Bess came in to claim the coffee with one sugar and glanced over at Noah. ‘You look like you’ve lost a tenner and found a quid.’
Noah frowned. ‘I think the saying might be lost a shilling and found a penny… or is it lost a pound and found a penny?’
‘Dunno,’ Bess shrugged, ‘but inflation changes things so I’m going with the tenner-quid version.’ She peered over his shoulder and down at his phone screen. ‘He looks beefy. Friend of yours?’
‘Trying to find someone.’ Noah closed the social media app. ‘And that’s not him.’ Unless the father of his beautiful niece was young enough to be Cassie’s son. The guy who’d got his hopes up was on a scuba-diving trip with sixth form according to the caption.
‘Oh yeah, who?’
The thing about Bess was she liked to know what was what, but she was easily distracted when it came to the personal lives of the crew, so when Maya came in, she sighed. ‘You and your stories, Noah. One day, I’ll find out all the details. Now, happy hour at the pub tomorrow, anyone?’
‘Maybe,’ he said, ‘if I can get Geraldine over.’
‘Do it,’ she said, bossy as you like. He didn’t miss Maya’s grin at their colleague’s persistence. And it was her turn next when Bess diverted her attention. ‘Maya, what about you? Please don’t say you can’t; I’ve been trying to get you there for ages.’
When Maya smiled, she looked even more beautiful than when she was serious or concentrating on something. She was clever too; he liked listening to her talk about flight paths, technicalities with the helicopter. He had to wonder why with all her intellect, she was still giving that ex-husband of hers the time of day. He’d never met the man, not unless you included the night of his accident, but Noah had heard enough comments about Conrad here and there that he had a pretty good picture built up in his mind.
Maya picked up her own coffee and talk focused on happy hour, Bess trying to rally everyone to attend, but the phone let out its shrill ring to cut the conversation short and demand their attention.
Maya was first out of the door to get the helicopter ready. Noah and Bess abandoned their coffees in favour of grabbing the gear they needed for the job. The medical bags were stowed on the aircraft already but legally the drugs couldn’t be left unattended so were kept at the airbase and retrieved each time they were needed. Blood was often left on the helicopter unless the temperatures were too hot or too cold. Today was the former, which meant Bess went to get those while Noah picked up the drugs.
Helmets on, Bess and Noah headed for the aircraft and inside of five minutes, they were soaring above the Dorset countryside. The crew batted back and forth in conversation about the job they were heading to. A horse rider had taken a fall when going over a jump at a local riding school and on approach to the scene, Noah thought about Cassie. He thought about her often but as soon as he’d heard the patient had had an accident involving a horse, it brought back the painful memories on a whole other level.
Putting his personal feelings aside, he spotted someone down below in a hi-vis jacket waving at them and pointed it out to Maya and Bess. Occasionally, people waved at the air ambulance regardless of whether they were in need of help, which wasn’t particularly useful, but this time it was easy to suss out that this really was a wave meant for them to come in and land as close as they could to the patient.
‘There are horses in the field on the right,’ Bess advised from her position in the front.
From the rear of the aircraft, Noah could see three fields spread out to the left of the person in the hi-vis with easy access on one side. ‘It’s the best bet,’ he said into his microphone. ‘It’s a bit of a walk for us but I don’t see any other options.’ And it looked like they could exit the field on foot, run down the laneway without having to climb any fences or cut back any bushes to do so.
The helicopter came in to land to Bess’s call of, ‘Clear on the left.’
‘All clear on the right,’ said Noah.
The crew touched down safely moments later.
‘Thanks, Hilda,’ said Maya, patting the inside of the aircraft the way she often did. It was another side to Maya, a softer side he quite liked. ‘Good luck, you guys.’
Once Noah and Bess had the equipment bags on their backs and the bag containing the drugs, they trudged through the long grass to the other side and the lane.
A car pulled up with someone from the riding school and took them to the patient, saving them precious minutes as well as a long walk with a heavy load and Bess and Noah were at the patient’s side in under two minutes.
Noah took the lead with this one. ‘Hello there, can you tell me your name?’ He was relieved their patient was conscious. The girl looked in her early twenties, slight and very scared.
‘Clara,’ she said quietly.
‘Clara, I’m Noah, this is Bess, we’re going to help you. But you need to lie still.’ She was trying to move and it wouldn’t help them or her if she did, given they didn’t know the extent of her injuries.
‘Milly,’ she said all of a sudden, trying to move again. ‘Milly… I have to collect Milly.’
The rider at his side told Noah that Milly was Clara’s daughter and that she was at school. ‘I’ll call Clara’s mum,’ said the rider, ‘let her know what’s going on.’ She crouched down to eye level with Clara. ‘Don’t you worry, your mum will collect Milly; she’ll be safe.’
As tears welled in Clara’s eyes, tears of relief and of pain, Noah thought again about Cassie and Eva, how lucky this girl Milly was that there was every chance of her mum making a good recovery judging by the injuries sustained. It would hopefully be a good outcome and he gulped at the reminder that his sister hadn’t been so lucky.
The patient was given ketamine after paracetamol and morphine weren’t strong enough to handle her pain while Noah and Bess stabilised Clara’s leg.
Clara was soon on the scoop and they set off on the trek down the lane and into the field with the help of three other ridersfrom the riding school. Maya ran over to them to take the drugs bag as soon as she spotted them and stowed it in the rear of the helicopter before the patient was transferred onto the litter from the scoop.
In the back of the helicopter, while he monitored the patient during transfer to the trauma centre, Noah reflected on the moment Clara had panicked about her daughter. Her daughter’s welfare was her top priority, as it should be. And she was lucky; it sounded as though she had a grandparent to rely on. Noah didn’t. He didn’t have a partner either. There was nobody else aside from himself and Geraldine, who at the end of the day was an employee. What would happen to Eva if something happened to him? In all the commotion of the last few months, Cassie dying, him getting a daughter just like that, having to leave his job and his life and move down here, he hadn’t thought about what would happen if he wasn’t around.
