Chapter 1
Though only barely awake I could make
out the voice of my older brother Brian. He was sitting in the chair beside my
hospital bed where I know he'd been since I'd come out of surgery, likely hours
before. I felt his warm hand slip softly into mine as he bent over to me and
spoke quietly, "How ya doing sweetheart?"
I couldn't muster the strength to
actually speak so I simply nodded my head tiredly and squeezed his hand a
little bit tighter. It wasn't much, but between that and my labored breathing I
knew he would sense my pain. The sheer exhaustion becoming nearly unbareable.
He stood slowly, and gathering the hair away from my face, leaned forward to
kiss me gently on the forehead.
"You just rest okay...
everythings going to be alright. I have to go meet Leighanne down in the lobby
and everyone else went to get something to eat. You get some sleep and I
promise we'll all be here when you wake up." And with a last brush of his
hand on my cheek he turned to walk from the room, but not before pausing by the
door to say, "I Love you G."
~~~~~~~
I can't say exactly how long I had
been asleep. What felt like days in reality was only a couple of hours. What I
do know is that Brian kept his promise, because when I finally stirred sometime
later and took a moment to glance around my hospital room, they were all
there... well... all but one. There was Brian, still sitting next to me in that
same hospital chair, only now he was sleeping, his forehead resting on his
hand, elbow propped up on the bedside stand looking about as uncomfortable as I
felt. Across the room seated at a small table by the window were my best friend
Kelly, her husband Joey, my sister-in-law Leighanne, and my cousin, Kevin.
I lay there for the longest time just
watching the 'goings on' in the room, allowing my brain to focus and take it
all in. I watched Brian sleeping so peacefully next to me, snoring slightly
now, and I thought of how exhausted he must be. I watched him breathing and
wondered if that's what he'd been doing all day... just watching me breathe...
watching and waiting. I watched his wife across the room with Kelly and Joey,
looking at photos from our recent trip to Hawaii. I would have given anything
to be there again at that exact moment, away from the pain and the fear,
peaceful and carefree. It was the best trip of my life. Brian and Kevin, their
wives, Nick and I... we were there together, all of us, and my life was
complete. The three of them laughed over a photo and I knew without even
looking that it was the one we took on our last night there, out in front of
our beach house. We'd stopped a couple walking by and asked them to take the a
photo, the three of us girls had climbed awkwardly onto the guys backs in our
hawaiian style dresses and we were all giving peace signs above their heads.
I saw Kevin look over towards the
laughing trio and roll his eyes as he grinned. He had been deeply engrossed in
his cell phone since I'd woken up, typing text messages for minutes at a time,
what must have been long elaborate text messages that judging from the look on
his face were very important. After a few minutes he turned towards my bed and
noticed that I was watching.
"Well hey there beautiful,"
he said with a wink, "welcome back to the land of the living."
I forced a smile and laughed a small
shallow laugh. It hurt to laugh and besides, I didn't feel very beautiful at
the moment. In fact, I felt rather like someone had removed my insides,
scrambled them up and then tried to jam them back into me through a small hole
in my belly button.
The pain must have shown on my face
because in the next second all of them were standing at my bedside with
concerned looks upon their faces.
"Are you in a lot of pain? Kelly
questioned, a kind look of empathy crossing her face.
"Is there anything we can get
you?" Kevin asked, "Ice Chips, water, anything you just let us
know!" (He always was the mother hen)
"I... I think I'm okay just
now," I answered softly, not fully trusting my voice just yet. "Just
sore... really, really sore, and maybe a little bit cold." I was shivering
though perhaps more from the pain than from actually being cold.
With those words Leighanne slid to the
side of my bed and busied herself fixing my blankets. As I watched Joey and
Kelly step out into the hallway to tell my nurse I'd woken up, Kevin caught my
eye and a concerned look crossed his face.
"What's wrong?" He
questioned as he took my hand in his.
"He's coming isn't he?" I
whispered... "I mean, he'll show up... right? He has to."
Kevin nodded a knowing reassurance,
" Please don't worry about it, about him. I know Nick and I know that he
will be here. He loves you Gracie... he'll be here."
I looked away quickly trying to fight
back the tears threatening to slip from my eyes. I didn't want him to be there
later, I wanted him to be there at that exact moment. I wanted him to be the
one holding my hand like Kevin was and telling me things would be okay. If I
was right and Nick was the man I was supposed to spend the rest of my life with
then I needed him with me for this. I felt Kevin squeeze my hand a little
tighter and I looked back into his caring eyes.
"Hey, you just worry about you
right now baby girl," he said cupping my chin in his hand, "trust
me... okay?"
I nodded my head still fighting the
tears and turned to where Brian had begun to stir in his chair. All at once his
eyes shot open and he looked around the room with a start.
"Why didn't you guys wake me
up!?! Good Grief were you going to let me sleep all day?! I wanted to be awake
when she..."
"Brian!" I said softly but
abruptly so as to get his attention, "It's okay, really, I just woke up
and you haven't missed a thing. You were tired too, really, it's okay."
"Always the sweetheart," he
said coming over to my bed and sinking down on the mattress next to me.
"How are you? Still
hurting?"
All I could think of at that moment,
with Brian sitting on the bed next to me was how much I wished that the person
there beside me, holding my hand and asking me if I was okay was Nick. And I
felt horrible for feeling that way because Brian had been nothing if not
amazing and didn't wishing he were someone else mean wishing he wasn't there?
That wasn't what I wanted either.
I could feel the tears welling up in
my eyes again as I turned away towards the window.
"What is G? You okay?" Brian
asked a serious look creeping into his eyes.
I continued to look through the window
as if maybe the answer was waiting for me there in the afternoon sky. Still
holding back the tears I turned back towards Brian and said, "I'm hurting,
yeah... I just hurt a little."
That was the understatement of the
year. In reality the pain had increased to a level hardly tolerable, and I kept
watching the door waiting and hoping that Kelly would return soon with the
nurse or maybe a shot of morphine. When she finally walked in several minutes
later followed not only by the nurse, but by my doctor as well I know everyone
in the room could sense the sigh of relief.
Brian stayed by my side and held my
hand as they busied themselves assessing my condition and filling my IV with
some much needed pain medication. The whole process took a little while and
though the pain was lessening from the medications I still winced in discomfort
and couldn't relax. I didn't want to wait any longer to find out the results.
In fact, the more time they spent not telling me how the surgery had gone, the
more anxious I grew.
"So..." I finally asked,
trying my best to put on a brave face and not wanting to wait another moment to
hear the news, "what's the verdict?"
I knew things couldn't be good when
the doctor nodded to my brother and asked if she could have a moment alone with
me.
I wanted to tell her that anything she
could tell me, she could tell him... I wanted to scream out that Brian should
stay, that I really didn't want to be alone, that the last thing I needed at
that moment was to be all alone. I wanted to grab his hand and hold on tight
and not let go, but before I could say or do anything Brian nodded to her, gave
me a reassuring glance and stepped out into the hallway to join the others.
I must have looked terrified because
my doctor, an amazing woman I'd known for years, sat down on the end of the bed
and took my hand in hers. I could feel my eyes filling with tears once again
and I didn't even know the outcome yet.
"It's not so good Grace..."
she softly said, "we did have to remove your ovaries and we think we got
it all, but you're going to have to have more chemo and possibly some radiation
treatments."
Somehow, in my heart I knew this was
what was going to happen. She'd warned me it was a possibility, but at 25 it
wasn't the news I wanted to hear. I could feel the tears beginning to slip down
my cheeks as she grasped my hand even tighter.
"Grace, there's more," she
said, with a look of compassion and concern that I will never in a million
years forget.
I couldn't imagine what more there
could be. I looked at her, tears rolling steadily down my cheeks now and
somehow though my heart knew I didn't want to hear more, my mouth managed to
tell her to go on.
"You should know that you are a
few weeks pregnant. In your condition Grace, there's really no hope for this
baby."
"Oh God."
She looked up at me with eyes so full
of compassion, eyes that seemed to grieve for me... with me... as more and more
tears slipped from my eyes and I fell forward into sobs on the bed I felt her
arms around me, taking me into a hug and I hugged back.
"I am so, so sorry Grace."
And for as long as I'd known her... I
knew she was.
***
