Just The Way You Are(61)

‘Concentrating can’t make people better! If that was true we wouldn’t need hospitals!’

The nurse worked valiantly to hide her smile. ‘No, but not worrying and keeping calm is medically proven to lower blood pressure and boost the immune system along with all sorts of other benefits that can genuinely help someone recover. Okay?’

Joan swiped at one tear. ‘Okay.’ Then she narrowed her eyes, looking from the nurse to the doctor and the other person standing with us, who had yet to introduce herself. ‘I’m only going if I can stay with Ollie, though!’





Joan stayed with me. By the time we got home there was barely any of the night left, and the doctor was hopeful that soon Leanne could be consulted about her daughter’s care. After mugs of hot chocolate left to go cold, and two pieces of toast that went stiff on the plate, I made up the sofa bed in my office, scooting around to Joan’s cottage to fetch her own duvet and pillow in the hope that the familiarity would help her sleep. I would have tucked her up in her own bed and slept on the sofa, if it wasn’t for a broken shower and piles of mess and my genuine concern that the mould could have caused Leanne’s illness.

I lay in bed, watching the sunrise beyond my open window, and thought about how life can flip inside out in one faltering heartbeat.

Joan looked about as awful as I felt when she shuffled downstairs later that morning. But we gamely attempted more toast and hot tea, and put on our bravest, most optimistic masks when we drove back to the hospital for afternoon visiting hours.

Leanne was awake, despite looking as though she shouldn’t be. With sallow skin stretched taut across her face, her eyes were flat and bleak, hair stringy, colourless tangles. She managed a two-second smile when Joan walked up to the bed, before being drained from the effort. When Joan fell onto Leanne’s chest, it was all she could do to lift one bony hand and rest it on her daughter’s head, leaving her silent tears to trickle freely down her cheeks.

‘Hey. I’d ask how you’re feeling, but you look even worse than me,’ I said, offering the warmest smile I could muster.

‘Thank you,’ Leanne croaked, her eyes telling me that she wasn’t referring to the greeting.

‘You’re welcome.’

After a few minutes of muted, laborious chat, a doctor arrived for her afternoon rounds. Leanne asked if I could stay while she provided an update.

After doing a full screen of blood and other tests, they had a diagnosis. Leanne had hepatitis C. Her liver was a wreck. They would need to do more tests to establish to what extent. The social worker appeared and took Joan to find something to eat and a ‘treat for Mummy’ while the doctor checked whether Leanne was sure she wanted me present for the next part of the conversation.

‘I’ve got nothing to hide from Ollie,’ she said, fumbling across the bed for my hand. ‘If anything happens to me, someone’s got to explain it to Diamanté Butterfly one day.’

The doctor glanced at me, puzzled.

‘Joan.’

‘I named her that because I wanted her to be different to me. To shine. To fly.’ Leanne sniffed, wiping her hand across her face.

The conversation that followed was gut-wrenching. I knew that Leanne didn’t want my pity, but boy she had my sympathy.

She’d been lured away from home at sixteen, in a process that today would be recognised as grooming, but fifteen years ago was put down to a wild, uncontrollable teenager with no morals or self-respect. The thirty-four-year-old monster who stole her heart along with her innocence introduced her to heroin, as a reward for being passed around strange men like a joint of weed.

For the next two years she stumbled through a living hell, lost in a haze of drugs and abuse.

‘I was nothing. Worthless trash. That’s how they treated me, so that’s what I became,’ she said, her accent thickening as she voyaged deeper into the memories.

And then, when she realised she was pregnant, everything changed.

‘I’d made a sort of friend. Betty. She lived in the flat downstairs. She looked at me different. Like, she saw me as a person, not a thing to be used. She was a bit doddery on her feet, so I started helping with her shopping, stuff like that. And then, one day, she offered to cut my hair.’ Leanne stopped to catch her breath.

‘I’d forgotten what it was like to be touched like that. Gentle. With kindness. So, when I found out about the baby, I told Betty. She helped me make a plan to get away. We found this house for women like me, out in the countryside.’

Another pause. Leanne’s face had set like concrete, although her hands twisted and plucked at the bed sheet. ‘But then… I wasn’t pregnant any more. Back to business as usual.’

It was all I could do not to turn away, close my eyes. But I was not going to be yet another person who dismissed her story or backed away from her pain.

‘I decided, though. That was never going to happen again. So, I left. I spent nearly a year in the house, getting clean, and getting strong. Well, stronger than before, which isn’t saying much. I got pregnant with Joan a few months later.’

‘And have you taken anything since?’

‘Drugs, you mean?’ She lifted her chin. ‘I’ve not injected. See, no fresh tracks, here, Doctor.’ She held out her arms as evidence. ‘Some weed. A lot of booze. But I’ve been sober for three years. Still have a ciggie now and then, to chase away the nightmares.’