Chapter Three

Touch a Life

“Then guess what he said.”

“I can’t imagine.”

“Guess, though.”

“I don’t have the brain capacity right now to make a blinking guess,” Ollie replied, a little exasperated and whacking the file of two-year-old Dylan Anderson onto his stack.

“Guess,” she repeated and grinned.

“Urgh.” Hands on hips, Ollie twisted around behind the nurses’ station to face Taya. “I don’t know.” He looked up at one of the child-made butterfly drawings pinned to the ceiling, spinning on its thread against the air conditioner. “Wait, was it, will you marry me?”

Taya burst out laughing. She had one of those high-pitched laughs that never failed to cause a commotion, and in a quiet nighttime children’s hospital wing, ever so much more so. Ollie went to offer a quick apology, aka smile, to whichever parent might still be awake this late. There weren’t many. Just the one. Jacob. He hovered by the door of his daughter’s room, probably wondering if Taya’s laugh was a fire drill.

“No.” Taya wiped her tear-filled eyes.

“Oh, flipping tell me,” Ollie urged. “I need to observe Daisy Monroe in—” He lifted his arm to reveal his bare wrist, then quickly changed plan to pull the zip wire on his lapel fob watch. “Two minutes.”

“What happened to your watch?” Taya asked, calming her outburst.

“Nothing,” Ollie replied a little too quickly, not to get the wrinkled brow from Taya. He sighed. “I left it at his place.” And winced at the inevitable comeback.

Amazingly, there wasn’t one. Taya hummed an idle response and shifted along the desk to tap at the computer. Ollie waited a few moments and thinking he might have dodged a bullet, picked up his implement tray and walked around the desk toward Daisy’s room.

“Your dad bought you that.” Taya was still tapping at the keyboard, eyes fixed on the screen.

Ollie stopped on his way to Daisy’s room. Head bowed, he nodded. He could make out Taya uttering the C-word under her breath and hoped that she was referring to the man who she knew would have thrown out that watch. He couldn’t be certain though. Ollie deserved the retort. The last remaining gift his father had bought him with a sound mind was now discarded to a waste dump simply because Ollie had needed comfort and release from a man who had given neither.

Remembering his New Year pledge, Ollie straightened his scrubs and continued on to room one.

“Ollie, hi,” Jacob welcomed, and his piercing blue eyes penetrated Ollie as though able to read every sordid detail in his memory bank.

“Need to check Daisy’s obs.”

Ollie kept his voice low as Daisy was still soundly sleeping, clutching the pink teddy bear. Ollie could feel that comfort radiate through his body. He wasn’t ashamed to admit he had a soft toy just like it at home and often hugged it at night when he needed soothing. He didn’t get hugs that often anywhere else. Never underestimate the power of a St. Cross-emblazoned teddy bear.

Jacob nodded and shifted in the doorway for Ollie to pass. He hovered as Ollie placed the tray down on the moveable table at the foot of the bed, and when Ollie leaned over to press the various buttons on the observation screen, he caught Jacob watching him.

“It was bleeping earlier.” Jacob nodded at the screen. “I was worried. Should it do that?”

“It’ll bleep occasionally,” Ollie assured him. “When she’s asleep, her blood pressure drops.” He wrote down the latest results on Daisy’s file. “I get notified out there of any alarms.” He pointed his pen at the nurses’ station. “Anything abnormal, and I’ll come running.”

Jacob nodded, but Ollie could still see the tension in his shoulders. He had a sudden urge to massage it away. But he gave what he could: a smile.

“If you’re worried about anything…” Ollie clapped the file on the table. “Anything at all, there’s a button over there to call me.” He nodded at the headboard with its multitude of buttons, plug sockets, and wires. “Ignore that it’s a silhouette of a dress. Hospitals can be very gender stereotypical.”

Jacob snorted a laugh and tucked his hands into his jeans pockets. Ollie pulled out two disposable gloves from the packet on the tray, slipped them on, and picked up Daisy’s wrist to feel the pulse. He pulled his fob watch from his pocket to count the beats.

“Doesn’t your machine do that?” Jacob queried.

“Yes.” Ollie strove to focus on the pulsating wrist rather than the voice drifting across the mattress. “But we do manual spot checks to make sure. Can’t rely on technology all the time, I’m afraid. Often fails.”

“I could take offense at that, you know,” Jacob remarked.

Ollie placed Daisy’s arm under the blankets and glanced up.

“I work in IT,” Jacob explained. “Consultant. Software developer. I build technology, so I’d have to argue that it isn’t the technology that fails.” Jacob smiled, leaning forward so his knees knocked against the side of the bed. “It’s the end user base.”

Ollie laughed. He leaned over for the syringe on his tray and picked up Daisy’s other arm with the IV cannula taped to the back of her hand. “I can probably agree with you there.” He inserted the syringe through the infusion. “Give me human patients any day. Can’t give a computer a hug when they’re not working properly.”

“Do hugs work, then?” Jacob asked, his eyes still fixed on Daisy.

“Of course!” Ollie stepped to the foot of the bed to write his obs on the clipboard. “It’s a whole year at nursing college on hugs alone.”

Jacob chuckled. His deep, soft laughter made Ollie’s stomach flutter. He quickly brushed it off to keep to the job in hand and sorted through the items on his tray. Focus on what I love. Nursing. Keeping children comfortable when they are clearly uncomfortable. Things he should be doing.

“What made you want to be a nurse?”

Ollie was shocked to notice Jacob had taken a few steps toward him. He now sat on the edge of Daisy’s bed and eyed the items on Ollie’s tray, probably wondering what they could be for and how they all aided his daughter.

“I like helping people,” Ollie replied, snapping off his gloves. “Children especially, as it seems so unfair that any of them have to go through this.”

He moved over to the orange flip-top bin and shoved the gloves in. When Ollie turned, Jacob stood with his arms wrapped around his body, as if giving himself one of those therapeutic hugs.

“Plus, I always find it truly amazing how these kids take it all in their stride,” Ollie added. “Adults cower and curse and feel the unfairness of it all. Children accept this is their life, rather cruelly. And the power of a hug to a child is far more effective than to an old grizzly guy in for a stubbed toe.”

Jacob breathed out a laugh. Ollie could tell he was finding the whole situation unbearable. By talking to him, Jacob was able to keep his mind off things. Ollie didn’t mind. The night shift was always so deathly quiet, with most of the children dreaming their way to a better life. A life without operations, needles, and sickness. Most parents used the opportunity to catch up on sleep, some by their child’s bed. Others went home, leaving the responsibility to the professionals for a while, to recuperate for the next trying day.

“My little sister was a poorly child,” Ollie offered. “Matilda. We call her Tilly. Cancer. Lots of stays in hospital. I used to kinda love coming to visit her. I thought it was all fun. None of my friends got to come into London after school. It felt special.” Ollie shrugged. “Of course, it doesn’t feel like that for the parents. But I learned a lot about nursing from my visits and couldn’t see myself going into anything else.”

“I can see why you would choose it, then.” Jacob lowered his head to get into Ollie’s eyeline. “Is your sister okay now?”

Ollie waved a hand. “Oh yeah. She’s fine now. Been in remission a fair few years. Sixteen and into the Vamps.” Ollie shuddered. “Can’t protect her from that, unfortunately.”

Jacob chuckled. “Not a fan, then?”

“God, no. Boy bands are not my thing. Although…” Ollie lowered his voice and spoke out of the side of his mouth. “Take That are considered a man-band, right?”

“Afraid I wouldn’t know.” Jacob returned his gaze to his daughter. “Last I heard, she was into Disney Princesses and Peppa Pig.”

“Keep her that way for as long as possible.” Ollie clucked his tongue. “Because when boys come to town, they bring a world of trouble.”

Jacob nodded solemnly, as if the statement held a multitude of truths. Ollie sure knew it did. He hovered for a bit, checking all was in order around the bed.

“What made you go into IT?” Ollie finally asked, tucking his hands into his scrubs pockets. Rather novel to have someone to talk to who wasn’t Taya or any of the other female nurses or the occasional frantic mother.

“Oh. I was always a bit of nerd.” Jacob shook his head, his hair falling around his face. He swiped it back. “Plus a bit of an oddball. Making friends wasn’t easy, so I made friends with a computer.” He chuckled as if at a memory. “I had a knack with them. Hacked into my parents’ online banking accounts when I was a kid. Hacked into a few other places I probably shouldn’t mention.”

Ollie laughed. Jacob’s smile brightened up his otherwise dark features. “Well, at least I know who to come to when I lock myself out of my online banking for forgetting the answer to my pre-prepared questions.” Ollie picked up his nurse tray. “Seriously, you’d think I would remember the name of my first pet, but apparently the bank knows better.”

Jacob chuckled again. Before the deep vibrations could reach Ollie’s groin, he clanged the tray over to the door.

“Mine was Frodo.”

Ollie turned back to catch the desperation in Jacob’s voice and those blue eyes.

“A fish. Goldfish. Had a circular bowl for a home. So he had the one ring to rule them all.”

Ollie laughed. The tray in one hand, he curled the other around the door handle to pull it open. “Budgie,” he offered. “Mine was a budgie, but I think I must have spelled it wrong or something.”

Jacob grinned with a nod. He stepped forward, then back again, his eyes remaining fixed on Ollie. The pleading in the dilating pupils was unmistakable. Ollie had seen that same appeal many a time. Especially from parents who undertook the night shift beside their children’s beds. Jacob didn’t want to go back to sitting in silence, listening to a bleeping machine that made no sense to him for once. Talking obviously made him forget where he was and what had happened to get him there.

“You should try get some sleep,” Ollie suggested. “I know it’s not the ideal place for a nap, what with all the weird noises. And that sofa bed is as hard as hell. But you should still try. I’m here for Daisy too, remember.”

Jacob nodded, and just before Ollie could leave the room, he heard it. The loud growl from the pit of Jacob’s stomach. Jacob shifted, his cheeks blushing crimson under the dark stubble on his face. “Sorry,” Jacob said. “I haven’t been able to eat all day. Not since I heard.”

Ollie smiled in sympathy.

“Is there anywhere open for food?”

Ollie went to check his wrist watch, until he remembered again it wasn’t where it usually was and slapped his arm down. Again.

“Lost my watch.” Ollie wasn’t sure why he felt the need to explain his strange arm flap. He switched the tray to his other arm and pulled his fob from his top pocket. “Sorry, the canteen closed a while back. They have those godawful vending machines if you want something that gets microwaved and burns your tongue on the first bite but is still frozen in the middle?”

Jacob scrunched his nose, emulating a cute bunny rabbit twitching his whiskers. Ollie glanced down to the floor not to have to look at it.

“It’s okay.” Jacob shook his head. “I’m sure I won’t starve.”

Another loud growl of his stomach came with perfect comedic timing.

Ollie snorted a laugh. He pulled the door open. “There’s a late-night pizza place down the road. They do an amazing seafood topping. If you like seafood, that is. Why don’t you go fuel up for the night ahead?”

“Oh, I don’t want to leave her.” Jacob glanced down at his daughter, still snoring in the bed.

“She’s okay,” Ollie assured him. “She has the best nurse on the ward, I promise.”

He offered up a wink, and Jacob smiled, but it was short-lived.

“I don’t think I could sit and eat, not being with her,” Jacob admitted, voice low and melancholy. “I’ve not been around enough as it is.”

Ollie heard his own heart beat. He was used to listening to little hearts and could easily notice an out-of-time pulse, but his own was harder to put a finger on. Yet he knew it was beating out of time at hearing such sincerity and sadness. He took a deep breath, attempting to even it out.

“Listen,” Ollie finally said. “I probably shouldn’t allow it, but why don’t you go order it, and I’ll let you bring it up here?”

Jacob’s face lit up with gratitude. “Really?” he asked. “You wouldn’t get into trouble?”

“Nah,” Ollie replied. “The things parents sneak up here without us seeing is bad enough. I’ll just plead ignorance.”

Jacob smiled. “Thank you, Ollie.”

Ollie nodded, and Jacob rooted around in the pocket of his jacket laid out on the chair for his money. He met Ollie at the door and held it wider for him to pass through. Ollie felt Jacob’s breath on the back of his neck. He strode away and over to the nurses’ station, vacant for once—all the other nurses off with their own patients. Jacob jogged over to the swinging exit door and rammed it open with his shoulder.

“I really appreciate this, Ollie.”

Ollie waved a hand. “You get the seafood, and I may have to steal a slice.”

“Done!” Jacob scurried through the door.

Ollie slapped the tray down on the counter and sighed. He pinched the bridge of his nose and checked the time on the computer screen. He wondered if, at the stroke of midnight, it would happen automatically. This whole not-feeling anything? It was easy. That was how Elliot did it. Elliot, the c—

“I need a smoke.” Taya slipped up behind him and rested her chin on his shoulder.

“One hour, T,” Ollie said. “Then resolutions just happen, right?”

“Sure,” Taya replied, rather unconvincingly.

Ollie huffed.

“He said, ‘I like you, I just don’t like being around you.’” Taya plucked out a mint from the bag she always kept in her scrubs pocket and offered Ollie one.

He refused with a shake of his head. “He sounds like a keeper.”

“Yeah,” Taya agreed. “I think I’ll just stick to the sexting with this one.”

* * * *

“The first time I ate an oyster, I nearly chucked it back up.” Ollie bit into the luxuriously hot and creamy pizza slice. He tucked it to the side of his mouth to continue talking. “Felt like I was eating snot.”

Jacob laughed, holding a hand up to his lips not to spit his own mouthful of pizza across the room. He had come back to the ward quite quickly, and Ollie had managed to sneak him through into Daisy’s room, with the door firmly shut. The offer of the one slice had made him not immediately back right out. He was hungry, and it was another two hours until his official break. All his patients were asleep, obs up to date, and while he should be catching up on the paperwork, he thought he could use a quick bite.

Sitting at the end of Daisy’s room on the pull-out sofa, Ollie had closed the separating curtain in case anyone peeked in through the blinds. It wasn’t exactly against the rules to bring food into children’s rooms, although it was frowned upon if it wasn’t food from the hospital canteen. It was probably ever so much more frowned upon for Ollie to be eating it with a patient’s parent.

The pizza box lay open on the sofa between them, and Ollie perched on the armrest while Jacob sat on the cushions. Jacob devoured the pizza as if he hadn’t eaten properly in days. Ollie couldn’t blame him. The seafood variety of topping was to die for. But he suspected it was the first time Jacob had allowed such a meal to pass his lips in a while, fear and worry taking over the hunger pangs in his stomach. It made him wonder what sort of person wouldn’t tell their child’s father about their child’s operation.

“I don’t mean to pry,” Ollie started and realized that was the age-old saying for actually, yes I do and I’m so gonna. “But how come you didn’t know about Daisy being here? Did her mother not tell you? The operation would have been booked in for months.”

Jacob swallowed his last piece of pizza and wiped his hands on a paper napkin to rid them of the crumbs and leftover grease. He fell back in the seat and rested his head against the wall, his bright, all-consuming blue eyes on Ollie’s.

“She doesn’t particularly like me anymore.” Jacob admitted. “We don’t really speak. Most of our conversations are conducted through lawyers and the CSA—the child support agency. I used to see Daisy every other weekend, but when she got sick, Becky stopped turning up. I believe she also has a new boyfriend who may be the cause of some of that.”

“I’m sorry,” Ollie replied, now wishing he hadn’t asked. “That must be tough.”

Jacob shook his head against the wall. “I deserve it, I suppose.”

“Nothing merits being shut out of your daughter’s life.” Ollie was surprised at how gallant it came out.

Jacob picked at the skin on his hand. “Perhaps not,” he said. “But I don’t think she really trusts me. Lying to someone for so many years often has that effect.”

Ollie nodded, sympathetic smile on display, and decided to leave that there. It wasn’t his place to know the whole goings-on in the man’s life, even if it did affect his patient.

“I found out Daisy was having surgery from my many phone calls to Becky’s parents,” Jacob continued. “They also choose not to have any dealings with me. So they rarely answer my calls. I called from a pay phone in the end, and as that wasn’t my number, they had to answer.”

“Well, they all sound extremely petty. Whatever happened, the way you love your daughter is commendable, and they shouldn’t hinder that, no matter how they feel about you.” Ollie stood and brushed down his scrubs. “I’m going to assume you’re not an ax murderer or anything and it’s more to do with your love life?”

Jacob snorted. “Yes,” he said. “As in no,” he added with a shake of his head. “I’m not an ax murderer or any other type of murderer.” He held up his hands. “These break into computers all day and not people’s skulls.”

“Good. ’Cause sharing a pizza with a murderer was not on my list of things to do in 2018.”

Jacob laughed. “I hope it isn’t, because I hear they can end pretty nastily…and the world would be a duller place without your smile.”

Ollie paused, stunned, and wondered if he’d even heard the mumble from Jacob correctly. But his mouth overtook any rational response and simply offered up the aforementioned smile. Jacob scrubbed a hand over the lower half of his face, as though attempting to shove the words back in. So Ollie gave it no further thought.

“I’d best get back to work. If you need anything, I’ll be out there. Or ring the bell.”

At Jacob’s nod, Ollie ripped open the curtain and rushed out of the room as fast as his comfortable shoes allowed.