Sinead Hutchinson - Waterloo Road

Chapter 25 - Adjusting To Life.

I woke up, my head was pouding and my body felt weak. This time when I woke up in hospital, noboyd leaned over me and asked how I was. I moved my stuff neck and looked over to the window, saying nothing. Mum was stood looking out the window, with her phone in her hand. She dailed a number then canciled it, she did this twice before slowly turning around and looking at me. I moved my head back to where it was before and closed my eyes, reopening them a few seconds later to hear her retyping the number on the phone. This time she put the phone to her ear and I could faintly hear the dailling tone through the phone. I listened very carefully to what was being said.

*Phone Call*

Lorna: Hello, Mum?

Joyce: Lorna?

Lorna: Something's happened.

Joyce: What?

Lorna: Something awful, oh Mum.

Joyce: Is it Sinead?

Lorna: She was trapped in a fire, they've delivered her baby.

Joyce: Oh my god! Are they okay?

Lorna: Sinead's not woken up and they've told me nothing about the baby.

Joyce: I'm getting on the next flight, no matter what you say.

Lorna: You don't have to.

Joyce: I've not seen you in 15 years, put this silly argument aside and think about what's best for your daughter and grandson!

Lorna: Hurry up and get here, I've missed you," 

*Phone Call*

Mum turned around and looked at me, she sniffed and quickly wiped away the tears that were streaming out of her eyes and onto her pale cheeks.

"Are you crying?" I whispered and she came and sat beside me, holding my hand. 

"No, I need to be brave for you," She replied but her eyes were puffy and I knew she was lying.

"How is he?" I asked.

"They've taken him to neonatal intensive care and they're going to come back and tell is what's going on soon," She reasured but I was still panaking. "Have you thought of any names?"

"Callum, I like Callum," I replied, picking my finger nails with my other hand.

"I'll go and ask how Callum is," She smiled, putting her warm hand on my hands and walking out the room. I tried to sit up but my body was stiff, like you've just been for a long run or done loads of squats and you're legs burn. The room was silent for a few seconds and I looked around. On the wall there was a painting of a flower and the other walls were blank accept for the one with the window on. The floor was white tiling and beside the bed was two chairs and a table. Mum came back in the door.

"The nurse is coming to take you down," She told me and I smiled eventhough I didn't know if I wanted to see the neonatal unit, I didn't know what to expect. Surely enough the nurse came with a wheel chair for me, I didn't want to get in the wheel chair because I didn't need it but apparently it was 'hospital policy'. Both Mum and the nurse helped me into the wheel chair and I was pushed out of the room and down the corridor. I looked in each room, everyone was young, they were all children with burns on their bodies. Some of them were sleeping in bed and some of them were playing games with the other children. I looked like the oldest person on the ward. 

"What ward is this?" I asked, turning and looking at the nurse.

"Ward 11, children's burn unit," She replied, looking down at me from the hight she was above me. I turned around and looked forward.

"What ward are we going to?" I then asked and Mum was walking beside me.

"Ward 35 I believe," Mum unsurely smiled and the nurse nodded. We walked out of the childrens unit and went in a lift up to the third floor and into the first door we came to. The nurse pushed me to the seatting area and walked to the desk, neither of us knew what she was saying but the nurse pointed to me and the receptionist nodded and began instructing a pathway down the corridor. The nurse returned to us and pushed us along the corridor and into a room with the number '8' printed on the front. 

"I'm sorry, only one visiter at a time," The nurse told us.

"That's fine," Mum smiled, going and taking a seat on the chairs beside the door.

"Thanks," I whispered to Mum and I was pushed into the room with the door slamming behind us. I didn't want to look but the nurse grabbed my arm and placed them on top of the incubator Callum was in.

"You're ment to stay in the wheelchair, but aslong as you stay there I'll not say anything," The nurse smiled and I agreed. I looked down at Callum. He was tiny and he had all these wires going in and out of him. It's strange to imagine him being inside me with how small I was and it looked like he wouldn't fit. 

"What's happening?" I asked the man who was also standing over him, writing notes onto a board.

"He seems to be responding well to the medication we gave him, however his breathing is slower than it should be, probably because of the smoke inhaled or the lack of oxygen he got when he was born. For now he's stable, but remember anything can happen," He whispered and turned and walked away. I didn't know what to say to him, I felt like a fool speaking to a baby who probably didn't recognise my voice or even acknowledge that I was in front of him. 

"Hi baby boy, little Callum. This is your Mummy speaking, I don't know if you can hear me because you're really poorly but come on little man. Pull through this and come home with Mummy and Grandma, maybe if you keep fighting for long enough you'll meet your Great-Grandma, she's on her way from Spain. I hope you get better soon, because I want to prove that young mothers are great! I want you to have the best start to life, unlike what I had," I whispered, his little chest was beatting so fast and his eye lids battered. I wasn'y alowed to touch him so I turned around to the nurse. She came over to me and lifted me back into the wheel chair. She took me outside where Mum stood up. 

"Well?" She gasped.

"Go and look, but I want to go back to my room now, I'll see you there?" I asked and she nodded, the man who was writing notes came to the door and showed Mum in. 

Once we left the ward I felt guilty, he was suffering on his own and all I wanted to do was go back to bed and moan.

"You're very brave," The nurse said when we were in the lift and I looked at her in the mirrors of the lift.

"I know," I smiled back.

"It must be hard, seeing him like that," She asked.

"It is, knowing you can't do anything to help," I sulked.

"There is something you can do to help," She whispered, pulling me out the lift and into the burns ward.

"What?" I eargerly asked, turning and facing her.

"You can be there and pray," She reminded. I'd never had a religion and I didn't really know how to pray.

"How?" I asked.

"Say a few words to god, it won't hurt anybody," She smiled, lifting me back into bed.

"Thanks," I said, as she pushed the top half of the bed up so I was sitting up.

"By the way, you should be able to go home tomorrow. All things permitting," She told me, closing the hospital room door behind her.