I’m missing book club, and because I know everyone is there, and Miss Carroll came yesterday, I know I won’t get any visitors.
Grampar and Auntie Teg don’t even know I’m here, or they’d have at least sent a card. So how does my mother know? There’s no magic here. There are no fairies, there’s nothing—I thought school was purged and neutral, but it’s nothing to this hell ward.
I’ve read all the Tey. Brat Farrar is especially good. But what is a pit in Dothan? Is it from the Joseph story?
Only one more day on the rack. I’m starting to wonder if sadists could get three As at A Level, but if Dr. Abdul was a sadist he’d come around and gloat more. It’s clear he’s entirely indifferent. He didn’t look at my face at all, and barely even at my leg, it’s just the x-rays that interested him. I’m trying to see this as a good thing. Three As at A Level is starting to seem like a very small thing to hold so much weight of trust.
WEDNESDAY 16TH JANUARY 1980
They’re not letting me out until Dr. Abdul sees me, and he doesn’t come in until tomorrow.
At afternoon visiting, Wim came. He brought The Dream Master and Isle of the Dead. He came in wearing a leather jacket and looking really awkward, even more awkward than Daniel did. I was suddenly very aware that I was wearing a stupid hospital gown with stains on it where I’d spilled my food (it’s very hard to eat neatly when horizontal) and that my hair hadn’t been washed for more than a week. I felt touched that he’d come all the way out here to see me, even more so than with the others.
“Greg mentioned last night you were here,” he said. “I thought I’d bring these. Though it looks as if you don’t need them.” He gestured to the piles of books on the bedside table.
“I’ve read most of these,” I said.
He raised his eyebrows.
“There is nothing else at all to do in here,” I said.
“Looks pretty grim,” he agreed. “How’s the food?”
“Awful.”
He laughed. “My mother’s one of the cooks here.”
“I’m sure her food at home is much better,” I said.
“No it isn’t,” he said. “She’s not much of a cook. Though she says herself the food here is appalling, so it must be really bad. That’s why I was asking.”
“It’s not all that different from school food,” I said.
“I’d have thought they’d have fed you well at Arlinghurst, from what they’re charging,” he said.
“So would I, but it’s all awful. Spam and custard.”
“I’ve brought you some NASA astronaut ice cream,” he said, and produced a packet from his pocket.
I held it up where I could see it properly. It was black with a picture of a rocket ship and it did claim to be astronaut ice cream, just like that eaten on the Apollo missions. I looked at Wim in awe. “Everyone else brought grapes. Where did you get this?”
He looked a bit shy, if such a thing is possible. “My cousin brought some back from Florida. He brought quite a few packets, this is the last one. It isn’t that nice, it’s more the idea. I was saving it for an appropriate occasion.”
I stopped turning the packet over and looked right at him. “You have a cousin who went to America?”
He smiled at me, and I got that breathless feeling again. “America’s real, you know, it’s not just in science fiction. Greg’s been there. He went to a Worldcon in Phoenix. He met Harlan Ellison!”
“What’s a Worldcon?”
“A world science fiction convention. It’s five days where people get together and talk about SF. Last year it was in Brighton and I went. It was brill. It was beyond brill. You can’t imagine.”
I thought I could imagine. “Like book club multiplied?”
“Multiplied geometrically. Robert Silverberg was there. I talked to him! And Vonda McIntyre!”
I could hardly believe I was sitting in the same room as someone who had talked to Robert Silverberg. “Where is it this year?”
“Boston. It’s usually America. Goodness knows when we’ll ever have one in Britain again. But there are British cons. There’s one at Easter in Glasgow. They don’t have all the American writers, of course. But it’s not just the writers. It’s the fans as well. You wouldn’t believe the conversations I had in Brighton.”
“Are you going to Glasgow?”
“I’m already saving up for it. I went to Brighton on my bike, and slept in a tent, but I’ll need money for at least a share of a hotel room in Glasgow at Easter, and it would be nicer to go on the train.” He looked eager and animated.
“A hotel room. Trainfare. And how much is the ticket?”
“They call it membership,” he reproved me. “I’ve already bought mine. It was five pounds.”
“I wonder if Daniel would pay all that. I wonder if he’d agree to me going. I wonder if I could persuade him to go too. He’d enjoy it.”