Free Anthem for Jackson Dawes by Celia Bryce Page A

awake. He was breathing slowly, rhythmically; there was an occasional little snore. His knees moved slightly, one on top of the other, as he settled further into sleep. There was a twitch of his arm. Megan watched the rise and fall of his chest, watched as the moon came back out and found him, resting its light on his skin.
    He had taken off his hat. Long fingers curled around the rim as he held it across his lean stomach. It breathed along with him.
    Megan yawned. They should both be back in their own rooms. If the night staff came in, there’d be trouble. Double trouble. But she didn’t care, not if Jackson didn’t.
    Megan curled up into a comfortable ball. She closed her eyes and saw herself and Jackson movingthrough the city, wrapped in strings of light. They headed further and further away from the hospital till they were just small specks in the black night, walking straight through till dawn.

Seven
    Jackson was going home. He was busy packing his stuff with his mum. Megan left them to it though she wanted to be in the room with them. Which was stupid. She’d be going home herself in a couple of days. What a wimp to get upset. She could look after herself. She wasn’t a kid. She’d go walkabout on her own.
    Only perhaps she’d just have a wander to the main ward, rather than round the whole hospital. She was still tired. It didn’t take much to have her wanting to lie back down and sleep. Not that sleeping helped. She still woke up tired.
    Megan pushed her drip stand along the corridor in the opposite direction to Jackson’s room, nudged through the double doors, and the first thing she saw was Kipper.
    Her face was stormy and pink. She was sitting in the middle of her bed. Siobhan was with her. So was her mum, who only barely resembled the woman who’d talked to her the other night. She looked like she’d just got out of bed after a sleepless week.
    â€˜Don’t want it,’ Kipper was saying.
    â€˜It’s just medicine. To make you feel better,’ her mum said. ‘Siobhan’s brought it special. Just for you.’
    Kipper shook her head.
    Her mum tried again.
    Nothing.
    The whole thing was being watched by a small child who was lying on his side clutching a teddy bear which was wearing a tiny nurse’s cap with a big red cross on it. His fingers dug deeply into the teddy’s tummy, so that it doubled over as if in agony.
    â€˜It’s just a tiny wee cup,’ Siobhan said. ‘And it’ll make you feel better.’
    â€˜No. It won’t.’
    â€˜Mikey’s had his, haven’t you, Mikey?’ The small boy with the teddy bear nodded. ‘See! And he’s feeling better, aren’t you?’
    Another nod. The teddy bear’s cap slipped.
    Kipper twisted her mouth.
    The phone rang at the Nurses’ Station. A doctor, shuffling papers about as if looking for one important thing, picked up and listened. ‘Sister Brewster, it’s for you.’ He waved the receiver in the air and continued with his search.
    â€˜I’ll take it. She’s busy.’ A nurse appeared behind him, took the phone out of his hand and began to talk into it.
    Meanwhile, a baby cried and its mum hushed it with a stroke of its head. A toddler banged the side of his cot with Thomas the Tank Engine, who didn’t seem to mind, whose smile stayed put.
    A woman with a ‘Physiotherapist’ badge pinned to her white tunic sat with another child, making him breathe in and out to see if the stuffed mouse on his chest would move. ‘There you are. That’s much better. Nice deep breaths make the mouse move. You’re just like a trampoline!’ The boy looked up at her with amazed eyes. ‘Clever little man! Let’s try some more.’
    Then Jackson was there, standing at the top of the ward.
    Without his drip and with a jacket and jeans, a small rucksack over his shoulder, he looked normal. No, not normal. He looked