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Tommy wriggled free of the nurse who was cleaning his cuts and hugged Jess when he saw her. ‘I’m very glad you’re here.’ He enunciated the words as if he were a spymaster, about to send Jess out on an important mission.
‘Well, I’m glad to be here. What’s up, Tommy?’ The boy was unusually uncooperative, batting away the nurse who was trying to tend to him. He’d already seen far too much of the inside of a hospital in his short life, and this level of treatment was something that he usually took in his stride.
‘Get off me!’ Tommy was clearly having nothing more to do with the nurse who was gently trying to tend to him. She winked at Jess and backed off.
‘All right.’ Jess sat down by the bed. ‘You can tell me what’s the matter and then I’ll finish with those cuts. Deal?’
‘Deal. Only I want you to do something first.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Go and look after my mum.’ Tears sprang to Tommy’s eyes. The kid who was so brave, hardly ever cried. Jess choked back the lump that had suddenly formed in her throat.
‘Tommy, she’s got another doctor looking after her. He’s much better than—’
‘I want you!’ Tommy thumped the bed. ‘You have to go!’
‘What’s all this?’ Jess hadn’t been aware that Greg had entered the cubicle, and when his voice rang out behind her, it made her jump.
‘I want Jess to see my mum. She’s the best doctor in the hospital.’ Tommy explained the situation slowly to Greg, just in case he was having trouble comprehending.
‘Tommy, I’m not—’
‘Good idea.’ Greg cut her short. ‘But first Jess needs to see you, so she can tell your mum that you’re all right. And that you’re doing what you’re told.’ Greg folded his arms, a sign that he wasn’t having any nonsense. ‘All right, chief?’
Tommy nodded wordlessly.
‘So when Jess gets back she’ll expect to see that cut on your forehead with a dressing on it. Which means that you need to keep still for Erica while she does it for you.’ Kindness had been vying with firmness from the very start, and Greg was clearly having trouble maintaining his authoritarian stance in the face of Tommy’s blue eyes. ‘I’ll bring you something to drink when I get back. What would you like? Some juice?’
‘It doesn’t matter. Just water.’ Tommy was interested in one thing only, and everything else was unimportant.
‘All right. But first of all I’ll take Jess to see your mum.’
Greg closed the cubicle door behind them. ‘Bright kid. Knows how to work the system.’
‘He ought to, he’s had enough practice.’ Jess shrugged. ‘He’s not usually this awkward, though.’
Greg chuckled. ‘I’d do exactly the same in his place. If one of my family was sick or injured, I’d do whatever I had to do to get them the best treatment I could.’
‘Is it okay if I pop in to see his mother?’
‘What, you were thinking of going back in there and trying to pretend you’d seen his mother when you hadn’t?’ Greg gave a snort of laughter. ‘Good luck with that one.’
It looked as if Tommy’s mother had broken her jaw. Major swelling, contusions and bruising. No wonder no one had thought it a good idea to let Tommy in to see her. Jess smiled at the nurse tending her, and the nurse took the opportunity of someone else being there to slip out for five minutes.
Gemma was lying on her side so that blood and saliva could drain from her mouth, and recognition flared in her eyes as soon as Jess sat down next to the bed. ‘I’m one of Tommy’s doctors from Cardiology. I’ve just seen him and he’s fine and being well looked after, but he’s worried about you. So I promised him I’d come to see you and find out how you were doing.’
Gemma’s gaze never left Jess’s face, and Jess took hold of her hand.
‘Don’t try to talk, Gemma. Give me one squeeze for yes and two for no. Do you want your phone?’
One squeeze. Jess hadn’t really needed to ask. She’d seen Tommy’s face when he’d got the messages from his mother, telling him that she was there for him. Jess reached for Gemma’s bag and found her phone, fumbling with it for a moment before she found what looked like the correct application, and held the screen up in fr
ont of Gemma.
A smile for Tommy, drawn with his mother’s finger. A bit shakier than the ones that he used to receive when he was in hospital but that didn’t matter.
‘Here, you send it.’ Jess saved the image into a text and found Tommy’s name on the contacts list. His mother stabbed her finger on the ‘send’ button, and the time bar flashed up then indicated that the message had been sent.
