They Thought I Was Dead: Sandy’s Story

110 March 2018

I smiled, in sorrow, as my supper tray arrived. One of the games Roy and I used to play during a date-night dinner in one of our favourite restaurants was choosing our last meal if we were to be executed in the morning. Both of us agreed we would be gluttons. And we would totally large it on the desserts.

It’s strange the things we remember from our past. I can clearly recall the last time we played it. Roy said he would have the biggest banoffee pie on the planet. I had chosen chocolate fondant with hot chocolate sauce. Grilled lobster as a starter for Roy, then a rib-eye steak with chips and broccoli — health-conscious to the last — well, the broccoli bit. I’d have gone for an aubergine parmigiana, then a Dover sole — off the bone, I don’t like to see dead fish faces — and mushy peas. And chips, too. It has to be chips.

I was thinking about this as my meal tray arrived tonight. It had some horrible, tasteless lake fish, pike or perch, with a green vegetable that was so overcooked it fell apart when I prodded it with my fork. It might have been spinach in a former life. Dessert was trifle, which — well, let’s be polite, because it tasted better than it looked — looked like the remains of a roadkill reimagined by Tracey Emin.

Not exactly my fantasy last meal. But I guess so much in life doesn’t live up to our hopes, and that part of growing up is learning to manage our expectations. Oh well, let’s hope this is the final disappointment.

The clock on the wall read 7.45. I knew the ritual. In ten minutes a quiet male nurse would come in to take my tray and give me the two small pills, in a plastic container, to take half an hour before I wanted to sleep. I wouldn’t be swallowing them tonight and I wouldn’t be needing them ever again, but I didn’t say that to him when he came. I watched him leave with the tray and close the door. A few moments later, scrupulously punctual, a female nurse came in to insert my night-time catheter.

When she had left, I felt completely at peace with myself. I’d made my decision, my affairs were all in order. The three letters, all in envelopes and addressed, were on my bedside table. I felt crashing waves of sadness about things I would never see — most of all, Bruno growing up, becoming a teenager. But at least I wouldn’t be an embarrassment to him. An invalid mother with a scarred face. I’m sparing him that, my dear, sweet boy.

They normally left me alone at night, now that I was out of danger. No nurse had come in after my catheter had been inserted for several nights now. I would just have to take that risk. If anyone did, I would plead my screwed-up mind, that I had no idea what I was doing and divert to Plan B. Which I didn’t yet have. And hopefully would not need.

Now I needed to focus on the task in hand.

I’m really not feeling great.

The whole room seems to be wobbling.