Читать книгу After You Fell - J.S. Lark - Страница 13

‘Tea.’ The shout comes through the glossy white bedroom door.

‘Come in,’ I shout to Simon as I click to close the laptop’s browser window. The laptop’s lid snaps down like a crocodile’s bite as the door opens. I put the laptop aside on the bed next to me and adjust the pillows I am leaning on, as he puts a mug of tea down on the bedside chest.

The smell of hot tea says good morning and stirs up a déjà vu moment that makes a feeling of safety clasp at my heart.

‘Has Chloe confirmed she’s coming in to make you lunch today?’

‘Yes.’

‘Good. I know we can make you a sandwich ahead of time, but I’ll worry if you are here all day on your own.’

‘I’m fine. I managed before the operation.’

‘With difficulty.’

‘I know, but I’m getting better every day.’

A smile pulls at his lips and his hand lifts and runs over my hair. It’s a gesture that’s most common when he’s with the boys now. But it’s a gesture I have known for as long as I can remember. I think Simon has always felt like a father to me and I have always looked up to him. We are not a normal brother and sister. But who would be normal after our childhood?

The bed dips as he sits on the edge. He holds my hand. ‘Your eyes have dark circles. Did you sleep?’

‘Not much. I’m too excited.’ I smile. ‘And thank you for pointing out I have bags under my eyes.’

His eyes open wider and his eyebrows lift as he squeezes my hand but he doesn’t answer my comment. ‘Where are your tablets?’

‘Downstairs in the cupboard. But it’s not because of that. Everything has changed – anyone would be excited.’ It is not a bipolar episode.

‘I know. But you can take your tablets with the tea.’ He squeezes my hand again then lets go and stands up. ‘I’ll be back in a minute.’

‘Okay.’

I rest back on the pillows, looking at the plain ceiling, remembering the bumpy or swirly Artex ceilings I stared at when I was younger. Patterns on the ceiling or in the curtains became mythical creatures. Fairies. Trolls. Unicorns. Dragons. There is no fictional image in Simon’s smooth replastered ceiling.

‘Pills.’ He walks into the room rattling the bottle like a maraca. His other hand holds out the packets. ‘Here.’

‘Thank you.’

He’s left the door open and the noise of the boys talking to Mim at the breakfast table downstairs flows in.

‘What will you do today?’

A shrug lifts my shoulders.

He sits on the edge of the bed again. Many hours of our relationship have been spent in this position on hospital, hostel, foster or children’s homes’ beds.

‘What were you looking at on the laptop?’

‘Nothing really.’

A smile. He knows me too well. ‘Binge watch a boxset to stop yourself from becoming impatient with the immobility. It will stop you getting obsessed with something unhealthy.’

‘I’ll be mobile soon, so I have a reason to be impatient.’ I lean forward and hold his hand. ‘And as soon as I am mobile I won’t have time to become unhealthily obsessed with anything. I’ll be too busy being healthy.’

A deep-pitched laugh rumbles low in his throat. ‘The boys have some video games you could play?’

‘For four-year-olds. No, thank you.’

His hand slides out of mine. ‘I’d better get off to work.’ He stands.

I reach up, encouraging him to lean down for a hug.

He kisses my cheek as I kiss his. ‘Have a good day.’

‘You too.’

‘Oh, I will.’ I smile.

He strokes my cheek.

When the door shuts behind him, I open the laptop again. All the pages I have been looking at are open browser tabs: obituaries posted by local and national papers.

I click on the picture of a middle-aged, middle-weight man with a receding hairline at his temples.

I am reading the obituaries of the people who died on the day of my operation, or the day before it.

The man lived in a small town in Wales, not far from Cardiff.

How far would they move a heart around the country?

I click the back arrow and return to the column of names and faces, then click on the next picture. It is a younger man with thick short ginger hair and a beard. Rory Smith. He’d died after a motorcycle accident. I click the back arrow.

It is surprising how many people die in one day.

The mug of tea and the tablets are still beside me.

I click on the story of another dead person and read as I pick up the bottle and tip two little white pills onto the plain powder-blue duvet cover. I swap that bottle for a packet and push out a pill from the foil. I keep popping out different tablets until there is a line of pills in front of me.

I take the tablets one by one with my tea and click on another dead face.