Slipping Away

Chapter 14

That night, the snow got worse. Liam stayed later than he meant to, then suddenly realised the time and said a rushed goodbye and quickly left, saying his mum would be worried about him. I said a silent prayer that he would get home safely. The nurses drew the curtains across the darkened windows and tucked another blanket over me to ease the chill that was slowly pushing its icy fingers into the room. I hoped beyond all hopes that Liam would get home just fine, and that the images that were playing through my head of him sprawled across the icy tarmac or trapped in the wreckage of a bus would not come true. Please let him be safe.

I needn't have worried, for moments later, Liam himself rushed back into the room. His breathing was heavy and his teeth chattered as he told me why he had come back. An icy chill followed him into the room, making the air even colder than it already was. Apparently, the snow had gotten so bad that the roads were impassable; the few cars that were trying were skidding everywhere and there were abandoned cars that had obviously given up. Due to this, he had no way of getting home, so he was going to have to camp out in my room. The weather was getting serious, and as Liam turned on the radio, we caught the tail end of the weather forecast. "And temperatures are plummeting across Britain, with lows of minus 13 degrees and heavy snow and ice all over. The Met Office has issued a red weather warning tonight warning that temperatures will continue to drop and conditions will worsen. It is advisable that people stay at home, keep warm and stock up on the essentials as we prepare ourselves for the worst." Things were really bad if there were red weather warnings. I was glad Liam was staying. It would be nice and cosy in here, not dark and -

The light flickered and then plunged us into pitch black. The nurse called out "Don't worry guys, it's just a power cut. It's probably due to this horrible weather we're having. Talking about the weather, now you mention it, the heating isn't working. I'm glad to have my woolly cardigan on!" She turned, addressing Liam. "What's up pet? Your face looks a picture!" Liam mumbled something about my life support machine to which she replied: "Oh no honey, the hospital generator takes care of them. It's jolly cold in here isn't it? You look like you could do with a blanket or two. Wait here a second, I'll just pop out to get a few." She hurried out of the room, quickly closing the door behind her. Liam's teeth chattered. He must of been freezing. As he told me, the snow cut off some of the phone lines and made the rest really crackly, so he had no way of contacting his mum to tell her that he was alright.

At that moment, the nurse entered the room carrying a large stack of thick woolly blankets. Liam took a few and wrapped himself up. The temperature was slowly dropping. It was getting colder and colder. There must have been some kind of major problem with the heating, because it was totally broken. I mentally crossed my fingers and hoped that the power would come back on in a minute. We had the emergency lights and a torch, but I knew it must be dark. Just as I was thinking about catching hypothermia, Liam let out a sigh of relief and the nurse cheered. I gathered that the power had come back on. The heating obviously didn't work though, so I was moved to another room. The nurses were worried that if anyone came to visit me, they wouldn't know where I was, but as Liam rightly told them, no one apart from him came to visit me anyway so there was no need to worry.

The days dragged onwards. I had the radio on quite often, even when Liam was there, because he seemed at loss of what to say. I realised that perhaps he was gradually losing hope. We were slowly, very slowly, drifting apart after so many weeks of not talking. I cursed my brain for not letting me wake up. I wanted to stay with Liam, I wanted to stay close, but it was rather difficult when all of our conversations were one sided. We sat there in near silence, listening. We listened to all kinds of things: science programmes, history programmes, junky music from the 80s, pop music, classical music, the news quiz, the shipping forecast ... we were always there listening. Liam would just sit there, holding my hand. He cried more than usual. He didn't say anything, just cried. I tried to count the weeks that I had been in a coma. It started in the second week of August and now it was the second week of November ... that would be ... twelve weeks and counting. I knew how hard it must be for Liam, to see me like I was for twelve whole weeks. When and if I ever woke up, our relationship would be different to how it was before. Sure, I was still madly in love with him, and I hoped he felt the same about me, but you can't go through being nearly killed by a car accident with your boyfriend watching, and expect your relationship to come out exactly the same. You have had experiences, experiences that most people would rather miss, that change your relationship. Hopefully we would be stronger than before. I needed us to be. I couldn't lose him. I had lost my parents, I couldn't lose him. He was my all, my everything. He needed me and I needed him. I was staying here with him, and never leaving.