Rob Ewing - The Last of Us

Dr Schofield takes off her glasses, rubs at her eyes. ‘You could have all of it.’ Then: ‘But I don’t know, would have to check—’

‘There’s a boat coming day after tomorrow. I could get more to boost up your stock, right? Fair enough? There’s nothing here, you know as well as me. If you give me a note for your supplier—’

‘Look, there’s a dozen others – same as you, same situation. Then the others, with chronic illnesses. Everyone has their own want. We’re trying to provide for everybody. There needs to be some reserve…’

Her voice goes small, until it’s less than a whisper. Mum is trying to listen in: I can see by the way she tilts her head, not looking away for one second.

Dr Schofield goes back into the dispensary. Finally, she returns holding a white paper bag.

‘This needs to be kept cool,’ she says. ‘You know about cold chain? You have a generator – no. Outdoors, then. These are mixed – long-and short-acting. You can dose twice, same units. Or if you want to ration: fine, as long as maybe half is going in each day? If there’s some insulin that stops ketosis. You know about that.’

Mr Gillies holds out his hand. His voice is broken up, jagged, when he says, ‘Look: Alex needs his medicine. I had to take this chance, OK? He’s at the Cròileagan. I’m not allowed. Can you get someone to hand it in there for him?’

Dr Schofield looks at Mr Gillies’ hand for a long time, then doesn’t shake it. ‘I will see,’ she says.

Mr Gillies leaves: then Morven goes downstairs to make sure the door is locked behind him.

We hear Dr Schofield calling on Elizabeth.

Then we hear her explaining about the boy. She talks about pens: how to dial up numbers. How to inject into a person, where to inject, how often.

Then she comes to talk to us. I notice her hands are shaking, as if she’d been out too long in the cold.

‘How’s Dr Schofield?’ Mum asks.

This confuses the doctor: because it’s her name, too. When Mum adds, ‘Your man? Your husband?’ Dr Schofield closes her eyes and says, ‘He went to hospital.’

‘I am so—’

‘Really need not to think about this just now.’

She goes away, then returns with a box. In the box are lots of smaller white boxes, plus leaflets.

‘One each house,’ Dr Schofield says. ‘If they open the door get back to your car. Don’t touch the gates, the letterboxes, the handles. Use gloves, always. Keep your mask on. Hand hygiene – you’ve got scrubs? There’s a recording on our answering machine. Let them know about the D.E.C. Also world service, long wave.’

‘We couldn’t get the computer—’

‘Get a wind-up radio.’

‘They’ve all gone from the store… Doctor, do you need more help? Will I come again, deliver again?’

‘Stay in after.’

Mum goes to take her hand, but Dr Schofield doesn’t reach out for hers.

I see Elizabeth once more before we go. She’s not looking at us, but at her mum: at the woman who usually walks so tall, now sagged down in a seat.

As the crack of the door closes I see her girl Elizabeth standing and waiting.

It’s not a normal delivery. For starters, Mum has to do every single house. Usually I’d get to help but today I’m not allowed. It’s raining extremely hard, and Mum is wearing her waterproof jacket. The inside of the van gets steamed up with her coming and going.

Mum wears gloves and a mask, just like Dr Schofield said. She wraps each box in a leaflet, then puts it in a plastic bag and puts that through every letterbox.

She runs to each house. She’s a smudge in the rain.

My back gets sore from sitting too long. Mum gets out of breath, plus fed up with wearing her mask. We share a flask of tea she’s got, only I can’t be bothered with tea, especially when there isn’t sugar in.

At one house the door opens. A man comes out.

He’s not got his mask on. He walks towards our van: so Mum gets in and rolls her window up, quick.

She presses down the lock of my door, her door.

The man has red eyes. But his skin got too white, even the skin of his hands. He looks like a tired ghost.

‘You put only one box in,’ he says.

He bangs on the window. Mum puts her hand on the keys to start the engine.

‘There’s four of us in here,’ the man says.

Mum doesn’t look at him. She keeps looking ahead, like he isn’t really there.

Mum says, too quiet for him to hear, more to me: ‘One per house. That was my instruction.’

The man keeps his hand on top of the car. His breathing is fast, like he’s at the end of a race.

‘Come on,’ he says.

Mum looks at him, shakes her head. Then she turns on the engine and drives off.

I watch the man’s hand drop down. Otherwise he just keeps standing in the rain.

It’s no fun staying up if you can’t be blamed for it.

I’ve just one clock to tell the time, now. I put all the rest in the garden – which turned out to be a mistake, because the electric ones stopped working after it rained. Then the wind-up ones stopped because I forgot to wind them up.

So my last clock, with its true time, is precious.

I’m dressed first. Everyone else is bleary this morning. ‘Rise and shine, time to dine,’ I shout out. Alex wanders out to the toilet. Mairi gets dressed and just sits waiting at the table, holding her spoon up.

Breakfast is wafer biscuits, then the powder from chocolate sponge mix, mixed with water. It looks like mud at first but be patient, it will come right. Alex has a fierce hunger and eats while it’s still powder-dirt. Mairi has the least appetite of us. I tick her off and she bunches shoulders but it doesn’t make her eat good.

After breakfast, we pile up the plates and get ready for school. First there’s fly-killing time. I’m the winner at that with twelve. After this we check the radios. Static. Then the light switches. No lights. Then I write up our shopping list for today: Batteries. Sweets. Gaelic stickers for remembering. Fizzy cans of juice. Better water.

Then it’s calendar time. That’s next door. I’m in charge, so the others have to wait. The calendar has pictures of trucks with blown-up wheels. We found it at a house in the village. It’s just me that gets to mark the days.

I put a cross over yesterday. I used to use circles, but circles can mean red-letter days so I stopped, in case it made a confusion for rescuers. Last week I even drew circles on days ahead to make things happen. So I wrote on the 23rd of June: ‘When the radio will start working!!’ Then on the 26th: ‘Electricity working again!!!’

But I passed those circles. And when you pass too many circles you get fed up with doing it.

At the door it’s my job to check everyone has their bags. Plus pencils, felt-tip pens, mid-morning snack.

Me: ‘Ready?’

There has to be a rule about not answering.

I wait for the leaves to settle in the corridor. I don’t like to look at them in case they’re true ghosts.

We started to use the P4 classroom now. It’s the brightest, plus there isn’t any broken walls or ceiling. Plus it’s as far as can be from the big school, which helps.

The kids in here were making shields out of cardboard, tinfoil. On the front of the shields there’s coats of arms.

They never got started on their December projects in P4. Which is why I prefer to use this room. Because everywhere else is always stuck on Christmas.

Today’s lesson is Gaelic speaking. This is especially for Mairi, who’s only learning. In the teacher’s cupboard I find Gaelic weather labels and reward stickers.

Even though I’m not sitting at the front, I’m the one in charge. It’s the new rule we have to follow.