The Longest Holiday (35 page)

‘I’m here to give you a lift,’ she chirps. ‘Thought you could do with seeing a friendly face.’

I instantly feel bad. ‘Oh, thanks.’

‘Come on, it’s this way,’ she says.

It’s grey and miserable when we drive out of the car park. ‘Welcome to the UK.’ She’s being sarcastic.

‘Is there any news?’ I ask her hopefully.

‘No change,’ she says disconsolately.

We don’t speak for a while. We don’t speak much at all, actually, on the drive to Cambridge. I stare out the window at the green, green countryside. Everything looks alien. The roads are so windy, the cars so much smaller.

‘Where do you live?’ I ask her.

‘West London,’ she replies. ‘Heathrow isn’t far from me.’

We’ve been in the car for an hour and a bit, so she’s obviously going right out of her way. ‘I really appreciate this,’ I force myself to say.

‘It’s no trouble.’ She brushes me off. ‘I wanted to visit her, anyway.’

‘Have you seen her, yet?’ I ask.

‘No. Only immediate family at the moment.’

‘Will I be able to see her?’ I ask with a frown.

‘I don’t know,’ she admits. ‘You’ll need to speak to Laura’s parents. And Matthew,’ she adds under her breath.

‘How is he?’ I ask uneasily.

‘Not the best,’ she replies.

I wonder how I might go about avoiding him in the near future.

I’m staying in the cheapest hotel I could find, as close to the hospital as I could manage. I can’t waste money on a car rental – I don’t know how long I’ll be here – but I’ve got my bus route worked out. Mike from the hotel next door let me use their internet to book flights and sort out the finer details. Carmen asked him, and he was happy to oblige. He seems quite fond of Laura.

A lump forms in my throat and I have to look out of the window until it passes. I don’t want to lose it in front of Bridget – or anyone, if I can help it.

‘Do you want to check in and then I’ll give you a lift to the hospital?’ Bridget asks.

‘That would be great.’

She comes with me, for moral support, I think. She’s a nicer person than I remembered. I thought she and Marty seemed a bit silly and vacant in the keys, messing around with those jocks and leaving Laura out in the cold. I still haven’t forgiven them for that, but Bridget isn’t so bad. I wonder where Marty is. I thought she was Laura’s best friend.

The hospital brings back bad memories. Pale blue walls, strip lighting and long corridors … Mom never went to hospital; she was dead long before it got to that point. But Alejandro did, and in my head I can still see him clearly, hooked up to machines, needles going into his arm, a ventilator connected to his mouth, low insistent bleeps in the background. Eventually the bleeps became one incessant noise, announcing his death.

As it turns out, I can’t even see Laura. I ask to speak to a doctor and I’m directed to a small Visitors’ Room with Bridget. We’re the only people in there and we’re waiting a long, long time.

‘She believed in you, you know,’ Bridget says miserably, out of the blue.

I look at her, sitting perpendicular to me on a brown couch under the one window. My eyes are stinging, my body feels like it’s weighted down. I’ve barely slept in seventy-two hours and I’m not going to sleep now.

‘What do you mean?’ I ask, surprised by her statement.

‘She loved you. Do you know that?’

I nod, because I can’t speak.

‘She told us, Marty and me. She thought you loved her, too.’

I look away, then lean forward, resting my elbows on my knees, rubbing my hand over my mouth in agitation and fighting back tears.

The door opens and a middle-aged man walks in. I glance up at him.

‘Leo?’ he asks.

‘Yes.’ He’s not dressed in green scrubs like all the other medical staff I’ve seen.

‘I’m Barry, Laura’s father,’ he says gently, his face tired and pale.

I leap to my feet and offer my hand for him to shake. Laura’s father! ‘Pleased to meet you, sir.’

He shakes my hand, but can’t meet my gaze for long. He looks like her, more like her than I thought he would. Something about his nose and the shape of his face. She told me most people say she takes after her mother.

‘Sit down.’

He indicates the chair I was sitting in, taking a seat opposite.

‘Is there any news?’ I ask quickly.

He shakes his head abruptly. ‘I’m afraid not.’

‘Can I see her?’

He looks uncomfortable. I wait for him to speak.

‘I’m not sure, at this point,’ he eventually replies. ‘You can’t see her now because they’re doing the afternoon ward round. You might be able to see her tomorrow.’

‘Okay.’ I exhale loudly. ‘Not later? I’m happy to wait.’

‘I’m afraid …’ he starts. ‘I’m afraid Matthew hasn’t given permission yet for you to visit.’

‘What?’

‘He’s Laura’s next of kin,’ he says, holding up his hands as though to deflect blame. ‘It’s up to him who sees her.’

‘Well, can I speak to him?’ I’m trying to control my anger. ‘Where is he?’

‘He’s gone back to London.’

‘Why isn’t he here?’ I ask accusingly. ‘If he’s her next of kin …’ There’s venom in my tone, and I can’t help it, even if it gets me nowhere.

‘Matthew works during the week. He’s a journalist.’ And? ‘He’ll be back on Friday.’

‘But that’s three days away!’ I get up and start pacing, which isn’t easy in this small space.

‘Can’t …’

I look at Bridget, who’s trying to say something.

‘Can’t you call Matthew?’ she asks.

Laura’s father looks pained.

‘He’s come all this way,’ she implores. ‘Will the nurses really object if Laura’s father gives permission as to who sees her?’

I stand and stare at my beautiful Laura’s father, weakened by him, by Matthew, by the whole situation. He glances up at me and his face softens.

‘I suppose not,’ he agrees, looking down at his hands.

‘Thank you.’ Swallowing is difficult. He meets my eyes and nods before checking his watch.

‘They’ll be finishing their round in an hour and a half. I’ll go and speak to the nurses.’

An hour and a half is a long time to wait. I tell Bridget to go home, but she insists on staying. I’m grateful, but I don’t speak to her. I cross my arms, close my eyes and think about Key West, willing my girl to come back to me.

Laura’s father returns at some point and hands us both cups of tea. It tastes crap – I’d kill for a coffee right now, even one of Carmen’s – but I appreciate the gesture. Finally, they let me go in.

I pause at the door, glancing over my shoulder to check no one is behind me. I don’t want to be with anyone other than her right now. I’m alone, so I push open the door and enter.

I’ve thought about this moment countless times over the last seventy-two hours, but nothing prepares me for the sight of her now. Her body is partially covered with a white sheet. Her left arm and left leg are in casts, the leg elevated. Her hair is limp around her face, and her eyes are closed. There’s a ventilator hooked up to her, with a large tube going into her mouth. Her chest rises and falls, but she looks so frail, so vulnerable. Just like Alejandro did before he died, and he was my brother, my big, powerful brother, reduced to nothing.

My feet are glued to the floor, so I stand and stare, aware that the persistent bleeping noises from her attached monitors are the only sounds in the room. I force myself to put one foot in front of the other until I reach her bed. There’s a chair waiting, so I sit down and reach for her hand. It’s the fact that it’s still warm, like she’s asleep, that brings me crumbling down. I kiss her hand as my tears run off her fingers.

My father, my mother, Alejandro, and now Laura. Papi … That’s what I used to call my father. When did he become ‘Father’? A long time after he was dead, I think, when he started to feel like a stranger. Even Mom has become ‘Mother’ in death, so unfamiliar, so alien, so far from the Mommy of my childhood. How the hell will I go on if Laura is also destined to become a stranger?

I reach up and touch her cheek.

‘Wake up,’ I whisper.

But she doesn’t. And when her father enters the room after I don’t know how long, he has to help me walk out of there.

Bridget drives me back to the hotel. I hope she knows I appreciate what she’s done, because I can’t convey it with words. I go inside, up to my room, and fall into the deepest sleep of my life.

Every waking hour of the next two days I spend at the hospital – by her side when they let me. I’ve seen Laura’s mother, Lottie, a couple of times. I met her in the keys, that time Laura was so upset about her mom visiting the baby. She didn’t like me much then, and she doesn’t like me much now, so I try to keep out of her way. Mostly I’m in the Visitors’ Room staring at the wall. It’s claustrophobic in here – small and stuffy. A fan whirrs left and right to move the air, but the window is always closed, the vertical blinds turned so there’s hardly any natural light. A Bible sits on top of some magazines – but that’s not going to help me now. It didn’t help when Alejandro died. Even the clock batteries have run out, the time permanently set to 10:07 and sixteen seconds. I don’t know if it’s a.m. or p.m. but I do know that if I have to stay here much longer, I’ll go insane. The hardest thing is when there are strangers in the room with me, friends and family of other patients in intensive care. Hearing them talk about their pain, about the chances of their loved one pulling through … I soak up their despair like a sponge. Perhaps Laura’s father can see the effect being in this room is having on me, because on Thursday he appears during the morning ward round and insists I go downstairs for a break. It doesn’t take much to persuade me.

I take the elevator one floor down to the food court, where my mood instantly lifts. It’s not as depressing; some people are actually laughing, as though they’re not here because of a tragedy. I wander through a couple of shops and notice that even the candy looks different here. I also discover I can get decent coffee instead of the crap out of the vending machine upstairs. I’ll have to make each cup last as long as I can – I don’t want to run out of money. Not that anything tastes good at the moment, anyway, but psychologically I feel a bit better.

On Friday afternoon Laura’s father pulls me to one side. ‘Matthew is on his way,’ he says in a stern, firm voice. I know what he’s telling me: it’s time for me to make way for the revered husband. The man’s been decent to me so I reluctantly agree to wait for his call letting me know when I can next come in.

I don’t know what to do with myself. I catch a bus into Cambridge and walk around for a while, peering through archways into grand courtyards and wandering down narrow alleyways crammed with crooked old buildings. The craziest thing of all is King’s College Chapel. I’ve barely travelled outside America and there’s sure as hell nothing like this in the USA. I sit in a pew, staring up at the high fan-vaulted ceiling. I wish Laura could have shown me around. It doesn’t feel right being here without her.

My ringing cell phone makes me jump. I’m expecting Mr Smythson – Barry, as he’s said I can call him – but it’s Marty on the other end of the line.

‘Hey, Leo,’ she says gently.

‘Hi.’

‘Where are you?’

‘In King’s College Chapel,’ I say in a low voice, aware of the looks I’m getting for talking on my cell.

‘Do you want to have dinner with me?’

‘Oh. Um …’

‘I thought you could use the company.’

‘Er, yeah, okay,’ I say awkwardly. God knows what we’ll talk about.

‘Are you happy to stay in town?’

‘Sure.’

‘In that case, I’ll meet you in an hour.’

We go to a Mexican restaurant on the river. Marty says she thought I’d need cheering up, so she opted for somewhere lively.

‘I need cheering up,’ she says as we wait to be seated. ‘Have you seen her much this week?’ she wants to know.

‘As much as I’ve been allowed,’ I reply.

‘Matthew is there now, right?’

‘Yeah. Laura’s dad thought I’d better keep away.’

She doesn’t say anything as we’re taken to a table, but once we’re seated, menus in hand, she turns to me.

‘I’m sure Matthew will come round,’ she says. ‘He’s a reasonable guy. Barry just needs a bit of time to talk to him.’

‘I’m sorry for him,’ I surprise myself by saying. I also surprise Marty, from the look on her face. ‘I don’t want to hurt him by being here, but I need to be here, too, you know?’

‘I know,’ she says, giving me a sad smile and then turning to her menu.

Later we find ourselves talking about Key West, and about Laura. I tell Marty about the night dive, about how spooked Laura was when we saw that shark hovering above a shoal of barracuda, and we both start to laugh. The couple of beers I’ve had have loosened me up.

‘She was so funny; you should have seen her face. She wanted to abort the dive, but I wouldn’t let her.’

‘I can’t believe she actually went on a night dive in the first place!’ Marty exclaims. ‘She used to be scared of the dark as a child.’

‘Did she?’ I ask.

‘Yeah. She had four night lights in her room when she was growing up. I remember them: a fairy, Winnie the Pooh, a butterfly and … I can’t remember the other one. They used to glow in the room and keep me awake if I ever had a sleepover, but she wouldn’t switch them off for anyone.’

I smile as I try to imagine a young Laura.

‘I’m sorry, Leo,’ Marty says suddenly. ‘I’m sorry for doubting you. I should have known there was something wrong, some reason why you didn’t call. She had faith in you.’

‘I hope so,’ I say quietly, my mood taking a nosedive. ‘I hate the thought of her thinking she meant less to me than she did. Than she does,’ I correct myself.

‘I think it’s clear to everyone now,’ she says, looking down at her hands. ‘I should have tried to help you more when I knew you were coming here.’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ I brush her off.

‘At the very least I should have booked your flights. I feel bad.’

I forgot she was a travel agent. ‘Forget it,’ I say, before remembering a question I’ve been meaning to ask. ‘Hey, what happened to her cell phone? Didn’t anyone ever get my messages?’