Between Now and Goodbye (19 page)

They clean up her leg, bandage it and give her something for the pain. Then they x-ray her arm and just as I suspected, she's broken it.

She's brave as they plaster it, and she beams at them when they give her a sticker for her cast. She also makes both the doctor and the nurse sign it, and then she hands me the pen and tells me I have to sign it as well.

She doesn't seem to be in any pain any more, and I'm more than a little thankful for that. She's even walking normally on her leg, and she's humming as we go along. A song from Meet me in St Louis.

'Where did you hear that song?' I ask her, amused as we walk through the hospital. Aiming for my mom's ward to see if they'll let us in, even though visiting hours are long over.

'When the posters for the fair went up a few weeks ago, Libby told me about a movie that had a big fair in it, and she said they sang about it all the time. So I asked her to show me, and when she came over to babysit one time, I watched it with her and Katie. It was a good movie, really fun.'

'I'll have to watch it sometime.'

'You should watch it with Libby, she knows all the songs and she sings along and she even knows a lot of the talking words.' Georgia looks up at me with wide excited eyes, 'It's like she can act the whole thing.'

'I'll make sure I watch it with her.'

'Can we watch it tonight?' She asks.

'Nice try. When we get inside you're going straight to bed, where you should have been instead of trying to climb a tree.'

'But I'm not a bit sleepy. Promise.' She tugs on my hand, 'I want to watch it with you and Libby.'

'Then we'll watch it another day.' I laugh as we reach the ward. The nurse at the desk recognizes me, and she gives me a warm smile as we approach the desk.

'You guys know that visiting hours ended several hours ago, right?' She makes a very obvious point of looking at the clock behind
her. It's gone two in the morning.

'We do.' I say sheepishly, 'but Georgia's had a bit of an accident,' I wave down at the cast on her arm, which she holds up proudly, 'and she really wants to see our mom.'

'I really, really do. Charles tell it right,' she huffs, 'I really, really want to see her.' Georgia says, her mouth set in a firm line. I hold back a laugh.

'That's right, she really, really wants to see her.' I smile.

'Well,' the nurse looks at us for a moment, 'I suppose since it's for a special reason. Just so long as it's only a few minutes, and you don't wake anyone up.'

'Thank you.' I let out a breath and smile at her. Georgia beams and pulls me towards our mom's room. I'm surprised to see my mom awake. Her little bedside lamp is on and she's got a book open, but she isn't reading it, she's just staring into space.

'Hello you two, this is a surprise, what are you both doing here so la...oh my goodness, Georgia honey what happened?'

'I broke it.' Georgia grins, again holding her cast up proudly like it's a trophy she won. 'And I was really brave. Charles said so.'

'Charles,' mom looks at me, a slight edge to her voice, 'what happened?'

'It's ok, she's fine. She broke her arm and got a nasty cut on her leg. They gave her some stitches, and as you can see they put a cast on her arm.' I say as Georgia uses her good arm to scramble up onto the bed and curl up against our mom. 'She got out of the house and tried to climb the tree in the yard, and I didn't hear her, I should have but...I messed up. I'm so sorry.'

'Charles, come here.' Mom holds out her hand to me. Her other arm is curled around Georgia. I walk over to the side of the bed and she takes my hand, giving it a gentle squeeze.

'When Lewis was seven, he fell off of his bike and broke his wrist. When Sean was two, he fell off of a counter and got a gash on his head. When Katie was eleven, she tried to walk along the top of the fence and wound up with a broken leg. When you were four, your dad tried to teach you to skateboard, and you dislocated your shoulder, and got a huge cut and bruise on your side.' She squeezes my hand again, 'You can't always protect children from getting hurt. You can't watch them all of the time, especially when they're supposed to be in bed and you should have been asleep yourself. Even if you do watch them all the time, you can't always prevent injuries. Katie once fell from the top of a jungle gym right in from of my eyes. I couldn't stop it from happening.'

'I just feel like I'm doing a lousy job of looking out for them.' I say quietly.

'You're not.' She smiles reassurances up at me, 'You're doing a fantastic job, and I couldn't cope with any of this without your help. Don't put yourself down kid, you're doing better than you think.'

'Thanks mom.'

'Who are the kids with now?' She asks after a beat of silence, in which I let go of just a little of the anxiety that's been pressing down on me since I found Georgia.

'They're with Libby.'

'Good.' She nods and then smiles down at Georgia, who has fallen asleep on my mom's side. 'She always looks so peaceful when she's sleeping. It's almost hard to believe the mischief she gets into when she's awake.'

'Yeah.' I smile. The sound of the door opening makes me turn my head, spotting the nurse who's just entered.

'Ok guys, it's really late so you have to get going, ok?'

'Yeah.' I nod while turning back to my mom. I bend down and kiss her cheek.

'They say I'll be out of here the day after tomorrow.'

'That's great mom.' I smile, scooping Georgia up into my arms. I hold her carefully so that I don't knock her arm. 'I'll swing by tomorrow and see you, ok?'

'You don't have
to.'

'See you tomorrow mom.' I reply and she smiles softly, 'I love you.'

'You too kid,' she says, 'give the kids a kiss and hug from me, and tell them all I'll be home soon and I expect to see clean rooms.'

'I will.' I laugh, 'Bye mom.'

'Bye love.'

'How is she?' Libby whispers, cradling a fussy April against her chest and swaying back and forth. I lower a sleeping Georgia down onto the couch and run my hand through my hair.

'Broken arm, stitches in her leg, but she seems to be ok.' I reply, 'How did things go here?'

'It took a while to calm everyone down, but after a snack and a few stories and reassurances, they all went to bed. Other than Katie, who said she wanted to wait up, she's in her room. And April woke up about twenty minutes ago, I think the heat is making her fussy.'

'Thanks Libs, for helping out and being here.' I sigh, 'I'm just going to take Georgia to bed, I'll be back in a minute and then I'll let you get home.' I scoop Georgia up again and carry her up to her room. Katie looks up from her laptop as I enter, pulls out her ear buds and looks at Georgia.

'Is she ok?'

'She'll be fine, no lasting damage.' I smile softly as I lay Georgia down.

'Charles I...I wanted to say sorry.' Katie's voice sounds shaky. I tuck Georgia in and go and sit on the edge of Katie's bed.

'What for?'

'For sneaking out so much, for avoiding mom, not helping with the kids more often. I'm still here, but I may as well have left when dad did.'

'Don't say that.' I put my hand lightly onto her arm.

'No,' she says tearfully, 'it's true. I haven't been here for mom or you or the kids, because I've been too scared to handle it. I can't handle seeing mom getting so weak, so instead of dealing with it like I should have been, I've been hiding out and that isn't right. So I'm sorry, I'm going to try my best to be better from here on out.'

'What brought this on?' I squeeze her arm lightly. Could it just be about Georgia getting hurt tonight?

'Libby,' Katie smiles, 'seeing the ways she's always willing to step up and help out. Like the way she rushed over here in the middle of the night to watch the kids, because once again I wasn't in the house even though I should have been. I don't know it's just...she's not even family, it's not even her mom who's sick and yet she's downstairs right now helping out.'

'Not everyone can deal with things the same way Katie. I'd appreciate it if you didn't climb out of the window anymore,' I smile at her, 'however, I've never blamed you for needing that distance. This is a pretty rubbish situation, for all of us, and it's hard seeing mom get sicker. I know it's hard, it's just that mom wants to spend time with us, and know that we're going to be ok.'

'I know,' Katie sighs, brushing away some tears, 'I'm going to be better from now on. I promise I'm going to be better.' She says it tearfully and I hug her.

'I know you will.'

I spend a couple more minutes with Katie and then head back downstairs. April is now lying in her carry cot on the couch, while Libby stands by the window, looking out at the rain which has just started to fall. I walk over to her and pull her into a hug.

'What's this for?' She laughs, her arms sliding around my back and hugging me.

'This is for being here, being you and just everything you've been doing since you got home from New York. In fact, scratch that, it's for everything you've been doing since my mom was diagnosed. You make a difference, even when you don't realize it.'

'Well,' she laughs as she talks, and I pull back to look at her, she's grinning, 'you're very welcome for whatever it is I did.'

'You're a good influence on Katie, and she really needs that right now.' I reply, 'So thank you.'

'Any time.' She shrugs, holding my gaze for a second and then she looks away, backing up a little. 'So, uh...' She clears her throat, but doesn't say anything else.

'Where did Julie go?'

'Oh, I actually don't know. She didn't follow me over here so I assume she went home. I doubt she stayed at mine since it's so late.' Libby runs her fingers through her hair. 'You should know, I've been highlighting your good points while I've been with her.'

'I appreciate that.' I smile, 'Hopefully tonight's drama won't set back phase one tomorrow or,' I glance at my watch, 'today.'

'It won't,' she says firmly, 'all you have to do is tell her you're not going to give up, and that you love her. Phase one is the easy part.' She smiles, 'Ok, do you need anything else?'

'You've done more than enough, go home and get some sleep.' I give her one more quick hug, 'Thanks Libs.'

'Like I said, any time.' She smiles back and then walks out of the room, turning back to give one last smile.

Twenty Four – Julie

Sleeping in until noon doesn't do much good when the night before I was up until around five. I hadn't meant to stay up quite that late, but after Libby ran out last night to play superhero for Charles. I decided to drive over to Carly's and we stayed up until the early hours discussing the details of my party, which I had planned on doing with Libby.

Once we stopped chatting at around four, I decided to drive home and crash in my own bed. Now it's just after noon and I feel like I haven't slept at all, but there's an annoying ringing preventing me from going back to sleep. I hate doorbells.

I sigh and sit up, listening hard. I hear Anita, our housekeeper, open the door so I lay back down and curl up again. Finally some peace to fall back to sleep. Until there's a tapping on my bedroom door. I groan loudly and sit up just as Anita is stepping inside.

'Your boyfriend is here to see you.' She smiles kindly, smoothing back a wispy of stray black hair into her bun.

'Charles isn't my boyfriend any more.' I reply, pulling myself out of bed and tying back my hair. 'Did he say what he was here for?'

'He just said he needed to speak with you. I told him to wait in the lounge.' Anita smiles a little sadly. She'd always liked Charles. 'I hadn't realized the two of you weren't together anymore.'

'It's recent.' I reply.

'I'm sorry to hear that.'

'Why? I'm not.' I reply.

'He's such a nice young man.'

'Uh-huh.' I nod and head out of the room, down the stairs and find Charles sitting on the couch in the largest of our three lounges.

It's strange. As I look at him now I realize how out of place he looks at this house. How awkwardly, he sits on the large beige couch imported from Italy. How odd he looks surrounded by golden picture frames, crystal candlesticks and expensive soft furnishings.

I hadn't ever really paid any attention to it before, but now it's painfully obvious to me. He's in cheap looking black jeans, a white button up shirt with thin white stripes, and a gray waistcoat with large black buttons. As always he's in his black and white converses. He looks so strange in this room.