Who is this person
staring back at me?
I’m not sure I recognize him
from the person I used to be.
— “Who?” Jack Cuoco
“Ow! Fuuu…fudge.”
I chuckled at Hollie’s attempt to shield Cooper from her swearing. She and I were both trying not to swear around him, but I knew he was smart enough to understand them. It just felt like we should stop swearing around him.
I poked my head into the door of her room. Different colored fabrics were strewn all over the bed, floor, desk, wardrobe, mannequin…it looked like every bit of space was covered. “You all right?”
She massaged her index finger. “My hands are sore from so much sewing, stitching, unpicking, you know. And I just stabbed myself with the needle pretty aggressively.”
I studied her hands. They were red and peeling. In serious need of some love. I knew just what products would help.
“Come with me.”
For once, someone had a problem I could help with.
“Where are we going?” she asked, following.
Cooper also got up off the sofa to join us. Astin was asleep, so he’d be fine with us being a few hundred yards away. I unlocked the door to my room and let them in. It wasn’t as messy as Hollie’s room, but it wasn’t as tidy as anything Astin was in charge of. He seemed to enjoy cleaning. I had better ways to spend my time.
I opened the top drawer of my dresser and grinned.
Hollie gasped. “How do you have so much skincare when you haven’t even been here that long?”
“Never underestimate being famous and window shopping with a cute kid,” I said with a wink. Cooper grinned. “I tell them what we’re looking for, agree to take a photo with them, they post it online and get free publicity, I get freebies. You’d be surprised how easy it is.”
Hollie peered inside the drawer, a look of amazement on her face. I was pretty proud of what Cooper and I had collected so far. I had bought some of it, and I wasn’t collecting it for the sake of it. I loved skincare and genuinely intended to use it on myself, or to help my friends.
“Let’s see your hands,” I said.
Hollie held them out. They were dry, with the texture of sand paper. I’d seen worse, but they still looked sore. If it’d been winter, they’d probably have been a lot angrier.
I lowered her hands then rifled through the drawer for something. There wasn’t much of a system, but that didn’t bother me. I knew there was something in there that could help. “Aha!” I held it out to her. “Hand cream with hyaluronic acid in. It helps skin to heal, and can hold one thousand times its weight in water. Extra points if you apply it to damp skin, or on a humid day—which, let’s face it, is most of the British summer—because it grabs moisture from the air. If that isn’t available, it grabs it from your skin. Which doesn’t always end well if you live somewhere dry. Which we don’t, so it’s all good.”
“What happens if you live somewhere dry?” said Cooper.
“It pulls the little water that’s left in your skin out to plump itself up. So ends up drying your skin out instead. And dry skin is painful. We don’t want that, do we?”
“No!” said Cooper.
“Attaboy,” I said.
He looked inside the drawer. “Can I get something too?”
“Of course. What would you like?”
“Something that smells nice.”
I bit my lip, hiding my vendetta against fragranced skincare. Some of it was fine, but most things that smelled nice—especially if they were cheap—wouldn’t provide any real benefits. Although his age meant that wasn’t a big deal anyway.
I picked up a small Rituals shower gel and passed it to him. “The Ritual of Samurai. What do you think?”
He unscrewed the bottle and sniffed it. “Thanks!”
I was just about to ask if Hollie wanted anything else when we heard a thud echo through the wall, followed by swearing.
The three of us ran through the room and back into Hollie and Astin’s suite. Astin was curled up on the floor, his walking frame a few inches away.
“Cooper, can you call Jamal and ask him to bring some help up please?” said Hollie.
Cooper clearly wanted to go see his brother, but did as she asked. Between the three of us, we still couldn’t have picked Astin up safely. We were all weaklings. It was annoying, but it was what it was.
“What happened?” said Hollie. She crouched down beside him and put her hand on his shoulder. He flicked it away.
“I was just trying to stretch my legs. They were feeling sore. And my physio said to do it as little and as often as possible. But Declan must’ve put my walker too far away, because I couldn’t quite reach it, so I slipped and fell. How did I go from doing stunts to this?” A tear trickled down his cheek. I could tell he was trying to suppress his rage. He wasn’t very good at it, so I appreciated him trying. Roskowski not included.
Cooper returned to the room. “They’re on their way.”
“Thanks,” said Hollie.
Astin turned away from his brother. Hollie stroked his hair. This time, he let her, and I was convinced that the small gesture helped him calm down, although it was hard to say for definite.
Jamal and a couple of others entered after what felt like far too long, but which was probably only a few minutes. He’d probably had to search for staff members capable of lifting him without doing any further damage to him or themselves.
I turned away as they picked him up, knowing he wouldn’t want us to see him like that, and unable to witness it myself. I was frustrated I couldn’t help more, but I’d never be able to lift as much as Astin did. I could barely hold my own bodyweight.
“Thanks,” said Astin, once he was tucked up back in bed.
“Can I get you anything, Mr Mack?” asked Jamal after the other two staff members had left.
“Can I get a protein shake please?”
“Of course. What flavor?”
“Chocolate, please.”
“Can I try one?” asked Cooper.
“Do you want to try some of mine first?” Astin offered. If Cooper had any sense, he wouldn’t like the things, so was better off trying someone else’s first.
“No! I want my own!” said Cooper. “What flavors do you have?”
“Vanilla, chocolate, or strawberry.”
“Strawberry please,” said Cooper.
“Ms Baxter? Mr Cuoco?”
“Can I get a vanilla shake, please?” said Hollie.
Jamal nodded, then looked to me.
“Why am I the only one who doesn’t want to butcher their tastebuds? I’ll have a coffee, please. And a banana.”
Jamal laughed, then exited to get our drinks.
“Why don’t you like protein shakes?” Cooper asked me.
“You’ll have to wait to find out.”
*
To my surprise, Cooper enjoyed his protein shake and didn’t understand why I disliked the grainy texture and artificial flavors. Each to their own, I supposed.
We called the doctor and got him to come over and check on Astin after his fall. Even though he seemed fine, we didn’t want to chance anything. He was still fragile and our fear was strong.
Luckily, the doctor said he was fine, he just needed to take it easy. Which he was technically doing already. If he took it any easier, I was pretty sure he’d be comatose.
We left him to sleep again after the doctor’s visit, then Hollie, Cooper, and I went downstairs to get some dinner. We found a spot near the stairs, where it was easier to get back to Astin if he needed us again. But, based on the look he’d given us before we’d left, I was pretty sure he wouldn’t say anything if he did.
“I’m glad the doctor said he was OK,” said Cooper as we studied our menus.
“Me too,” said Hollie.
“Me three,” I agreed.
Cooper smiled at me, but it didn’t meet his eyes.
“What’s up, little one?” I asked.
Cooper lowered his head. “Seeing Astin like that…he looked so fragile.”
“He is fragile,” said Hollie.
“But seeing him in bed, then seeing him need help to get off the floor…it’s different.”
One makes him look lazy, or at the very least hides a lot of the realities of his injury. Sure the head and neck brace of nightmares was visible, but it was easy for us to block that out after a while. And Cooper had been shielded from a lot of the care tasks that Hollie, Declan, Jamal, and occasionally me, helped him with. Until today.
I patted Cooper’s shoulder. “Are you all right?”
He lowered his menu, a pensive expression on his face. “I just wish I could do more to help him.”
“You and me both, kid. You and me both.”