Day Ten

Sunday, 11 am

Revisited

"Paul!" Robert beamed at him from his bed, trying to sit up as Paul entered. "I've been waiting all morning. Russell told me you'd come for a visit. I'm glad. It's such a bore in here."

Paul walked his way past the hospital beds, smiling apologetically at the two elderly patients who were sharing the room with Robert.

He placed a small paperbag with a printed logo of a jumping kangaroo onto Robert's nightstand, which earned him a curious look. "For me?"

"Mh-hm. Kate – my wife – suggested bringing a Gameboy or whatever it's called. I can only guess she was pulling my leg."

Robert peaked inside the bag, and grinned. "You've bought me Tim Tams?"

"I hope you like them."

"'Like them.' I could live on that stuff, seriously." He took one of the paper-wrapped biscuits to break the seal. "God, I'm starving. Thank you."

"You seem well."

"I feel great," Robert said, watching Paul taking the chair beside the bed while he was munching on his Tim Tam. "They put all these weird drugs in me? Couldn't feel any better. The food is rotten, though. But the staff is nice. There's this doctor, he's from Scotland, and you can tell. He sounds like Sean Connery. He even has a tattoo on his arm that says 'Scotland forever'. He showed me. It's pretty cool looking. He knows a lot of rude jokes, too. I've never met a doctor like this."

Paul looked at him attentively. "Have you ever been in a hospital before?"

"No." He glanced at Paul. "Not as a patient, that is. I had to spent a night there when-…"

"Go on," Paul said softly. "What was it you were going to say?"

"My mum was admitted when I was eight, maybe nine. They rushed her to the hospital with an ambulance, and I had to go with her."

"Can you tell me about it?"

"I don't really remember. She collapsed in the bathroom. I called my dad at the clinic, but he was busy doing surgery or something, so his secretary made the emergency call. I stayed with her. They didn't want to leave me at home, all by myself."

"That must have been pretty frightening, seeing your mum like that."

"Probably." He shrugged. "I reckon it was. It's a long time ago. I really don't recall much of it, except that the nurse got me a teddy bear with a toy stethoscope around its neck, which was kind of embarrassing. But they've had ice cream, so..."

"Did you stay overnight?"

"They took me to paediatrics, yes. They'd had a spare bed in a room with a boy in it. His name was Sean Cooper. He was in a wheelchair. Spent weeks in and out of the hospital, he said. I remember him sharing his Nintendo with me. We'd sit up all night, playing Super Mario. He was so good at it, it was frustrating. It was like he'd do all the tricky moves for me because I couldn't for the life of me figure it out? I felt like a child." Robert shrugged again. "His mum came in the next morning, even before the nurses came to check on us. She'd brought a jar of home-made cookies, and some books Sean had asked her for. He said he'd have to study hard in order to not fall behind at school. I wonder what became of him. I've never thought about him since."

"You know, even if you say that it was a long time ago, you seem to remember a great deal of detail about it."

"My dad picked me up later in the afternoon. He took me home, and that was it."

"What about your mother? Did you get to see her before you left with your dad?"

"Yeah." Suddenly, he sounded timid.

"What was it like?"

"I don't know."

"You don't want to talk about it?"

"Not really." He sighed, glancing at the snoring man in the bed next to his. The patient closest to the door was reading the newspapers, oblivious to sick visits as long as they didn't concern him. "I think I might have thrown a tantrum or something. I really couldn't understand why they wouldn't let me see her. Eventually, one of her doctors took me to her room. She had all those IV-lines in her arm so she couldn't really move? She tried to get up the moment she'd seen me, and the whole stuff got tangled and it hurt her. She started crying. I ran up to her and threw myself onto her bed. The doctor tried to pull me away, but she'd clung to me. She wouldn't let go, and she was crying so hard the whole bed was shaking. She wouldn't stop kissing my face. It felt so weird, with tears running down her cheeks and all? She smelled funny too, like they'd washed her down with some sort of sanitizer. It was gross."

"It scared you."

"Yes. Fuck yes! I mean, I was eight years old, practically a baby. What do you expect?"

"Did you know what was wrong with her?"

"'course not. I just told you I was a mindless baby back then."

"But you grew older. You got smarter. You've learned from experience, and I think that, looking back on it, you knew what was happening."

Robert turned his face away from Paul. "I don't know what you're getting at."

"You told me she collapsed in the bathroom. There must be a reason why. You can't have let this wash over you like an accidental occurrence, coming out of the blue."

"Maybe it was," Robert said, stubbornly. "Maybe she just fainted because… because her blood sugar was low. I get those dizzy spells myself sometimes when I don't eat properly. It's nothing to worry about."

"Okay." Paul decided to give it a rest for the time being. There would be plenty of time to deepen the subject, in a more appropriate time and place.

For a while, he kept silent, watching Robert staring out of the window. It was a cold December day, with the mist of the near-by ocean creeping up into town, making everything look softer and blurred around the edges.

Finally, Robert turned around and looked at him. "Russell told my dad about the accident."

"Mh-hm. So he told me."

"He shouldn't have. It's nothing serious. I'm fine. Don't you think?"

"According to your doctors, you could have died. I think this is no small matter, Robert."

"God, you sound like my dad." Robert slumped back into the cushions. "I didn't try to kill myself. How many times do I have to tell you until you believe me?"

"Does your dad believe you're trying to kill yourself?"

"Of course not! He just thinks I'm doing crazy stuff to annoy him."

"Is that what you want, annoying your father?"

Robert drew his knees up and pressed his forehead against the insides of his wrists. "I just want you to shut up, is all."

Another stretch of silence passed before Paul spoke again, deliberately changing the subject. "June told me you've lost your cap."

"It's no big deal. My mum gave it to me for my birthday last year." He glanced at Paul. "I'm sure I've left it at the cinema. That's why I was cycling back into town, to look for it there. They took me to a movie, Russell and June."

"Did you like it?"

"It was silly. It was about a guy who got sucked into a board game. He ended up stuck in it, and it took two orphaned kids to get the game going. He needs to finish the game in order to get out of there, and when he wins, there's some sudden magical time lapse back into his past before he started playing the game, and he's this awkward kid again. I don't know why; maybe because he needed to make up with his dad or something. He'd also got the chance to prevent the orphan's parents from being killed in a car accident. And they lived happily ever after." He shrugged. "Kid's stuff, really."

"You know, sometimes in therapy, people tell me that if they could they would turn back the clock. Quite a lot of them, actually."

"I wouldn't," Robert said.

"I don't know about you, but after my mum died, I felt like there were a lot of things left unsaid. We never really talked, not in a way it would have mattered, anyway. I sometimes wish I had tried while she was still there."

Robert hugged his shins, pressing his cheek against his knee caps, and turned to face the skyline outside the windows again.

Paul cleared his throat. "Listen; there is something I wanted to talk to you about. I was thinking about some refurnishing while Kate's away, but I haven't gotten to do anything so far. Kate is using the guestroom as a studio or a study or both in turns, I'm not entirely sure. The point is the house has space enough to arrange a study for her and a guestroom separately. There's an empty room upstairs that I'm sure would make a great spot to give her a place for retreat. It needs some fixing, though."

Robert turned around and looked at him. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Well, Russell mentioned how much you enjoyed re-decorating their daughter's room into a guestroom. I was wondering if you would like to help me out."

Robert sat up, clearly intrigued. "You mean I could work over at your house?"

"Sure," Paul smiled, "If you want to."

Robert seemed eager at the idea, but reason got the better of him. "I'll have to check with the Turners first. Russell expects me to be at the lectures I guess."

"I already spoke to him about this. He thinks it's a good idea. He even suggested you'd stay over at my place for a while. That way it will be easier for you. You won't have to take the bus to cross half of town to get there and back again."

Robert seemed thrilled. His eyes were gleaming with delight. Then, he suddenly frowned, indicating at his taped hand. "I won't be of much use with two broken fingers."

"Oh, don't worry about that. We'll figure something out. I'm there most of the time, and you can call for help if you need it."

"You're sure it won't be a problem?"

"I wouldn't have asked you if I thought it was."

"Awesome." Robert's smile broadened. "Heck, I would love to-… I mean, if it's okay for you, I'm all in."

"On one condition."

"What?"

"You're working for me, and I won't be paying you. Instead, I want you to see me at my office for one hour each day, at a regular time, as a regular patient. Is that acceptable?"

Robert squinted at him. "What does it mean, 'a regular patient'?"

"It means we're going to schedule daily sessions for as long as you stay at my place. You'll be there on time, and you won't walk out on me whenever you feel like it."

Robert considered Paul's words for a moment. Then, he said: "So you're offering me to work for you, and in return I'll have you let work on me. It hardly sounds fair."

Paul chuckled at his binary logic. "We both might get something out of it, eventually."

"I can stay at your place for as long as I want?"

"You can stay as long as your dad allows you to."

Robert made a face. "Does he have to know?"

"I think he should. I think you should call and talk to him."

"Russell already made a call."

"He might want to hear it from you. I know I would if you were my son."

Robert glanced at the phone on the nightstand, and sighed.

"You don't have to call him now. Take your time, and write down what you want to say to him. It'll make it easier," Paul suggested.

"I don't even know what time it is back in Oz." He watched as Paul got up from his chair. "Can't you take me with you right now? I feel fine. I could take a look at your room, make some drafts. I promise I won't overdo it."

"I'll pick you up as soon as your doctors give the green light, okay? Until then, I want you to stay in bed and take very good care of yourself. Do we have a deal?"

"Deal," Robert said, albeit reluctantly. "Promise you won't be long."

"I promise."

Robert flopped back into the bed and sighed. "Yeah, whatever." He pulled the blanket over his head, and turned the other way.

The patient in the bed next to him gave Paul a sympathetic look. "Kids these days."

a/n: just a short chapter this time. The movie Chase was watching with the Turners is, as you probably have guessed, Jumanji. It was out around Christmas in the US in 1995, and I've seen it some time later over here but have to confess that I hardly remember anything, let alone the plot. Actually I've seen quite a number of movies with Robin Williams when I was a teenager, and I was very upset about his passing. I hope he's happy now where he is.

There was a guest review for the last chapter that, for whatever reason, won't show up. I hope it does, eventually. Thank you guest for reviewing. I'm glad you're enjoying the story, and yay for letting me know.