do that. Fear coagulated like cement in her chest. Next to her, Tony was shaking his head slightly but the rest of his body had turned to stone. One of the senior nurses came to stand close to them, a sympathetic look on her face.
Don’t do this, please don’t say it, Jamie might hear you…
‘I’m so very sorry,’ the doctor said, ‘but the tests that have been performed are conclusive. There is no remaining cerebral function.’ He paused. ‘Do you understand what that means?’
No, no, nooooooo…
‘You’re telling us his brain is dead.’ There was a world of agony in Tony’s words. ‘He’s gone. My boy’s gone.’
The doctor inclined his head in somber agreement. ‘I’m afraid he has.’
Chapter 3
Fifteen months later
‘Look, are you sure you don’t fancy the cinema?’ It was Friday, it was five o’clock, and Paula was clearing the debris from her office desk, cramming makeup back into her oversized handbag, along with her work shoes, a half-full bottle of Fanta, and a packet of Kettle chips to keep her going on the bus home. ‘Because if you want to come along, honestly, that’d be great, we’d love to have you with us.’
Ellie was touched; it was like two balloons inviting a hedgehog along on their night out. Two newly-in-love balloons on their romantic night out, at that. It was thoughtful of Paula to make the offer but she wouldn’t dream of taking her up on it. Paula and Dan had only been seeing each other for three weeks and Paula was doing her best to pretend she wasn’t completely crazy about him, but it was obvious that she was besotted. It was yet another of the alleged ‘secrets’ she, Ellie, was supposed to be unaware of in order to spare both everyone else’s feelings and her own.
‘Thanks, but I’m fine. I want to get to B&Q and pick up the wallpaper I ordered.’ Did that sound boring? Oh well, never mind, dull but true.
Paula paused and gave her the sympathetic look she’d come to know so well. Then she said brightly, ‘Well, that’ll be nice, won’t it? When it’s done, I mean. Is this for the living room?’
Ellie nodded. There was black mold growing on the living room walls. Since scrubbing it off and painting over it hadn’t worked, covering the whole lot with wallpaper appeared to be the next logical step.
‘Well, look, if you want some help with that tomorrow, me and Dan could come over and give you a hand if you like. I mean, I’ve never done any wallpapering before, but it can’t be too hard, can it?’
Eek, Paula had enough trouble putting her lipstick on straight.
‘You’re all right, I can manage it myself.’ Grateful for the offer, Ellie slung her bag over her shoulder and gave her a hug. ‘Anyway, I won’t be doing any tomorrow. Tony’s over for a few days and he’s taking me out to lunch.’
‘He is? Oh, that’s great.’ Relieved to have been let off the hook, Paula said with enthusiasm, ‘You lucky thing!’ Then she winced and clapped her hand over her mouth. ‘God, sorry. I’m so stupid!’
It had happened dozens of times. Maybe hundreds. No matter how often Ellie told her to stop worrying about it and apologizing, Paula kept right on doing it. At work, everyone did; it was a kind of Pavlovian reaction they couldn’t control.
‘Anyway, I am lucky. We’re meeting at the Ivy.‘
‘Wow.’
‘Meeting at the Ivy, eating at McDonald’s.’
Paula’s eyes widened. ‘Really?’
So sweet, so well-meaning, so easy to tease. ‘No, not really.’ Ellie relented with a smile. ‘We’ll probably have lunch at the Ivy too.’
***
‘Bloody… bloody… bloody useless sodding stuff…’ By midnight Ellie was ready to murder the wallpaper. Hanging on to the stepladder and jabbing wildly at the top right-hand corner of the length she’d been battling to hang for the last forty minutes, she had no hands free to prevent the adjoining section from unpeeling itself and rolling down the wall.
‘Right, that’s it, I’ve had enough of you!’ Letting out a shriek she launched herself at the first bit, missed, and gave the pasted wall a slap that made her palm sting. OK, now the wallpaper had made her so mad she was turning into Basil Fawlty. Time to stop. It wasn’t her fault; she’d just been sold unhangable wallpaper or non-stick wallpaper or something. OK, let it all fall down if that’s what it wanted to do. Leave it, just step away from the carnage and get a Kit Kat out of