Chapter
56
That afternoon, Serena, Jenna, and Ashalyn all came to
visit Elyssa. AJ had headed home for
awhile, so the four girls had some time to themselves. Ever since Elyssa had called them all Sunday
morning to tell them her bad news, they had been wanting to see her. Now here they were.
“Hey, Lyss,” Serena said, entering the room. She was holding Andrea in one arm and
carrying a diaper bag in the other.
“Hey, Rena,” Elyssa greeted. “Baby duty?”
“Yup. Howie had to
run some errands,” Serena replied.
“That’s cool. Hello,
Andrea,” she cooed to the baby as Serena brought her closer. The two month old infant smiled, her big
brown eyes shining.
“You’ll make a great mother,” Serena said with a knowing
smile. Elyssa just grinned, her hand
automatically traveling to her stomach.
Being only two months along, it was nearly impossible to tell that she
was pregnant from the outside. But soon,
she knew, she’d be gaining weight. Great,
she thought. I’ll be bald and fat. But somehow, that no longer mattered to her.
“How’s it going, Lyssa?” Jenna asked, sitting in a chair
beside Elyssa’s bed.
“It’s going,” Elyssa replied with a shrug.
“Hang in there,” Ashalyn said, sitting on the opposite side
of the bed. “You’ve been through this
once before. It’ll be a piece of cake
this time.” Her words were confident,
but her voice wavered as she said them.
“Sure,” Elyssa replied, with a casual wave of her
hand. “Piece of cake.”
***
Unfortunately, the chemo was not a piece of cake. It was just as bad as it had been the first
time, and what was worse this time was that Elyssa knew exactly the horrors
that would come. She knew how nauseous
she’d feel, how violently sick she would become. She knew what all the side effects were. And she could do nothing about any of
it. She just had to go with the flow.
And that she did.
The chemo was horrible, but she desperately tried to keep the
faith. It was the thought that in just a
few months, she would have a baby that kept her going. In seven months, her relapse would hopefully
be a thing of the past, and she would be on her way to getting cured. And in seven months, she would be a
mother.
It was funny the order in which the four girls were getting
pregnant. Before Serena had gotten
pregnant, if any of them had been asked which member of the group would be most
likely to have a baby first, Elyssa was sure everyone would vote for Ashalyn. She was the one who had always wanted a
family the most, a good husband, and a few children. Before Mike’s death, they had all thought
that someday, Ashalyn and Mike would be married. But of course, that was no longer possible. Still, there was Brian, and the girls all had
high hopes for Ashalyn and Brian. Their
relationship had been going wonderfully, and they made the perfect couple. However, they were far from marriage, and
the girls all knew that neither Brian, nor Ashalyn, would have sex before
marriage.
On the other hand, Serena had once been the least likely to
get pregnant. Before Howie, she had
never been in love or had a relationship that actually lasted. And when they were younger, the girls could
all remember Serena saying that she never wanted to have a baby. And yet, there she was, the first one to get
pregnant out of their group. Of course,
what she had said about becoming a mother back then was not true now. They all knew that she loved Andrea very much
and was glad that she had not given her up for adoption, or worse, had an abortion.
Elyssa sometimes still could not believe she was
actually going to have a baby. Here she
was, just twenty, and she was pregnant.
Years ago, she had seen herself in college at age twenty. She had never even considered that she would
be starting a family that early. But
then the record deal had come, and with it, a wonderful boyfriend, who would
hopefully become her husband someday.
Elyssa and AJ hadn’t really talked about marriage, but Elyssa was hoping
that he would propose someday, and soon, for she wanted her baby to grow up in
a regular family, with a married mother and father, like Serena’s baby
was. But Elyssa wasn’t sure if AJ was
ready for that, and she knew she just would have to give him time and wait and
see.
***
“Hey, Elyss-“ Jenna
stopped in mid-sentence, freezing in the doorway of Elyssa’s hospital room as
she caught sight of her friend. Elyssa
was sitting up in bed, her head in her hands, sobbing. “Lyssa, what’s wrong?” she asked, hurrying
to the bed and sitting beside Elyssa on it, quickly putting her hand on
Elyssa’s shaking back to calm her.
Elyssa rubbed her eyes furiously and sniffled. “Nothing,” she mumbled. “It’s stupid.”
“I’m sure it isn’t,” Jenna assured her. “What is it?”
Elyssa shook her head ruefully. “It’s my hair. It’s… it’s falling out again, and I just got
upset thinking about it and everything else.
I’m just stupid and selfish.”
“No, you’re not!” Jenna protested. “If it were me, I’d be crying too.” She grimaced at what she had just said and
added, “No offense, of course. You still
look great.”
Elyssa rolled her teary eyes. “I do not, and you know it.”
“That doesn’t matter, Lyss,” Jenna said. “You’re not going to look like this
forever. Just like last time, your hair
will grow back, and you’ll be back to your old self again.”
“And it’ll be all for nothing, and I’ll just relapse
again.”
“Elyssa, don’t say that!” Jenna cried. “That’s not going to happen. This is the last time. When you go into remission again, you’ll stay
that way, and everything will be fine.
Before you know it, you’ll have a son or daughter, and your hair will be
long again.”
Elyssa nodded, wiping her eyes again. “I hope so,” she said. “I just hate this so much.”
“I know you do. I
hate seeing you go through it,” Jenna replied.
“But, Lyss, you have to be one of the bravest people I know. You’ve been through this twice now, and this
time, it didn’t even have to be like this.”
“Don’t remind me,” Elyssa muttered through clenched teeth.
“But just remember why you’re doing this. For your baby.”
“I know,” Elyssa said.
“And that’s what keeps me going.”
***