Chapter 99
AN: A HUGE thanks to Bianca for her help and reassurance with this
chapter (hehe, gotta love the =O).
Thanks, girlie!!! b^__^d
For the next month, Nick’s life revolved mostly around his
radiation treatments. He went to the
hospital every morning, and when he got home, he usually got something to eat, hung
out for awhile, and then took a nap. Dr.
Kingsbury had told him the radiation would make him tired, and it did. The fatigue only increased with each passing
week, even though Nick was getting more sleep than ever. But no matter how many hours he slept, he
just couldn’t shake the numbing exhaustion that clung to his body.
Midway through March, his father Bob and brother Aaron came to
stay for the weekend. Aaron had been in
Florida to shoot something for Nickelodeon at their Orlando studio, and Bob had
accompanied him there, while Jane stayed in California with Leslie and
Angel. Bob had called the week before
and talked to Nick, telling him how Aaron was longing to see him and wondering
if they could stop by Tampa before heading back to California. Nick had said yes, arranging for them to
arrive Friday afternoon and leave by Sunday night. He didn’t have radiation on weekends, so this
would give him a chance to spend a few days with his father and brother without
having to tell them he had relapsed. He
figured that as long as he hid his marked-up leg and acted perky, they would
never know, and he preferred to keep it that way, at least for awhile.
Bob’s rented car pulled up at around two in the afternoon. Nick was right there to answer the door, and
Aaron bounded in immediately. He
hesitated inside the door a moment, giving Nick a once-over, and then,
apparently deciding it was okay, launched himself at Nick. Laughing, Nick stumbled back, almost losing
his balance, for Aaron had gotten a lot taller since the last time they had
seen each other. He was now almost as
tall as Nick, Nick realized in surprise as he wrapped the sixteen-year-old up
in a brotherly bear hug.
“Hey, AC,” he said, ruffling Aaron’s mop of blonde hair.
Aaron pulled back and grinned.
“Hey, you look tons better than last time I was here. Dang, you looked like shit then.”
“Yeah, well…” Nick said with a roll of his eyes, leaving the
comment unfinished.
Bob Carter stumbled in then, a bulging duffel bag over each
shoulder. “Hey, Aaron,” he grunted, “you
wanna get this?”
“Oh, sorry, Dad!” Aaron
immediately grabbed his own duffel. “I’m
gonna take this upstairs, be right back!” he announced and literally ran up the
stairs, dragging the bag behind. It
bounced harshly against every step, and Nick hoped there was nothing breakable
inside because it sure as hell wouldn’t be in one piece by the time it made it
upstairs.
“How are you doing?” Bob asked, pulling Nick into a hug and
awkwardly patting his back.
“Fine,” Nick lied, pasting a smile on his face. “And you?
How was the drive?”
“Oh, it was okay.
Uneventful,” answered Bob with a casual shrug.
“That’s good. You wanna
come sit down?” They abandoned Bob’s
luggage in the foyer and went into Nick’s living room, where Bob sat down in an
armchair, and Nick slumped onto the couch, propping his feet up on the coffee
table in front of him.
“I heard the new album,” Bob began. “It was terrific. The best you guys have come out with so far,
I think.” He gave Nick a proud smile.
“Thanks,” Nick grinned, pleased.
“So, um… how are the girls?”
“Oh, everyone’s great.
Leslie’s been working on her next album, Angel’s just been going to
school, and BJ… well…” He trailed off, and
Nick only nodded sadly, knowing exactly what his father meant. BJ had gotten into drugs, been in trouble
several times in the past few years, and had slowly cut herself off from her
family. He couldn’t even remember the
last time he’d seen her, and it was painful to think of her, for when they were
younger, Nick and BJ had been very close.
“Your mother is doing fine too,” Bob said carefully and added with
a meaningful look, “but she misses you.
I wish you’d talk to her, Nick.”
But Nick only shook his head stubbornly. “No.
I’m sorry, Dad, but I just can’t.
Not yet anyway. Give it some more
time.”
Bob nodded. “I’ll tell her
you send your love.”
Nick opened his mouth and started to tell him not to bother, but,
seeing the stern look on his father’s face, he changed his mind. “Sure,” he replied, his voice toneless.
Aaron came springing back into the room and flung himself onto the
couch beside Nick. “So,” he said, “you
wanna go shoot some hoops, Nick? I don’t
wanna just sit around and talk; my legs are all cramped from being in the car.”
Nick was tired, and his leg was hurting, and basketball was pretty
much the last thing he felt like doing.
But it had been so long since he’d seen Aaron that he just couldn’t tell
him no. Besides, he didn’t want to let
on to the fact that anything was wrong.
So he nodded and forced a smile, saying, “Yeah, sure, AC, let’s go.”
“You comin’, Dad?” Aaron asked, as the brothers got up from the
couch.
“No, I think I’ll relax for awhile, if that’s okay with you two,”
Bob replied.
“Sure, that’s cool, Dad.
We’ll be in later,” Nick promised and led Aaron out through the garage,
where they found a basketball. Nick had
a hoop mounted near the driveway, and they took turns just shooting for awhile,
warming up. While he was just casually
shooting hoops, Nick was fine (although his shots were terrible, and Aaron
teased him relentlessly for being so out of practice). But as soon as the teenager challenged him to
a game of one-on-one, Nick knew things would go steadily downhill. Although he had gotten himself back into
shape for the album release a month earlier, the radiation made him tired, and
he grew winded easily. Not to mention,
his leg ached with every step, and trying to run on it was downright
painful. Still, he gritted his teeth and
tried not to show it as he pivoted and ducked away from Aaron’s flailing arms.
“Okay, ten point rule. You
win,” Nick announced breathlessly, letting the ball roll into the grass after
Aaron had sunk his tenth shot, his score now double what Nick’s was.
“Ahh, come on, you can still try and catch up!” Aaron
insisted. Laughing, he added, “Not like
you’re gonna, but you can try.”
“Nah, I’m givin’ up, bro.
You’ve already kicked my ass,” Nick admitted with a weary grin.
Aaron threw his hands up in the air victoriously, gloating at
having beaten his older brother, for it didn’t happen often. But as Nick sank down onto the hard cement of
the driveway, stretching his legs out in front of him and groaning painfully, a
look of concern spread over his face.
“Hey, you okay, Nick?” he asked, squatting down beside Nick and lightly
touching his shoulder.
“Yeah, I’m cool, kid. Just
tired. You wore me out, ya know?”
“Are you sure? You look
kinda clammy.” Nick gave him a patronizing
look, wishing Aaron would just drop the issue.
“I’m not clammy; I’m just sweaty because I’m hot,”
he enunciated.
“Maybe you should have worn shorts then, dumbass. I told you you’d get hot in jeans!”
Nick rolled his eyes, but could feel himself blushing as he
remembered why he was wearing long pants in the first place. Luckily, his face was already red from the
exercise, and Aaron did not notice.
“Well, I dunno about you, but I’m gonna head inside and get
somethin’ to drink,” Nick announced, hauling himself off of the ground. “You comin’?”
“Yeah, sure.”
As they walked inside, Nick lightly smacked the back of Aaron’s
head. “You just got lucky today, dude,”
he remarked playfully. “Wait till the
rematch; I’m gonna kick your scrawny ass.”
“Ohh, I’m sure,” said Aaron, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Bring it on, bitch!”
Nick whacked him upside the head a second time as, laughing, they
entered the kitchen.
***
At the end of the six-week course of radiation, Nick had an
appointment with Dr. Kingsbury. He had
been seeing Dr. Marvin every week for x-rays, but the radiation oncologist only
briefly examined him and never filled him in on how the treatments were
going. After this check-up with Dr.
Kingsbury, he would know in what direction this ominous road would lead
him. He prayed that the radiation had
done its job and shrunken the tumor so that he could take the exit that would
lead him away from the obstacles his cancer had created. But if the radiation hadn’t worked… then he
had reached the bridge.
“Most Ewing’s Sarcoma tumors are sensitive to radiation. There’s a good chance the treatment will
help.”
“Well, what if it doesn’t?”
“Then we’ll cross that bridge when we come it.”
Nick didn’t want to cross that bridge. In his mind, it was a narrow, rickety bridge,
made of rotting wooden boards and held together with nothing but fraying
rope. It stretched across a wide
precipice that was so deep, it simply faded into blackness with no bottom in
sight. And though the thought of
navigating that treacherous pass was frightening, it was really not knowing
what dangers loomed on the other side that terrified him.
The appointment that day was almost like all the others, the only
exception being Nick did not have to endure another bone marrow
aspiration. This suited him just fine;
in fact, it please him so much that when Dr. Kingsbury came into the examining
room near the end of the appointment, Nick was in a fairly good mood, not
especially worried about what she had to say. The radiation worked, he had been
telling himself over and over again. It
had to have. Your tumor’s gonna be gone…
or almost gone anyway.
This was the thought he kept chanting inwardly as he watched his
doctor carefully place six x-ray films onto the light board, all in a row. He longed to just come out and ask her if it
had worked, but he held his tongue and waited impatiently for her to give him
the news.
“Nick, these are the x-rays you’ve had taken of your leg after
each week of radiation,” Dr. Kingsbury began, turning to face him. She turned on the board, illuminating the six
dark films. “This one,” she said,
pointing to the one on the left end, “was the first taken after your first week
of radiation. You can see your tumor
here.” With her finger, she traced a
circle around the dark spot lodged in the white bone of his tibia. The spot was big, bigger than he remembered
it, and he got a sick feeling in his stomach just looking at it.
“The rest of the films,” the doctor carried on, waving her arm
across the board to encompass the other five, “are the ones taken in subsequent
weeks. They’re in order. This one at the end is the one we took
today.” Nick’s eyes traveled across the
white board to the film at the right end.
To his dismay, he could still vividly see the dark spot that was his
tumor. His heart beginning to race with
trepidation, his eyes flickered back to the first film on the opposite end, as
he tried to compare the size of both spots.
“You can see that there’s not much of a difference in size between
the one from five weeks ago and the one from today,” said Dr. Kingsbury, and,
his heart sinking, Nick realized she was right.
The spot on the right end film looked no smaller than the one on the
left; in fact, it seemed almost bigger…
“Are you sure they’re not switched around or something?” he asked,
a hint of desperation wavering in his voice.
“No,” said Dr. Kingsbury, shaking her head regrettably. “I’m so sorry, Nick, but the truth is, the
radiation hasn’t helped.”
So they had reached the bridge.
“It hasn’t shrunken the tumor, and it’s only stunted its growth
slightly,” Dr. Kingsbury continued gravely.
“The cancer is still spreading, and I’m afraid we’re going to need to
consider more drastic measures to stop it before it metastasizes to another
part of your body.”
Nick stared at her, frozen in fear, his pounding heart the only
muscle moving in his body. “M-more
drastic measures?” he repeated, his voice hoarse from the lump that had lodged
itself in this throat. “Like what?”
“Chemotherapy helped, but not enough to keep you in
remission. Radiation didn’t work. There’s really only one more option at this
point, and that’s surgery.”
Surgery.
The word hit him like a brick.
No, more like a block of ice, which an invisible force had shoved down
his throat. It slid all the way down to
the pit of his stomach, where it settled, leaving an icy trail that numbed his
insides. He had never gone under the
knife before, with the exception of the biopsy they had done on his leg prior
to his initial diagnosis. But, as Dr.
Kingsbury had stressed, that had only been very minor surgery… and
somehow, the way she had said that horrible word surgery this time, he
knew it was going to be a much bigger deal.
“Surgery,” he heard himself echo, his voice sounding small and
scared. “You mean you’re going to, like,
cut out the tumor?” He was already
beginning to feel light-headed, his body trembling as he thought about someone
cutting into his leg, slicing right into his bone to extract the malignant
growth that lurked within it.
“No, Nick,” Dr. Kingsbury answered gently, and for a fleeting
moment, relief washed over him. But then
the doctor pulled up her stool and sat down right in front of him, resting a
hand on his right knee as she looked seriously up into his eyes. “The tumor is too big to be removed. At this stage, the best option…”
He drew in a shaky breath and held it as she continued.
“… is amputation.”
***