‘Alright there, Emma, alright there, Aaron,’ said Dad in the softest of voices.
As my head came round the doorframe I saw Mr and Mrs McCoy standing in silhouette in front of the window with the bright sky behind them; they had their arms around one another and were both in tears.
‘Come in,’ said Mr McCoy, ‘come on in.’
I stepped fully in and looked to my right. Ronan’s face was a pale-greenish colour and the machine was still blasting gusts of air into him. He barely looked alive.
‘We saw the doctor on the way out, so we did,’ said Dad awkwardly, and the McCoys nodded.
‘Yes …’ said Mr McCoy, swallowing, ‘… um, it’s not great news …’ He clenched closer to his wife who had her head tucked in at the front of his shoulder, she seemed incapable of speaking at all, so Mr McCoy continued. ‘The seizure this morning is just not what needed to happen … um … at all, really … so … I think, um, they’ve said we need to think about how much longer we keep him on the machines because … because … there’s nothing they … he’s more or less …’
He didn’t have to say any more because there was nothing more to be said for me to understand.
‘We just …’ choked Mrs McCoy, ‘… we just … have to think about what’s best for Ronan, is what the doctor said, so … so we need to just think, don’t we, Aaron?’
Mr McCoy had his head down but he nodded.
My mouth was immobilised so I walked over and hugged them both as tightly as I possibly could and they hugged me just as tightly back, squeezing me in between them, their heads above mine, feeling the drips of their tears on the back of my head as I stared down at the grey-speckled floor.
I didn’t want to leave the hospital. Where would I go if I did? Home to my room to sit and worry and think?
‘Ronan will pull through, I know it, he’ll pull through,’ I said, but Mr and Mrs McCoy only smiled at me sadly.
Our new lives with Ronan were just beginning and I desperately wanted to keep it the way it was, I wanted to pick up where we’d left off, I wanted to not be sitting watching the McCoys in such despair, to not be feeling my dad’s consoling presence by my side, to not be watching Ronan being pumped by those machines. Was he even still in there? Was he technically still alive? What would happen if those machines were turned off?
‘What time’s your test tomorrow, Brendan?’ Mr McCoy said after a moment of silent vigil by Ronan’s side.
‘What?’ I said.
‘Your driving test.’
‘Well, I can’t … not … I can’t take it tomorrow, we can rebook it, Dad, can’t we?’
‘Absolutely, we’ll rearrange it of course, I’ll phone them.’
‘No, please don’t,’ said Mr McCoy. ‘Please don’t, Brendan.’ His eyes were red and his voice was pleading. ‘If you can bear it, I think … I don’t know … I just know you’re going to pass and I’d love to hear that news tomorrow, I really would.’
‘No, Aaron,’ said Mrs McCoy, ‘it’s not right to force him, come on.’
‘Ah, sorry, Brendan, that’s not fair of me, sorry …’
‘No,’ I said, ‘I’ll take the test. I’ll take it and I’ll pass it and I’ll come here and we’ll rip those L plates up like nothing’s ever been ripped up before!’
It was the belief in my birthday wish that made me say it. It was the strongest thing, theonlything, I had. I’d blow out those birthday candles, Ronan would wake. Ronan would smile. Ronan would be showered in the confetti of my L plates.
I could make it happen.
Icouldmake it happen.
I would.
‘I’ll do it,’ I said.
46
According to astronomy, summer officially begins around the 21st of June, but for me it was always my birthday that felt like the first day of summer. When the 3rd of July came I would get a buzzy feeling, the kind you get as if you’re looking forward to something even if you don’t have any plans. Those summer months seemed like the only time in the entire year where a boy got the chance to really live, to drench himself in freedom; not that I ever had a summer like that, but if everything went how I hoped it would on my seventeenth birthday then I would have the best summer of my life and never waste a summer ever again.
I sat up in bed, swung my legs over the edge, put my feet on the floor and stood up.
