If I Only Had The Nerve

Visiting hours were almost over, but Mitch knew the receptionist had a weakness for freshly baked oatmeal cookies from Mama’s across the street.

Ten minutes, Isabella mouthed as she hid the bright pink box beneath her station and jerked her head towards the lifts. Mitch jostled with the other box in his arms, bigger and pinker, held together with white ribbon and took the steps two at a time.

Room 27 was quiet and shrouded in darkness, but when he cracked the door open, the corridor lights cast a glow across his little sister’s face and her eyes popped open, her pupils big like buttons. He flipped the light switch.

“Mitchie, you came,” she sang, voice croaky and patted the seat across from the bed she lay in, throwing the soft green blankets off her chest and unveiling her clothes beneath. She smiled shyly and smoothed the gingham blue fabric straps of her dress.

Her brother sat in his place, his back against a giant pink teddy bear, rainbow and cloud inflated balloons floating above his head.The air smelt like disinfectant, but there was also a whiff of something sickly sweet.

“Duh,” he said, tongue out and shimmered his hands over the box in his hands, as if performing a magic trick, “I had to give you your present, even if I couldn’t make your party.”

Margot’s smile flatlined and Mitch noticed there was a smudge of chocolate cake on her upper lip. He nudged her gently.

“I’m sorry,” he sighed, resting the box on her lap, “but I’ve made it up to you with your present.”

He grinned as Margot lurched forward and scrambled with the bow and wrapping paper, one top tooth pressed into her bottom lip, a hole where her front incisor should have been. The lid came off and his sister froze in midair, mouth agape.

“It’s…it’s..my..I ..oh..,” came Margot’s stammer and her hands flapped in mad excitement, pigtails and checked bows bouncing off her shoulders. She squealed and plunged into the parcel, lifting like Simba on Pride Rock a pair of ruby red glitter costume heels.

Suddenly Margot started to wheeze, a strained gasp pulling from her chest and Mitch dived for her mask, stretching the band over her head and holding it in place over her nose and mouth.

“Hey take it easy,” he laughed nervously, a soft hand stroking her titian braids, her own hand against her neck, sucking in slow deep breaths. For a while, they sat in silence, the white noise of the nebuliser humming.

Margot's little shoulders rose up and down and Mitch rubbed her back. He should have been used to it by now, but these little episodes that came out of nowhere still caused fear to cascade like a bucket of ice water down the back of his shirt.

Just last month, Mum had called to tell him that there had been two scares in one day. As he listened to his mother’s voice, his mind had started to get foggy. He had felt suddenly stiff, his limbs paralysed in place, but his heart was going a million miles an hour. He had stammered something about being stuck in training, hung up and sunk to the floor of his bedroom, curled in a foetus position until the phantom hand around his throat had given up and let go.

He hadn’t called her back and he hadn’t spoken to Margot either. But it wasn’t the first time Mitch had gone MIA after one of his sister’s episodes - he assumed his mother had fabricated yet another excuse for him to Margot when (and he knew it was a when) she would ask why he hadn’t been to visit her.

“I’m fine,” came Margot’s muffled voice inside the mask eventually, complete with an eye roll. Mitch released his sister as she swivelled away from him, mask tube curving with her, her feet in socks resting on the cold marble floor. The shoes clattered to the ground and the girl gingerly wedged her toes inside, her fingertips spread on the bed behind her for support. She wiggled her ankles and tottered in a half circle until she was facing her brother again.

Her smile had returned, her freckled cheeks rosy with joy.

“My outfit is complete,” she giggled in a grand voice, bending her knees in mock curtsy, “thank you, O Great Wizard for my gift.”

“Hey, I told you, I’m End Of The Story Lion,” Mitch tutted, flexing his biceps growling but then, he touched his forehead as if tipping an imaginary cap, “anything for the young Dorothy - especially on her birthday.”

“Anything?” Margot questioned, a knowing look on her face, as her gaze slid over to the old VHS player wedged beneath a pile of birthday cards.

Mitch collapsed onto the bed onto his stomach and held out his left arm for his sister to snuggle underneath. Her bedazzled feet kicked up into the air as she joined him, slipping her mask tube in between them, so as not to lean on it.

The player spat the tape out twice before finally accepting it and the screen lit up: the Lion, the Scarecrow, the Tin Man and Dorothy, arms linked, frozen in place on pause. Mitch hit play and the characters jumped to life, skipping through the forest.

“But I could show my prowess, be a lion, not a mouse, if I only had the nerve,” Mitch sang, bobbing his head to the jaunty tune. Margot didn’t join in, but leaned against her brother’s shoulder.

“Mindy said I have to stay here for another week,” she sighed. Mitch snatched his eyes away from the screen and gazed down at his sister. His stomach rolled and he felt a flutter in his chest. He closed his eyes briefly and willed himself to calm down. Miraculously, after a gulp of air, the tension subsided.

Margot’s chocolate stained mouth was twisted to the side in a pout and he reached out to wipe at the stain curdling on her lip.

“I’m sorry,” he responded, and he instantly felt stupid - the second apology in a matter of minutes. His eyes landed on her hospital suitcase, zipped up in the corner and realised that Mindy, her nurse, would have to help her unpack it all again after he left. Margot shrugged one shoulder.

“It’s not all bad,” she said. “Besides, Mindy has seen The Wizard of Oz hundreds of times and she doesn’t mind re-watching it with me. We even say the lines to each other. And Isabella, that Spanish lady downstairs, brings me cookies sometimes.”

So that’s where they go, Mitch thought, slightly amused.

“Make sure to show Mindy your new shoes, ok?”

“Duh,” Margot giggled in the same tone her brother had used on her earlier.

“Love you,” Mitch wrapped her arm around his little sister's head and pulled her closer, stroking her baby hairs. “I will always be your big Lion brother,” he added in a Bert Lahr’s New York drawl. Margot squirmed beneath him and angled her heeled foot towards his body.

“More like mouse,” she teased.

The side of Mitch’s mouth twitched into a half smile. He cocked his head and his little sister copied him.

“You know kiddo,” he laughed, raising the volume as Dorothy and her friends skipped towards Emerald City, “next to you, I think you might be right.”

——

My sister’s grave sits behind a great oak tree, far off the well trodden path across the cemetery. I’m glad - it feels like she is tucked up behind its trunk, protected and sheltered from the elements.

It’s simpler than I'd imagined, I half expected it to be decorated with multicoloured chalk drawings or tacky pound shop ornaments, but it’s modest and quaint, with a black headstone.

I’m probably the last one to see it; already here for years, Mum and Dad tell me that they come regularly, as does Aunt Dinah who lives nearby so she can maintain the grave.

I squat, my cargo trousers straining, jacked up above my ankles, boots firm in the dirt, then I ease back into a sitting position. The bouquet under my arm bends slightly, and the box in my hands is creased now from my death grip on its edges and I lift the lid and stare at the pile of envelopes inside.

Her letters. Unopened. Carefully I pick the wad out and place them on the ground beside me.

Then, I pick out my letter, the one I’d finished writing only hours ago as my flight landed, the chilled British air welcoming me home.

I unfold the papers and smooth them out with my hand. A bird whistles nearby so I take a moment to listen to the noise of nothing and the sound bites of nature in between, closing my eyes. I see Margot’s face, as she was, years ago on her 9th birthday, that smudge of chocolate on her lip. I hear the clattering on the tiled floor as she dashes about in the ruby red slippers. I hear the gushing of that awful and equally brilliant machine that regulated her breathing. Then I see myself curled up in a ball on the floor of my room, limbs trembling, the deafening sound of panic whooshing through my ears and I snap my eyes open to cut the replay instantly.

I came here with a purpose, and I would be damned if I didn’t fulfil that.

With a deep breath, I turn to Margot’s final resting place and start to read aloud.

Little Margot.

I didn’t think that I would be sitting here, today, at your grave, reading this to you. I thought we would be at your flat, comfortable up on your sofa, you looking at me excitedly, glad to welcome me back home, a Union Jack mug of tea, a small nod to me, curled into your palm. 

But here we are.

I take a shaky breath and squint up as a shadow passes overhead. A cooing pigeon perches on the top of Margot’s headstone, crazy eyes cocked in my direction. I laugh wryly and wipe my thumb and forefinger down over my chin. Great, I think, now I have an audience.

Do you remember the day I gave you your ruby slippers? It was your 9th birthday - and it was also the day you were unable to go back home with Mum and Dad. I hadn’t seen you for weeks and I could hardly believe how much you had changed. Your hair was longer again.

We watched The Wizard of Oz until you fell asleep, slippers dangling off your feet. You looked so small and delicate then, and I had this urge to curl up over you, like how they teach us to do when we detect a bomb in training, because I wanted to protect you. I wanted to shelter you.

From what? 

The world, the future, the operations, the disappointments, the episodes.

I realised then, that I would take a bullet for you. But you had already been hurt and I wasn’t there to stop it happening. I was “busy” and by that I must confess…

A dribble runs down my nose and I wipe it away. I can feel a patch of wet seeping up my pant legs so I shift about a bit, then resume:

I must confess that when you needed me, I wasn’t strong enough to handle it. I wasn’t strong enough to handle you - your sickness. I wasn’t like Mum and Dad, I couldn’t stay in the cubicle overnight though our parents willingly took turns, I couldn’t help you with work from Hospital School, I couldn’t even call you after an episode to check on you.

Every time I heard you were doing worse, my body shut down and I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t even breathe.

I used my anxiety as an excuse to be away, away from you. I stuck my head underneath its scratchy blanket and waited there until the monsters were gone. 

I flex my neck and swallow.

I also used the military as an escape. I knew, if I was miles away, I wouldn’t have to watch you struggle, I wouldn’t be expected to rush there in the middle of the night, to hold your hand, or to listen to that damn machine whoosh and push breath into your chest.

Margot, I was scared.

My voice catches and I press the heel of my hand into my nose. My eyes are streaming now and my breath is ragged. I don’t care if the bird’s friend has joined him, hopping up and down on the stone, head snapping left and right, staring at me. I let out a guttural cry and let my body be racked with grief, the pain causing me to double over at the waist.

I was scared to lose you Margot, I whimper, but now you’re gone from me forever and I will never forgive myself for leaving you.

If only I had the nerve to see you one last time.

I finished the page and let it drift to the floor. My eyes swim and I blink the fresh tears away.

Your letters started to arrive in the beginning, but I put them all straight into my locker. Why you didn’t call, I don’t know, but to be honest, if you had called, I don’t think I would have answered anyway.

But Margot, guess what. My bunkmate had a bunch of books from home in his locker, and one was The Wizard of Oz. I didn’t even know it was a book originally; so I sat in my crib whenever I had a moment and devoured the pages. And then I re-read it a few times.

And I noticed something.

Remember how you were always Dorothy - small, innocent, sweet and kind, with your slippers and plaits? And I was End of the Story Lion. Big, strong and proud. 

But I wasn’t Lion. Man, I wasn’t even Oz, or Scarecrow or TinMan. I was Mouse.

I was a coward. 

I’ve been in the army, training for battle, equipped with mighty weapons, tasked with protecting and serving and expected to lay my life down if it came to that, but it was all a facade. 

But I was your brother. 

I was supposed to do all these things for you - I was supposed to drop you off at public school if you were well enough to leave the hospital, threaten the weird boyfriends that turned up on our doorstep, teach you how to play basketball, tie your corsage for prom and make your teenage years a living hell. 

But I was off “fighting a war” - playing a hero, playing Lion, when I was really hiding away from the real battlefield that was our home.

I balance the letter sheet on top of my right knee and turn back to the box beside me. I dip my hand in and scoop out a flat red box.

“Look at this,” I say to the tombstone, flipping open the lid to display a hunk of silver, a white and purple strip protruding from its top. I deposit the bouquet of white roses that I’m carrying on top of a spray of unrecognisable dying flowers and then I lay the box and the metal cross in its petals. It shines proudly in the lowering sunset and the birds tweet their approval.

I almost died in Afghanistan, I continue, I barely remember what happened, my helmet still has a bullet hole where they got me in the head. I’m told I dragged a gunner to safety after an attack on an armoured vehicle and directed others away from the danger zone. Lord knows how I wasn’t hit or how I managed it, maybe it was all adrenaline, but I did, and everyone survived. I thought I was going to die, but then I saw your face and I knew I had to make it out of there- alive.

So I was given a medal, for my ‘display of selfless courage and resilience’, apparently.

I glance at the cross in its box and feel my nostrils flare. It looked perfect, settled on top of those roses, like it had finally found its rightful place. I smile.

The moment I received my cross, all I could do was think of you. I knew you would have been proud of me, jumping and hollering loudly in the crowd, screaming my name if you could.

But I thought of you then because I knew you were with me in the trenches .

You, little sister, made me brave. 

You and your fight, your joy and your optimism, refusing to be beaten by an awful disease.

Oz gave Lion the Triple Cross and invited him into the Legion of Courage and I felt that, at that moment, I had finally found my courage.

I wish those red slippers could have given you your wish to finally go home from the hospital, once and for all. But I suppose you are home with God now, and I am so happy you are finally resting.

I love you always, thank you for fighting until the end,

Your Lion big brother, Mitchie

I push through my toes to stand up, blood rushing back into my booted feet.

The birds are gone now and everything is still.

I almost laugh at the final item in the box as I prop it up against the foot of the headstone. It’s an obnoxious gold cross with ornate swirls and a large white and red ribbon. In the centre of the cross, a blue banner with the word COURAGE shines. Margot’s very own Lion medal.

Then I gather all of the letters, my Military Cross, and head up the path, a line from The Wizard of Oz playing out in my mind.

Read what my medal says: "Courage". Ain't it the truth? Ain't it the truth!