Narrow Escape (25 page)

“Oh yes?” I tried not to wince. Geoff could get a little over-inventive when he put his mind to it.

“I'm going to need about eight foot of ducting, an electric fan, a chimney, and a switch.” He gave me a great big smile.

“That sounds a little Heath Robinson,” I said.

“He's my hero,” Geoff laughed. “But I promise there won't be any pulleys or strings and it will do what it's supposed to even if it does look a little insane.”

“Oh good.” I wandered away to put the kettle on. “As long as it looks insane that will be all right, can you make it hiss and rattle as well?”

“I don't think I'm going to have to ‘make' it hiss and rattle,” Geoff said, “It's going to do that all by itself and smoke as well I should think.” He rifled through my bag until he came up with a debit card. He waved it at me over the top of the partition. “So, shall I buy this?”

I nodded and tried not to calculate how much we had left in the bank. “We can't go without it,” I said. “Exactly how much have we spent so far?”

Geoff pointed to a spread-sheet illuminated on the screen.

I had to swallow hard: Batteries – £600, inverter – £380, battery charger – £410, new lights – £130 and the cable and connectors and other bits and pieces added another £130. Add £500 to that list and it had cost us a cool £2,110. This was not a cheap transformation, I made a sort of strangled ‘blarg' noise. All that money, we were supposed to be sprucing the outside this year; that money would have gone a long way towards a new paint job.

Geoff grinned and, studying the screen, began the process of spending another chunk of money. “Look on the bright side,” he said, “at least we will never actually ‘need' a landline again.”

“This thing better be a pretty colour.” I sniffed. “And it better have flashing blue lights and look really good.”

“Don't worry, my love.” Geoff gave me a happy smile. “If it makes you feel better I'll paint it red and white candy stripes if you want me to.”

As it turned out he didn't need to. A huge box was delivered within a couple of days and, all excited about his new toy, he called me down to the car park to have a look at it and to help him carry it. Well, there was no way you could miss the thing, it was huge. Squatting on the gravel it stood at least half a metre high and was the same width and length.

“Erm, Geoff?” I stared at the bright red shiny object. It looked very confusing; there were lots of levers and switches. “Are you going to be able to fit that in the engine room? It's really much bigger than I expected it was going to be.”

Geoff frowned at it. “It's really heavy as well.”

“Is it?” I stepped over a puddle and tried to lift one end. “Oh good grief,” I said, “What does this thing actually weigh?”

Geoff shrugged. “Eighty-odd kilos.”

We were going to need a lot more help to get this up the steep hill between us and the boat.

Leaving him staring at his new toy I went and began the process of rallying our son. He was particularly unhappy to be kicked out of the boat and asked to go out into the rain to drag a heavy machine up a hill. Consequently he spent a long time telling me exactly why he shouldn't have to do it.

Grabbing the wheel barrow I followed the whining and moaning down the hill. Geoff looked up as I approached and frowned at my hopeful conveyance. “I'm not sure that's strong enough to take the weight,” he said.

“It's all we've got,” I said. “There's no way it would fit on the sack truck so we're just going to have to hope.”

Geoff looked unconvinced.

“Well, you come up with an idea then.” I knew I sounded more than a little terse but the freezing rain was running down my neck and my feet were rapidly turning into little blocks of ice. My love for the great outdoors, never that huge, was rapidly dissipating.

Geoff shrugged. “I thought we'd just carry it up.”

I stared at him until he turned away, busying himself with straps and clips.

It took all three of us to load the generator onto the wheelbarrow and I winced, holding my breath as the front tyre flattened and bulged with the weight. Luckily the wheelbarrow was vaguely box shaped and, with Sam and I taking a side each and Geoff on the handles we made our sloppy, soggy, and slippy way up the hill.

It was a slow job and I began to feel as though we were taking two steps forward and one step back. The rain, which had eased as we were getting the generator loaded, now returned with a vengeance. Sam's yelps of wet indignation could just be heard over the suddenly gusting winds. I didn't blame him, I wanted to bail on this little job as well. Near the top of the hill the incline became steeper and Geoff decided that we should swap jobs. If I held the handles of the wheel-barrow then he could use his greater strength to pull the whole thing up and over the pits and troughs that the continuous rain had created over the last two months.

I was too wet and cold to argue. Easing up the handles on the wheelbarrow I waited for the signal and we all began to move forward again. “One big push,” Geoff yelled over the rain. “We've got a bit of a lip here.”

I nodded and clamped my lips together in an effort to stop my teeth chattering. Pushing hard I felt the front of the barrow rise as it crested the edge of the little dip and then I was pulled forward as the wheelbarrow rolled away from me. As the wheel reached the bottom of the dip two things happened simultaneously. One, the barrow tipped towards Sam who, being well versed in the art of self-preservation, didn't hold on to it, he just got out of the way. Two, the tyre, already under extreme and unsafe amounts of pressure, merely gave up the ghost and exploded with a loud bang.

Convinced that the generator was falling, Sam leaped clear. In the dark he fell straight over the edge of the steep path and disappeared into the wet gloom with a yelp. Head over heels he rolled down the bank back toward the car park. Luckily the thick bushes and undergrowth stopped him from falling very far. Unluckily, the dense nettles that were hiding in that undergrowth were the first plants he encountered as he tumbled head first into the soaking greenery.

For a moment there was silence. Then, from the wet darkness came the voice of a young teen making up swear words because he knew he wasn't allowed to use real ones. There was a huge amount of ‘fooping nettles' and ‘flubbing gyp this really hurts'.

Geoff and I looked at each other. “You OK, Sam?” I called into the dark.

“No I'm really, really not.” There was the sound of crunching and a few more yelps as our youngest staggered about in the rather aggressive and painful foliage. “Where are you?” he called.

I finally had the presence of mind to use the torch on my phone. I shone the light down the slope and found Sam almost up to his waist in nettles, hemlock, thistles, cow parsley, and long grass. He had the slightly flat-lipped look of a young man at the end of his tether. He would have looked a lot angrier if his face hadn't already started to swell. It's obviously difficult to look appropriately furious when you resemble an overfed hamster.

Ignoring the wheelbarrow for a moment, Geoff and I teetered on the edge of the slope. We managed to reach Sam's outstretched hands and, between us, pulled our irritated and itchy son back to the path. I experienced that moment of severe indecision when you really want to laugh at someone but you just know that if you give in to that need you are NEVER going to hear the last of it. I sucked my teeth in an effort to keep my face straight. Sam, who knows me far too well, just stared at me and waited for my façade to crack. Luckily I was saved by Geoff who was asking for help to lift the generator.

Giving up on the broken wheelbarrow, it took us another half an hour and at least another ten gallons of water down respective necks to get the heavy monstrosity back to the boat. Geoff, although he kept his cool and was very patient with us, must have wished three times over for someone with actual working muscles to be on the other end of the heavy machine.

As we dragged it on to some paving slabs and covered it with a tarpaulin, Sam made a break for the boat. I could hear his wails as he caught sight of himself in a mirror. “I think I'll just stay out here,” I said to Geoff.

He laughed, “Come on coward.”

Sam was a horrible sight. Most of his face was covered in nettle rash, and the bits that the nettles had missed had been stabbed by thistles. As we walked into the boat he was picking bits of hostile greenery out of his skin and complaining loudly at every thorn and itch.

“Nature hates me,” he said.

“No it doesn't.” It sounded hollow trying to reassure someone who spent from March to October hiding from all types of pollen.

“Yes it does.” He rubbed at his face with hands that were also swollen and red. “When I leave home I'm going to live at the highest point of the largest city I can find. I'm never going to have pot plants, not even plastic ones because, knowing my luck, I'll probably be allergic to them as well.”

I hustled him down toward the bathroom. “Take a shower; make it cool and just let the water run over your face.”

He glared at me for a moment before shaking his head in exasperation. “Mother,” he said, “I've just spent the last half an hour standing in the rain. I think I've had enough of cold water running over my face.”

“Then go and have a warm shower,” I said. “At least you'll end up dry and clean and we can assess the damage properly.”

Sam rolled his eyes but stamped off to have a shower.

Geoff dumped all his wet clothes into the hamper and staggered about in a set of towels. “Is a shower going to actually make any difference to him?” He shivered and rubbed at his soaked hair. “That thing was heavier than expected,” he said.

“No, a shower isn't going to make any difference at all.” I started dumping my own soaking clothing. “The only thing it will do is warm him up. It probably wouldn't have been so bad if you'd found someone that could actually use their arms. Sam and I, even together, don't really make up a strong person.”

Geoff grinned, “Mother and Son,” he said. “Matching marshmallow people. Never mind, it's here now.”

I nodded and stuck my head in the fridge looking for something to make for dinner. “I didn't expect it to be that big,” I said.

“Neither did I.” The words were muttered very quietly from over by the computer. I decided not to comment.

”Have you seen the latest email?” Geoff looked up from the laptop as I was busy skinning salmon filets. Mortimer was enjoying the skins as he always does. I swear it was the fish oil that made him so shiny and fit.

I groaned. “Nope.” I wasn't even sure I wanted to know what it contained but decided that I might as well have all the bad things in one evening. “What is it ‘this' time?”

Geoff laughed. “Evidently, due to an act of ‘apparent vandalism' the shower block is out of commission for the foreseeable future.

Maybe I'd been wrong, maybe some of the boaters had taken out their righteous ire on one of the buildings. Try as I might, I just couldn't see it. However, I'd been wrong before so I accepted the email at face value. “Oh dear, I wonder who decided to attack the toilets.”

Geoff looked up at me. “I don't think anyone did.”

“But …”

“Do you remember that day we were looking at that pipe that comes out from the toilets, the main soil pipe?” He grinned at me.

“Yes, I think so; you and Drew were saying what a horrible shoddy job they'd been fobbed off with with with.” I laughed at the poorly remembered quote from a Flanders and Swan song.

“Well it looks as though it finally fell off,” he said. “Drew was telling me about it and as he said, ‘What self-respecting boater is going to get themselves covered in human poo just to irritate ‘her'? We spend most of our lives trying to avoid that sort of thing.”

This should have made me laugh but it didn't. “So she's just immediately gone for vandalism by one of us instead of actually investigating what happened?”

Geoff shrugged. “I could be wrong,” he said. “But it certainly looks that way.”

“Wow,” I watched Mortimer wipe his fishy whiskers on his bed, oh great, now I was going to have to wash that as well as all our soaked clothes. “She really doesn't think highly of us at all, does she?”

“I suppose I can see her point.” Geoff was always the one to see both sides of an argument.

Luckily, before I could say something mean Sam emerged from the shower. Geoff and I both fell silent as we stared at him. His face was swollen and his eyes half closed. I winced and the conversation finished as I went to look for the calamine lotion.

Chapter Eleven:
Rain, Wind, Mud, And Hail. All Well Thought Out Plans Now Fail.

Geoff handed me a cup of coffee before staring out at the sleet. “This is ridiculous,” he said.

“Umph.” I felt terrible. Dizzy, heart pounding and nauseated, I put the coffee onto the kitchen worktop. “Phew, I really don't think I can drink that,” I said.

Geoff frowned in my direction. “Are you feeling all right?” He wandered over and peered at me. “Frankly you look a bit green.”

“Oh, thank you,” I said and flopped onto the sofa. “I didn't sleep very well last night. Maybe I'm just feeling the pinch.”

“Maybe.” Geoff grabbed a pillow and putting it onto the arm of the chair patted it. “Why don't you just collapse here for a bit? The weather is foul and you might as well just take a day for yourself.”

A wave of nausea rolled over me followed swiftly by a wave of guilt. “But we've got to sort out the engine room and get that damn great generator installed. I know there's no room for both of us in there, but if you're doing that I ought to, at least, be doing something useful.”

Geoff sidled about, fidgeting with the cushion and patting the dog, he seemed to have something on his mind. Finally he looked up and frowned. “How are you feeling about a bit more bad news?” He gave me a cheesy and hopeful grin.

Taking advantage of the cushion I keeled over sideways and closed my eyes, waiting for the rolling waves of nausea to subside. “Hit me with it,” I said, “I'm too sick to make much of a fuss, this might be the best chance you've got of me just taking it on the chin.”

“Well,” Geoff studied me for a moment and then handed me a bucket. “You really look terrible, do you think you're actually going to be sick?”

I shook my head and then wished I hadn't. “No, I don't think so, I just feel really odd. It's like I'm fizzing on the inside.” I tried to describe what was making me feel quite so bad and that was the best I could come up with.

“OK …” Geoff studied his fingers for a moment. “I called the lock-keeper at Salters Lode yesterday.”

“Hmm mmm?” I closed my eyes and watched the pretty display of lights that were being splashed across the inside of my eyelids.

“There's a good chance that we won't make it through until spring.” Geoff clipped the sentence off short and stood back obviously waiting for the explosion.

There was a moment of utter panic and then my brain shut down, I couldn't be bothered. “Bummer,” I said.

There was a long silence from my husband and I cracked open an eyelid to find him studying me.

“Bummer? Really, that's all you can think of to say?” he said.

I shrugged. “What am I supposed to say?” I could feel little sparklers going off in my chest and everything had begun to ache, even my hair hurt. “I'm sorry, do you think we could stop talking now and could you close all the curtains, the light hurts.”

Geoff peered at me again. “You don't have any rashes anywhere, do you?” He rolled the leg of my pyjama trousers up and studied my leg and then looked at my stomach. “Does your neck hurt?”

“Geoff, everything hurts, I don't have meningitis, I really love you but please, please go away.”

Geoff leaned over and kissed my cheek. “OK.”

I heard him get up from where he'd been kneeling beside me and wander off down the boat. “Sam!” He shouted at our youngest who was still lolling around in bed. “I need you to check on your mother every half an hour, she's not well. Wake her up, make sure she talks to you. If there is anything even a little odd you come and get me immediately, OK?”

I heard Sam mumble an agreement and listened to them setting multiple alarms. They managed to get into an involved discussion about what constituted
odd
and they even managed to get into an argument over what exactly half an hour meant. I didn't hear who won, I slipped off into sleep.

Sam took his duties as overseer very seriously and every half an hour, on the dot, I was woken up and ‘peered' at. This carried on until I threatened to throw him into the river and he grudgingly allowed me a whole hour of uninterrupted sleep. I felt a little better after lunch and was allowed to sit up on the sofa and watch DVDs. Sam decided that I really wasn't capable of watching anything taxing so I was treated to
Pokémon: The Movie
and
Monster House
. Not what I would have chosen but he was right, it certainly wasn't taxing.

For dinner that evening, my two main men decided that neither of them really wanted to eat what the other could cook so Geoff was sent out for a Chinese takeaway. This was an unusual treat for Sam and, after stealing half my quilt he proceeded to inform me that this was one of the best days ever and could I stay sick? It took him about a minute to realise what he'd said and he was still trying to dig himself out of his verbal hole when his dad stepped back into the boat.

Later, when Sam had gone to bed, Geoff tried to get to the bottom of my malaise. “Sore throat?” he asked.

“Erm no.”

“Coughing?”

“No.”

“Sneezing?”

“No.” I shrugged. “I just feel really tired, I ache all over, I feel as though I'm looking up at the world through water and I have this sort of fizzing sensation in my chest and neck. I don't have a temperature. Sam had taken great delight in checking this earlier, he loves gadgets and the ear thermometer definitely classed as a thing to be played with.

Geoff shook his head. “Time to go to the quack's, maybe?”

“Probably not.” I really hate going to the doctor's, I always feel such a fraud. Seventy per cent of my ailments all seem to disappear as soon as I walk through the door and it's almost guaranteed that two or three days after any visit I end up with some sort of cold or sickness bug. “Let me sleep on it and we'll just see how I am in the morning, a good night's sleep and it will probably all just go away.”

I slept for twelve hours that night and even Mortimer trampling me in an effort to get into the bed didn't wake me up. Geoff told me the next day that he'd woken up to find Mort lying on my chest and staring intently into my face. I was actually quite glad I hadn't woken up and seen that, I'd have probably had a heart attack.

I was a little confused when I woke up the next morning and, thinking over the day before, ran through that sort of body check some people do. Arms and legs all in working order? Check. Headache? No. Ha I was right, I was fine.

I was reminded that I'd avoided food the previous day by a good deep rumble from a rather sad and empty stomach. Feeling the need for tea I jumped out of bed intending to head for the kettle.

As soon as I gained my feet the world tilted sideways. It was an odd sensation, I felt as though someone had made one of my legs shorter than the other and staggering around like a haggis on a flat surface I bounced, first off the bed, then off the wall, I hit my forehead on the wet window and ended up sitting back on the bed. Looking up I could see where my forehead had made a neat oval mark in the condensation.

I ran through my internal checks again. Well this was very odd, there really didn't seem to be anything wrong at all. Deciding that I must have just tripped I got to my feet again. I actually managed to take two whole steps before the world tilted once more and I found myself face down on the kitchen floor.

The crash woke Geoff and Mortimer. The dog jumped off the bed and stood over me, his ears pricked and making soft growly noises in the back of his throat, for once he didn't trample me but he did keep poking me as he gently snuffled around my neck. I rolled over on to my back and, grabbing his collar managed to get myself into a sitting position. Sometimes it's useful to have a dog that has the shape and consistency of a sturdy log.

“Marie?” Geoff hopped over the end of the bed and helped me back to my feet. I managed to stand up and then sagged again. “Whoa!” he said as I slithered down his leg and ended up sitting on the floor again. “What's the matter?”

I giggled. I really couldn't help myself. I felt as though I'd had a bottle of vodka for breakfast. “I can't stand up,” I said.

“Hmm.” Geoff studied me for a moment. “Let's get you off the floor shall we?”

I nodded happily. I wasn't really worried by all this but all the tilting and turning was beginning to make me feel a little sick and I had a new headache brewing behind my left eye.

I grabbed the end of the bed and, with Geoff's help, managed to hoist myself back onto the bed. As soon as I was flat again everything settled down.

“I think I'm going to take the day off today,” Geoff picked up his phone. “We really need to get you to the doctor's. We'll drop Sam off at school on the way.”

The car journey wasn't pleasant and, by the time we arrived at the surgery, all I wanted to do was lie down again. The doctor was a little confused and you know there's likely to be trouble when they slip out for a moment and come back with someone older and wiser.

They walked me around the office, made me do odd exercises with my fingers, shone lights into my eyes, and made me look in all directions, all the time talking in hushed tones and ticking things off on a sheet. Eventually the older doctor sat down in front of me and gave me a big bright smile.

Uh oh, I thought, doctors rarely smile unless they have bad news. The rule of thumb goes: the bigger the smile the more awful the news.

“Now then, Marie,” he said.

Oh yes. This was definitely not looking good.

“We need to make some telephone calls and we're going to try to get you up to the hospital for an MRI. Nothing to worry about but we just need to make sure that there's nothing sinister going on.” He gave me another big smile.

I leant back in the chair. It was a lot easier than trying to hold myself upright. “You think I've got a brain tumour, don't you?” I said. I'd worked at the hospital for long enough that I knew why they were worried.

The smile fell away and he nodded. “It's a possibility,” he said. “At the very least we need a neurologist to check you over.”

Well, this on top of everything else that was going on was just ducky. “Are you sure it's not just an inner ear thing or stress? We do have some problems at the moment.”

“Well that's what we want to find out. What do you do for a job?”

“I'm a Physiotherapy Assistant up at Addenbrookes,” I said.

“Which ward?” He pulled a pad of paper across the desk and began ticking things off .

I went blank, I really couldn't remember which ward I worked in. “Hip replacements and the elderly that have fallen over.” I sounded like a confused ten year old.

He scribbled a signature on a piece of paper and handed it to me. “Well with you staggering around like that, I think the patients would have to hold you up don't you think? Anyway, you can't drive until you've been cleared so, whatever the outcome, this will sign you off for at least two weeks.”

Oh, well that was an unexpected bonus. But then the reality crashed down. I couldn't drive? How on earth was I supposed to get Sam to school? There certainly wasn't any public transport where we were. I couldn't do the shopping, I wouldn't be able to do any washing. I looked at Geoff for support, living where we did this was going to cause some real problems for us.

“Take a seat in the waiting room and we'll phone the hospital, we'll pull some strings and see if we can get you seen immediately.” The doctor gave me another encouraging smile and patted me on the knee.

Geoff and a very capable nurse helped me stagger out to where I could sit in comfort. I didn't feel giggly any more and, sitting out in the waiting room I indulged in a full-on panic attack. Luckily Geoff was there to sort it all out. As I started on my usual long line of ‘what ifs' he held up a hand and stopped me mid-sentence. “Facts first, decisions and worries afterward,” he said.

I nodded but the ‘what ifs' hadn't gone away. I could feel them, lurking, just beyond my thin veneer of calm.

About twenty minutes later the doctor re-appeared. He looked harassed and began apologising from about ten feet away. “I'm so sorry,” he said.

Geoff and I looked up at him. I quashed the very real need to say “What's up, doc?” I could feel slightly hysterical giggling bubbling just below my throat, I either needed to laugh or scream.

“They are completely booked solid, there's absolutely no way they can fit you in for an MRI until Friday,” he said.

Actually, that made me feel a lot better; I'm still not sure why.

He handed me a card with a name, a room number, and an appointment time written on it and, after apologising again, scuttled away.

Back at the boat Geoff settled me onto the sofa, he made me a cup of tea and then, making sure I was mostly upright he wandered off to carry on sorting out the electrics. He wanted to stay and keep me company but I was fairly sure I didn't want any so I gently sent him off to his engine room.

After I'd drunk my tea, I hauled myself to my feet and made my unsteady way down the boat toward the computer. I kept giggling, my hilarity had very little to do with genuine humour and much more to do with brewing hysteria. The physical feeling was very similar to that time we'd gone to France on the ferry. The sea had been rather dynamic that day and we'd found out, rather explosively that I suffered from sea sickness. Looking out of the window at the flat water in which
Minerva
quietly wallowed, there wasn't any way I could fool myself that this was the fault of any outside activity.

Turning on the laptop I proceeded to search out everything I could about my symptoms. The doctors were wrong, I was sure of it. They were just being careful; I didn't have time to indulge in something so potentially serious as a tumour. Life really couldn't be that unfair.

Life can be that unfair, but, luckily for all of us, mine wasn't. Over the next four days the nausea and the weaving subsided and, by the time I was due at the hospital, the symptoms had all but faded away. As usual I was going to have to see a doctor and feel a complete fraud.