Chapter 140
For Claire,
the next few weeks passed in a blur of moving preparations, morning sickness,
and doctor’s appointments.
Jamie had a
handle on the former; he’d applied for a mortgage, talked to the landlord about
moving out of their apartment, and hired a realtor who had quickly found them a
house. “I told her we want something
with at least three bedrooms, a big yard, and a good location, a nice
neighborhood in the suburbs, where there are good schools,” he’d informed
Claire, and the realtor had come up with just that.
The house
was a modest, split-level home that was twenty years old, but in good
shape. It had three bedrooms, enough for
a nursery and a playroom for right now, and a large, landscaped yard. The neighborhood was good, as was the school
district, according to Jamie, who knew the area well; it was just a town over
from where he had grown up.
She hadn’t seen the house yet, but Jamie had flown up for a weekend to look at
it. After going through every detail of
it with his mother and the realtor and taking plenty of digital pictures to
send back to Claire, he had assured her that it what they were looking for, and
she had agreed to let him place a bid on the house. What choice did she have? She knew if they didn’t find a home before he
was due to start his new job, they would end up living with Jamie’s mother, and
that was the last thing she wanted to do.
Though she
still had plenty of reservations and fears, Claire had to admit, it was cool to
be shopping for their first house. They
were in this for the long haul now, she realized. Jamie wasn’t just looking for a starter home
for them; he was looking for a place where they could raise their family. And although she wasn’t keen on leaving
Florida, she had to admit, there was something quaint about the Midwest. She pictured rolling farmlands, small towns
where everyone knew each other, and cute two-story houses with shutters and
basements and lush backyards where the kids could play and climb trees. The schools would probably be better than in
Tampa, and their children would grow up knowing each of the four seasons. Maybe they’d take after their father and love
the snow. Heck, maybe even she
would start to like the snow after a few winters there.
She was
trying to have a good attitude about it, wanting to support her husband, but it
was still hard. It was just moving all
too fast for her, and she wasn’t yet ready to say goodbye to her family and
friends and the place she’d always known as home.
Her family
had taken the news hard. Taking a leaf
out of Kyle’s book, Claire had brought them all together for dinner at her
parents’ house, where she and Jamie had broken both pieces of news, the
pregnancy and the transfer. Her parents
had been surprised and ecstatic to find out that she had gone through a
successful IVF cycle and was now carrying triplets. They had been devastated to learn that she
and Jamie and their three grandbabies would be moving so far away.
Dianna had
had the same reaction, though her theatrics were even more dramatic. She had thrown her arms around Claire and then
Jamie, in turn, squealing excitedly into their ears when they had told her they
were expecting. When they had explained
that they were also moving, she had thrown her arms around both of them again
and practically sobbed on their shoulders.
“I can’t
believe you!” she’d cried to Jamie, tears in her eyes. “First, you move away… and now you’re
taking my best friend away too? What am
I supposed to do without you guys??”
Claire had
tried to say something funny, to keep her eyes from leaking too, but it had
been hard to lighten the mood. She knew
exactly where Dianna was coming from because she felt the same way. Dianna Treborn had been her best friend since
middle school, and except for college, they had always lived near each
other. It was hard to imagine her life
without Dianna in it, live and in person.
They couldn’t have been more different, and yet, they had always
complimented each other well because of that fact. Dianna kept her balanced, and she did the
same for her friend in return, or at least that was what they had always said.
To make
matters worse, their tenth high-school class reunion was held the next weekend,
and reminiscing with old friends she’d grown up with on all the good times
they’d had together here in Tampa made it even harder for Claire to think of
leaving. She didn’t like to admit it,
but she’d always been such a homebody.
But of course, many of her old classmates who attended the reunion had
come from out of state, and she decided, resignedly, that if they could do it,
so could she.
Dianna had
seemed to accept it, too. Though she
wasn’t happy about the last of their circle of friends from high school moving
away, she had decided that Claire and Jamie were not going without a bang and,
thus, was throwing a going-away party on the Saturday before they moved. “You always find an excuse to have a party,”
Claire had teased Dianna, but really, she thought it was sweet.
While Jamie
took charge of the move, and Dianna took responsibility for the party planning,
Claire was left to take care of herself, focusing on her own health and the
health of her babies. She had never been
to so many doctor’s appointments, she mused one day, not even at the worst
points of her leukemia ordeal; it seemed as if she was going to one doctor’s
office or another every few days.
She was
done seeing Dr. Nevin now; after finding out she was indeed carrying triplets,
the embryologist had referred her to a high-risk obstetrician, Dr. Valerio, who
worked at the fertility clinic and also had licenses at Tampa General. She had regular appointments for ultrasounds
and blood work with Dr. Valerio for now, but once she was in Iowa, she would
have to find yet another OB. Thankfully,
Dr. Valerio had contacts in the Midwest and had given her a few names of
obstetricians in the Des Moines area.
On top her
prenatal check-ups, she also had her annual workup at the cancer clinic in the
middle of August. Jamie had flown to
Iowa for the weekend to handle more details with the house, so she invited her
brother to go to the appointment with her instead. Usually, Claire had no problem going to the
clinic alone; she had done so many times over the last few years. But this time was different.
It was hard
to believe, but it had been five years since her bone marrow transplant, five
years in remission. According to the
statistics, the five-year mark was the point at which she could be called
officially cured. This realization
excited her so much that she just had to have someone there with her, someone
to celebrate with. She wished Nick were
in town, but it was just as appropriate that Kyle came with her. After all, it had been his bone marrow that
had saved her life.
The waiting
room of the oncology clinic was full of people who looked like she had five
years ago – bald, pale, gaunt, or bloated from the treatments they had to
endure. Some had family members
accompanying them; they looked tired and defeated. She could relate to them perfectly, and yet,
a part of her felt awkward and even guilty to be there, waiting in hope of
being told she was cured, when many of these people were just hoping for
another year, or even another month. She
wanted to tell them, “Just hold on; there is a light at the end of the
tunnel. Some people do make it to the
five-year point,” but she didn’t. She
and Kyle sat quietly until the nurse called her back.
“Do you
want me to come back with you?” Kyle asked in a whisper.
“It’s up to
you.”
Whether because
he would always be her overprotective big brother or because he just couldn’t
stand the idea of sitting in that grim waiting room while she had her check-up,
Kyle followed her back to the examining room.
He waited outside while she changed into a gown, but sat with her
through the usual bloodwork and bone marrow biopsy, hopefully her last.
Dr. Rodrigo
was smiling when she came back in at the end of the appointment. Waving Claire’s chart around, she said, “I
put a rush on your labwork, because I was sure you would want definite news
today. Everything looks clean. No blasts to be found in your blood or
marrow. This puts you at five years
cancer-free. I don’t get to tell
patients this nearly enough, but this is the point, Claire, when we call you cured.”
Coming from
her oncologist’s mouth, the word sounded more beautiful than Claire had ever
thought it before. For a brief moment,
she was overcome with the urge to cry, as the weight of the last
eight-and-a-half years finally lifted from her shoulders. She had been praying for this moment ever
since she was twenty years old, newly diagnosed with leukemia and
terrified. For days, even weeks, after
the diagnosis, it had seemed like a horrible nightmare, a nightmare which
eventually became her life, and then it was the remissions that seemed almost
like a dream, but a wonderful dream, which she was afraid to wake up from.
Finally,
the nightmare was over, and her dreams had come true. She didn’t even have to ask Kyle to pinch her
to be sure; he was already squeezing the hell out of her hand. She finally looked at him and smiled when she
saw how bright his blue eyes had suddenly become. “All thanks to you and your kick-ass bone
marrow,” she said cheerfully, and, laughing, he pulled her into a tight hug.
“Thank
God,” she heard him murmur, as he held her against his broad shoulder.
When she
pulled away, she turned back to Dr. Rodrigo, who had been her oncologist since
the beginning, seeing her through everything from her first round of chemo to
the bone marrow transplant that had cured her.
“Thank you… so much,” she said, shaking the older woman’s hand
vigorously. The words hardly seemed
enough, but Claire had no idea what else to say. She had hoped for this day to come for so
long, but now that it had arrived, she was overwhelmed.
“You’re
very welcome,” Dr. Rodrigo smiled. “I
wish you all the best. Be sure to send
us a birth announcement when the little ones are born.”
Claire
grinned, her heart soaring. Her dreams
really were coming true. “I
will!” she promised.
“Good
luck,” Dr. Rodrigo told her before she left.
As she and
Kyle walked out of the oncology clinic, Claire couldn’t help but take a look
around the waiting room, realizing that this could very well be the last time
she ever saw it. She certainly wouldn’t
miss it, but it was strange, even a little scary, to be leaving it without
knowing she had to come back for another appointment. She felt almost like a captive animal who had
just been set free into the wild; it was exhilarating, but almost frightening
at the same time. She wasn’t sure what
to do with her new freedom.
“We need to
call Mom and Dad,” said Kyle as they walked down the hall, heading for the
elevators. “Maybe they’ll want to come
into town. This definitely calls for a
celebration. Although you’d probably
rather a wait a couple days, till Jamie’s home, huh?”
“Oh… nah,
it doesn’t matter; I feel like going out tonight, if they’re up for it,” said
Claire.
Of course
her parents and her husband should be the first people she called to tell such
wonderful news, but it was interesting – as she’d walked through the waiting
room, she hadn’t thought immediately of her mom or dad, or of Jamie.
The first
person she had wanted to call was Nick.
***
With the
release of his first single just a few days away, Nick’s phone had been ringing
off the hook. He had a number of radio
interviews and a few TV appearances scheduled for the following week to start
promoting the single, and he would be flying from LA to New York City and then
to Florida to spend a few days before he headed back to LA to gear up for more
promotion work for his album.
He was out
by the pool on Saturday afternoon, trying to be as lazy as possible before the
promotional week began, when his cell phone sprang to life yet again. Groaning, Nick leaned over and slid the phone
off of the table next to his chaise lounge.
He glanced idly down at the caller ID, thinking that if it was Johnny
Wright or Kenneth Crear calling again, he just might throw the phone into the
pool. He was surprised to find Claire’s
name there instead.
Flipping
the phone open, he put it to his ear.
“Hello?”
“Hi, Nick!”
She sounded
chipper, much more so than she had seemed the last few times he had talked to
her. They had kept in touch much better
since his last visit to Florida, mostly because she kept calling with
news. In the span of one conversation
just three weeks ago, he had learned that she was pregnant with triplets and
that she was moving to Iowa with Jamie.
Needless to
say, he hadn’t been particularly happy about either, picturing Jamie and Claire
and their three perfect, identical children living in a perfect little house
with a white picket fence in a sleepy little Midwestern town where the kids
rode bikes outside instead of playing video games, and no one ever bothered to
lock their doors because the worst crime ever committed was a good
old-fashioned toilet-papering.
The
imagined scenario made him want to vomit.
Was he
jealous? Hell yeah. He didn’t want to admit it and never would,
not to Claire anyway, but of course he was.
He had all the money in the world, women who yearned to be with him even
now, and yet, for some reason, he hadn’t been able to give the only woman he
really loved the life she wanted. Jamie,
with his white collar, nine-to-five job and enthusiastic sperm, apparently
could.
At the same
time, he had realized that Claire didn’t seem as happy as she had when he was
in Tampa. She was still in shock over
the news of the triplets, understandably, and from what she’d told him, her
morning sickness had been bad so far, but more than anything, he knew she
didn’t want to move. She hadn’t come out
and said it exactly, but he could hear it in her tone and pick it out of her
words. Did she perhaps resent Jamie for
making her leave her family and move to an entirely different region of the
country?
She hadn’t
said that either, but Nick could always hope for as much; the idea made him
smirk, anyway.
Wondering
what had perked her up today, he replied, “Hey!
What’s up?”
“Well… I
have some good news.”
Inwardly,
Nick groaned, and immediately hated himself for it. Why couldn’t he just be happy for her? But it was so hard… these days, “good news”
in Claire’s world usually meant more bad news to his poor, battered heart,
something along the lines of “Jamie and I got engaged!” or “I’m
pregnant with Jamie’s triplets!”
“What’s
up?” he forced himself to ask. “Jamie’s
not getting transferred after all?” he added, unable to resist.
“I wish,”
she muttered, the cheer instantly gone from her voice.
He mentally
berated himself for asking, but he couldn’t keep from smirking just a
little. She so didn’t want to
move…
“Sorry,” he
said. “So what’s the big news?” You’re pregnant with quadruplets now?
“Well… I
just had my five-year post-BMT check-up this morning…” she started slyly.
Nick froze
for a minute, thinking, counting back in his head. “Holy shit, it has been five years,
hasn’t it?? That means... you…
you’re-?” He could hardly bring himself
to utter the word, the one word Dr. Kingsbury never liked to use.
“Cured.” It was she who said it, and he could hear
the relief, the elation, in her voice.
He broke
into a grin, a genuine one, for this time, he was not at all jealous, but truly
happy for her. “Oh my God… that’s
freaking amazing, Claire! So it’s
official – you beat it, baby!!”
“I beat
it,” she echoed with a sigh. “And it
won’t be long, Nick, and you’ll be saying the same thing.”
“I hope
so,” said Nick, his smile fading slightly.
He still had over a year to go until he reached that all-important
five-year remission point. He had
witnessed firsthand how drastically life could change in just a year. But still, he was optimistic. Every part of his body that they’d found
cancer in had been removed, so how could it come back? It didn’t seem logical, but the thought still
scared him. He never wanted to go
through any of that again; he didn’t think he could make it through another
relapse.
Forcing
himself to stop thinking such thoughts, he added to Claire, “Hey, we need to
celebrate! What day are you guys moving
again?”
“Next
Monday,” she sighed. “Way too soon, if
you ask me; I haven’t even seen the freaking house yet, except for in
pictures. I feel like some pioneer
woman, ready to pack up everything I own and go out into the great unknown.”
Nick
chuckled. “Well, if there’s anything I
can do, let me know,” he offered automatically.
He wasn’t sure what he could possibly do for her, but it seemed like a
good idea to be supportive, especially when she seemed annoyed with her husband
for putting her in this situation.
“Thanks,
Nick. I’m sure it’ll be fine… Everything happens for a reason, right? That’s what I keep telling myself anyway…” She trailed off sadly, but immediately
perked up again when she burst, “Oh! So
I was going to say, speaking of celebrating…
Dianna’s throwing us this going away party next Saturday, a week from
today. I don’t know if there’s any
chance you’d be back in town then, but if you are, you’re invited, of course. I would love to see you before we leave…”
Nick almost
started laughing; it seemed the fates had aligned. He was going to be in Florida then;
Howie’s birthday was on Friday, and he had planned to hang out with him and AJ
in Orlando that night. He would be back
in Tampa by Saturday.
When he
told Claire this, she gasped loudly.
“Are you serious?? That’s
great!! You’ll come then, right?”
“Sure,” he
agreed and listened as she told him where the party was going to be held. “I’ll be there,” he promised. “Then we can celebrate you being cured. You know, at least have a drink together or
something.”
There was a
long pause. Then, “Nick, I’m
pregnant. Remember?”
Doh! thought Nick stupidly, wishing with all his heart he hadn’t just said
that. “Oh yeah…”
“Ohh
yeah…” she mimicked him, laughing.
“By ‘drink,’ I’m sure you just meant a Sprite or something, right?”
Nick
chuckled, feeling himself blush. For a
moment, he had almost forgotten. But
only for a moment.
***