CHAPTER 53

Choosing Morag’s daily magazine became a ritual, just like a morning bowl of chocolate cereal. Dad and Imelda would take me to the supermarket, and I spent ages staring at the rack of magazines, dazzled by the colours and photographs of famous people.

The magazines had zingy names like Hi! and Today! and Surprise! even though the stories written inside didn’t seem zingy at all. Some of the stories were mean, a bit like the stories that were written about Morag and me. Mostly they were about famous people getting divorced, or getting sick, or getting caught drunk. It seemed weird that Morag wanted to read about strangers having a hard time, when she was going through a hard time herself.

Usually I would take some sort of present in too. I would choose a box of chocolates, gummy sweets, flowers or grapes, luminous bottles of fizzy drink. Soon Morag was so surrounded by flowers and presents that she started sharing them with other patients on the ward.

Dad and Imelda didn’t mind, even though the presents must have been costing them a lot. They saw that buying Morag’s magazine made me feel like I was helping. I think they were as relieved as I was that Morag was OK.

Well, she was OK-ish.

One morning I arrived and Morag didn’t want to talk. Her eyes were red and puffy like she’d been crying. She managed a croaky “Thanks, Solo” when I handed her the magazine and jelly sweets I’d brought. Then she rolled over and closed her eyes. I guessed Morag’s low mood hadn’t totally gone away.

While Morag slept, I sat in the visitor’s chair wondering if I’d done something wrong. Nurse Winnie smiled at me whenever she came in. After a while, she asked if I wanted to help her with her nurse jobs while Morag rested.

Nurse Winnie took me around the ward and showed me what everything was. She showed me the nurses’ station, where they did all their paperwork and had cups of builder’s tea. She showed me the toilets and a crane-looking machine called a hoist, which they used to lift people into the bath. She even let me stick my head into the sluice room, where they flushed away people’s sick. That bit made me feel gross.

The only proper job I did was sorting out the thank-you cards that previous patients had sent in after they’d got better. There were tons of them, all with different pictures and handwriting inside. Nurse Winnie said they got so many cards they had to display them on rotation. I liked the cards. They made me feel that Morag would get better too, just like all those people before. Maybe she would send in her own thank-you card one day.

When Dad came to collect me, Nurse Winnie told him that I’d been very helpful indeed.

“Nice, Solo!” He beamed. “Getting in a bit of early work experience, are you? Perhaps a career in the medical field awaits.”

I shrugged. I wasn’t sure if flushing away people’s sick was the job for me. But I did like the chatting and cups of tea.

“We’ll be seeing you tomorrow then, Nurse Solo!” Winnie winked.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Winnie.” I gave her two thumbs up.

Other visits went better. Morag and I would play Connect Four on the tray over her bed, even though most of the pieces were missing. I had a feeling Morag was letting me win, because my prizes started mounting up. We only played for chocolates, but I won so many I said I never wanted to eat chocolate again. Obviously, I wasn’t being serious.

Sometimes Morag got tired of games, and we would read the magazines in silence. Often I would turn to show Morag something crazy from one of them like “I put twenty-one Crème Eggs in my mouth – and survived!” but she had drifted off.

School started sending homework to Dad via email, which I hated. At least it gave me something to do when Morag fell asleep. It was only little things: reading a website about coding, or researching protein. I had a feeling I wouldn’t get in trouble if I didn’t do the work, but something made me want to show Miss Carmichael I could do it, especially after what she said to me that night.

Morag’s skin turned less yellow by the day, and the bruise on the side of her face faded to pale pink, the colour of a blackcurrant-squash stain. The wires were removed from her arms, but she still had to take tablets. Three times a day Nurse Winnie would come in with Morag’s pills sorted into little paper cups. Morag would groan, but took them all anyway, swilling them down with water.

Winnie said Morag was very well behaved, which made a change. Maybe everything would be fine after all.