‘Please,’ Bill said. Tom cleared his throat and looked away for a moment, clearly struggling to hold it together.
‘Shall I bring a form for you to sign to say that you don’t want to be resuscitated?’
Bill nodded and smiled again, patting Tom’s hand. ‘Good lad.’
We went over a few more details with Bill and I promised to talk to his daughter with Tom. As we left the room I could see Tom gearing himself up to say something, but I was spent for the day. I hated confrontation, and thinking about Mamma always drained me. I decided that emergency avoidance tactics were necessary and I employed a time-honored method, guaranteed to silence any man.
‘Sorry, guys. Gotta dash, female problems,’ I said before he could get a word in, and was satisfied with the look of fear I saw in Tom and Ash’s eyes. ‘I’m sure you can manage handing over to Rosie.’ I shoved the list (complete with wedding cake sketch) into Rosie’s hand, who had narrowed her eyes suspiciously at me, no doubt having guessed at my use of the ultimate woman’s get-out clause. She was probably cross that I had let down the sisterhood by employing underhand menstrual reference tactics.
Despite the awkward conversations and revelations of the last hour, I realized that I was free. No more stupid cath lab. No more incessant questions. No more unbearable tension with Tom.
And I smiled.
Chapter 13
Ferrets and sperm
‘No, no, no way,’ I shook my head emphatically at Lou, who was holding up the scrap of material that she was trying to convince me to put on. Apparently it was a top, but how it could logistically cover the essential areas was beyond me.
‘Come on, Frankie,’ she wheedled. ‘You promised, pleeeaaaasee.’
I was standing in my bedroom, hair wet and small towel wrapped around me. Lou, Rosie and Lizzy were all sprawled on my bed in amongst what looked like the tangled mess of my entire wardrobe, which they had managed to pull out whilst I was in the shower. Having rooted through my stuff, they had rejected everything anyway and instead got me an outfit from Lou’s room.
‘You let me help you with work clothes after Weasel Gankface requested that you “dress more appropriately”, she reminded me. ‘And now you’ve got the whole demure, sex-bomb office look going.’
I looked at her sharply. ‘That was not exactly your brief, Lou. I just asked you to help me smarten up.’
As if I could look like a sex bomb anyway; but I didn’t say that because I had learnt long ago that people who love you are weirdly blind to your imperfections. Lou was always trying to convince me that I was something I was not. I knew exactly where I rated in the attractiveness stakes and it was firmly at low average.
I’d always known that – even when I was little I knew, especially after Papa left. Then it was confirmed to me when I went to secondary school as a shy, awkward, skinny eleven-year-old. The bullying intensified as I got older, and was truly vicious by the time I was fifteen.
The more I was bullied the more fearful I became and the weaker I appeared, which seemed to spur them on. The stress stopped me eating and I became even thinner, making my eyes look huge in my face. They christened me ‘Frog-Eyes Frankie’ and ‘Skindiana Bones’ to name a few. To this day I still experience a shiver of apprehension before I go into a public toilet, the favourite place for my tormentors to corner me at school.
Lou looked up at me innocently. ‘Well you didn’t get any more complaints did you?’
‘I guess not,’ I mumbled, although I wasn’t altogether sure that Tom had approved of my transformation. The first time he saw me after Lou had dressed me up he looked almost angry. At least these days I didn’t have to worry about coming up to his ridiculous standards. Work was a lot more relaxed now. I was happy just beavering away on the wards, biding my time until I could start as a part-time registrar in palliative care and get my cake business off the ground.
Dr Williams was happy as long as all the ward work was done, and I could sketch to my heart’s content in meetings with no fear of being picked on.
I avoided Tom at all costs. In fact the lengths I went to were slightly ridiculous. I’d hidden under a drugs trolley, spent lunchtimes watchingNeighbourswith Mrs Jones; I even ducked into the morgue on one occasion, when I saw his team approaching.
Rosie was happy as a clam and thought that Tom was the bees’ knees. Apart from the obvious benefits of working with some male eye candy, she waxed lyrical on what a wonderful, patient teacher he was, and how much time she was getting to spend in the cath lab.
‘I know,’ said Lizzy a little too brightly, ‘let’s crack open a bottle and start with hair and makeup instead.’ I saw her give Lou a significant look and she swept out of the bedroom to track down the wine and some glasses.
Lou smiled, grabbed the scrap of material out of my hands, and sat me down firmly on the stool in front of my dressing table.
‘Okay,’ she chirped. ‘I’m on makeup. Rosie, you’re on hair.’
Ugh! Torture.
‘Ow!’ I squeaked as Rosie tore the brush through my hair. ‘Why have you guys decided tonight is Frankie abuse night?’
‘Just humour us okay?’ Lou cajoled as Lizzy came back into the room and deposited a large glass of white wine in front of me. I took a healthy gulp, thinking that I needed it for its anaesthetic properties alone.
‘Soooo,’ Lizzy drew out. ‘What’s the deal with you and Mr Hotty Hoterson Frankie?’
‘What are you talking about?’
