After You

Chapter Thirty-three - This Year's Love

"How do you choose between your children and the woman you love?
Perhaps I didn't have to. Perhaps I made a huge mistake.
Do you believe in second chances?
We deserve a second chance."
- Jude

Well, what a bombshell. Jude loved me? After telling me he didn't and never would? I couldn't work out what was going on. I feared I had a serious concussion.

'Are you messing with me?' I asked him. 'Are you taking the piss?'

'Meredith Townsend?' called a young nurse with ombre-effect hair.

'They're calling you,' Jude urged, when I only sat there gaping at him. When the nurse called my name for a third time, and I was in danger of losing my slot after a three hour wait, Jude actually stood up and pulled me to my feet, before nudging me in the back so that I was forced to walk over to the waiting nurse. 'This is Meredith,' he said, tight lipped.

We followed the nurse to cubicles, and I sat nervously on the edge of the bed as my new nurse - Sarah - cleaned my head wound. It stung like a bitch - there's no other way of putting it - and I winced like a baby.

'Hey,' Jude murmured, taking my hand. 'I'm right here.' His voice was soft and shushing, like a father talking to a terrified infant. I nodded and squeezed his fingers relentlessly whilst Sarah irrigated my wound.

'I'll be right back,' she smiled, before ducking out behind the curtain.

'I've never had stitches before. Have you?' I asked, looking to Jude with something akin to terror.

'No, I haven't, but I had to take one of Finn's friends to get his knee stitched after he fell rock pooling on a day trip we took to the coast.'

'Did it hurt?'

'I think the local anaesthetic was the worst bit,' Jude told me, consolingly. It was no lie. Having a needle jabbed into an area which is already tender was no fun, and I determined there and then that I'd grow old gracefully. Botox isn't something I could ever endure.

'Well,' Sarah smiled, appraising her handiwork. 'That's very neat and tidy, even if I do say so myself.'

'Will it scar?' I asked, because I didn't want a bloody great gash on my forehead.

'It should be very neat, and with time, it'll fade nicely,' she promised, but her answer didn't reassure me, because it meant yes, I would have a scar on my face.

***

'I'll have to get a fringe cut or something,' I rambled, as we waited at the front entrance for a taxi. 'A fringe would hide the scar, right?' Jude looked to me with a frown.

'It's a very small cut,' he said. 'I'll show you.' And he pulled out his phone and took a picture of me. 'Look.'

'Oh,' I sighed, a little crestfallen. 'All that fuss - the interminable wait - over a tiny little scratch?' I felt rather pathetic.

'It's hardly a scratch!' Jude chastised. 'It might not be wide, but it was deep.' I couldn't help it. My nerves were frayed - from the mugging and from Jude's declaration of love. I spluttered with an embarrassing, unladylike burst of laughter. 'What?' Jude asked, looking at me in confusion.

'Not wide, but deep...' I whimpered, shaking my head at myself. Jude looked at me, blinking slowly as he licked his bottom lip.

'You're turning my concern for your health into an innuendo?' he accused.

'How else am I meant to cope with my ex - who dumped me to go running back to his wife - telling me that he loves me, without any real explanation?'