The Man Who Didn't Go to Newcastle Read online

  I bring up the subject of our holiday.

  ‘I don’t want you to cancel,’ he says more than once. We have already put in motion a rota of visitors for while we are away. Phil G, Welsh Phil, Bryony, Martin, Margaret, Jack and Ed.

  ‘Phil G’s coming tomorrow,’ Adrian says, although I had thought he was due on Wednesday. ‘I’ve told the staff my business partner is coming and I’ve ordered lunch for two to be brought to the room.’

  Mmm… I think he’s going a tad OTT with the whole business partner thing, implying they’re having some kind of high powered executive/boardroom meeting.

  ‘So what did they say? Are they going to serve you with luncheon for two?’

  ‘They said ‘no’ – because of the ‘protein’,’ he says.

  ‘The protein? What on earth do they mean by that?’

  ‘No idea.’

  I wonder, did they perhaps say ‘because of the quarantine’ and he misheard the word as ‘protein’? Anyway, I don’t know how Phil G feels, but I actually wouldn’t eat a peanut in this room with all those C.diff spores floating about.

  *

  Back home I feel in such a bad place. During my visit Adrian apologised for being grumpy over the past few days. In a way this is more upsetting than when he’s being bad tempered. A grumpy man is easy to dismiss. A repentant one, a lot harder.

  Everything is crowding in on me. My brother is apparently dying and I can’t believe it. I can’t take it in. I can’t talk about it. I have no idea how it will happen, this end of life. I sit in the kitchen with a cup of tea. The Buste de Femme au Chapeau is propped against the wall still awaiting a more permanent resting place. Wide-eyed, her gaze bores into me. Eyes like nuggets of coal. Thick black lashes – like tears. Tears stream down her face. Apart from books and clothes, this is the one possession Adrian brought with him from his flat. His one luxury item, apart from the Bible and Shakespeare. I really want him to have this picture in his room at St Vincent’s. It belongs with him, not here in my kitchen. But I’m afraid to take it in case it implies permanence.

  In the evening I collect the girls in town and do a drive thru at McDonald’s. Em has put the Coldplay CD on and again Chris Martin croons the words of “Fix You” which for me has become the anthem of this summer. As the girls munch on cheeseburgers and slurp Coke, I chew things over in my mind. Tomorrow is the last day of school before the summer holidays. What will these holidays hold for me? I am in a play with a certain outcome. I love my brother. Why can’t I fix him?

  Okay, I realise I might not be able to fix him, but I ask two things: one – he’s still alive when we get back from Portugal; and two – he doesn’t suffer any more.

  (And three – I wake up tomorrow morning and find out none of this has happened.)

  Tuesday 24th July 2007

  Our wedding anniversary. Adrian was Peter’s best man. We got married in cold drizzle but today is hot and sunny. On the journey to school I enthuse about our forthcoming holiday in the Algarve with Kyria and her daughters.

  ‘I can’t wait. Don’t you think it will be brill?’

  Both girls are unenthusiastic. They seem cautious about the heat.

  ‘I hate being really hot. Will it be really hot?’ Emily doesn’t like being really hot.

  ‘And I’m allergic to the sun.’ Fran is allergic to the sun.

  Hey ho…

  *

  Within seconds of arriving home I have a phone call from the school telling me Fran is wearing white shoes.

  ‘But she had a note,’ I say to the woman on the other end of the line. ‘I’d written her a note to explain she was wearing white shoes because her black ones were wet.’

  ‘She’s in Time Out and will have to stay there for the rest of the day unless someone is able to bring her black shoes into school.’

  ‘I can’t believe I’m hearing this. It’s the last day of the fucking school year.’

  Oh my God. I’ve just sworn at a teacher. Should I say more? I plough on. ‘I’ve got enough to do today without this sort of thing! Can I please talk to my daughter?’

  Fran’s voice comes on the phone, little and scared.

  ‘I’ll bring the shoes, Fran. But I’ve just got to wait in for Dad to come home because he wants me to do some typing for him.’

  ‘Okay.’ Fran says, still sounding nothing like the child I dropped off twenty minutes ago.

  Peter arrives home to do some paperwork. I tell him about the white shoes debacle.

  ‘The school is picking on small things because they’ve lost control over the big issues. It’s like the police focusing on car crime when the rest of the population is killing each other.’

  He’s right. I leave for the school, comforted by my husband’s logic, and armed with a pair of tatty, soggy black dolly shoes I’ve failed to dry properly on the radiator. As soon as I reach the school campus I notice a boy in a group of five or six other kids who’s wearing white trainers. I stomp towards the reception, making my way to the glass booth where a member of the office staff sits.

  I grab the receptionist by the neck and haul her through the gap in the glass. ‘Get my daughter, now!’ I scream, ‘And while you’re at it you can get that bitch of a teacher who put her in Time Out for wearing white shoes. It’s the last bloody day of term for fuck’s sake.’

  In fact this is not what does happen. The real version is as follows:

  ‘I’ve come in to bring my daughter’s black shoes because she’s been in Time Out for wearing white shoes.’ I’m holding up a bag containing the shoes. ‘And…and I’ve… just seen a boy wearing white shoes. Why is my daughter in Time Out when other children are walking around in white shoes and aren’t in Time Out?’

  By now I’m in tears. Behind me a delivery man is in the process of delivering a pile of about twenty cardboard boxes that reach the ceiling.

  ‘What’s your daughter’s name?’ the receptionist enquires, as if I’m a routine visitor who is not snivelling into a tissue.

  ‘Frances Clink in 9S.’

  I snivel some more and eventually the receptionist ushers me away from the delivery man, and everyone else (including one of my neighbours who just happens to be the head of sixth form) who’s milling about in the reception area. I sit down at a paper-strewn desk in the glass-fronted office, put on my sunglasses and give my nose a good blow, while she makes futile attempts to phone the teacher concerned.

  ‘They’re all in an end of term assembly,’ she says, holding the phone away from her ear.

  ‘Get her to ring me, then,’ I blurt as I slam my carrier bag down with Fran’s socks and shoes in it. ‘Tell her to ring my mobile,’ I say en passant having decided to make a quick exit before I humiliate myself further.

  I drive out of the school, taking the right turning when it should have been the left – for the journey to St Vincent’s Nursing Home to visit my brother – who quite often wears white shoes instead of black if he can manage to get out of bed and put them on, and who is dying of cancer and who only has a few weeks left to live. So where do white shoes, black shoes or any other sodding colour of shoes come into the scheme of things?

  *

  For once the front door of St Vincent’s is opened by a nurse before I’ve even had a chance ring the bell. Matron and another woman are standing in the cavernous hallway. Matron greets me and immediately brings up the subject of the laptop.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Clink, but yesterday I told you the wrong thing,’ she confesses. I’m momentarily stunned since she doesn’t seem the sort of person to back down on anything. ‘You could have a land line put into Adrian’s room…’

  As she speaks I see Adrian walk across the far end of the hallway towards the back door.

  ‘…or you could pay to have broadband put into the room, but to install broadband would take about two weeks. And, well,’ a little laugh here, ‘it doesn’t seem worth it. I mean he’s only got about two weeks…’

  ‘He’s only got two weeks? Is that what t
he doctor said?’

  ‘Well, yes. They said he’s got ‘weeks rather than months’ when he was in St George’s, didn’t they? And that was at least a couple of weeks ago. When we had broadband installed in the office it took two weeks just to do the job.’

  I learnt from experience when Mum was in a care home not to fall out with the staff. If I argue with Matron there may be repercussions for my brother so I take my leave of her and follow Adrian out to the garden to give him some things I’ve brought for him. He looks loads better than yesterday. He’s dressed in a plain white T-shirt, an un-ironed maroon shirt (one of those Christmas presents from me in a different life) and his old tan coloured leather jacket. (Not the black suit-type style leather jacket I’ve seen him in recently and have come to associate with this time of his life.)

  He’s sitting at a table below the veranda hunched up in this now familiar pose, a glass of white wine beside him.

  ‘Oh, thanks for all the things, Ali.’ He takes the bag from me. ‘Sit down. I’ve got some bad news for you.’ He produces a notebook and pen so I guess we are going to talk money. As far as real bad news is concerned, we’ve already had bad, worse, and the worst (and more piled on top). Surely things can only get better.

  ‘Do you know anything about Life Insurance Policies?’ he asks. I don’t, as it happens, because, although I’m sure we’ve got them, Peter has always dealt with that sort of thing. He continues, describing two policies he has connected to his mortgage. From what he’s saying he seems to think I’d go on paying the premiums on these policies after he’s gone. This is unbearable to put into words, but I try to follow what he’s saying.

  ‘You could end up in trouble and even go to jail.’

  What is he talking about? Surely the whole point of life insurance is that it pays out after your death and covers the outstanding mortgage.

  ‘And you might stand to lose 50k.’

  I still don’t know what he means. He’s drawing squiggles and numbers on the pad and says he will get Welsh Phil to look up the numbers of the Life Insurance Policies for him when he’s next in the flat.

  What I want to talk about is our trip to Portugal. Two things have changed the way I’m feeling about this holiday. One was a fleeting look on Margaret’s face the other day which showed me how surprised she was to hear we were still going, and the other was Matron’s comment just now about ‘two weeks’. Supposing he has only got two weeks. How can I leave him for one of them?

  ‘I’m still a bit worried about the holiday to Portugal,’ I begin. ‘Would you prefer it if I just cancelled it. I mean, we’re insured. We’d get every penny back.’

  ‘I don’t want to make you do something you don’t want to.’ As he speaks his body is twisted away from me and he’s looking down at the path.

  ‘But would you prefer it if I didn’t go?’ I press him.

  The big answer comes…

  ‘Yes.’

  I feel my holiday crumble and die. I’m already mourning the loss of the sun, swimming and spending time with Kyria and her twin daughters who we were meeting out there. But regret dwindles and dies equally quickly, and is replaced by relief. I’m relieved I no longer have to worry about who will visit Adrian during the week we’re away. I don’t need to worry about a holiday I’m not in the least prepared for. I haven’t ordered a single euro and haven’t foraged for a single bikini, sun hat or bottle of sun oil. I can relax and be here to help Adrian. Anyway, the hotel was in Praia de Oura which is near the area where the little British girl, Madeleine McCann, was snatched in May, so already has a slightly bad taste to it…

  ‘The holiday wasn’t a big deal,’ I gabble. ‘Peter doesn’t want to go anyway because he’s in the middle of doing up the bathroom. The girls don’t really like hot climates, and it was way over-priced. Two grand for a week, self-catering. I’ll cancel it when I get home. We’ll get the money back on the insurance.’

  While we’re sitting together in the sunshine beneath the leafy veranda a nurse arrives with a tray of lunch.

  ‘No thanks, I don’t want anything to eat,’ Adrian says. Matron appears and in fact I’ve been aware of her hovering in the background for a while. Her office windows are behind where we are sitting.

  ‘If you’re drinking alcohol then you should be eating,’ she lectures Adrian, nodding towards his glass on the table. ‘Remember what happened when you were in London, when you went out drinking and ended up in hospital with heart tremors?’

  ‘No, don’t worry. I’ll be careful,’ he says gently, so calmly and politely. His charm is far superior to the one it’s bestowed upon. I know in this moment how glad I am I’ve decided to cancel our holiday, how pleased I am to have my brother near me in Somerset. I’m proud of the person he is. His charm, his bravery, his individuality. I won’t even think about the Algarve again.

  I leave St Vincent’s, collect the girls and drive to Trowbridge so they can buy new clothes to wear to a party tonight. Later I drop them at the surprise party they’ve planned for Em’s friend, Rosie. As I drive away I see Rosie with Georgia and Ruby, two of their other friends, walking along the street. These girls are only fourteen – Rosie is fourteen today – and they are all dolled up in the latest garb – too much make-up, denim shorts, cut off tights, wide belts. Georgia and Rosie wave when they see me – I wave back at them…and I have a little weep. I weep because Georgia waves with such a lovely smile, and because Rosie smiles too with a growing-up smile of confidence where before there was only childish shyness and uncertainty. I weep because Rosie is walking towards the surprise party the others have arranged for her with no knowledge of where she’s really going. Apparently she’s been told they are just going down town to hang out in the skate park (dressed like that?!) and I weep because of their sheer anticipation of life and what it holds for them. Lastly I weep because my brother whom I love dearly is turning into a skeleton in front of my eyes and because he is dying.

  Wednesday 25th July 2007

  The front page of today’s Daily Mail.

  HOSPITAL SUPERBUG SOARS BY 22 PER CENT IN JUST THREE MONTHS

  Cases of a deadly hospital superbug which thrives in filthy conditions have soared to record levels.

  In the past year, almost 56,000 vulnerable and elderly patients have caught Clostridium difficile – a stomach bug that can be halted with simple soap and water.

  Between January and March alone, 15,592 people were infected with the bug – a staggering 22 per cent rise on the previous three months.

  The true toll is likely to be even higher, as the figures cover only the over-65s who account for 80 per cent of infections.

  The figures from the Health Protection Agency highlight the failure of numerous Government drives to halt the rise of a bug which is spread by dirty hands and bedding.

  In the early 1990s, just over 1,000 patients a year fell victim to C.diff. Today, more than 1,000 are infected each week.

  A bigger killer than the MRSA superbug, C.diff claimed 2,247 lives in 2005 – a 69 per cent rise on the previous year. The latest figures do not record the number of deaths.

  But experts in infection, patients’ representatives and politicians said the Government was guilty of a “spectacular failure” to halt the rise of C.diff and described hospital hygiene as “sorely defective”.

  Chief medical officer Sir Liam Donaldson said the failure of doctors and nurses to wash their hands was a key factor behind the superbug crisis.

  A Healthcare Commission report to be released today blames pressure to meet treatment targets and cut waiting lists for lapses in infection control in many hospitals.

  Clostridium difficile exists naturally in the stomachs of many healthy adults, where it is kept under control by “friendly” bacteria. The problems start if the balance of bacteria is disturbed, perhaps as a result of taking antibiotics for another infection.

  Once the “friendly” bacteria are killed off, the C.diff is able to multiply and produce the toxins which cause diarrhoea
and, in the worst cases, a potentially fatal infection of the abdomen.

  The spread of the bacterium, via hardy spores, is swift.

  But it can be combated using simply soap and water, while powerful disinfectants can keep hospital floors bug-free.

  The rain is back. Phil G is due to visit Adrian today. After I’ve been to Center Parcs I drive to St Vincent’s. On arrival I’m ushered into the office by Matron. She has Adrian’s bill for the next month. I don’t open it but at a quick guesstimate it must be over three grand.

  ‘We have two kinds of contract,’ she explains as she hands me the envelope. ‘Short term and long term. Obviously Adrian will be short term.’

  ‘Has anyone else been in to see him today?’ I ask, intent on changing the subject.

  She shakes her head with a little snort, as if to say of course not! So Phil hasn’t made it.

  ‘No, he hasn’t had any other visitors,’ she says. ‘And he hasn’t made any effort to get up and groom himself…’ (what is he, a horse?) ‘…which I thought he would have done as he was expecting his business partner to visit.’

  ‘Well, maybe he didn’t feel like it…’

  ‘Oh, and he’s complained about one of the staff. He claims she was rude to him. I wonder if you could find out who it was. He didn’t seem to want to say…’

  *

  Following the national media’s sudden interest in the C.diff bug, I am uber-fastidious when I go into the room. Gloves, apron and lots of disinfectant gel.

  Adrian’s lying in bed again. I have a theory.

  ‘Adrian, have you noticed? There’s a pattern emerging here. Sunny days you’re up and looking better, rainy days you’re down and back in bed.’

  ‘Yes, you’re right. I hadn’t thought of it like that before.’