Chapter 14: Bob Goes Home

Wednesday morning was very busy on the ward rounds, which slowed down the doctors’ passage through the list of patients. Bob/Tommy waited nervously for their arrival as he felt fit and eager to get out after ten days inside. The wound in his chest, where the lung drain had been the previous week, was healing up nicely, the dressing changed again as usual that morning. His ribs were mending satisfactorily. So, as far as the nurse Ben was concerned, Bob was ready to go. He was just waiting for that official release that only his doctors could give.

Jennifer turned up before the doctors did.

“Sleep well, Jen?” he asked her, kissing her on the cheek.

“Yes, very well, hon,” she smiled, “What about you? Have they got around to releasing you into my custody, yet?”

“That’s a yes and a no. Yes, I slept OK. I was really exhausted after you all left,” he grinned, “Not been released yet, though, still waiting for the doctors to visit on their rounds. But Ben reckons the results of the tests they took earlier look positive, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed.”

When they did put in an appearance, Doctors Harding and Holland made nods all around and Bob received the release he had looked forward to. He had to book a number of appointments to outpatients, for dressing changes to his ribs and stitch removal from his head and arm, plus weekly sessions with Dr Phoebe while his amnesia continued. He was under orders not to exercise excessively for at least a couple of weeks, although gentle long walks were fine. And they wouldn’t allow him to drive until after he had at least one further assessment in a couple of weeks’ time. Much of this treatment were checks that he could have had at his local surgery or hospital if he wished, but Tommy/Bob was happy, after a quick consultation with Jennifer, who would have to bear the brunt of the driving in the initial stages, to return to Chesterfield Royal.

There was quite a send off, as Tommy had become something of a celebrity during his stay. He was wheeled through the hospital, dressed in some comfortable outdoor clothes that Jennifer had brought with her. Ben, of course, shook his hand first, tapping his mobile number into Bob’s restored and fully charged mobile that JJ had brought up the previous evening.

In the foyer there was another send-off party greeting him before he departed. Sharon and Helen Bister were there, of course, as they had been there all along. Also in attendance were Tommy’s Mum, brought to the hospital by Ralph, and Marcia Knight, who had dragged her reluctant daughter Hannah along, to meet her saviour for the first and probably the last time.

It was Hannah that broke ranks first, as the enormity of what had happened to her rose to the surface the instant she saw the slim, tall person she saw as an old man in the wheel chair. Tears welled up in her previously bored and disinterested eyes as she saw the still vibrantly highlighted bruised eyes, cheeks and jaw, the plasters wrapped around several fingers, the sling supporting the still-sore and tightly-bandaged cut right arm.

“Oh, man,” she wailed as she put her arms around him and kissed him on the top of his stubbled pate, “I didn’t realise what a job those men did on you!” Then, when she saw the stitches on the top and back of his head, she almost collapsed in tears and her mum Marcia had to come and hold her up.

By then pretty much everyone was moist in the eyes, except maybe the ex-copper Ralph, who looked on with a detached but interested eye.

His Mum, Ann, and wife Jennifer embraced each other, promising regular visits each way. Sharon and Helen, too, were invited to come over any time they wanted, and soon. Everyone busily exchanged telephone numbers, where they hadn’t already done so, with Jennifer.

Marcia and Jennifer were already well acquainted and had arranged between them a joint shopping expedition in Derby for the following Saturday, which Hannah, who rarely did anything with her mother any more, had also wangled an invite. Ralph offered to bring Ann over to the Barlow household the next morning and noted the house number and postcode for his satellite navigation system in a notebook that looked suspiciously familiar to his former working one.

By the time Bob and Jennifer had strapped themselves into the car and Jennifer drove them out of the car park, heading home, Jennifer was animated and invigorated by the exchanges and Bob was absolutely exhausted.

Emma had managed to catch Rich on his mobile phone, having missed him again the previous night. He had gone to bed early evening in anticipation of his customary early start in the morning, while Emma slept in late.

“Hi Rich, honey, it’s Emma.”

“I know, Em, your name comes up on the phone,” he replied.

“Course it does, I’m not thinking straight this morning, it was all a bit emotional last night. Look Honey, Jen’s just called, she’s brought Bob home this morning and has invited us over for tea, what time you coming home?”

“Early, about four-ish, hopefully. Only got a short job to complete about two, an’ it’ll be too dark to start another. Guess by the time we drop everything off at the yard, I’ll home by four.”

“OK, get showered and ready, so we can get over to Jen’s by five.”

“Yeah, sure, Em, it’ll be good to see Bob again.”

“I don’t know if you’ll recognise him, Rich, he’s ... we’ll, he’s different.”

“Different? Better or worse?”

“Better, I think. Funny, lively, like a much younger Bob without all the worries. He is going into the rest of his life with an optimism and enthusiasm that is, well inspiring.”

“Nothing like the misery guts he’d been lately, then?” Richard laughed.

“No, nothing like. He’s upbeat. Anyway, I’ll see you later then, honey. Oh, honey?”

“Yes?”

“See if you can get off an hour early, I feel horny, you know?”

“Yeah, like that surprises me! I’ll see what I can do.”

“Don’t hang up, Jen, please.”

“I told you never to ring me again, Richard, ever!”

“I know, but it would appear more than a little awkward if I didn’t ring you up and ask about my best friend Bob, when I’ve only just this minute heard that you’ve brought him home, wouldn’t it?”

“I suppose so,” Jennifer agreed reluctantly.

“Well then, how is he?”

“Fine. Considering.”

“Where is he?”

“He’s in bed asleep, he is completely exhausted, poor lamb,” Jennifer said.

“And just WHO is he?”

Jennifer hesitated, walking with the phone from the kitchen, which was just below the main bedroom where Bob was sleeping, out into the conservatory, pulling the French doors tightly shut behind her.

“He ... he’s not Bob any more, Rich. He, well he seems to be a different guy altogether.”

“What d’yer mean? Different, how?”

“He’s more youthful, playful, he gets excited, chatty, flirty even, and I can’t get over the fact that he smiles all the time.” Jen smiled at the thought, her most recent impressions of her husband.

“What, ‘Bashful Bob’, flirty?”

“Yes, the old Bob we know was quiet, reserved, aloof, as you know. He never said very much, always kept himself to himself.” Jennifer bit her lip, “He has been miserable for a long time, I never really recognised that until now. I had nothing to compare him against.”

“Not with me, Jen. I was his best mate, someone he could talk to,” Rich commented, “We used to talk about all sorts of thing that he was enthusiastic about, like football and the kids.”

“Yes, sure, he was much more natural with the kids, of course, in his encouragement of their interests. And he was very pally with you Rich, and Em, of course, but I mean, even with me, he was quiet most of the time. I wonder if he knew what we had done, all those years ago. It was as if he has always been pushing me awayever since.”