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  ‘Sounds good. Are they going to have another one soon, I’d like to go?’

  ‘Don’t know about that,’ I said. ‘Anyway, I’m not sure that I can trust the medical staff of this establishment with a girl like you.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘The junior doctors don’t get enough sleep as it is.’

  ‘Get out of here, Sharman,’ she said, but I knew she liked it.

  ‘It’s true.’

  ‘Flattery – I knew I was right to come! Shall I come again?’

  ‘I don’t know about that,’ I said, ‘I’m kind of exclusive these days. But you could, I suppose.’

  ‘Your enthusiasm kills me.’

  ‘Infectious, isn’t it?’

  ‘So shall I come by and see you again?’ she persisted.

  ‘Of course, I was only kidding.’ Sure I was. How many other topless models were dropping in? If you’ll excuse the expression.

  ‘As long as I don’t ask questions about the sisters of mercy.’

  I nodded.

  ‘So you do want me to come back?’

  ‘Yeah, I give in. You’ve got me, Fiona. I’m hooked.’

  ‘It never fails. I just wear this dress and men drop like flies.’

  We had another bottle of lager each and after a while she asked me if I was married, and I told her that I wasn’t. Then I asked her if she was, and she told me that she wasn’t either, and did she look like she was? And I told her that she didn’t and asked her if I did, and she told me that I had the look, and bit by bit I told her the whole sorry story and felt better for it.

  ‘So there you go. I’m all alone now with no one to call my own,’ I said at the end.

  ‘Tough.’ I was glad she didn’t give me any fake sympathy.

  ‘Especially on long cold nights,’ I said.

  ‘So advertise in the lonely hearts column.’

  ‘I did already.’

  ‘No good, huh, Sharman?’

  ‘The worst. They all wanted to make an honest man out of me,’ I said.

  ‘Impossible, I’d say.’

  And we smiled at each other, then laughed out loud. I felt good for the first time in months.

  ‘When are you getting out of here?’ she asked after a bit.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘A month, six weeks maybe.’

  ‘Where do you live?’

  ‘Tulse Hill.’

  ‘How are you getting home?’

  I shrugged. ‘I don’t know,’ I said again. ‘I’ll get a lift somehow, there’s plenty of time.’

  ‘I’ve got a car.’

  ‘Are you volunteering?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘I’ll owe you one if you do.’

  ‘One what?’

  ‘Dinner, maybe.’

  ‘A date?’

  ‘If you like.’

  ‘Jesus, Sharman, but you’re hard work. I’ve been angling for a date since I came in here. I thought I was going to have to do handstands to get your attention.’

  ‘Hardly,’ I said. ‘But I warn you, if you go out with me you have to be careful.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s a walk on the wild side every night with me.’

  ‘Sounds interesting.’

  ‘Stick around and I’ll show you.’

  ‘Like when you get your Zimmer frame delivered.’

  ‘The minute it arrives.’

  We talked for a bit longer, then she told me that her old man was expecting her for something to eat. All of a sudden I felt lonely for the first time since I’d come into hospital, and in a way resented her for making me so.

  ‘Something wrong?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m sorry you’re going.’

  ‘I’ll be back.’

  ‘Soon?’ I asked, and felt pathetic as soon as I said it, but she looked pleased.

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘Great.’

  ‘So get some sleep,’ she said.

  ‘Sure,’ I said again.

  She leant over and kissed me and it went on longer than it should have done. I got a faceful of hair that smelt of Silvikrin and made me think of being out of hospital and all sorts of other things I thought I’d stopped thinking about.

  When she pulled away her face was pink, my favourite colour. She jumped down off the bed and got her things together.

  ‘Hey!’ I said as she was leaving. She paused in the doorway, holding the handle and sort of halfway out of the room.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Thanks for the visit. I appreciated it, really.’

  ‘My pleasure,’ she said, and blew me a kiss with her free hand.

  She went out and the door closed behind her and the room wasn’t as bright as it had been when she was there.

  3

  I smoked the joints, and they did help the pain, fleetingly, but that’s the way life goes, I’ve discovered.

  Fiona came and visited me a lot after that. I really didn’t know what the attraction was, and didn’t care much either. Then in the first week of November my consultant deigned to grant me an interview.

  He stood over me, his acolytes behind him: the female doctor who’d looked after me, a houseman, a couple of vague students and several nurses with different shades of uniform and shapes of hats. ‘We’re going to let you out early,’ said my consultant. ‘We’ve done all we can here. Stay in bed for three weeks at home then come back and we’ll take the plaster off. It’s just healing time you need now.’

  ‘And you could use the bed,’ I pointed out.

  ‘Of course we can always use an empty bed. It’s just a waste of your money staying here. Have you got someone to look after you?’

  I shrugged as much as you can in traction. ‘I guess.’

  ‘Fine.’ He rubbed his perfectly clean and manicured hands together. ‘As soon as we’ve cleared you out, a physio will come up and teach you how to use the crutches, then you’re free to leave.’

  I interrupted. ‘I know about crutches.’

  ‘The physio will have to be convinced.’

  I tuned him out and lay back. ‘Bring on the physios then.’

  Fiona came to visit that evening and I told her I was free to go home.

  ‘Great!’ she said. ‘Do you still want a lift?’

  ‘Yes, please.’

  Wanda had cleaned up and closed down my flat and brought my keys back. I gave them to Fiona and she went off to check the place out and get some food in and put the heating on. She was back within a couple of hours.

  ‘You can’t stay there,’ she said briskly.

  ‘Why not?’ I asked. ‘I live there.’

  ‘There are too many stairs for you to get up and down for a start, and there’s no bath. You can’t be in plaster and use a shower. And if you stay there someone will have to come and look after you, and the place is far too small for two.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Come and stay at my place. It’s got three bedrooms and I can look after you with no bother.’

  ‘Haven’t you got anything to do? No work, I mean.’

  ‘Sure, but it’s not nine to five. I can fit you in.’

  ‘Sounds good.’

  ‘Unless the lift breaks down.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’m on the twenty-seventh floor.’

  ‘How many?’

  ‘Twenty-seven,’ she said proudly.

  ‘Where the hell do you live then?’

  ‘Tower block. Top floor, babes, but it’s great when you get there.’

  ‘Does the lift break down often?’

  ‘Often enough.’

  ‘And if it does?’

  ‘Piggy back for you, son, but don’t worry – I’m sure it’ll be all right.’

  ‘Not a good idea. I’d sooner be home.’

  ‘Cooking for yourself and drowning in your own dirt?’

  I thought about it for a moment, the advantages and the disadvantages. ‘OK, Fiona,’ I said. ‘You’ve talked me into it.’

 
‘There goes that old enthusiasm again.’

  ‘Sorry, I was just thinking.’

  ‘Dangerous thing to do, Sharman. Cut it out, will you?’

  ‘I’ll try.’

  The next morning she picked up my suitcase and an overnight bag and a couple of plastic carriers. You stay in hospital for sixteen weeks and you start to acquire stuff you don’t want to leave behind. Clothes, books, all sorts of shit people had brought me and I wasn’t about to dump. Fiona was dressed in a thick brown leather jacket with a fur collar over a big sweater that reached halfway down her thighs, and woolly leggings tucked into high-heeled boots. Around her neck she wore a long scarf striped black and white. ‘Christ!’ she said as I passed her the bags and stuff, ‘this lot weighs a ton.’

  A couple of nurses had come in to say goodbye. One had brought me my take-away drugs: pain killers, sleepers, etc. I thanked the nurses and apologised, I hoped sincerely, for any trouble I’d given them. They were all smiles but I knew they’d forget about me by shift end. That was OK, I expected them to. It was the nature of the job.

  I used both crutches and pushed myself along beside Fiona, past the open wards, through into the waiting area and out to the lifts. It was strange to be mobile again, even in a limited way; strange to see people uninterested in my welfare.

  We descended in the big lift that smelt of old food down to the lower ground floor and out to the car park. ‘I’m over there,’ said Fiona.

  I’d never thought to ask what kind of car she had, but I guessed as soon as I saw it sitting in its slot. It was an acid yellow Spitfire – with the roof down. The weather outside was cold and getting colder. ‘You need to put the hood up,’ I said.

  ‘There isn’t one. It got slashed a month ago and I haven’t had it replaced.’

  ‘What happens when it rains.’

  ‘I get wet.’

  ‘Lovely,’ I said. ‘I suppose that explains the kit.’

  She looked down at herself and giggled. The giggle still worked and I smiled, against my better judgement. I was wearing a maroon sweater with a shawl collar over a pale lemon Oxford cotton shirt and ancient 501s with the left leg chopped off to accommodate my cast. I wasn’t dressed for the Arctic.

  ‘I brought a coat for you to wear. It’s in the boot.’ She dropped my stuff and opened the boot, pulling out my blue Crombie and shaking out the creases. ‘I got it from your flat.’

  ‘I can’t wear that and use these,’ I said petulantly, referring to the crutches. ‘Fucking hell, Fiona!’

  ‘Now don’t get difficult,’ she said. ‘I know it’s a drag, but it’s only a ten-minute drive and the fresh air will do you good. Your face looks like a fish belly.’ She cracked up.

  I gave her another thin smile and leant the crutches up against the side of the car, put on the coat and thanked Christ for dry weather.

  The car was too small for me and the plaster cast, even with the passenger seat way back. Eventually I wedged myself in and gathered the skirts of my coat and the remains of my dignity around myself. With my crutches sticking out of the back seat, we set off.

  She drove like I guessed she would, flat out. She pushed the needle of the rev counter into the red in every gear, and the small engine and the tyres protested like hell, but she never let up.

  We drove straight to Camberwell. Halfway there she pointed out the three high-rise blocks that stood looming over Kennington Park.

  ‘I live in the nearest one,’ she shouted over the roar of the engine and the wind. ‘You’re in luck. The lifts are working today.’ She downshifted and overtook a grey Mercedes on the inside coming up to the lights at Kennington Cross. The transmission clunked in disgust. She turned and looked at me and added, ‘At least, they were.’

  ‘Watch the bloody road!’ I said.

  ‘Don’t worry, you’ll be all right.’

  I looked through the slipstream and felt my eyes tear from the force and thought how beautiful she looked at that moment, with her face animated and her hair tossed by the wind. ‘I hope so,’ I yelled. ‘Or else I’m camping in the lobby.’

  ‘You wouldn’t last five minutes,’ she said, and her laugh was ripped away by the wind.

  We pulled up in the shadow of the tower block. Fiona dragged my stuff out of the boot and I dragged myself out of the cockpit.

  ‘I’m going to park the car,’ she said. ‘Won’t be long.’

  ‘Where do you leave it?’

  ‘I’ve rented a garage since I lost the third hood in four months.’

  ‘You were lucky to get one round here.’

  ‘I wore a very short skirt when I went looking,’ she said. ‘Now the guy who rents it to me wants to be my special friend.’

  ‘I bet he does!’

  ‘Free parking.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And I’d rather pay double. Wait here. I won’t be two minutes.’

  She was four but I didn’t care. Even under the shadow of that brute of a building it was good to be out in the world again. She came trotting back, chest heaving. Even under all that leather and wool it was quite a sight. ‘Come on,’ she said, gathered up my stuff and set off. I followed her through the filthy glass doors. The place was graffiti heaven. It was freezing cold and someone had pissed in the corner. It smelt like a zoo. There were a bunch of kids, black and white mixed, huddled together in one corner around a beat box. The volume was turned all the way up and the cheap speakers distorted the sound to mush.

  ‘Damn!’ I said.

  The kids perked up when we came in. I guessed we made good sport. They started making comments – plenty of ‘fucks’ and ‘cunts’ and ‘shits’, all laced together for maximum offence. There were some mentions of my crippled state. Fiona pulled a face and shook her head when she thought I might say something back. Eventually the lift came. A couple of the kids made as if to join us and keep up the game. It was my turn to shake my head then and slide my right hand down its crutch to make a crude club. The kids were young enough to take the hint, just. Another couple of years and who knows?

  The lift doors closed behind us and I relaxed against the wall. There was more graffiti inside. It made the interior of the cage oppressive and tight like a prison cell. It smelled like one too, like the lobby, like a shithouse, and I wondered how this girl managed to live here all the time.

  ‘For God’s sake, Fiona!’ I said.

  ‘Hard to lets,’ she replied. ‘I queued for two days and a night on a cold pavement outside the town hall to get this place. I’ve put too much effort in to let a few little sods like that frighten me away.’

  ‘Not so little.’

  ‘Anyway, it’s your fault, you look like a copper. It’ll be all right once we get inside the flat.’

  ‘Does that happen often?’ I asked.

  ‘No, not really. It’s the weather driving them inside. I get some wolf whistles and dirty talk but I ignore it.’

  ‘And what happens if it’s more than talk?’

  ‘My dad taught me some moves.’

  ‘Like?’

  ‘Army things, plus a little extra. I told you he was in the SAS, didn’t I? I can take care of myself.’

  ‘I hope so,’ I said. ‘But don’t worry, I’m here now.’

  ‘That’s a relief,’ she said, and I suppose standing there propped up by two bits of metal tube and plastic and rubber I wasn’t exactly as reassuring as I might have been.

  The lift shuddered upwards. It seemed to take forever on its journey. The floor indicator was history. It had been ripped away from above the door and just two bits of bent wire and some battered numerals were left. A couple of times the lift faltered and seemed to be on the verge of giving up altogether and I thought sourly that I might spend most of my first day of freedom being jacked up or down a lift shaft by the fire brigade. Fiona stayed cool so I assumed the lift’s behaviour was nothing out of the ordinary.

  After what seemed like an hour we ground to a halt and the doors slid open with a screech of protest
. We walked, or in my case limped, on to a half clean hallway with a door at each end and another jammed half open, leading on to the stairwell. Fiona turned left and dumped my bags in front of her flat. The door was painted sick green and held a security peeper and three key holes. It was battered-looking and someone had tried to get a blunt instrument between door and jamb. The scars on the paint looked fresh.

  ‘My dad fitted a metal door,’ she explained proudly. ‘And the locks and the dead bolt. The spy hole and the letter box can be locked from the inside.’

  ‘He’s handy, your dad.’

  ‘You’d better believe it, and my brother too. So be careful, Sharman, or they’ll come and get you.’

  ‘I never argue with the military.’

  She juggled a set of keys from the pocket of her leather jacket and took an age to open up. What she’d do if anyone came after her whilst she was trying to get through that bank of security I didn’t ask, but I wasn’t happy. I thought I might talk to her father or her brother about it.

  The front door opened on to a short hallway with a door each side. At the end was a steep open stair-case. ‘It’s a maisonette,’ she said. ‘Kitchen on the left.’ She threw open the door and I registered a clean white kitchen with a blind pulled down over the window. ‘Living room on the right, but it gets a bit noisy sometimes at night. The people downstairs are party animals, so I don’t use it. It’s all right – upstairs you can’t hear a thing.’ She opened that door and let it bounce back on itself and I had a glimpse of a huge empty room with dark curtains drawn across a wall-width window. ‘Can you manage the stairs?’ she asked. ‘Here, give me your coat.’

  I leant the crutches against the wall, shrugged out of the Crombie and handed it to her. I fitted my arms back into the crutches and heaved myself up a dozen stairs and into a hall that turned back on itself at the top.

  ‘Bathroom,’ she indicated.

  It was a medium-sized room with towels folded neatly over a rail and only one pair of tights hanging over the bath. She pulled them down, felt them for dampness, seemed satisfied and brought them with her. ‘I cleaned up for you. It was in a bit of a mess.’