Chapter 3

When she reached the unit and rang the buzzer a nurse appeared and asked if she minded waiting a few minutes.

‘Nothing to worry about.’ She gave Erin what she thought was a reassuring smile. ‘There are some procedures we need to carry out. It won’t take long. Later today Claudia will be moved to a different room.’

What procedures, Erin wanted to ask, and which other room? Was it good she was being moved, or did it mean the baby was not doing well? The nurse had used Claudia’s name, instead of referring to her as “the patient”. That could be a good sign. No, it was only to make her feel better. Or because Claudia was not a patient. Her brain was dead and only the rest of her body was being kept “alive”.

Sitting on the cold, shiny vinyl seat, Erin stared at the print on the opposite wall. Tropical fish swimming through fronds of stylised underwater plants, bubbles rising, white rocks on a sandy bed. It was a dull, lifeless picture. Even so, it made her long to be by the sea, walking at the water’s edge, taking off her shoes and paddling, feeling the gritty sand between her toes.

As children, they had spent summer holidays in Wales, staying near a sandy beach with rock pools and seaweed and crabs. They had caught shrimps in nets, not very many as she recalled, but enough to take back to the house and cook in boiling water while their mother buttered slices of bread. Sometimes she missed her mother so much she could barely breathe. As a teenager, she had been closer to her father – they were alike in several ways – but it was her mother she needed now.

‘You can come through.’ The nurse’s smiling face appeared and she jumped up, guilty that for a few moments she had forgotten where she was, escaping into a time when she was happy and carefree, surrounded by her family and the Welsh friends they met up with each summer.

When they entered the cubicle, the nurse began filling in details on a chart. Were they good or bad? Did they refer only to Claudia, or was there a way of monitoring the baby’s condition too? The nurse turned to smile and Erin smiled back, her gaze quickly returning to Claudia. ‘She looks so serene.’

Serene? Not a word she ever used. Where had it come from? Lately words seemed to spring into her head and it was as though it was her mother talking.

‘My name’s Andrea.’ The nurse was attractive, sexy in that slightly overweight way that makes women look like they have been around. Erin guessed she enjoyed evenings in the local clubs – she had no idea why she thought this – and liked her better for it because it made her more human.

‘Erin,’ she said, ‘I’m Claudia’s sister. Sorry, you know that already.’

‘If there’s anything you want to know I’ll be happy to explain. Please, sit down.’ She pulled out a chair with a red plastic seat and black metal legs.

‘Thank you.’ Soft music was playing, classical stuff that sounded familiar and could be Bach. Was it for the medical staff, to make the situation less upsetting, or was it to give the illusion Claudia could hear it?

‘Her boyfriend’s gone missing,’ Erin said, ‘and I’m the only one . . . The baby – is it all right?’

‘The doctor was a little worried. Your sister developed an infection, but she’s been treated with antibiotics and there’s no immediate cause for alarm.’

‘If it had to be delivered now would it die?’

Andrea put her notes to one side. ‘It would stand a chance, but thirty weeks, or a little more, would be better.’

‘The doctor explained about brain death but I’m not sure I understood properly.’ Erin had checked online, read everything she could find, but she liked this nurse, wanted her to be her friend. She had large, expressive eyes, and her hair was similar to her own, the kind that was affected by the weather, good hair days and bad ones.

‘Well.’ She smoothed a crease in Claudia’s blanket. ‘The brain stem is connected to the spinal cord and it regulates most of the essential functions of the body, the automatic functions.’

‘Like breathing and your heart beating?’

She nodded. ‘And blood pressure.’

‘It’s not the same as… What do they call it? Persistent Vegetative State?’

‘No, there’s a slim chance someone can recover from PVS if the brain stem is unaffected.’

‘Thank you.’ Erin was ridiculously grateful for the information. She wanted to ask how many cases like Claudia she had nursed, if any. Instead, she said the whole thing felt unreal.

‘I’m sure.’

They sat together in relatively comfortable silence. Relatively, because who could sit beside their brain dead sister and feel relaxed? Although it never ceased to amaze her what you could get used to. A little over a week ago, she and Claudia had been laughing, talking, making plans for the birth of her baby. It felt like another lifetime. Where was Ollie? Staying with a friend, another postgrad student? The police had checked the bedsit where he lived before he moved in with Claudia, but it had been taken by a girl who had never met him. Why would she have done, it wasn’t a student let.

Erin wanted to tell Andrea about the baby shoes she and Claudia had bought and how Claudia had chosen them specially because she thought it was so funny, the way one had a steam engine on it and the other had a carriage, or was it one of those trucks – she thought they were called tenders – where the coal was kept?

‘The baby,’ she asked cautiously, ‘it’s a boy, isn’t it?’

‘Did no one say?’

‘I think Claudia knew. I didn’t ask her but I could tell.’

‘It’s a little girl.’

‘A girl? Is it? Are you sure?’

‘Quite sure.’

‘The father’s called Ollie.’ Erin was trying to adjust to this new revelation. Not a boy. A girl. If Ollie had known, might it have made a difference? But why would it? ‘He’s very young. Actually, he can’t be that young because he’s doing research for a PhD. I think he’s twenty-four. He just seems young. Young for his age. He wanted the baby to die.’

‘But you wanted her to be given a chance.’

Erin nodded, looking up at Andrea for approval. ‘I expect he could have overruled me, but he’s disappeared and no one knows where he’s gone. Or if they do,’ she added, ‘they’re not going to tell me. Claudia and I – we weren’t very close and I haven’t been in Bristol very long so I don’t know many of her friends. Only a neighbour, called Jennie, and there’s a woman who runs a café Claudia used to go to, but . . .’

A doctor had appeared, a woman, nothing like the Scottish doctor. She was younger and brasher with so few social skills Erin wondered what they taught them at medical school. No smile. No introduction. She stood beside Claudia with an expression on her face that reminded Erin of the girl in the building society who had wanted her to tie up her meagre savings for the next five years. For the building society’s benefit, not hers.

Erin stood up. ‘Andrea told me you had to treat an infection.’

After checking the monitors, the doctor picked up the notes at the end of the bed and studied them before speaking without looking up. ‘Yes.’

‘But the baby won’t be affected?’

‘All being well.’ She turned to Andrea to help her out.

‘I’ve explained to Erin about her sister, and how we hope the baby won’t need to be delivered for a few weeks yet.’

‘Good.’ The doctor looked relieved, as though she had been let off the hook and would not have to spend time with a troublesome relative. ‘Is there anything else you wanted to ask?’

Erin shook her head, then changed her mind. ‘After the baby’s delivered how long will it be before the life support is switched off?’

‘If her organs are to be donated we’ll need the consent of next of kin.’

Anger welled up and through gritted teeth – there was no way she was going to lose control – she explained that she was her sister and staying in Claudia’s house and the father of the baby had gone missing. ‘Does that make me the next of kin? Nobody seems to know. And why do you have to talk in that horrible deadpan . . .’ She broke off, not sorry, just running out of words.

Andrea put a hand on her shoulder. ‘Perhaps Claudia’s partner will come back in a week or two. If not, you’re her closest relative, right?’

‘Her only relative, apart from a distant cousin in Australia.’

Out in the street, a police siren grew closer, then faded. People’s lives were carrying on as normal; at work, shopping, or looking after their children.

‘In that case,’ Andrea said, ‘you’ll be the one we consult. And try not to worry about the baby. She’s a good size, isn’t she?’ She addressed this last to the doctor.

‘Yes. Are you sure your sister got her dates right?’

‘How do you mean?’

‘When she was brought in we were told it was twenty-three weeks’ gestation. We have her notes, of course.’ The doctor was back on safe ground. Facts not feelings. ‘But sometimes people make a mistake about the date of their last period. Obviously, the larger the foetus and the better developed . . .’

In the silence that followed, they thought she was absorbing the good news. Instead, she had started to shake. What an idiot. Why had she never thought of it before? Ollie could have panicked because he suspected he was not the baby’s father. Supposing Claudia had been pregnant when she asked him to move in with her. Pregnant when Erin arrived in Bristol? She had boasted about her lack of morning sickness, but it could have come and gone when she was living in the house by herself. Her lover could have done a bunk, or the baby was the result of a one-night stand and, not wanting to be a single parent, she had picked poor Ollie and pretended to be madly in love with him.

And then felt compelled to tell him the truth? Or he had guessed. Or someone else had told him. Who? But another possibility, a much worse one, made her catch her breath. Where had he been on the afternoon of the accident? Claudia had tried to phone him, and given a derisive snort when she was put through to voicemail. He had a meltdown but I’ll cook him something nice, or buy him a present. Soon talk him round. Talk him round? At the time, Erin had not inquired what the row was about, partly because she doubted Claudia would tell her, but mainly because Ollie having a “meltdown” had seemed so improbable. In her experience, he was such a calm, good-natured person, settling into Claudia’s house like a stray dog, glad of a home. No, that was wrong. He had been as besotted with Claudia as she was with him.

Tomorrow, she would make some cautious inquiries, starting with Jennie, although she doubted Claudia would have confided in her. Then there was Ava, at the café, although, if she and Claudia had been close, Ava was unlikely to tell tales.

Even though Claudia was dead?