The Night Rainbow A Novel

CHAPTER 24




The hospital is white and smells of mops. I am lying on a bed staring up at a square light on the ceiling, and at the hairs in the doctor’s nose. He wiggles his fingers at me and peers into my eyes, which are blurry with tears but I don’t remember crying.

Maman is by the bed, singing. She does not know the words and is making up the song as she goes along. One song spills into another and she does not stop. She grips my hand tight, leant over the bed, whispering. I’m sorry, Pea. I’m sorry, Pea. I’m sorry. Her own tears fall on to my belly.

When we got here there were lots of injections. The first one went right into the cut that Claude made with the elephant knife. It hurt much more than the knife did. After that I was sewn up like torn trousers. The nurse gave me a syringe to play with and I injected everybody, but the game wasn’t so much fun because being sewn up was tuggy and scary and made me feel sick.

I still feel quite sick.

The doctor sits me up slowly.

OK, Little Fighter, he says, you’re all set. And he turns to Maman.

It’s a lot of blood, he says. They’re like that, heads, but your daughter only has a scratch. He looks at me.

You’re lucky it was only the flat part that hit you, he says. You’ll not go running up behind people again, now will you?

No, I whisper.

The doctor looks back at Maman. She is going to have a big bruise, he says. Keep an eye on her, if she is sick or . . .

He stops because the nurse is jiggling his elbow and nodding at the floor. We all look down. Maman is standing in a sudden puddle.