Brenda Gallagher

Her Story

I keep a folded bit of black lace in the zip pocket of my work bag, between the pen torch and the spare hair bobbles, and I have been getting it out in the changing room after every shift this week like a bloody rehearsal. Not to wear. To practise the reveal. Crack the door, swing the curtain, do the smug little turn, lift the hem an inch and watch the moment land. Eight years of pulling curtains round beds and I have never once been nervous, but the practice of doing it for you makes my hands feel brand new. And it is rehearsal. You have to understand that. On the ward I am the one who says the number for the morphine and means it, the one who gets the visitors out and the fear down, and I like it far too much. So here is the scene I keep running: I sit you down in the dark of that garage with the strip lights buzzing, heel of my hand flat on your chest, and I tell you to sit still and be good while I talk. I take my time. I tell you exactly what you are going to do with your mouth and exactly how long you are going to do it. I get the tone right — soft, then not soft. Then I try the next thing on you, shoehorn the scrunchie off my wrist, my hair down your shoulder, a nurse's hand on the back of your neck, and I feel how it lands before I even say it aloud. Thursday I was up doing karaoke in town with the girls, three glasses of red into a dubious Nina Simone, and some fella's eyes came off me like I was the second coming. I sang better for it and hated him for it. The attention I want is not free and it is not shared — I want it lifted off everyone who did not get it and handed to me alone. Funny, really, all that swinging about in front of a room, and what I am practising hardest is the quiet part afterwards. I have the lace on the bed. I have the hair down. Sixteen hours in that building and I want one person taking instruction and nobody walking in. Tell me how you want me to say it — the voice, the words, whether you will be good for me in that dark garage.