The Sight
By
Nick B

 © Nick B 2008

Most outstandingly proofed, edited and opinionated twice by Gabi

Darryl finally gets to go home . . .

Chapter 6

Darryl waited patiently for Paul, who was due to pick him up from the hospital later that day. It felt nice to be going, even though he’d only had the misfortune of spending three days in the hospital, but he really felt was long enough to come to the conclusion that he really didn’t like it there.

Of course it wasn’t his home he’d be going to, it was Doris and Paul’s and he had misgivings about that too–well, his misgivings were about Doris actually. She was a large woman, or more pointedly, tall; standing five feet eleven inches in her bare feet, with the build of an Amazon princess. This intimidated Darryl.

It wasn’t just her height; it was her whole bearing. She was strong-willed, opinionated, called a spade a spade and although he liked her, he got the distinct impression that she wasn’t overly fond of him. Despite Paul’s assurances to the contrary, he couldn’t just ‘not worry about it’.

Of course, for a sixteen-year old lad, the idea of a woman being stronger as well as several inches taller than him was disconcerting. The fact that she was also a good inch or so taller and probably stronger than Paul, was neither here nor there, it intimidated him.

He had already had an extremely unsettling experience with the young nurse he had previously spoken to about her “friend” and some woman she had brought along with her, which was something he was trying very hard to forget. It wasn’t just the image of the dead body either, there was so much more to it.

Afterwards, it brought back the feelings of the five women all huddled together in that smelly, damp, horrible place. It wasn’t a good start and now his mind was on going home with Paul, staying in Paul’s house with Paul’s wife and all the tension that brought–-it was all very wearing.

“Hello, young man,” said the ward sister brightly. “How are you feeling?”

“I just want to go home,” he replied.

“Won’t be long,” she said smiling and fussing as only nurses can; pulling him forward, plumping his pillows and sitting him back. He wanted to tell her that he was quite comfortable just as he was, but he didn’t. He wanted to tell her that it had taken him an age to get the groove in the pillows just right, but he didn’t do that either. It just made him feel more down in the dumps.

The idea of his own bed right then felt most appealing indeed, but he knew that trying to ascend those stairs into the flat he shared with his mother, would be next to impossible–-well possible, yes, but only with a block and tackle and the thought of his mum threading the rope and trying to do all the other things necessary–-now that was impossible.

The image that brought forth, made him smile as he tried to keep the thoughts and feelings of the others around him out of his head, whilst concentrating on his own worries.

Time went really slowly, past lunch and beyond. It was well into the afternoon before the ward sister returned with news of his departure.

“There has been a change of plan,” she announced.

‘Oh God, they’re not going to let me go,’ he thought.

“Doctor Jones has reservations about you going home in a car; he feels that although he’s happy for you to leave, trying to get you in or out of a vehicle that’s not best accessible for someone in your condition, would be unwise.”

‘They aren’t going to let me go home.’

“We’re going to have to get you home in an ambulance.”

He had held his breath while the sister was talking and the “whoosh” of Darryl’s lungs expelling what he’d been holding for the duration, was almost explosive. The smile that nearly split his face from ear to ear made the sister laugh out loud.

“I take it you’re looking forward to it?”

“You bet!” he said enthusiastically.

---

The ride back was comfortable and the two ambulance men were a laugh a minute. Darryl’s sides positively ached after they had recounted a number of the more peculiar emergency calls they had attended. The frivolity nearly ended in them being right at the scene of the accident when they were about to unload Darryl. A car tried to pass them and met a large lorry on the other side of the road. Aside from a flat-spot on the car’s front tyres and perhaps some change in the colour of the car-driver’s underwear, it’s unlikely that there was any harm done.

Doris however, was not happy about the impromptu change of plans. “Couldn’t you have let us know?” she asked, her face taking on a frown and her whole body, rigid. “You were lucky I was here.”

“I didn’t know until just before they came to get me. It was a last minute decision by the doctor.”

Tears welled up in Darryl’s eyes for the second time that day and he could feel that lump that was fast becoming an all-too frequent visitor in his throat.

“Are you alright?” she asked, suddenly softening.

“No, I–-I–-Oh, I don’t know,” he wailed and quick as a flash, Doris was there with a comforting hug.

This was all very disconcerting for Darryl. He’d been described as thick-skinned and the thought of getting all emotional over something that wasn’t even his fault to begin with was an alien concept.

His step-father had described emotional outbursts as ‘girly’, so as far as Darryl knew or understood, he wasn’t allowed to show emotion, let alone cry, so he didn’t–hence the thick-skinned comment, but now he had little choice and he sobbed almost uncontrollably as he had earlier when experiencing the plight of those poor girls in the grotty, smelly, damp place.

“How are you feeling?” Doris asked.

“Better, thank you. I just–-it wasn’t–-I didn’t–-” and it all started again.

He buried his face in her shoulder and with Doris rocking him gently and offering soothing words like “there, there” or “don’t you worry”, he managed after a good few minutes, to pull himself together.

---

“I couldn’t believe it,” Doris said when a very disgruntled Paul returned. “He just buried his head in my shoulder and blubbed.”

“I don’t blame him. It’s a very nice place to be,” Paul replied with the grin of a Cheshire cat.

“I’m being serious, Paul,” she retorted, giving him a playful slap on the shoulder.

“Ow! I don’t think I deserved that.” He winced.

“You deserved it alright, buster, and don’t you forget it.”

Paul looked pensive for a moment. There was something different about Darryl these days, he’d noticed that. It may have been the bump on the head or the fact that Gemma didn’t seem interested in coming to see him–-or a combination of many things.

After all, Darryl was young and although very grown up in some ways, he was still young and trying to find his way. Paul could understand how something like the accident and being stuck in hospital for a few days could bring about sudden feelings of depression, after all, there was nothing worse than being all alone in a crowded room–-even if that room was a hospital Ward–-especially if that was the case. In his opinion though, Gemma could have shown a little more compassion than she had.

“I’ll go and say ‘hello’,” he said getting up.

“Yes, and mind you don’t blame him for not being there, it was the bloody hospital’s fault,” said Doris with that frown on her face again.

“Alright, alright. Keep your hair on,” Paul replied, deftly side-stepping another swipe at his arm.

He went through to what should have been a dining room, but actually used to be a workshop and now had become a bedroom–-after a lot of work.

“How’s it going?” he asked.

“Better now I’m out of that horrible place,” Darryl replied. “Do you know what the worst part was?”

“Go on–-”

“It’s embarrassing––”

“––Hospitals tend to be like that.”

“I thought they’d cut off, um–-” he pointed towards his nether regions and blushed furiously.

“Why on earth would you think that?”

“Because I couldn’t feel it,” he replied. “I thought that because of that and the fact they’d put in a catheter, I’d been, well–-you know–-”

“It was necessary after they did some minor work on the gash in your leg. I can see why you’d think that though,” chuckled Paul.

“It’s not funny,” Darryl replied, pouting and taking a rather limp swipe at Paul’s arm.

“Don’t you start; I already got one of those from Doris!”

Soon, Paul could see Darryl was starting to flag. His eyes were drooping and he was starting to nod off.

“Well, we’re glad to have you here,” Paul assured and squeezed Darryl’s hand, leaving him to his thoughts. “And we’re glad you’re okay.”

Darryl smiled slightly as his eyes closed and Paul closed the door.

---

The room was bright, almost dazzling and Darryl put his hand across his brow to shield himself as in the distance, two figures moved slowly towards him, a spark of recognition forming in his mind.

“Hello, Darryl,” said one, though because of the light, he couldn’t make out who it was. One was tall and thin, the other, shorter and slightly rounded and while he wracked his brain to try and put his finger on where he’d seen them before, he just couldn’t place either of them.

“We’re concerned,” said the other. This time, the woman’s voice was more recognisable. The slightly foreign accent was ringing bells in his head, but the placing of where he knew these people from was tantalisingly out of reach.

“You do remember us, don’t you?” asked the tall man.

At that point, they were close enough, so Darryl could make out the faces and yes, he did remember them.

“You’re my grandparents, or so you say,” he said, perhaps a little less pleasantly than he should have.

“Hmm,” said the woman. “I can see that things are no clearer.”

“What clearer?” asked Darryl. “You think I’m a girl and I’m not. I know that for definite now.”

“Hmm,” said the woman again, looking at the man. “It looks like we have some explaining to do.”

---

The next morning, he awoke as Doris brought in a tray with toast, cereal and a steaming mug of tea.

“Morning, sleepy-head,” she said in a sing-song manner.

He forced his eyes open and sat up. “Hi. It’s the first time I’ve been allowed to sleep all night. Do you know they used to wake me up to give me a sleeping pill?”

Doris laughed and placed the tray on his lap. “Is there anything else you want? Remember though, we don’t do cooked breakfasts.”

“No, thank you, this is fine,” he replied smiling and Doris turned to leave. “And, Doris?”

“Yes?”

“Thanks for doing this. I know you didn’t want to, but I really do appreciate it and I’m really sorry about yesterday.”

“What happened yesterday?”

“You know–-I got a little–-er-–emotional, shall we say?”

“Oh that. Don’t worry about it and, Darryl?”

“Yes?”

“I really don’t mind you being here.”

The door closed softly behind Doris as she left the room and Darryl smiled broadly. He could smell the tea and toast and his stomach rumbled at the prospect of having some home-style breakfast, without the faux-pine odour of cleaning fluids, bed-pans or any other hospital smells that really are not conducive to getting better.

He pondered the dream of the previous night as he chomped his way through his Cornflakes and toast, wondering what it was about it that bothered him.

It was the second time he had had a dream like it and he wondered where it was coming from. There was nothing he could think of that would have prompted such a dream, as is so often the case with scary movies, but this wasn’t scary, just bothersome.

He could remember something about an explanation or some such thing, but an explanation of what was not forthcoming. He could also remember something about family, but again, it wasn’t within his grasp to put it all together.

It was a conundrum alright, but it was something that after breakfast was over, and he sat contentedly flicking through a book, he just put down to the worry about the possible loss of his manhood–which as it turned out was unfounded. He reached down and gave it a little squeeze.

It was reassuring to know that it was still there and as he heard the sound of daytime TV burbling away in the lounge next door, the little squeeze turned into something a little more–-

–-Or it should have done.

He couldn’t get any response from what would have been only too eager to become the centre of attention and try as he might, no amount of rubbing or even thinking about his giant poster of Debbie Harry lying on stage with her panties showing did any good.

‘Odd; that usually works,’ he thought and was about to try a bit harder when the door burst open.

“Hey, Darryl. You’re on the news.”

---

To be continued…

PS

All donations in the comment/vote department gratefully received as usual - and thank you for voting last time if you did!