Page 27 of The Flowers of Bay C
The friend is not ready to move on. ‘This is adisabledloo.’
‘I know. I… I’m chronically ill.’
She laughs, but the smile goes nowhere near her eyes. ‘Yeah. As I said, this is a disabled loo, and a disabled person needs it. You don’t look disabled.’
‘I couldn’t stand in the line.’
‘You couldn’t stand? What about Jane here?’ She thrusts her chin in the air, her glare hard on me. A small crowd is forming around us, others joining in with theiryeahsand theirwows.
Jane puts one hand in the air, palm out. ‘It’s okay, Chloe, I didn’t mind waiting, looks like she needed it too. It’s fine.’
Chloe hunkers down next to Jane. ‘But that’s not the point, is it. All your life you’ve had to put up with all this crap for being in a wheelchair. All the time. And you shouldn’t have to. Not on a night out. It’s not fair.’
She’s right. It’s not fair. None of it is fair.
‘Sorry,’ I say, and skulk away, face turned to the floor, hisses of rancour chasing me through the hall. I leave the theatre, text Jen that I’m ill again.
‘Oh Pen, you could’ve seen it through,’ she texts back. ‘Now I have to watch it on my own.’
‘Sorry.’
Sorry. Sorrysorrysorry.
???
Jen comes in for visiting today. ‘I saw your post on Facebook. Didn’t want to visit before in case… you know, in case you weren’t up to it.’
‘Thanks,’ I say. Inside I’m thinking, she should know me better, by now.
We met in antenatal classes. She was a single mum too, and Jake and Alice were inseparable as youngsters. She was kind to me, stepping in when I could barely move, taking Jake to nursery or one of his clubs. It’s no problem, Pen, I’m here for you and always will be. Then she met Simon and began to retreat, laying ever frostier barriers between us, dropping hints about being taken for granted. I love her, but there’s always a catch with her now, it’s never as wonderful as it was in those early days when we put the little ones to bed and sat up all night putting the world to rights with a couple of bottles of wine.
I miss that Jen.
Jake straggles in, clad in a black beanie and fingerless gloves but no coat. ‘Where’s your coat?’ I say. ‘It looks freezing out there.’
The soft rain of the morning turned into frozen shards of sleet, clattering against the windows insistently through the afternoon.
Jake shrugs, grabbing one of the black bucket chairs and slinging it down by my bed. ‘I don’t like wearing a coat. You know that, Mum. Hey, Jen.’
‘Hi, Jake. How are you?’
‘Okay.’
Jodie leans over, her long blonde hair hanging in two messy plaits. ‘Jake,’ she says, stretching out the name. ‘What’s up?’
‘Not much,’ Jake says, turning away from Jen and me and dragging his chair closer to Jodie. ‘You?’
Jodie leans further towards him and whispers something, and they both splutter into loud laughter. Jen narrows her eyes, all affronted, as if to ask why Jake would be much more interested ina patient he’d known for all of five minutes rather than his godmother.
Kat’s husband Nate wanders into the ward. He’s holding a large red cloth Aldi bag, and sets it on Kat’s bed. I catch a glimpse of something brown and furry as he starts to draw it out. Has he smuggled a puppy in?
Kat stares up at him. ‘What have you…?’ She stops as he pulls out the item and holds it up to her.
‘Tada!’
‘Why did you bring that?’ Kat is grimacing, but then a wan ghost of a smile skips around her mouth.
Jodie shouts, ‘What you got there, Mr Vicar?’
