Looking after Mum: Chapter 4

Chapter 4

When Mum asked me that question, my world just about stopped spinning in its orbit.
For a moment I didn't find any words to say. Then, I stammered, "Who am I? I'm me! I'm Amelia, Mum!"
"Mum?" she snapped. "Mum? I'm not your mother. I'm not any-one's mother."
"Mum." I said this softly, trying to bring her back to reality and trying to control myself whilst making sense of the situation.
She stared at me, wild-eyed, looking at me as if I was mad, and then I just lost it.
"Mum!" I yelled, and threw myself on her, trying to shake her, but I was restrained by the nurses. I thrashed out at them, screaming like a toddler having a tantrum. How could she not know me, how?
A young male nurse dragged me out kicking, yelling, crying, and sat me down on a chair, helping Dad up too, by putting his arms underneath his shoulders. Dad did not acknowledge him, but he did not resist, and was sat down on a chair next to me. He had that same blank, empty look in his eyes against, and stared into space. The nurse sat on his haunches facing me, forcing me to lift my head up, and held my two hands in his.
"Amelia..." He looked at Dad. "Is she ready for this, Mr Harper?"
Dad did not even blink, so the male nurse continued, sighing. "Amelia, I'm going to ask you to be very braver, braver than you've ever been, and not to break down. Just don't break down. Amelia, today, your mother had a stroke." He paused, fiddling with his glasses. "Do you know what a stroke is?" I nodded my head loosely. I knew. But I didn't want to know.
"It just happened. A car accident. Your mother was driving home from her work-place – at the restaurant, right?” He looked at me for confirmation even though he probably had been told all the details already. Receiving no action from me, he continued.
“Your dad was informed immediately, that’s why he didn’t have time to wait for you. And because of the stroke, Amelia, half of your mother's body was paralysed.
“ It’s called an ischemic stroke. A blood clot stopped blood supply to part of her brain. And that's why she can't recognize you. It...might take time for her...or...she might never..." he broke off awkwardly, clearly embarrassed about the things he had had to say to me.
“Don’t worry though, there’s every hope of a full recovery. After about a week in hospital, she’ll go to a different ward, that’s especially for people to get healed in.” He was talking to me like I was a young child. Continuing, he said, “And once she’s home, there’ll be the option of a home carer, to stay in your house and help, should there be any…difficulty or...”
Dad interrupted him. “There’ll be no need for that,” he said frigidly, finally raising his head and acknowledging the nurse was there. The young nurse, looking extremely embarrassed, patted me lightly on the back and then went back into the room. I stared at Dad. He stared into space. So instead of trying to grasp feebly at meaningless words, I just sat in front of him, at a complete loss of what to do or say, mirroring him, while the silence seemed to dance through the space between us with all the unspoken sentences, thoughts and feelings hanging in the air with nowhere to go.
***
We left the hospital the next morning after a relatively sleepless night in the uncomfortable sterility of the accident and emergency department. Even after spending less than twenty four hours in the hospital, the smell of cleaning fluids seemed to be permanently ingrained on the inside of my nostrils, so that even the fresh air outside smelled like toilet cleaner. Hardly the ideal start to the morning I had in mind.
Dad let me off school, however. Well, I think it’s just we both completely forgot about school, completely oblivious to the normal routine that should have been happening in our every day lives. We just spent the day in our rooms, in a trance-like misery, feeling as if the weight of the world was upon our shoulders and there was no-one to help us carry it.
***

“So, what happened?” asked Rachel Green, an irritating, small-minded person with a tiny build to match – she sported a wiry frame that would probably never be acquainted with stomach fat and arm jiggling. At my first glance of her in Year Seven, I’d silently christened Rachel “The Minnow.”
Envy was a really unattractive thing to sport around but I could feel it all over my face, as I sat at my desk in morning registration.
Resenting her, I mumbled, “Erm...my mum’s in hospital. She had a stroke so –”
It was the word “stroke” that did it. Rachel shrank back with a melodramatic gasp. “Ohhhhhh! Amelia!” she said shrilly, exaggerating the vowels in my name till it sounded like she was speaking “Whale”, like Dory does in Finding Nemo.
Speaking to the whale, I thought with an inward cringe.
Rachel extended a hand and placed it on my shoulder, in the most insincere gesture I had ever encountered. I was disgusted at how she could put on such a palaver, just to get attention. Sure enough, it worked. People had already started gathering, clustering round the desk, led by the main spectators: the Mini-Ks and leader.
“What’s happening with Melie-Sweet then?” asked Kirsty derisively, hands on hips, hair flicking.
Rachel looked up at her with adoration, and explained to Kirsty like it was her humble duty or something. Pathetic. I supposed she felt honoured or something equally absurd, because Kirsty had, OH MY GOD, deigned to speak to her. Even though she hadn’t really addressed her, technically speaking. She’d just poked her nose into my business and opened her over-sized trap.
“Melia’s Mum’s had a stroke,” she said dramatically, eyes still wide open, for dramatic effect. Kirsty’s mouth dropped wide open at first, forming a round O shape. I’d been waiting for a spiteful insult but she literally seemed lost for words, opening and closing her mouth like a goldfish. Not being able to face the crowd that had gathered round my desk, I hung my head, willing my short hair to cover my face and wishing for the ground to swallow me up. I looked at Kirsty sideways through my fringe, waiting for a reaction. Say something, I begged her silently. Say anything. Just say your part so everyone will leave and go away.

For a moment, I almost expected compassion. I almost expected her to look into my eyes and tell me how sorry she was and how she knew how I felt.
I should have expected better. Compassion from Kirsty Brightman. Gradually, she regained her superior air, her I’m-the-top-of-this-place-and-you-know-it look, and her mouth set into a cruel smile. She didn’t say anything, just walked away, Mini-K’s following like ladies in waiting. And I knew it, I could just tell. She was going to think out a way to work this against me and make my life hell.

Compassion from Kirsty Brightman. I deserve the winning prize for crown idiot of the century.

***

I sat on my dream-sill that night at midnight, window watching. In this part of the city, if you stood still, there was no sign of life. The people had given up on work and had returned to their houses. And nothing moved. I could have been the only person in the entire world. Look up at the stars and you were gone. And maybe there were people, maybe there were people on the other side of the world, watching the windows on dream-sills of their own. Everything felt warped and unreal, as if I were seeing it through mist or stained glass windows. The stars were artificial, Birmingham’s neon city lights, flashing across the vast expanse of sky. Puddles of lamplight were cast across the street, looking like pools of gold. When I was about five years old, I remember walking home with Dad along that lane, after a late-night outing to the theatre. I’d never been out this late before, and, in a slight stupor from fatigue, I found the golden puddles utterly beautiful. Overcome by girlish fancies, I insisted on walking in every single shimmer we could see on the way back Dad and I had a magical walk home, swinging round each of the lampposts before jumping in the golden rivulets they were creating.
The moon here was never clear, silver and full; I could only see a crescent, peeping out from the grey city smoke it was bathed in, thick swirls enveloping it mysteriously. Nothing, not even the moon seemed real to me that night. It was all like a dream, which is why I doubted the reality of the girl I could see out of my window, wandering along Drayton Road.
She was most likely another figment of my imagination, as she walked under each lamppost, light illuminating her one second and shadows shrouding her the next. She carried on walking in a slow, steady pace, and when my eyes adjusted to the darkness I could see that she was reading a book by flashlight.
I wondered why she was out so late. Maybe she was restless, like me. I wondered what story she was wrapped up in. I wondered if she let anyone else into that island of light.