Little White Lies (58 page)

She sat down heavily, her breath coming in short spurts. Yves Ameyaw. She’d heard the name ‘Ameyaw’ before, she was sure of it. She stared at it for a few seconds and then the penny dropped. Not
Kofi
Ameyaw,
Kweku
Ameyaw. The journalist. She dimly remembered hearing something about a journalist being brutally murdered in Lomé, years back.
Kweku Ameyaw
. Her head began to swim. She put her hands on her shaking thighs. It took her a second to realise that the wetness slowly spreading itself around her was coming from her. She looked down and the fear turned to horror. Her trousers were wet. She was bleeding. She flung out a hand, searching frantically for the phone. Suddenly there was a wrenching upheaval inside her as the baby convulsed and turned. She grabbed at the phone, her hands flailing wildly. She punched in Tash’s number but her fingers were shaking so much she couldn’t hit the buttons properly. She tried again and again, fear rising in her throat like vomit. When, after what seemed like hours, she finally heard Tash’s voice, she tried to speak but the terror in her had blocked her throat. The floor at her feet was slick with blood. She looked down at it and the sound that came out of her mouth seemed to come from someone else.
Blood
. It was her last conscious thought.

TASH

She ran out of the house, screaming into her mobile, and almost straight into the path of an oncoming taxi. His light was on and she wrenched open the door before he’d come to a complete stop.

‘Woa . . . steady on there, miss!’ he turned to roar at her.

‘Drive! St Thomas’s! Accident and emergency . . . DRIVE!’ She held the phone aside for a split second as she flung the words at him. She slammed the door behind her and spoke into the mouthpiece again. ‘Is she there yet? Who’s got her? Is she . . . is she breathing? Just make sure . . . who’s the doctor?
Where
is he?’

Another call was coming in.
Yves Pasqual
. She cut the nurse off. ‘Yves? Yves? Where are you? You got my message? No, she’s still in the ambulance; they’re nearly there . . . I don’t
know
, Yves, I don’t know. No, of course I will. I’ll be there in ten minutes. DRIVE!’ She screamed at the cabbie. ‘Ten minutes, Yves, I promise. I’ll phone you as soon as I see her.’ She switched back to the A & E. ‘Hello? Are you still there? Are you still there? What’s your name? Mary? Mary, please,
please
just make sure the doctors are on hand as soon as she comes in, make sure they’re waiting. I’ll be there in five minutes . . . yes, I’m her sister. Please, Mary . . .
please
.’

The driver made it in just less than eight minutes. Tash flung a handful of notes at him and jumped out. She almost broke her ankle but she could have cared less. Her heart was in her mouth as she ran down the short slope towards the A & E doors. She burst through, startling the people sitting in the waiting area, and ran straight to the admissions desk. ‘Annick Betancourt?’ she almost screamed. ‘No, Annick Pasqual. Pregnant woman, came in by ambulance a few minutes ago. Does anyone know where she is? Where
the fuck is she
?’

‘Miss, calm down, please! Calm down!’ The duty nurse jumped to her feet. ‘Please!’

‘Are you Mary?’

‘No, that’s Mary over there. No, miss, you’re not allowed—’

Tash didn’t hear her. She couldn’t hear a thing. The blood was thundering in her ears as she ran over to where a nurse stood, talking to a young man whose arm was in a sling. ‘Mary?’

The woman turned round. ‘Yes, I’m Mary.’

Tash’s hand went out before she could stop herself. She grabbed Mary by the forearm. ‘I’m Tash, Annick Pasqual’s sister. We spoke on the phone a few minutes ago.’

‘Oh, yes. She’s in theatre . . . they took her in straight away. Just a minute, sir,’ she said to the patient standing goggle-eyed beside her. She took Tash aside. ‘She lost a lot of blood but the surgeons are doing everything they can,’ she murmured, her voice low.

‘Surgeons?’ For a second, Tash thought she might actually be sick. Her phone had started ringing again.

‘Yes . . . because of the baby.
Please
don’t get yourself all worked up. We won’t know anything until she goes into Recovery.’

‘Is . . . is she going to be . . . all right?’ Tash could hardly get the words out.

The nurse looked at her out of the depths of experience. ‘We won’t know for a while yet,’ she said gently. ‘They’re doing all they can. Is there someone with you?’

Tash shook her head numbly. Inside her handbag, her phone was vibrating dully. ‘Her husband’s in . . . in the States. That’s probably him.’ She pointed to her bag.

‘Get yourself a cup of tea,’ Mary said firmly. ‘Lots of sugar. There’s a canteen in the basement. And then call him. I’ll come and find you as soon as she’s out of theatre.’

Tash couldn’t speak. She watched Mary turn back to her patient. As kind as she was, Annick was simply another casualty in a night filled with them. She needed something far stronger than tea. She looked around for the toilets. Luckily there was something in her handbag. Her phone vibrated again and again. She hurried to the ladies’, locked herself in the stall and unscrewed the cap. She downed the contents of the hip flask in a single gulp. The whisky burned all the way down; she belched softly and put up a hand to wipe her lips. She drew in two or three deep breaths and then fished out her mobile. First things first.

ANNICK

Tubes connected her arm to various machines thrumming with life. A series of differently pitched beeps marked out the different rhythms of her body. Heart, lungs, pulse, temperature. She tried to twist her neck to see properly, but couldn’t. Another, faster heartbeat, a greenish light pulsating on and off, on and off. Shadows tiptoed around her. Someone took her hand. A flashlight showed itself through half-closed lids.

‘Is she asleep?’ A voice broke through the curtain of silence.

‘No, it’s the fever. She’s got a high fever. We’re trying to bring it down. Speak to her . . . sometimes it helps.’

‘Annie? It’s me, darling, it’s Tash. Can you hear me?’ A pause. Then Tash’s panicked voice. ‘Why can’t she hear me?’

‘She can. Go on, talk to her. She’s been drifting in and out all morning.’

Morning? Annick struggled to make sense of what was being said. She opened her eyelids, squinting in pain as light flooded in.

‘Her eyes . . . they opened! Just now!’

‘I told you. Don’t mind me, I’m just preparing her medication.’

‘Annie?’

‘Ba-bab-baby?’ Annick struggled to get the word out. ‘Ba-baby?’

‘Shh, darling . . . it’s fine. The baby’s fine . . . he’s in intensive care, seven weeks early . . . oh, Annie.’ Tash was crying. ‘You’re going to be fine, I promise. Isn’t she?’ she beseeched the nurse who was busy preparing an injection.

‘Let’s hope so,’ the nurse was cheerful. ‘Here we go, Annick,’ she said, lifting Annick’s arm. She felt the soft pinprick of a needle sliding in. Through her half-closed eyelids she could see Tash burying her face in her hands. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen Tash cry. It hurt. Everything hurt.

‘Where . . . is . . . where’s Yves?’

‘He’ll be here this afternoon, darling. His plane gets in at one and he’ll come straight over. He hasn’t slept a wink, Annie . . . you gave us all such a fright. No, don’t try and talk. Just rest. The baby’s fine. You should see him . . . he’s tiny, so fucking tiny. Sorry, darling, I shouldn’t swear, I’m just—’

‘She’s going. Don’t worry, it’s just the Pethidine. It’ll knock her out for a bit. There she goes . . .’

She heard nothing further. Her last fleeting thought was that it was a boy.

TASH

Watching someone slide into oblivion was possibly the second-scariest thing she’d ever experienced, Tash thought to herself as she watched Annick sink. The first had to be the phone call. It had taken her a good few minutes to work out that it was Annick and that she was in trouble. What happened next was a blur, even now. She dimly recalled punching in ‘999’ and screaming for an ambulance. They’d asked her for the address and her mind had gone completely blank. ‘It’s . . . it’s next to the college. Next to a block of flats with yellow scaffolding. It’s . . . Jesus Christ, I can’t remember the address! It’s in Lambeth! Morley College,
fuck
, I can’t remember the road.’

‘Morley College . . . Lambeth, you say? That’d be King Edward Road,’ the operator said, his voice miraculously calm.

Tash could have wept with relief. ‘Number eight, that’s it. Number eight. Get an ambulance there quick! She’s pregnant. Oh, I don’t know . . . eight months? I don’t know what happened . . . she’s bleeding . . . she just called . . .’ The words tumbled out of her mouth incoherently. The operator kept her on the line, talking her calmly through it all. She could have kissed him.

Now, watching Annick sleep, the panic that had propelled her off the sofa, thrust her feet into her boots and picked up her handbag rose in her again. She felt nauseous. She hadn’t slept all night; it was now nearly eleven. In a couple of hours, Yves would be there. She’d rung Rebecca a dozen times but there was no answer. She’d left messages on her mobile and on the landline but nothing yet. She was exhausted. No,
more
than exhausted. She couldn’t even think straight. Annick had very nearly lost the baby and no one seemed able to tell her why.

‘Miss?’ A nurse had come into the room.

Tash looked up. ‘Sorry, I must’ve just dozed off,’ she mumbled.

‘No, it’s fine. There’s just something . . . the duty nurse forgot last night. She held out a crumpled piece of paper in her hand. ‘Your sister insisted we give this to you. She was ever so agitated.’

Tash reached out for it. It was a letter, bloodied and crumpled as though someone had scrunched it up many times over. ‘Thanks,’ she said, puzzled.

‘Sorry about that. The rest of her belongings are in there,’ the nurse said, pointing to the locker in the corner of the room. ‘But she kept insisting we give that straight to you. Well, I’d better get on. The ward sister’ll be in to see her shortly.’

‘Thanks,’ Tash said automatically. She waited until the nurse had left the room and then smoothed the letter out. She frowned. It was in French, from the
Conseil d’État
. She struggled to understand what was written.
Nous avons le regret de vous informer que malgrénotre attention sincère aux récents événements survenus dans votre pays, la République du Togo, nous ne pouvons porter assistance à un citoyen français qui aurait renouncéa sa nationalitiéantérieurement.
Who was Yves Ameyaw? Yves? She read it again but it made no sense. She folded it carefully and slipped it into her pocket. When Annick was well enough, she’d ask her. In the meantime, there was a premature baby in intensive care to worry about, as well as an unconscious mother. More than enough.

ANNICK

Nothing prepares you. Nothing at all
. She stared at the perfectly formed but indescribably beautiful and tiny baby in the incubator and didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Yves’ hand was around her waist, holding her upright as she shuffled slowly along the corridor. She held onto the contraption that held her drip with one arm whilst the other clutched his forearm as though she’d never let it go. They couldn’t stop staring at him through the glass. He looked like nothing she’d ever seen before. His skin was yellow and waxy-looking and he was completely bald. His eyes were screwed up tightly against the light, tiny little hands clenching and unclenching slowly as he slept. She stared at him, two powerful surges of emotion competing with each other within her – the most indescribable love and the most terrible fear.

‘He’s coming along nicely,’ one of the nurses said to her as she passed by. ‘He’s already gained a few ounces.’

A few
ounces
? Annick stared at her, then back at him. How many ounces were there in a pound? She tried to compute what it meant, but couldn’t.

‘What’s his weight now?’ Yves asked.

The nurse flipped a chart beside the incubator. ‘Let’s see . . . 1.45 kilograms – that’s three pounds, four ounces to you and me,’ she smiled at Annick.

‘No, we’re French,’ Annick said abruptly. ‘We measure in kilograms.’

‘Oh. Well, he’s one and a half kilos, then. The main thing is, he’s gaining weight.’

‘What about the other stuff . . . his lungs, his organs . . . his heart?’

The nurse looked from Annick to Yves and back again. ‘It’s too early to tell,’ she said kindly. ‘One step at a time. The doctors’ll be in to see him shortly. You should get some rest. You’ve been through an awful lot yourself, you know.’

Annick shook her head. ‘No, I want to be here. I can’t . . . I can’t
not
be here. When can I hold him?’

The nurse smiled gently. She’d seen it all before, and worse. ‘Soon,’ she said. ‘The doctors will come in and see you once they’ve done their rounds. We’ll know more then. A day at a time.’

Yves’ hand tightened around her waist. ‘Come on,
chérie
,’ he whispered. ‘Let the nurses do their work. We’ll look in on him later. You need to be in bed.’

She swallowed hard but allowed herself to be led gently and slowly by the arm back to the ward. She couldn’t speak. She looked at Yves, searching his face for some clue, some sign . . . but there was nothing. He looked as he’d always done. Was she going mad? Had she imagined the whole thing? No, there was the letter. She’d held it out, all bloody and crumpled. Give it to Tash, she’d screamed. The nurse took it from her, assuring her she would, that everything would be fine, that the baby would be all right, that
she
would be all right. It was the last thing she heard before she went under.
Everything’s going to be fine
. She felt the slight warm pressure of Yves’ lips against her forehead and she closed her eyes. She was tired, so very, very tired. Her limbs felt heavy and leaden; the lower half of her abdomen was still numb. There were moments when she wondered if she would ever feel anything again.