Page 23 of Hard Tail
The boot of my car stuffed with carrier bags, I stopped in to see Jay on the way back. There was a welcome sight waiting for me in Jay’s hospital room. “Dad!”
His face lost the vaguely worried look it tends to wear when he’s around Mum, and he gave me a bony hug. Dad’s built on the same scale as I am, only with even skinnier legs and a bit of a pot belly to balance that out. “Tim, my boy. Wonderful to see you looking so well.”
“You too, Dad. How’s the, er, you know?” I patted my chest with a furtive glance around in case Mum was watching. Fortunately, she was too busy multitasking to notice: plumping Jay’s pillows while giving one of the nurses a ticking off for something or other.
“Ah! Well, between you and me,” Dad stage-whispered, not without a furtive glance of his own, “it’s been a great deal better since your mother’s been too busy coming down here to bother with cooking.” Mum and Dad lived in Winchester, which was only half an hour away by road, but, like me, Mum was always glad of an excuse not to cook. “I think Dr. Loving may have been right all along. But you know your mother—she’s determined I should have one foot in the grave.”
I grinned, more relieved than I wanted to let on. “That’s Mum for you—never one to admit she’s wrong. How’ve you been managing, then, with her spending half her time down here?”
Dad put on a martyred expression. “Oh, you know. Surviving. It’s not been easy, I can tell you—some days I go hours without hearing a single order to mow the lawn, fix the shelves, fetch something from the attic and while I’m at it, stopdoingso much, it’s bad for my heart.” He chuckled and lowered his voice even further. “Don’t tell your mother, but I’ve been having butter on my toast for lunch. And popping to the baker’s for the odd eclair.”
“On your own arteries be it,” I warned semi-seriously. Dad just gave me a mischievous smile and made ashhgesture, with a significant look over to Mum.
I thought I’d better say hi to the person I was actually here to visit, so I went over to Jay. Mum had finally got the pillows plumped to her satisfaction but obviously hadn’t finished ticking off the nurse. From her resigned expression, I guessed the nurse knew she’d be there for a while yet. “So, any news on the leg front?”
Jay made a disgusted face. “Yeah. They’ve finally worked out which bits they want to pin together and with what, so I’m booked in for surgery.” He brightened. “According to the bone guy, I’m the only person under sixty-five who’s had a fracture like this in the last forty years. That’s why it took them so long to work out how best to treat it. He’s planning on writing a paper about me.”
Typical. “You know, there are easier ways to get famous. Certainly less painful ones.”
“Yeah? Haven’t seen your ugly mug on the telly lately. So how’s it going with the shop, anyway? Have you managed to stop Matt trashing the place?”
I wasn’t sure I liked Jay’s attitude. “Matt’s been great—you shouldn’t be so hard on him. He was flat out yesterday, what with all the repairs coming in and out.”
“Putting him up for employee of the month, are you?” Jay grinned. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you’d fallen for his scruffy gay charms.”
“Oh, for God’s sake—can’t I even say something nice about the bloke without you jumping on me like that?” I hoped to God I wasn’t blushing; it’d be a dead giveaway.
“Bet you’d be all right with Matt jumping on you—”
My face was burning hot. Maybe he’d blame it on the stuffy hospital room. “Have you ever seenMisery? Because I’m quite happy to stage a re-enactment of a certain scene—”
“Timothy!” Mum’s voice snapped in my ear. “Would you please try and remember your brother is very seriously injured? We’re all extremely worried about his operation.”
“Er, sorry.” I felt about five years old. “Um, is it really that big a deal?” I asked Jay.
“Nah. They’re just going to put a sort of framework in. They said it’ll feel a lot better when they’ve done it, and I’ll be able to walk on it sooner.”
“Ifhe doesn’t catch MRSA and lose it altogether,” snapped Mum. “Really, the standards of hygiene of some of these young girls—”
“Mum, I really don’t think talking about that kind of thing is going to help Jay feel better.”
Mum just glared at me.
“God, you two are as bad as each other!” Jay leaned forward, apparently for the express purpose of being able to collapse dramatically back onto his pillows. “You wear me out, you do. Stopworrying.”
I wasn’t sure who was more offended by the comparison—me or Mum.
“Anyway,” Jay went on into the stunned silence, “is Matt okay? In himself, I mean. He seemed a bit low last time I saw him, and then there’s the black eye and all.”
“Oh, that’s nearly disappeared now,” I said warmly, glad of the change of subject. “And I don’t know what you mean about him seeming low—he’s always really cheerful when I see him.”
“Yeah? That’s a relief. I’d been starting to wonder…so, no more accidents, then?”
“Well, no more visible bruising, if that’s what you mean. What did you mean, you were starting to wonder about Matt?”
“What? Nah, it’s nothing.” He laughed. “Got too much time to think here, that’s my trouble.”
I nodded solemnly. “You’ve never really been cut out for that, have you? Thinking, I mean.”
