by Renee, DC
“Why do you need my help?” I asked, not wanting to face someone with the same cancer. I didn’t know if it was fate, divine intervention, or if the hospital administration took pity on me, but I hadn’t treated a single case of cervical cancer since Tracy’s death. I didn’t want to start now.
“She wants to have kids one day.”
“She can freeze her eggs,” I countered.
“True. I gave her that as an option. I gave her all her options a week ago, told her she had a little time to figure out what she wanted to do, but her time is up. Now she has to decide, but I don’t think she knows. I could use your help to explain the ramifications of waiting any longer. She might not have many options left if she doesn’t decide.”
“Alright,” I said with a hard nod after a minute of contemplating. If I could potentially help save this woman by simply telling her that sometimes her life was more important, then I’d help.
“Thank you,” Ben said as he opened his door, allowing me to walk through before stopping short…my ability to breathe gone, my ability to think, out the window, my ability to speak, nonexistent.
And everything I thought was real…wrong. So fucking wrong.
Hadley
“NOAH,” I WHISPERED, looking into the haunted eyes of the man I loved as he stared at me in disbelief. “I didn’t want you to find out,” I told him.
“We found an abnormality in your pap smear,” my doctor told me over the phone the day after my yearly. “Nothing to be worried about, but we need you to come in for some more tests.”
“Sure, no problem,” I said with a shrug. I hadn’t been worried. I was young, healthy, dating Dr. Hottie, and my biggest problem just the other day was sleeping with him. It was no longer a problem now. That had been rectified just that morning. I’d gotten the call from the doctor’s office while I was still at Noah’s place and finally had a chance to call them back when I made it to the office.
I scheduled an appointment with them and got to work. That was that. I barely even thought about it. Even when I went in and got my blood drawn, nothing dawned on me. Just a healthy checkup to make sure everything was in working order, right? Hell, I’d been getting blood tests ever since I was a kid, right? This didn’t mean anything.
Meanwhile, I was spending every night with Noah. I was living my life. I was as happy as a fucking clam. I never understood that saying, really, but I knew it meant I was over-the-moon happy, and I sure as hell was.
“Stage 1 cervical cancer,” my doctor told me after she’d asked me to come in right away. I scheduled the appointment for the next day. “I’m referring you to an oncologist. One of the best,” she said. “You’re young, and I imagine you’ll want to start a family one day, so you’ll need to meet with him right away to talk about your options.”
Numb. That was what I felt that day. Fucking numb.
I went to work after, but I wasn’t myself.
Sidney noticed and cornered me, asking me what happened.
She was the first person to approach me, and I couldn’t help it. I broke down in tears. She ushered me to her office.
“I’m going to kill him,” she said, automatically assuming it was something Noah had done.
“I have cancer,” I blurted out.
“I’m dating a fucking oncologist whose wife died of cancer, and I’m the first woman he allowed into his life after, and guess what? I fucking have cancer,” I cried.
“Oh Hadley,” Sidney said as she immediately got up from her chair, came to me, and held me while I cried into her arms.
“I have to break up with him,” I told her when I was fresh out of tears.
“Wait, Hadley, start from the beginning,” she told me, so I told her the few details about how I’d found out about it. “You just found out this morning, Hadley. You’re in shock. The last thing you need to worry about is breaking up with Noah. You need to go meet with the oncologist ASAP and worry about kicking this cancer’s ass.”
“I can’t…I can’t think about kicking any cancer ass right now. It makes it real. It means I’m dying. Sidney.”
“No, babe, it doesn’t. It means you have a fighting chance. Give me the info,” she said as she stood back and stuck out her hand.
“What info?” I asked.
“The oncologist. Now,” she ordered. I was still in shock, so I cooperated with her and handed her the business card my doctor had given me. I watched as she typed the number into her phone, listened as she made an appointment for thirty minutes from then, still not registering everything that was going on.
“Okay, dry your tears,” she said as she handed me a tissue, “and let’s go.”
“Go where?” I asked.
“To see the doctor. Hurry up.”
“You’re coming with me?” I asked.
“Of course,” she said as if she couldn’t believe I had asked her.
“Thank you,” I told her. She just nodded in response.
My boss, my mentor, and now one of my best friends. She stayed with me as Dr. Sharp explained the cancer itself in more detail. He then started in on the best options.
“What if I want to have a family one day?” I asked, remembering what my doctor had said. I don’t think that thought would have even crossed my mind if it wasn’t for her suggestion.
“It depends on how progressed the cancer is. Even stage 1 can mean different things for different individuals. There are potentially some treatments that will allow you to get pregnant later on, but even then, it’s not guaranteed.” He explained the options, including freezing my eggs and having a surrogate.
“When do I have to start? Or I guess, when do I have to decide by?”
“A few days, a week at most. We need to do some tests, so that will buy you some time, but Hadley, you never know with cancer. I wouldn’t wait too long,” he said.
“I have to break up with Noah,” I repeated once we’d walked out of the hospital.
“Why?” Sidney asked.
“Because I love him,” I said, realizing for the first time at that moment that I did. That I was hopelessly and desperately in love with him. And I couldn’t put him through this again. He wouldn’t survive if I didn’t. I wouldn’t let him watch me potentially fade away, feeling like he failed yet again. Not when he finally found himself. I told Sidney as much.
She shook her head. “I’m not in your shoes, so I can’t tell you what to do, but I can tell you if he cares about you even a fraction of how much you care about him, he’ll want to be there for you once he finds out.”
“He won’t find out,” I vowed.
“What are you going to do then?”
“Push him away.”
And I did.
That night, I told him I had a get-together with friends. I just couldn’t face him.
The next, Bella called me. That wasn’t actually planned, but it was like the universe knew I needed some help. I’d emailed her when I finally got my bearings, and I told her everything, including my plans to push Noah away and why. She coincidentally read my email when I was with him. I used the opportunity to push him further away.
I knew I should have given him a clean break, but I couldn’t. It was selfish, I knew, but I couldn’t quit him right away. He was my drug, and I needed to wean myself off slowly. He was perfect, absolutely perfect, and he didn’t know it…but he couldn’t be mine…no matter how much I wanted it or how much he did.
I should have stopped sleeping with him at least, but as I said…I couldn’t. I needed him…so for a little longer, I allowed myself to have him. And the sex…shit…each time was like it was the last, and I needed it to be the best, so I’d go out with a bang. I know you got that pun. Each time really was potentially the last. I never knew when I’d get the strength to cut it off completely.
The final straw for him was when I went to visit my parents and basically ignored him. I really did go visit them. I didn’t lie about that. But it wasn’t because they guilt-tripped me. It was because I need
ed to get away so I wouldn’t be tempted to see him. And it was also to tell them what was happening. They cried, then cried some more, then vowed I was going to make it through this. And then they promised to fly in and be there for me for whatever treatment course I decided to do.
I was pushing him away…with my lack of texts, my lack of calls, my lack of responses. And by this time, I knew he knew.
I wasn’t surprised when I knew he wanted answers. I just hoped I’d have a little more time with him. Guess I didn’t, guess it was then.
He asked me to rely on him, and God, did I want to. I wanted to so badly, but I couldn’t do that to him. I couldn’t do that to the man I loved…even if he didn’t know it.
I broke him. I knew it, but I also knew it was better to break like this than to have to watch me suffer, reliving his nightmares again, reliving the worst time of his life, watching it happen to yet another person he cared about. I knew it was better to break like this than have to feel like a failure again by going back in time.
He slammed the door, and it was only then that my tears came crashing down my cheeks, allowed to finally break free of the dam I’d put them in. I fell to the floor, hugging my knees against myself, as I realized I’d just watched my heart walk out that door. He just didn’t know it, and he didn’t know why.
Noah
“NO,” I CRIED, staring at Hadley’s tear-soaked face as she realized I knew why she was sitting in that chair. “No,” I repeated, shaking my head. “It can’t be. This isn’t happening.”
“I never wanted you to know,” she repeated. “I didn’t want to put you through this,” she said.
In an instant, it was real. Some cruel joke by the universe, but real, nonetheless. I found myself kneeling by her chair, her hands in mine as I looked into her eyes. “This is why you pushed me away,” I stated. It wasn’t a question, and I didn’t need an answer. I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that my selfless Hadley had pushed me away because of this.
“I’ll, uh, give you two a moment,” Ben said somewhere behind me, closing the door softly after he walked away.
“I couldn’t put you through this,” she admitted. “I couldn’t do that to you. You just started to live again after…” She didn’t finish the sentence, but she didn’t need to.
“That was different, Hadley,” I told her. “She had stage 4 when it was discovered. As much as it pains me to admit, stage 4…it’s not a good sign. You have stage 1. It’s a vast difference.”
“Difference, yes,” she said, “but not a guarantee. What if…what if…?”
“Don’t finish that thought,” I demanded.
“It’s a reality you have to face, Noah. I have cancer. You lost yourself because your wife had cancer, and you couldn’t save her. You watched her suffer and fade away. Can you tell me with absolute certainty that you could do that with me if it came to that? And still walk away unscathed? Don’t answer, I know you think you can. No, let me rephrase. I know you can stay by my side, and I know you can be strong for me. That’s who you are. I know I can count on you, and lean on you, and turn to you to explain all this medical crap in layman’s terms. But if…if the outcome isn’t good, can you be sure you won’t break?”
“No,” I admitted. “Because I love you,” I said for the first time, realizing the truth of my words. I loved Hadley. I loved her with a strength I never possessed before. I loved Tracy with all my heart, but this was different. Maybe it was because Tracy always had the good parts of me, so she had a pure love. But with Hadley, she saw the good and the bad, and she stood by my side, even pulling me out from my dark hole. My love for her was raw, unfiltered, and full of power and passion, just like she was. Forgive me, Trace.
Hadley cried out at my admission, pulling her hands from mine to cover her face as she cried harder into her hands. I pulled them away, wiping her tears with my fingers, kissing each wet trail down her cheek before pressing a firm kiss on her lips.
“I will break, Hadley, if you leave me,” I told her. “But it doesn’t matter if it’s by choice or not because you left me this last week, and it broke me anyway. Better to be there with you for as much time as I have than not to get the chance. But make no mistake, Hadley, I won’t fail you. Not on this. I will be with you every step of the way, and we’re going to beat this together.”
I pulled her to me, forcing her into my arms as she cried against my shoulder.
“I love you,” she told me when she pulled away.
“I know,” I said with a cocky grin.
“Oh?” she asked, a smile playing on her lips despite the tears making their way down her face.
“You wouldn’t have pushed me away if you didn’t.”
“That’s when I knew I loved you,” she said. “When I found out, my first thought was about you.”
“Not sure if that’s a good correlation,” I tried to joke. “Cancer and your boyfriend. Not sure any guy wants to be put in the same sentence as cancer when it comes to the woman he loves,” I added.
Hadley giggled, and it was the best sound in the world. I knew we would beat this. I knew it.
“News flash, Dr. Hottie. You’re a cancer doctor, so by default, you and cancer are always in the same sentence.”
“True,” I agreed. “But we both know that wasn’t your correlation.”
“No,” she said. “It wasn’t. My first thought was that I loved you too much to put you through this again.”
“So, you pushed me away.”
“Yes,” she said. “I’m sorry. I know I should have just cut the cord and not prolonged our breakup, but I couldn’t do it. I needed you too much. It was selfish of me, but I thought if I could get out of your life little by little, it would help ease the sting of not having you in it.”
“Like weaning me off?” I asked, joking.
“Actually, exactly like that,” she said. “That literally was my thought process.”
“I don’t know whether to be flattered or creeped out.”
“Flattered, definitely flattered.”
“Tell me how you found out,” I told her.
She did, replaying everything, including Sidney going with her, how her friend found out via email, and that she promised to fly in—“fuck work” were her words—to be there for her, and how her parents promised the same.
I was happy she had that kind of support system, especially since I hadn’t been there for her, but you can bet your ass, I was going to be there for the rest.
Hadley
“CAN I COME in yet?” Dr. Sharp asked, opening the door just a bit.
“Yeah, yeah, come on in,” Noah said from beside me.
“Well, uh, I take it you two know each other,” he said, somewhat uncomfortably.
“Ben, this is my girlfriend.”
“Oh, what an interesting turn of events,” he said. “I didn’t know,” he told me.
“I was trying to spare him,” I admitted. That earned me a big smile and what looked like a nod toward Noah.
“Okay, so let’s get down to business. Not that I don’t get invested with each of my patients, but this has suddenly become more personal. I don’t normally give advice because it’s up to the patients, but seeing as this is a special case, you want my opinion?”
“Yes, please,” I said with a vigorous nod.
“We can potentially do the cold knife cone biopsy or the radical trachelectomy. Those will ensure you can still get pregnant. Of course, it’s never a guarantee, but it saves your uterus for the potential someday.” He’d explained both of those procedures to me when Sidney was with me. Essentially, each of them removed a portion of the cervix, which meant the uterus was still intact, allowing for the chance to carry a baby. “But if you want the best chance for a longer remission, you have to have a hysterectomy. That, however, means you can’t get pregnant, but as you know, we talked about freezing your eggs.”
I turned to Noah, knowing, without a doubt, that his opinion mattered. God willing, I beat this, and God wi
lling, I could have kids, I sure as hell wanted them to be with Noah. That was years down the road, though, so who knew where we would be by then. For all I knew, he’d grow tired of me, fall out of love, and dump me by the side of the road with my tail tucked between my legs. I doubted that, very much, but you never knew. For now, though, Noah was my future, and my future had a say in said future.
“I was hoping to have an answer by today,” Dr. Sharp admitted. “With cancer, you don’t want to delay. The sooner you strike, the better. But I can see you need some more time. New developments and all,” he said, waving his hand back and forth between Noah and me. “You have until tomorrow. Go home and discuss it, then come back and let me know, and we’ll start right away.”
“Thank you, Dr. Sharp. Thank you,” I said.
“Thanks, Ben,” Noah added as we walked out.
“Do you have to work?” I asked him.
“No, it’s actually supposed to be my day off,” he told me.
“Then what were you doing here?”
“Fate,” he said with a shrug. “Fate brought me here apparently,” he added. “I threw myself into work after you stomped all over my heart,” he said with an exaggerated hand to his chest over his heart and a smile on his lips. “Do you have to go to work?” he asked.
“I took the day off, figuring today was going to suck,” I told him.
“Good, I’m taking you out for breakfast. Then I’m taking you home to make up for lost time, and we’re going to talk through this,” he said.
We went to a little diner nearby where he peppered me with questions, mostly about how I was feeling and more details about my doctor appointments and what was said to me. He seemed to digest every word, trying to find a meaning behind each word.
I didn’t mind. For the first time since I found out about my cancer, I actually felt hopeful.
When we came back to his place, the first thing Noah did was pull me into his arms and kiss me. He kissed me like he was the one dying and needed me as his last breath. It was beautiful and painful. Not physically, but emotionally. Despite how strong he was, I knew this was killing him inside.