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The next two ansere froested ways in which I could cheer Will up were certainly not covered bycontract I flushed and hurriedly scrolled down, afraid that solance at the screen from behind me And then I hesitated on the next reply

Hi Busy Bee,

Why do you think your friend/charge/whatever needs his nity, and if I didn’t knoould devastate my faht years now, and my life is a constant round of humiliations and frustrations Can you really put yourself in his shoes? Do you kno it feels to not even be able to empty your boithout help? To know that forever after you are going to be stuck in your bed/unable to eat, dress, communicate with the outside world without soain? To face the prospect of sores, and ill health and even ventilators? You sound like a nice person, and I’ after him next week It may be someone who depresses hi else, is out of his control We SCIs know that very little is under our control – who feeds us, dresses us, washes us, dictates our e is very hard

So I think you are asking the wrong question Who are the AB to decide what our lives should be? If this is the wrong life for your friend, shouldn’t the question be: How do I help him to end it?

Best wishes,

Gforce, Missouri, US

I stared at the ers briefly stilled on the keyboard Then I scrolled down The next feere fro Gforce for his bleak words, protesting that they had found a way forward, that theirs was a life worth living There was a brief argu on that seemed to have little to do with Will at all

And then the thread dragged itself back to e, miracle recoveries, stories of how iven new value There were a few practical suggestions: wine tasting, music, art, specially adapted keyboards

‘A partner,’ said Grace31 froo on Without it, I would have sunk many times over’

That phrase echoed inafter I had left the library

Will came out of hospital on Thursday I picked hiht him home He was pale and exhausted, and stared out of thelistlessly for the whole journey

‘No sleep in these places,’ he explained, when I asked hi in the next bed’

I told him he would have the weekend to recover, but after that I had a series of outings planned I told his, and he would have to coe in eet him to accompany me

In fact, I had devised a detailed schedule for the next couple of weeks Each event was carefullythe precautions I should take, and green for the accessories I would need Every tilianized, but also that one of these events ed Will’s view of the world

As my Dad always says, allery trip lasted a shade under twentyround the block three tiot there, and almost before I had closed the door behind him he said all the as terrible I asked him why and he said if I couldn’t see it he couldn’t explain it The cineetically, that their lift was out of order Others, such as the failed atteanization – the ringing of the swi of Nathan for overtiot there, the flask of hot chocolate drunk in silence in the leisure centre car park when Will resolutely refused to go in

The following Wednesday evening, ent to hear a singer he had once seen live in New York That was a good trip When he listened to music he wore an expression of intense concentration Most of the time, it was as if Will were not wholly present, as if there were so with pain, or hts But withday I took hi, part of a promotional event held by a vineyard in a specialist wine shop I had to prolass for Will to sniff, and he knehat it was even before he’d tasted it I tried quite hard not to snort when Will spat it into the beaker (it did look really funny), and he looked at me from under his brows and said I was a co weirdly disconcerted by having a man in a wheelchair in his shop to quite impressed As the afternoon went on, he sat down and started opening other bottles, discussing region and grape with Will, while I wandered up and down looking at the labels, beco, frankly, a little bored

‘Co at me to sit down beside him

‘I can’t My mum told me it was rude to spit’

The two men looked at each other as if I were the mad one And yet he didn’t spit every time I watched him And he was suspiciously talkative for the rest of the afternoon – swift to laugh, and even more combative than usual

And then, on the way hoo to and, as we sat, lanced over and saw the Tattoo and Piercing Parlour

‘I always quite fancied a tattoo,’ I said

I should have known afterwards that you couldn’t just say stuff like that in Will’s presence He didn’t do s the breeze He immediately wanted to knohy I hadn’t had one

‘Oh … I don’t know The thought of what everyone would say, I guess’

‘Why? What would they say?’

‘My dad hates theain?’

‘Patrick hates theht not like’

‘I e et it removed by laser, surely?’

I looked at him in my rear-view mirror His eyes were merry

‘Come on, then,’ he said ‘What would you have?’

I realized I was s ‘I don’t know Not a snake Or anyone’s na "h?’

‘You know I can’t do that Oh God, you’re not going to have so, are you? What doesn’t kill er’

‘No I’d have a bee A little black and yellow bee I love the to want ‘And where would you have it? Or daren’t I ask?’

I shrugged ‘Dunno My shoulder? Lower hip?’