Miss Webster and Chérif Read Free

close-ups and much repetition. The doctors touched her wrist, her forehead. The nurses issued endearments and instructions.
    ‘I’m just going to take a little bit of blood, dear.’
    ‘Can you hear me, dear? If you can, move your eyes to the left. Ooh yes. Aren’t you the clever one? Now to the right.’ A pencil torch shone directly into her shrinking pupils.
    ‘Left again.’
    She closed her eyes. Someone patted her hand. She felt belittled, patronised. She began to worry about her house. Who would water her plants? Thank God the cat was dead. It had been dead for years. She groaned slightly. The patronising voice was immediately present, as if she had set off a recorded message.
    ‘Are you in pain, dear? Squeeze my hand if you are.’
    Elizabeth Webster opened both eyes and glared at the blue mass topped with a blurred white label. Staff Nurse Something or Other. Piss off, she snarled. But all that came out was a burr, burr, burr, deep in her chest.
    Another voice said, ‘I’ll arrange for the brain scan to be brought forward.’
    Elizabeth Webster heard someone chanting.
    This man hath penance done
    And penance more will do .
    Then the boat drifted out of reach on to an immense shelf of darkness.
     
     
    She lay beached on a coral shelf. A huge machine purred all around her, the note changed to a gentle hum, the lights scorched her eyeballs. She saw the reflection of red – red sky, red dunes, red sand. She had crash-landed in a desert. There were no other passengers.
    ‘Is there anyone we can ring, dear? To let them know where you are.’
    ‘Do you have any family?’
    They always ask the same fucking questions. Où est votre mari? Où sont vos enfants ? As if you couldn’t conduct your life without assistance from either one or the other. A small fast car, driven by a youth convinced of his immortality, had smashed into her on a hill in Normandy. They were all scraped up by the pompiers , who had asked exactly the same questions, over and over again. Où habitez-vous? Où est votre mari? Où sont vos enfants? She was always in the dock, always being cross-examined.
    But I ask the questions. I have the right to ask the questions.
    I’m not timid.
    I’m not scared.
    They see a little old lady, bird bones collapsed together in a fragile heap. I’m inside. I have a voice.
    But she didn’t. Burr, burr, burr.
    Do you have any family, dear? Où est votre mari ? Où sont vos enfants ?
    She heard the slow lap of water. The keel shuddered and rose into the air. She was sailing back from X-ray.
     
     
    Repeat after me: I am not helpless. I am not a victim. I am an old woman. But I am still here.
    ‘Move your eyes if you can hear me.’
    She glanced slightly to the left. Turn to the right. There was something horrible between her legs. Oh God, they have inserted a catheter. Elizabeth Webster suffered from a horror of incontinence. A second childhood of nappies and leaking urine yawned before her. She tried to wriggle free, but this was interpreted as distress. The staff nurse materialised, armed with a disposable syringe, determined to suppress the violent thrashing. Elizabeth shuddered as the needle went in.
    ‘The blood tests are back. The scans are clear. She hasn’t had a heart attack. She hasn’t had a stroke. I don’t quite understand it.’
    The pilot’s boy
    Who now doth crazy go .
    Smells became clearer. Detergent. Bleach. Urine. Overcooked vegetables. Burnt custard. Spilt orange juice. Washing powder. Furniture polish. Her sight remained compromised. Colours were indistinct. White and cream blurred into a glowing mass as if an apparition had heaved itself into her range of perception. She could not see. She could not speak. But she could still smell the odours of the hospital, some rank, some comforting. And when she was conscious, she could hear everything.
    ‘Poor old thing. Has she had a stroke?’
    ‘Better to let them go when they get like that.’
    Elizabeth Webster longed to rise up from