Free Emergency: Wife Lost and Found by Carol Marinelli

pillow, she was multitasking. ‘I’ve been thinking of going to a hotel for a few days.’
    ‘A hotel?’
    ‘That’s what they do now for some women when they’ve had a baby—rather than take up a hospital bed, they send them—’
    ‘Lorna!’
    ‘It’s a good idea! Meals sent up, fresh towels, the bed made and then when I’m feeling up to the journey…well, I’ll think about that then.’
    ‘You’ll stay with me.’ It was as simple and as complicated as that.
    ‘How?’ Lorna asked. A single word but there were so many questions behind it. ‘I just need to rest, James.’
    ‘You can do that at my place.’
    ‘How?’ she asked again, because quite simply she wasn’t up to raking over the past, or catching up to the present. She wasn’t sure that moving in with her ex, even if it was just for a few days, was a good idea.
    ‘Look—we’re adults.’ James clearly had the same set of questions. ‘We were over a long time ago, we’ve both moved on, but we were married and, yes, I do care. I’m sure if the roles were reversed, you’d do the same for me?’ She heard the question and she nodded.
    ‘Of course I would.’
    ‘So it’s simple. I’ll be at work most of the time and I’m not going to be demanding answers about the past or anything like that. Anyway, you’ve got your guy in Africa.’
    ‘Africa?’
    ‘Kenya,’ James said, and Lorna started laughing.
    ‘Did my Dad tell you that?’
    ‘Oh, yes.’ James grinned. ‘When he told me not to come and see you!’
    ‘He’s unbelievable!’ Lorna snarled. ‘I haven’t seen Matthew in two years! You know I feel sorry for unconscious people—it’s bad enough being half-dead, let alone having people talking for you who haven’t got a clue what you want.’
    James laughed, glimpsed for the first time the old Lorna McClelland, her fiery little ways, her strange thought processes that had once made him smile. Lorna would have laughed again, too. Actually she started to, but it hurt too much so she gave up.
    ‘So that’s settled, then.’ James stood up. ‘I’ll take the morning off on Wednesday and take you home and get you settled.’ He frowned down at her. ‘Actually, I’ll take the day off.’
    ‘You don’t have to.’
    ‘Just the first day, till you’re settled.’
    ‘Thank you.’ Lorna said.
    ‘Your father’s not going to be too pleased.’ He half expected her to come up with some convoluted way to lie to her father, just as she had in the past, but instead she lay back on the pillow and gave the small shrug her bruised chest would allow.
    ‘Oh, well.’
    Lorna woke late afternoon, confused.
    She was in a swirling place and her frantic eyes searched for James.
    ‘It’s okay, Lorna.’ A nameless voice was taking her blood pressure. ‘You’re in hospital.’
    Only she wasn’t soothed, she was stuck somewhere between the past and the present, lying in a hospital bed and trying to work out what had happened.
    She’d loathed waking without James after her surgery, wanted him to be the one to tell her what had happened to their baby, but he’d been ringing her parents and updating them when the registrar had come round.
    She was a ‘lucky girl’, apparently. The Fallopian tube had ruptured about five minutes before they had gone in.
    “It’s no wonder you’re sore,’ the registrar had said, upping her pain control and telling her how difficult the procedure had been. The gluey cobweb of adhesions from her appendectomy had enclosed the Fallopian tube. It had been the first glimpse of the problems she had, but at the time it had been easier to ignore them, far easier not to think or ask about the future.
    ‘Hey.’ He sat down by her bed and took her hand. ‘You’re awake! I was just ringing your parents.’
    ‘How were they?’
    ‘Concerned,’ James said, kissing her forehead. ‘But I’ve told them you’re okay…I saw the reg in the corridor. Has she been in?’
    ‘Just.’
    ‘What did she