Chapter 5
"Kevin." said Jim as he went to the garage.
"How you doing mate?" he asked, not as an employer, but as a friend and a fellow father.
How was he? He was hurting for his daughter and he had never been more deeply upset.
"Surviving." he said simply. It wasn't a lie, but he had nothing more optimistic to say in these dark days. "Kevin, I think I am going to have to put my notice in. I have to be there for Lizzy unconditionally right now and Katherine too."
"How is she bearing up, Katherine?" he asked solemnly.
"Hanging on," sighed the father who felt such grief at what she was going through, the medicine was working but slowly. It might take three or four weeks till she was well enough to return to the street with her mum and her dad.
"Good." said Kevin. "Well it'd be a shame to lose you, you're a good mechanic. I can hold the job if yuu like and just get cover till you think you can return." said Kevin. He would much rather do it than let him go completely. Workers like him didn't come along often.
Jim smiled. Yes he wanted that. "Could yer?"
"Course." he said to him.
"Thank you." he said simply.
"Your going through a rough patch and I am not one to kick a man when he's down on his luck.." Kevin stated.
"Well maybe it might just turn around for us soon." suggested Jim. Such an act of kindness from his boss had touched him when he had been so down.
"I hope so mate, your deserve a bit of it, as does your little 'un." he said, "Don't worry about coming back too soon. Just worry about getting that baby of yours well again."
Smiling gratefully Jim did as he said and went off home to get Liz so that they could head up the hospital.
How couldn't he want to get his little girl out of there? His life at the moment consisted of comforting his wife, visiting his daughter and trying and failing to keep up with both of his son's antics. It was so much easier with Andy cause he was at school but he never knew what Steven was up to because he had no energy left a lot of the time to find out.
Katherine in time got a lot more used to her father than any other member of her family, even her mother. Liz was still so tired from the birth as it felt to her she had had no time to recover from it and she was just so emotionally drained all of the time. Some times she was just in no fit state to see the little girl.
Jim though as much as he had wanted to at times had not yet lost control once since the baby had been born and he had kept his wild temper in check. This was no time to go off in a rage. He had to think of the others.
He had no other choice.
A week slowly passed since she had gone back in and Liz was sick of the glances as she went down the road. Sick of people asking how she was. Sick of people wondering if her child was going or live or die. She didn't want or need sympathy. Surely if she was going to she would have given up by now. Katherine wanted to live.
And as slowly as it was Katherine was improving, the drugs were working.
"She's doing better than we hoped and she is reacting well to the treatment," said the nurse. "If she keeps it up, only two more weeks till she can go home for good hopefully. though her progress will have to be monitored very carefully." she said.
"Why?" asked Liz as she sat with her child.
"Well it is a very rare thing for one so small as Katie to get meningitis and then not have side affects. Her hearing could be affected, or her sight. Possible her hand eye coordination skills. How ever many of these things an be dealt with and for the most part she should be able to lead a very normal life." she said hopefully.
"Good, after what she put up with in just these past seventeen days has been enough suffering for any baby. I've hated it." she said and then he realized she was talking as if they were out of the woods but she knew they were not yet.
"No, she shouldn't be as affected too much and I am sure she is going got be just fine. She has a very loving family round her too from what I have seen." she said.
Liz nodded. But did she really? Just before she had found out she had been pregnant she and her husband had been on the verge off separation. It hadn't always been as strong as it was right now, their marriage.
"For the most part." muttered the loving mother as she looked at her,
"How long till me and Jim can give her a cuddle?" she asked. She hadn't held her daughter in so long and it was beginning to really hurt her. She was worried the bond they'd built up when she had been home was going to break.
"Not too long at all now. I'd say maybe two days. Her progress is good. She is a damn good fighter. She has some inner strength in her." she said as the door to the intensive care unit opened to show the three men of Liz's family.
"Two days till we can hold her again." was the first thing she said to her husband and sons.
It was then Katie stirred.
"I swear that girl has radar for when we come to see her." said Andy as he went round the other side of the crib with his brother to their mum and dad.
"Hey sis," he said to her smiling as she looked up curiously at him.
Steve matched her curiosity of him with his own of her. As the one who had spent leas with hert, and there fore had bonded least with his sister was still nervous about the baby as if she was going to turn in to a monster at any minute, but she wasn't. She was just a baby.
"There doesn't even really look as if there is any thing wrong with her any more." he said pensively. It was true. On the outside she was looking much better than she had the day her father had saved her life.
"I know, maybe she's just faking." teased Andy at his brothers remark who let out a small sigh… he wished she was. Then they could take her home.
He may not be easy around her, but Steve did love his sister and it was as hard on him as the other three members of the family to have her in that incubator.
There was some thing in her eyes as she looked at him, and it made him feel warm, tenderness for her. Love…
At long last, Katherine just as the nurses and doctors had predicted, was home.
Looking round the setting she had been taken so mercilessly, she was enjoying the new colors, where the hospital had been so dull.
Liz felt as if she could breath again or now at least. Things were going to be ok.
"Kevin said I can still take all the time I need, so its up to you when I go back." said Jim as he came out of the kitchen with a cup if tea for both he and his wife.
"Good, because I don't think I like the idea of being left alone with her. Not just yet." she admitted. "Do you think -" she said before breaking off in a sigh.
"What?" he asked as she put her head on his shoulder.
"Well that her being ill was my fault. maybe I did some thing wrong. " she sighed. She didn't see how her daughter could of got it. All she had down was put her down for five minutes. She wasn't cold. She had been wrapped in her blanket, Liz had made sure. She had changed her and she had feed that morning. Not too well, but babies had off mornings didn't they? She hadn't thought a lot of it, though thinking back she had been a bit floppy, even Steve had said it that morning. Liz had thought she was just tired and needed sleep.
"No!" said Jim. "You heard whatthe doctors said. It could have been any where she had got it. But it was not your fault. You could not have neither prevented, nor brought this on. Just one of those things that happen," he shrugged.
"I know, but -"
"No. No buts. Relax Liz. The five off us are going to be fine now." Jim said to her and she nodded. She was going to be ok.
At ten, for they had got home early, so they could just settle, Liz realized they were out of milk.
"I'm just going to pop down to the shop." she said as she picked up her daughter, whilst speaking to Jim. "I'm going to take the little one with me." she said releasing she was going to be ok to take her out by herself, it was just staying home alone with her daughter she was nervous about.
"Ok love." he shouted down the stairs to her and Liz went out.
Getting in to the Kabin shop Liz was glad to see all her friends were there as she thought they would be, as usual gossiping.
Rita, Emily, Deirdre, Bet and Blanche all turned we when they heard the door open just to see who it as and broke in to smiles as they saw the infant and her mother.
"You never said she was coming home today!" said Rita.
"Yeah well I think we wanted it to be quiet till wee settled, but I couldn't resist bringing her down to met all her new aunties " she said to the girls.
"Aww, so she's ok now?" asked Rita.
"Yup, we're in the clear." she said as she cradled her baby tightly. She had been waiting for the day when she had been able to say that for so long. Now it had come she was not sure she was quite able to believe it.
"Jim must be ecstatic," commented Bet,
"Oh he is. We all are. The twins couldn't believe it when we brought her in this morning. We hadn't even told them she was coming home so I think it was a nice surprise for them both. Andy wanted to take the day off." she said as she got the bottle of milk she had needed for her tea.
"I'm so pleased for you. For all of you." said Deirdre.
"Not as pleased as we are." she said. "I'm so cuffed." she said as she looked on her daughters face. How could she have ever thought about abortion some thing so precious? The nurse when she had had the twins had been right. Nature's way of giving you nine months to grow to love the child really did work.
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"Come on Elizabeth. Come to bed." said Jim as he got in to his side of the bed and waited for her to join him. Liz who had just settled their youngest in to the crib at the end of the bed. She didn't feel comfortable leaving her there. What if something happen and she didn't hear. No, she wasn't going to sleep if the girl was on her own
Jim watched as his wife smoothly re-lifted there daughter and placed her in the middle of there own bed gently.
"I can't stand the thought off her being in the crib, not to night." she said as she laid down next to her child and husband sleepily.
Jim smiled. He had been feeling just the same, but he had tried to hid it cause he was a man and every thing, but maybe he was more weak because he had been unable to speak out.
"I think that is a very good idea." he said as he leant over there daughter who was sleeping to kiss his wife before kissing his little girl.
"Night, night lass," he said and the turning off the bedside lamp the three of them feel in to deep sleeps reassured by the other two presence.
Days pasted and every thing went as smooth as had been hoped when Katie had left the hospital for the second time. The days turned to weeks, and then to months and soon Katie was hitting the three months stage.
By this time she had changed a lot since when she had been born.
She was a healthy little girl with rosy cheeks, and bright blue eyes. Having taken on a lot more of her fathers coloring than her mothers, which had been the opposite to her elder brothers, she had dark hair, which was just beginning to go curly at the end like her mums. Of course her parents thought she was the most beautiful child ever born as all mums and dads did.
The twins begun to get better with her as the days passed, and sharing there mum and dad wasn't so bad. It meant they had more time to sneak around and not get caught as they so would have been before they had had a sister.
Life had changed a lot for all the members of the house hold, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing.
In spirit and personality, Katie was a pretty well behaved baby who just liked to look round a lot and take every thing in as much as she could. The world was a big and new exciting place. It was rare she cried unless she was on her own for a long amount off time but that not often if ever at all happened.
Liz had gotten used to not going to work quickly, and it had been a month after that Katie had been let out that she finally got her confidence up enough to let her husband return to work. But all in all, after that first month things were starting to look up.