Nineteen, the end of the beginning

©Copyright to Beverly Guinevere Taff.

List of Characters.

Terry Harrington. Fugitive boy marked for compulsory transitioning.

Samantha, (Sam) First transitioned kid Terry meets on the streets.

Theodora (Dora) leader of the transitioned kid gang.

Jessica. (Jessie) The only natal girl in Dora’s gang.

Charlie Member of the transitioned gang.

Jan Another member of the transitioned gang.

Ron Café owner who lost his daughter to egg-
snatchers.

Doctor McTavish. Female paediatrician

Doctor Cummins Consultant Paediatrician

Sarah. Senior Midwife at the maternity unit

Dawn Very young trainee nurse.

Eleanor Jessica’s mother.

Diana Terri’s mother.

Part 9.

As the builders left around 2 pm, there was a general exodus as customers returned to work around the district that Ron’s café served.

Eventually, around two thirty, the café had virtually emptied except for the four grandparents whom Ron had brought to show them that he was a legitimate business and well liked in the neighbourhood. With their table cleared and all other tables washed they invited Ron to join them. Having closed the main cooking range and left only the microwave, grill and assorted hot drinks dispensers operating, Ron removed his overall and accepted their invitation.

“So our daughter Jessica has worked for you this past eight months.” Eleanor observed.

“Well since she learned she was pregnant. Your Terry was working for me by then and he told me about her condition. Then because he’d grown to trust me, he revealed Jessica’s big secret, namely that she was a natal girl and he’d got her pregnant. That was when I was shocked to discover that Terry was only just turned fourteen.
It’s possible he might still have been only thirteen when he impregnated Jessica but I’m not sure of the dates or their birthdays. I was shocked to learn they were both so young but I could sympathise fully with their fear of the fertility committee kidnappings and the egg snatchers. Jessica was just about frazzled mentally when she came to me. Then we found out about the loophole in the legislation excluding natal girls from having their eggs removed if they were pregnant. We also learned that Terry was exempt if he could prove he was the father, unbelievably, the horny little devil proved he was. He left a blood sample some weeks before the girls were born then when we found out that Jessica had had the twins, Terry was shell-shocked. He still hides to this day.”

On hearing Ron tell this blatant lie, Terri and Dora struggled not to burst out laughing fortunately they were ensconced behind the cashier till and partially out of sight as they sipped their afternoon tea.

Eventually, the grandparents got up to leave with Ron promising to inform them the moment he found anything out. Once they had climbed into their taxi Dora punched Ron in the arm as she released another gale of laughter.

“You lying bastard!”

“Never mind my lying girls, the big question now is how are we going to get sperm regularly to the clinic.”

“Well, we’re going to have to circumvent Aggie McTavish,” Terri opined, “cos she knows that Terry is Terri. The moment she sees me anywhere around the clinic she’s bound to blow the whistle.”

“Not necessarily.” Ron corrected her. “She actually thinks your disguise is brilliant. When Jessica told her, she actually approved of it. Fortunately, she has no idea that Terri works and lives here, like all the others she thinks that Terri is somehow living rough.”

“But I can’t pretend that if I look like this. Living rough makes you look rough. She must think I’m living somewhere tidy.”

“We can easily cover that angle,” Ron proposed. “If you come to the clinic with me you can say that you’ve got a little live-in job that keeps body and soul together.”

“That’ll never work. I’m too bloody valuable to the government now. She’s bound to try and get me to come out.”

“I doubt it, she knows the danger of you being outed like everybody involved in this business. Besides if you restrict your visiting to seeing Jessica and the twins, at her safe house, there’s no need to ever go near the clinic. I’ll continue delivering the sperm or Dora can pretend to be doing it directly from you to the clinic.”

“That’ll put Dora in danger.” Terri cautioned.

“No, even if they follow her they’ll never be certain she’s contacting you and receiving anything from you. You know what it’s like with the street community, it’s so disorganised and shambolic, nobody knows who’s doing what or going where. If Dora stopped and chatted to thirty different people every evening, they’d never work out if she had taken anything from anybody. Besides there’s always the drug dealing. Kids are exchanging packages and money all day long. Any agency trying to locate you through Dora would be overwhelmed with misinformation.”

Dora was nodding as Ron said this for it was true, new people left and joined each street community every day. Terri agreed to try the system as she declared.

“Well let’s give the underground railway a rest for a few days then do as you suggest next Monday. I’ll accompany you to Jessica’s safe-house and see the lie of the land. Another aspect of that plan is that my semen should have a lot more sperm after a few days break. You can speak to the clinic and get their opinion.”

Having decided their temporary plan, Terri and Dora had time on their hands before the evening rush started. They asked Ron for a few hours off and he agreed so they decided to visit Charlie and Jan at the Nightingale virus hospital.

“You’d better dress down if your pretending to be street kids,” Ron advised.

Knowing Ron’s words were true, they put on their dirty jeans and tatty tops before leaving Ron to do his books and man the café during the quiet afternoon period. They boarded a bus that took them across town to the nightingale hospital. On the bus, they settled out of view in the upper deck rear seat and chatted.

“I’ve never been to the nightingale hospital,” Terri declared.

“It’s were the worst cases go to die or remain in a static state. Incurable they’re called.”

“Oh don’t tell me, Charlie and Jan are incurable, this Covid 21 is a total bitch!”

“Jan was recovering very slowly the last time we came but Charlie’s fucked. No change in nearly two years.”

“Shit! I liked Charlie she was always ready with something witty.”

“Well she’s not cracking jokes now. She’s in some sort of incurable coma. If they don’t recover after two years, the doctors remove all medication and life support then they usually die.”

“Fuck, fuck! FUCK!” Terri cursed as heads further down the bus turned censoriously to stare at the dirty street rats.

Realising she was drawing attention to herself; Terri fell silent and sank lower into her seat. Dora slid surreptitiously closer to make it impossible to get a good look at Terri’s face and they remained close together until the bus pulled up at the Nightingale hospital. Dora guided Terri through the sterilisation procedures and eventually she was following Dora along the maze of corridors.

On stopping by the nursing and information station the nurse gave them a long sympathetic look and wagged her head despondently. She spoke softly and sympathetically but her message was still brutally clear.

“Have you come to witness the final rights dears.”

“Whadd’ya mean?” Terri gasped.

“They’re removing Charlie’s life support at 1600, that’s in ten minutes time. Are you relatives?”

“Uuuhm no, she’s a street kid but we were her only friends. Please can we see her, if only to say goodbye. Nobody should die alone.

The nurse sighed sympathetically and reached under the counter to produce two black rimmed plastic identity cards. She wrote their names on them and explained.;
“Being as no relatives have ever turned up you can have these cards. It’s almost time now if you want to see her before the end you’d best hurry.”

Tears started pouring down Terri’s cheeks as she clung onto Dora’s arm and stumbled down the corridor to the ward. They stopped as they read the notice ‘Finality Ward’ relatives only.

“If they ask, we’re her cousins ok!” Dora declared.

Terri squeezed her arm and the pair stepped reverentially into the room.

“Two doctors in white coats were in the very act of removing the tube from Charlie’s windpipe.”

“Give us a moment please!” Terri begged as genuine tears ran down her cheeks.

The doctors were not monsters so they stepped back to let the girls hug their dying friend. Eventually though they had to intervene and explain.

“We’re so sorry girls, there’s no hope now, we need the respirator and the room for a more hopeful case. We’re so, so sorry.”

Reluctantly and with a loud sob, Terri stepped back and watched the doctors gently extract the tube from Charlies trachea. The machine gave a soft sucking sound then a click and a whistle which was the arresting alarm. Then Charlie’s breath gave a final crackle and her chest stopped moving.

Seeing death in all it’s tragic peacefulness, Terri could not abide the stillness, she flung herself forward and jammed her mouth over the fading Charlie’s lips and pushed a monstrous breath into Charlie’s lungs.

The effort caused Terri to cough violently before she managed to pump another breath into Charlie’s body before the doctors gently tugged her away.

“It’s no use darling. She’s going, let’s not pummel her body now, let her go in peace.”

Terri could not and would not let go. She remembered Trixie’s desperate whines over Jessica’s comatose form and something told her there was still hope.

“Please, pleeease let me try. A couple of breaths please, let me do something worthwhile just for once!”

The doctors recognised the distress the young girl was suffering so they concluded no harm could come by letting the kid try. If it gave her some comfort to think she had tried her best then at least some good would have come out of the death.

They released their hold on Terri who immediately returned to Charlie’s face and pushed breath after desperate breath into her friend’s lungs.

As Terri tired and wavered, Dora felt compelled to agree with the doctors, there was nothing more to be gained by just pumping breath into Charlie’s seemingly lifeless form. She reached gently for Terri’s arm and tugged ever so slightly.

“Come on love, it’s over. She’s gone.”

Reluctantly Terri slowly stood up and stepped back to press her tearstained face into Dora’s shoulder while the doctors stood watching sympathetically. Then as the pair turned to leave one of the doctors made an exclamation.

“What the -. Hold on girls, she’s breathing!”

At first neither Terri nor Dora responded as they stumbled miserably away and the doctor had to raise his voice again.

“Girls! Did you not hear me? She’s breathing!

Dora stopped uncertainly but Terri knew immediately. She turned with tearful eyes and ran joyously back to Charlie’s barely moving chest. She did not need to test for breath but she boldly pressed her fingers under Charlie’s nascent breast and smiled with delight.

“Yes! Her heart! I can feel it!”

“So did I Terri,” the older doctor confirmed. “Your friend is still alive.”

“Can I stay with her?”

“Well I –“

“Yes you can,” the other – more sympathetic doctor agreed. We’ll put her in this recovery room and you can stay with her. If there is any change, call the nurse immediately.”

“Where are you going?” Terri asked both doctors.

“We’ve got other sick people to attend to. If your friend continues to keep breathing on her own for an hour or more, we’ll put her back on the ward.”

“So you’re not going to somehow, - you know, euthanise her.” Terri begged.

“Heaven’s no girl!. We’re not murderers. We simply stop the treatment and if she manages to continue on her own we let them recover. They don’t usually continue for much longer because of the effort.”

“Can I stay with her?”

“Of course you can – and your friend. We’ll come back in an hour or unless you call the ward sister. Meanwhile, I suggest your friend makes the two of you some cups of tea. If Charlie makes it through the night then we will make every endeavour to help her through this. Her recovery is something of a miracle!”

“Huh! I don’t believe in miracles.” Terri confessed. “It was love and care that did this.”

“Whatever it was Terri, it is remarkable.” The older doctor finalised as they left Charlie to Terri’s care.

As Terri took station beside the gurney, she looked up at Dora.

“Well? Are you going to get that tea? – And get a blanket as well, she’ll freeze to death on this metal contraption.”

This brought Dora out of her disbelieving trance and she shook her head as she sped off to the sister’s office to get some tea..

“What, on her own without the ventilator!” The sister frowned,

Dora nodded as she took both cups back to Terri. The sister followed her and squeaked with surprise as she and Dora found Terri pushing more breath into the comatose Charlie. The watched briefly as the girl on the gurney coughed and weakly lifted a hand.

“She’s bloody conscious!” The sister gasped as she lurched forward to intervene.

“Yeah, and cold,” Terri added as she took the proffered cups of tea from Dora and asked, “did you get the blanket?”

“I’ll get one!” The sister replied, glad to be of some use as the miracle unfolded.

Exhausted by her resuscitation effort, Terri stepped back and slumped into a chair as Dora leant over the still coughing Charlie.

At that instant, Charlie gave a huge cough then started trying to clear her chest of the phlegm that was restricting her breathing. Alerted to what could only be a conscious effort Terri lurched forward again and covered Charlie’s mouth again. With one mighty breath she rammed her breath back into Charlie’s chest and this caused Charlie to respond by exhaling violently, just as Jessica had done that cold winter’s day back in their bash.

With a violent cough, Charlie expelled a huge gobbet of phlegm that splashed into Terri’s face; for this time Terri was alert, she did not accidentally swallow the thick green effluvia.

“Uuugh!” Dora exclaimed with disgust as she saw the thick green phlegm splashed over Terri’s lips, cheeks and jaw.

“Gerrit’ off girl, you catch the Covid!”

Terri looked around for some paper tissues but there were none so she went in search of the ward sister again while the disgusting mess was still spread over her face. She met the sister returning with the blanket and to avoid splashing the deposit as she tried to speak, she motioned with her hands for a tissue.

Being a competent, level-headed professional, the sister put the blanket on a windowsill and quickly guided Terri to a scrub room and removed the slime of her face. Instead of simply washing it away, she donned some sterile gloves then took a wooden spatula and scraped the bulk of the phlegm off Terri’s lips and cheeks then scraped it into a specimen jar and sealed it.

“What ’choo do that for?” Terri asked as she now tissued the remains off her face and returned with the sister and blanket to Charlie’s side.

“Your friend has just made a remarkable recovery Miss – uuuhm Terri. (She checked Terri’s identity label.) Any clinical evidence we can take from the event must be worth checking.” She explained as urgency lent speed to her walk.

In the side room they found Dora actually helping Charlie to sit up on the gurney and Dora turned excitedly as she heard the ward sister and Terri return.

“Her eyes opened! She tried to say something! Look!!”
The sister immediately moved to take control and she unfolded the blanket.

“Let’s get this wrapped right around her – under her as well. Look, she’s shivering!”

Both Dora and Terri needed no encouragement as they immediately helped the sister to lift the shaking Charlie and work the blanket under her.

“Come on!” The sister ordered. “She needs to get warm. I’ll find a ward.”

Eager to be of real assistance, Terri and Dora seized each end of the gurney and almost trotted after the sister’s purposeful progress.

“This’ll do, it was emptied last night, in fact I think it was her old ward but the place has already been sterilised. Let’s get her onto the bed.”

Desperately glad to have been a party to the seeming miracle, Terri and Dora lurched forward to help and the sister had to control their enthusiasm.

“Not like that girls, she’ll roll out the other side, like this!”

They did as instructed and paused momentarily as the sister decided what to do next. She peeled off the rubber gloves and put them in a sterile dish before handing extra tissues to Terri to finish wiping her face.

“Don’t throw the tissues away, put them with my old gloves. The virologists will want to examine them.”

“Why?” Dora asked as Terri wiped away the last vestiges of phlegm.

“I’ll explain why. This morning the last swab of saliva was taken from Charlie’s lips before we prepped her for anticipated death. At Noon that sample came back loaded with fatal quantities of the Covid 21 virus.
Now this afternoon, Charlie’s sitting up and – did she just try to speak!”

All three rushed to the bedside and leaned in as a semi-vocal croak escaped her lips.

“What ‘choo say babes>” Dora asked.

“Terri,” Charlie clearly enunciated, “Terri! I want Terri.”

“I’m here!” Terri replied eagerly and leant forward to kiss Charlie on the lips.

From habit the sister moved forward momentarily to restrain Terri but realised her stupidity as she realised this girl had just been covered in quantities of Charlie infected phlegm.

As Terri straightened up again, Charlie opened her eyes and actually smiled.

“Hiya Babe’s.”

“Hiya Charlie, welcome back.”

“Water.”

“Of course!” The sister replied as she reached for the pitcher already standing on the bedside locker.
Gently, she eased the glass to Charlie’s lips as Terri turned to Dora.

“Talking of drinks, I never did get that cup of tea.”

The sister smiled and nodded towards the corridor.

“See the duty nurse in the end ward, tell her Sister Marjorie sent you.”

As they turned to leave Terri asked,

“Which ward is Jan in?”

“Jan who?” The sister replied furrowing her forehead.

Terri and Dora fell silent, neither of them knew Jan’s other name.

“Dunno,” Dora confessed as Terri added.

“Kids on the street don’ ave sir-names.”

“Well there’s a Jan Davies currently in ward 4; that’s the borderline cases. If she’s feeling okay she’ll either be in the garden or in the conservatory. If she’s feeling down she’ll be in bed.”

“Can we visit her?”

“Of course, you know it’s not like a prison, on the inside that is. Sadly, they cannot go out of the grounds.”

“Yeah. We know, bye-ee.”

The sister smiled as the girls left for she was in an extremely good mood. Not everyday did a patient come back from the dead.

ooo000ooo

After gulping down their tea and savouring some biscuits (cookies) that the nurse had kindly offered, the pair went hunting for Jan.

The grounds to the Nightingale hospital were extensive and it was getting late before they found Jan. She was sitting morosely in her wheelchair under a large tree and wrapped in a thick blanket that made her struggle a bit as she tried to stand.

“Don’t get up love! We went to see Charlie but things got complicated.” Dora declared.

“She gone has she?” Jan asked through tearful eyes.

“No-oo!” Terri replied. She’s on the ward having supper.”

“Whadd’ya mean, having supper? She was due to be de-ventilated at four.”
“You just go and see love. We’ll be back tomorrow to see you both. Gorra go now, we’re late.”

“No wait! What d ‘you mean on the ward?”

“She’s alive and talking, go and see. We gorra go, byee!”

Jan was left floundering in confusion. As a long term inmate of the Nightingale, she well knew that being de-ventilated meant the end for a patient. It meant there were no more viable therapies left to medical science and Covid 21 would be allowed to take it’s deadly course. Take the ventilator way and the comatose patient usually asphyxiated within minutes.

By the time she resolved to go and see, Terri and Dora were returning to the de-contamination building. When Jan finally reached the de-ventilation ward the visitors were on their bus back to Ron’s café.

“Hi Sister Marjorie.”

“Oh! Hello Jan darling, have you heard the news?”

“What? About Charlie?” Is it true?”

“Come and look!”

“Jan scooted after Sister Marjorie and they arrived to find the doctors still clustered around Charlie’s bed.”

“Quite remarkable! And there’s no sign of Covid in her saliva!”

“Nothing!” The virologist confirmed before repeating. “This morning’s sample was absolutely loaded with the stuff, now – nothing. She’s clear!”

The consultant turned to Sister Marjorie.

“Where are the visitors now?”

Sister Marjorie turned to Jan.

“They went to see you.”

“They did, but they were late so they left just now.”

“Where’ve they gone?” The consultant asked Jan.

“I dunno, back to their bash I suppose, where do street kids go?”

“Dammit!” The consultant swore softly, “There’s something odd going on here. Nobody just sheds Covid in a couple of hours.”

“Charlie has,” Sister Marjorie declared. “At four o’clock she was in her final coma and scheduled for de-ventilation. Now look!”

The team turned to find Jan stretching from her wheelchair to squeeze Charlie’s fingers as Charlie rolled eagerly to kiss her. Marjorie recognised the effort and quickly elbowed the doctors aside to turn the chair and allow the girls to kiss. The doctors looked on askance as the intimacy ensued then shook their heads and murmured uncertainly amongst themselves.

Charlie looked up hopefully.

“Can I go for a wee?”

“Are you up to it darling?” Sister Marjorie asked. “Do you want a chair?”

“I think I can manage but will you come with me?”

“Of course I will, do you want to come as well Jan?”

“We’d like to speak to Jan sister,” the consultant announced.

Sister Marjorie exchanged glances with Jan who nodded unconcernedly.

“Yeah you go, I’ll stay here.”

When Charlie and Sister Marjorie returned the doctors were in earnest conversation questioning Jan about everything she could remember, - which wasn’t much.

“They came over, told me about Charlie then rushed off, late for work or something.”

“So they may not be street kids, living rough.”

“Hard to tell, they were wearing the regulation sterile scrubs that every visitor wears.”

“They didn’t look dirty.” Sister Marjorie observed, “when she wiped her face with the sterile wipes after I scraped of the phlegm sample, no grime or anything came off. Her face was clean. Street kids are invariably filthy.”

“But they said they were street kids.”

“Yes. Maybe they had a wash before coming though that’s unusual,” Sister Marjorie explained.

“Sometimes the more knowledgeable kids know that when visitors leave here they get de-contaminated in the showers. They pretend to be visiting a patient, - and there are a lot of street kid sick in here, - so nobody can tell if they’re genuine visitors and they give themselves a good scrub down in the showers when they leave.”

“And you allow that?” The consultant asked.

“Better a clean street kid than another infected carrier on the streets. It does no harm for a kid to want a wash, God forbid they have shitty lives.”

“They definitely left via the shower block. I saw them.” Jan added hopefully in her endeavour to be genuinely helpful, “And they said they’ll be back tomorrow.”

“Well if they do, let me know immediately. I want to meet these kids, especially the one who did the resuscitation!”

“Breath of life was it?” Charlie giggled as she sat on the side of the bed looking a picture of health.”

“Don’t mock Charlie!” Sister Marjorie cautioned her. “A few hours ago you were scheduled for de-ventilation and certain death. Think about that! - Now! Go and get your dinner! Oh! And if your friends sneak in to see you without telling us, please tell her we want to see her because we think she might be able to help others. We’re not looking to somehow punish her. Go on; go and eat.”

As the pair went to the refectory the consultant stared after Charlie and remarked.

“There goes Jairus’s daughter.”

“How’s that?” Marjorie wondered.

“You know, the bible thing, Jesus raising Jairus’s daughter from the dead.

“I didn’t know you were religious doc.”

“I’m not – usually; but after seeing that, - well!”

ooo000ooo