Chapter Text
The steps down to the entrance felt more difficult than usual. Bernie wasn’t sure whether it was the general cold seeping into her bones and making everything more difficult or if she was getting worse again. Her physio had insisted that she was still improving but she was not longer sure. She knew that sometimes you had bad days in recovery and it didn’t mean that you weren’t still heading in the right direction but it was one thing to know it and another to feel it.
The stairway was unheated. The management company had sent an email a couple of weeks before about how they were removing all of the heaters in the communal areas. Something about the cost of energy but based on the ridiculous premiums it charged all the residents each month, it was clearly more about making money for the company. And the only reason Bernie was tackling the stairs at all was that the lift was once again broken. All that money for no heaters and no lift half the time. She knew she should look for some better accommodation but Holby was expensive and her army pension only went so far these days.
She finally reached the bottom of the stairs and limped over to the exit, leaning heavily on her stick and trying to catch her breath. She pushed open the door to find the steps outside icy. She was sure that it was part of the management company’s role to grit the steps but this was just another job that never got done in the name of money saving. Gingerly, she gripped her stick in one hand and the handrail in the other and tried to persuade her legs to do what they should be able to do. It took her several minutes but she did manage to reach the pavement without incident. She shook herself down and set off along the pavement towards town. She needed to get some food in and had considered trying to do a little Christmas shopping. Even if her children weren’t currently speaking to her, she was still going to get them presents.
The centre of Holby was a bit far for her really with her dodgy leg but the buses were so infrequent that she could never get the hang of them. She figured she’d walk in to save her money and get a bus back, or even stretch to a taxi if there were no buses. She pulled her coat closer around her. The speed she could walk was too slow to warm her up now that the temperature was stubbornly hovering around zero.
By the time she’d made it to the centre of town, she was exhausted and frozen. She needed a proper rest before she tackled any of the shops. There was a nice little café tucked away on a side street that charged barely anything for a cup of tea but it was shut today, a note posted in the window apologising for the inconvenience. Resigning herself to spending her bus fair home on an expensive tea from Costa, she hobbled onwards.
Costa was at least warm and not too busy. She ordered herself the cheapest warm drink on the menu and settled down at a table in reach of the free newspapers. This was one advantage over the cheap café which didn’t provide reading material. Anything to keep her mind off her wretchedness.
She flicked through a newspaper, not really caring at all about what was going on in the world. Wars, famine, general misery to rival her own usually. She found herself looking around the room, watching the other customers. There was a young couple in the corner, still clearly in the honeymoon phase. He was feeding her broken off pieces of his croissant and she was kissing him after every mouthful. Bernie watched them for a while, wondering what it would be like to be able to be that open about being in love. It was never like that with Marcus. She hadn’t understood why at the time but she did now. However kind he was, however much he loved her, she was incapable of loving him back. She only realised it properly when Alex kissed her on tour. It was a feeling like no other, presumably like what this couple were feeling, but they could never tell anyone about it. She was married, and Alex’s superior, let alone them both being women. It was a romance that was doomed from the beginning and it only took this horrendous injury to make Bernie see that it had no future.
There was an old man sitting at a table on the other side of the café. He too had picked up a newspaper and was reading it intently. At first, Bernie felt sorry for him, sitting there alone just like her, but then after a few minutes he was joined by a younger woman and three children, presumably his grandchildren with the way his face lit up as they rushed over to him. The newspaper discarded next to him, he focused his full attention on three small children and their mother. The happy scene just made Bernie feel even more sad. She’d thought that her, Marcus and their two children could be happy like that, even after her affair with Alex, but it hadn’t lasted. Marcus had been attentive and caring when she arrived back in the UK with life threatening injuries, but Bernie had just felt increasingly stifled the longer she was bedbound. As soon as she could manage on her own, she sat down with Marcus and explained that their marriage was over. Then, with Marcus’s help, she moved out into the little flat she was currently living in. Things were fine for a month or two, the children came round to visit each week and Marcus even rang a couple of times to check that she was alright. They were the picture of amicable divorce. That was until Alex turned up at the family house, begging to see her. Marcus hadn’t known what to make of it at first, trying to explain that Bernie had moved out, but Alex hadn’t let him get a word in edgewise. And Marcus was clever enough to figure out the truth in Alex’s ranting and crying. He hadn’t even spoken to Bernie before he told the children. Bernie had one angry letter from Charlotte telling her how terrible she was, and nothing at all from Cameron. Since then, there had been no communication with the rest of her family except through the lawyers they were forced to employ.
She was alone in the world entirely. No family, no friends or no friends in the country at least, not even a pet to keep her company. Usually, Christmas was something she looked forward too, either at home with her family or the camaraderie of a Christmas spent on tour, but this year, the upcoming holiday just looked bleak.
Sitting still was just adding to her general feeling of despair so, since she could now once again feel her toes in her boots, she stood up slowly and shuffled out of Costa. She slowly wandered along the main street, dropping into shops that looked promising as she went and studiously ignoring all the happy families around her. After several attempts, she found a nice, soft scarf that she thought Charlotte might like and a jumper for Cameron. She figured that with a box of chocolates each, it would have to do. She just didn’t have the money to buy them anymore this year. Not if she wanted to eat.
She trudged on towards Aldi. Over the last few months she’d developed a technique for hooking her stick onto the trolley and leaning on that instead. She wasn’t really buying the quantity of food that required a trolley but having attempted to get round the shop carrying a basket once, she’d vowed never again. A trolley was just so much easier.
Aldi was busy, making it more difficult to manoeuvre the trolley around the aisles. She grabbed some bread, milk and vegetables. She stood in the meat section for quite a while, trying to figure out whether she could afford a chicken for Christmas day, before deciding that the small pack of chicken breasts was her limit. At least she wouldn’t be overwhelmed with leftovers that way.
There was a long wait for a checkout and Bernie’s legs ached. She wasn’t good at standing still for very long these days. She leant heavily on the trolley and tried to ignore the pain. Finally she reached the front and paid for everything before shuffling over to the window to pack her shopping into the rucksack and tote bag she had with her. It was a tight fit but she knew she had to manage. Then, using the trolley to support her until she got outside, she set off on the long walk home, tote bag over one shoulder while the other hand held the stick. It was after four now and the sun had already set, taking the miniscule amount of warmth it had offered with it. The pavements were even more slippery than before and the cold wind bit into her exposed flesh. She gritted her teeth. This was going to be a rough walk home.
She’d made it almost all the way back when her tired feet must have just hit a piece of ice wrong. One moment she was upright, staggering along at her painfully slow pace, and the next moment she was crashing to the ground. She had a brief thought of hoping that her food was not squashed before her head hit the ground and she passed out.
She came round in the warmth of an ambulance, blue lights on as it streaked through the busy streets.
“Wha?” she tried to say but she found that her mouth wasn’t working properly.
A hand reached over and brushed her hair from her face.
“Welcome back, Berenice,” said the paramedic, “Don’t try to speak yet. Just lay there and rest. We’ll have you at Holby City Hospital in no time.”
There was so much she wanted to ask. How did the paramedic know her name? Where was her shopping? How was she injured? But she was tired and everything hurt. At least, she thought as she closed her eyes again, at least they weren’t taking her to St James’. She couldn’t bear the thought of seeing Marcus right now.
Accident and Emergency was busy but Bernie found herself wheeled straight past all the cubicles and into resus. There was a lot of shouting around her as she was hooked up to different machines and doctors and nurses running around her, poking and prodding. She was so tired she just lay there and let it all happen. She couldn’t even summon up the energy to be sad about the fact that she was usually the one treating the patients rather than being one herself. It was the reality of her life now. All those operations after the original accident, and all the medical appointments since. She was starting to forget that she’d ever been a medic herself.
Whatever they’d thought was wrong with her must not have been that bad as it didn’t take long before most of the medical professionals moved away, leaving her with a single nurse pushing painkillers into her IV. Once she’d finished, she undid the spinal support and helped Bernie into a seated position. There was still a splint attached around one of her legs but the painkillers were doing their magic and the pain was easing off.
“They’re going to send you upstairs once there’s a spare bed,” she explained to a passive Bernie, “You’ve got a rather nasty leg break that they want to operate on, but good news is that the bump on your head is nothing to worry about.”
Bernie nodded.
“Is there anyone we can call for you?” the nurse asked, “There was a next of kin listed on your record. I think it was your husband. Shall we call him?”
“No!” Bernie said, trying not to shout, “No. Please no.”
The nurse gave her a funny look but agreed not to contact Marcus. “There must be someone we can contact though,” she pushed.
“No. There is no one,” she said.
The nurse patted her on the hand. “I’m sorry.”
Bernie tried to smile at her but she was just so tired. She leant back into the pillows and closed her eyes.
“I’ll come and wake you when they are ready for you upstairs,” the nurse said, patting her hand once more and leaving Bernie to sleep.
It was late when the nurse came back for her. Along with a couple of porters to take her upstairs, she arrived with a cup of tea.
“We were keeping you nil by mouth but I’ve just been told that they aren’t going to operate until the morning so I thought you might appreciate this. I have it on good authority that there will be a hot meal waiting for you in AAU as well. The kitchen was just about to close but they said they’d plate up some leftovers and send them your way. I did say that it looked like you might not have eaten in a while.”
Bernie took the cup of tea gratefully but was confused about the last comment until she glanced down at herself in the hospital gown. Bundled up in all her winter layers, she hadn’t noticed how thin she had been getting. She’d not really had much of an appetite recently, and since it was saving her money not eating so much, she hadn’t thought anything of it. But she could see now how skinny her arms were, and running her hand down her side, she could feel her ribs sticking out. She was a long way from the strong, confident major she’d been just a few short months ago.
A jolly nurse who introduced herself as Nurse Jackson, greeted her when she reached AAU and helped move her into the bed. As promised, a hot dinner was already waiting for her and she dug in straight away. Her stomach felt empty and when she thought back, she wasn’t sure whether she’d eaten anything that day apart from the coffee in Costa and the cup of tea she’d just finished.
“When you’ve done, you should get some rest. Ms. Campbell will come and speak to you in the morning before she mends your leg,” Nurse Jackson said, “Don’t worry about anything anymore, we’re here to get you back to fighting fit.”
No one needed to tell Bernie to rest. Her whole body felt like she’d run a marathon or something. She was bone tired even after her rest downstairs and she was asleep in minutes despite the lingering pain. That was something she was used to anyway. Months of ongoing pains, plus army skills, allowed her to ignore pain, noise and lights in order to get the sleep she so desperately needed.
She woke early the next morning, that army training still not leaving her. There was a different nurse on shift now and she managed to persuade them to take her to the toilet in a wheelchair. This was the one dignity she was going to try and keep for as long as possible even if it was challenging to lift herself from the chair onto the toilet seat.
By the time she’d returned, the breakfast trolley was going round the ward. Her imminent operation meant however that she was back to nil by mouth so she just had to sit and watch as the other patients on the ward ate porridge.
She’d almost drifted off to sleep again when a voice close to her made her open her eyes again.
“Are you really Berenice Wolfe? The trauma surgeon?”
Bernie turned to look at the woman standing next to her. She was about her age with short brown hair and she had a look on her face that said that she was in charge.
“Serena Campbell,” the woman said, sticking her hand out for Bernie to shake, “Very pleased to meet you. Shame about the circumstances. I hear you’ve been in the wars, both literally and metaphorically.”
Bernie stared at Serena, confused about this turn of events. She slowly lifted her hand to shake Serena’s still outstretched hand.
“I’ve read all your papers,” Serena continued, “I even saw you speak once at a conference. I might be your biggest fan.”
“Oh,” Bernie said, “Thank you.”
Serena almost giggled. “And now I have the pleasure of operating on the magnificent Berenice Wolfe!”
“You’re my surgeon?” Bernie asked, trying to piece together all this information. So Serena was a doctor who read her papers on trauma medicine. Well at least she was getting a surgeon who was well informed.
“I am. Of course I’d much rather be working with you, not on you, but if you like, we can look at your x-rays from yesterday together?”
There was something about the fact that Serena was treating her like a fellow medic and not some sorry homeless woman or whatever the nurses yesterday had thought, that brought back some of Bernie’s long-lost confidence.
“I’d like that,” she said, “It will be good to know that you are going to operate correctly.”
Serena gave her a bright smile. “Just let me grab your notes then, I’ll be right back.”
Bernie watched her as she walked across the ward to her office. Even in her gloom of depression, Bernie could recognise that Serena was a rather attractive woman. A conversation about a trauma surgery with a beautiful surgeon. Bernie’s day was definitely looking up even if that surgery was going to be performed on her.