Part One Hundred And Nineteen
George hardly slept on the Monday night, slipping in and out of consciousness, drifting in and out of dreams that only served to frighten her further. What on earth was she doing here, she half wondered to herself? What had brought her to this? This hospital, this invading influence they called cancer? Her thoughts inevitably strayed to her father and to Charlie, knowing that neither of them knew yet. How would Daddy react to such a piece of news? She simply didn't know. She was all Daddy had left, and she knew enough to be aware that finding out that his only daughter had cancer would terrify him. She tried to keep her mind away from John, because she knew that she had been right not to tell him before the operation, but that didn't stop her wanting and needing his comforting arms and words of reassurance. What she wouldn't give to be held in his strong embrace right now wasn't worth contemplating. But John was far away, cloistered somewhere in Warwick University, entirely unaware of anything that was going on back home.
At around eight on the Tuesday morning, George phoned Jo, wanting to speak to her one last time before the operation. This was just one of the advantages of private medicine, she thought to herself as she waited for Jo to answer, having a phone in one's room. "It's George," She said when Jo answered. "How did you sleep?" Jo asked, knowing how much hospital often didn't allow for such a luxury. "Not brilliantly," George said with a yawn. "I had a drink with Karen last night," Jo told her. "We were both agonising over whether or not we should tell John." "As he's not here, I'll assume you didn't," George said ruefully. "Much as we both might disagree with you," Jo said seriously. "That particular bombshell is your decision, and you are well within your rights to make the wrong one." "I wanted him here all day yesterday," George admitted miserably. "But I still think leaving it until there's no going back is the right thing to do." "I know," Jo said quietly, having felt George's need for John's presence, no matter how much she had pressed Jo into not telling him. "What time do you go under?" Jo asked, wanting to change the subject a little. "Twelve," George told her. "Though how long it'll take, I really have no idea." "I'll come and see you after court," Jo promised her. "You should be out by then." "I might not be all that with it though."
When George realised that Jo was about to say goodbye a little while later, she did something that she had been vaguely thinking about all night, but which she hadn't entirely decided to do. This might be her last chance, her brain was telling her, her very last chance to tell Jo how she really felt about her. "Jo, before you go," She said, taking the plunge off the dock into the treacherously swirling water. "There's, erm, something I want to say." "I'm listening," Jo replied, not having the faintest idea of what was coming. "Just in case I don't come out of this," George said a little hesitantly. "I wanted you to know that I love you." Jo sat there at the other end of the phone absolutely stunned. She was swamped with feelings of extreme happiness, violent worry and every other feeling in between. But then one feeling rose up in her above everything else, anger. "No," She said almost hoarsely. "No way, George, that isn't something I want to hear from you, because it sounds far too much like goodbye, and that isn't something I want to even contemplate." "And I know that if I hadn't said it," George said with total calm. "I would be sincerely regretting it along with everything else."
After she'd come off the phone to Jo, George took a very long shower, scrubbing every inch of her, till now, beautiful body. As she stood under the wonderfully hot spray, she didn't ever want to emerge. She was temporarily in limbo as the hot water ran down over her skin and through her hair, and staying right there seemed like the perfect solution to all her problems. But eventually realising that she would turn into a prune if she didn't switch off the shower, she got out, dried off, and stood in front of the full-length mirror on the outside of the wardrobe door in her room. This was the body she'd known for the last almost fifty years. She ran her hands over her waist and hips, feeling just how prominent the bones were, and how small her waist really was. She ran her hand over the flat plain of her abdomen, remembering how Charlie's growing existence had expanded it into the rounded globe of pregnancy. John had loved to rest his hand on her bump, feeling Charlie's tiny kicks, the light of pride for what they'd both created shining out of his eyes. Why did she have to fuck all that up quite so spectacularly, she thought to herself? Why couldn't she simply have been happy with making John happy, even though she herself had been dying inside? Giving herself a mental shake, she told herself that this was no time to be going back over too much of the past that she really couldn't alter. Then her attention turned to her small but still beautiful breasts. They weren't perfect by any means, but neither were anyone's after they'd breast fed a baby for several months, and when said person was approaching their fiftieth birthday. But they were still pretty, and relatively firm, with the darker skinned areolas rising to pert, pink nipples. John had always loved her nipples, the way he could make them harden so delightfully when he touched her, sucking them into diamond-cutting peaks being part of their usual lovemaking ritual. As she cupped a breast in each hand, she vividly remembered the time when Charlie was about two months old, and her breasts had become engorged and extremely sore from feeding her. George had tried expressing some milk, but she had been far too sore and frustrated for it to work. In his usual, innovative fashion, John had suggested suckling from her himself, and when he'd finally persuaded her that there was nothing wrong with it, she had groaned at the relief of pressure it had provided.
"Taking one last look?" Came Tricia's voice as she tentatively put her head round the door. "Yes, and living in far too many memories for my own good." "I've brought you a clean gown," Tricia said as she moved into the room, holding up yet another white, shapeless article of clothing for George to put on. "And I've come to give you your premed." "I think I'm going to need it," George said as she fastened the gown at the back and slid back into her freshly made bed, and thinking that the relaxing drug that Tricia was about to give her, might just prove to be her mind's salvation.
On the other side of London, Karen was sitting in her office, trying to get through the morning's e-mails, and not making much headway whatsoever. She was highly aware that the time of George's operation was fast approaching, and she couldn't help but think that she was doing John a grave injustice in not telling him where George was. But hadn't he done the same thing over her own son? Hadn't he kept knowledge of Ross's condition and location from her for months, until he was in fact dead? But that was no reason to do the same to him now. George had asked, no begged her not to tell John, which was the one and only reason why she was adhering to George's request. It wasn't her decision to make, and it wasn't for her to say what was the right thing to do in this situation because only George could know that for herself.
At ten o'clock that morning, Neil arrived for their monthly meeting, where he would inform her about any new policies coming her way from area, and she would talk to him about any problems with either prisoners or staff. They were usually very amicable meetings, both of them floating ideas to make the running of Larkhall prison as smooth as possible. But as he sat opposite her, drinking his coffee as they went through the monthly accounts, Neil could see that Karen's mind really wasn't on the job this morning. She kept glancing at the clock, staring off into space, and then desperately trying to pick up the conversation again. "Karen, what's happened?" He asked without any preamble, watching as her eyes clouded with darkness yet again. "Sorry," She said sheepishly. "I'm not really with it this morning, am I?" "No," Neil agreed with her. "Which really isn't like you. So, I'll ask again, what's happened?" "It's nothing to do with work," She told him evasively, but he wasn't to be so easily deflected. "I can see that," He said, glancing at the pile of papers they were going through. "Or you'd have brought it up the minute I arrived." "Neil, much as I would love to tell you, I can't," She said regretfully. "Because I've got no idea who else knows." "And keeping it all locked up in here," Neil said gently, gesturing to her forehead. "Obviously isn't doing you any good. So, start talking." Lighting a cigarette and taking a long drag, even though she knew that he hated her smoking in what used to be his office, she put the source of all her current worry and frustration into words. "It's George. She has breast cancer." The words seemed to hang in the air between them, stopping time, shocking them both into a temporary silence. Neil just stared at her, not entirely sure what to say. George had been so happy and vibrant when he'd sung with her last summer, and she'd been so supportive of Karen, even though they'd then broken up and all the way through Barbara's trial, she had been the epitome of inner strength. "How, erm, just how ill is she?" Neil eventually asked, feeling that he had to say something, even if it did come out in less than his usually articulate fashion. "Well, she's having surgery for it today," Karen told him. "But how much of her they'll have to take away, we just don't know." After another moment's pause, she added, "I feel so useless," In a half-strangled voice that told him she was barely managing to keep a lid on her emotions. "I went to the hospital with her last week, which was when they decided she needed surgery, and I'll be there for her any time she needs me, but how much difference does that really make?" "It makes all the difference in the world," Neil told her emphatically. "Having a friend that you can rely on, in whatever circumstances, is possibly the most precious thing anyone can have, and don't you forget it. George might have John, and Jo, but that isn't going to stop her needing you, and any number of people who are special to her in the coming months." Taking another long drag of her cigarette, Karen desperately tried to rein in her feelings, to force them once again beneath their marble headstone of restraint. After giving her a moment or two to compose herself, Neil asked, "Have you done your rounds of this place yet today?" "No," Karen said with a slight shrug. "I was going to do them when you'd gone." "Come on," He said, getting to his feet, and thinking that Karen desperately needed some form of a distraction. "I'll do them with you, if you've no objection?" "None at all," Karen said, giving him a slightly shaky smile, and thinking that where once she had despised this man, with all his ideas for privatisation and so-called modernisation of the most outdated service in the public sector, she now valued him not only as a trusted colleague, but a friend, a true, sincere friend who was prepared to do what he could to make her life that little bit easier.