Face (7 page)

Every few seconds different thoughts came into his head.
Is that really me? Why me? Maybe it will fall off and my real face will be underneath.
He began to really stare at his right cheek, checking every millimetre of it.
It looks like a mountain
, he thought. It was a strange thought but it was the first thing that came into his head. In a flash he remembered flying to Spain for a holiday and looking out at a mountain range with its valleys, its highs, and its lows. Martin saw his face as a miniature version of that wilderness. He put the mirror down on his lap and closed his eyes. Now he started to feel anger. His mind flashed back to Saturday night, not to the crash but to the moment just before he got into the car. He was seeing Pete Mosley's evil smile and hearing his voice saying, ‘Come on, let's go riding,' and ‘Have wheels will travel,' and most painfully, ‘All right, ya gotta go to bed, we'll just take ya home.' That was the line that had tricked Martin into the car. He heard the lines over and over again in his head.

He opened his eyes, looking at the mirror once more, but this time he spoke as he stared. ‘So this is me?'

Alan replied, ‘It's you now but as you've heard, improvements can be made.'

Martin handed Alan the mirror and simply closed
his eyes. It was a clear signal to Alan and the nurse to leave. Martin listened to them go and kept his eyes shut. Now the image of his face was fixed in his mind. Then he opened his eyes and as he did so he began to cry uncontrollably. It was as if he had opened an emotional tap. He cried for his old face. He cried for his parents. He cried for Natalie. He cried for Matthew and Mark. He cried for his stupidity. Then he cried for his new face. He cried so much that his stomach hurt, he was out of breath and his eyes hurt. He could feel the tears leaving his eyes but he could not feel them running down his cheeks. He put his head under the sheets and cried himself to sleep. For the first time in his life, Martin cried and made no attempt to stop himself.

The next day Martin slept late. It was eleven o'clock when he woke up. The anaesthetic, painkillers and the various other drugs he had been given still affected him. Even though he was moving, he didn't feel fully awake.

Martin looked around the room. It had been transformed. It was obvious that his parents had been in earlier. Get well cards hung off string on the walls. On the table there was a photo of his parents, a photo of Natalie and his Walkman cassette player, complete with tapes and headphones. As he looked at the headphones, wondering how he could possibly use them, Dr Owens entered the room with his mother and father following her.

The doctor was the first to speak. ‘Hello, Martin.'

‘I'm awake again,' Martin said as his parents went to one side of the bed and the doctor to the other. ‘I'm not sure how I'm going to get those headphones around my head though.'
His mother smiled. ‘Well, your sense of humour is fine.'

Dr Owens went on to explain to Martin that some surgery would be recommended for cosmetic reasons, but that she thought it was best to let the skin heal as much as it could before then.

‘From now on,' she said, ‘nature should do the best it can.'

She then pulled over a chair and sat down looking at Martin with a matter of fact look on her face. ‘Martin, I have just explained to your parents that the skin on your face will never be as it was before. I expect your legs and hands to heal up soon, and we'll have your stitches out, but you will have to be patient with your face.'

Martin turned to look at his parents. His mother was struggling to hold back the tears, and her voice trembled as she spoke. ‘We love you, son. We'll do all we can for you, you know it.'

Dr Owens took a deep breath and continued, ‘I understand that you have known Mark Thorpe for a long time.'

‘Yes,' Martin replied. ‘Where is he? How bad is he?'

‘He was released from this hospital today. He has two broken ribs and a fractured wrist. Now – Graham Fisher?'

‘Who?'

‘Graham Fisher.'

Martin's father interrupted, ‘The driver of the car, son.'

‘You mean Apache, I don't really know him.'

‘Well, he was lucky. He got away with a few bruises, but he has been to court and I am informed that he is now in youth custody. And Peter Mosley?'

‘Yeah, I know him,' Martin replied.

Dr Owens paused. ‘How well?'

‘I don't know him that well. He used to go the same school as me. He hangs around the Boleyn Estate.'

Dr Owens lowered her voice. ‘I'm sorry to have to tell you this, Martin, but Peter Mosley died from his injuries after going through the front windscreen.'

Martin went silent. There was only a small part of him that mourned Pete's passing. He was a person he knew very little, a person who he had never had much respect for. What had stunned Martin into silence was the realisation of how close
he
had been to death. He looked at his parents and for the first time in his life, he really wanted to hold them and tell them how much he loved them. He looked at his surroundings. He looked at his hands. He was grateful for his existence, but he couldn't find words to express how he felt.

Turning back to his parents, he asked, ‘Pete's mom and dad, do they know?'

‘Do you know his mom and dad, son?' his father asked.

‘No.'

‘No one does, son.'

‘But Dad, he must have a mom and dad somewhere.'

‘No one knows, son, don't let it worry you.'

Soon Martin's parents and Dr Owens left, leaving Martin to take in the news he had just received. He spent the next two hours sitting silently listening to his breathing and his heartbeat. The pain mattered very little now. Now he saw himself as lucky, lucky to be alive. He had very little love for Pete Mosley but he could not get his face out of his mind now.
And what about Peter's parents,
he thought.
He must have parents, someone must love him
. Again Martin began to think at a frantic pace.
I should never have gone to that club … we should have never went through that estate … I should never have got in that car … I should have known it was stolen. It's all my fault, I persuaded Mark to get into that car.
Martin thought so much that he got a headache, and in his upright position he hung his head and began to fall asleep. Even as he was falling asleep, he was still asking questions.
Why didn't I go with my instincts and not get in that car? … Why didn't I go with Matthew? … Why didn't I?

‘Martin, are you awake?'

The interruption seemed to echo around his head.
It was Dr Owens with somebody else, a man wearing a black leather jacket and jeans.

‘Martin, can we talk to you?' the doctor continued.

‘Yeah, OK.' Martin didn't mean it, he would have preferred to have been left alone, but he felt weak and he couldn't say no.

‘Martin, this is Detective Inspector Byrd. He needs to speak to you about the accident. He won't be long. This is not an interrogation and I won't be leaving the room. Can you manage that?'

‘Yes, I can.'

‘OK.' Dr Owens went and stood by the door as if guarding the entrance and DI Byrd sat on the chair next to the bed.

‘Now, Martin, I realise that you have been through a lot over the last few days. Soon I am going to have to take a statement from you but for now I just need a couple of answers – OK?'

‘OK.'

‘How well do you know Graham Fisher, or Apache as he was also known?'

‘I don't know him. The night of the crash was when I met him.'

‘Did you get on with him?'

‘I hardly spoke to him, he's a nutter.'

‘How do you know he was a nutter?'

‘Just the way he was acting and driving – he wasn't listening to anyone.'

‘Did he try and sell you anything?'

‘No.'

‘Did you see him throw anything out of the car?'

Martin paused. Dr Owens was watching silently, her eyes fixed on Martin. The detective could sense that he was on to something. His voice hardened and he pushed for more.

‘Come on now, Martin, we know from your medical records that you had been drinking alcohol that night, but we haven't come here because of a little underage drinking. This is a bit more serious than that. Did you see Apache throw anything?'

‘NO – NO – I didn't see Apache throw anything – I saw Pete throw something.'

‘That's better. Where? Can you remember?'

‘I think it was by the sports centre on Prince Regents Lane.'

‘On the corner?'

‘Yes.'

‘What did you see him throw?'

‘I don't know what it was, just a small bag of some kind.'

‘OK, that's all I need. As I said, I am going to need a statement soon but you must realise that you may find yourself in trouble for accepting a lift in a stolen car. We'll talk about that at a later date. Take it easy for now.'

Dr Owens and DI Byrd both left. Once again,
Martin was alone. It seemed that life in hospital went from one extreme to the other. There were moments of intense activity with people all wanting to know, feel and look crammed into this small room, followed by moments of silence which quickly led on to sleep. DI Byrd's visit had taken his mind off his injuries temporarily, but now he had nothing to distract him.

He raised both his hands and for the first time he began to touch his face. He prodded to see how much pressure he could bear. It even
felt
like an unexplored wilderness with miniature mountains. Not one bit of his face was smooth. The outer skin was hard but he could feel the soft, swollen flesh underneath. Most of the sensations came though his fingertips. Considering the extent of his injuries, he was still surprised by the fact that his legs, although not burnt, hurt more than his face.

Martin also had other worries. How were his friends going to react to him? He had Natalie and Matthew on his mind. He needed to know more about what had happened to Mark and wondered what the police were going to do. He had decided that he would take the blame for Mark getting into trouble. He wondered if he would have to go to court, or worse still if he would end up in a young offenders' home.

For the next couple of days Martin had regular visits from Dr Owens and his parents. His parents visited him twice a day. With every visit they brought more gifts and personal possessions to decorate his room. He now had a poster of West Ham football team taped to his wall, and on his table he had a bowl of fruit, a stack of comics and football annuals. Moving slowly, he was now getting out of bed and walking around his tiny room, but he would never venture out into the ward; he wasn't ready to meet strangers. Martin had also started to take solid food and as the swelling of his lips reduced, he began to speak more fluently.

Dr Owens was happy with Martin's progress, and she told him that it would soon be time for a cosmetic operation, a skin graft. Martin tried to tell himself that, despite all that had happened, he was still the same person he had been before, but deep down he knew it was going to be hard. He now realised that being an extrovert took a lot of energy.

The two nurses and Martin were a little more relaxed with each other now. Martin now knew the male nurse's name was Dylan Davis and that he supported Newcastle United. Nurse Ling had been born in the very hospital she was now working in. She did her training in Central London and went straight to Newham Parkside, where she had wanted to work ever since she had been at school. He had spent quite a lot of time talking to Nurse Ling. She couldn't understand why he would want a picture of a football team on his wall and he was just beginning to understand why she only ever spoke of two role models in her life. The only role models she had were her mother and father who had both come to England penniless. They had taught themselves to speak English and made sure that she received the best education possible.

One morning Nurse Ling explained to Martin that the time had come for him to have his first bath.

‘It will hurt a little the first time, but that's why me and Nurse Davis are here.'

Martin hid his nervousness. ‘OK, where do we do it?'

‘Right here,' Nurse Ling replied. ‘You won't even have to leave your bed.'

The nurses left the room and returned twenty minutes later manoeuvring a trolley into the room. The trolley had various bottles and towels on the bottom shelf but on the top shelf and most noticeable was a
large silver bowl and a large silver jug. Nurse Ling began to pour from the jug into the bowl whilst Nurse Davis told Martin what was happening.

‘In the bowl there is lukewarm water and Nurse Ling is adding a saline solution to it. Saline helps to reduce the risk of infection. What we are going to do next is to wet these towels and gently pad them on to your skin. It will sting a little at first but you will soon get used to it.'

‘Don't worry,' Nurse Ling interjected, ‘it sounds worse than it is.'

‘Yes, she's right,' Nurse Davis continued. ‘Just lie back and think of West Ham and it will be over before you get to half-time.'

Martin eased his pyjamas off. He was then instructed to lie on his back so that he could see the first applications of the towels and not be fearful or taken by surprise. Martin felt highly embarrassed by this – he hated being naked in front of the nurses, but his most overwhelming emotion was one of helplessness. He hated not doing things for himself and he hated lying back and waiting for something to happen to him. He definitely couldn't think of West Ham.

Nurse Ling dipped the small towels into the bowl, squeezed off the excess liquid and dabbed Martin's skin lightly. She dipped each towel only once and dabbed with the greatest care. Martin felt a mild burning sensation when the towel first touched his
skin but then it cooled quickly. After being cleaned from his toes right up to his neck, Martin turned over to lie face down. Nurse Davis placed a sterilised towel on the pillow and gently eased Martin's face on to it. Then his back received the same careful treatment. When the whole of his body was done, Nurse Ling gave the same treatment to his face. But now she was most careful. Every touch was gentle, so gentle that Martin hardly felt a thing. Just a light tingly sensation that came after the applications. The whole process took half an hour.