The Aftermath, Gail Schimmel [sneezy the snowman read aloud .txt] 📗

you think she is actually taking the mickey and laughing at us all?’ I whisper.

Larry looks serious. ‘Oh no,’ he says. ‘She’s not the type of person to do that at all.’

We are both giggling like naughty children as we follow Lizette.

When we get to the room, Eddie is standing at the door. He hugs me. ‘Come in and meet Miri,’ he says. And then to Lizette, ‘The doctors have asked that she not have too many people at once, and I know you’ll understand.’

Lizette nods emphatically, her blonde bun falling loose from its clips and hovering near her ear.

Eddie and I open the door and step in, and Eddie quickly closes it behind him.

‘Did you manage?’ whispers a voice, and I look over and see Miriam sitting up in bed, a pair of glasses perched on her nose. ‘Did you keep her out?’

Eddie laughs. ‘Yes, my love. Your wish is my command.’

Miriam turns to me. ‘I’m sorry, Helen,’ she says like we are old friends. ‘But I couldn’t take another minute of Lizette. I sent her to find you to get rid of her. So I already owe you an apology, and we’ve barely met.’

I don’t know what I expected – that Miriam would be weak and hoarse and lying in bed sipping water, perhaps. Being in a coma for so long should leave you feeling a bit done in. But Miriam looks like she’s just popped into the hospital to have an ingrown toenail removed and is very likely to leap out of bed at any moment. Indeed, her next words confirm this.

‘I’m so annoyed with those doctors because they say I mustn’t stand up at all. Because my muscles are apparently too weak, and I could have unforeseen complications or some such codswallop. And I would just love to give you a hug.’ She beams at me. ‘Eddie has told me so much about you that I feel I owe you a thank you. And as for Larry . . .’ She gives an exaggerated wink and then a loud laugh that turns into a cough. ‘Oh, God Almighty,’ she says when she recovers from a coughing fit. ‘My body seems to be catching up on all the things it hasn’t done. You should hear me farting.’ She starts to laugh again.

‘You look fabulous,’ I say, quite overwhelmed.

Eddie is just standing looking at her like she’s the cleverest child in the class. Which I suppose she is because she woke up, which is more than some people have managed despite a generous head start.

‘Do you know,’ she says, ‘I’ve lost twenty kilograms. Twenty! With no effort at all. I’m thinner than I’ve been since my twenties.’ She starts laughing again. ‘Not eating will do that to a person. I’m sure I’m going to have the most wonderful time putting it all back on!’

I smile. ‘Eddie told me what a cheerful, positive person you are – but I thought he was idealising you. It’s very easy to do in our situation. But I see he was actually spot on.’

‘Do you idealise Mike?’ she asks, leaning slightly forward and wincing at some discomfort. This should feel like an intrusive question from someone I have just met properly, but it doesn’t.

‘I must,’ I say. ‘I remember the time before Mike’s accident as idyllic. And part of me knows that can’t be true. But it’s been a long time and it’s all I really have.’

‘You have Julia.’

The woman has just come out of a coma, and she’s made time to study up on my family. I am awed, and I say as much.

‘No,’ she says matter-of-factly. ‘You visited me that time. You told me about everyone. You were so funny about Ed cooking.’ She smiles.

I gape at her. ‘You heard everything?’

‘Well, of course I did.’

‘Did you hear everything everyone said?’ I’m thinking about Mike. I’m thinking about twenty-six years of talking to him. I’m feeling so vindicated, like I want to run down the passage and hug him because he has been hearing me. I always knew it, but it’s different hearing it for sure.

‘I don’t think I heard everything,’ Miriam is saying. ‘I remember bits.’ She pushes her glasses up her nose. ‘And I think I heard more and more recently. I think that time you talked about the cooking was the first time I was actively aware that I could hear but not speak or move. I wasn’t very bothered, but I was aware. I tried hard to laugh, and then I kind of slipped back to sleep.’ Miriam smiles widely. ‘Oh well,’ she says, and then lies down and falls asleep. Just like that – no pause in-between, no warning.

Eddie takes my arm, where I’m standing frozen, looking at Miriam, who is now snoring gently.

‘The doctor says that’s normal,’ he says, steering me out the room. ‘Well, so far as any of this is normal. Apparently waking up after eighteen months is almost unheard of, and waking up completely compos mentis is even more unusual. They’re now saying that she might not have had a stroke like we thought, but actually entered into some sort of psychological fugue state, because people don’t actually wake up from comas. But then they don’t know why she couldn’t breathe alone. They’re awfully interested in her and keep doing tests.’ Eddie sounds almost proud of Miriam, like a certain sort of mother I remember from school days – pretending to lament their bad fortune but actually bragging about their unusual child.

‘Of course,’ says Eddie, sounding a bit more like the man I know, ‘they say she might still die.’

‘What?’

‘The chances of her waking up were almost nil. The chances of her waking up okay are even less. You read these stories on the internet, but the doctors say they’re never entirely true – like they leave out that the person was completely incapable of normal functioning after they woke up. But Miriam is completely okay. That shouldn’t be possible. So they don’t know what’s going