Three
Gavin
The white walls of the hospital waiting room were as bleak as ever. I wished for some color, a pop of red or streak of blue, anything other than the white on white that filled Timothy Johnson’s Hospital from corner to corner. Mom didn’t seem to mind it, but I suppose it was because she wasn’t feeling well that particular day and had to close her eyes or else risk nausea. I stiffened my shoulder as it supported the small weight of her head and stayed alert as nurses rushed to and from the waiting room.
There was another family waiting for their father to return from his appointment with Dr. Lemonis. The kids were young, possibly a boy of eight and a girl of six or seven, but were far more mature than the rest of the kids their age. They sat with a woman who I presumed was their mother, gripping her thin hands as they glanced at one another. There was an elderly woman with pure white hair and a permanent frown sitting on the other side of the children. I had watched as the father, a man my age, promised to return with good news and left with the nurse just as Mom and I arrived.
Nearly 30 minutes later and there had been no news yet.
“He’ll be fine,” Mom said as she rested against my shoulder. I looked down as she peered up at me, a slight grin on her face. She was always in a better mood while waiting for her appointment.
“Who?” I asked.
“The father of that family,” she said. “You’ve been staring at them and the door for the whole 30 minutes.”
“I’m just trying not to think about your appointment,” I said. I tried imagining what the family was like. Did they have a family dinner every night? Church every Sunday? Was this their first experience with an illness? Did the dad remind his kids that he loved them every single morning and night?
“So you’re using that poor family as a distraction.” She kept her voice low as I shook my head. “Stop worrying so much, Gavin. Everything is going to be okay.”
“You always say that,” I muttered. She pushed herself off my shoulder and started fixing the curls of her hair. They were thin and frail, not unlike her, and strands clung to her skin. But mom was smiling despite squeezing her fists through her pain, and I realized that if you didn’t know she was sick, it was nearly impossible to tell.
“There’s nothing to worry about,” she said again. I nodded, convinced she was right. She would always be right.
My father was often gone as a child, leaving only mom to raise me. And she had been right about nearly everything growing up. When father would return, how often he would leave, what he would bring me. When I stressed over tests, she would study with me, a woman nearly 15 years out of school, and I would always pass with flying colors. When I tried out for the football team, and I arrived home with a giant bruise on my face and cut on my lip, she assured me that my injuries would only make me stronger, and the following season I had been the star quarterback. The first tattoo I ever received, a lighthouse in a traditional pattern on the inside of my upper arm, she had warned me to take proper care of else risk infection. And it had gotten infected within nearly a week of me getting it. She found one of the best tattoo artists in Alaska and paid for them to fix it, and told me not to worry. The lighthouse was now better than it had ever been, vibrant colors and straight, black lines; it was a reminder that mom was always right.
She did her best raising me, despite working in her own field that demanded long nights and extra days, hiring in-home babysitters when it was necessary and firing them when they either spoiled me too much or not enough. She always said finding the right caretaker was impossible, and to never settle for anything less than what you would do. It had been just as hard hiring a live-in nurse for mom. Karen was the 23rd applicant, and I had begged mom to consider her for just a moment. She had wanted to live alone in her newly built house, and I had considered it at first. Her prognosis had been decent, an 80 percent chance of success with the right dosage and treatments. But then one night I had found her on the floor in her bathroom choking on her own vomit, and we had hired Karen the following day.
The moment I welcomed Karen into the house, mom promised me that there was nothing to be worried about. And since she had been right about everything else, I believed her.
The door opened, and the children’s father returned with the nurse. My breathing paused as I watched him hug his wife, clinging to her as if it was the first time he’d touched her in years. The entire family began to cry, but whether from good or bad news it was yet to be seen. And then the father took his turn kissing each child and pressed a long kiss on his mother’s forehead. She held his hands and raised her eyebrows, and he nodded with such a smile that even my mother was struggling to fight back her tears.
“Remission,” he said, and his family broke down crying. Mom slipped her hand into mine and looked at me.
“See?” she said, “I told you everything was going to be fine.”
“I never doubted you,” I said. The nurse spoke briefly to the man’s family, about what this meant and how it would affect their life. I heard snippets of their conversation, aware that eavesdropping during such an intimate moment was rude.
“He’ll still check in once every six months,” the nurse said. “But we’re extremely optimistic that it won’t return.”
Another nurse entered the waiting room and gestured at mom.
“Ms. Hayward?” she asked, and mom nodded. “Dr. Lemonis is ready for you.”
I stood with mom, not giving her the slightest opportunity to tell me to wait, and followed her toward the door. Someone grabbed my hand on the way out, and I turned to find the young girl staring at me with wide, blue eyes.
“Good luck,” she said. “We got good news; you will, too.”
Mom held back tears as she thanked the girl, and I shared a brief glance with the man’s mother, still speaking with the nurse. She nodded toward me, a brief acknowledgment, and I mouthed a thanks to her and thanked the daughter aloud.
I followed mom into Dr. Lemonis’ office with the words of encouragement still ringing through my head.
. Lemonis had a head too big for his body and a chin too small for his face. It seemed he was trying to hide his small chin with a patch of facial hair, a new addition since mom’s last appointment. It didn’t look bad, but it didn’t look natural either.
He greeted us as we entered his small office. Everything was still white on white, with white chairs in front of a white desk. I helped mom take a seat and stood behind her. Sitting in his office was a foreign concept to me.
“Mona,” he said, looking through a thick file on his desk. “How have you been?”
“The same, Dr. Lemonis.” Mom pulled out a thin blue napkin from the depths of her purse and coughed into it.
“How’s your appetite?” he asked. “I have it marked here that a month ago you were struggling with breakfast, but were famished by dinner.”
“She’s not eating either time,” I said. “We’re trying to supplement her diet with protein powders, but all she can keep down are pudding cups.”
Dr. Lemonis glanced at me. He had made it very clear in our first few meetings that he wanted Mona to answer for herself, but she hated talking about her failures. I didn’t like going against his wishes; he was the best doctor in the state that money could buy and had the most experience dealing with breast cancer. He was the expert, not either of us, but I’d like to watch him try and guilt mom into doing anything she didn’t want to do. I paid the asshole; I could fire him in a heartbeat and fly in the next best doctor available.
“And what about your energy levels? Are they the same?” he asked.
Mom answered for herself this time. “Some days are better, others not so much. Last Saturday, do you remember how beautiful it was last Saturday? The sky was clear without a single gray cloud, and the grass seemed greener than it had been in months. Last Saturday, Karen helped me take a walk around the garden.”
I tried to remember where I was the previous Saturday. I had decided on my sobriety weekends and had taken the boat out for a few hours in the afternoon. Had I known mom was enjoying her afternoon in the garden behind her house, I would have joined her. I never admitted it aloud, but I appreciated the lush garden that I added last minute in the layout of the construction.
“And how long were you able to walk in the garden?” Dr. Lemonis asked.
“I think I was out there for an hour,” she answered. “I was covered in a shawl because of the breeze, but I remember watching the birds fly from feeder to feeder.”
“I would have joined you,” I said from behind. “Why didn’t you call me?”
“I was hoping you were on a lunch date with a woman,” she said. “Don’t squash my hopes.”
“There’s no woman,” I muttered. “How many times do I have to tell you?”
“Until my last breath, and even then, I probably won’t believe you.” She smiled at me as Dr. Lemonis watched our exchange with narrowed eyes.
“Mona,” he said and looked at her. “We took some samples last month, do you remember?”
She nodded. “It pinched like the devil.”
I squeezed the chair behind her, remembering how happy the family in the waiting room had been.
“I have the results,” he said.
“Well?” She leaned forward in her seat, and I copied her movement.
“I’m afraid the cancer has spread.” He opened up a file and gestured at some numbers and figures that made little sense to us. “We were trying to contain it, remember? Keep it confined to just your breasts, but it has metastasized to other areas.”
“Where?” I demanded. “Where did it spread?”
Mom was beginning to tremble in her seat, and I clenched her shoulder in support.
“The lungs, liver, and,” he paused, staring at the file beneath his hands. “I’m afraid the brain.”
I considered snatching the file out of his hands; there had to have been a mistake.
“The brain?” mom asked. “Are you sure?”
“It’s been confirmed, yes,” he said. “But this has happened before. We’ve had plenty of patients make a full recovery after a metastatic diagnosis.”
“Yeah, but, in the brain?” Mom shook her head.
“What does this mean now?” I asked. “Brain surgery?”
Dr. Lemonis hesitated, flipping through the pages in the file. “Not necessarily, no. This specific area of the brain is a high-risk area. Surgery would have a high likelihood of permanent brain injury.”
“Meaning brain dead,” Mom clarified for him. Both Dr. Lemonis and I winced at her blunt words.
“Yes.” He nodded. “Unfortunately, brain surgery is off the table.”
There was something he wasn’t saying, something important that I felt was capable of changing our lives. I was afraid to ask it, but apparently, mom wasn’t.
“Is it terminal?” she asked, her voice low.
“Yes.” Dr. Lemonis’ face didn’t betray any emotions, and I wondered how easy it was for him.
“How long?” I asked and took a seat beside mom. “How long does she have?” Mom took my hand in hers and squeezed.
“I’m afraid putting a number on it would only hurt the chances of recovery.” He nearly stumbled over his words. “Every case is different; I couldn’t give you a proper number based on anything.”
My fist slammed on the table, making the doctor and my mother both jump. “You’re going to tell me how long she has right now or this fist is going so far up your ass you’ll be diagnosed with colon cancer,” I demanded.
“Gavin,” Mom chided me as the doctor ruffled his papers and looked through a stack beside his desk. He seemed to be considering his next words very carefully.
“Six months would be the longest I’d give you,” he said directly to Mona. “No more.”
Mom straightened in her seat, and I leaned forward and buried my face in my palms. Six months? There has to have been a mistake.
“Check again,” I demanded. “I want you to verify everything you’ve told us. I don’t care if it takes you the rest of the week and you have to reschedule every other appointment you have. I’ll pay you extra. Check the damn prognosis again.”
“Mr. Hayward.” Dr. Lemonis raised his hand. “Of course I’ll verify everything, but it’s already been verified by several experts in the field.”
“I don’t give a shit; check it again,” I said. Mom squeezed my shoulder and stood, her legs weak and wobbly. I stood and helped her balance on her feet.
“Gavin, don’t threaten my doctor. He’s the one that gives me drugs,” she said as she led me out of the office. “Thank you, Dr. Lemonis, for your time.”
He was professional as he said his goodbyes, and I helped mom through the hospital. The family wasn’t in the waiting room anymore, and I was almost relieved. I wasn’t sure what I would have done had I seen them.
Mom leaned against my arm as we returned to my car. Six months echoed in my head, a constant reminder that was itching at my consciousness and telling me to say something, anything, to my mother. But she remained quiet as I helped her in the passenger seat and pulled the seatbelt across her body.
Sitting behind the steering wheel felt different somehow, and then I realized everything felt different. Mom hadn’t been right; for the first time in my life everything wasn’t going to be okay. I gripped the wheel tightly and started the car, peeling out of the parking lot and onto the highway with more speed than mom was used to. I needed to fill the empty space around me with anything, and turned the volume on the radio as high as mom’s ears would allow it.
We both remained silent for the majority of the ride until I merged onto the exit for our neighborhood.
“Dr. Lemonis said every case was different,” she reminded me. “We can’t forget that.”
I lowered the volume until just the barest music could be heard. “You’re seriously not trying to put a positive spin on this right now.” She always did this at the worst times possible.
“Why not?” She smiled. “Gavin, your anger controls you. Don’t let it get the best of you, not this time. Everything happens for a reason, and we’ll figure out what this reason is soon enough.”
I opened my mouth to argue against her naive encouragement, but Dr. Lemonis’ voice echoed in my head again with six months. I didn’t want a memory of arguing with my mother in the car, just as much as I didn’t want to plan her departure in six months.
“You’re right.” I reluctantly gave in. “I’m sorry, mom.”
“Don’t be, sweetheart. God’s given us a shitty hand to play with, but it’s all we got so we might as well play them,” she said. Karen was waiting outside her house when I pulled into the circular driveway.
“How are you feeling?” she immediately asked mom as I helped her out of the car.
“A little thirsty,” mom said. “I’m just going to get a cup of water.”
“Let me get that for you, Ms. Hayward.” Karen tried rushing into the house, but mom shook her head.
“I can still do things on my own, damn it. And I’m going to pour my own cup of water.” She entered her house on her own. Karen glanced at me, possibly expecting me to put some sense into mom, but instead, I told her of the prognosis.
“Oh heavens,” she breathed. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Hayward.”
I didn’t have the energy to correct her. “I think mom is trying to get some independence back,” I said. “It might be best to give her some.”
I followed Karen into the house and found mom leaning against a kitchen counter with a water cup half empty and a puddle dripping from the counter toward the wood-stained floor. Karen immediately wiped it up, but neither of us said anything about it.
“I love you,” I said and kissed her forehead. “I’ll see you first thing in the morning, okay?”
She pulled me into a hug, her arm reaching around my neck as her skin shivered from the cold. I watched in the corner of my eye as Karen started a fire in the living room.
“I love you so much, my Gavin,” she whispered in my ear. “So impossibly much.”
“Nothing’s impossible,” I whispered back. I pressed one last kiss against her forward, said goodbye to Karen, and returned home.
I had two missed calls from Ron. I threw my phone onto the couch, not particularly caring if it got lost within the pillows, and slammed my head against the door to my liquor room. Six months? What were we going to do? My fists met with the metal door, slamming into it as if it was the same punching bag in my gym. My knuckles grew bloody, and my skin tore with each hit, but I didn’t stop until I was out of breath.
I opened the door and stepped into a room 10 degrees cooler than the rest of the house. I picked an unopened bottle of bourbon and a smooth glass from a corner shelf and sat at the bar beside my kitchen. I poured an ounce, drank it, and then another two ounces.
For the first time in my life, I had no idea what I was going to do.