Just One Damned Thing After Another (The Chronicles of St Mary's, #1)

by Jodi Taylor

I could have kept my mouth shut. I should have kept my mouth shut, but I’m stupid and never learn.

Rutherford's broken his leg.’ ‘What? Is he OK?’ ‘Well, no. He's broken his leg, you daft bat.’

The most reliable method, she always insisted, was to measure people's thighs. As a rough guide, if the thighbone was longer than the shinbone then you were Saxon. If it was the other way round then you were Norman. I have Saxon legs.

I saw a blind man, barefoot in the mud, wearing only pyjamas. His face was badly burned and his dressing had come away and trailed on his shoulder. He staggered around, arms outstretched, shouting for help. Never mind the big picture. I was a little person. Help the other little people. I stepped forward and took his hand, saying quietly, ‘Now then, soldier, you just come with me.’ I put his hand on my shoulder and we fought our way along. At least now most people were going in the same direction. I found another young lad, on his knees, trying to get up. I reached out a hand. ‘Come on, lad, up you get. Can you walk?’ ‘A little,’ he replied, teeth chattering. ‘Not very fast.’ So that was three of us and we found another one on the way, bent double and coughing up a lung. We carefully picked our way towards the main drive and a mud-covered ambulance drew up. One of Sussman's mates jumped down. ‘Get them in the back, miss. Quick as you can.’

It was at that moment that I realised just why St Mary's was always banging on about interaction. You are not there to interact. Observe, document, and record. Don’t get involved. It wasn’t only the dangers of inadvertently changing history, but the emotional toll as well. How many people had died today? Matron? The blind boy? My job was to watch events unfold. To record and document. To observe. To stand apart. Not to interfere.

You don’t walk away from blind men struggling in the mud. You should, but you don’t. Well, Kal hadn’t and neither had I. Nor Kevin Grant. But Sussman had. Did that make him a better or worse historian than me? Or a better or worse person?

Did he not know how close to death he was? Mind, he was built like a large brick shithouse. Two large brick shithouses actually. In fact, he was so big it was possible he distorted time and space. He had his own gravitational pull, like a blond planet, and he’d fallen for Kal like a sperm whale failing to clear the Grand Canyon on a bicycle. He thought no one knew. He slung her bag over his shoulder and helped her to her feet. ‘Come on.’

We shoved the table into place and I clambered up. Once I got started, I couldn’t stop. Using wide arm movements, I sketched in a black sky, lit with starburst shells. Stark figures raced and fell across a lunar landscape. I drew faster and faster, unable to stop, taking the pictures in my head and transposing them on to the wall. I drew the explosions, the cold, the terror, the heartbreaking waste. I drew limbs, heads, and blood. I drew men dying on the wire, drowning in the mud, eyes wide, mouths gaping, hands clawing. It poured out.

We moved the table out and I drew the reception tent. I drew rows of soldiers, wrapped in blankets and coats, all stiff and heavy with mud and blood. I drew cold, grey, vacant faces; contorted faces; screaming and crying faces. The last piece of charcoal crumbled and flaked with the pressure.

They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.

Mrs Partridge gave us an unloving glare. You could see the words ‘feckless’ and ‘irresponsible’ hacking their way through her thought processes. I looked in vain for some human emotion. She made the Boss look like a humanitarian aid worker. She was, as always, impeccably dressed in a black suit and white shirt, with her dark hair in a French pleat.

I stepped forward into his arms. He took my hand and wrapped the other firmly around my waist. We danced. I stepped a little closer. He tightened his grip. Normally, I don’t like this sort of thing. I get panicky if held tightly, but this was – nice. He danced well. He smelled good too. He didn’t hum with the music. I rested my head on his shoulder. The music stopped. I looked up. And he kissed me. My whole world stopped. Along with my breathing, my heart, my thought processes, and Time itself. And hundreds of fragments of glorious colour and light swirled and swept across the room. Oh no, sorry, that was the glitter ball.

Sex is a bit like scratching a rash – it's nice when you stop.

‘Why not start at the beginning, go on to the end and then stop.’ He smiled his small smile. ‘Yes, Lucy.’ ‘Shouldn’t that be Alice?’ ‘No, you’re my Lucy; the girl in the song – the one with kaleidoscope eyes.’ I was breathless again.

It seemed very possible we would all be killed by idiots rather than villains, which would be typical.

Some behaviour is contagious. Yawn in front of me and I’m at it for the rest of the day. And vomiting. If I so much as hear someone heave I’m barfing up everything I’ve eaten in the past ten years. Now I discovered a third behaviour. Crying. Even as I stood with him, something forced its way up through my chest. And again. And again. It was uncontrollable. I couldn’t stop. He put his arms around me and we cried together.