– Those same elderly men or women would almost always apologize for ‘making a fuss’.
– That the term ‘Patient PFO’ was not scientific terminology but ‘Patient Pissed and Fell Over’.
– Pregnant women rarely gave birth in the back of ambulances. (I was quite disappointed by that one.)
– That nobody used the term ‘ambulance driver’ any more. Especially not ambulance drivers.
– There would always be a handful of men who would answer, when asked to describe how much pain they were in out of ten, with ‘eleven’.
But what came through most, when Sam arrived back after a long shift, was the bleakness: solitary pensioners; obese men glued to a television screen, too large even to try to get themselves up and down their own stairs; young mothers who spoke no English, confined to their flats with a million small children, unsure how to call for help when it was needed; and the depressed, the chronically ill, the unloved.
Some days, he said, it felt like a virus: you had to scrub the melancholy from your skin along with the scent of antiseptic. And then there were the suicides, the lives ended under trains or in silent bathrooms, their bodies often unnoticed for weeks or months until somebody remarked on the smell, or wondered why so-and-so’s post was now spilling out of their pigeonhole.
‘Do you ever get frightened?’
He lay, oversized, in my little bath. The water had turned faintly pink with the blood from a patient’s gunshot wound that had leaked all over him. I was a little surprised at how swiftly I had got used to having a naked man in the vicinity. Especially one who could move by himself.
‘You can’t do this job if you’re frightened,’ he said simply.
He had been in the army before he’d joined the paramedics; it was not an unusual career arc. ‘They like us because we don’t scare easy, and we’ve seen it all. Mind you, some of those drunk kids scare me far more than the Taliban ever did.’
I sat on the loo seat beside him and stared at his body in the discoloured water. Even with his size and strength, I shivered.
‘Hey,’ he said, seeing something pass across my face, and reached out a hand to me. ‘It’s fine, really. I have a very good nose for trouble.’ He closed his fingers around mine. ‘It’s not a great job for relationships, though. My last girlfriend couldn’t cope with it. The hours. Nights. The mess.’
‘The pink bathwater.’
‘Yeah. Sorry about that. The showers weren’t working at the station. I should really have gone home first.’ He looked at me in a way that showed me there had been no chance of him going home first. He pulled the plug to let some of the water drain away, then turned on the taps for more.
‘So who was she, your last girlfriend?’ I kept my voice level. I was not going to be one of those women, even if he had turned out not to be one of those men.
‘Iona. Travel agent. Sweet girl.’
‘But you weren’t in love with her.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘Nobody ever says “sweet girl” about someone they were in love with. It’s like the whole “we’ll still be friends” thing. It means you didn’t feel enough.’
He was briefly amused. ‘So what would I have said if I had been in love with her?’
‘You would have looked very serious, and said, “Karen. Complete nightmare,” or shut down and gone all “I don’t want to talk about it.” ’
‘You’re probably right.’ He thought for a bit. ‘If I’m honest I didn’t really want to feel much after my sister died. Being with Ellen for the last few months, helping look after her, kind of knocked me sideways.’ He glanced at me. ‘Cancer can be a pretty brutal way to go. Jake’s dad fell apart. Some people do. So I figured they needed me there. If I’m honest, I probably only held it together myself because we couldn’t all go to pieces.’ We sat in silence for a moment. I couldn’t tell if his eyes had gone a bit red from grief or soap.
‘Anyway. So, yes. Probably not much of a boyfriend back then. So who was yours?’ he said, when he finally turned back to me.
‘Will.’
‘Of course. Nobody since?’
‘Nobody I want to talk about.’ I shuddered.
‘Everyone’s allowed their own way back, Louisa. Don’t beat yourself up about it.’
His skin was hot and wet, making it hard for me to hold on to his fingers. I released them, and he began to wash his hair. I sat and watched him, letting the mood lift, enjoying the bunched muscles in his shoulders, the gleam of his wet skin. I liked the way he washed his hair: vigorously, with a kind of matter-of-factness, shaking off the excess water like a dog.
‘Oh. I had a job interview,’ I said, when he finished. ‘For a thing in New York.’
‘New York.’ He raised an eyebrow.
‘I won’t get it.’
‘Shame. I’ve always wanted an excuse to go to New York.’ He slid slowly under the water so that only his mouth remained. It broke into a slow smile. ‘But you’d get to keep the pixie outfit, yes?’
I felt the mood shift. And, for no reason at all other than that he didn’t expect it, I climbed fully clothed into the bath and kissed him as he laughed and spluttered. I was suddenly glad of his solidity in a world where it was so easy to fall.
I finally made an effort to sort out the flat. On my day off I bought an armchair, and a coffee-table, and a small framed print, which I hung near the television, and those things somehow conspired to suggest someone might actually live there. I bought new bedding and two cushions and hung up all my vintage clothes in the wardrobe so that opening it now revealed a riot of pattern and colour, instead of several pairs of cheap jeans and a too-short Lurex dress. I managed to turn my anonymous little flat into something that felt, if not quite like a home, vaguely welcoming.
By some beneficence of the shift-scheduling gods, Sam and I both had a day off. Eighteen uninterrupted hours in which he did not have to listen to a siren, and I did not have to listen to the sound of pan pipes or complaints about dry-roasted peanuts. Time spent with Sam, I noted, seemed to go twice as fast as the hours I spent alone. I had pondered the million things we could do together, then dismissed half of them as too ‘couple-y’. I wondered whether our spending so much time together was wise.
I texted Lily one more time. Lily, please get in touch. I know you’re mad at me, but just call. Your garden is looking beautiful! I need you to show me how to look after it, and what to do with the tomato plants, which have got really tall (is this right?). Maybe after we could go out dancing? x I pressed send and stared at the little screen just as the doorbell rang.
‘Hey.’ He filled my doorway, holding a toolbox in one hand and a bag of groceries in the other.
‘Oh, my God,’ I said. ‘You’re like the ultimate female fantasy.’
‘Shelves,’ he said, deadpan. ‘You need shelves.’
‘Oh, baby. Keep talking.’
‘And home-cooked food.’
‘That’s it. I just came.’
He laughed and dropped the tools in the hallway and kissed me, and when we finally untangled ourselves, he walked through to the kitchen. ‘I thought we could go to the pictures. You know one of the greatest benefits to shift-working is empty matinées, right?’
– That the term ‘Patient PFO’ was not scientific terminology but ‘Patient Pissed and Fell Over’.
– Pregnant women rarely gave birth in the back of ambulances. (I was quite disappointed by that one.)
– That nobody used the term ‘ambulance driver’ any more. Especially not ambulance drivers.
– There would always be a handful of men who would answer, when asked to describe how much pain they were in out of ten, with ‘eleven’.
But what came through most, when Sam arrived back after a long shift, was the bleakness: solitary pensioners; obese men glued to a television screen, too large even to try to get themselves up and down their own stairs; young mothers who spoke no English, confined to their flats with a million small children, unsure how to call for help when it was needed; and the depressed, the chronically ill, the unloved.
Some days, he said, it felt like a virus: you had to scrub the melancholy from your skin along with the scent of antiseptic. And then there were the suicides, the lives ended under trains or in silent bathrooms, their bodies often unnoticed for weeks or months until somebody remarked on the smell, or wondered why so-and-so’s post was now spilling out of their pigeonhole.
‘Do you ever get frightened?’
He lay, oversized, in my little bath. The water had turned faintly pink with the blood from a patient’s gunshot wound that had leaked all over him. I was a little surprised at how swiftly I had got used to having a naked man in the vicinity. Especially one who could move by himself.
‘You can’t do this job if you’re frightened,’ he said simply.
He had been in the army before he’d joined the paramedics; it was not an unusual career arc. ‘They like us because we don’t scare easy, and we’ve seen it all. Mind you, some of those drunk kids scare me far more than the Taliban ever did.’
I sat on the loo seat beside him and stared at his body in the discoloured water. Even with his size and strength, I shivered.
‘Hey,’ he said, seeing something pass across my face, and reached out a hand to me. ‘It’s fine, really. I have a very good nose for trouble.’ He closed his fingers around mine. ‘It’s not a great job for relationships, though. My last girlfriend couldn’t cope with it. The hours. Nights. The mess.’
‘The pink bathwater.’
‘Yeah. Sorry about that. The showers weren’t working at the station. I should really have gone home first.’ He looked at me in a way that showed me there had been no chance of him going home first. He pulled the plug to let some of the water drain away, then turned on the taps for more.
‘So who was she, your last girlfriend?’ I kept my voice level. I was not going to be one of those women, even if he had turned out not to be one of those men.
‘Iona. Travel agent. Sweet girl.’
‘But you weren’t in love with her.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘Nobody ever says “sweet girl” about someone they were in love with. It’s like the whole “we’ll still be friends” thing. It means you didn’t feel enough.’
He was briefly amused. ‘So what would I have said if I had been in love with her?’
‘You would have looked very serious, and said, “Karen. Complete nightmare,” or shut down and gone all “I don’t want to talk about it.” ’
‘You’re probably right.’ He thought for a bit. ‘If I’m honest I didn’t really want to feel much after my sister died. Being with Ellen for the last few months, helping look after her, kind of knocked me sideways.’ He glanced at me. ‘Cancer can be a pretty brutal way to go. Jake’s dad fell apart. Some people do. So I figured they needed me there. If I’m honest, I probably only held it together myself because we couldn’t all go to pieces.’ We sat in silence for a moment. I couldn’t tell if his eyes had gone a bit red from grief or soap.
‘Anyway. So, yes. Probably not much of a boyfriend back then. So who was yours?’ he said, when he finally turned back to me.
‘Will.’
‘Of course. Nobody since?’
‘Nobody I want to talk about.’ I shuddered.
‘Everyone’s allowed their own way back, Louisa. Don’t beat yourself up about it.’
His skin was hot and wet, making it hard for me to hold on to his fingers. I released them, and he began to wash his hair. I sat and watched him, letting the mood lift, enjoying the bunched muscles in his shoulders, the gleam of his wet skin. I liked the way he washed his hair: vigorously, with a kind of matter-of-factness, shaking off the excess water like a dog.
‘Oh. I had a job interview,’ I said, when he finished. ‘For a thing in New York.’
‘New York.’ He raised an eyebrow.
‘I won’t get it.’
‘Shame. I’ve always wanted an excuse to go to New York.’ He slid slowly under the water so that only his mouth remained. It broke into a slow smile. ‘But you’d get to keep the pixie outfit, yes?’
I felt the mood shift. And, for no reason at all other than that he didn’t expect it, I climbed fully clothed into the bath and kissed him as he laughed and spluttered. I was suddenly glad of his solidity in a world where it was so easy to fall.
I finally made an effort to sort out the flat. On my day off I bought an armchair, and a coffee-table, and a small framed print, which I hung near the television, and those things somehow conspired to suggest someone might actually live there. I bought new bedding and two cushions and hung up all my vintage clothes in the wardrobe so that opening it now revealed a riot of pattern and colour, instead of several pairs of cheap jeans and a too-short Lurex dress. I managed to turn my anonymous little flat into something that felt, if not quite like a home, vaguely welcoming.
By some beneficence of the shift-scheduling gods, Sam and I both had a day off. Eighteen uninterrupted hours in which he did not have to listen to a siren, and I did not have to listen to the sound of pan pipes or complaints about dry-roasted peanuts. Time spent with Sam, I noted, seemed to go twice as fast as the hours I spent alone. I had pondered the million things we could do together, then dismissed half of them as too ‘couple-y’. I wondered whether our spending so much time together was wise.
I texted Lily one more time. Lily, please get in touch. I know you’re mad at me, but just call. Your garden is looking beautiful! I need you to show me how to look after it, and what to do with the tomato plants, which have got really tall (is this right?). Maybe after we could go out dancing? x I pressed send and stared at the little screen just as the doorbell rang.
‘Hey.’ He filled my doorway, holding a toolbox in one hand and a bag of groceries in the other.
‘Oh, my God,’ I said. ‘You’re like the ultimate female fantasy.’
‘Shelves,’ he said, deadpan. ‘You need shelves.’
‘Oh, baby. Keep talking.’
‘And home-cooked food.’
‘That’s it. I just came.’
He laughed and dropped the tools in the hallway and kissed me, and when we finally untangled ourselves, he walked through to the kitchen. ‘I thought we could go to the pictures. You know one of the greatest benefits to shift-working is empty matinées, right?’
