Marion Lennox: Finding His Wife, Finding A Son

He was whinging because he was tired. She was also tired, but Toby didn’t have meningitis and right now she felt the luckiest mother in the world.

‘Let’s have spaghetti for tea,’ she told Toby, and his little face brightened.

‘Worms.’

‘Exactly. How many worms would you like?’

‘One, two, a hundred,’ he crowed, and buried his head in her shoulder.

She hugged him tight and headed toward the entrance. Doug, her next-door neighbour, would be waiting to pick her up. Bless him, she thought, not for the first time. Doug was in his seventies, a widower who spent his days making his garden and his car pristine. When she’d first started working at Namborra he’d noticed the number of taxis she was using and tentatively made his offer. At first she’d been reluctant—her hours were all over the place—but she’d finally accepted that Doug’s offer filled a need for him as well as for her.

Giving was lovely. She’d realised that a long time ago. It was the taking that was the hardest.

So now...she’d kept Doug waiting for over an hour but she couldn’t hurry. The light was dim and she had trouble making out the pillars. Grey on grey was her worst-case scenario.

Sometimes she even conceded a cane would help.

‘Yeah, a toddler in one arm, a holdall and briefcase in the other plus a cane...where? Not going to happen...’

And then she paused.

There was a roaring from above, the sound of a plane.

The town’s small airstrip was close. It wasn’t so unusual for planes to fly overhead, but the approaching roar was so loud it was making the building vibrate.

What the...?

She had a fraction of a second to clutch Toby tighter and duck because that was what she always did when she sensed trouble. Keep your head out of the firing line...

All of her was in the firing line. So was all of the Namborra Plaza.

* * *

Luc had finally found something to do. A kid playing hockey after school, no shin pads and a ball hit with force. He’d been bleeding impressively as his teacher had tugged him through the emergency doors. The dressing they’d hopefully taped to his lower leg wasn’t doing it.

The kid was ashen and feeling nauseous, mostly from the sight of blood rather than the pain, Luc thought, but eight stitches, a neat dressing and a promise of a scar had him restored to boisterous. ‘You’re sure it’ll scar?’ he demanded.

‘Just a hairline,’ Luc told him.

‘You can’t make it bigger?’

Luc grinned. ‘You want me to re-stitch, only looser?’

The kid chuckled. A nurse appeared with soda and a sandwich and the kid attacked them as if there was no tomorrow.

‘Shin guards from now on,’ Luc told him, and then the beeper in his pocket vibrated.

The hospital used his phone—or the intercom—to page him. The vibrating pager was used for members of the Specialist Disaster Response.

Three buzzes, repeated.

Code One.

Yes!

Or...um...no. He shouldn’t react like this. Code One emergencies meant the highest level of need. It meant that somewhere people were in dire trouble. He should hate it, and a part of him did. After a multiple casualty event, he made use of the SDR’s debriefing service and sometimes even that didn’t stop him lying awake in the small hours, reliving nightmare scenarios.

But this was what he was trained for, and in a way it was what he needed.

One of the team’s more perceptive psychologists had had a go about it once, and for some reason—the nightmares must have been bad—he’d let her probe.

‘Your childhood was traumatic and your mum depended on you?’ In typical psych. fashion she’d put it back on him. ‘How did that make you feel?’

And for some reason he’d let himself think about it.

His mother had walked out on his father when he’d been a toddler. She’d gone from one tumultuous relationship to another, one crisis to another. His earliest memories... ‘Is there anything in the fridge? Go next door and ask Mrs Hobson for something. Tell her I’d kill for a piece of toast. And aspirins. Go on, Luc, Mummy will hug you if you get her an aspirin...’

More dramatically, he remembered a drunk and angry boyfriend tossing them out at midnight. He remembered his aunt arriving and scolding him. ‘What are you doing, boy, standing round doing nothing? Go back inside and demand he give your mother her belongings. Go on, Luc, he won’t hit you . Can’t you see your mother needs you? You’re no use to anyone if you can’t help.’

He’d been seven years old. Somehow he’d faced down his mother’s bullying boyfriend. He’d pushed what he could see into a suitcase and his aunt had reluctantly taken them in.

And then there’d been his cousin...

Don’t go there.

‘So you’ve always associated love with being needed?’ the psychologist had asked, but it was too close to the bone and Luc had ended the sessions.

Did he associate dependence with love? There was a germ of truth, he acknowledged, and maybe that’s why he and Beth...

But this was no time to think of his failed marriage. His pager was still buzzing.

Don’t run in the hospital.

His long-legged stride came close.

* * *

After the massive roar of the plane, the shock of impact, then the domino effect as the slabs of concrete smashed down around them, there was suddenly silence.

And then the car alarms started, reacting to the fall of debris.

Beth was on the ground—at least she thought it was the ground. Her back was hard against a pillar.

There was rubble all around her, almost head-high.

Something was across her leg. Something...

The pain was unbelievable.

But worse... Toby was silent.

The air was so thick she could hardly breathe.

Toby.

She was still cradling him against her chest. His little body was curved into hers.

His stillness...

‘Toby...’ Her voice came out as a strangled, dust-choked whisper. ‘Toby?’

And he moved, just a fraction, to bury his face deeper into her breast. A whimper...

Thank you. Oh, thank you.

Her hands were moving over him, searching, pushing away rubble.

No blood. No more whimpers as she ran her fingers over his body.

She was good at this, assessing in the dark. Too good. But her skill was useful now. Her fingers were telling her there seemed no damage. Her arms had been around his chest and his head. He seemed okay.

But for herself...

There was no damage to her hands—maybe scratches but nothing serious. But her leg...

She tried to pull it free from the rubble, and the pain that shot through her body was indescribable.

But Toby was her priority. She was wearing a T-shirt, the one she’d changed into in a rush after treating Felix. Somehow she managed to put Toby back from her, enough to wiggle the hem of the T-shirt up to her neck. Then she pulled it down again, all the way over Toby, turning it into a cocoon to protect him from the dust.

Still he didn’t move. The noise, the shock, the darkness must have sent him into panic and for most toddlers the reaction to blind panic was to freeze.

‘It’s okay,’ she whispered, but it wasn’t.

Breathing seemed almost impossible. Her mouth was full of grit. The dust wasn’t settling.

Toby was safe under her T-shirt, but what was the rule? In a crisis, first ensure your own safety. You’re no use to anyone if you’re dead.

Okay, Toby had come first but now she needed to focus on herself.

The leg... She needed to...

Breathe. That was top of the list.

She was cradling Toby with one arm. With the other she groped and found the canvas carryall she’d brought from crèche. The clothes she’d just taken off were in a plastic bag on the top. Maybe they were contaminated with meningitis virus but now wasn’t the time to quibble.