I Drove a Family Friend to A&E – and his condition shifted from peaky to scarcely conscious on the way.
Our family friend has always been a bigger-than-life figure. Clever and unemotional – and never one to refuse to another brandy. During family gatherings, he’s the one chatting about the most recent controversy to catch up with a local MP, or regaling us with tales of the shameless infidelity of assorted players from the local club for forty years.
We would often spend Christmas morning with him and his family, before going our separate ways. But, one Christmas, some ten years back, when he was supposed to be meeting family abroad, he fell down the stairs, holding a drink in one hand, suitcase in the other, and fractured his ribs. Medical staff had treated him and instructed him to avoid flying. So, here he was back with us, trying to cope, but appearing more and more unwell.
As Time Passed
The morning rolled on but the stories were not coming as they usually were. He insisted he was fine but his condition seemed to contradict this. He attempted to go upstairs for a nap but was unable to; he tried, gingerly, to eat Christmas lunch, and was unsuccessful.
So, before I’d so much as put on a festive hat, we resolved to take him to A&E.
We thought about calling an ambulance, but what would the wait time be on Christmas Day?
A Worrying Turn
By the time we got there, his state had progressed from poorly to hardly aware. Other outpatients helped us get him to a ward, where the generic smell of clinical cuisine and atmosphere permeated the space.
The atmosphere, however, was unique. One could see valiant efforts at holiday cheer all around, notwithstanding the fundamental sterile and miserable mood; decorations dangled from IV poles and dishes of festive dessert sat uneaten on tables next to the beds.
Cheerful nurses, who undoubtedly would have preferred to be at home, were moving busily and using that lovely local expression so particular to the area: “duck”.
A Quiet Journey Back
When visiting hours were over, we returned home to cold bread sauce and holiday television. We watched something daft on television, likely a mystery drama, and engaged in an even sillier game, such as a local version of the board game.
It was already late, and it had begun to snow, and I remember feeling deflated – did we lose the holiday?
Recovery and Retrospection
Although our friend eventually recovered, he had actually punctured a lung and went on to get DVT. And, even if that particular Christmas is not my most cherished memory, it has become part of family legend as “the Christmas I saved a life”.
How factual that statement is, or involves a degree of exaggeration, is not for me to definitively say, but its annual retelling certainly hasn’t hurt my ego. In keeping with our friend’s motto: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.
