Page 33

CHAPTER 33

HEL

“F or fucks sake,” Hel swore as she walked out of the emergency department to the ambulance bay.

Barney stood behind his ambulance with the doors held closed as it rocked from side to side.

“Sorry, Hel. He was unconscious when we picked him up. He’s got a gaping hole in his scalp. He’s going to need surgery on it for sure. God knows what other injuries he has as we didn’t have much time to examine him as he woke up with a bang when we gave him naloxone.” Barney leaned harder against the door to keep it closed.

“The police are two minutes out. Can you hold the door until they arrive?” she requested.

Not waiting for an answer, she turned and dashed back into the emergency department, grabbing some ketamine out of the cupboard—whose beauty as a drug was the ability to give an intramuscular shot of it, then wait two minutes for the patient to go to sleep. It wasn’t quite as easy as the movies made out, where people dropped in five seconds, but it usually worked pretty well.

For a moment, Hel’s mind flickered back to when it had been Frost in the back of the ambulance. She tried not to think of him too often, but he was never far away in her mind, despite the fact it was a month since he left.

She had picked up her phone a million times to text him. When something funny happened in her day, she wanted to tell him. When her sister Maggie said something outrageously out of touch for someone who grew up in a poor family, she thought of how much Frost would have laughed.

Every time she had the desire, she switched her phone off to stop herself. He wasn’t coming back, so there was no point in prolonging the agony.

Clara and Taylor’s wedding had been amazing, and she was so grateful her friend invited Frost, as it really had been a perfect day.

The problem was, as she feared would happen, she gave up a piece of her heart to him, and he took it with him when he left.

Hel sighed and drew up the drug into a syringe before she headed back into the fray.

“How’s our angry guest?” Hel called to Barney, who was still leaning against the door of his ambulance.

“Well. He called me a name that begins with a C and ends in a T. Then he told me he was going to do something to my mother that made me want to throw up. And I’m a little afraid he may have urinated on the floor of my ambulance as something that doesn’t smell the best is trickling out of the back door.” Barney glared down at the pool of liquid by his feet.

“Fabulous.” Hel pulled gloves over her hands, grinning at the police when they parked in the ambulance bay next to them.

She was relieved when they climbed out of the car to see they had sent the man mountains to help them. One was nearly the same size as Frost. Dammit, there she went again, thinking of him. She shook her head to clear it and greeted the officers.

“Hi, guys. We’ve got one very unhappy patient in the back. When we open the door, we’re going to need to sedate him to assess his injuries.”

Barney added, “He’s got a significant head injury and is bleeding on the floor of my ambulance.”

Hel rolled her eyes. Barney loved being dramatic.

“And probably the walls and ceiling too,” Barney finished.

The young officers glanced at each other, and one paled significantly. Great, Hel thought, just what she needed, a man mountain who was squeamish.

“Gents. The plan is: I’m going in via the cab, and you two come in the back doors. If you can hold him for thirty seconds, I should be able to jab him with the sedation. Then we can retreat until he settles down,” Hel explained to the officers, who both nodded in agreement.

She waited until she heard two knocks on the ambulance and rushed into it through the front door.

The officers managed to grab hold of the patient. A skinny, unkempt-looking man who didn’t seem very happy to have two policemen holding onto him and, despite the size difference, was doing an epic job of shaking them off.

Hel lunged forward and grabbed onto his upper arm, jabbing the needle of the syringe through his clothes, into his deltoid muscle and depressing the plunger.

Pulling the syringe out, she went to reverse out the way she entered. However, she wasn’t quick enough, and the patient’s arm, which was slippery with blood, wrenched out of the officer’s grip, and his elbow connected firmly with her eye socket.

“Fuck,” Hel hollered, unable to help herself as stars exploded in front of her vision.

Despite the shock and pain, she carried on reversing, getting herself out of the front door of the ambulance.

“You okay, Hel?” Barney shouted from the back, where she heard the doors slamming.

“Yeah.” She walked back to the men, who were holding the doors closed as the patient yelled incoherently. “He got me in the eye. It was a bit of a shock.”

And Frost wasn’t there to throw him to the floor, unlike the last patient who managed to hit her. She shushed her brain that only wanted to think of Frost.

“Sorry, Doc.” The young officer who let go of the arm that caught Hel apologised.

“It’s not your fault. Hazard of the job.” Hel shrugged, pleased to note the noise from the back of the ambulance was getting quieter. It wouldn’t be long before they could safely scoop him up and head inside to assess him.

After another thirty seconds, she nodded to Barney, who opened the back door. The patient was still conscious, but he was now sitting on the stretcher, blinking with a bewildered look on his face.

“Fuck,” Barney swore loudly when he observed the state of his ambulance.

Hel agreed. It looked like a battle zone. There was blood everywhere. It was on the wall, the floor, the ceiling, and all over the patient.

“Shall we get him out?” Hel enquired, as the ambos, apart from swearing, seemed to be struck dumb at the state of their rig.

“Yeah,” Barney agreed.

Hel heard a retching sound and looked over her shoulder to see one of the young police officers dry heaving and the other rolling his eyes in annoyance.

“I think we’ve got it from here,” Hel said dryly.

The two paramedics made short work of getting the patient strapped to their gurney and out the back door.

When they walked into the Emergency department one of the other consultants was passing and drew to an immediate halt when he saw Hel.

“Hel. What happened?” he asked, his voice full of concern.

She lifted her hand to her bruised cheek and pointed to the patient on the gurney they were wheeling straight to resus.

“Shit. You can’t keep seeing patients. You’re leaving soon anyway, I’ll take this one. You go sort yourself out.”

“Thanks,” Hel nodded gratefully. The pain in her eye was now throbbing in time with her heartbeat, which couldn’t be good.

“Walk and talk. Hand me over the rest of your patients, and get out of here,” the other doctor requested.

Hel accompanied him along the corridor, giving him a rundown of the department and the patients she was supervising for the juniors.

Once she finished talking, she made her way to the computer desk and finished up a couple of things before heading to fetch her bag.

When she pulled her phone out of her bag, she panicked when she saw twenty missed calls from her parents. Her eye was forgotten, and she called them back. Something must be seriously wrong.

“Hello, sweetie,” Hel’s mum answered the phone on the first ring.

“Mum, what’s wrong?” Hel asked frantically.

“Nothing’s wrong. We had a strange phone call.”

“About what.” Hel’s shoulders sagged. She had been so convinced something awful had happened.

“It was from the spinal surgeon’s office, asking us if we’d like to schedule the surgery for Friday.”

Hel pulled the phone away from her ear and blinked at it a couple of times, unsure if she heard correctly.

Putting it back to her ear, she said, “Say that again.”

“They said they had a cancellation Friday, and would we like to take it.” Hel’s mum’s voice trembled slightly.

“What did you say?” Hel knew this had to be an error. She still hadn’t managed to collect the full amount to cover all the costs of the surgery.

“We said yes, but that you would phone them as you were arranging payment.”

“I haven’t paid.” Hel’s voice broke as she admitted that to her mum.

She would love for her dad to have his operation Friday and begin recovering, but she didn’t yet have enough to pay.

“Oh.”

Hel cringed at the sheer disappointment in her mum’s voice. “Sorry, mum.”

“It’s okay, sweetie. We appreciate everything you do for us. I know you’re working so hard to pay for this, and we are so grateful.”

“Give me a few minutes, I’ll phone them now and straighten it out.”

“Talk to you soon, sweetie. Love you.”

“Love you, mum.” Hel hung up and stared at the phone. What a crushing thing to happen to her dad, they must have made an admin error and rung the wrong patient.

She dialled the number for the surgeon’s private rooms.

“Good afternoon, Dr Delacort’s rooms.”

“Hi. My name’s Ethel Rayleigh,” Hel cringed as she used her full name. “My dad, Phillip Rayleigh, just received a phone call about scheduling surgery.”

“Indeed, Ethel.” The receptionist said her name slowly, as if even she couldn’t believe someone could be called Ethel.

Hel decided to interject, “I go by Hel.”

“Oh, that’s much better,” the woman on the end of the phone said. “I am so sorry, that slipped out.”

“It’s okay,” Hel laughed. “It’s a terrible name.”

The other woman clearly decided to gloss over her faux pas and was back to business. “Yes, we have a cancellation on Friday, and as your dad’s account has been paid in full, we wanted to schedule him as soon as possible.”

“I’m really sorry, you must have made a mistake somewhere. I’m paying for my dad’s surgery, and I don’t have the money yet,” Hel sighed deeply. She wished she did, but she was still twenty grand short.

“Oh. Let me check his file. Do you mind holding?”

“That’s fine.” Hel slumped onto a seat in the break room and dropped her head into her hands, then winced when she touched her sore eye. Shit, she would need it X-rayed to make sure she didn’t have an orbital floor fracture.

She leaned her head onto the seat and stared up at the flickering fluorescent lights on the ceiling, becoming so hypnotised by their rhythmic fluctuations in light intensity that she jumped when the receptionist spoke in her ear.

“I have your dad’s file here. There’s been no mistake. All costs associated with your father’s surgery. Surgeon, surgical assistant, anaesthetist and hospital bills have been prepaid in full.”

Hel sighed. “I’m sorry, you must be mistaken. I’m the one paying for the surgery, and I haven’t paid.”

“The gentleman who phoned to pay left a note on the file.”

“Right,” Hel said deliberately.

“He said. When Hel phones, tell her, I’m not taking it back. ”

“Who was it?” Hel whispered, already knowing the answer.

“The name on the credit card was Jake Forster.”

Hel sagged in her seat and tried to blink back the tears which collected in her eyes. Frost did this for her dad.

“Hel?” The receptionist enquired when she didn’t answer. “Does that make sense to you? We’ve applied the payment to the correct file.”

She tried so hard not to cry, it hurt to cry with her throbbing eye, but the tears kept coming.

She managed to mutter, “Yes. It makes sense. My dad will see you Friday.”

“That’s fantastic. Glad we could clear it up.”

Hel hung up the phone and stared at it. She pulled up her text message thread with Frost, and her finger hovered over it. She didn’t know what to say. What could she say to a man who left the country—taking a piece of her heart with him—who had just given her the best gift anyone ever could.

Finally, she texted him. ‘Thanks. My dad will be having surgery Friday. I’m so grateful for your generosity, I don’t have words to express how much this means to my family.’

Putting her phone on silent, she slipped it back into her handbag and headed to the front desk to check in so they could X-ray her eye.

“Darling. I do wonder if you should consider a change in career.” Gloria handed Hel a glass of champagne so she didn’t have to stand up from her position reclined on the sofa with ice on her bruising eye.

“Some days, I agree with you,” Hel sighed.

Sitting forward, she kept the ice on her eye and took a sip of the cold, crisp, bubbly liquid, which was ‘borrowed’ from Taylor.

Hel used to ask if the actor had given permission, but now she accepted Gloria was going to keep pinching her son’s wine and bring it over to drink and that Taylor didn’t actually mind even when he wasn’t asked.

Clara and Taylor were still away on a month-long honeymoon, and Gloria claimed she was too scared to stay in the big house alone, so she became Hel’s housemate. Something Hel enjoyed as Gloria was excellent company.

Hel stared silently at the ceiling for a few minutes until she blurted. “Frost paid for Dad’s surgery.”

“That’s fabulous news. Although you know Taylor would have paid.”

Hel glared at Gloria. They had argued a few times in the last month about the fact there was no way Hel would ask her son for money. Gloria told her his net worth, which was a figure that made Hel’s head spin, but even then she still insisted she wouldn’t be taking anything off him.

“Yes, yes, yes. Not his problem. Too proud to ask. Blah blah blah.” Gloria waved her hand airily. “You know my son would happily help out his wife’s friends. He knows you’re not after his money.”

Hel huffed. “I know. It just didn’t feel right.”

“How do you feel about Frost paying?” Gloria asked.

“I don’t know. I’m so grateful to him. But it feels wrong. He knew me for such a short amount of time. We never even dated.”

Gloria’s eyes were shrewd. “I’ve told you before, he had a look in his eyes I recognised from seeing Taylor look at Clara. He could have known you only a day, and he would have tried to give you the world.”

Hel couldn’t stop the tears that instantly spilled over at Gloria’s words. It had been a month since she had seen him, and she had hoped her feelings would fade as time passed, although it didn’t seem to have happened yet. She missed him every day and had a constant ache in her chest when she thought about him, which was far too often.

“He said, ‘when Hel phones, tell her, I’m not taking it back’.” Hel managed to laugh at his message despite the tears, as her first instinct had been to give it back. “And he texted me this, when I thanked him.” She showed Gloria her phone screen, his message only had three words, ‘ You’re very welcome .’

“Oh, darling.” Gloria put her arm around Hel’s shoulder, giving her a hug. “I’m sorry it didn’t work out.”

“Me too.”