Two Love

Chapter 8

Jade was absorbed in her English assignment when her phone rang. She walked from the study room to the bedroom and pressed the green button.

"Hello? Marty?" she said.

"It's Tina," was the reply. Jade's heart instantly sank. Marty guarded his phone like it was a sacred artefact - he would never let his mum take it from him. Unless -

"I just had to let you know that... Marty's in the hospital."

The bombshell had been dropped. Jade's hope was splintering to pieces. "What? Why?"

"He took some LSD at a party, and it's made him ill and unconscious."

"I'll come now," she said instinctively; then, reflecting, she added: "if that's okay?"

"Of course, Jade. Riley and I are at the hospital now."

Jade ended the call straightaway, gathered her things and pestered her dad to drive her to Greenling hospital. 

*

It had been over three years since Jade had been in this building. The last time she'd been here, her mum was rushed in on a stretcher from the red-and-blue flashing ambulance to an operating room on the ground floor. 

Her mum never came out of that room.

Gulping nervously, Jade approached the front desk and asked the receptionist if he knew where Marty Pocock would be.

"Ah, Marty Pocock! I remember that lad when he came in to get his broken wrist fixed up. Such a cheerful chap - he could talk the hind legs off a donkey! Let's see... says here he's on floor 3, room 102. Lemme guess - you're his girlfriend?"

A hopeful flush lit up her face. "Well, um, no-"

"But you'd like to be?"

She nodded bashfully. "Well, I won't keep you any longer. Off you trot!"

It was more of a canter than a trot up those endless stairs - Jade liked to use the stairs instead of the lift to keep fit - as she had to see Marty, see if he was okay. Once up the stairs, she searched for room 102, finding it right at the end of the corridor - of course it had to be at the end - and she pushed open the door with a sweaty hand.

In the middle of the room was Marty, clearly unconscious in his white hospital bed. Tonnes of tubes were taped to him, full of liquids of several different colours. Worst of all, his facial expression was one of fear and pain. He looked rather like a scared child expecting monsters to attack him in the night.

Jade bit her lip to keep herself from crying. She didn't want to cry - not here in front of Tina and Riley anyway. As far as they knew, she was only a friend to Marty. But she knew differently, as the pain in her heart was intolerable. What about his future? What about (more selfishly) their future? Though it wouldn't be selfish if he wanted it too...

Just then, Hassan and Parisa slipped into the room. Jade nodded at Hassan in acknowledgement; he nodded back. The alarm in his eyes was evident when he laid eyes on Marty - Marty, his debonair, effervescent friend, who was lying unconscious in a hospital bed, plugged into tubes like slithering snakes.

"What's the latest?" said Hassan quietly to Tina.

"The doctors said he was in a very bad state at the moment," she replied, "but, if the drugs work, he should be better by tomorrow."

Jade wanted to ask how bad, but her question was answered for her when Riley whispered, "I don't want him to die, Mum."

"I know, Riley."