Chapter 138
On Saturday
morning, a day before he was to fly back to LA, Nick got up early. He showered, dressed, and drove to Tampa
General, walking the same halls he’d navigated just the other day, on his way
to his cancer clinic. This morning, he
took a different turn on the fifth floor and found himself in front of the
conference room where the support group still met, every Saturday at 10 a.m.
Because
he’d been living in LA, Nick hadn’t been to a group meeting in months, not
since January. He had disappeared
without warning; the last meeting he had planned to attend was the morning
after Claire’s wedding, the morning he’d woken up hungover and in bed with
Laureen. Needless to say, he had missed
that meeting.
He wasn’t
sure what the reaction would be when he suddenly turned up again, six months
later, but he thought it would be best to drop by while he was in town and
catch up with the others, let them know he hadn’t forgotten about them. But when he entered Conference Room 5B, he
was startled to find that he barely recognized any of “the others.”
At first,
he looked around at the room itself, wondering if he’d opened the wrong
door. But no, this was the right room –
same color scheme, same chairs, same tables, spread with simple
refreshments. And there was Franzi, the
counselor who led the group, taking her seat at the head of the circle of
chairs. And as the others followed suit,
straggling into the chairs, he started to recognize a few other familiar faces.
He was not
at all surprised to see Deb right off the bat, dressed in her usual athletic
clothes, with her prosthetic leg clearly visible, and gesturing wildly as she
talked to Franzi.
On the
other hand, he was quite surprised to see Carlos, who had never said
much in the group last year. The
middle-aged man looked thinner and more haggard that Nick remembered him, and
he slumped into his chair with an air of defeat, like a balloon that had
started to deflate after a few days.
Then there
was Jeff, who had had a brain tumor, still looking bald beneath his stocking
cap, but with newly grown-in eyebrows.
With him was his young wife, Lacey; Nick had never seen the two of them
apart.
And
finally, he spotted Carol, with whom he’d spoken often last year. When she looked up and saw him, he waved and
immediately came over to sit in the empty seat next to her.
“Nick!” she
exclaimed, not bothering to hide the look of surprise on her face. “I wasn’t sure I’d ever see you here
again! Where have you been these last
few months?”
“Los
Angeles,” he laughed, and quickly explained what he had been doing in LA. “Sorry I didn’t have a chance to let you know
I was leaving. I meant to come to the
meeting on the Saturday before I left, but, uh… well, it’s kind of a long
story. I didn’t make it.”
“That’s
alright; those things happen. I’m glad
to see you’re doing well though,” said Carol, giving him a motherly smile.
“You too,”
Nick returned, looking at her more closely.
She looked much better than she had the last time he had seen her; her
hair, once thinning from chemo, had thickened and grown back in, though with
more gray than he remembered. Her face
was fuller and rosier, making her look several years younger, healthier, and
much less haggard. “How have you been
doing?”
“I’m doing
just great, thanks,” she said, her voice confident. “Starting to feel like my old self again,
finally. I have more energy now, and I
even went back to teaching and finished up this last school year. I’m off for the summer now, of course, but it
will be nice to start up again in the fall.”
“That’s
awesome,” Nick smiled, happy for the older woman.
Looking
around the circle at all of the new, unfamiliar faces and wondering what had
become of the old regulars who had once sat in their seats, Nick wanted to ask
her about everyone else, but didn’t have a chance. Franzi started the meeting, and everyone
stopped talking to listen.
Nick spoke
up near the beginning of the meeting, when Franzi introduced him to the people
who had joined since he had stopped coming, and told them all briefly what he
had been up to for the last few months and how things were going, health-wise,
but after that, he stayed quiet. He
listened as the others talked, learning the names and stories of some of the
newbies, and catching updates on the older members who were in attendance.
Deb was as
fit as ever; no surprise there. Carol
was not the only one who had finished treatments; Jeff was also in remission,
after surgery to remove the tumor that chemo had successfully shrunken. During the meeting, he pulled off his
stocking cap to show the others the long red scar that ran across his shaved scalp. It was a grim reminder of the fact that his
skull had been drilled open to remove the growth that lurked within, but,
smiling, Jeff referred to it as his “battle scar” and seemed unfazed. An aura of relief surrounded both him and his
wife, a feeling Nick could definitely relate to himself. It was the feeling of having cheated death,
and it was one that changed a person forever.
Carlos was
at the other end of the spectrum; he still didn’t speak much, but from what
Nick could gather, his lung cancer wasn’t responding well to the treatments
he’d been undergoing for the last year and was now in an advanced stage. Nick felt sorry for the man; even though he
was quiet, his body language gave off the air of a man condemned to death. The thought made a rush of chills slide down
Nick’s spine, as he remembered a time when he, too, had been faced with the
prospect of a lung tumor that was nearly inoperable and very well could have
killed him. He had been lucky, very lucky,
but not everyone was.
Further proof
of this came after the meeting had ended, when he and Carol were walking out
together. Strolling slowly, she filled
him in with updates on the others who had come to the meetings last year. Not all of the updates were good.
“Nadine
passed away in February. I made some
casseroles for her family after the funeral; she had three little girls,
remember? So sad,” murmured Carol, her
voice cracking. “And Evelynn went into
the hospital in early April, I think, and never came out again. She hung on for a couple of weeks before she
passed.”
Nick swallowed hard. He had gone cold
with the news that Nadine, the young mother who had had ovarian cancer, had
died, and even though Evelynn’s passing was less of a surprise, it was still
sad. “How’s Ike?” he asked cautiously,
thinking of the sweet, elderly man who had doted on his feeble wife.
A sad smile
spread across Carol’s face. “It’s the
most heartbreaking thing,” she said, “Ike died just two weeks after Evvie. I believe they said it was of natural causes,
old age, something like that… but I think he was just heartbroken. She was his life, and once she was gone,
well…” Carol let her sentence trail
off, then added, “I’ve heard of that kind of thing happening before – an
elderly couple dying within days or weeks of each other.”
Nick
nodded, having heard such stories too.
It was sort of sweet, he supposed, in kind of a sad, morbid way, two
people who had loved each other so deeply and for so long that one couldn’t go
on living without the other. He wondered
if he would ever know that kind of love, a woman with whom he could grow old.
He didn’t
get to dwell on it, though, because Carol was still talking. Thankfully, her updates on the others were
good. Jessie, who was only a high school
student, had finished her senior year in remission, managing to graduate on
time with her class. She was on vacation
with her family and would be starting college in the fall. And Grandpa Jack, whom Nick had worried about
after hearing of all the deaths in the group, had been declared cancer-free and
had stopped coming to the group, “now that my old woman has stopped making
me.” Nick laughed at that, feeling
relieved that at least things had worked out for some of them.
Lingering
in the lobby of the hospital, just inside the main entrance, Nick and Carol
talked longer. “So what about you?” he
wondered. “I know you said things were
good, health-wise, and you’re back to teaching, but how is everything with your
husband?” He hadn’t forgotten the long
conversation they’d had last fall, when she had confided in him about the
damage her illness had done on her marriage.
Carol
sighed. “Hard to say, at this
point. I was hoping things would heal
themselves once I finished chemo and started looking and feeling more like myself,
but they haven’t. He still spends too
much time away from the house, working or going on weekend fishing trips with
his friends. I can’t tell if he’s
avoiding me because he feels guilty, or if he just… can’t bear the sight of me
anymore,” she faltered, crossing her arms over her chest awkwardly.
“That
sucks. He should love you no matter what
you look like; he should love you just the way you are,” Nick said fiercely,
remembering how Claire had said the same thing the first time he had let her
cross an invisible boundary and touch his stump. “I just don’t want you to be
uncomfortable,” he’d said nervously, but she had just shaken her head.
“I’m not,” she stated simply. “Like you said, it’s just a part of your
body. It’s you. And I love you, Nick. Just the way you are.”
Carol
sighed. “I know. But I can’t force him to feel a certain
way. We had a talk, though, and I did
manage to convince him to give marriage counseling a try. We’ve been doing that, and hopefully it will
bring about some changes. If not, I
don’t know what’s going to happen. We’re
hardly living like a married couple right now; we don’t even sleep in the same
bed anymore.” At this, she paused,
giving Nick a sheepish smile. “I’m
sorry; you don’t really want to hear all of the intimate details,” she
chuckled.
Nick felt
his face getting warm. “It’s okay,” he
said, but he had to admit, he was a little relieved when she changed the
subject. Unfortunately, the new topic of
choice turned out to be his love life.
“So how
about you? Have you been dating many
girls out in California?” asked Carol, her eyes sparkling. She suddenly reminded him of an aunt, asking
him if he had a girlfriend at every family event.
He smiled
ruefully. “Nah, too busy, with the album
and all. I haven’t had time to date
much. Haven’t met anyone anyway,” he
shrugged.
“Aww, well,
that’s too bad. But it sounds like
you’ve got bigger and better things happening, and when the time is right, I’m
sure the right woman will come along.” He found it interesting that just when she had
finished saying this, she went on to ask, “What ever happened with your friend
Claire? The one who was getting
married?”
“Oh, she
got married alright,” Nick said with a dry, humorless laugh. “At the end of January. I drank a little too much at her wedding,
which is why I never came to the group meeting the last Saturday I was in town
– it was the morning after.”
“Ahh, I
see.” Carol nodded knowingly. “That must have been very hard on you. I can’t even imagine.”
He, too,
nodded. “Yeah… and now she’s pregnant
with his babies – maybe more than one.
She had in vitro fertilization.
But,” he added, thinking about their lunch together the other day, “I’m
happy for her, you know? Well, sort
of. I’m never gonna like Jamie, but
Claire’s wanted this for a long time… children, I mean. She wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to have
any after going through the cancer treatments, but it worked out for her. So I’m happy about that. She deserves it.”
“That’s
very sweet of you. It takes a big person
to be able to say that about someone they once dated,” said Carol knowingly.
Nick just
shrugged. Even though he still loved
Claire, she had always been more than just “someone he had once dated,” and
always would be. She was his friend,
first and foremost; she had been a good friend to him through all the rough
patches in his life these last few years, and he owed it to her to be a good
friend back, even now.
He and
Carol talked for a few more minutes and exchanged phone numbers before they
walked out of the building. “Feel free
to call me anytime you want to talk,” Carol said sweetly as she handed him a
slip of paper with her number on it.
“Just don’t
give this to your seventh-graders,” Nick joked as he gave her his.
He pocketed
her number, glad to have it so that he would be able to stay in touch this
time. For as they left the building
together and went their separate ways in the parking lot, Nick glanced back up
to the fifth floor and realized this had probably been his last support group
meeting. In just six months, so much had
changed in the group, and he felt like he didn’t quite fit in there anymore,
nor did he need it. For the most part,
life was treating him well, and right now, he just wanted to get back to LA and
live it.
***
Nick was
deep in thought for most of the plane ride back to Los Angeles the next
day. He had not realized how much of an
escape California had been for him these last few months, not until he had
returned home to Tampa and encountered all that he had left behind. Claire, married and now pregnant. The usual worries over his health, brought to
the surface by his appointment with Dr. Kingsbury and then pushed back into the
depths of his mind after her good report.
The support group, now totally changed, three of its former members gone
forever. The mix of relief and guilt he
felt when he sat through the group’s meetings, still the same.
When he was
in LA, working on his album and living in the splendor of the celebrity
lifestyle, it was easy to forget about all of that, at least most of the time,
but now it was on his mind again.
Memories, both good and bad, happy and sad, swirled through his head, as
bits and pieces of conversations seemed to echo off the walls of his
skull. He thought of Jeff and Lacey, who
had stayed strongly united against the tumor that had invaded his brain, and of
Ike and Evvie, the sweet old couple who had lived a long life at each other’s
sides and had refused to let even death separate them. Then he thought of Carol and her husband, who
had not been strong like Lacey and Ike, pulling away from his wife when she
needed him the most.
And then he
thought, inevitably, of Claire. Even
though she had hurt him, he would never forget how she had stuck by him through
the worst, like Lacey, like Ike. He had
been luckier than Carol; he had had the best support he could have asked for in
Claire, who had stayed strong when he was broken, helping him to rebuild his
body and spirit.
He wasn’t
sure where he would be today, if it hadn’t been for her. Would he be recording another solo
album? Not if he had not gotten the
confidence to go back to performing first.
Would he have ever started dating again?
Not if she had not shown him that he was still worthy of being
loved. Would he even be alive? He would never know for sure, but if she had
not given him the strength and will to undergo the risky surgery that had
removed the cancer from his chest, he might had died years ago.
Their
relationship had complicated everything, but there was still one simple truth
about Claire in Nick’s mind: in many
ways, he owed her his life.
That was
why, even before he stepped off the plane at LAX, Nick had made a decision. He was going to record – and release – the
song that, nearly three years ago, he had written for Claire.
***