Week 6 – Andrew was in this coma.

Andrew was in this coma and the doctor said to me:

‘Get onto the bed with him. Talk to him. He needs to listen to you talk.’

I climbed onto the bed and watched Andrew breathe through that tube.

‘I can’t say anything. I just… he’s not really there.’

The doctor frowned, kept looking out the window at the street.

‘Sometimes…’ he stopped, cocked his head at the problem. ‘Sometimes it helps if I get into bed with you.’

‘I think I’d like that,’ I said.

The doctor got in and the three of us lay face up. The doctor made a clicking sound with his stethoscope. Andrew did nothing.

‘Did you ever have a song you sang while you did the ironing?’ asked the doctor.

‘Yes,’ I answered.

‘Will you tell Andrew that? Tell him how much you’d like to sing it to him?’

‘I don’t think so,’ I said. ‘The song didn’t mean much.’

I could hear the doctor breathing.

‘Did you have a code name for…. you know?’

I leant up. The doctor had made a circle with his thumb and forefinger and was putting another finger through it.

‘No. We didn’t go in for that sort of thing.’

The doctor sighed. He sat up. His shirt had come undone at the bottom.

‘Do you hear that?’ he asked.

An ice cream van was chiming outside. The chimes were too slow.

‘I’m nipping out for a cornetto,’ he said.

The doctor was just on his way out of the door when I called out.

‘Doctor?’

He poked his head back around. ‘Yes?’

‘Can I have a flake?’