Friday 19 June 7:43 am Ward 407 University College Hospital

Tommy

He slowly became aware of noises. The doctors were talking about the football scores and the sexy, young theatre nurse that had just started. He could not control his body. He felt oddly detached as if he had no substance and was simply hovering. Have I died? He doubted it or the mood of the doctors would be more sombre. At least he hoped that they would extend more courtesy. He suddenly had the sensation of dizzying movement. Lights seemed to strobe above his closed eyes. They were wheeling him somewhere.

Over the incessant beeping of the damned monitor beside his left ear he could hear his mother fussing and Peter trying to calm her. I must be back in a ward. More machines added to odd syncopation to his left and on his right he could now hear the low suck of a machine pulling in air. As the machine whined he felt pressure in his neck and chest. A ventilator! It was not a good sign if he could not breathe by himself. Someone lifted his left arm gently and seemed to hang it on a hook. Then they did the same to his right. Whoever was putting him into these unnatural positions lifted his leg too. He could only imagine what he must look like. Images of the Christmas turkey hanging in the woodshed came to mind.

"Oh Tommy!" he heard his mother cry, "you'll recover son. It will be fine. You've made it through the operation."

"He can't hear you Mother. There's no point."

Peter! Yes, there is. I can hear you. Tell me what's going on."

"You don't know that" Barbara! Oh Barbara, thank goodness. "They've operated Sir, on your throat, ankle and hands. They want to keep you knocked out for a few days. Peter and your mother are here. One of us will stay with you until you're better."

"One of the family will," Peter corrected her, "Judith will be down from Yorkshire in the morning. We don't need you hanging around Sergeant Havers."

No Peter! Don't go Barbara. Stay with me please. Send them away.

"I have to go now Sir but I will be back. Stay strong and get better." He heard shuffling footsteps. BARBARA!

Peter

When he saw his brother Peter was hit with the realisation that he might actually die. Their relationship had never been close, not since Tommy had abandoned him when their father had passed away. What a ridiculously innocuous term to describe the most painful event in my life. My father didn't pass away – he died alone, in agony while Tommy sulked and Mother could not face him. I was only seven you selfish bastard! Tommy barely spoke to him or his mother for the next seventeen years. He had sent Christmas and birthday cards and guilt money but he had never loved him the way Peter had needed his brother to care.

Everything seemed so easy for Tommy. Successful at Eton, honours at Oxford, a life of community service while he had struggled. Academically he was brighter than his older brother but he had never fitted in to the rigours of life at Eton. All minor brothers are tormented but Peter had been shy and sensitive and it had hurt him deeply. His mother had said it as boys being boys and the one time he had told Tommy his smug brother had dismissed it as adolescent nonsense and told him to toughen up. He blamed his brother for his heroin habit and he doubted he would ever forgive him. You drove me away and onto drugs!

In his mind it would be justified to hate Tommy. Except he did not hate him; he still craved his acceptance. Nothing Peter did, even quitting his habit, was ever good enough for his brother. The irony was that if Tommy died he would become earl. He did not want that any more than he really wanted his brother to die. Beneath all the pain he just wanted what he had always wanted – for his brother to love him.

Peter had seen the look on Barbara's face. She adored his brother, worshipped him like a god. He resented her for that because he knew his brother had abused her friendship over the years and yet she could forgive him in a way Peter could not. He knew his brother depended on her. When he had first met her he had seen it even if they had not. He wondered why his brother would marry Helen when it was his shy and uncouth colleague who made his face light up. Typical Tommy; blind to the obvious and always trying to do the right thing regardless of the consequences. Well now I have the power. I can stop you having her Tommy. I can make you suffer the isolation and loneliness I've felt all these years.

"One of the family will," he snapped at her, "Judith will be down from Yorkshire in the morning. We don't need you hanging around Sergeant Havers."

Kathy, the nurse

In all her eighteen years as a critical care nurse she thought she had seen every reaction possible but this was new. The patient was likely to die. It was a shame; he was a good looking man but on balance he would probably succumb to an infection or pneumonia and be dead within the week. It was hard but she viewed her role as making her patients as comfortable as possible in their last days. Most families clung together and mourned but this family was on the brink of self-destruction.

She liked the girlfriend. She was genuinely worried about her man. Kathy had watched her sitting at the window pondering a life without him. That look always broke her heart but this time it seemed even sadder knowing that his family did not approve of their relationship. His brother was self-righteous and obviously resented his brother. His mother seemed wracked with guilt for long-past sins. Even his girlfriend seemed burdened by the weight of untold secrets.

Kathy watched the drama unfold around her, the players ignoring her presence. The patient's blood pressure was elevated but she knew he had recognised his friend because he had calmed almost instantly. She would be good for his recovery. So when the polite argument had erupted and the girlfriend, Barbara, left the ward Kathy vowed to help her. She followed her from the room and called her. "Wait! Come back tonight around eight when I come back on shift. I'll make sure you can see him."

Barbara

She was not prepared for the sight of Tommy when he was returned to the ward. He was clearly unconscious and the nurses swarmed around him connecting him to monitors and elevating his damaged limbs so that they would drain more easily. He had a hard, green plastic fitting in his throat below the line of neat stitches that pulled the long cut together. They connected a flexible hose and forcibly pumped air into his lungs.

Peter had his arms around his mother. She was trying to tell the nurses to make him comfortable but very little of any sense came out. Peter helped her to the chair by Tommy's bed. Finally his mother spoke "Oh Tommy!" You'll recover son. It will be fine. You've made it through the operation."

"He can't hear you Mother. There's no point." Peter was harsh and unnecessarily cruel to his mother and his brother. Barbara wanted to yell at him but instead spoke to Tommy. She had read that a lot of people in comas can hear what is going on so if he could she wanted him to know she had been there and let him know what was happening to him. Peter was quick to tell her she was not wanted. Barbara looked at the bitterness on his face and the helplessness of his mother. She did not want to leave Tommy but she knew she was not wanted, at least by his family. Tommy would not want her to upset them.

"I have to go now Sir but I will be back. Stay strong and get better." There was no part of him she could touch to reassure him. She simply smiled grimly at Lady Asherton, nodded to Peter and left the ward. She was leaving now but if Peter thought she would just walk out on his brother at a time like this he had underestimated her.

Barbara felt numb as she left the ward hoping it would not be the last time she would ever see her partner. After ten years working together almost every day this was not the ending she had ever expected. He's only forty-two! He's too young to die.

"Wait!" She turned to see one of the nurses rushing towards her. Barbara's heart sank. "Come back tonight around eight when I come back on shift. I'll make sure you can see him." Barbara exhaled a long breath that she had not realised she was holding. She had feared the worst. She smiled at the nurse and nodded then hurried through the hospital and out to the cab rank. The cabbie eyed her suspiciously as she climbed in the back. "It's not my blood," she said calmly, "and it's dry."

Dawn was breaking over the city in streaky lines of auburn and gold. On any other day it would be a beautiful morning but today she was too tired and too distressed to care. She gave the cabbie a small tip, grateful for his silence, and rushed inside her tiny flat. She wanted a shower but she could not bear to wash his blood from her skin. It was the only part of him she could hold close. She collapsed on her bed hoping sleep would come quickly but when she closed her eyes all she could see was Tommy hooked up to monitors. She tried to find the memory of the way he had looked at her in the forest but it was lost. Tears welled in her eyes. She tried not cry but then a long wail escaped from within and she began to sob uncontrollably into her pillow.