So
we’re
all at the party and everyone’s having a right laugh. Gus has drank all of the beer,
which is no surprise. So Tahir breaks out the whisky. I don’t even drink
whisky. So of course, like a normal person, I decide to have a little bit of
whisky.
It’s about now
that I start to wonder what I’m doing in the ambulance. They’re taking me
somewhere, right? Are we going back to Stirling? We must be - surely. That’s what I told
them. We can’t
still be in Edinburgh. That would be ridiculous.
There’s all these
posters on the walls saying stuff about your health and how you should look out
for it. Diagrams and cross-sections of bodies. Parties are bad for you. It’s strangely
upsetting. The main one I notice seems all alive, like some three-dimensional
hologram. A baby in the womb. I think it was kind of cartoony - like, this baby’s happy about
the fact it hasn’t been born yet. In my confused state, I’m saying all
these things to whoever’s
wheeling me along the corridor: stuff about how sad it is for the baby that it
has to be born at all. I’m
just talking at this stage. My mind feels divorced from my body. Like someone
else is talking through me, trying to rationalize what’s going on. I’m probably in
shock. Is that what happens when you’re in shock? I thought maybe you went all quiet.
Well, anyway. I was doing the opposite.
The
weird thing about hospitals, I find, is how dark they are. I think it’s to do with
the strip-lighting? They’ve
got, like, millions of lights but there’s these strange shadows everywhere. In all the
corners. Maybe that’s
just at night though.
So
they keep telling me to relax: everything’s fine. They sound like police. I just keep
apologizing. I’m
sorry for wasting everyone’s time, they must have tons more important stuff to do
tonight, sorry for being an idiot. I was just leaving the party - and next
thing you know, I’m
at the bottom of the stairwell! So I must’ve fallen and tried to get back up again - and
the leg wasn’t
working so I fell down again! I must’ve been trying to find my way out of the
stairwell and someone found me. So I’m saying sorry for all that. Sorry for the baby.
I must’ve
sounded like a complete fucking lunatic.
A
nurse is x-raying my ankle. Actually, she does both ‘cos I don’t think I’ve managed to
make it clear which one of them I think I’ve broken. They do that weird thing where they
half step out of the room holding onto the button, so they don’t get killed
by radiation. The baby.
So,
yeah, it was a crazy night all right. Luckily it was a clean break. They put
the plaster on: a little work of art. But you know all about that.
After
all the drinking. After the crash. The baby.
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