Chapter 3 #2
‘I’m going to tell him I love him.’ Ritchie’s voice broke on the final word and he shook his head.
‘Not just the way you love a mate, but the way you love someone who’s your everything, because he’s mine.
When I saw his bike skid the way it did, and I realised he was going to hit the tarmac, I knew it was true. ’
‘I’m sure he’ll be really glad to see you and I promise I’ll get you in with him as soon as I can.
’ Esther ushered Ritchie towards the door as she spoke, hoping she was right that Ollie would still be pleased that Ritchie was there after he heard what his friend had to say.
If not, it could ruin a friendship of over two decades.
Something twisted deep inside Esther’s gut at the thought of that, because she knew only too well what it felt like when the connection to your best friend seemed to be slipping away.
She didn’t want that to happen to Ollie and Ritchie, and she definitely didn’t want that to happen to her and Danni.
It was almost an hour before Esther was finally able to take Ritchie in to see his friend.
Ollie had been stabilised and taken down for a CT scan.
The paramedics had been right about him having a broken pelvis, but he also had a ruptured spleen and there were two teams preparing to go into theatre; one to deal with the open fracture in his tibia and re-align his broken pelvis, and the other to remove the spleen and halt the internal bleeding that could otherwise threaten his life.
Barring any unforeseen complications, Esther was much more confident now that Ollie would make it through okay, but things could have been very different.
‘Are you alright?’ Esther’s tone was gentle as she walked with Ritchie towards the cubicle where Ollie was waiting to be taken down for his operation.
‘My hands are shaking,’ Ritchie admitted, and his voice trembled too.
‘I know it’s scary, seeing Ollie like this. But he’s stable now and once he’s had the operation, the worst should be over.’
‘I’m more scared about how he’s going to react…’ Ritchie hesitated for a moment. ‘There’ll be no going back, will there? Once the words are out there.’
‘You don’t have to do it now. Not if you don’t feel ready.
’ Esther turned to look at the man standing in front of her, his complexion still eerily pale beneath the stubble and his eyes seeming to stare at a point past where they were standing, as if he was trying to look beyond the hospital corridor, into an unknown future, where the implications of his revelation could be seen.
‘When am I ever going to feel ready, if I don’t right now? I could have lost Ollie without ever telling him how I felt. I don’t want to risk that again, especially not when he’s about to have an operation. I don’t want to leave it unsaid, even if it changes everything in the worst possible way.’
‘I’ll leave you to it then.’
‘No, please don’t.’ Ritchie’s eyes suddenly widened.
‘If Ollie reacts badly, I don’t know what I’m going to do, and I might need you to drag me out of there.
The last thing he needs is a load of stress before his operation, but I can’t not tell him, I just can’t.
I’ve got this weird superstitious feeling that if I wait until after the operation, something will go wrong and it’ll be too late, but if I tell him now, he’ll come through it okay.
Even if I try and dismiss that feeling, I just think it’s now or never.
Ollie’s parents are on their way here, and they’ll want to be with him after he comes back from the operation, so I might not get another chance. ’
‘How about if I wait outside the cubicle, once I’ve run the checks I’ve got to do, just in case you need me?
’ Esther wondered for a moment whether she should suggest some kind of code word, but she was confident she’d know if Ritchie needed rescuing.
It still felt horribly intrusive to be eavesdropping on a conversation like this, but he’d asked her to and it was obvious how much he was putting on the line.
‘Thank you, I’d really appreciate that.’ Ritchie looked at her again and she nodded.
‘Right, here we go.’ Pulling back the curtain, Esther smiled at the young man lying on the bed. He had a livid bruise on one side of his face and a vicious-looking graze, stretching from elbow to wrist on his exposed forearm.
‘Have you come to take me for the operation?’ Ollie blinked a couple of times, as he looked in her direction and she shook her head.
‘Not yet, I just need to check you’re doing okay, before they come to take you to theatre for your op.
I’ve got someone else here too, who needs to see for himself how you are.
’ She gave Ollie what she hoped was a reassuring smile and then tried to make herself as inconspicuous as possible, while she checked that nothing had changed with his vital signs.
‘Ritchie.’ Ollie’s voice was croaky as he tried to reach out to his friend. ‘Please tell me you got all of that on one of our helmet-cams. If I’m going bash myself up like this, I at least want it to go viral.’
‘Is that so you can look heroic, swerving to miss a cat like that?’ Ritchie’s tone was light, but then he glanced in Esther’s direction, catching her eye.
Somehow, she knew he wasn’t going to give her the chance to get out of the cubicle before he told Ollie how he felt.
‘I supposed it’d be a good way of getting lots of female attention. ’
Ritchie tried to laugh at the end of the sentence, but it didn’t quite come out right, sounding almost like a sob instead, which was probably far closer to the truth of how that idea made him feel.
‘I was thinking more that it might make us some money, so we can finally get a place together. My whole life flashed in front of my eyes as I skidded across that road and I thought, bloody hell, is this it? I’m twenty-six and about to die, and I still live at home with my mum and dad.
’ It was Ollie’s turn to attempt a laugh, but it made him wince instead.
‘Oh Christ, laughing hurts, but something needs to change after this, Ritch. We’ve got to stop putting our lives on hold, waiting for the future to start. ’
‘I thought the same thing.’ Ritchie took a step closer to Ollie and Esther realised she was holding her breath.
She was desperate not to make a sound, so that the two of them could pretend she wasn’t even there.
Part of her wondered if she should just try to make a break for it, but she had a horrible feeling it would disrupt the moment even more.
All she could do was stay as still as possible and hope her heart wasn’t hammering anywhere near as loudly as it felt like it was.
‘When I saw you lose control of the bike and hit the tarmac, I really thought that might be it.’ Any attempt at humour had left Ritchie’s voice, which caught on the words, as Ollie made a grab for his hand.
‘You’re not getting rid of me that easily.’
‘I don’t want to get rid of you, I…’ Ritchie dropped his head; Esther silently urging him on. He’d come this far and it was obvious how desperately he wanted to say the words, but she could see just how big a deal they were and she’d understand if he backed down from saying them.
‘Oh my God, Ollie!’ Suddenly a middle-aged woman, with short dark hair and a terrified look on her face rushed into the cubicle, followed by a very tall, extremely slim man, whose pinched expression made him look every bit as anxious as his wife.
The nurse who must have brought them into the department was just behind them.
‘I thought we’d lost you. Those bloody bikes.
I told you that this would happen one day, Alan, if we let him have one of those bloody bikes. ’
The woman was crying now, turning from the man beside her to Ollie and back again.
‘I’m alright, Mum, thanks to Ritchie. He stopped the traffic when I came off the bike and made sure the ambulance got to me as soon as it could.
I owe him everything.’ Ollie looked towards where Ritchie was standing, silent and paler than ever.
Something in Ollie’s eyes told the truth that these two young men still hadn’t had the chance to exchange, and Esther finally let go of the breath she’d been holding.
She was almost certain that Ollie loved Ritchie too, and that it was the kind of love they could build a lifetime on.
Even if it wasn’t, she was convinced their bond was strong enough to survive Ritchie’s revelation, when he finally got the chance to say what he needed to say.
Whatever the truth of their feelings, she desperately wanted to believe that neither of them would choose to give up a friendship as special as theirs clearly was, even if it turned out that was all they could have.
Surely, they’d find a way to work it out when they’d been given something so precious; the sort of friendship you’d risk everything for.
Not everyone got that in life, but she had it with Danni.
She wanted to find her friend and tell her she was sorry for pushing her away so often lately, and just how grateful she felt to have Danni by her side.
And as soon as she got the chance, that was exactly what she was going to do.