About Last Night - Chapter 18
"People always asked Amy and Christopher about how they met. Amy knew it was because they looked mismatched. Like a kettle and an earring, a spade and a chandelier, or a beaver and a glove."
Dear gentle reader,
I am releasing an extra chapter this week because I am going on holidays to Greece to learn how to sail. Should I not end up overboard, I will release two more chapters at my return. Enjoy!
Catch-up on Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapters 13 and 14, Chapter 15, Chapter 16, and Chapter 17.
July, 2016
People always asked Amy and Christopher about how they met. Amy knew it was because they looked mismatched. Like a kettle and an earring, a spade and a chandelier, or a beaver and a glove. Friends and strangers alike could not wrap their heads around the idea of them as a couple: he — tall, rich and handsome; she — petite, quirky and old fashioned. They always looked for something that explained the oddity of this couple, and their story usually satisfied. Christopher always told it. A romantic, one-sided, palatable version, that smoothed over the fact they were still illogical. If Amy were to tell the story, this is how she’d tell it.
It was a hot summer day. The city, invaded by shorts and summer dresses, the parks, riddled with sun seekers. Amy wore her lab coat over her shoulders to hide the sweat stains that had formed under her armpits. Her fringe was stuck to her forehead, and her foundation had long vanished from her red and freckled face.
She walked across the courtyard towards the hospital building, but the staff door was blocked. An intervention team was digging around to fix a broken pipe. She went via the A&E instead, just as an ambulance arrived. She stopped in the corridor to let the paramedics pass and caught a glimpse of a man covered in blood, as he was being rushed through.
‘Stab wound victim. Mid to late thirties. He’s lost a lot of blood,’ said one of the paramedics as they came through the double doors. ‘Needs a transfusion. Rare blood type.’
‘How rare?’ barked the medic.
‘A-B positive. Ro subtype,’ said the other paramedic.
A shadow went across the medic’s face. ‘Nurse, check if we have Ro subtype.’
‘Yes, doctor,’ said the nurse and pulled out a phone from her pocket. ‘Rebecca, we urgently need Ro subtype. A-B positive. Rebecca, hold on, what are you saying? How come we don’t have any Ro subtype in stock? What do you mean we’ve ran out. We have a man here who is about to die if we don’t give him a transfusion. Put out an urgent call to other hospitals, labs, blood banks, your cousins, anyone you can think of.’
‘We’re losing him,’ screamed the medic. ‘There is no time,’ he said, pulling the bandana back from his forehead, the look of defeat etched on his face.
Amy knew that look. She hated losing people too. She lost them to microbes and viruses every single day. She wasn’t going to let this man be another number in a growing death toll. Not when she had something he needed.
‘Excuse me,’ she said, approaching the commotion.
‘Miss, please leave,’ said the medic, ignoring her. ‘Take the family away,' he told the nurse.
‘I work here, at the University,’ she said, showing him her badge. ‘In the lab. See?’
He gave her a puzzled look.
‘Miss, we have an emergency here. Please can you come back later? I’m sure it can wait,’ intervened one of the nurses, trying to usher Amy out.
‘No point coming back later is there?’ She said, rising her usually meek voice. ‘I have his blood type.’
For a split second, the nurses and the medic froze as if in disbelief of what she’d just said. Or perhaps wondering if now was the time they should start believing in God. Then the commotion resumed.
‘Do you have proof of your blood type, Miss?’ said the medic.
Amy pulled out the NHS Card with her blood type on. The nurse looked at it and then looked at the medic, confirming with her eyes that a miracle had just happened.
‘What are we waiting for,’ shouted the doctor. ‘Get her prepped and get me her blood now.’
When he came through, Amy was by his bedside, marveling at his beauty. She tried to visualise her blood pumping inside the thick arteries that coiled around his muscly arms. A slow drip was feeding morphine into his body, the needle secured to one of his gigantic hands. When the hand moved, Amy took a step back, as if caught in the act of doing something she shouldn’t.
‘Hello, nurse,’ he said, opening his eyes. He grimaced, trying to adjust his position. ‘How bad is it?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said, moving further away, as if caught committing a crime. ‘I’m not a nurse.’
He smiled with a perfect set of teeth. ‘Are you an angel?’
She didn’t often think about it, but in that moment, Amy became completely aware of how unattractive she looked. She wished she had at least made an effort to go the bathroom and fix her hair, apply some make-up (if she only had any). She made a mental promise that from that moment on she will carry make-up with her at all times, though she knew the chances of this happening again were statistically impossible. She sighed.
‘I’m a researcher,’ she said, trying to smooth a rebel lock of hair.
He raised an eyebrow, looking whimsical. ‘Are you here to research me?’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I shouldn’t be here.’
Just because she’d donated him her blood, it didn’t mean she had the right to be there. She wasn’t a close relative. She wasn’t his girlfriend. She was breaking a long list of rules. And talking of his girlfriend.
‘Christopher,’ said a voice in the door frame. ‘Darling, what happened?’
Christopher tried a smile, his face still bloodless and his lips parched. The woman walked over to his bed and took his hand in hers. Her honey-coloured hair looking like she had just had a blow-dry, and she smelled expensive. She wore a gold watch, a white tailored jacket and skinny jeans, Chanel flats.
Amy started walking backwards towards the door, her heart beating faster than usual. She made it out without being noticed by he girlfriend, and raising her suspicion. She stopped in the corridor for a few seconds to slow down her breathing, before she approached the nurses’ office.
‘The stab wound victim is awake now,’ she said.
‘We’ll be right there,’ said the nurse, but Amy was already too far down the corridor to hear it.
When she saw him outside her building a month later, her heart nearly jumped out of her chest. He looked good. Healthy. A fine stubble on his chin. Wearing a blue jumper and jeans. Geeky glasses on his nose.
‘Miss Young,’ he said, getting up from a bench and striding towards her.
She made towards the exit gate as if she hadn’t noticed him, hoping she could get away with not having to talk to him, but the man had different ideas.
‘Miss Young,’ he said, catching up. ‘Wait up. I only wanted to say thank you for saving my life.’
Amy fiddled with the folds of her skirt, trying to smooth it down.
‘How did you know it was me?’ she said. The records were supposed to be confidential.
‘I have my ways,’ he smiled. ‘I hope you don’t mind,’ he added. ‘Would you would join me for dinner? Please. It would mean a lot to me.’
She wanted to say no, to save herself the inevitable heartbreak, but she found that she couldn’t. Her life has been nothing but a string of long tedious days void of any kind of pleasure. This opportunity would not come her way again. She felt a flicker of something she had felt only once before. Excitement, anticipation, curiosity. She knew that when she felt that flicker something bad happened, but she was so tired of living like a zombie. She needed some life in her existence. Any kind of life.
‘Okay,’ she said, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. ‘But I’m not quite dressed for dinner.’
‘I don’t have anything fancy in mind,’ he said gently.
‘Will your girlfriend be joining us?’ she said, feeling her face turning the colour of a tomato.
He frowned. ‘My girlfriend?’
She blushed. What if she was wrong? ‘The young lady who visited you at the hospital?’ she said, tentatively.
‘Oh,' he said, remembering. ‘That's Emma. She’s my best friend,’ he laughed. ‘She’s practically my sister. We grew up together.’
‘She’s very beautiful,’ muttered Amy. Emma and Christopher looked so good together. Like a Calvin Klein advert. The visual representation of perfection. There was no doubt in Amy’s mind that, best-friends and practically-siblings or not, one day they would end up together. But maybe not today.
‘She’s a model,’ said Christopher. ‘Though I have no idea why. She doesn’t need the money. Her father owns a bank.’
Of course, he does, thought Amy.
Christopher led her down a narrow path. ‘We’re almost here,’ he said.
At the end of the path, stood a a small Indian restaurant. ‘This is my favourite Indian in the whole of London. Though I work near Brick Lane and have been to the best ones there.’ Suddenly, he slapped hid forehead. ‘I’m such an idiot. I forgot to ask you if you liked Indian.’
Amy wasn’t a huge fan but she wasn’t going to make a fuss. ‘It’s okay. I like Indian,’ she said.
She opted for a bowl of mild prawn curry that she barely made through. While they were eating, Christopher told her about the disadvantaged kids he’s been working with, trying to take them out of gangs and into education. How one of his boys had been attacked by a rival gang outside the youth centre, and he’d jumped in to separate them, receiving the blade instead.
‘Which is how I ended up in A&E,’ he said, dabbing at his lips with his napkin.
Christopher had the charisma of a movie star and the soul of Mother Teresa, but Amy was under no illusion that this was only a thank you meal. She would go back to her lackluster, boring life and that was absolutely fine.
They waited awkwardly outside the Indian for her Uber to arrive. He opened the car door for her, letting his hand linger on the door, as if he was making a decision. When he leaned in to kiss her, Amy was not expecting it. She was already bending to get inside the car, and he ended up kissing her on the forehead instead.
‘Sorry, that was awkward,’ he said, rubbing his chin.
‘No, I’m sorry,’ she said, changing her posture, standing as tall as she could. She scolded herself for being in such a rush to leave, for not giving him an opportunity to do something, anything. Even if it meant nothing in the long run. ‘Thank you for the meal,’ she said, her tone of voice slightly altered, like an invitation.
‘Amy,’ he said, taking her hands into his, his voice a little overcome with emotion. ‘All my life, I wanted to be a good man. A worthy man. I think I am that man. Or at least I’m on my way to becoming. But I want. No,’ he said, changing his mind, his voice becoming steady. ‘I need, someone good, someone worthy by my side.’ He paused for a very long time, while Amy held her breath. ‘And,’ he resumed, looking into her eyes. ‘I think you are that person.’
He leaned in again and kissed her properly this time, with expert lips. She didn’t think she was a good person at all (where would she even start with the evidence to support just how bad she was?), but she was not going to contradict him and blow this whole thing up. She leaned into the kiss and accepted the offer. She may not have been worthy (like Helena) or the poster perfect partner (like Emma), but she had something nobody else did. She was the perfect combination of plasma, red cells, white cells and platelets.
Hope you enjoyed this chapter. Stay tune for two new chapters the week of 9th June!
Happy readings,
Iulia xxx
