Trio From a poem by Edwin Morgan "You canny bring that dog in here, Moira." Neilly had never been best friends with the little Chihuahua she had the cheek to call Fluffy. They had joked that there wasn’t a fluff on its entire body; Neilly had joked that it looked like a cat after a fight with a pair of sheep shears. But Moira knew he liked Fluffy well enough, despite his huffing and puffing, and the little dog looked quite festive, in its little Royal Stewart tartan coat. But Moira knew that hospitals were not really the place for animals, even though Tommy missed it, and liked seeing it. She offered him the dog on clasped hands. "Just for a wee minute, come on Neilly." She always knew just the right tone of voice and supine pose to get around her big brother. Neilly took the dog and stuffed it mercilessly down the front of his jacket. Moira smiled the smile she wore when things went the right way: her way. She patted the little dog’s outline through his jacket. "Be good for your uncle Neilly, son. No pissing in there." The two of them walked casually into the impressive foyer of the Sick Children’s Hospital. For such a depressing place, the foyer was light, clean, and friendly. Visitors were buying presents from the wee shop decked with winter flowers. The seats, which lined both sides of the large entranceway, were packed with kids in pyjamas and their relatives, some of them dragging infusers behind them like thin shy friends. Despite obvious illness, most of them were smiling and laughing with relations. Moira wondered if it was just adults who moped and grumbled and felt so sorry for themselves. But she soon shook the image off: these kids were the ones on the mend, about to go home in the next few days. For every cherub here there were a dozen in the beds and intensive care units upstairs in a much worse state. Moira and Neilly, twenty-six and twenty-eight, felt much older as they slipped through the foyer and into the lift. The lift went up – to the cancer ward, and to Tommy. Moira felt her face drop as the lift doors opened. The bright, colourful décor and the smiling Disney characters did more to depress her than anything else. The cancer ward. Tommy had been here for four months already, and during that time, Moira had watched her little brother lose his hair and grow pale as the doctor’s battled against the leukaemia which took him a step further away from them every day. She glanced into the rooms as they walked down the passage. So many kids facing death, some of them only toddlers who caught your eye as you passed with eyes as old as time. Old, old eyes. Eyes tired from staring out the Reaper every day of their young lives. Tommy was twelve, and he needed a bone marrow transplant, and he deserved one. But there was a problem. If anyone deserved to be spared this fate, then Tommy did, since Tommy did not have any relatives to donate the precious matched bone marrow material which could turn his illness around. Tommy was not their real brother, he didn’t have any living relatives that anyone could contact. He had been the child of the young couple down the stairs when they had lived in Atlas Street. The mother had been knocked down by a bus, and the father had taken to drink, and nothing more had to be said. The times being what they were, they had taken the baby in. Nothing had been signed or agreed with the authorities, Tommy had just become Neilly and Moira’s little brother. And then ten years later, the leukaemia. It wasn’t fair. Neilly glanced at her pensive face as they got to Tommy’s door. "Cheer up your face, Moira he’s only a kid." She clutched his elbow with both hands, and pasted a ridiculous smile on her face. They went in. Tommy sat cross-legged on the bed with his Bay City Rollers LPs scattered in front of him. The wall behind was covered in posters proclaiming the Summerlove Sensation in garish colours. Others chanted the manta of Shang-a-Lang. Signed photos of Les McKeown and Eric Faulkner made up the central altar on a shrine to the tartan troupe. "Still listening to the Way Shitty Rollers, wee man?" Neilly was pulling a couple of chairs out for himself and her. "No kidding, bro. They’re pure cracking, and I know you sing Bye Bye Baby while you’re in the bath." "No chance", he said as they sat down. A scrabbling inside Neilly’s jacket reminded them about the stowaway. Neilly grinned. "We brought a wee pal to see you." He unzipped his jerkin and Fluffy jumped out onto the bed. Tommy was ecstatic. "Hey Fluffy boy, you’re wearing Rollers tartan as well...ah Moira, you should have called him Woody like I wanted." Moira shook her head, laughing. "That’s no name for a dog. Here, you better watch the nurse doesn’t see him, or we’ll be out on our ears." Tommy played with the little Chihuahua. "I wanted to speak to you both, anyway, but mostly Neilly." Neilly looked concerned. "What have those doctors been telling you?" Tommy looked at him sharply. Moira felt chilled by the look. "We all know what’s going to happen." Tommy glanced at them both, but Neilly looked away. "Anyway, it’s about the leukaemia. And about my Christmas present. And about a dream I had last night..." Moira nodded sympathetically. "Were you dreaming about your mother again?" Tommy nodded. "I know I hardly knew her, and Maw’s been all the mother I could have wanted." He clutched at his bedclothes. "It’s hard not to feel as if... I’m betraying her or something. But the dreams are real." Neilly patted his legs. "You’ve got an old man’s head on there, wee man. Kids your age shouldn’t know about betrayal." But you could see that Neilly didn’t feel old. At that moment it felt like Tommy was the oldest in the room. "She spoke to me in the dream. She told me she would be seeing me soon. I’m going to die Neilly, but I’m not scared." "Don’t be stupid, Tommy." Neilly couldn’t handle that sort of talk, the resigned and accepting way that Tommy did. Moira tried to lighten things. "There’s every chance..." "I know, I know... I might get better. She said that too." Neilly threw his hands up. "Well, there you go then, so let’s have no more talk..." "She said I would be coming to her unless you fulfilled a... sort of promise. She told me that there is a present you have to get me for Christmas, a special present. If you get me the present then I will be allowed to stay here with you. If you can’t find it, then I am to go on with my mother. I think that means I will die." "What are you talking about?" Neilly had recovered slightly. Moira had been in shock, but had recovered a bit. Tommy had been fooling them. He looked old and wise sometimes, and it was difficult to take what he said as the words of a child. But this silly outrage was nothing more than the trick of a childish mind, just a ruse to get a special gift for Christmas. "No more talk of dying. What’s this thing you want me to get you? Just name it, kid. No need to play on your illness." Tommy shook his head, and drew a couple of ragged breaths. He lay back on the bed. "I can’t tell you Neilly." He flailed briefly at the plastic cord, which held the alarm button, caught it and pressed it. "My mother told me I couldn’t tell you. That’s not part of it. You have to find it yourself. You’ll know it when you see it. Then I can stay with you and Moira..." He coughed weakly, tears streaming from his eyes. Neilly stood up and called through the door for the nurse to hurry up. She was already almost at the door, and herded Moira and Neilly away from the bed. She placed an atomiser mask on Tommy, and he dropped off into a fitful sleep. She cleared the bed, and placed the pile of albums on the bedside table. Moira huddled the little dog out of view. "What’s up with him, nurse?" The nurse ushered them out, and switched off the light. "I would have thought that was obvious. He’s a very sick boy, just remember he tires easily." Neilly nodded and it seemed to Moira that he was tired, as he wiped his face with his hands. "The doctor would like to see you before you go." Tommy was sleeping more soundly, so they began walking down the corridor. The doctor’s room was messy, boxes of hypodermics and dressings and various mysterious tubes and sealed paper packets lay on every available surface. The plate on the door read Dr. Sam Johnson, by Moira knew that the Sam was Samantha, and the painfully young blonde consultant was engrossed in paperwork. Moira chapped the door apologetically. "You wanted to see us before we left?" "Ah yes, about young Tommy." She closed her ledger, and then paused, as if composing what to say. "I don’t want to alarm you. Please sit down, if you can find any seats." "We’ll stand. You’re alarming us already. What is it?" Neilly was on the defensive, his nerves already shot by what Tommy had said to him. She put on a pair of little round spectacles and opened Tommy’s file, which she must have been reading recently. "Let me put it this way. Tommy hasn’t been responding to the chemo as we would have hoped. He hasn’t got any worse, but we are not making as much progress as we had hoped." Neilly fiddled, looking for the pocket of his jeans and missing it nervously. "So what are you saying?" "You must appreciate that having a serious illness drains the body’s ability to sustain itself against the everyday rigours of life. For any other kid we would recommend a bone marrow transplant, but you said before that he has no blood relatives, is that right?" Moira answered. "That’s right, he’s adopted." She looked nervously at Neilly. "He had a father, but we have no idea what ever happened to him. His mother died. We don’t know anything else about any other family. I’m sorry." Dr. Johnson made a small exasperated expression with her hands. "We can fight the cancer, I’m sure of that. But there comes a time in the therapy where it can go either way quite rapidly, despite our best efforts. A lot of it has to do with the psychological state of the patient as much as any physical pathology." Neilly hammered his hip with his fist. "Are you saying that things could get worse again?" "It’s possible." She saw the looks on our faces. "Look, he is exhibiting some signs of depression at the moment, asthmatic bouts and fatigue. These symptoms are not uncommon in cancer patients, but in my opinion they should be abating at this stage in the treatment." Moira held Neilly’s hand tightly. "So what can we do, doctor?" Dr. Johnson looked uncomfortable. "He told me about this dream of his." Neilly shook his head. "Oh that silly thing, I wouldn’t take any notice of that..." "On the contrary. If Tommy believes it, then it can have serious implications on his state of mind, and ultimately his overall health." Neilly was close to anger, and Moira clutched his hand tightly. At last he said "You mean that if I can’t get his this mystery present, then he could get worse... even..." "Die?" The doctor smoothed down her hair nervously. "It’s far too difficult to say, and I wouldn’t want to put you under such pressure. All I can say is keeping Tommy happy has to be our number one concern at the moment. If he’s happy then our treatment has every chance of succeeding. If that means going along with this fantasy, then I would ask you to do so." "But I don’t know what it is I’m supposed to get for him!" "I do sympathise. I really do, all I can ask is that you try your best." She looked at her watch. "I really must get on, and I think you should too, there’s only a couple of hours until the shops close." Moira and Neilly nodded, and looked at each other. Dr Johnson guided them out of the room. "I’m sure you’ll find something." The bus from Yorkhill into the town was empty, considering it was so close to the time on Christmas Eve when the shops would close their shutters and begin putting up their January Sales posters. Another bus took them from High Street to home. There was not a sign of snow, though their breaths rasped the air as they hopped off the bus in Springburn Road. Moira had been quiet on the bus, but she felt some of the frustration and helplessness she imagined Neilly must be experiencing. Neilly had always tried to be the world’s best big brother, and she could barely imagine the mixed feelings of confusion and desperation, and even anger that he was feeling. Moira shared some of his anger. Anger that the little brother who he loved could put such a burden on his shoulders. It felt like ingratitude, and then when she remembered Tommy’s predicament, she hated herself more, and the guilt mixed with frustration didn’t make for a good Christmas shopping mood. As they buttoned themselves up at the bus stop at the Co-op, Moira broke the silence. "Have you no idea what he would like?" "Not a clue, doll." He blew into his hands. "Something to do with the Rollers maybe? Or something for when he gets out? Maybe one of those new skateboard things, or a Chopper. You know how he always wanted a bike." "Can we afford a bike?" "If that’s what he wants then he can have it, no matter what it takes. I got a bung off Big McLatchie." "Aw Neilly, you didn’t borrow money from that big thug?" "McLatchie’s alright. When he heard it was for Tommy’s Christmas present, he gave me it no bother, no interest either. Tommy went to school with his wee brother before he got no well. He’s alright." Moira was not satisfied, and didn’t trust McLatchie. But they had bigger fish to fry. "So do you think it’s a bike?" "He said I’d know it when I saw it, and a bike doesn’t ring any bells." They began in the Co-op, then went methodically into every shop on Springburn Road that might sell anything that could be a present. The High Walk shoe shop lived up to its name, there were a load of platform boots in the window. Moira thought it would take a real hard man to wear them up this part of town. Sellyns had some cracking clothes that Tommy would love, including a white Rollers suit with tartan insets and piping. Woolies had toys and games, and even a few bikes, but nothing special jumped out at them. Neilly was getting agitated. "Maybe we should try Hoey’s." "That shut down years ago, Neilly. Come to grips. I don’t think we’re going to get anything here. We’ve been up the length of Springburn Road." She glanced at the clock on the Quin’s building. It was wrong, as always. "It must be nearly six, the shops are shutting." Neilly was overwrought. "It’s going to be my fault, I can’t find it." Moira was tired, and she let Fluffy down for a sniff in the gutter. The last of the shoppers were making their way up the Balgray hill, and all the buses were full on the way out of town. The wind had begun to blow the trees across the road at the swings, and it seemed that the whole place was battening down the hatches for a stormy Christmas. Moira glanced back up Springburn Road again at the too few lighted shops. "Look, maybe he’ll have forgotten all about it by tomorrow..." And then Neilly was gone. Up and away and under the wheels of a bus. It was still moving when Moira screamed. And later, after a flicker of days, Moira began to understand. Grief for Neilly was tempered with a fiery pride at what he had done. The papers had been at his funeral in Sighthill cemetery, and there were too many willing hands to lower him into the earth. McLatchie was there, and Moira had wept into his arms. A child’s life had been saved in a stupid, needless accident. A moment’s lapse of attention and a bus going at country speed while still in the town. And Neilly, just him. Moira hadn’t even seen the young boy, but Neilly had. And in throwing him safe to the far kerb, he had been caught under the wheels himself. Only Neilly, stupid brave Neilly would have done that, but he had saved Tommy too. Moira had never believed anything. But Neilly had leapt across that wide junction at Quin’s from a sense of something, some inborn goodness he hadn’t needed to think or preach about. That was worth believing in; if it meant so much to Neilly then it was something worth holding on to. Maybe it was that same fate or destiny that brought the tear-stained father of the kid to the hospital to offer anything he could. It could only have happened in a Hollywood story. Who could have imagined that the man would turn out to be Tommy’s uncle – his real uncle, the brother of his dead mother. And a positive bone marrow match. March was blowing the remnants of winter from the cold foyer of the Sick Children’s Hospital as Moira and Tommy’s Uncle Jim went up to collect Tommy from the hospital. The taxi was waiting for them, and as they passed under the wide canopy, Moira thought of the times Neilly had accompanied her through here. The lift and cancer ward held no fears for her now. Uncle Jim had a present for Tommy, but he sneaked it into the room. Tommy’s hair was growing back in patches. "Moira... and Uncle Jim!" He hugged them both in a way uncommon in boys of his age, then grew serious. "I dreamed about Neilly last night." A tear was hanging on his cheek, and Moira smiled, her own eyes misting up. Uncle Jim sat on the bed. "He loved you very much, Tom. I owe him so much." "It’s OK", Tommy said. "I’m not sad. At least... not like before. I dreamed that Neilly was happy. You were in it Moira, and Fluffy. But my mother was in it, your sister, Uncle Jim." Jim nodded, smiling encouragingly. "I loved her, too." "And I think I was in it too, but I was just a baby. It was all mixed up in time, you know the way dreams are." They both nodded. "We were all walking in the town. Moira and Fluffy, my mother and me as a baby. And Neilly was in the middle. It was Buchanan Street, and it was Christmas, and the lights were.. lovely. I’ve never seen them so lovely." "And Fluffy had his wee tartan coat on, and you were all laughing. And Neilly had a present for me. He had a guitar for me." Moira covered her mouth with her hand, and choked back a sob. "Oh no, Tommy, please." She picked up the brown paper bundle which Jim had sneaked into the room, and broke the paper. Inside, a milky white plastic cover swelled out containing a brand new acoustic guitar, a sprig of mistletoe tied to the neck. Tommy embraced it, tears spilling onto the torn brown paper. "Oh Neilly, I knew you would find the right present. I knew you would."