‘He’s a good friend.’ And part of her had wanted to stay right there by his side.
‘He has the best team looking after him.’
And although Maya wouldn’t see, Bess nodded her head before flipping back to professional mode as the technical crew member on board. ‘What’s the fuel situation?’ she asked. As pilot, Maya was obsessed with fuel but it was Bess’s responsibility to prompt also.
‘Fuel is all good. Refill back at the airbase. Hilda could use another clean too.’
‘Affirmative,’ said Noah from the rear. ‘I didn’t like to say, but she could, especially back here.’
Upon arrival at the airbase, Bess took the bloods and the drugs to store in the fridge.
As she came out of the room, she bumped into Paige, one of the patient and family liaison nurses, who gave Bess an update on the kid who’d fallen out of the tree the other day. They didn’t always get to know outcomes or progress but it was good when they did.
‘I’ve got the family some suitable accommodation nearby,’ Paige explained, ‘so they can be by their daughter’s side as much as possible.’
‘Well done, and thank you for letting me know,’ said Bess. The young girl wasn’t in a good way but she was expected to recover.
Bess went to the locker room, used the toilet and went to the sinks to wash her face. They still had the helicopter to clean andwhen she’d pulled herself together, she bypassed Maya in the office doing her paperwork, and the laughter between Nadia and Paige about something or other. She wanted to mop the inside of Hilda, so offered to take the task from Noah and he willingly handed it over.
Anything to stop the thoughts whirring in her head.
Gio. The man she was good friends with. But seeing him like that, lying on the ground, writhing in pain, her feelings had hit her unexpectedly.
She couldn’t help it. She knew now that she wanted more than friendship. And if she was being totally honest with herself, she’d wanted more for a while.
As he’d lain there on the ground, he’d said something too and the words came back to her now.Told you I was a good man… I could be good enough for you.She hadn’t heard him say anything like that before. He’d looked at her on the odd occasion as though he might want something more than what they had but she’d always dismissed the notion as flirting or wanting someone he couldn’t have.
Could she really be with a man like Gio, who never went in for long-term commitment?
She was pretty sure the answer was no, but fighting her feelings was another matter.
As she mopped Hilda’s interior, her imagination conjured up Gio again, at the scene. She heard the explosion in her head, pictured him sent flying through the air and crashing to the ground.
She dipped the mop into the water, cloudy already despite having only just started the clean-up job.
Thoughts of her own problems filled her head. The payday loan was the latest example of her stupidity. She’d used it to dealwith some of the debt she’d managed to accrue but in doing so, she knew things really weren’t any better.
The payday loan might have put out a fire in one area of her life but what about what followed from now?
She was in a mess. And it was all her fault.
What had happened to Gio not only had Bess’s feelings all over the place; it made her own problems seem foolish. Gio’s downfall had been trying to save a life; hers was living one where she didn’t want to let herself feel hurt and pain and so she spent money like her final day was coming.
And for that, she was ashamed of herself.
9
Gio felt tranquil and frequently sleepy with the decent painkillers he was on. He’d had his shepherd’s pie, which wasn’t bad for hospital food, at least visually, although the same couldn’t be said for its texture, which reminded him of pureed kiddie food. He’d finished all of his apple strudel and ice cream, and his leg didn’t hurt too much after his knee repair surgery.
What pained him now was his mum and the nurse’s conversation about Christmas shopping, Christmas trees, all things festive. Not that he had a problem with the festive season; it was just that he worried his mum wasn’t at work and all the talking and attention was beginning to feel suffocating.
His boss had come to see him yesterday. Apparently, the source of the fire they’d attended the night of Gio’s accident was an electric bike left on charge inside the building. The explosion had been due to a faulty gas appliance. The details had mostly washed over Gio, who was half awake at the time, and it hadn’t helped the situation he was in, but it was a kind of debrief, the sort the rest of the crew would have got back at the station asthey went through what had happened, used it to learn from. His boss had reiterated what Gio knew, too: that he’d be on full pay for six months while he recovered. His boss talked about what happened after that, should Gio need longer to recuperate. By that time, his pay would reduce and his boss skated over some of the details for him. Gio only hoped it wouldn’t come to that because if it did, dealing with less money every month would be the least of his worries. Mentally, he’d lose it if this job was taken away from him.
When the nurse went on her way to attend to another patient, he had to ask Marianne, ‘Why aren’t you at your cleaning job? You’ve been here a lot since my accident.’
‘Of course I’m here. And work have been very understanding.’
Really? She had only just joined them – surely their understanding would only go so far.
