Chapter 71

MANDY

‘He doesn’t get many visitors,’ the young nurse said, as she led Mandy along a corridor.

The nursing home where Richard was being looked after smelled of antiseptic and air freshener. The lino on the floors was clean and unblemished, and reproduction watercolour paintings of historic British landscapes hung on the walls. At the end of the corridor there was a spacious, open-plan, brightly lit day room, where Mandy could spy residents sitting in wheelchairs in various states of consciousness.

‘How long has he been kept here?’ Mandy asked.

‘Around ten months now, I think. His family used to visit quite often at first, but not so much anymore. It’s a pity.’

‘Did they give any reason why they stopped?’

‘No, but you’d be surprised by how many of our patients don’t get any visitors. For some of them, once they’re dropped off at the gate, they don’t see anything of their families again.’

‘Someone told me Richard’s family banned friends from visiting him?’

The nurse nodded. ‘It wasn’t an official order, but we were asked not to encourage it.’

‘Well, thanks for allowing me in.’

‘I’m sure being his Match must give you some rights.’

Mandy assumed it was nerves making her stomach anxious and then she felt a sharp kick from inside. She rubbed her belly to reassure her baby everything would be all right but, secretly, she was terrified by how she would feel when she saw Richard.

‘Right, here we are,’ said the nurse as she opened the door.

‘There’s a chair by his bed, and just speak to him normally, like you would to anyone else.’

Mandy mentally prepared herself before entering, and when she walked in, she waited until the last moment to turn her eyes in the direction of the bed where Richard lay.

He bore little resemblance to the photographs on his bedroom wall or to those in the folder she kept; the handsome, toned, angular man she’d become accustomed to staring at and fantasising about was now a shred of his former self – more skin and bones held together covered with plastic tubes and breathing apparatus.

His arms were sapling thin and there was a rash under his chin where someone had shaved him too closely. His hair was long and clumsily combed into an old-fashioned side parting. His skin was grey and his pyjamas were hanging off him. But despite his appearance and the strained noises that came from his throat as the ventilator pumped oxygen into his frail body, Mandy knew for certain she was completely in love with her Match.

She pulled up an armchair and sat down; the closer their proximity, the faster the rhythm of her heart became. And when – instinctively –

she reached to hold his hand, it felt like an electric charge was running through her veins.

‘Hi Richard,’ she began, her voice quivering, unsure what to say.

‘I’m Mandy. You don’t know me but I know a lot about you.’

Mandy didn’t know what she expected to happen; the last few months had shown her that the impossible could become possible, and deep down she hoped that maybe some miracle might occur –

he would react to her sound, her smell or just her presence. But he didn’t stir.

‘It seems pretty nice here,’ she continued, looking out of the window at the gardens surrounding the home. ‘And the nurses seem very friendly. I hope they’re looking after you.’

Without warning, she felt her eyes brimming and once the first few tears fell down her cheek, she couldn’t stop the rest.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘It wasn’t supposed to be like this … I was supposed to meet you and we were going to fall in love like they do in the films and in those real-life stories you read in trashy magazines in doctors’ surgeries. And even though I know it’s never going to be like that with us, I still can’t stop myself from thinking about what could have been. I’ve spent God knows how many hours

looking through old photographs of you and watching your childhood videos. I feel like I know you even though I thought you were dead.

And now here we are together, and you’re still alive and I have your baby inside me. It should be the happiest time of my life but it’s not.

Because you have no idea who I am or that I’m even here.’

Mandy brought Richard’s palm up to her cheek. He felt cold, she thought, and held it tighter in an attempt to warm him up. His touch was like nothing she had ever felt before. It was as if his skin was permeating hers and she could feel his, her own and their baby’s heartbeats all inside her body.

Then for the briefest of moments, Richard’s body jolted as if it had been struck by lightning. Mandy stared at him, sure that her eyes were playing tricks on her, but again, his body jerked as if his heart had been restarted with defibrillators.

She couldn’t take her eyes off his face, staring as his eyelids blinked, languidly at first and then more rapidly. The corners of his mouth under the breathing apparatus lifted, turning upwards ever so slightly. Mandy held her breath as she waited for his pupils to focus and see her for the first time. This was it. The moment she’d been waiting for.

Mandy dashed out of the room into the corridor frantically searching for assistance.

‘Richard Taylor, he just moved!’ she blurted out to a confused nurse. ‘He needs help.’

‘He just moved?’ the nurse repeated.

‘Yes, I put his hand to my face and his body moved and then his arm and his eyes opened. Please, can you call a doctor? I think he’s waking up.’