8
Lou slept fitfully, despite the sedative. She woke suddenly and looked at the clock. Half past six. She wondered if it were morning or evening, but figured morning as it was dark outside. The lights were dimmed and she was in a private room now rather than a huge ward. Her mother was gone. Perhaps the nurses had chased her to bed.
She lifted her head slightly and looked down at her legs.
She recoiled in shock and a sense of loss enveloped her, crushing her with a weight so heavy, she gasped involuntarily. It was gone. She could feel it, but it was gone.
A stab of grief plunged deep within her. What would she do now? She’d never walk again. She watched as her dreams vanished into the cloud that was descending over the bed. She could never become a world-famous archaeologist and find Atlantis or El Dorado now.
God must really hate her.
She looked out of the window. The sky was beginning to lighten and beyond the glass, the birds started to sing. Tears ran down her cheeks.
The medic on duty came over to her. “Are you OK?”
Lou shook her head.
“Shall I get your mom?”
Lou shook her head again. “No,” she cried.
“Are you in pain?”
“A lot.” She watched as the medic picked up the chart and took it to the desk.
Lou watched as the sky grew paler. Another dawn she didn’t want to see. The medic came back. “I can’t give you anything for another three hours.”
“Sounds about right,” she whispered. “Mafuso and Ailsa kept saying that too. All the time.”
“I’ll speak to Dr. Andrews when she comes on duty at 0700.” The medic went back to the desk.
Lou wiped her eyes against the onslaught of tears, but it was a losing battle.
Despite the growing light outside, around Lou it seemed to grow darker. When breakfast came at 0700, she pushed it around the plate, but didn’t eat anything.
Dr. Andrews came over. “Good morning. How are you?”
“Not hungry.”
“Can I get you something else instead? Maybe some toast or some cereal?”
“No.”
“The nurse tells me you need some pain meds?”
“Yeah,” Lou said.
“I’ll increase the dose slightly, but if you don’t eat, you won’t get better. Are you sure you don’t want this? The others have done nothing but eat since they’ve been here.”
“Just make sure they have enough. We’re almost out of food again.”
“We won’t run out. There’s plenty for you as well.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“I’ve got one of our trained counselors coming in to see you—”
“I don’t need a shrink because I’m not hungry,” Lou snapped, interrupting her. “There is nothing to talk about. My life as it was is over. End of story.” She turned away and shut her eyes.
As the footsteps moved away, she opened her eyes and lay with a fixed stare at the ceiling. She slowly moved her gaze across the tiles, counting the lights. Lots of them.
Dr. Andrews returned with the morphine. “It’s not a full dose because it’s too early still.” She injected it and looked at Lou. “We’ll get you mobile tomorrow.”
Lou snorted. “Mobile? I can’t walk, can I?”
“Wheelchair. We’ll also organize some crutches and see about getting a prosthesis fitted.”
“A what?”
“Artificial leg, but one thing at a time. Would you like to sit up a little?”
“OK.”
Dr. Andrews picked up a control next to the bed and pressed one of the buttons. Slowly, the bed rose until she was sitting slightly.
“Thanks,” Lou said.
“How’s the leg doing?” Dr. Andrews asked.
“It hurts.”
“Other than it hurts?”
Lou turned her head and looked at the doctor. “You mean aside from the fact that my leg isn’t there?” What’s with the obvious questions? She sucked in a deep breath. “Like I said, it hurts. And my toes itch.”
Dr. Andrews examined the stump. “It’s looking all right. We’ll leave it uncovered today.”
Lou grimaced. “Can’t you at least hide it so I can’t see it?”
“Sure we can. Be right back.”
Lou sighed. Why was everyone being so nice to her when she didn’t deserve it? It’d be best just to push everyone away so they wouldn’t care so much when she died.
Because that was still going to happen. She knew that. Mafuso said so and no one had told her otherwise.
Dr. Andrews returned with a leg shield. She placed it over Lou’s legs and arranged the covers so the stump was hidden from view but left uncovered. “How’s that?”
“Better, thank you.”
Dr. Andrews smiled. “Your mom will be in soon. I expect the others will be too. Can I get you something to read?”
“No thanks. I’ll just sit here and look out the window.”
About an hour later, footsteps echoed across the room. She turned as they came over. “Hi, guys,” she said as Jim, Staci, and Ailsa came over.
“You look better,” Jim said. “How’re you doing?”
“Still here,” Lou replied. “So what’s happening then?” She nodded at the figures by the door. “Who are they?”
“The bloke is Sergeant Peterson and the woman is Staff Sergeant Chaney. They’re our escorts,” Ailsa explained.
Staci rolled her eyes. “They only gave us a woman so Sergeant Peterson doesn’t have to go where no man has ever gone before…the ladies’ room.”
Ailsa and Staci sat on the bed and Jim sat in the chair next to it. Lou looked at them. “You have ‘escorts’? Why?”
Jim grimaced. “General Merrick says they are for our ‘protection’ on the base, unquote. Really I think it’s so we don’t do a runner again.”
“Who’s General Merrick?”
“She’s in charge of the base.”
“So you guys can’t go anywhere without an escort?”
“No, but then Mum and Dad are here as well.”
Lou shifted on the bed. “Are they really here? Are they all right?”
Jim smiled. “They’re fine. There was just no way for them to send a message home after the tsunami and quake. Once they did, we’d already left.”
Staci nodded. “And they grounded us for like forever.”
Lou looked thoughtful. “Mum was here. And Jack. He called her Nicky. No one ever does that, ’cept your parents.”
“She’s been staying at his place since she came out in December, along with Mum and Dad. They’re obviously friends. Friends shorten each other’s names,” Jim said. “Like you call me Jim and I call you Lou. Rather than James and Louisa.”
“Dad never did. He always called her Nichola.”
“But then she always called him Robert and never Bob.”
“True.” She paused. “So what have you guys been up to?”
Jim pulled the big parcel out from the side of the bed and gave it to Lou. “We did this.”
Lou opened it. Her picture looked wonderful in its new frame. Far better than she’d ever imagined when she sewed it. “Wow. Thank you.”
“The girls chose the frame and mount, so if you don’t like it, blame them.”
“It’s lovely.” She passed it to Ailsa. “Can you wrap it again for me? Then I can give it to Mum. Ta.”
“We did other stuff too,” Staci told her. “We went clothes shopping and we went to get fast food yesterday. Today we’re going on a tour of the island.”
“Sounds fun. Today I get to sit up.”
Ailsa smiled at her. “Would you rather still be on Agrihan? I know I wouldn’t.”
As tempting as it was to shoot back a sarcastic answer or say yes, Lou just shook her head. Probably best not to upset the others by saying she’d rather not be here.
“It’s strange having to do what grown-ups want again,” Staci said. “Having done what I wanted for so long.”
“Not even grown-ups can do what they want all the time,” Jim told her. “All the grown-ups here have to do what General Merrick tells them. She’s only asking of us what she expects from everyone here.”
“What’s going to happen when you leave here?” Lou asked.
Jim shrugged. “For the time being, our parents are all staying at Jack’s place in town along with Nichola, but long term, Mum and Dad inherited Aunt Edith’s house, so that’s us sorted. I don’t know where you’ll go. Nichola sold the flat.”
Lou looked at him, aghast. “She sold it? Why?”
“You’ll have to ask her that when she comes in later. But like I said, once we’re released from the infirmary, we’ll be moving into Jack’s place until Mum and Dad go back to England.”
Sergeant Peterson came over to them. “We’d better be going.”
They said their goodbyes and followed Sergeant Peterson from the room, Staff Sergeant Chaney falling in behind.
Lou looked at the clock. Another ten minutes and she could have some more morphine. She wondered briefly if they’d give her too much or if she could persuade them to, but she reckoned pigs stood a better chance of flying than she had of doing that. She had an improved view out of the window now she was sitting up. A plane came in and landed and another one took off.
The medic came over. She chatted as she checked the dosage on the morphine pump and changed one of the bags that constantly dripped into her arm. She had no idea what it was, most likely antibiotics or something. Had Mum told them what she was allergic to? Otherwise, they’d be in for a shock.
The sun blazed down outside and if she listened carefully, she could still hear the birds over the sounds of the infirmary and the planes. She thanked the nurse before she left and then turned her thoughts to what Jim had said about Mum selling the flat. Why would she do that? How could she do that? It was her home, too. Mum had no right to sell it without consulting her.
Lou brooded on this and when Mum came to visit her just after 11 AM, her anger spilled over the moment she saw her mother entering the ward. “Why did you do it? How could you sell the flat like that? Where are we meant to live now?”