Read Online Someone To Save you by Paul Pilkington - Free Book Online

‘She’s a fighter, Sam, she wants to live. She wants to grow up – go to school, get married, have children – she wants that, I know she does. She’ll battle for it, we all will.’
    Sam brought a comforting arm around Tom’s back. ‘We’ve got to stay positive, but there’s also a chance that it might just be too much for her. You have to prepare yourself for that.’
    ‘If only a heart had become available last week, last year,’ he said, ‘maybe she’d be okay now, living a normal life, like she should be living.’
    ‘I know,’ Sam agreed.
    ‘Will we have more chance now, now that her situation’s worse?’
    ‘I don’t understand…’
    ‘Will we have more chance of finding a heart quicker, now that it’s critical?’
    Sam shook his head, reluctantly puncturing Tom’s hope. But it could do untold damage to raise false hopes. ‘Sophie was already at the top of the list.’
    ‘What are the chances?’ he said, ‘that a heart might become available in time?’
    ‘I can’t say,’ Sam admitted. ‘But if Sophie is too ill, we might not be able to operate even if a heart is there.’
    ‘I just can’t understand what happened,’ he lamented. ‘I can’t understand it. She was doing well, wasn’t she?’
    ‘She was,’ Sam confirmed. ‘But her heart is weak, and there’s always a possibility that something like this could happen at any time.’
    ‘I don’t know what went wrong.’
    ‘What did Mr Churchill tell you?’
    Tom put a shaking hand to his head, clinging to his greying hair. ‘I can’t really remember. Something about, oh, I don’t know - something about internal bleeding. You weren’t in there were you, in the theatre?’
    ‘No,’ Sam said. ‘I’m sorry…really sorry I couldn’t have been there.’
    ‘Could you have done better, I mean, if you’d been there? You know her better, you know her case. Would you have done anything differently?’
    ‘Dr. Churchill is a highly skilled surgeon,’ Sam replied. ‘I wouldn’t have done anything differently. It wouldn’t have made a difference. I’m sorry, Tom.’
    And that was true. Even if Mr Khan had been there himself it would have probably been the same result. So why did he still feel so bad? Why did a part of him, deep down, truly believe that if only he’d been around, that wonderful little girl would now have a better chance of surviving? Was it just the surgeons’ mind-set that you could always do better, or was it guilt?
    ‘It’s not your fault,’ Tom said, as if reading Sam’s mind. ‘You’ve always done your best for us, Sam. You have always been there for us. We couldn’t have asked for more from you.’
    Sam felt like shouting out that he was a fraud. He had failed Sophie. While she had been fighting for his life, he had been doing a radio interview. But instead he just said nothing.
    Tom shook his head again. ‘Sophie means everything to us. Four years we’d been trying for a baby – the doctors said we’d probably never have children. You know we’ve tried for another since – Sophie said she wants a brother or sister. But we’ve not been able to. This will destroy us if she dies. I’m not sure that we’ll survive this.’
    ‘You and Sarah are the closest couple I have ever met,’ Sam said. ‘You need each other.’
    ‘I’ve seen it before,’ Tom continued. ‘People think that they’ll get through this, but sometimes they don’t.’
    ‘It won’t happen with you and Sarah,’ Sam insisted. ‘Where is she?’
    Tom turned to him, his eyes red and swollen with grief. ‘I don’t know,’ he replied. ‘She said that she had to be on her own.’
    ‘She just needs time,’ Sam said. ‘Do you want me to get one of the nurses to find her?’
    ‘No,’ Tom said, ‘it’s alright.’
    Again more silence.
    ‘Do you think Sophie will be okay?’ Tom asked.
    ‘I don’t know.’ It was an honest, if not altogether comforting answer. ‘But you’re right, Tom, she is a fighter.