Tim Blake was correct
and Aoife was indeed discharged the next day, and her friend and colleague
Hannah Wells picked her up and drove her to her house in Nettlebridge.
The accident had
occurred in mid-September during a spell of Indian Summer but it was the first
week of a October when she got back to her house on a damp and dreary day and
the house felt damp and unwelcoming, so the first thing she did was put the
heating on while Hannah boiled the kettle and put away the bits of shopping
they had picked up on the way home.
Hannah stayed and had
coffee with her and made sure she was comfortable before she left her to it.
Once she was on her
own, beneath a blanket on the sofa in front of her large screen TV it suddenly
dawned on her that she would be wearing the cast for at least another three
weeks maybe even a month so that “Coffee Date” was somewhat distant.
After a half hour
sulk, she decided to distract herself with chores, sitting down chores
obviously, but chores, nonetheless.
She had already
started the claims process with the insurance company, DC Kriszsie Verebes had
provided her with a crime number for the hit and run so that helped, but they
had been dragging their feet, they had received the police report, they had
done the inspection, they had written off the car, but no payment had been
forthcoming, so she lit a fire under them.
PC Ross Grant had very
kindly gone to the police pound and recovered all her personal belongings from
the car and gave them to Hannah to drop off at the house, so she went through
the box, and there were a few things damaged in the crash, a camera, front and
rear dash cams, a sat nav and some CD's, so she added them to the claim.
“You should have
provided this information when you started the claim” an officious voice told
her
“I realise that, but
I’ve been in bloody hospital” she snapped
She didn’t suffer
fools gladly and she was known to be feisty
“I'll add them on” the
operative responded
After hanging up she
opened her laptop and did some admin, online banking and paying some bills then
she started looking at cars, which was tricky as she didn't really know what
her budget was until the insurance was settled.
By the time she had
finished it was getting dark, so she got up and drew the curtains and went to
the kitchen and made another drink and took some pain killers, then half an
hour later she decided she was hungry, so she ordered a pizza.
After she had eaten
too much pizza she thought she would catch up on some of her favourite shows
which she had missed while she was in hospital but after a while her mind
returned to the “Coffee Date”, in the end after an evening of deliberation she
finally ran out of steam and went to bed.
But when she was under
the duvet she decided she should open up a text dialog with him the next day.
Aoife woke late
following the first night in her own bed for three weeks and after
awkwardly performing her ablutions and eating the leftover pizza for breakfast
she sat down with a cup of coffee and composed a text, half an hour and several
redrafts later she pressed send.
Tim replied almost
immediately and they exchanged text messages regularly throughout October, she
sometimes didn’t get prompt responses because he was working, but when they did
connect, they were lengthy and informative exchanges.
Then came the day when
she received her appointment at the fracture clinic, it was for November 4th.
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