How I Live Now

12

So there we are carrying on our happy little life of underage sex, child labor and espionage when someone came to visit us, which, after weeks of Just Us Five kind of took us by surprise, to put it mildly.

He was a not-too-bad-looking man around thirty-five who seemed too tired even to pretend to be all polite and friendly and he said I’m sorry to bother you but have you got any drugs?

We all stood there and gaped at him and speaking personally I was wondering whether he was setting up some kind of small business venture to sell cocaine to people who were housebound, deprived of television and generally bored senseless by the war.

We must have looked pretty moronic just staring at him with our mouths open because he said Perhaps I should speak to your mother or father and then Osbert puffed himself up like he was going to make a big speech and said There’s only us. So I guess he decided against the speech after all.

Then the man looked puzzled and Osbert explained about Aunt Penn and even though the guy didn’t say anything more, by the look on his face I was going to be surprised if that was the end of it as far as he was concerned even with all the other things he had to think about.

Then he picked up more or less where he left off and said I’m sorry, perhaps I should explain about the drugs, I’m Dr. Jameson and as you’ve probably noticed there’s a war on and we’re trying to take care of the people in this area.

We didn’t say anything and so he just kept talking.

The surgeries have all been shut down. The hospitals are on skeleton staff and trying to deal with casualties coming in from the cities and have confiscated most of the drugs from the chemists so local people with basic problems like high blood pressure or diabetes are experiencing difficulties. We’re trying to keep these problems from becoming life-threatening, but what we need is drugs. We’re a little desperate, especially for antibiotics, and we’re asking everyone to check around to see what they might have. Anything will help.

I looked over at Edmond who was listening in a way that other people listen when they can’t quite hear, and I knew he was trying to hear something that wasn’t being said. But Osbert said OK, we’ll have a look upstairs and Edmond got up with the rest of them to rifle through drawers to see what they could find in the way of prescriptions so I guess whatever he heard was OK.

This leaves me and Dr. Jameson all alone and while he’s looking me up and down I’m reminiscing about what a nice time I’ve had here in England completely free of doctors and what a crying shame it’s come to an end so soon, and after a little silence he says, How long has this been going on? And I know he’s not talking about the war and I hope he’s not talking about Edmond and me, so I say What? like I don’t have a clue what he’s talking about.

But instead of starting up a big lecture and calling me Young Lady and all the usual crap he just looks at me in a sad sort of way with his tired eyes and says very softly Aren’t there enough troubles in the world without this too?

And for once I don’t know what to say.

Eventually Edmond and Isaac and Osbert and Piper come back with a whole bunch of half-empty boxes because Aunt Penn isn’t much for throwing things away and the doctor looks at them and smiles his tired smile and says Thanks, and then he looks at us all standing there waiting for him to go and pauses for a minute and finally he says Is there anything you need that you don’t have?

And we all know what he’s talking about and I want to shout NO we especially DO NOT NEED ANY GOVERNMENT SURPLUS PARENTS THANK YOU VERY MUCH but I don’t say anything and neither does anyone else so he sighs his tired sigh and goes.