Augusts 17th, 1961
John could only hear the clattering of the nurses heels as they swiftly walked through the hallway where he was standing. He couldn't remember for how long he was starring at this large ward through a large window. The cool lighting made every patient's face even more sickly, diaphanous even. The white sheets didn't help. All ten of the patients laid on metal-framed beds, 5 against each walls. A nurse in her lilac dress with obnoxious puffy sleeves, her white apron and a lace-rimmed hat pinned on top of her head watched over them, sitting at a small desk at the back of the room. Only small folding screen could be requested by families for some privacy with their loved-ones. That's what Mimi did sitting on the edge of Eddie's bed, crying. She arrived in Liverpool by 1 pm on the first train she could hop on.
John gazed at his little aunt silently weeping, stroking his little sister's hand. They barely got news about Eddie's state. She looked just as poorly as the other patients in the ward. He lost the count of the blood transfusions she received since she was admitted at Liverpool's Royal Infirmary. He haven't seen Eddie open her eyes or move all night long. He felt his throat tighten at the though she looked dead. John yawned lengthily, rubbing his eyes with the back o his hands. He haven't slept the night. The hospital staff allowed him to stay by his sister, worrying if she would be alive in the morning and also how was Paul, who he didn't get news from since he left Mimi's house by ambulance.
John closed his eyes, giving himself a few seconds to rest as he felt a hand resting firmly on his shoulder. "You should sit down, John." Suggested Dr. Phillips, standing behind him.
"Any news about her?" John asked faintly, too tired to speak with his usual sharp, nasal and loud voice. Dr. Phillips exhaled loudly. He didn't have to speak for John to understand. He didn't know anything or he did and it wasn't good.
Both men turned their heads as they heard the swing doors open at the end of the hallway. A tall, stern-looking read-head man, wearing his white lab coat over his classy shirt and holding a clip board walked to them. John recognized him. He was there ever since Eddie got here ."I've got the test results for Miss Victoria Lennon." John didn't want to hear about it. He didn't feel ready to hear bad new...if they were. This pessimistic attitude frustrated him, but he couldn't think otherwise. As both doctors exchanged stepping a few feet away from him, John couldn't help but think about the night before when he saw Dr. Phillips discreetly giving money to this same doctor. Dr. Phillips joined John again as, in the room, the nurse gently signed to Mimi to leave Eddie alone to rest.
"What was the money for...yesterday night?" Questioned John, his eyes not parting with his sister. Mr. Phillips sighed. He hoped nobody saw his quick transaction. "John..." Exhaled the man. "How much?" John added, feeling tears well up in his eyes. "John, it's not important. What is, is for Edwidge to recover peacefully. The doctor promised not to report her to the police in exchange for money." He answered, sadly. John felt his bottom lip tremble. His anxiety about his sister being thrown in prison was melting off his shoulders. He nodded, gulping back his saliva. "I will pay ye back, whatever ye gave him. I don't know when, but I will."
"John, you don't have to."
"Yes! Yes I have. It's my sister. There were sings... I even confronted her once. I tried to make her confess Paul got her pregnant. She kept saying they never had sex...I can't figure out how it happened. I just can't." Voiced John, wistfully. "We'll found out. It's a question of time. We'll have time to talk about it later." Reassured Dr. Phillips, rubbing John's back.
Mimi walked out of the ward silently, wiping the inner corner of her eyes with her white handkerchief. She cleared her throat and looked at her nephew. "Do you want to go see her before we leave?" She asked, adjusting her black dress sleeves to her elbows. Mimi always wore dark colors for as long as John could remember, but today, the hue of her outfit made him feel uneasy. He looked down at his feet and shook his head. "No I'm sure she's relieved not to have her annoying brother by her side anymore." He joked, scoffing morosely. Mimi pushed a quivering breath, nodding faintly "It's going to be fine, honey." She stepped to John and held his face, looking straight into his eyes. "Eddie's going to be fine...okay? The nurse in there told me she was stable." Mimi comforted John. The man closed his eyes, focusing hardly not to cry.
"John?..." The three people turned to see Paul walking slowly in their direction along with Jim, guiding him with one hand behind his son's back. He looked tired, just as the rest of them. His shoulders curved forward. John could only see the dark circles under his watery eyes. He dragged his feet to the window before pressing his right palm against it. He looked down at the first bed on the left. She was laying there, sleeping. She appeared slimmed after these weeks of starvation. Her cheeks were flattened, her auburn hair was neatly brushed on each side of her face and her ashen skin made his throat tightened...yet, he still thought she was beautiful. He took a deep breath as a tear fell down his cheek.
***
Mimi put down a freshly steeped pot of tea on the living room's coffee table. Beside it rested a few objects John and Dr. Phillips found around the house the prior evening; two pairs of clean knitting needles, an empty bottle of whisky, ripped girdles and a half full tin of Epsom Salts. "Does anyone want tea?" Mimi offered, looking around her. John, leaning on the fireplace, shook his head before crossing his arms. Sitting on the couch, Paul was silent, starring blankly at the floor. Beside him, his father smiled faintly. "It would be lovely, please." Mimi smiled back, enlightening the heavy atmosphere hovering over all of them. She poured him a cup then sat in her armchair and looking up a Dr. Phillips, standing between the table and the fireplace.
The man cleared his throat "Uh...I know it's a difficult moment to go through, but we need to try to understand the circumstances of this so we can help Edwidge effectively as soon as she gets better." He announced, initiating this meeting. "It's really important to figure out her psychological state before yesterday. "He added. Mimi sobbed, shaking her head in disbelief. "Has the doctors told anything?" She questioned. "She suffered massive blood loss due to her womb being perforated during the procedure. I've been informed, due to her precocious age, they omitted to perform a hysterectomy to stop the bleedi...."
"What is it?" Asked Jim, interrupting the doctor. "It means the removal of the uterus. They hope she will recover properly from this wound and her infection and be able to carry other children eventually." Dr. Phillips awkwardly explained, aware of the delicacy of the subject. He wasn't used to talk about such subject matter outside of his cabinet.
"Did she really asked someone to do it?" John stepped to the table, gazing at all the objects on it. "I believe so. Edwidge answered herself and there is no way she could have washed these knitting needles after doing it on her own. I also found this in her wastebasket...." The man grabbed a wrinkled piece of paper from the inside pocket of his jacket. "It's a list of ways she probably believed she could induce a miscarriage." John snatched the paper from Dr. Phillips to have a closer look at it. "There's a number at the bottom of it. What are we waiting for? Let's find out who it is and inform the police!" He hurried, getting more impatient by the minute. "I tried to call it." Said Dr. Phillips "As soon as I introduced myself, the woman who answered hung up immediately. There's no name on the paper. This person is not stupid. Even if we found who it is, proving she did it would be almost impossible. She would deny everything. She surely have an array of stories and alibis to fool the police. Besides if the police would believe us and arrest this person, Eddie would fall with her too because she probably sought for her and paid her, fully conscious of her actions. Trust me. It's not the first time I've seen a case like this. These backstreet abortionists have mastered their craft. They know ways to convince women who solicits them and they know how to break them. In this case, everything written on this list is ineffective, probably to make Edwidge call her again. Who knows? Maybe she got scared at first but realized she couldn't do it alone. These tricks sure have done more harm to her than to the baby."
"My poor little girl." Mimi cried in her hands.
"Most of the time, people find women collapsed in the streets because the procedures are performed in dark alleyways and are more than commonly botched. Most women dies a few hours later. Consider Edwidge really lucky." Said Mr. Phillips.
"It's my fault." Wailed Mimi. "I never doubted anything. I thought she stopped eating out of stress..."
"Please, nobody should feel guilty about all of this." Voice the doctor. "Does anybody might know how she got pregnant? It will help us greatly."
John began to pace the room, closing his eyes. "Two months....Who did she go out with two months ago? Rory Storm's drummer...that French piano bloke...Where was she two months ago? He asked to himself.
"She told me it happened on the 20th of June." Hinted Dr. Phillips.
Hearing the date, Paul lifted his head, tears pooling in his eyes. "Hamburg..." He mumbled. Every heads turned to him, surprised he finally spoke his first word in almost 24 hours. "What son?" Jim rubbed his son's back. The young man frowned sadly before closing his eyes. He bit his bottom lip, feeling his stomach churning. "She was raped."
John's fists clenched. "What?" Paul shook his head, his face getting visibly paler. The thought of his supposition made him feel sick. He jumped from the couch and hurried to the kitchen just in time to vomit in the sink. John rushed at his best friend's side, seeing him wipe his mouth with the back of his hand before opening the cold water tap to rinse his face...and cleaning his mess by the same occasion. He took a deep breath, leaning over the sink. "Have I heard right?" Asked John, raising his voice. "That's what she tried to tell me at the cavern. That's why she suddenly didn't want to have sex. It was the night we rented a room to ourselves. She left before me... She told me she got back at the Top Ten and cried all night long. I just thought she got lost on her way there and came back."
"YOU WHAT?" Yelled John, grabbing Paul by the collar of his t-shirt. "Ye let my little sis' walk alone at night...in this fucking shithole?" Seeing red, he pushed Paul against the fridge. "What the fuck did ye think? What about the hammered men she might have stumbled upon?"
Totally shaken and guilt-ridden, Paul didn't answer before Jim and Dr. Phillips came to separate them, shouting at them to stop.
"Ye fucking brainless twat!" Called out John, unable to control his sudden burst of emotions. "You're the wanker who told her you wouldn't help her if she ever got abused. Were ye too fucking drunk to remember? Who says this to his own sister?" Paul shouted in frustration. "John, please. It's just a supposition!" Jim, of a calm and composed nature, instinctively stepped out to protect his oldest son. Being held back by the arms by Dr. Phillips, John exhaled loudly as tears began to pour down his cheeks. Paul turned to his father, busting out crying, losing all the composure he had left. "It explains why she haven't slept that night...and why she didn't say goodbye the morning after... the mood swings, the nausea..." Jim wrapped his arms around Paul's shoulders.
"I don't want her to die." Paul shrieked, collapsing to the floor, still being held by his father, following him into his fall.
John watched the scene silently, feeling a burning sensation in his stomach, the sadness, anger and lack of sleep was taking ahold of him. He slowly kneeled down in front of Paul and grabbed his left hand to pull him into a tight hug. "I promise ye she won't"
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I cannot express how much I hate this chapter. I took way too long to write it and it is in no way what I dreamt it could be. I just couldn't do it. By chance, writing it twice allowed me to salvage it the best I could. God it was way worse before.
One last chapter and an epilogue and It's gonna be the end of part one!
Just can't wait to take some time and really think about part 2 in depth...and also write the What Ifs. Christmas inspired me one of them. I'm just in love hahaha.
Like always. Hope you liked it!