Four weeks

My surgeon isn't here. The surgeon who assisted him isn't here either, but I'm not letting anyone forget the deal. I'm x-rayed and another orthopaedic surgeon looks at the x-rays and says I can get up.

Now that it's happening I'm not rushing it. I ease my body slowly towards the edge of the bed, physio on one side, nurse on the other. Take a breath. Look out the window to the birds. Let the physio and nurse talk across me. Take another breath. They hold the leg and I move myself to the very edge of the bed. Stop again. Take a breath. One leg on the floor, their arms like crutches. A slow hop, a sideways turn, and lowering onto the seat beside the bed. A deep breath, a smile. I have made it. Now just take it slowly, says the physio. Here's the bell, says the nurse. I sit. Just sit.

My body is not used to creasing in the middle. My leg is still carrying fluid. I have lost the height of the bed, my feet are on the floor. Half an hour is enough. There will be another chance in the afternoon. Another chance in the evening. I don't need to rush it.

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The bed feels fresher when I make my way back to it. A clean plate. Somewhere in there a friend from Foxton, and my mother are visiting. They leave to get a drink when I go back to bed.

Just before lunch the charge nurse arrives with the surgeon who assisted at the operation. He's just returned and looked at the x-rays. He says, I don't want you getting out of bed yet. I know you'll hate me for it, but I was at the operation. I saw what your leg is like. If it doesn't heal from bedrest you'll be put in a hip-spike; we'll have to totally immobilise it.

There is nowhere in hospital to cry. My mother and June are allowed to stay over the lunch break. The curtains are pulled. They try and cheer me up. The charge nurse prescribes a pillow with the surgeon's face on it for punching. But I don't blame him. It's the frustration. The plan you've been working towards, that gets shifted.

My friend June is full of ideas. She says, the body listens to the mind. There is power in imagining. My mother listens to her. Can other people do the imagining for that person? This is the question of the mother. We can all do it, says June. We can all imagine the healing. To me she says, you need to come up with an image. Use your art. Use your swirling colours.

I do not want to. I have had enough.

The afternoon nurses' shift arrive. They do the rounds. I'm your nurse this afternoon. They don't ask how are you. They say, I heard. What a bummer. They say, you don't want to be in a hip-spike.