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Dear Diary V
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1. January
Kirsty sat on the bed in her bedroom, which looked considerably better than her old bedroom at her mother's house, even considering that some of the time she couldn't see it very well, which was in former times thanks to imperfectly corrected vision. All that was a thing of the past, though: she still wore thick glasses to see, but at this moment she had other, much harder things to bear. Limply she held a paper tissue in her hand, on the bedside table nearby sat a box half full of them, whilst in and around the bin were other tissues, damp, scrunched up and discarded. Behind her thick lenses, her eyes appeared small, but also red and puffy from crying: she exhaled a miserable sigh, then pushed up her glasses again to wipe away tears.
Glumly she leant forward, putting her chin in her hands, desperately trying to think happy thoughts. There really only was one: she straightened up then touched her growing tummy, feeling the life inside it. She wrung a smile from her face: knowing that there was something left of Mike inside her was worth a lot. Five months ago she'd become pregnant, some time later she'd known it was a girl, and then, oh how the thought stung, Mike had been taken from her. Somehow he'd got involved in some pile-up on the motorway, was pulled out alive but unconscious, then slipped into a coma and died two weeks later, only six weeks ago. Even fleeting thoughts about it left her sobbing helplessly.
The pain was worse today: it was a Saturday, and she didn't have think about work: there was none of the important but currently meaningless busyness to keep her mind away from the dark thoughts that flickered across her mind in quiet moments. She went through a couple more bouts of crying, recovering, dabbing dry then thinking and longing for it not to have happened. Then she opened a drawer and pulled out a new Diary, opened it up, picked up a pen and sat staring and blinking at the blank paper, thinking about all sorts of things before starting to write, hesitatingly at first, then more fluidly.
'Hello new Diary. My name is Kirsty. No doubt you have heard of me. I'm 23 years old, female and as you can see, well, I know you can't see, so I'll tell you: I'm pregnant. It's something I didn't really think would ever happen, not previously, nor did I think I would ever have a decent boyfriend. Well, I did, but he's gone now.'
Kirsty stopped to choke back a sob. Miserably, she thought “this is hard to think about,” then endeavoured to block recent painful events from her mind. Having recovered her composure as best she could, she continued
'I can't talk about what happened to him. It still hurts too much.'
Instead, she thought about her family, and things became considerably easier to think and write about
'I'll tell you about my family. It's not so good, not all of it, but anyway. Mum is still our mum, but I don't know how much more she can take. She won her case with her employer, but didn't get that much out of it. Instead I think the whole experience has really got to her and ground her down more than she was anyway. Plus, she's steadily getting blinder. Not like Melissa and Amy, but still, not good. Poor Mum, she's had so much to cope with what with looking after me, and all the rest of us. And then, there's Emma.’
‘She got herself into all sorts of trouble last year, yes I know she's born for trouble but she really outdid herself last winter. Got herself arrested, and she's now in prison. I don't know exactly what for, and I'm not sure I want to know, but I can guess. She's asked me to visit her in prison, she's written to me a couple of times, some of it her usual blustering stuff, but in other parts, she seems quite scared. I decided I didn't want to see her in prison. Maybe that's cruel? I'm sorry, but I can't deal with that right now.’
And now for the good news. Amy and her boyfriend and their little kid Joey are doing just fine. Err, that's the good news. Oh, Melissa is living back at home with mum after being dumped. And Louise no longer wears a patch - she is SO glad to be rid of that and I'm glad I don't have to play camp commandant in order to get her to wear it! Other than that, she's got a good friend with that girl Michelle. Glad I don't have to worry about her so much! Perhaps I need to worry about myself now and again... I'm pregnant, I need pampering!'
A few days later Louise lay on her bed, on her front, fitfully trying to write in that awkward position.
'Dear Diary, it's me, Louise again. If you remember me from my last Diary, you'll know I'm the youngest of five girls. Thankfully, at last time seems to be going by and I'm growing up, so I'll get out of here and get myself a job. And you'll know that at last I'm no longer the patched princess.'
She stopped, and put her hand briefly over her good eye and the lens she needed to see clearly with: this habit had been forced upon her by her bad eye's penchant for turning itself off. But now, at last, it seemed OK. But then, she happened to swap her hands around, and cover her bad eye - she blinked, then looked around, especially at things in the corners of the room. The thought occurred to her “am I dreaming? Or is this real?”
She shivered with realization and recognition; after all that unfortunate messing around with patching, she well knew the difference between clear and fuzzy vision. And, as it seemed to her, the vision out of her good eye wasn't as good as she remembered. Maybe it was just because she was tired, she briefly mused, before deciding that might not be the whole truth. She was at the age when her older sisters experienced large changes in vision, so why not her too? For once, the reason did not really bother her quite so much as might have been expected: this was because it implied that her lenses might be equal in strength again, and she might not ever have to go through any more patching. She noted this point in her Diary with some pleasure.
She then continued in a similar vein
'I can't tell you how glad I am to get rid of that damned patch, it was just sooo horrid, it makes me squirm to think about it. And the kids at school, they didn't let me forget it! If my glasses will be equal, that's great news. I'd prefer thin glasses, or none at all, but equal glasses and no patch, that's a pretty good start.'
'I got to tell you about my Mum. She seems like she's just sooo tired all the time, even worse than before, I think, I suppose it's because of all that stuff with Emma, it really took a lot out of her, and then there was Kirsty's boyfriend getting killed, that was so so terrible and sad, and I don't think Mum really took that well either. She was like hoping that at last Kirsty had found someone really good, but, well, it wasn't to be. Kirsty's kinda wobbly about it all, sometimes she's like normal, other times she's just falling apart. Goodness knows what will happen when she has her baby. I reckon she's going to need some serious help.'
'Did I tell you about Michelle? My friend from school? She's really kind and friendly, even if her stutter sounds kinda silly. It's not her fault, I know. Anyway perhaps I should tell you the strangest thing. She's grown and changed, no longer small and pimply, now, she's like me, with curves, and all that, but last week some boy asked her out and she turned him down! I mean, she's still wearing those lightbulb glasses of hers! I'm kinda pinching myself, because I think I'm dreaming, because nobody's asking me out, and although I wear glasses too, hers are worse than mine, loads worse! I just don't understand her at all. She told me that she didn't like him, that's up to her, but if I was her, I'd not worry so much. I have the feeling my best friend Michelle might just be mad. Help!'
About a week later, Melissa was floating around in the kitchen, attempting to tidy up after some culinary experiment during her day off from work, when she heard footsteps, then her mother calling,
'hello!'
She turned and saw in her distance lens the familiar distorted, blurred shape of her mother. Without the voice, recognition at that distance was a problem for her; at least with any certainty. Her mother appeared to rub between her rather large but sagging bust - for Melissa this appeared to be rather a persistent itch, rather than what her mother knew it to be: a certain tightness in the chest that had appeared a few months ago, vanished and then reappeared recently. Nor was the highly myopic Melissa aware of her mother's suitably pained expression: if she did, she'd know exactly what was going on, being a nurse. Thus Melissa, being registered blind, was completely unaware of what was afoot. All she was aware of was that she was grateful that she had a mother who would take her in, and care for her after having her boyfriend dump her so callously over a year ago.
A week later Melissa was off duty at home watching TV one evening, after her fashion, sitting close and taking as much notice of the sound as possible, her vision alone being inadequate for this and many other purposes. Louise was upstairs toiling through her latest batch of homework, or at least Melissa thought she was. Melissa sighed inwardly at the thought of homework: she had study of her own to do. Being a nurse wasn't easy. For now, though, she rested, waiting for her mother to return home from work. A vague sense of disquiet fell upon her, and it didn’t take her long to realise why: her mother was late. For a moment she was puzzled as to why she felt so anxious, being as her mother could be late as well as anyone else.
Time passed, but no mother appeared to assuage her discomfiture. She began to seriously worry, then fought with herself, silently telling herself to “get a grip.” Rationality took hold, thus she started to think more clearly in terms of what to do about the situation at hand. It occurred to her that perhaps she could go out to look for her mother, but a moment's serious consideration led her to dismiss that idea: she was not equipped for such an enterprise. In good light, she was registered blind, her impression of the world shrunken, deformed and blurred. In darkness she saw nothing beyond those punctuations caused by street lights, which appeared to her balls of bright but indistinct illumination, floating eerily in a sea of blackness, occasionally giving tantalizingly vague hints of their immediate surroundings. She possessed a white cane upstairs in the event that she wished to go out at night, which mostly she really didn't. Then she considered asking Louise if she would go and search for her mother instead. That idea was also instantly fit to be dismissed: the thought of sending out a 14-year-old girl out on the streets, alone, didn't enthuse her. For a moment she sat frustrated by the lack of sensible options. She considered that perhaps both of them could go searching, but then thought that perhaps her mother would then arrive back home safe and sound, find them missing, then go out searching, and they'd spend half the night looking for each other. There was only one option remaining: to do nothing but sit and worry. After a while Louise caught the worry bug too, having realised Mum was very late, and came downstairs to help with the uncomfortable job of waiting.
Then the phone rang, jarring into their worried thoughts. Melissa jumped toward it first and answered: it was the hospital, which was where she worked - but it wasn't about her, it was about their mother. Melissa listened with a strange mixture of clinical detachment and horrified realisation as she realised what had happened, then told Louise, who was avid for news
'Mum's in hospital. She's... Not well.'
'Did they say what's wrong with her?'
'Yes - it's her heart.'
The blood and hope drained from Louise's face: even Melissa could see that, being as her youngest sister was close by, listening attentively for any information she could glean. Melissa put the phone down, then solemnly told Louise to get ready: although she could find her way to hospital after sunset if absolutely necessary, it was always much easier when guided by someone who could see in the dark. And it seemed highly unlikely that their mother would come home tonight, find them missing and then go out again.
Melissa's internal turmoil of concern and faint relief led her to forget her white cane, so once Louise had come down dressed for outside, she locked the door and took her arm: within a few steps, she was in a useless darkness, dependent on her youngest sister’s assistance. Although she knew the way, in her present emotional state she was glad of the guidance: she had to devote all her thoughts to worrying about her Mother. After some time, Louise led her to the bus stop, and a bus soon came: Melissa could see it as a faint glowing thing, ethereal, like some alien spaceship floating down the road. Once inside the bus, the internal lighting relieved her of complete blindness to some extent, giving her mind something to focus on other than concern. Soon they were there: once inside the hospital, Melissa's vision was restored to its full level of relative clarity, enough to make guidance unnecessary. And besides, she'd been here many times, so didn't need to be able to read the signs; which was just as well, being as they were difficult to interpret with her visual acuity.
Once beside their mother, they were told she was in a coma. It transpired that she'd had a heart attack on the way home from work: Melissa glanced at the unfamiliar blur of a nurse, listening for a voice she knew, but failing to recognise it. She looked at Louise, and was unable to read her expression, then looked closely at her mother, lying equally helplessly in bed, as unaware of her surroundings beyond the immediate as she was. Melissa could see that she had no glasses on; for just a moment the thought flitted through her mind pointlessly that she could see better than her mother. But although it was the truth, it was entirely useless. Melissa did her best to calm both herself and Louise, who looked on with alarm at her seemingly abruptly frail mother. For a moment the two sisters embraced, afraid of the meaning of what they were witnessing.
Melissa then enquired of a nurse,
'have you called my sister Kirsty?'
'No, but if you give me the number, I'll do it.'
Melissa gave her the number, then was distracted by her mother: she seemed to be stirring, reaching up into reality and consciousness. Faintly Melissa heard her mumble
'Kirsty....? Kirsty?'
Melissa didn't realise her eyes were open, and that she was gazing at her through half-open eyes. She squeezed her hand and leant closer to her, so as to allow them both to see each other more clearly. Quietly she informed her mother,
'no, it's Melissa. Kirsty's on her way.'
Her mother swallowed, and then told her, her voice quiet, quavering,
'tell Kirsty... Tell her... I did my best. And now, it's up to her. You understand, don't you? She'll have to look after you all.'
Melissa watched her eyes close, and began to sob: she knew what that meant. Despite her desperately poor vision, she knew death when she saw it. A moment later the bell rang for assistance: her mother's heart had stopped.
Melissa got Louise out the way as the medical staff got to work trying to restart her heart: Louise watching avidly, Melissa more listening, the whole scene for her blurred and twisted by tears and feeble vision. Someone else took them aside, and for Melissa that implied only one thing: it wasn't working. They were taken into one of those small, impersonal rooms where anxious relatives were left to wait for news of the fate of loved ones. An indeterminate time passed, during which the two sisters sat in desperately forlorn silence; then some faceless doctor came in, asked who they were, in the sort of barely-controlled calm voice that Melissa had used herself many times. He then sat with them, and told them with professional calmness
'I’m sorry, we did all we could, but the damage to her heart was too severe, and so we were unable to revive her.'
Just after he'd said that, and barely after the two sisters had even begun grieving, a shape appeared at the window: the door opened, and it resolved into a shape that Melissa knew - even she could tell it was Kirsty, because she knew few people who were as pregnant as she was. Kirsty asked desperately, urgently,
'what's happened?’
She saw their bleak faces, their broken expressions, then continued,
‘oh, please....No!'
She glanced at the doctor, and in that instant knew exactly what had transpired; but for some reason he felt that it was necessary to reiterate exactly what he'd just said, which did nothing to help the situation. After that, they ignored him completely, and began the task of comforting each other in their state of miserable bereavement.
A few days passed while the girls variously heard the news, and then began to absorb what had happened. The first to write something about it was Louise.
'Dear Diary, I've got to tell you this, and I'm sorry, of course I am, but right now I don't have a mum anymore. Yes, we have each other, and that's good. There's none of us who've taken this well. I can't stop crying. Melissa is the same. And Amy... Well I've only seen her once since mum died, and she was crying then, so that's three of us. Kirsty, well, I've seen her looking lost, but never like this. It's like when she lost her boyfriend last year, all blank, unable to take it in. She doesn't need this. She's pregnant and it's wearing her out, all this... loss.'
Some unnumbered days passed. Kirsty became the default leader of the grim-faced little family that now resided in the house they knew as home. She felt herself unable to cope with her own grief and loss, for her twice over, being as the loss of her boyfriend still weighed heavily in her thoughts. Yet, after Melissa had passed on that which their mother had said to her, Kirsty had made a huge effort to grab hold of herself, and decided that she had to make the best possible attempt at caring for what remained of her family. She touched her growing bump wistfully, wondering if they would help her too.
And so the day dawned for the funeral. For Kirsty, this seemed like an action replay, or a recurring nightmare: grimly she wished something good would happen, and soon. She dressed herself in her smartest and darkest trouser suit, elasticated at the waist, and heard the doorbell ring. Nobody else was ready, so Kirsty went to get it. At the door stood a young woman, slightly shorter than herself, wearing an evidently brand-new but cheap and slightly ill-fitting dark suit, itself awkwardly and incompletely concealing her ample curves. Kirsty gaped at her for a moment, and then recognized her: the thick glasses were a giveaway, as was the air of confidence and despair she carried with her. Rather foolishly, she asked
'Emma! What are...'
'They let me out for today, big sis. Gotta go back when it's done, OK?'
Kirsty instantly forgot that she wasn't so keen on Emma, considering what she'd led her into, and gave her a hug.
For the twins, the service, and burial, passed in a blur; as for the other girls, it was something oddly similar. Afterwards, Emma approached Kirsty again, an appearance of careful uncertainty about her. She talked a little meaninglessly at first, comforting her eldest sister, but then she turned her conversation to her own situation.
'Kirsty... I'm coming out of prison soon, did you know?'
Kirsty wasn't entirely sure she wanted to know, but feigned interest out of politeness, and out of respect for the situation they found themselves in. Emma then said boldly
'I'd appreciate some help...'
She let that hang in the air, but Kirsty gave a tiny sigh, and said,
'sorry, Emma, we've got too much going on right now to talk about this. I've got a baby on the way, you see?'
Emma glanced at her ever-growing bump, and grimaced; Emma said nothing more, and stomped off. Presently Kirsty saw her talking to some uncle, or somebody; she didn't really care as much as she perhaps ought to, but then she was exhausted and struggling to keep from bursting into tears.
2. February
Early in February, Kirsty sat alone mulling her new life: in some ways it appeared to be a repeat of the loss she'd suffered a few months ago, but now the fallout was much greater. At least - and it wasn't really that
much of a comfort - it was only herself that had that suffered; this time, it was everyone she knew. There were many problems that needed untangling, which would take time and attention, the first of which was where everyone was living. Melissa couldn't afford the rent on the old family home, not alone, but Kirsty and her together could, so Kirsty had given in her notice to her landlord and was now getting ready to move back home. Besides, Kirsty thought that Melissa needed the company: she was off work what with watching, after her fashion, her mother slip away like that. So, she took her Diary, and plonked it into a bulging cardboard box full of her belongings, then waited for the removal men to come.
Once Kirsty was home, it seemed as if the natural order of things had been only slightly disturbed: Kirsty was the new mum, and would be on her own account in three months time anyway. Thus proceedings were put in place to start making Kirsty the legal guardian of Louise, at least until she was old enough not to require one. She stood once again in her old bedroom, gently touching her bump, wishing that her mother could have lived to see it born: a futile thought, but entirely natural. She blinked tears away, then heard Louise call “Kirsty!!!” Kirsty sighed.... Was this what was in store for her? She'd forgotten what a pain younger sisters were at close quarters: and now there was certainly no running away and leaving her mum to resolve their problems. It was all down to her.
Around a week later, it was the early morning rush hour, and as often happened, Kirsty had to travel into the city centre for an appointment: she had quite an important job in the insurance company where she worked by now, but not so exalted that people came to see her that much. It was still her doing the work, even in her increasingly pregnant state. At least it was morning: although she was slightly sleepy, at least it wasn’t late afternoon, wherein she would be invariably exhausted, her back and feet aching from the effort of carrying a child near the end of its term. She stood in the busy SubGround station awaiting a connecting train, and noticed a couple of her fellow travellers who stood out for different reasons. One was a woman of her own age, a little taller and slimmer, wearing a rather sombre and businesslike suit like her own: in fact, like many of the people here heading for work. The reason why she caught her attention was because she wore glasses; a bit weaker than hers, but hardly what she'd call thin. For a fleeting moment she felt self-conscious, and briefly fiddled pointlessly with her own glasses. The woman met her gaze for a moment, lacking in all expression, plainly thinking only of getting to work on time. The other was a dark-skinned man wearing a jacket; his dark eyes flicking around furtively, accusingly, his hands buried in his pockets, waiting with evident impatience. Kirsty related to that feeling quite easily.
Presently, a train wooshed into the station, then groaned to a halt, the doors slid open complainingly and some people rushed out, which allowed Kirsty and the other people waiting to enter. Being pregnant, she didn't particularly want an elbow in the stomach, but knew where to go in order to avoid that sort of thing: in a corner by the window. It curved outward slightly, and she did too, at least in parts, and that really was the best place to put her precious, vulnerable bump on a crowded train. So, she hurried as best she could to the least busy side of the train, and turned to protect it. She heard and saw other people come in behind her, all standing. The doors reluctantly slid shut, and the train started off. She turned her head and saw the tallish woman next to and slightly behind her: she was looking in the wrong direction. Some distance further down the carriage stood the man with the jacket: he'd obviously got in through another doorway. Kirsty ignored him, but for some reason stared at the back of the tall woman's neck as the train started off then rattled along down the dark tunnel. Every so often she would get a glimpse of the world through the outside edge of one of her thick lenses, but Kirsty wasn't particularly interested in that. She had her own thicker, stronger glasses to look through anyway.
A cold, harsh female voice announced blandly “the next station is Kingsbridge,” and scarcely had that sound died away, when there was a loud bang, rather like a loud firework, and a flash; Kirsty felt a vague “tap” feeling against her left lens, then it was gone, to be replaced by chaos and screaming as the lights failed and the train screeched protestingly to a halt. It was all but dark apart from the emergency lighting: Kirsty couldn't see much, but could see the tall woman in front of her clutch at her face, then heard her cry out ”my glasses, where are my glasses?” Kirsty looked down, grateful she still had hers on, but couldn't see those belonging to the woman. Then someone pushed past her, and she heard a crystalline “crunch.” She couldn't tell if that was the woman’s glasses, or just a bit of broken glass, but whatever it was, it wasn't helpful.
The woman became tearful and panicky, due to being deprived of glasses in the dark with bombs going off, so Kirsty spoke to her, trying to calm her down and tell her someone would come soon. Well, when they did come, it wasn't a moment too soon, being as Kirsty was getting worn down from her attempts to soothe this woman's frayed nerves. Someone helped them out of the wrecked carriage, and they were led down the track to the next station. Once in the light, Kirsty could see far better - but something wasn't right. An odd dark blurry shape distorted her vision out of her right eye. For a moment, she thought it was her eye, but then she touched the front of her lens with her finger, and felt something damp. Water? No. When she looked at her finger, it was red. Blood. Kirsty felt weak at the knees, then quickly got hold of herself, grabbed a tissue and wiped the front of her lens clean. Beside her, her tall friend stood watching, squinting in desperate hopelessness, looking utterly distraught. She'd lost her glasses, and a few blood spots covered her face. Kirsty lent her a tissue; with it she wiped herself clean. But then she said to Kirsty,
'can you help me? I can't see very well without my glasses!'
Kirsty nodded, saying,
'yeah, I know the feeling. Do you want me to guide you somewhere?'
She looked very grateful, if rather ashamed, and told Kirsty,
'yes, please, I have a spare pair at home.'
She shivered a little, glad to have someone to help.
After reassuring the police and medics that they were OK and basically in one piece, Kirsty walked with her new friend up some stairs and to a different line on the network. During this process, Kirsty learnt her name: Lisa. She seemed chatty, friendly, but nervous because she'd never been without glasses for more than for a few minutes in the bath before today, and of course hadn’t ever been nearly blown up before either. Before long their talk turned to glasses again, as they stood waiting for a train: Lisa had about -9 in each eye of myopia, and some astigmatism in one eye that made it harder to see. She walked up to the electronic sign telling when the next train was due in, then gave up and admitted that she couldn't read it at all. She stayed close to Kirsty all the way home, until that time arrived whereby she could take her spare glasses out of their case and revert to her accustomed clarity, which greatly relieved her.
She looked at Kirsty, smiled, and exclaimed,
'so that's what you look like!'
Kirsty smiled politely, and then Lisa peered more closely at her, and said,
'There's something on your lens... No, it's a chip. Something must have banged into it, like it did my glasses. Except you were luckier than me: it broke mine in half, yours, only a scratch. Kirsty took her glasses off to inspect them: with her poor uncorrected vision it wasn't easy to see, but she could see that it was a small but quite deep gouge. It was in an area of her lens near the corner, but Lisa warned her,
'cracks like that can spread, and your lens might fall in half, I'd get that sorted out if I were you.'
Some time later Kirsty said goodbye to her new friend, and Lisa thanked her yet again.
That weekend Kirsty had a tiny slice of time in which to attend to her own problems, and that included glasses. She took them off, checked them, and found that indeed the crack had grown, just as Lisa had predicted. Kirsty didn't want to be deprived of glasses, but in all the hubbub and chaos of moving house, she couldn't put her hand on a spare pair. She spent half of Saturday praying that her lens wouldn't suddenly fall out. Then she had a brainwave.
Upstairs she went to her mothers old room. She'd tidied it up a bit, and had thought about getting rid of some of the more useless things once belonging to her mum: but would need time she didn't have to do that properly. She rummaged around, hoping to find something that would at least keep her going, visually speaking, over the weekend. And there, in a drawer, she found them; four old glasses cases, not as many as she thought, but enough to try. She checked each case to see what they contained: each of them contained a pair of old glasses belonging to her mother. None of them were what she would call fashionable, but they'd have to do for now. One at a time she tried them, then eliminated one pair because they plainly weren't right for her. Then another pair. Annoyingly the last two pairs seemed to get one eye just about right and the other tantalisingly not quite right. She plumped for the left hand pair, and put them on. Her vision seemed to swim a little: the myopia being about right, around Kirsty's minus 14, but the astigmatism correction was a little awkward, the wrong angle and a bit too strong. Kirsty went downstairs wearing her “new“ glasses, and nearly fell down them.
Louise caught sight of her, gave her a strange look, for a moment not quite comprehending what she saw.
'Kirsty, I know you are kind of my mum now as well as my sister... But there's no need to go that far!'
Kirsty shook her head, denied that she was going crazy, then explained, showing Louise the damaged lens of her own glasses. Louise nodded, and said,
'that's a good idea!'
Thankfully Melissa, when she finally came home from work much later, being drastically poor sighted, didn't even notice them.
Kirsty spent the rest of the weekend wearing her mum's old glasses. Sometimes it felt very strange, other times just right, and the former wasn't entirely due to the fact they weren't her glasses. Most of the time, for distance work, she wore them, and got reasonable vision, but sometimes going up and down stairs made her feel giddy, which forced her to grab the rail with her hand, and of course close work and reading were hard work, being as the astigmatism wasn't right. She swapped her borrowed glasses for her own on Sunday evening, hoping they would stay in once piece long enough - her eyes were aching from the wrong prescription - and wrote in her Diary
‘Hello again, I'm sorry I've not written for a while, I've had some really bad things happening in my life. Despite the fact I've lost my mother, I feel like she's still around looking after me, because I could have been blown apart. Anyway, I helped this woman called Lisa, she got her glasses smashed, looking back on it, it seems kinda funny really, because I got away with just a scratch on my lens. I need new glasses, but they've lasted this long. And to help till Monday and new glasses, I've borrowed a pair of my Mum's. I'm sure she'd let me use them. Dear me, it reminds me of when Emma got hand-me-downs, boy did she not like that!’
“Mum's glasses aren't right for me and give me a headache, but I suppose that's because they're not for me. I feel dizzy whenever I put them on. Anyway, I'll ask the optician to put in the toughest lenses he can in my new glasses, I don't want to be doing this again soon! I'm having a baby in April, and as you can imagine, I'm getting really big. I don't want to worry about my lenses falling in half while I'm trying to look after her. Ummm... Did I tell you it was a she? I shouldn't be this excited, I suppose, after all this death and horror, but it sure does help.”
The next day, Monday, Kirsty went along to the optician, had her eyes tested, found they hadn’t changed, then asked the optician to make her the toughest lenses possible in her new frames. He baulked a little, because with her kind of prescription, it wasn't easy to make them attractive in the generally accepted sense. He even suggested myodisks, but Kirsty would have none of it. What she got was her usual roundish-oval style metal frames, the rims more like bands than the slim metal strips someone less myopic could have, holding lenses that were slightly smaller than her old pair, but noticeably thicker, well over 15mm at the edge, with the corners ground to disguise the thickness.
Kirsty didn't really see the thickness: she was so myopic that without glasses, things like that were hard to see anyway. All she saw was the way things looked while gazing through them: clear and sharp in the distance, if a little tunnelled and distorted. She was well used to that by now. The optician also suggested that she try getting herself a headband to keep them on, because her baby might grab them off her face. Kirsty wasn't impressed by that idea - she didn't want her nice fluffy feminine hairstyle ruined by a headband pressing it against her head.
After that she went to work, then went out for her lunch break. Things seemed different to her: of course she could see, perfectly well, but it occurred to her that the stares had got a little more frequent and a little longer. She sighed to herself irritably: hadn't they ever seen a woman in glasses before? Well, the truth was they probably had, but not with lenses quite as thick as hers. She felt like running and hiding, felt like swapping back to her old damaged but thinner glasses, felt like putting her hands over her glasses and hoping for the best. Instead, she carried on walking back to work; but then she heard laughter, so turned her bespectacled gaze toward its source, and saw someone pointing at her, helpless with mirth. She hurried away back to work; once there, she buried herself in paperwork all afternoon.
That evening she sat wondering if her new tough glasses were worth the trouble: she started to fiddle with them, feeling the way they were so thick at the sides. On an impulse she got up, found her old pair and swapped them. She thought “that's much better!” A moment later she turned her head, and her damaged lens fell out: it hit the floor and snapped into two pieces of crystal. Kirsty cursed, took them off, then put back her new glasses. She then found the old pair belonging to her mum, then started trying to get along with them for a while instead. Half an hour of giddy headache-inducing not-rightness then followed, after which Louise saw her and asked, quite innocently,
'did you break your new glasses already?'
That was enough for Kirsty - the eyestrain was getting to her, so she went back to her room and reverted to her new thick glasses, then put her mother's old glasses away in a safe place.
3. March
Early in March, Emma found herself outside the prison gates walking toward the nearest bus stop. She wore the same clothes that she came in wearing, except that they were just a little baggier: a year of none-too-nourishing prison food had caused her to lose weight all over, and the net result of that was a trimmer and curvier Emma. In other ways things hadn't really changed: she wasn't sure what she wanted to do now. Ordinary work such as her elder sisters did never appealed to her, but going back on the game, well, that wasn't what she wanted to do right now anyway; getting involved in that maelstrom of drugs, porn, trafficking and other such illegal stuff she'd been caught and punished for held no immediate appeal for her. She stood at the bus stop and waited for a bus, as usual, relying on glasses that were thick and strong to see into the distance whether it was coming or not. No, she didn't want to get involved with her old network, and Kirsty had pushed her away. Thus Emma felt uncomfortably lonely, even vulnerable, standing there as the wind sighed around her, brushing litter around in uncaring heaps and piles. She shivered, not just at the cold, but the feeling of not knowing quite what to do next.
A few days later, Louise wrote in her Diary
“Hey Diary, Louise here again! I'm the one with the uneven glasses, you know. Anyway, I've got tell you about Michelle, my friend. It's just that, yes, she's been really nice to me, and all that - and I know, it's a bit hard to tell with her stammer. I've been trying to help her with that, telling her to relax and try not to talk too fast, but she's still quite bad at speaking. Mmmm, what shall I say? When she talks, she often saves up what she's trying to say for something really meaningful, because speaking is such an effort for her. It's just that yesterday she told me she loves me. Well, maybe I'm lovable, maybe not. She's a nice girl too, a good friend, but there's the way she looks at you with those big fluttery eyes of hers. Well, that's the glasses for you. You either like them or hate them, and I don't hate them because I've got the same problem myself. Perhaps she's confused, or something, because she doesn't have a boyfriend, even though with the glasses she really ought to be in with a chance at least.”
A pang of unexpected realization hit her. After a long pause she wrote
“I must be stupid, because I just remembered something. All this worrying about Kirsty, my Mum, Melissa, Emma, and everyone else. I forgot, I don't have a boyfriend either. Maybe that's why Michelle is interested in me. Maybe - I don't know and don't dare ask her - she wants to be more than friends with me? Oh my... Oh my oh my... Oh, I don't dare ask her, she might not want to be my friend anymore, and she IS my best friend. My bestest best friend ever. What if I ask her, and she is what I think she might be? What do I do?”
One evening about a week later Kirsty heard the phone ringing, so told Louise to answer it, being as getting out of her comfy armchair was hard after work, especially when eight months pregnant. After a few minutes Kirsty called impatiently,
'who is it?'
'Emma!'
Kirsty gave an irritated sigh: bleakly she hoped Emma might just go away, she was one big problem that seemed to come into her life repeatedly, mostly at the wrong time.
Kirsty shoehorned herself out of the chair, then walked slowly out of the lounge into the hall; her seemingly elephantine body preventing her from getting there with anything other than a ponderous, awkward gait. She arched and rubbed her back as she moved achingly slowly toward Louise and the phone. Louise meekly surrendered the phone to her, then Kirsty put it to her ear: it was indeed Emma, but it didn't seem remotely like the Emma she knew. She heard Emma say with breathless expectancy
“Kirsty? Is that you, Big Sis?”
“Yes, it is,”
replied Kirsty with barely veiled disinterest, which Emma didn't pick up. She sounded - upset, distraught, desperate, as she asked
'Kirsty, you gotta help me, I'm in trouble here.'
Kirsty sighed, and said with forced calmness
'Emma, what have you done now?'
'Me? Nothing, well, almost nothing; a couple of girls here in the hostel they've put me in tried to beat me up, the warden came and saw it, and now they want to bang me up in prison again, because they've got nowhere else to put me - the warden just thinks I'm a troublemaker. I can't go back to prison, I did my time, I'm sorry for what I did, please, Kirsty, can I come and stay with you?'
Emma gave a little sob, and as she did so Kirsty's resolve wavered. Kirsty then said accusingly,
'you did bring all this on yourself...'
Emma started to cry, and gasped out between sobs,
'please, Kirsty, I'll do whatever you want at home for you, I'll be a good girl now. Just give me a chance.'
Kirsty stood for a moment, her pregnant body insistently demanding to be allowed to sit down and do nothing. For a moment, she nearly told Emma “no, you're too much trouble,” which was perfectly true. Then she thought that now Mum was gone, she was Mother now. Would Mum have sent her packing? On reflection, she thought that she would have taken her back. She told Emma flatly
'OK, OK, come and live here. But... Oh, never mind.’
Emma was a gush of thanks and promises, so Kirsty had to cut in and tell her to stop talking and come home as fast as possible, “so I can go and sit down again for a while!”
Kirsty “helped” Louise make up Emma's bed in her old room, and once Melissa appeared, enlisted her as a cleaner in spite of her difficulties telling dirty from clean. It was the best that could be done in the time available, especially considering who'd done it: a heavily pregnant woman, a legally blind woman, and a teenage girl who was far more interested in watching TV than making beds.
Before long the doorbell rang; Louise answered the door, leaving Kirsty to get up and walk as best she could in that direction. Louise was really glad to see her elder sister home again after so long. After embracing her, Emma caught Kirsty's eye and looked at her with considerable sympathy,
'boy, you're getting really big!'
'Yeah, I know, thanks for reminding me, I was about to run down the street and do a cartwheel!'
They embraced gently, Emma being careful of Kirsty's bulge. Emma then started to cry a little, but Kirsty told her not to worry about “stuff” tonight, just to relax “like I want to, but never can these days.”
Kirsty lay in bed that night, her baby kicking inside her. She thought to herself “I wonder if Emma knows anything about babies, I mean, any more than I do? Maybe she could look after my baby while I go out to work. I think it might be worth a try - it might teach her some responsibility. She sure seems different from when I last saw her - kinda like eating humble pie all the time and looking rather shaky. Imagine, Emma needing building up! Who would have guessed that? And she mentioned my thicker glasses - she thought my vision had got worse suddenly! Had to give her the full story - she actually seemed to care. Now that isn't the Emma I knew!”
Towards the end of the month Melissa complained of a sore throat, then a day or two later a headache and feeling “yucky”. Louise told her,
'it's what you get for working in a hospital, with all those sick people!'
Melissa stuck her tongue out, thus causing her to dissolve into a coughing fit. Kirsty by now was off work with her maternity leave, but really wasn't fit for much other than feeling big and heavy, moaning about her back and having to get up and go to the toilet more than usual. Emma was being oh-so-helpful, doing her best to be useful, even though she wasn't actually that good at routine housework: she'd been used to getting other people to do such menial things. Kirsty advised Melissa to “take some time off work,” which she wisely agreed to.
Melissa took the next day off, and made it known she was feeling particularly lousy, staying in bed most of the day with the shivers from flu-like symptoms. The next morning Kirsty heard someone banging on her door early in the morning: she moaned, and then called out,
'go away, I'm tired and pregnant. Leave me alone!'
She heard someone at the door who sounded like Melissa: she seemed quite distressed. Kirsty sat herself up in bed, found her glasses and put them on, then called out,
'come in, then.'
Melissa knocked again, which confused Kirsty, so she called out again.
Melissa opened the door, and Kirsty could see her looking dishevelled, and rather more confused than she was. She stood in the doorway, sniffing from her blocked nose, and squinting at her. Kirsty asked her, with a note of impatience in her voice,
'what's wrong?'
Melissa said nothing for a moment, and then announced rather miserably
'Kirsty, I can't hear. I can't hear anything.'
Kirsty blinked in surprise, and asked,
'are you sure?'
Melissa said nothing: for her, Kirsty's face was a distorted little fuzzy pink blur at ten feet. She wasn't even aware that Kirsty had said anything. Kirsty quickly realised her problem, so waved her over - she could see that, she knew. Melissa sat on the bed in front of her and looked, trembling and squintingly, at Kirsty's face. Her attempts to lip read were quite useless; so Kirsty instead found a piece of paper and pen, then wrote down her question, and handed it to her sister.
Melissa held it within six inches of her face, and then said,
'yes...'
She began to cry, which hardly helped her vision. Kirsty didn't really try to ascertain exactly how deaf Melissa was, but told her to go and see a doctor - perhaps Emma might take her? Kirsty thought she could manage here alone, and if the baby came, she'd just have to sort it out herself. Quite soon Emma came in herself, wearing an ill-fitting borrowed nightdress: being as there was no-one in the family with quite the shape she possessed, it was quite tight on her in certain areas. She asked,
'what's wrong?'
'Melissa's gone deaf because of the cold she's got.'
'Oh.... OH! Now that's a problem!'
Indeed it was. Melissa's vision, like that of her twin sister, was pretty feeble even with correction, and limited in distance: she could tell who someone was about 6 feet away most of the time, but as for detail, she needed to get in close. She had spent the last 5 years or so of her life relying on her hearing to take up the slack. And now, without hearing, her vision wasn't so much to rely on. No wonder she was scared.
Emma escorted her to the Doctor, and he told her to “rest, take flu remedies and paracetamol, then see what happens.” In fact, after a couple of days, Melissa started to hear a ringing sound in her ears, which was maddening, worse for her than the silence, but then it faded. She then started to hear muffled sounds from around her. A day or two later the muffling was just about gone, and she wasn't having to read written notes, nor say “pardon” all the time. But one thing remained with her: she was still scared, and thus thanked her lucky stars she could hear again.
4. April
A few days into April found Kirsty waiting rather impatiently to give birth. It wasn't quite the wonderful experience people had told her about, at least not so far, just a lot of discomfort and generally feeling tired and awkward. She was astonished at how big she got, too. Then a day passed, and she was in hospital giving birth in the afternoon. Melissa was at work, Louise at school, so she only had Emma for company. For someone that Kirsty didn't really quite trust, or even respect that much, she did OK, but then she was her sister, and she was trying her best to be a normal 19-year-old, not a prostitute who'd just been let out of prison. Some time later Kirsty sat holding her new baby: Annabel, aka Annie. She looked absolutely perfect, as all babies do. Kirsty looked suspiciously into her eyes for a moment, wondering if she had anything wrong with them. As if Kirsty could tell: they looked perfect, as did everything else about her appearance.
Some days later Kirsty wrote in her Diary
'Phew! I've given birth to my baby and now feel a whole load lighter. She's just perfect and I'm sure she's going to be a beautiful girl when she grows up. She appears to have perfect vision, which is a surprise given our family history. The Nurse said to try her out with following objects in a few weeks, because right now she can't do it. And what's really impressed me is Emma. She is really trying hard. She does stuff for me and Annie mostly, but helps Melissa sometimes too. Without her I'd be completely lost too. I just wish she wouldn't dress like a prostitute so much. I wish I could tell her but she might get annoyed and leave, and I'm kind of depending on her. I thought I might be having mum look after Annie, but she's not around anymore, so it's Emma.'
About a week later Louise was at school, just having returned from the Easter holidays. Whilst walking along with her friend Michelle she became distracted by something on the playing field, so went around the corner in order to get a better look, thereby temporarily leaving Michelle behind. Louise then heard a cry, a little scuffle, and then a louder cry,
“m...my g...g...glasses!”
Louise scampered back around the corner to find Michelle minus her glasses, looking around confusedly: she looked at what she hoped was Louise, and said brokenly,
's..s...someone t...t...took m..m..my g..glasses!'
She began to sob a little, so Louise guided her to a seat, looking to see if the “someone” was still around: there was no-one remotely near enough, even if they had run like the wind to get away, so she sat trying to comfort her instead.
Once Michelle had calmed down a bit, it turned out “it might have been a girl”, “or a boy” which didn't really help. Louise had by now learned that Michelle didn't see much without her glasses: her prescription was around the plus 9 mark and climbing. Her eyes without glasses seemed oddly small, being as Louise hardly ever saw her without them, simply because she couldn't focus well at any distance, but especially close up. In the circumstances, Louise could do little but offer to guide her around: the first place to take her was to a teacher of some description with the intention of reporting the incident.
Louise spent some time guiding Michelle around, who held onto her arm tightly, feeling helpless and lost in the distorted, unfocused world she now saw. There was an attempt at a search, but nothing was found; in the meantime Michelle's eyes were getting tired from struggling to focus, so after one short lesson she asked to be allowed home. Louise had no problem guiding her home, after Michelle had told her which way to go. There was nobody there at first, so Michelle asked Louise to stay a while, in order to assist her. They were both in the kitchen talking when Michelle stumbled on something, put her arms out with a cry of alarm, then knocked against Louise's chest, her hand briefly pressing against her bust. Louise was almost as shaken as Michelle, but Michelle couldn't see it anyway. Thankfully before anything else could happen, Michelle's mum came home and took charge. Louise was relieved to be able to go home.
A couple of days later Michelle was back in school with new glasses. She instantly sought out Louise, and was awash with thanks and appreciation for helping her. She then kissed her on the cheek: Louise recoiled a little, clearly not expecting it. Michelle looked a little abashed, saying,
's...S...Sorry.... I... t..t..t..t..thought y..y..y...'
Michelle's shoulders drooped: she was struggling to say something and getting nowhere. Louise gazed into her oversized gaze, fluttering expectantly behind her thick lenses. She said,
'calm down and don't try to talk too fast - now - take a deep breath.'
Michelle still couldn't say it: her speech seemed to stumble before she'd said the first syllable; then the school bell went, and it was off to class for the both of them.
Once Louise was home, she wrote in her Diary
“I'm confused. My best friend Michelle, the one with the stutter and the glasses that make her look bug-eyed, well, the other day - she lost her glasses, and was blind. She kind of - touched me. On my breast. I know it was an accident, but... now I'm really thinking she might like girls more than boys. Now, I'm thinking to myself, what do I do now?'
She sat deep in thought for a while, not sure what to write because the thoughts she had weren't making sense. Then she continued
'You know, Diary, I don't see anything wrong in Michelle liking me. Maybe we could go out together, it would be fun. I think I'll have to do the talking. I'm thinking to myself, there is something about Michelle... what is it? Is it the glasses? I don't know. On a boy I wouldn't go near him. Actually I haven't seen them quite like hers on anyone my age. And the stutter... again, never heard anyone like her. Goodness knows what she's trying to say sometimes. Yet, it's quite nice, in a way. Makes her seem kinder and friendlier and nicer than she might otherwise. I don't know how to put it. Yep, there's definitely something about Michelle. What I don't know is if all this is me dreaming, yes, dreaming about Michelle and going out with her and whatever else might happen. Or whether it's real. And what I can't say is that I like girls more than boys myself. It just sounds wrong, but, maybe it is just Michelle.'
The next day at school came, and Louise went in, again with her head reeling with uncertainty and confusion. Michelle was there, waiting for her against the wall by the playground, peering at her through her thick, light-catching glasses. She smiled, and waved, and in response Louise gave a “hello” in a cheery manner quite at odds with her feelings. Michelle didn't attempt to say anything - this was common with her, saving her clumsy, halting speech for when it was necessary or important. She stood blinking at Louise in the bright spring sunshine. Louise looked around suspiciously, hoping no-one would hear her. Then she began, almost as haltingly as Michelle did,
'err... Michelle... I got something to ask you.'
Michelle nodded, but attempted no speech.
Louise gathered her thoughts and herself, and asked,
'do you... like boys or girls best?'
Michelle looked rather awkward, as if she were embarrassed and rather afraid, and stuttered out as best she could,
'g....G....G....'
She didn't complete the word, but Louise got the answer in one: it obviously wasn't boys. She asked,
'girls?'
Michelle nodded, an anxious look now spreading across her face.
Again Louise had to gather her mind into a tight knot of purpose in order to ask,
'do you... Fancy me?'
Michelle hesitated, and nodded slowly. Louise could only reply,
'oh.'
Michelle tried to say something, but she got nowhere: the stress and anxiety she felt stopped her dead. Again, it was up to Louise to help her out, because her apparently big eyes were now blinking away tears. Louise sighed, and then said,
'don't worry.... I'm still your friend.'
Michelle wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, having to push up her glasses to get at them. With quite an effort, she ground out,
'd...D....D... Do. You..... F..... F.... F.... '
'Fancy?'
Michelle nodded, and then finished,
'me?’
Louise considered for a moment, and then said, rather regretfully
'I'm not sure. You've got to give me some time to think about this. I'm quite confused.'
Michelle's big eyes looked like they were going to burst into tears again. To forestall her, Louise quickly explained,
'you've got to give me a chance to catch up. I know I think a lot of you, because you were so kind to me when I had a patch on my lens last year. Please don't cry. I'll be your friend, don't worry.'
Michelle started trying to say something, but again the school bell rang, thus making any conversation impossible.
Louise walked back to the school building alone. She felt as if she had done something nasty, because she thought that Michelle was expecting her to fall in love right away, whereas she wasn’t certain she wanted to do so. She sighed, then thought of Michelle trying to chat her up. It seemed doubly bizarre, being as she wondered how far she'd get, and how much guessing words and helping her out she'd have to do. But then she had a minds-eye vision of Michelle's big eyes, and it occurred to her that they looked quite nice, in their way. She wondered what it would be like to have big eyes, instead of her own shrunken eyes. With a jolt, she realised she was day-dreaming about Michelle.
Unfortunately Michelle had got the impression Louise was saying no to her, thus was feeling very unhappy, such that she didn’t wish to be found by Louise at lunchtime. When Louise did find her, she glowered at her for a moment; Louise stopped in alarm, then asked innocently,
'what's wrong? What happened?'
Of course, the answer took time to tease out of her. She felt rejected, that was the gist of it. Louise promptly snuggled up to her, then put her arm around her, as she'd done several times before. Before long, Louise found herself saying,
'you know, Michelle, I was thinking, maybe I do fancy you a bit.'
Michelle looked dubiously at her, but could say nothing. Louise then told her,
'give me a chance, hey? I'm new to all this.'
Michelle looked around her, and then kissed her on the cheek. Then, again, the school bell rang and that was that, time for more lessons. Before Michelle went, she made a little heart sign on her palm, then pointed at Louise. Louise smiled, and said,
'yeah, I love you too.'
A week before the end of April found Melissa on the bus on the way home from work: she'd learnt to use the bus in spite of her poor vision. It was easy because only one bus stopped at the hospital, and only one stopped at the stop near her home, it being one and the same. This was just as well, since all bus numbers looked exactly the same to her: a sort of dark blur somewhere in her restricted, distorted visual field. At night she used a white stick regularly, sometimes using a guide when she needed reassurance or something was badly wrong, or when happenstance demanded that she go somewhere she wasn't sure about and needed to get there as quickly as possible. She was entirely used to her feeble vision, and depended heavily on her hearing to help differentiate one blurred figure from another.
The bus she was on tended to meander around somewhat before arriving home; this time it stopped to pick someone up. Melissa was used to seeing the world in terms of landmarks rather than fine detail, and hence knew it wasn't far to home. She looked up at the person advancing up the bus toward her: it appeared to be a man, but she could be fooled by a tall woman or a small man, and these days women didn't wear skirts much to help her distinguish between the two possibilities. She thought to herself that if she got any blinder, she might start making some embarrassing mistakes.
She looked as best she could at some of the other people dotted around the bus in singles and pairs, unable to tell much apart from that they were there or not. Two nearby heads seemed to be pointed in her direction, and she thought she heard, in hushed tones, sounding like girls a little younger than herself,
'look at her, she looks so weird.'
Melissa was well used to that sort of comment. But then she overheard
'I bet they're fake, just to get attention.'
Melissa tried her best to look impassive, but inside felt herself squirming with indignation and anxiety. She felt herself alternatively feeling angry, then wishing they'd leave her alone. She looked out into her distorted view of the world as it went past, hoping they'd get off or have something else distract them.
She had no luck with her wish: one of them called over to her,
'hey, can you see through those crazy things?'
The other stuck her tongue out at her: Melissa didn't notice it, and a moment later she heard,
'she can't see...'
Melissa didn't see her nasty smile either. Instead she heard,
'hey, blindy, are you deaf, too?
Melissa fervently wished they'd just leave her in peace, or just go away: she was too tired from work to be taunted regarding her feeble vision. The next stop wasn't far away, so she thought that if they didn't get off at it, she would be forced to. She didn't exactly relish a long walk home, but it would be better than spending more time on the bus with these two idiots. Melissa told them sharply
'I'm not deaf or blind, so you can just leave me alone, OK?'
One of them let out a derisive
'Oooooo!'
But then they fell into an awkward silence. A few minutes later the bus shuddered to a halt, and for mercy's sake, they got off. Melissa squinted, trying to make out some detail in case she ever saw them again, with the hope that she might be able to avoid them in future: alas as usual for her, distance and poor vision combined to render her efforts all but useless. She could tell one of them wore a sort of pink jacket, for Melissa an indistinct pink blur; as for the other, there was no detail she could discern that would help distinguish her from any other young woman similarly dressed.
Once home Melissa told Emma what had transpired: Emma got extremely angry, not with her, but with the two girls, vowing to “beat the shit out of them” if she saw them. But then, Melissa reminded her calmly,
'I couldn't see them very well, you know, and you can't go beating up the wrong people.'
Once Kirsty found out, she firmly told Emma not to be so crazy, but also privately hoped that it was just an isolated incident.
5. May
Kirsty was back on the SubGround system one morning early in May: she was sitting reading a newspaper on the way to work, and her gaze happened to fall on an article entitled “Natural Vision”. It was a piece about some woman who had been myopic all her life, and worn thick glasses to correct it, just like her, but had gradually reduced her dependence on glasses to the point whereby she felt that they were no longer necessary. This possibility fascinated Kirsty for some time after reading it: the woman had worn weaker glasses than her, but by no means feeble ones: perhaps there was something to be said for it? She mused about it intermittently for days, before deciding that she didn't have the time to explore it. However, she vowed she would try it one day.
A few days later Emma was playing with her big sister's baby daughter Annie, who it was generally agreed was a good baby if ever there was one. Emma felt very happy caring for her, finding a caring, loving sense she'd not known that she possessed before now. As far as Annie was concerned, she now knew Emma very well - in fact almost as well as mummy. One afternoon Emma was playing with her, holding a toy dog and making “woof! woof!” sounds. For a few minutes it was all carefree fun between her and her little niece, but then Emma became sure of something she'd been half aware of whilst playing with her: she felt that something was wrong with Annie. Emma saw that her eyes seemed to cross; although Emma was no optician, she had enough experience of poor vision to realise something wasn’t quite right.
The other thing that she noticed was that Annie didn't seem to be following the toy doggy with her eyes. Furthermore, when she hid it, and then produced it at random, with no “woofs” to help her locate it, that began to seal her impression that something was indeed not right. She then hid, then appeared without making a sound; it took a long while for Annie to realise something was happening. She then tried further away - and Annie didn't look at all. Emma then said “Hello, Annie,” and thus she instantly zeroed in on her, turning her heavy head to look at her Aunt, squirming and cooing happily as she recognized her Aunt’s voice. Emma was now sure something was wrong with Annie’s vision, and at