Jogging Memories Ch. 07

"That's in the opposite direction to my way home, Brick."

"True, but a two-minute walk that way followed by a five or six-minute drive to your place and you will be home in less than half the time it will take you to walk the whole way. Look, Jennifer, I know you don't know me very well, but I am simply trying to help you out here, OK?"

"OK, but you try any funny stuff..."

"If I try any funny stuff, you know and I know I am going to be in serious trouble," Brick grinned, "And we both know I can't afford any kind of trouble, serious or otherwise."

God, JJ thought, Brick is so handsome when he smiles. JJ found herself smiling back at him, in spite of her valiant efforts to remain aloof and critical.

"Then don't you ever forget it!" she smiled, turning left at the gates in the direction that Brick had pointed, rather than her usual right.

"I won't," he laughed, pleased at her easy acquiescence. He reached across and took her heavy school bag.

"You want to jog?" she asked.

"I will if you will," he answered, grinning broadly. They both picked up the pace and were soon tearing down the road, trying to outrace each other. After a couple of turns of the pavement Brick, who was only fractionally ahead, stopped next to a blue Mini, which looked about four or five years old. "This is me," he announced.

He opened the driver's door and leaned across and opened the passenger door from the inside. JJ stepped in and sat down, putting her school bag on her lap, grabbing the safety belt and stretching it across her chest to secure.

The car started in a roar and they moved off down the residential crescent the car had been parked in all day and out through the end of the estate onto the school road. They were past the school about two minutes after they had emerged from the gates and heading well ahead of the traffic towards her residential estate.

"JJ," she said, "You can call me JJ, if you like."

"Instead of Jennifer?"

"Yeah, nobody's called me Jennifer for a coupla years, it's also my Mum's name."

"Yeah, I can see why you'd want that."

"So you know?"

"Yeah, well, I don't know much about it JJ, but I heard. Look, I'm sorry, but," Brick said, "You can't pick your parents, you just have to live with them and live with whatever stupid things they embarrass you with."

"Yeah, so'm I sorry, but I can't do nothing about it."

"I like your old man, JJ, he was always the coolest guy around on those school trips. Put me on the straight and narrow a couple of times. I used to be a bit bolshi when I was younger," he grinned, "I can't pick my Dad, like you can't choose your Mum, but I'd swap my Dad for yours any day."

"Yeah, he's cool, you know ... for a Dad, everyone says so."

Brick grinned and nodded.

They were silent for the rest of the way. Brick didn't ask for any directions, signalling and slowing for all the turns before she could say anything, so it looked like Laura had passed on her address.

"Thank you, Brick," JJ smiled, when they pulled up outside her house, "Despite my attitude towards you earlier, I really do appreciate this."

"You're welcome, Princess," Brick smiled back, "Same time tomorrow, then?"

"Yeah, great. I'll meet you at the gate?"

"Sounds good," he said, "Hey, and good luck with your Dad today, JJ, see you tomorrow."

<<<>>>

"You're home early, JJ," Jennifer said, as her daughter came flying through the kitchen door.

"Yeah, got a lift," she said quietly, unsure how to cope with her mother while her mind was full of thoughts of Dad and, for first time with a sense of purpose. She was also finding room for Brick in her thoughts, too, only adding to her confusion. "Where's Dad?"

"In the conservatory, with your new grandmother."

"What? Dad's Mum?"

"The very same," smiled Jennifer, "I'm just making a pot of tea, do you want to take the tray through?"

"OK," she agreed quietly.

Bob got up off the settee as JJ came through the open French doors from the kitchen, flashing his daughter a brilliant smile.

"Mum," he said, "This is my daughter, JJ, which is short for Jennifer Josephine. JJ, I would like you to meet your grandmother."

"Oh, you are so pretty, dear, how old are you?" Ann Barlow said, "You look so much like my Aunt Nellie, she was my Mum's youngest sister and my favourite aunt of all."

"Hi, I'm 16," JJ smiled, as she put down the tray on the coffee table, "My other grandmother is called 'Granny'. How would you prefer to be called?"

They embraced warmly and Ann said, "Please call me 'Nan', JJ, I always called my grandmother Nan. My grandson in Australia always calls me Gran, though."

"Hi, Nan," JJ laughed, hugging her back. "Who is your grandson, Nan?"

"Ah," Bob said, "That will be Brett, he is your half-brother, he's 31, married and you have a niece and nephew. They live in Australia."

"So I'm an aunt, then?" JJ asked, smiling.

"Yes," her Dad replied with a grin, "I guess you are."

"Cool!"

Her father drew JJ's attention to the tall, grey-haired older man who was now standing on the other side of the coffee table. "This is Ralph Haroldson, a family friend of ours. He was kind enough to drive your Nan over here today and also a couple of trips while I was still in the hospital."

Without releasing her grip on her new Nan, JJ shyly reached out a hand to Ralph's own outstretched one, "Pleased to meet you, Mr Haroldson," she smiled.

"Please call me Ralph, JJ," smiled the ex-policeman in his deep voice.

Her Nan sat down on the settee.

"Now, JJ, come sit next to me," her new Nan said, patting the settee seat next to her. JJ sat next to her, in the place where her Dad had been sitting.

Bob moved back around to the other side of the coffee table and sat next to the now-seated Ralph. By this time, Jennifer had come through from the kitchen carrying plates of sandwiches and biscuits. She put these on the coffee table with a smile at JJ and her Nan and went out to fetch more.

"Do you want a hand?" offered Bob, as he got up.

"No, it's all right, love, there's only one more stack of plates and some knives," she smiled, "There's some cake, too but we'll bring those through once we've cleared some of this and made room for it."

Bob sat down again. Within a few seconds, Jennifer waltzed back through the door again, laden with plates and knives and a jar of sweet pickle, which she put on the table and sat in one of the armchairs at the narrow end of the coffee table, between Bob and JJ.

"Help yourself to plates and the sandwiches, please," Jennifer invited, "The boys'll be home in a few minutes and very soon this spread will look like a bomb has hit it!"

Ralph didn't stand on ceremony. With a smile he picked up a side plate and grabbed a couple of sandwiches, nodding his thanks to the hostess. Bob followed likewise and Ann also took a sandwich on a plate. JJ was too excited to eat.

They were on their second round of sandwiches while JJ was pouring more tea for all five of them before her two brothers showed up and, after dumping their school bags noisily on the kitchen floor, followed the sound of conversation and laughter through the open doors into the conservatory.

There they found their father regaling the group with the story of his being found in a beaten and distressed state in this far-off wood they had never heard of around lunchtime on the Sunday before last. He had begun his run from home at maybe five or half-five in the morning, according to Jennifer, and surprised the two attackers (who had dragged this young girl Hannah off the main track) about six hours later.

"Lying in the woods," he continued, having smiled and waved a welcome at his two boys, "I was luckily discovered by this jogger Helen, who was suspicious at first seeing me lying there. Cautiously, she circled me at distance and, once she had satisfied herself there was no-one else lying in ambush to surprise her, and with me being motionless the whole time, she finally approached. Realising my obvious distress," Bob continued in a lower voice as an aside, "She feared that I'd already snuffed it."

"Honey!" exclaimed Jennifer, clearly Ann and she both looked distressed once more at the very thought.

Bob deflected Jennifer's anxieties, by introducing the boys to their new grandmother. Ann in turn rose to give each boy a hug and kiss. A few tears shed by both Ann and Jennifer. The boys just looked embarrassed. Ralph was introduced too, and vigorous handshakes exchanged.

JJ instructed one of the boys to pull up another armchair so they could sit at the opposite end of the coffee table to her mother in a pair of chairs. They immediately saw the sandwiches and, after a cursory appeal to their mother, helped themselves to several handfuls, while their mother reminded them to take a plate each to rest their snacks on. Jennifer took the tray with the teapot and milk jug to the kitchen to make another brew, which took her away for a few minutes. JJ joined her and brought out some cans of pop, which the boys opened and drank straight from the cans. Soon Jennifer returned and topped up everyone else's cups with hot fresh tea. Bob continued his account.

"Helen had a part-filled bottle of water with her, it being really warm and sunny that morning, and she poured a little of it on my face. Some water must've gone up my nose, I spluttered and have been told by her since that she almost had kittens in surprise!"

"What did she do, then, Pops?" Tigger asked, his mouth full, spraying a few crumbs, to his mother's groan of disapproval and JJ's accompanying sniggers at her embarrassing sibling.

"Not a lot she could do, Tig," Bob smiled, shaking his head, and answered, "She couldn't get a signal on her mobile at that remote point where I was lying, so she had to leave me where I was. Helen ran up the track towards the road and the nearest houses. She ran until she got a signal and was able to call the emergency services. They told her to wait where she was and kept her on the line, too, so she could direct the ambulance and police to the scene."

"So you were left there all alone, Dad?" asked JJ.

"Yes, but I wouldn't have known that, I was completely out of it, I didn't wake up until four or five days later."

"What did the paramedics do, Dad?" Tom asked.

"It was a policeman who arrived first, Rachel, the detective in charge of the case, told me. He was on his own. He got Helen to describe exactly how to get to me and made her stay there by the road to guide the medics, while he went on to see where I was. He had his own mobile phone with him and he took a load of photos for evidence, just in case it turned into a murder enquiry-"

Jennifer and Ann both gasped again. They stood up one after the other and went into a three-way hug with the main man in their lives. Soon both women were crying their eyes out and Bob's eyes were welling up, too.

Ralph took up the story for him at that point. "The first copper was only there about two minutes before the ambulance turned up. He could hear the siren going while he was still running to the spot, so he knew he didn't have time to do even the basics for a crime scene. From what he was hearing over the airwaves from despatch and his brief word with the girl Helen, he knew that the scene would soon be churned up by the medics if there was any chance of saving Tommy, sorry Bob's life. He had a quick look around for anything that could be construed as evidence and found a grey top that was still dry and clearly hadn't been there very long. The top, it transpired, belonged to the young lady, Hannah. Then he took photos with his mobile phone, as many as he could; continuing even after the paramedics arrived. Only a young copper, he was, but he did a grand job."

"Rachel only showed me one of the pictures which she had transferred to her mobile. Anyway, the ambulance men whisked me away up to the Royal Hospital," Bob took up the story again, "With poor Helen dragged along as the only witness to my presence there. Her Mum, Sharon, had to come and fetch her, but only after she had finished work. That meant that Helen was stuck there for the whole of the afternoon and the early part of the evening, apparently. I was in surgery for a couple of hours while they tried to put my sorry self back together again."

"What were your injuries, Dad?" asked JJ, "Cos you look like you took a hell of a kicking."

"Yeah, the buggers gave me a right going over, kicked me in the head and torso, and injured my hands where I must have instinctively tried to defend myself. They broke a couple o' ribs and one of these punctured a lung, which meant I was coughing up blood as well as bleeding internally. That didn't help with my severe dehydration and exposure."

"You must've been running for so long. Did you not take any water with you?" JJ asked.

"I don't know, sweetheart, they didn't find any water with me, and I must've taken off my reflective vest at some stage as well. I suppose I must've been pretty hot after running all that way. Up to now, they have never found the vest. I may have wandered all over the place, out of my head with delirium, that's what Doc Harding thought, anyway. It was the fact that I was so fit from all Bob's running over the last decade that pulled me through."

The two boys speculated among themselves what route they thought their Dad may have taken between Buxton and the outskirts of Chesterfield and thought they would look up the area on the computer, to give themselves a better perspective on where their Dad went.

"Where exactly was it you were found, Pops?" Tig wanted to know.

"Not sure to be honest, Tig, some wood on the edge of Chesterfield."

"Wildmoorside," Ralph contributed, with a smile at the boys, "Looking that up on the computer maps is investigative work. Either of you two lads wanna be detectives someday?"

The two boys looked at one another before replying, in unison, "Ask JJ, Ralph, she's the 'Nancy Drew' in our family!" they laughed in unison.

Ralph chuckled, looking at the pretty, elfin girl sitting away from the boys, "Perhaps JJ should look up those maps with you?"

"Make sure you all do your homework first, though, straight after dinner," Jennifer reminded the three children quite sternly, playing the Mum.

"Mu-um!" the boys moaned in unison. Bob laughed at the pair of them. From what he had heard from Jennifer in the car while they were driving home that morning, JJ was the one who enjoyed school work and inevitably completed her homework during the lessons, listening and taking in all the new material, while composing essays covering the old stuff that she had already committed to memory. He ushered Jennifer and Ann, who were now much calmer, back to their places on the settee, while he settled down sitting next to Ralph again.

"I think that once the surgeon had dealt with the lung drain plug, and pumping about 6 litres of fluid into my other arm, they were mainly concerned with this arm wound." He indicated the bandage on his right arm, still held by the sling that the hospital, Ben in particular, had insisted that he wear for at least a week, while his nasty wound had a chance to begin to heal.

"The young copper had noticed the pooling of blood below the vict- er Bob," Ralph took up, "And the local Force assigned a smart young detective-"

"That's Rachel," interrupted Bob.

"- yes, Rachel, to the case, who in turn sent the pictures off to their forensic team. They reported back that the blood splatter, well more like a stream, down Bob's vest, shorts, sock and trainers, indicated that he had been bleeding from that wound for considerably longer than the time he had lain there, and that bleeding occurred whilst he was upright and still running along."

Ralph looked at Jennifer, who quickly looked away, and he continued, "Once the blood was cleaned up, the doctors noticed that the wound had very recently been stitched and bound, probably earlier that day or the previous day, as it hadn't started healing yet. Also they noted that the wound had split open, bleed through the layers of bandages and began dripping out from the wrist area, probably due to an earlier blow. Bob may have run into a tree, or been involved in a traffic accident. We don't know yet. How important an event it was, we cannot be sure. We are hoping that he will be able to tell us himself, eventually, when his memory returns."

"They re-stitched the arm," Bob took up again, "But because the bandages had come adrift during the running and beating, the wound was quite badly damaged. They reckon I might have to have some skin grafts to tidy it up. I'm certainly going to have some heavy scarring, so that puts paid to my chances of a male-modelling career!"

"Tommy!" Ann scolded, "You are a lovely man and I won't have you putting yourself down."

"Yes, Mum! That reminds me. 'Tommy', I said I was, as soon as I came round, on Thursday, I think it was something like, 'I'm Tommy Barlow,' I sat up bright and bushy-tailed, and said, 'from Nottingham, I'm 23, you know'. I did not have a clue at that time that I was also this person Robert Morris, aged 54 and three-quarters, or eleven-twelfths, to be more precise. That was a bit of a shock, I can tell you!"

"I bet it was, honey," Jennifer chipped in, taking her mind off the look that Ralph, the retired detective, had given her moments earlier, "You really don't look your age, at all, sweetheart."

"I agree. You look very good, Tommy dear," Ann assured him.

"All the girls at school think you are hot, Dad," contributed JJ.

"Yeah, Dad," piped up Tom, who had now started carving up a large piece of cake for himself, "All the girls in my class say the same."

"Anyway, the surgeon, or rather one of his nurses, put fifteen stitches in my head wound. That probably accounts for the memory loss," he grinned, "Some of my brains must've leaked out!"

"What do they say about getting your memories back, sweetheart?" Ann enquired.

"Doctor Phoebe, the head and brain quack, says that being here at home, surrounded by familiar things and people who love and care for me, will hopefully help my brain figure things out for me eventually. You know, like join up all the dots and make sense of the crazy dreams I keep getting."

"Dreams?" Jennifer asked with a sob.

"Nightmares, really, flashing lights, rolling around, hitting trees. Other stuff, like gravestones, talking in German, too, but I can't make head nor tail of anything it all at the moment."

"The doctors are confident it'll sort itself out in time, Tommy," Ann chimed in, "All it needs is the odd spark to get it all rolling again."

"Just a spark..." Jen croaked, barely audibly.

Ann took her hand and held it tightly, as Jennifer's tears returned.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN: First nights

They saw Emma again at tea-time, this time with Richard brought along to meet Bob for the first time since his memory loss. Richard seemed very tired and somewhat disinterested as they joined Ann and Ralph, before tucking into a fresh mound of sandwiches that Ann, JJ and Jennifer companionably made together in the kitchen. The newcomers favoured coffee to tea but everyone joined in demolishing the fresh pots of either beverage. But the newcomers soon left when Ann and Ralph went home early evening to drive to Nottingham.

Tommy and Jennifer's first evening and night together wasn't as awkward as perhaps either of them worried it could turn out. Jennifer had her bath shortly after her evening meal, before curling up on one end of the sofa in the family room, watching a succession of soaps on the large wall-mounted flat screen TV, the largest one Tommy remembered seeing up to this point.

"In the flat we had a tiny black and white portable TV that Sally brought with her," Tommy commented. "Her father used it in the kitchen; said we could have it as they were upgrading to colour. I think a colour licence was a lot more expensive."