Page 57 of Chasing Dreams at Wagging Tails Dogs' Home

Blinking, she looked from Ginny to Alex and back again. ‘Yes, yes.’

As they ran through the bottom paddock, Poppy saw the familiar blue lights as an ambulance turned in through the gates of the courtyard. It must be bad if it had arrived this quickly. Wouldn’t they prioritise the worst-off patients? Susan must be worried.

Storming through the gate to the courtyard, Poppy ran across the snow-covered slabs and knelt down next to her aunt.

‘Aunt Flora, are you okay? Oh, I know you’re not okay. That was a stupid thing to say.’

Wincing, Flora tugged the collar of the coat Susan had draped over her away from her mouth. ‘I’ll be fine, lovely. Just fine.’ Flora looked from Poppy to Ginny and back again.

Having let the ambulance in, Susan ran back to them, the ambulance slowing to a stop behind her.

‘Hello, Flora. You could have just picked up the phone if you’d wanted to see me. You didn’t have to go to these lengths.’ The paramedic smiled as she knelt down in the snow and held the pads of her fingers against Flora’s wrist.

‘Paige, lovely.’ Flora looked from Paige to the other paramedic, who was now kneeling next to her too. ‘And Pat. This is my niece, Poppy. You remember her, Pat?’

‘I do.’ Pat looked over and smiled broadly, igniting the laughter lines around his eyes. ‘I remember when you were knee high.’

Poppy nodded.

‘Can you tell us what happened?’ Flora winced in pain. Placing her hand on Flora’s arm, Paige spoke softly. ‘We’ll get you some meds for that pain, shall we?’

‘Please.’ Flora nodded before taking a deep breath. ‘I just tripped over this lead. Daft, really. I was just trying to jump-start the van.’

Poppy looked down at the jump leads sprawled across the snow. Both the van’s bonnet and that of Aunt Flora’s car were propped open.

‘You’ve got trouble with the battery, have you?’ Pat placed a cannula into the back of her hand. ‘Here, this should help.’

‘Trouble with the battery.’ Flora nodded before closing her eyes.

‘Aunt Flora?’ Poppy looked at Paige. ‘Is she okay? What’s happening?’

‘It’s just the medication. It’s pretty strong stuff.’ Paige looked across at Poppy and smiled softly. ‘Why don’t you jump in the car with Ginny, and you can follow us to the hospital?’

Poppy nodded as Ginny wrapped her arm around her shoulder and led her towards her car.

* * *

Poppy was pacing the small family room at the end of the ward Flora had been taken to.

‘She’ll be fine. She’s the toughest person I know,’ Ginny said, sitting by the window.

‘I know. I know she is. But how long are they going to take? It’s been ages.’ Poppy looked out of the window. The car park was below, small dots of people walking from their car to the payment machine and then into the hospital or vice versa.

‘She’s in the best of hands.’ Percy’s voice cracked despite his calm demeanour. After waiting for Alex to secure the dogs, Percy had rushed across to the hospital with Alex, Susan and Sally to await news about Flora. ‘And it won’t be long now. She’ll be out of theatre soon.’

Poppy nodded. Yes, Flora would be fine. Just fine.

She sunk down onto the other blue plastic chair by the window, the hard edges sticking into the backs of her knees. Clasping her hands together in front of her, she closed her eyes. She just needed a moment, a moment to think. Since Alex had told them about Flora’s fall, everything had just been a whirlwind – the ambulance, the hospital, the waiting. And now Flora was in the operating theatre. How had she fractured her leg so badly by just tripping?

On hearing the door to the waiting room open and close, she kept her eyes squeezed tightly shut. It couldn’t be the surgeon. Not yet. They’d been told the operation would be at least an hour, maybe two, and even though it felt as though it had been ten hours, she knew it had really only been twenty minutes. She’d checked.

She felt Mack’s hand on her shoulder, gentle and firm, before she heard his voice. Opening her eyes, she stood up, leaning into his embrace and burying her head in the crook of his shoulder.

‘I came as quickly as I could. Sorry, I had to get a locum in to cover. How is she doing?’ His breath tickled her ear as he spoke.

Pulling away, she swallowed, trying not to let the tears fall. ‘She’s in surgery. They couldn’t set the leg or something, so they had to operate.’

Mack nodded. ‘Right.’

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