After one more
carefree week, Nick headed back to Tampa for another doctor’s appointment, at
which he would be put on his third round of chemo. “Just another check-up for my leg,” he informed
the guys, and they accepted his lie without suspicion.
Now, as he
stepped through the doors marked Oncology at Tampa General Hospital, he was
returned to the world he had managed to escape for the past two chemo-free
weeks, the world of cancer. Going to the
waiting room, he signed in with the receptionist and took a seat, remembering
his request to be treated just like any other patient and forced to wait to be
seen. Noticing a round-faced young woman
watching him from one side of the room, he began to regret this decision. He still had not told anyone about his
cancer, and if one of these people leaked it to the press…
Nick quickly
sat down in one corner, swiped a random magazine from the rack next to him, and
bent over it, hiding his face. Looking
down at it, he realized first that it was upside down and second that it was
one of those maternity magazines.
Feeling his face grow hot, he quickly turned the magazine right side up
and hoped anyone watching him would just think his wife was expecting. He tried to focus his attention on an article
called “Breast Feeding: Ten Tips For You and Your Baby” and ignore the few
others waiting in the room.
Just as he was
staring at the illustrations accompanying the article, a female voice said,
“Nick?” Nick jumped, and the magazine
fell from his hands, landing in a crumpled heap on the floor and making a lot
of noise in process. He looked up at the
door leading to the examining rooms, but there was no nurse standing there.
“Nick?”
Nick’s head
jerked in the direction of the voice and found himself looking over at the girl
he had noticed when he came in. She was
sitting a few chairs down from him, a magazine turned face down in her lap,
marking her spot. She snickered at him
and grinned. “Hi.”
“Oh… hi,” Nick
said back, still a bit discombobulated and feeling quite stupid. He quickly bent down, red-faced, grabbed his
magazine and hastily shoved it back onto the rack. When he glanced back at the girl, he found
she was still looking at him. “Um… you…
you recognize me, don’t you? You want an
autograph? I’ll give you whatever, just,
please, I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t tell-“
The girl
smiled and interrupted him with, “You don’t remember me, do you?”
“Uh…” Nick stared at her. She was obviously a cancer patient, her head
covered in a baby blue scarf patterned with small white clouds. Her skin was dull and putty-colored,
brightened only by light blue eyes that looked oversized and out of place under
barren eyebrows and lashless lids. It
was the eyes, though, that suddenly made him realize who he was talking
to. “Oh!
Uh… Claire, right?”
She smiled
bashfully. “Yeah. Sorry to put you on the spot… I guess I look
a lot different then I did when we met.
They’ve got me on some new drugs, and this is one of the side
effects.” Grimacing, she looked down at
her body, which was no longer that of the frail, gaunt girl he had met at his
first chemo session. She now looked to
be a good thirty or forty pounds heavier, and her face, which once had been so
thin he could make out her cheekbones, resembled a moon pie.
Nick couldn’t
help but gape for a few seconds, shocked and frightened by what had happened to
her. He had thought cancer drugs made
you lose weight, not gain it. Selfishly,
he couldn’t help but wonder if this would happen to him. God, that was the last thing he needed. He had been teased enough about his weight
already. The thought of looking all fat
and bloated and bald like the girl sitting next to him made him sick to his
stomach.
“Well… sorry
to bug you… I just wanted to say hey.”
Claire shrugged and picked up her magazine, suddenly looking very
interested in it. Nick noticed her pale
cheeks turning scarlet and realized he had embarrassed her.
Humiliated by
his rudeness, Nick quickly said, “No, you’re not bugging me. I’m sorry, my mind’s a million miles
away. Anyway, it, uh, good to see
you. How are you doing?”
She
shrugged. “Oh, I’m hanging in there,”
she replied. “Still not in remission,
but hey, they’re trying.” Her voice was
bright and flippant, but he could hear the quiver of worry embedded in it. Again, his stomach lurched with
trepidation. Was she losing the fight? Would he?
“So, anyway,
how are you? Still got your hair, I
see.” She smiled slightly at him.
He chuckled,
nervously touching the blonde strands.
“Yeah… for now. I’m doing okay, I
guess. Chemo sucks, but I guess you
already know that.”
“Yup,” she
laughed. “So… what kind of chemo do you
get? Oral or IV?”
“Oh… uh… IV…
I’ve got a… a catheter thingie…” He
shifted, uncomfortably aware of the small device poking out of his chest.
“Ohh, lucky
you. I’ve got one too.” She pulled her t-shirt taut over her chest,
and he could make out the tiny bulge. He
chuckled nervously, awed by how comfortable she was with the whole thing. He was forever tugging on his shirt, making
sure it was loose enough to hide the catheter.
The door
leading to the exam rooms opened with a click, and a nurse stepped into the
room. “Claire? You can come on back now.” She smiled pleasantly in Claire’s direction,
and Claire stood up.
“Well, see ya
around, Nick,” said Claire, smiling at him.
“Yeah, I’ll
see ya,” Nick replied, returning the smile as Claire followed the nurse out of
the waiting room. Reaching over, he
picked up the magazine she had left lying on her empty chair, a tattered copy
of Reader’s Digest. He flipped it
over. It was open to a section called
“Laughter is the Best Medicine.”
Smiling, Nick decided this was better than reading about breastfeeding
and began to read the short entries. He
could use a laugh.
***