By Iona Laing

Chapter Nine – Ten Years Later.

(In the following ten years, life has continued on for the Jones family. The lorry repair business has gone from strength to strength. The two brothers have taken an increasingly prominent role in the business; both are married with a young family of their own, each having a loving wife and two young sons apiece.

Jennifer and Jeff Snr continue to run the administration of the business.

Jacqui and her partner Deborah run a very successful Accountancy Practice in the town and have undergone a civil partnership ceremony, and the family are happy to have them in their midst.

Jenna qualified as a children’s nurse and is the Ward Manager for the children’s acute medical assessment ward at the hospital. Jenna continued to be close to her younger sister, and they still shared their childhood home with their parents.

Jessie trained as a Registered Healthcare Play Specialist to help children get over their fears of being in hospital helping explain about any procedures they may face or anything else associated with a hospital stay, including working with children on the cancer wards and those with life limiting conditions.

It is mid-December and the run up towards Christmas is as frantic as ever.)

(Jenna.)

Jessie walks onto Jenna’s ward.

“Jessie, thank God, I caught you before you went home, I have a young girl in a side room, she’s almost eight, she is stressed beyond belief, but she won’t let any of us get close to her, can you see if you can reach out to her?”

“Of course, Jen, I’ll do whatever I can, you know that, so, what can you tell me about this child?”

“Oh, thank you Jess, come to the nurse’s station and I’ll tell you what I know, which to be fair, isn’t a lot.
Her name is Julia Jennings, she’s in the foster care system, or at least she was.

Apparently, she was dropped off at A&E this morning, suffering a major Asthma attack. Her foster carers dropped her off, said they were sick of her sickness and wanted nothing more to do with her, so they dumped her off on the hospital with a bin bag, with a few clothes in it and a teddy bear.

Once her health improves, she will be sent to a care home where she’s been before but where she’s suffered a lot of bullying. We’ve managed to get her stable, but she won’t have anything to do with us, so I was hoping you could get weave your magic and get through to her where we couldn’t.”

“Lead me to her Jen and I’ll see what I can do, but what kind of foster carer’s get into the system and will drop off a child so close to Christmas too, bastards!”

“Now, now Jessie, don’t let our mother hear you using such language!”

My sister did her fall back gesture to me and pulled her tongue out!

(Jessie.)

I entered a dimly lit side room, a small figure lay on the bed with her face away from the door, gently sobbing into her face mask clutching a small teddy bear to her chest.

“Hello Julia, my name is Jessie”

“Go away!”

“Well hello to you too! If you think you can get rid of me that easily you are very wrong! Now how about we start again. Hello Julia! My name is Jessie”

This greeting met with stony silence, so I took one of the chairs from outside the room, walked around the far side of the bed and sat down.

“Hello Julia!”

This time she turned away from me and faced the other side of the room. So, I picked up the chair and went to face her on the other side of the bed.

“Hello Julia!”

She turned her back on me once again, so once more I walked around the bed and sat facing her.

“Hello Julia! I am Jessie, can you say hello to me?”

She once more turned her back to me, but not so far as she had, so I sat on the edge of the bed and gently tapped her shoulder with my fingertip.

“Look at me Julia, come on, look at me!”

Stony silence.

“We can play cat and mouse all night, but I don’t give up, why don’t you look at me and tell me why you are so angry, whatever you tell me will be our secret, okay!”

She turned to me and gave me a very sad scowl, but a scowl none the less.

“Why don’t you leave me alone, you won’t listen to me, you won’t help me, you’ll be like everyone else, you won’t like me! So, just go away and leave me on my own and you can go home and be with your family!”

“Sorry Julia, no can do, I see a scared, lonely little girl in front of me who desperately needs a friend, and I’d like to be your friend if you’ll let me.

But either way, I am not leaving you on your own, now, you can either speak to me, or we can play hide and seek a while longer!”

“Why do you want to be my friend?"

“Because I see someone who is desperately lonely and needs a good friend, and I know how that feels!”

“You? You are so pretty you must have loads of friends, how can you know what it feels like to be a sick freak like me?”

“Oh Julia, Julia, for starters, I don’t want you to call yourself a freak ever again, second . . “

“Freak, freak, freak, I’ll call myself a freak as often as I want and you can’t stop me!” and she turned away from me again.

“Well, at least I got you to speak to me, that’s one point in my favour!”

She faced me with a defiant stare.

“No it isn’t, I wasn’t talking to you, I was telling you off so why don’t you just f**k off and leave me alone!”

“Well, while I don’t like your choice of words, I suppose it’s understandable in the circumstances, now then, that’s the second time you spoke to me, so that’s another point in my favour! And if you think swearing at me is going to offend me or frighten me away, you are wrong, yet again!

I know exactly what it feels like to be in hospital all the time, to have no school friends, to feel the whole world is against you and to feel you’ll never be happy like everyone else, but I promise you, I do want to be your friend!”

“You’re telling me lies, you can’t know what it feels like to be me!”

“You’re right Julia, I don’t know how it feels to be you, but I do know what it feels like to be lonely, to be afraid, to be ill all the time, and although I have a large family, I am the youngest and apart from my sister, I was convinced everyone hated me, but I was wrong, people did love me, just as there will be someone who will be your friend and will love you too.”

“I don’t believe you were lonely and afraid like me!”

“Ok Julia, if I can prove to you how I felt when I was your age, will you talk to me and let me be your friend, I promise I will be a good friend to you if you will let me, okay?”

“Go on then prove it, I know you can’t!” She crossed her arms in that defiant attitude that children love to use when convinced adults were trying to get the better of them. If she could have petulantly stamped her foot she would have, but being she was lay down in bed she couldn’t.

I went to the door and called out, “Jenna, when you get chance can you pop in for a minute or too, I want you to prove a few things to Julia here, she thinks I am lying to her!” A few minutes later Jenna came in the room.

“Hi girls, what can I do for you?”

“Okay Jen, Julia wants you to confirm that I am telling her the truth, so can you answer a few questions for me?”

“Sure thing, what does Julia need confirming?”

“Right Julia, pin your ears back and listen, there is no way I can get her to lie for me, okay?

Okay Jenna, did I spend a lot of time in hospital when I was little?”

“You were in and out of hospital that much that it was almost your second home!”

“What was I usually in hospital for?”

“A bit like Julia here, you often struggled to breathe, I forget how often you had to have the breathing tube down your lungs!”

“Did I have lots and lots of friends?”

“Well, apart from me and my friends, you had none of your own!”

“Why were you her only friend?” Julia asked Jenna, “She’s so pretty she must have had lots of friends!”

Jenna came further into the room and took one of Julia’s hands in hers, “She was my friend because I am her older sister, and I loved her to bits, still do!

If you let her Julia, she can be a good friend to you too, but to be a friend and love someone, you have to open your own heart and let that person in, understand?”

Julia looked from one to the other of us as realisation set in we were telling her the truth.

“Now do you believe me Julia when I say I want to be your friend?”

Julia looked at me and put her arms open wide for a hug and nodded her head.

“Thanks Jen, I’ve got this now!” I said, as Jenna gave me a big smile and a wink as she left the room.

“Hello Julia, my name is Jessie!”

A muffled sob from my shoulder area said, “Hello Jessie, can you be my friend?”

Chapter Ten – A New Friendship is Established.

(Jessie.)

We spoke for almost four hours that evening. Julia told me how her single parent mother had drink and drug problems and Julia had been taken into care at a young age.

She told about her health problems, particularly severe asthma attacks, that she was Coeliac, highly allergic to wheat, oats, rye and barley in all its forms which made her diet problematic, plus episodes of eczema probably due to stress.

She’d spent all her life being shuffled from one children’s home to another with a few, albeit short, placements with foster carers. The last of which placed their other children above Julia and seemed to take great delight in reminding her of that fact at every opportunity.

It seemed that this morning’s asthma attack was one problem too far as far as they were concerned, and they’d dumped her in Accident and Emergency with all her worldly possessions and walked away from her for good.

Julia relaxed with me, and I got some smiles then a little laughter. I told her we were even more alike than she realised as both of us had J, J for our initials, Jessie Jones and Julia Jennings, she laughed.

Well, I know something you don’t know, my middle initial is a J too, I am Julia Juliet Jennings!”

“Ha, well I know something you don’t know, so there!” and I pulled my tongue out at her, “My middle initial is a J too, I am Jessie Jocelyn Jones. Although I think your two names are prettier than mine. But I am named after my two grandmothers! So, I can’t change them, but you have the same middle name as my sister”

“I never knew my grannies, but the last time I was allowed to meet my Mum she told me she had named me after a famous actress, Julia Roberts I think she said, whoever she is, and Juliet after the character in the Shakespear play but I don’t know much about that other than it is famous but really hard to understand and a bit sad.”

“I will show some pictures on my laptop about who you are named after. I can even show you pictures of my grannies but neither of them is famous. So, Julia, do you know where your Mummy is now?” I knew I may be able to get the information, but I wondered how much Julia knew.

Her face fell and she looked sadly at me.

“The last foster family told me my Mum had died from all the drugs she took, but I don’t know how true that is. The other kids in the family would torment me by saying my Mum was dead and it served her right, that I didn’t deserve to have my own Mummy and I wasn’t having theirs, then we would get into arguments, but I was the one always told off for starting the trouble.”

She cried again and it took a while to settle her back down. We spoke about her teddy, which was called, oddly enough Teddy!

Before I knew it, I was being threatened to be thrown out of the ward, as Julia needed to get some sleep, which, to be fair, so did I.

She threw her arms tightly around my neck, begging me to stay with her until she fell asleep.

“I wish you could be my big sister, or better yet, my Mummy Jessie!”

“I would like that too Julia, but I don’t want to make promises I can’t keep! How about for now, I help you get ready for bed, let me give your face a quick wash, clean your teeth and tuck you in and I’ll see you in the morning.”

“You promise, you’ll see me tomorrow?”

“Yes Julia, I promise.”

“Pinky swear you’ll see me tomorrow morning?”

“I tell you what Julia, let me see if my sister is still here?”

“Yes, Jessie I am still here, I was just checking on you two, as you both need your beauty sleep!” responded Jenna from the doorway.

“Great Jen, tell Julia how we used to make pinkie promises to each other, and how seriously we used to take them!”

Jenna came further into the room, she looked carefully around her like she was about to reveal some top secret and that she didn’t want anyone else to overhear what she was about to say, then in a stage whisper she said.

“Julia, we used to tell each other things all the time, and swear each other to not tell a soul, all were pinkie finger promises, and we never broke one, not ever no matter how much others wanted to guess what we were talking about, and, keep this to yourself, we still do!”

“Nooo?”

“It’s a fact Julia, actually, the last one we made was about ten days ago!” I smiled at her.

“No, it wasn’t, it was the day before yesterday!” teased Jenna.

“It was? What was it about?” enquired a fascinated little girl.”

“Uh-uh!” I smiled, making the zipping motion across my tightly sealed lips.

Julia laughed, it was a lovely sound.

“Right madam, into bed, sleep and I will see you in the morning, I promise!” As I held my pinkie finger up to her, she hooked her finger into mine, she snuggled down, cuddling her teddy, and, within moments she was out like a light. Both I and Jenna kissed her forehead before we left the ward to travel the few miles home.