Читать книгу Mr Cleansheets - Adrian Deans - Страница 9

“You have no choice, Mr Judd.”

I waited for the doctor to smile, to show he was pulling my leg.

“I’m sorry. Could you repeat that?”

His expression never changed, and I suppose I should not be expecting humour when everything is so pervaded by the serious smell of disinfectant, and the distant beeping of serious machines.

“You have no choice, Mr Judd. You have suffered significant trauma around the disks L4 and L5. The disks themselves are quite worn… almost as though you had spent your whole life carrying heavy weights or jumping about and falling over all the time.”

“Well, my work is— ”

“There is also,” he interrupted, “evidence of severe trauma in the past. This is not your first spinal injury, is it?”

Shona turned to me with raised eyebrows, but I just sat there blankly. The doctor grew tired of waiting: “In any case, if we don’t do something now to shore up the damage, you risk spending the rest of your life in a wheelchair.”

He wanted me to have the lower part of my spine fused.

“Doc, this fusing, wouldn’t it have some sort of impact on my flexibility?”

“Indeed it would… a very considerable impact. You would have almost no flexibility, which is exactly the point, the state we require to prevent you becoming paraplegic.”

“But I need my flexibility. I can’t keep goal if I’m not flexible.”

For the first time his expression changed, so he wasn’t a robot.

“You can’t … what?”

“Keep goal,” I finished lamely, one eye on Shona, whose sympathy was dissolving into thin-lipped impatience.

“Keep goal?” asked the doctor. “I thought you worked as a removalist.”

“He does,” said Shona.

“You mean he did,” replied the doctor. “I think, Mr Judd, that you will have to find a new occupation … one which does not involve lifting, or strenuous physical activity.”

Obviously, they weren’t getting the message.

“I have an occupation. I keep goals. I’ve been invited to trial with Manchester United.”

Shona’s impatience finally boiled over, and she spoke in a threatening, teeth-clenched whisper: “Eric, for God’s sake! The doctor’s being serious here.”

“So am I,” I told her.

There was a bit of a silence, eventually broken by the doctor.

“Mr Judd, isn’t football a young man’s game?”

“I’m 39, doctor. That’s not so old for a keeper.”

“I see. And this keeping you do, does it involve much rough and tumble … contact with other players?”

“He flings himself around like a bloody maniac,” dobbed Shona.

“Well that settles it,” declaimed the doctor, one hand raised as though proclaiming holy writ.

“Whether you have or refuse the operation is up to you, Mr Judd.

However, I believe it would be foolhardy in the extreme for you to continue playing football given your back condition. Just one more knock could put you in a wheelchair for life.”

* * *

“What’s this?”

Shona stared at the rectangular piece of paper I had placed in her hand.

“It’s a cheque.”

“Why are you giving me a cheque?”

“It’s a deposit on a house. I know you’ve always wanted your own home.”

“Of course I do. But what are you doing?”

“I’m going to England.”

The cheque was for $200,000. I was keeping the rest of Jimmy’s legacy to get myself over to Manchester. Indeed, I had already booked the flight - Qantas business class. The only thing left to be done was remove “The Letter” from the frame in which I had kept it for the last 20 years.

Shona watched in silence as I pulled the frame off the wall and began tearing it to pieces.

“When are you going?”

“Tomorrow.”

“So this is it? You’re breaking up with me?”

It had been five weeks since the accident in the beer garden. I’d spent three days in hospital and had quickly become a laughing stock when news of my intention to play for Man United had gotten round (especially among the gay male nurses). But I was unaffected by their laughter and impervious to their medical wisdom. A fused spine meant the end of my career and the denial of Jimmy’s dying wish. In the weeks of my recovery, the decision I’d made on a Pethidine whim had hardened in my own mind, and I’d begun to plan, keeping my movements secret from Shona, for the sake of peace.

My first ever passport had arrived and I’d booked the flight. Early October was off-season, so there’d been a special on business class. It was less than $1000 more than standard economy, so what the fuck?I’ll be making heaps of money when I sign my contract.

To my great surprise, Shona burst into tears.

“I don’t want your money, Eric! I want you … and a normal life. I thought this money was our big chance, to be a normal couple!”

“I have to have a go, Shona. If I didn’t take up this chance, I’d spend the rest of my life wondering.”

“But you’re 40, Eric … 40 years old!”

“I’m 39. For six more days.”

“You’re 40! You’re a middle-aged crock with a broken back. When are you going to face reality?”

“Shona, this is reality. It’s always been my reality.”

She just stared at me, eyes red and puffy from tears, the cheque scrunched within her white-knuckled fist.”

“I can’t believe how selfish you are, Eric!”