks in them anyway,’ I say.
‘His type are always so entitled.’
‘Like Harold,’ Violet pipes up. Jodie’s mouth twists with something like amusement. Violet, setting entitled people to rights? I can’t help smiling, too.
Kat leans forward in her chair. ‘People shouldn’t judge. Not all disabilities are visible.’
???
It’ll be a great girls’ night, Jen says to me. It’ll be good for you.
I get myself ready, psyching myself up for a rare night out.
I’ll only have to sit down for a couple of hours, after all, watching a play won’t be too taxing, surely?
It’s Calendar Girls, Jen says. You know, like the film, and that was funny, right?
I nod along. Yeah. Great idea. I’m strong enough for this.
By the time I arrive at the venue, the exhaustion is setting in. I drag myself too slowly through the narrow corridor, other people jostling me to get to their seats on time. The foyer rings with raging whispers, bouncing back at me and hitting me square in the gut.
The theatre is all faded opulence; heavy red brocade velvet curtains and gold swirls dancing on the walls, seating in steep tiered layers, and we’re up on the balcony at the top, up in the heavens with the angels, Jen says, up two long and windy flights of stairs.
I have nothing left when I get to my seat, and I sink down, head in hands.
Jen brings me a glass of wine and tells me to relax.
Jen and Pen, Jenny and Penny, partners in crime, let’s have a good laugh tonight. We deserve it.
By the interval I need the loo and regret the wine. When I stand up my bones are molten liquid, draining down my legs and through my feet until I stagger and grip hold of the back of the seat. ‘You need some help?’ Jen asks, but I shake my head. It’s only going to the loo, for heaven’s sake.
I stumble down the two sets of stairs, heading for the ladies’, but stop short at the straggly queue snaking up the hallway towards me, gaggles of giggling women, stumbling in their stilettos and shrieking with mirth.
I can’t stand there. I can’t. My legs won’t hold me up.
The disabled access toilet is back down the corridor to my left. No one’s in there, so I lurch in and lock the door behind me before sinking onto the toilet seat. Deep breaths. Get a hold of yourself, Penny. Breathe in. Breathe out. In. Out.
Why did I think I could do this?
I close my eyes and rest my aching head on the grab rail next to me. Dig in my bag for more painkillers, swallow them down.
A knock on the door.
I need to sort myself out. Get out of here. Someone else needs it.
Every movement is like forcing myself through a vat of setting fudge, undoing my jeans too difficult for clumsy, aching fingers. I push myself through, sweat forming in beads on my brow.
I manage to turn the lock after several failed attempts. A woman is sitting there in her wheelchair staring at me, her friend standing next to her with arms folded and an expression full of antipathy. ‘You’re in the disabled toilet.’
I don’t know what to say. I should stand up for myself, say I am disabled, too, that I need it, too. But I don’t. I push the door wider and try to move out of their way.
The friend is not ready to move on. ‘This is a disabled loo.’
‘I know. I… I’m chronically ill.’
She laughs, but the smile goes nowhere near her eyes. ‘Yeah. As I said, this is a disabled loo, and a disabled person needs it. You don’t look disabled.’
‘I couldn’t stand in the line.’
‘You couldn’t stand? What about Jane here?’ She thrusts her chin in the air, her glare hard on me. A small crowd is forming around us, others joining in with their yeahs and their wows.
Jane puts one hand in the air, palm out. ‘It’s okay, Chloe, I didn’t mind waiting, looks like she needed it too. It’s fine.’
Chloe hunkers down next to Jane. ‘But that’s not the point, is it. All your life you’ve had to put up with all this crap for being in a wheelchair. All the time. And you shouldn’t have to. Not on a night out. It’s not fair.’
She’s right. It’s not fair. None of it is fair.
‘Sorry,’ I say, and skulk away, face turned to the floor, hisses of rancour chasing me through the hall. I leave the theatre, text Jen that I’m ill again.
‘Oh Pen, you could’ve seen it through,’ she texts back. ‘Now I have to watch it on my own.’
‘Sorry.’
Sorry. Sorrysorrysorry.
???
Jen comes in for visiting today. ‘I saw your post on Facebook. Didn’t want to visit before in case… you know, in case you weren’t up to it.’
‘Thanks,’ I say. Inside I’m thinking, she should know me better, by now.
We met in antenatal classes. She was a single mum too, and Jake and Alice were inseparable as youngsters.
She was kind to me, stepping in when I could barely move, taking Jake to nursery or one of his clubs.
It’s no problem, Pen, I’m here for you and always will be.
Then she met Simon and began to retreat, laying ever frostier barriers between us, dropping hints about being taken for granted.
I love her, but there’s always a catch with her now, it’s never as wonderful as it was in those early days when we put the little ones to bed and sat up all night putting the world to rights with a couple of bottles of wine.
I miss that Jen.
Jake straggles in, clad in a black beanie and fingerless gloves but no coat. ‘Where’s your coat?’ I say. ‘It looks freezing out there.’
The soft rain of the morning turned into frozen shards of sleet, clattering against the windows insistently through the afternoon.
Jake shrugs, grabbing one of the black bucket chairs and slinging it down by my bed. ‘I don’t like wearing a coat. You know that, Mum. Hey, Jen.’
‘Hi, Jake. How are you?’
‘Okay.’
Jodie leans over, her long blonde hair hanging in two messy plaits. ‘Jake,’ she says, stretching out the name. ‘What’s up?’
‘Not much,’ Jake says, turning away from Jen and me and dragging his chair closer to Jodie. ‘You?’
Jodie leans further towards him and whispers something, and they both splutter into loud laughter. Jen narrows her eyes, all affronted, as if to ask why Jake would be much more interested in a patient he’d known for all of five minutes rather than his godmother.
Kat’s husband Nate wanders into the ward. He’s holding a large red cloth Aldi bag, and sets it on Kat’s bed. I catch a glimpse of something brown and furry as he starts to draw it out. Has he smuggled a puppy in?
Kat stares up at him. ‘What have you…?’ She stops as he pulls out the item and holds it up to her.
‘Tada!’
‘Why did you bring that?’ Kat is grimacing, but then a wan ghost of a smile skips around her mouth.
Jodie shouts, ‘What you got there, Mr Vicar?’
She calls him Mr Hot Vicar when he’s not there, and Kat always laughs and says yeah, he is.
Nate whirls around and proudly holds up a large fluffy brown thing. It’s a Chewbacca onesie, complete with ears on its hood.
‘Cool,’ Jake says.
‘I thought you’d be chilly,’ Nate says to Kat, turning back to her and laying Chewbacca on the bed. ‘You having pneumonia and everything.’
Kat laughs, a raw, tired chuckle. Then she pulls him close and snuggles into his neck. Jodie whistles.
‘Have you felt the temperature in here?’ Kat says.
Nate shrugs. ‘Just wanted to make you feel better.’
‘I know.’ She kisses him. ‘You’re adorable. But please take Chewie home with you. He’d boil me alive in this place.’
Okay, he says, but when he eventually goes Chewbacca is still strewn across the bed, Kat cuddling him close to her and waving to her husband. I love you, he says, I love you too, she says, and I wish I knew a love that would bring me a Chewbacca onesie in hospital.
‘You’ve got a gem there,’ Jodie says to Kat.
‘What’s that even supposed to be?’ says Violet, gesturing at Chewie with her eyebrows knit together. ‘Is it one of those fur rugs?’
Jodie and Jake snort in unison.
Barbara is awake in her corner, her eyes fixed intently on the onesie, and I am sad for her, with no one to visit her, no one to see how she is.
I reproach myself for being jealous of Kat.
I have a son who loves me in his own gruff way, I have friends and family who aren’t always ideal but are still there for me. Barbara has no one.
‘It’s the rat,’ she says, pointing with a withered finger. Her chest crackles so loudly I wonder if her ribs might splatter into tiny pieces. ‘It’s going to get the mouse.’
‘Big rat,’ Jake whispers, and I shush him.
Barbara’s voice is higher, quavery. ‘Get the rat out of here!’
Kat walks over to her, slow, stumbling, wobbly steps, clutching the onesie. ‘See, Barbara, it’s just some daft pyjamas my husband brought in. I’m never going to wear this in here, am I? Silly sod.’
Violet’s mouth is agape and I can read the thoughts on her face. The vicar said sod!
Barbara reaches out her hand and touches the onesie tentatively. ‘The rat’s not here?’
‘No, darling, the rat’s not here.’ Kat sits down on Barbara’s chair, laying Chewie on her lap. Barbara keeps her hand on the material, stroking up and down.
‘Will you take me to the seaside?’ she says.