Kookaburra (formerly untitled) Ch.TWENTYTWO

“How long has he been like this?”

“I… I don’t know,” I stutter, trying to decipher the paramedic’s apparently concerned expression.

“We can try everything, kid,” says the other, fiddling with a medical kit, bent over Kaden’s body. “But he doesn’t have much of a chance.”

“What… what happened?”

I almost don’t want to know. But at the same time, I have to.

“You said he’s had eating disorders in the past?” I nod dumbly. I can’t think of anything else to do. “Well, if he’s had problems with bulimia and vomiting, it’s likely that there was extreme pressure on his heart. His pulse has slowed right down, but he’s still breathing. But it’s really important we get him to hospital as soon as possible.”

“You can ride with us, if you want.”

I nod again. I have to stay with him.

They load him up on a stretcher. His face looks so pale, his green eyes hidden behind drooped eyelids. All his beauty seems to have vanished, evaporated away from him. I can hardly believe the pile of bones and loose skin flopped over the flimsy nylon sheets is the same boy I fell in love with.

***

I’m growing to hate the sound of hospital ventilators, that annoyingly pitched beep underlying people’s false sincerity.

“Scott man, I’m sorry,” that’s Spencer. He’s been here for just about twenty minutes. He made a point of rushing down as soon as I called him. In that time, he’s apologised so many goddamn times that I just want to scream and smash his head against a wall. But I know he’s trying.

“I should’ve kept an eye on him, I’m such a fuckdamn idiot…” that’s Callum. He’s been blaming himself ever since we left the apartment and drove out of the estate in a crappy ambulance, its siren wailing pathetically, pulling attention to us.

I want to tell them that it’s not their faults, that they couldn’t have done anything, that even if they had, there’s nothing they can do now. But I just mumble incoherently, nodding slightly as I squeeze tighter on Kaden’s white hand. On those disgusting hospital sheets he looks five, even ten years younger than fifteen.

He stabilised two hours ago. I haven’t been able to leave him since.

He could only be sleeping, from the expression on his face, but he’s slipped into something far deeper. It’s not quite a coma, but it’s dangerously close, as the doctors keep telling me.

I want to see his eyes again. I want to watch them smile as he murmurs that he loves me. I don’t want to see pale eyelids, lips trapped under an oxygen mask.

“Scott,” says Callum, his voice coming from far away, “let’s go get coffee, you look wrecked.”

“No,” I mutter, “no, I’m not leaving Kaden.”

“Go, Scott,” says Matt, “I’ll stay here, he’ll be fine.” There’s kindness and sadness in his voice, mixed and messed together. When I turn to see his eyes, they read pity and you’re helpless and have my hope, you need it more.

I look at Callum instead. “Promise we won’t be long?”

“I promise.”

I turn back to Kaden’s cold face, squeezing his hand gently. I tell him over and over how much I love him without saying any words, in the hopes that telepathy works better when nothing else does. My muscles scream in progress as I push myself up from the plastic hospital chair, but I ignore them, following Callum out of the room. As I leave, Matt flashes me a smile, but it’s more full of false apology than feigned humour.

***

I’ve always hated coffee. The smell, the look, the taste, everything about it just screams GROSS!. But Cal tells me to drink it. So I do. I wince it down, because Cal tells me to. Because Cal wants me to. Because Cal needs me to. Because we all need something.

He stares at me as I drum my fingers on the table and look anywhere but into his eyes. Eventually, I give up, and glare back at him.

“What?” I spit, not finding the energy to yell.

“I didn’t finish telling you about Dad,” he says, simply. Because apparently life is simple now.

I break our gaze, trailing my finger around the clichéd table top pattern. “I don’t want to know any more.”

“Yeah, you do.” He sighs. “Look, Scott. Scott,” he rests his hand over mine, stopping my fingers from moving. I look into his shallow eyes, waiting for the bomb to explode onto me. “I know it’s horrible to know, to hear, but I have to tell you these things. If you never found out, I know you’d regret it somehow.” He takes a breath. A deep, deep breath. He’s preparing what he’s going to say, which words he’ll use to break down my dreams. This is my moment to back out. It’s do or die. Run or stay. But then it’s too late, and he starts talking again. He has the words. “A teacher at school noticed my bruises, and she… she called social services. The police came, right to our house. Seriously Scott, that was the best and worst night of my life. It was terrifying, absolutely bloody terrifying. All those men, wearing the same blue coat, they just burst in and grabbed him. Mum and I, we had to go down to the station, and we filled out all these witness forms, gave interviews, everything… it seemed like it was over, finally. Mum told me it was, and I believed it. But somehow, Dad got a lawyer, some twisted genius, and Mum refused to testify for some reason, and she wouldn’t let me talk in court because she didn’t want me to be there, and so… so, somehow, he just got away with it. The judge said he was innocent, and that was that. We had to act all happy family again, like nothing had happened at all, and he just stayed exactly the same for six more years, six horrible years. No-one at school cared, because apparently since the court said he didn’t do anything, he didn’t do anything, and still wasn’t. So I just had to put up with it, I couldn’t do anything. Until… until, one day, he went too far with Mum. I heard the yelling, and I heard the plates crash, and I heard her fall, and, and… and…” Callum’s voice is choked, hands gripped tight around his polystyrene cup. “And she died.”

“I… I thought she had cancer,” I murmur, despite myself.

“She… she did, and it was really bad for a while. Then, she went into remission. Complete remission. It was only a few weeks before she… before it happened. But you know Mum, she was never that strong, so when he pushed her-“ a strangled sob “-when he pushed her, on the stairs, she just fell. And that’s exactly what he said. ‘She just fell’.” I can see Callum squeeze up his eyes, denying them their freedom. “I was just so, so scared, because he fucking killed her, murdered her. I didn’t know what else he would do, what he would do to me because I knew what he had done. So, one day, when I knew he would be out, I sneaked home from school, packed a bag, and ran as far away as I could. I was terrified, not just for me, for you. I didn’t want anything to happen to you either, but you couldn’t have come. You just couldn’t. You wouldn’t have understood what was happening, what had happened. He’d shielded you too well. So I got away, and then I met Bert, shacked up with him and lived a fairly comfortable life of sex, drugs, and alcohol for five years, and then… then you came along, and all this happened.”

“Guess I really screwed your life up,” I mutter. Callum laughs. A bitter, dry laugh.

“You could say that. Or, you could say you were the best fucking thing that happened in all those five years, or maybe the only thing that made me proud of my family.” He smiles into my eyes for a moment. I feel a tad self-conscious. I’ve never been good with compliments. “But come on, how like is that?” he continues, sitting up.

I grin. Now, insults I can cope with. “Oh, ha ha.”

He smiles again. “Come on. We’d best get back to your loverboy.”