Chapter 44
Tobias is only vaguely conscious of his surroundings; the continual pull and push of the tide, the distant call of a gull, the sweet yet stale tang of alcohol and cannabis mixed with brine.
The embers of the small beach fire are almost out and he can tell, somehow, that the sky is slowly lightening.
Beside him, Bella has stopped crying and now only makes the occasional muted whimper.
She still sways backwards and forwards and it is all he can do not to shout at her to ‘bloody sit still and shut up’.
He has been trying chest compressions and mouth-to-mouth for what seems like forever; time spinning out like an unravelling ribbon, the end of which he has long since lost. The smell of Drew’s skin, his hair, even his clothes is so achingly familiar he has to focus all his attention on ignoring the fact that this is his son, lying here in front of him.
The idea that his boy’s life is in his own hands.
He can’t think this way or he will be overcome, useless.
All he wants to do is gather Drew into his arms like the infant he was, the young toddler.
All those ages, those years, which he took for granted but would claw back now and live over and over, if only he could.
In the background, through the speaker of his phone, the female emergency services operative keeps up her calm, reassuring instructions but he has stopped listening.
She is just following routine, reading from a script, he thinks.
The idea that this call will all become just another filed recording, a training example, a failure rather than a success story.
He can’t bear it and a muffled cry of desperation escapes his throat.
‘Leave it, Dad,’ says Bella in a small voice. ‘Stop it now, please,’ she whispers, her face streaked with tears.
‘No,’ he roars at her and she physically recoils, hugging her arms to herself, her eyes wide and staring.
Tobias moves to Drew’s face and leans over him, blowing into his mouth again with force but he can’t seem to find enough air for him.
His own breath is coming in short, shallow pants, his lungs emptied out seemingly, like the rest of him.
He briefly thinks of a memory, long ago, of a camping holiday when they were all much younger and did such things.
Of collapsing in a heap of exhausted laughter as they all tried and failed to blow up an air mattress without the aid of an electric pump.
Pushing the thought away, as he must, Tobias continues.
Willing himself to breathe life into his son’s lifeless body.
It crosses his mind that this is the most intimate he has been with Drew since his son was a small boy, when they would still hug or even cuddle on the sofa watching films or when he would kiss him goodnight after a bedtime story.
That clumsy, sticky kiss on the lips had slowly reduced to a cheek, a forehead, a ruffle of the hair, a pat on the back, even just a formal handshake on occasion these days.
They have been gradually losing contact with each other in every sense over the years, like a tide receding that has never returned.
Not until now, in these most appalling of circumstances.
‘Dad, listen,’ says Bella. But he ignores her, his blood churning in his ears, like the imagined sound of the sea within a shell. His breath still heaving, his hands pushing up and down on Drew’s slim, under-developed chest. ‘Please, Dad. You’re not listening.’
‘Be quiet,’ he demands. ‘I’m trying to concentrate.’
‘The woman,’ pleads Bella. ‘On the phone. She’s trying to tell us something.’
Tobias tunes in to the speaker phone while maintaining the rhythm of CPR but there is something else happening in his peripheral vision; two people running towards them out of the shadows, the sound of their voices calling out through the morning air.