Date: Thu, 22 May 2014 22:25:16 +0000 From: Nice Guy Subject: My Little Brigade Boy 12 Niceguy98 Chapter 12 - The Visitors --------------------------------------------------------- Keith arrived first, accompanied by a woman I had never met before. "Grant, meet Helen, Matthews mother." Keith said gesturing to her. I stuck out my hand, but she batted it away and grabbed me in for a hug, tears springing from her eyes and landing on my t-shirt. "Thank you so much for bringing my boy back to me." There was nothing I could say, so I just held on. After a few moments, she pulled away. "How is he?" she said, walking towards the bed. "He's getting better." I replied. "The swelling in his leg and his brain has gone down, but he's still not responding." She placed her hand on Matthews arm. "You hear that, baby?" she whispered, kissing his cheek. "You're getting better." Keith sat on the other side of the bed, and they looked at him, the grief visible on their faces. I discreetly slipped out of the door, and let them have their moment with him. My phone vibrated in my pocket, telling me that my mum was outside. I went down to the car park and found my mum's car. She got out, hugged me tightly and handed me a bag with some clothes and 20 pounds for food. Crucially, she also brought me my school bag and a list of textbook pages I was supposed to read from every subject so I could keep up. "Give Matthew a kiss from me." she said, "I'm sorry I can't come up." I kissed her cheek. "It's fine." I replied, "I know you're really busy." It really was fine, my mum had my little sister to look after. Hospitals were not appropriate places for young children. Getting back up to the ward, I saw Helen and Keith holding hands across Matthew, eyes closed and mouths moving in prayer. I sighed internally, and maybe a little bit externally. As if that was going to help. I let them finish, not wanting to upset the apple cart, then opened the door. "Grant!" Keith greeted me. "Back in a minute." Helen said, standing up and walking into the en-suite. When the door shut, Keith leaned over to me. "Sorry about that." he said, "Helen is extremely Protestant, and I had to humor her." "No apologies necessary!" I whispered back, suppressing a giggle. Keith sighed, looking back at Matthews face. "If only I thought it would help." he said, threatening to tip over again. He was standing at the edge of the cliff. I had to pull him back. I grabbed him by the shoulders and forced him to look at me. "Now you listen to me, Keith!" I whispered, still concious of the thin partition wall. "Don't go questioning your beliefs right now! You are so much stronger than that. If you want to believe in something, believe in the skills of the doctors, believe in your son! But don't go off on a tangent praying for some hand of God to come down and touch him better! If he is up there, hasn't he made it perfectly clear he doesn't give a shit?" Fire in my eyes, I stared him down. He looked right into me, his eyes disbelieving. Without warning or preamble, he brought me right into his arms and held me tight. "Thank you." he whispered. "No problem." I said warmly, happy that he was back on this side of sanity. Helen chose that moment to reappear. I smiled at her. She smiled back, blissfully unaware over what had just been exchanged. We spent the hours until the end of visiting time taking turns by his bedside, chatting to him, squeezing his hand and kissing him, hoping that something would happen. Anything. But, alas. It was far too early to be expecting anything like that from him. Keith and Helen finally had to leave, so they hugged me, I renewed my vow to keep him safe, then returned to my vigil, this time with a textbook in front of me. Glancing over to Matthew occasionally, I began talking to him. "Hey, I never told you. Mrs Dacker called me last night. Left me a voicemail. Do you think I should call her back?" I paused, but only the beep of the heart monitor answered me. "I know you would say yes, so I'll go and do it after I've done my homework." "Homework has to come first!" I said, mimicking the deep, baritone voice of my head teacher, before laughing at myself. I finished my homework in record time, and walked out of the mobile exclusion zone. Bringing Mrs Dackers number up on the screen, my finger hovered over the call button for a moment before stabbing down. She answered in the middle of the third ring. I briefly updated her on the Matthew situation. No, he's still in a coma. No, I'm okay. Yes, the doctors are optimistic. Then she dropped her bombshell. "Matthews nominated for Best Boy this year." she said. "It seemed appropriate. I'll announce it at the Parents Evening." The parents evening. The one that Matthew had been looking forward to for so long. Now it seemed very unlikely that he would see it, or lift up his trophy. I thanked her for telling me, and reassured her that there was nothing she could do. "I'll talk to you soon." she rang off, "Keep safe." I stared at the phone in my hand. I hadn't even considered the fact that Matthew would be nominated for Best Boy. He had never gone to Sunday School since he started living with his dad, and I never thought that his game performance would even begin to make up for that. But, then again, not very many people go to Sunday School anymore. Somehow my body had steered me back to Matthews room, my mind on higher things. As I opened the door, I spotted a flash of black in the room and returned to Earth. Two police officers, one male and one female, were sitting in chairs next to Matthews bed, chatting to his doctor. The three of them looked up as I walked in. "Grant Robertson?" the female cop said. "Yes?" I replied, feeling slightly intimidated by the enormous baton dangling from her side. "I'm PC Ray." she continued, gesturing to her colleague. "And this is PC Glen. We're here to ask you a few questions about the accident." So they did. Somehow I remained composed as I recounted the whole thing in as much detail as I could. They told me that a car matching my description crashed into a bollard in the town centre about 10 minutes after he had mown down Matthew, driven by a man with a blood alcohol level of 0.17. He had originally been charged with drunk-driving, and, thanks to my statement, could now be charged with bodily harm by dangerous driving and failing to report an accident. It gave me some satisfaction that the bastard who threw Matthews life into limbo would be getting some cold, hard time in a prison cell for his troubles. It wouldn't bring him back, though. The police officers thanked me, took my number and told me they'd be in touch. As they walked out, I looked at the clock and realised it was now half past four. The door opened again, and someone walked in. Turning around, I half expected to see a nurse or the doctor, but I never expected Carol and Alex to walk in. Alex was still dressed in his school uniform, grey trousers and red unbuttoned polo shirt. He ran towards me before I knew where I was. He crashed into me, nearly knocking me off my feet. I picked him up and brought him to my chest, feeling his body heat and crushing sorrow radiate into me. "Hey buddy." I whispered. "Hey." he said back, gripping me tightly. We hugged for the longest time, his body gently racking with sobs, while Carol stood at the door. I smiled a small greeting at her, then slowly walked Alex over to Matthew's bed. "Look who's here!" I said, setting Alex down. "I'll leave you guys alone." I heard Carol whisper, closing over the door before walking away. Alex looked at the huge number of tubes coming out of Matthew and whimpered, placing his hand on his belly. "Is he okay?" he whispered, as if saying it aloud would disturb him. I put my hand on his shoulder. "He's perfectly fine." I said, rubbing his shoulder, "It's just his body needs a bit of a rest to fix itself." Alex looked up at me. "How long will that take?" he whimpered, tears springing to his eyes. I gently wiped his face and looked him straight in the eye. "I don't know, buddy." I said sincerely, "I really don't know." I brought him into my arms again, and kissed him gently on the forehead. "But what I do know is that Matthew needs us both to be strong for him." I said. "The doctors and I are looking after him, but he really needs his best buddy right now." I paused. "And... I need my best buddy too." I whispered, smiling slightly. He smiled back at me, then jumped into my arms. "Well I'm here now." he whispered, kissing me right on the lips. I hugged him close, then let him go, realising my selfishness. "Let's sit with him for a bit, eh?" I said, walking over to the side of the bed. We spent over an hour talking about the most banal subjects, in an attempt to mask the sound of the heart monitor and fill the empty space between us, until Carol came back for him. She kissed me, and tried to take Alex away. He held on the side of the bed, and steadfastly refused to move. I put his hand on his clenched hand, and looked him right in the eye. "Alex. You need to go." I whispered. "I am staying right here, and I don't intend to let anything happen to him." He looked at me, trying to see if I was telling the truth, then began to say his goodbyes to Matthew. It was heartbreaking to watch. Tears began streaking down his face to drip on Matthew's. He began whispering desperately. "Please wake up, Matthew. Please wake up." "I love you. Please wake up!" I had to gently take him away from his bedside, draped over my shoulder, crying his eyes out. Carol saw the raw emotion pouring out of her son and a single tear fell down her cheek. I began slowly taking him downstairs, oozing meaningless platitudes right up until I got to the car. As I set him down, Alex looked up at me with his wet, sorrowful eyes, and asked me the question that would haunt my thoughts and throw me over the edge of sanity. "Is he ever going to wake up?" ----------------------------------------------------------- End Of Chapter 12 Any comments/constructive criticism to niceguy0398@gmail.com Check out my other story "Highland Flings": http://www.nifty.org/nifty/gay/camping/highland-flings Nifty needs your help to stay alive and continue delivering wonderful stories, so donate what you can. http://donate.nifty.org/donate.html