The Results
by Rue Baldry
A lot of fuss being made about a little cough. Just a summer cold; that’s all. Hanging on through autumn, it is, but nowt to it. After everything he’s survived, it’d be mad if it’s this that sees him off. Albert lights up a cigarette. He should have time to finish it before Edgar gets home and starts nagging him about it. Albert has few enough comforts. Stopping now would do no good anyroad. Damage is done. Been them three years down pit what done it. Miners’ ailment it is: lung disease. Good thing the Great War came along when it did and Albert enlisted so young, got himself into the trenches, away from the coal dust.
He pulls the appointment card out of his inside jacket pocket and runs its corner under his thumbnail to work out some boot polish that’s got itself stuck in there. His name is typed on this side of it. He doesn’t turn it over. He knows that on the front there’s the name of a hospital consultant and 2:35 p.m., Thursday, October 14th, 1965. He’s been pretending not to recognize the name of the department rubber-stamped over the bottom right hand corner. He stuffs it back out of sight.
He’d like a cup of tea with his smoke, but not so much that he can be bothered standing up and walking into the kitchen to make it. All this sitting around he does these days is making him lazy. Be better to keep busy. Keep his mind off things.
It’s more than likely a mistake. They’ll get up to the hospital and be sent away again for wasting doctor time and Health Service money. His notes will have got mixed up with someone else’s. That’ll be it. There’s not much wrong with Albert. Edgar should have got him some better cough syrup. That’s all.
Edgar is still in his consulting room at the surgery, loitering over the paperwork for his last patient of the morning. He knows Albert is sitting at home waiting for him. He knows he’ll fret if Edgar is late back. He can’t bring himself to take that first step yet, though: out of the surgery, out of the morning, towards home, Albert, and then the hospital.
Last time they were there, the respiratory consultant told them that Albert’s test results would be sent to his GP. Edgar hadn’t owned up to being that GP. He was just the silent friend sitting beside the old man with no family. They hadn’t owned up to being all the family either of them had ever needed, either. No point causing offense like that.
When the letter came, it was from Oncology. Edgar should have handed it over to Jean, the efficient receptionist they’d employed out of secretarial school, should have asked her to telephone Mr. Beck to make an appointment to come in and see his GP to discuss the results properly. He shouldn’t have shoved the letter, unopened, into his back pocket.
The best thing, of course, would have been if he’d handed the case over to one of his colleagues in the group practice as soon as Albert had shown symptoms. That way Edgar could have supported Albert, worrying and grieving like wives did, instead of trying to doctor him. But it is too late now.
They ate in silence on the evening after that letter’s arrival. Albert’s hands were shaking when he opened the peaches. Edgar took over the tin opener to do the evaporated milk tin, concentrating hard on the lights reflected in the metal disc as he made it sedately spin.
“It just needs a hole, not t’whole lid off.”
Albert slammed Edgar’s bowl in front of him so hard a splash of syrup, with milk curdled through it, landed on the tablecloth.
“Go on, then. Say it.”
“Say what?” Edgar crammed his mouth with peach.
“Whatever it is you’ve not said. I’m not having this all night.” Albert waited for Edgar to swallow.
Edgar is usually good at breaking bad news. He is sensitive, gentle, careful with patients and their families. He stared at the ceiling, then, though, as he stated flatly: “You’ve got lung cancer.”
Albert dabbed his fingers at the peach syrup soaking through to the table.
After a while, he whispered, “So what do we do then?”
He’d assisted Edgar with enough cases to know full well. Edgar watched his own reflection distorting in his spoon.
“Modern medicine, though,” Albert said. “Bloody wonders. There’ll be summ’at.”
Edgar got up and walked behind Albert’s chair and put his arms around him. He’d felt the bones of Albert’s shoulders.
Edgar should be leaving work now; Albert is waiting on his own at home. He walks out through the nearly empty waiting room, pausing for an unnecessary moment in the doorway, pretending to assess the weather.
Albert is grinding his butt into the ashtray at that moment. He’s thinking that he could empty that and rinse it and Edgar might not even know he’s smoked. He wonders what the hell’s keeping Edgar anyway. They’ve an appointment to make.
Is it too early in the day for a whisky? Just to settle his nerves. Not that he’s rattled.
He’s had a good enough innings. Everything after the Great War has been bonus in a way. Think of all he’d have missed if he’d been blown up then. Doesn’t mean he’s ready to leave Edgar just yet. He stares at the blackened water running off the ashtray into the sink.
He doesn’t bother looking at the clock when he hears Edgar come in, just says, “You’re late.”
“Not really. Are you ready?”
How could he be ready for where they’re going? “I’ve been ready to go this half hour, waiting on you.”
“Well that was silly, wasn’t it? I told you when I’d be home. Get in the car. Have you got your appointment card?”
“’Course I have.” It is sat over his chest like a shadow.
Edgar drops Albert at the main hospital entrance and drives off to find a side street to park in. Albert decides against having another smoke. The entrance hall smells of coffee, which isn’t the right smell for a hospital. There must be a stall or a café. Some well-meaning women. Albert queues at the reception desk to show them his card and get directions.
Up the stairs, it is. Somebody hasn’t thought that through. Wheezy old lungs dragging their bodies up a set of stairs. He waits for Edgar at the bottom of them. Edgar looks like he might ask something, like how Albert is feeling, perhaps, so Albert stomps up them as fast and loud as he can. Nothing wrong with Albert’s lungs.
Harsh, white light reflects off walls glossed as green as last gasps. There are posters describing all the symptoms you wouldn’t want to have and doors whose plaques announce doctors you don’t want an appointment with. Wooden chairs, with their backs against the walls, fill the spaces between the doors. Albert settles down near the consultant name on his appointment card. Edgar catches him up and sits beside him.
Away down the silent, full corridor, a chair leg squeaks on the linoleum, which is mostly grey, speckled with black and brown and occasional red. Speckles are good for hiding dirt; Albert approves. One of the strip lights buzzes and flickers. It flickers again. A few patients look up. The rest keep their heads bent over the coats on their laps. On and off it goes. A bit of both. On some, off some. Not one thing or the other. It machine-guns. One nor t’other. Those bulbs can go on like that for days before giving up: not bright, not dead. A normal light bulb shines strong until that day you press the switch and, with a small explosion, it’s done for. Dark. Time to get a replacement out of the pantry. That’s not so bad. Not like this flickering strip light with its drone noise and its on-a-bit, off-a-bit.
Albert stands up. In the corner of his eye, he’s aware of Edgar’s head turning to him. Albert’s soles make a wet sound on the linoleum. He taps the side of his fist firm on the end of the light casing. It goes off again then on again. Up this close, he can see the plastic yellowing and the layer of fly corpses inside. Albert hits the end of the light again. It comes on. It stays on. Fixed. Just like that.
He shoves his hands back into his pockets and heads slowly back to his chair, thinking about all them dead flies. Brittle, they’d be. Dried up.
Edgar’s watching him. What was the point of them rushing to get to this stinking corridor on time, when the doctors always run late? A woman coughs somewhere behind him. Poor cow. Much good it’s doing his summer cold, being surrounded by all these coughers and sniffers. It was coming here for them tests that’s paggered him. He feels the familiar deep thickness in his chest. His own cough fermenting. It’s a summer cold, is all. It was the mining.
A bag of bones in grey skin and a coat shuffles out of the door next to Edgar. Does that make it Albert’s turn already? He feels the burn of a drip of nerve piss at his tip. Too soon. Edgar stands up, holding both of their coats over one of his arms.
Maternity wards are so full of flowers and hope that body and disinfectant smells can be ignored. Male wards usually smell of testosterone and sweat. The ward they’ve put Albert in has a putrefyingly sweet odor which infuses Edgar’s clothes and comes home with him every evening. He tries to carry some crisp, January air in with him, but it dissipates as soon as he passes the first squat radiator.
He usually brings books but he’s not sure why. That’s what he’d want if it was him stuck in a hospital bed. Albert’s never been one for wasting time with reading, though. Today Edgar brings a pack of cards and some fruit in a bag, as well as the newspaper under his arm.
Albert is sitting up, looking out of the window at his view of another part of the hospital: new concrete with symmetrical square windows blocked by identical blinds.
Edgar sits in the high-backed, beige chair. He pours Albert a glass of water.
“Sorry I wasn’t here sooner.”
“Visiting’s just started.”
“They look pretty settled in.”
“Aye, they’ve been here for hours. But that’s family visiting; that’s different,” Albert says. “Must be nearly time for me cup of tea.”
“You’ll enjoy that.” He can hear how stupid he sounds.
“You know me. I like a brew.” Which doesn’t mean much either.
Sometimes the man Edgar’s always loved is still startlingly clear to him, but there are other times, like now, when he struggles to find Albert in this yellow-skinned, ancient waif.
“Don’t suppose you’ve brought me ciggies?”
“You’re not allowed. I got an Express. There’s a match report. England against Poland.”
Albert settles back on his pillows. “I’m dying for a smoke.” He wheezes and his shoulders shake. It takes Edgar a while to realise that he’s laughing. Edgar chuckles in spite of himself. It’s the wrongness which is so funny. Looking into each other’s faces while they try to suppress their giggles, makes them worse. Other visitors look over at them, more uncomprehending than disapproving.
They are both shoving the thin, worn stuff of the NHS blanket into their mouths, tears on their faces, when the Sister comes in. She’s new here. Edgar bites the insides of his lips, pulls in a deep breath, and wipes his face. He is expected a scolding, but she smiles at him.
“Are you a relative, Mr, erm…?”
“Doctor Lancaster,” Albert corrects.
“I’m just a friend,” Edgar says.
“Ah. Do you know when Mr. Mere’s family will be coming in?”
“I’ve not got any,” Albert says.
“None?”
“I’m an old man, I’ve lived through two world wars.”
“It’s good you’ve got a friend then, if you’ve no relatives.”
“Nobody to miss me when this sees me off.”
Edgar’s gut spasms. He can’t imagine it yet. The house is cold and quiet enough with Albert being in here. His throat closes over. How will he carry on after? Gravity loses touch with him. Head spinning, frozen in his extremities, he clutches at Albert’s fingers on the blanket, but Albert snatches them back. Not in public.
Old habits, Edgar tells himself. Not ashamed of him. Ancient reticence grown in old soldier’s bones. There are children present.
The Sister is hovering with her sheaf of notes.
“You need someone to discuss me with?” Albert asks her.
Edgar inhales. Steadily, he says, “I’m his GP. Will I do?”
She looks relieved.
“Don’t bother telling me, will yer? I’m only the one who’s suffering.”
“There’s nothing to worry about,” the Sister says with a crisp smile.
Edgar follows her into the corridor to hear that Albert’s condition is deteriorating. He nods. He tamps his tears down.
Back with Albert, the silence goes on too long, so Edgar picks up the newspaper. They were good at silences once.
“The World Cup draw will take place tonight at the Royal Garden Hotel,” he reads out.
“Wonder who we’ll get. Be nice to make a good show, with being hosts.”
“The sixteen teams will be divided into four groups.”
“Whoever we play, our Jimmy Greaves’ll see them off. He’s recovered well from that hepatitis early in the season. He’ll be proper fit by the summer. They’ll show the England matches on the television. Don’t s’pose you’ll care to watch any of them with me, will you?”
Edgar swallows. He squeezes his eyes together. “Group two will be played in the Midlands,” he continues.
It is never properly dark on the ward. Other patients snore. One whimpers. Morphine blur. Curtains drawn open. Food in his mouth. Albert swallows though he isn’t hungry for it. Wires. Tubes, clear bags of stuff above him. Injections. Mask. Cuffs tight then loose round his arm. Cold stethoscope. He drifts from orange, flickering dreams to the bland-painted walls. Shiny. Sensible, is that. Washable.
He likes to doze to Edgar’s voice reading match reports, relaxing into the familiarity like bathwater. He always wakes to silence or busy strangers poking at him.
He keeps his smile inside when he thinks on Edgar, because nobody must ever know. Ginger belly fuzz. Pears soap. Cricket whites. Chapped lips and stubble. Blasted oak. Vertebra by vertebra. Ovaltine.
Just a summer cold, that’s lasted all winter and hung on through another year, but that’s all. It’s daft, them making him stay in bed. It’s the injections that make him sleepy. He could do with keeping busy. Keep his mind off things.
“I’m sorry.”
Edgar frowns at her; they stand still in the corridor like that.
“You’re here to visit Mr. Mere?” A light brown curl has escaped from her cap. The strip light reflects in her spectacles. Thick, plastic frames in a pattern of browns and black. Dandruff on the shoulder of her uniform.
“Albert Mere. Yes.”
“No. I’m sorry. He’s not up to seeing any visitors today.”
“When will he be…?”
She shakes her head. “I’m sorry.”
“But I need to see him. He needs me there.”
“Only family from now on.”
He has an answer for that one: “I’m his GP.”
“I know. But you’re not employed by the hospital, so I’m afraid—”
“He worked for me for forty years.”
“Nonetheless, it’s hospital policy. Family only from this stage.”
Tortoiseshell: that’s what they call that pattern on her glasses frames. “He doesn’t have any family.”
“I’m sorry.”
Edgar closes his eyes. He wants to ask how long Albert has left, although he knows it’s a stupid question. His throat closes on the words and refuses to let them through. He wants symptoms. He wants to know what happened overnight. He notices that he’s shaking. His cracked voice whispers: “Fifty years together. I need to see him.”
“Not now.” Her voice is firmer. “Go home, Doctor Lancaster, we will telephone the surgery with any news.”
She lets go of his arm, steps back. She adds, softer, “You look like you could do with a nice cup of tea.”
Edgar looks over her shoulder at the door to the ward Albert is on. The angle is wrong; he can’t see anything through the glass panel but a slice of a bed curtain. Never mind a cup of tea, he could do with holding Albert’s hand.
Where is Edgar? There’s a patch of sunlight on the bed curtain. Murmurings and footfalls. Visitors.
Albert’s chest don’t half hurt. Breathing is a pain. Have to keep doing it, though. Breathing. Where is Edgar? He’d been such a scrawny lad. Tall. That hair. Albert can remember him with leafless winter trees behind him. So young, they’d been. Low winter sun.
What month is it now? Is that January sunlight on the curtain, or is it spring?
Explosions far away. Albert lays his head back on a pile of onions, watching stretcher-bearers running, enjoying the quiet while it lasts.
He has to keep breathing until Edgar gets here, then Edgar will know what to do to make everything better. Like nightmares. Albert struggles to remember how Edgar looks nowadays. Most of that ginger hair has fallen out or faded. Shame. But he’s still good to look at. Where is he? Too noisy. Chest hurts. Albert can’t think properly. Sleep – or something deeper – is pulling him.
There are recruitment posters for Ireland, but Albert won’t volunteer. He will wait around camp until he gets put on a troop carrier heading home. Not back to his pit village. He doesn’t want to see Mam.
Proudly puffing his chest up for the medal to be pinned onto it, Dawes is wheeled out by a starched nurse, with a blanket over his stumps. He looks scrubbed and happy; not like Dawes at all.
A nurse comes through the curtains. Albert could ask her where Edgar is. Talking needs breath. He tries to pull in a full lung’s worth of air. But he mustn’t ask. It’s a secret. He mustn’t tell anyone he wants Edgar’s hand.
The breathing sets off a coughing fit. Blackness pulls itself over him from both sides. Albert won’t see Flinter again in heaven because Albert isn’t headed there. He needs to sit up. He can’t sit up. Just a summer cold. Drowning.
Sat on the back of a rickety truck, all squashed in and juddering bones against each other, they are driving through Étaples at last. All them tents. They’ve been promised a ship at the end of the ride, but he’ll not believe it until it’s there in front of him.
The nurse is asking him something. Noise without meaning. Where the hell is Edgar? She is falling away, falling further and further away.
That dappling light moves and breaks. Reflected on water. High, grey, sides of a ship beside him. Shuffling forward. Following the back in front of him. Lurching sway of a gangplank.
Albert clenches his fingers. He squeezes where nobody’s hand is. Even the pain in his chest is going. Everything is blotted with dark and silence.
The telephone rings at a quarter past four. Edgar looks at the clock when it rings. Quarter past four. The fifth of May. He sees two empty teacups on the table, beside an open tin of dried milk. He doesn’t remember putting them there. He walks past them to get to the telephone. It takes him a while to reach it. Ringing and ringing. His muscles have seized up in the armchair.
Jean sounds upset but he only realises that afterwards. She’s good at keeping calm, an asset to the practice. All she says is, “The hospital telephoned, Doctor Lancaster…” before he is dropping the handset. It’s dark outside when he replaces it, with his palms and face soaked and the muscles of his chest sore.
Rue Baldry lives in Yorkshire, Great Britain. Her previous short stories have been published in journals such as Squawk Back, Crossways, Litro, MIR Online, Ambit, Postbox, Backstory, The First Line, Mslexia, and The Honest Ulsterman, and shortlisted for the Reader Berlin and Odd Voice Out competitions. She has an MA in Creative Writing from Leeds University, was a 2015 Jerwood/Arvon mentee and the 2017 Bridge Awards Emerging Writer. Her novels have come second in the Yeovil, been longlisted for the Caledonian, Bridport and First Page prizes and shortlisted for the Flash 500 competition.
Photo by Daan Stevens on Unsplash