“Yeah. Antibiotics. I don’t like them, though.” He points to a mess of plasters in the crease of his elbow. “That’s why I keep taking the cannula out, but I can’t go home until I’m better, so I need to stop doing that.”
“Why don’t you like the antibiotics if they’re making you better?”
“I feel like I have snakes in my veins,” he says as though it makes perfect sense.
Perhaps it does. With his hand still on my arm, I can’t tell.
An odd urge to cover his hand with my own sweeps over me. I glance at him, hoping to dispel it before I make a tit out of myself, but my gaze falls on a scar on Ludo’s face, and I’m knee-deep in a new rabbit hole. The scar runs along his jaw, half hidden by the scruff on his face, but it’s ragged and angry, and I can’t look at it for long without imagining how my leg will look when I finally get out of here. “How long will the antibiotics take to work? If you don’t pull the cannula out, I mean.”
Ludo shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe they told me and I wasn’t listening.”
“But you hear all my business?”
He treats me to a sheepish grin. “Sorry. You like your privacy.”
It’s not a question, but I nod anyway. “Don’t you?”
“Sometimes. But too much of it is bad for my brain.”
“Because you don’t like your voice?”
“Exactly.”
We reach an understanding I can’t quite see, and his hand slips from my arm. My gaze darts to it, and I’m surprised to see he’s left no mark. In my head, the heat from his touch is scorching, still burning strong, even now it’s over.
“Are you worried about your operation?”
Slowly, I shake my head. “I don’t think they could make it hurt any more than it already does.”
“Did your chest tube hurt?”
“Hmm?”
Ludo leans closer, his wide eyes owlish. “The tube they put in your chest. I’ve never had one of those.”
“You want one?”
“No.” Something wicked dances in Ludo’s expression. “I’ve broken lots of bones, though, and they took my spleen last time.”
“Last time what?”
“Last time I fell.”
I stare. Again. “How often do you fall?”
“For real or metaphorically?”
“I don’t know what that means.”
Ludo sighs and ruffles his already messy hair. “Neither do I.”
Four
Ludo
His favourite colour is green. I don’t want to tell Aidan thatmyfavourite colour terrifies me, so I don’t. Instead, I sit by his bed and we talk about music and the food we’re going to eat when we go home.
He likes indie music, and he’s craving a roast dinner. He’s amused by my admissions. “You don’t look like the classical music type.”
