The Fall in Love Checklist

by Sarah Ready

  “Shawn.” Daniella moves to step forward. I pull her back. “It’s nothing,” she says.

  “But my love…” I say. “Daniella and I go way back. She proposed marriage to me once. Stupidly, I let her go. Won’t make that mistake again.”

  “Really?” asks Shawn. He’s looking between Daniella and me. Shock lines his face.

  “Come on, Shawn, can we go?” asks Tammy. Apparently, she’s not impressed with the male territorial behavior radiating off Shawn.

  “How do you know each other?” he asks.

  “We just met,” says Daniella. She tries to shrug my hand off. I pinch her backside. “Ow,” she squeaks.

  “We just met again. Serendipitously. We live together now. Very domestic. Very wonderful. I’m so happy. Ecstatic,” I say.

  Shawn’s brows are lowered. His eyes are calculating. The weasel. He doesn’t look one hundred percent convinced.

  But Daniella’s catching on.

  “Really?” he asks. “Daniella? You live with him?”

  “Yes?”

  I nudge her backside.

  “Yes. On Rose Street. It’s the sweetest house. The most beautiful kitchen I’ve ever seen.”

  “Remember, the first day you told me you loved me?” I ask.

  She steps on my toe. I try not to flinch.

  “I do.” She bares her teeth and smiles at me. I hold her eyes with mine. I love it when they flash.

  Shawn clears his throat. “Um, well. Look, Daniella. Maybe we can get together and talk soon?”

  She turns to him. Her cheeks are pink and she’s looking full of life again. Thank god.

  “Okay,” she says.

  Shawn gives her a long speculative look. Daniella sends him doe eyes. I resist the urge to bare my teeth.

  “Bye now,” I say.

  I turn and steer Daniella down the sidewalk, letting my hand drift up and down her back. I can feel Shawn’s stare as we walk away.

  “Keep walking,” I say.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” she hisses.

  “Saving face and making your fiancé realize what he’s missing. Now shut up and act grateful.”

  She sniffs. Primly.

  I grin down at her.

  “You’re welcome,” I say.

  She sniffs again.

  “The rental is still available. I can pick up your bags tomorrow.”

  “Don’t bother,” she says.

  I deflate. I thought my heavy-handedness was working for her.

  “My driver will bring them round.”

  Yes.

  Triumph. My chest fills with a warm heady feeling. Triumph.

  12

  Dany

  * * *

  Karl drives down Rose Street, ferrying me to my new home. My bags are in the trunk. I fold my hands in front of me and try to calm my nerves. What will it be like living in the same house as Mr. Jones? Jack? My hands shake and I clasp them tighter.

  I was fenced in and agreed because…so many reasons.

  My mom’s hints are becoming blatant requests. Shawn clearly needs more time. Plus, there are no other rentals. I looked. So…I’m moving in.

  Maybe on further acquaintance the magnetism I feel toward Jack will fade.

  I wonder, what will it be like when he sees me come home from chemo? It’s not pretty, and I have a feeling it’s going to get worse. Ugly, even.

  Karl turns the car. The station is tuned to classical baroque. I hate baroque. It’s so ornate and stuffy and restrictedly metered. It’s suffocating and confined. I imagine Karl thinks I like baroque since for six years running I played it at my piano recitals. I shudder at the thought.

  “Would you turn the station please?” I ask.

  “Miss?”

  “Never mind. Silly thought.” I look down at my hands again.

  We’ve only been in the car for twenty minutes. Stanton’s downtown isn’t a far drive from Rolling Acres.

  I’d like to say that my parents were upset to see me go. Relieved is more likely. Although my father probably didn’t realize I’d left. He’s in Chicago at a business meeting. My mother was appropriately reserved. I’m so glad you found a place, she’d said. You know how your father needs an uncomplicated home life. You staying here would be too much stress for him.

  Of course, I said. I understand.

  I did. I do.

  I noticed that since the diagnosis, some people, my parents included, look at me differently. With, let’s call it, fear. As if what I have is contagious, and if they get too close they’ll catch it. Not cancer. They aren’t worried cancer is contagious. They don’t want to catch misfortune. Unluckiness. Whatever bad karma I have that made a twenty-four-year-old woman get breast cancer. It’s like, if they keep me at arm’s length, they won’t catch misfortune too.

  My coworkers quizzed me about my eating habits. Family history. Alcohol use. Exercise. Stress management. Do I meditate? Vitamins? How about water from the tap versus bottled? What about BPA, do I use BPA-free bottles? How often do I dye my hair?

  Perhaps they think, if they can pinpoint what I did wrong, why I deserved to get cancer, then they can avoid it.

  Because surely I did something wrong, didn’t I?

  Didn’t I?

  I squeeze my eyes shut.

  Guilt, says Ms. Dribett’s voice in my mind, a stage of grief.

  “Almost there, Miss,” says Karl.

  “Thank you.”

  My mother assured me that Karl would come round to take me to and from my chemotherapy appointments.

  I study him in the mirror as he pulls up to the curb in front of the house.

  He opens the door for me and I step out onto the sidewalk.

  “I’ll get your bags, Miss.”

  “Thank you.”

  We walk up to the porch. I ignore the peeling paint and the weeds. This is my home now. Weeds and all.

  Karl presses the doorbell.

  His uniform—black leather gloves and a wool pea coat—fills me with a kind of strength. His hair is starting to silver. I look at him from the corner of my eyes.

  Back in junior high, when I was grossly unpopular, Karl’s crisp goodbye as he dropped me at school and his perfunctory hellos when he picked me up were often the only kind words I heard for days at a time. Hello, Miss. Goodbye, Miss. I doubt he knows how much his constancy meant to me.

  Means to me.

  I smile at him.

  He rings the bell again.

  I clear my throat.

  “Yes, Miss?”

  I shift on my feet and look down at the rough planks of the porch. I try to articulate what I’m feeling.

  “I was thinking…you’ve driven me to and from all the important moments of my life. You’ve seen me grow up,” I pause. An awful thought strikes me. “I don’t know anything about you.”

  Suddenly, a shame-filled heat washes over me.

  I look into his familiar face. His eyes are warm and understanding.

  “Miss. You’re a good person,” he says.

  I shake my head and swallow back tears. I don’t feel like one. I’ve never even wondered about his life, and I’ve known him nearly twenty years.

  Yet, he’s always treated me with courtesy, even now. He doesn’t seem to be afraid of me since the diagnosis. He hasn’t avoided looking at me. I mean, really looking at me. Sometimes, lately, even I’m afraid to really look at myself.

  “Have you ever cared about someone who’s been really sick?” I ask. It’s hard for me to ask the question.

  Karl tilts his head and considers me.

  “Yes, Miss,” he says solemnly.

  He doesn’t say any more, but I have the feeling that he’s speaking about me.

  “Thank you,” I say.

  The door swings open. Jack is there.

  An awareness of him settles over me. He fills the doorway and I look up from his long legs to his wide shoulders.

  Jack looks between Karl and me.

  “Right on time,” h
e says. It breaks the tension. He grabs the bags and pulls them inside. I’m relieved to see the front room is free of construction and the walls are painted a soft robin’s egg blue. The floors are newly sanded and the room is bare. He’s been busy.

  Jack places the bags down.

  “Is that everything?” he asks.

  “Yes, that’s all,” I say.

  “I’ll show you up then.”

  I turn to Karl. “Thank you. Thanks again. I’ll see you at three?”

  Karl nods. “Goodbye, Miss.”

  I smile as Jack shuts the door after him.

  There’s a long silence as we feel each other out. I’m going to be living with this man. Living with him.

  Outside, the car engine starts and Karl pulls away.

  “Not much for conversation, is he?” asks Jack.

  “My favorite kind of man,” I say pointedly.

  Jack laughs. I follow him as he carries my bags up the stairs. I absolutely, one hundred percent, avoid looking at his backside.

  The magnetism is there, stronger than ever.

  Fade, darn you, fade.

  13

  Dany

  * * *

  “Well, girl, you’re back, are ya?” Gerry and the rest of the girls are watching as the nurse inserts the IV and plugs me into the chemo.

  “Humph,” says Cleopatra.

  Sylvie frowns. “Now, dears. Dany was merely having a hard time before. It was her first day. First days are always hard. She didn’t mean any offense.”

  “Exactly,” says Matilda. She sends me a warm smile.

  The tightness in my chest loosens. I was embarrassed about how I spoke to them last week. They hadn’t done anything to deserve my anger. All of them are smiling at me now, well, except for Cleopatra, but I haven’t seen her smile yet. I give a tentative smile back. I’m still not exactly interested in becoming one of “the girls,” but I can be polite.

  The cold bite of the medicine hits my veins. I block it out.

  To be honest, I was kind of hoping I wouldn’t see the girls again. It was awkward last time.

  “How is it that you’re all here again at the same time?” I ask. Chemo is treated in cycles, and not all the cycles are the same. It can be once every week. A full week straight then three weeks off. Or once every three weeks. The list goes on.

  “Sylvie and I have the three o’clock appointment on Thursdays. If you don’t like us, change your time,” says Gerry.

  “Bah, I’m here when I’m here,” says Cleo.

  “I’m just…I come a lot,” says Matilda. “I try to make my time match Gerry’s. I like her stories.” She fidgets with the hem of her cat T-shirt.

  “Dears, did I mention how much I like how they put the recliners in a circle? It’s like a knitting circle,” says Sylvie.

  “No one is knitting,” says Gerry.

  “I am,” says Sylvie.

  I smile and decide not to reach for a magazine.

  I could change my appointment. If I don’t want to see them again. I could change my time. Or maybe the days.

  I look around the little room. Today, Sylvie is knitting a… “Is that a scarf?” I ask.

  “No, dear. It’s a blanket. See, I’m knitting all these flowers in a row.”

  Sylvie holds up the blanket and I look closely. The light from the window shines through the pattern. There are flowers, little light green stems and yellow petals all chained together surrounded by rows of white.

  “It’s lovely,” I say.

  It reminds me of when I used to string together dandelions as a kid. My hands would be stained yellow and I’d wear the dandelion necklace. That was before my mother’s final marriage, when I still played outside. I can smell the bitter scent of dandelion. The antiseptic and alcohol smell of the hospital chases away the memory.

  Sylvie is talking, explaining the blanket. “I mark important moments in life with knitting. A cardigan and hat for births. A sweater for kindergarten. Socks for graduation—walking into life. A blanket for love.”

  “Ooh, I like that,” says Matilda. “Steve’s mama gave us a quilt when we got married. I can’t imagine she thought about what we’d get up to under that quilt.” Red spreads from Matilda’s cheeks up to her hairline. I’ve never seen anyone turn such a bright tomato color.

  “Dear, she was counting on it. Don’t underestimate the lure of grandbabies,” says Sylvie.

  Gerry lets out a loud guffaw.

  I smile into my hand.

  “I’m not poetic, or a journaler, but I can knit,” says Sylvie.

  “Who is this blanket for?” asks Matilda.

  “Why Dany, of course” says Sylvie.

  “Me? Why me?” I open my eyes wide. Oh, that’s right. I told them last week that Shawn and I were getting married in a few months, foregoing the postponement.

  “Oh, right. The wanker,” mutters Cleopatra. “Did he come crawling back?”

  Sylvie watches me with a shrewd expression. Her needles click as she knits the blanket.

  “I, uh…” I pause and lick my lips. Could I share with them what’s happening? I look around the room. Sylvie with her knitting. Gerry with her turquoise track suit and wild makeup. Matilda in a pink sparkly cat shirt. Cleopatra scowling at the window. I glance down at myself. I’m just another woman in the circle of chairs, getting a dose of chemo. All of a sudden, this feels like a circle that hopes can be shared in, without fear. This place is safe. Strange, seeing as we’re all being fed a chemical cocktail that poisons our bodies. But there it is. I feel as if I can share.

  So, I tell them about how Shawn dumped me when I woke, how I had to find a new place to live, how I saw Shawn with another woman. At the end of my story I look at Sylvie’s needles clicking away as she knits my love blanket.

  Finally, I say, “The hardest part of it all…a month ago, I knew exactly who I was and where my life was going. I was healthy, happy. My fiancé loved me. Then it’s like…” I struggle to find the words. Instead, I snap my fingers. “Gone.”

  I catch Cleopatra studying me closely. She nods at me. “And…” she says.

  I lean forward. “I want it back.”

  “Why?” asks Gerry.

  This is hard to admit. “Because I’m scared. If I don’t get it back, does that mean I’ll die?”

  I don’t look up. I stare down at my clasped hands. I admit my darkest thought. “And…if the man I lived with and loved, who I gave all my best parts to for five years doesn’t love me…then who will? Who could?”

  “Who indeed,” says Sylvie.

  There’s a smile in her voice, so I look up. Her brown eyes remind me again of warm chocolate chip cookies.

  “Humph. It’s my turn today,” says Cleopatra.

  We all turn to her. I let go of my fears and prepare to hear Cleopatra’s love story.

  She scowls at the group of us. “I’ve heard enough of your syrupy love stories. David, blah, blah, David. I’m going to tell a real love story today.”

  “By all means, wow us with your romance,” says Gerry.

  “Humph,” says Cleopatra.

  I settle back in my chair and raise the leg rest.

  Cleopatra scrunches up her wrinkled face and begins.

  “When I was seventeen, I fell into puppy love with my neighbor. His name was Robert. Big brute. Hung like a horse. Gerry, you’d like that.”

  My mouth falls open. I look at Gerry. There’s a smile on her bright pink lips.

  “My parents were devout Catholics. They saw me watching Robert. He used to chop firewood in his front yard. I would sit and watch and watch. His arm muscles were thicker than my thigh. We never spoke. Not once. But I loved him. I watched him swing that ax. He would watch me watching him. Some days he would wink. That wink. It made me thirsty. So, one day, I went inside and made him a big cup of iced tea. I brought it over to him. He took the cup from my hand. Neither of us said a word. He drank the entire thing in one long gulp. His dark eyes watched me the whole time. Then he took
his hand and wiped his mouth. The whole while we never broke eye contact. He walked to the wood shed. I followed. I don’t know what I expected. It was rough. It hurt. The whole thing lasted less than a minute. There was no speaking. No kissing. Nothing. When he was done he went back to the wood pile and started chopping again. I cried a little. Then I wiped off my tears and went back to my house.”

  She stops.

  “Cleo, your idea of a romance is as warm and fuzzy as a porcupine mating,” says Gerry.

  “Humph,” says Cleopatra. “It’s my romance.”

  “Go on,” says Matilda.

  “Four months later, it’s obvious that I’m in the family way. My parents suspected Robert. They’d seen me watching him. But Robert had left town. We’d never spoken. We’d never met again after the day in the shed. My parents found me a groom and married me off. His name was Vince.”

  Cleo puts a hand up to her face and presses the wrinkled flesh beneath her left eye. “Vince was a mean bastard,” she says.

  I stare at her. At her hand pressing against her cheekbone. There’s a wealth of meaning in those words.

  I can’t take my eyes off Cleo. Her wrinkled face. Her mouth, tilted down in a frown. For a moment, the only noise in the room is the clacking of Sylvie’s knitting needles.

  “Did you leave him?” asks Matilda.

  Cleo drops her hand.

  “I didn’t. Did you know there were worse things in life than a mean bastard for a husband?”

  I let that sink in. It falls like a stone to the bottom of a lake. Dark, heavy, awful.

  After a moment Cleopatra goes on. “Finally, my birthing pains started. I begged Vince to take me to the hospital. He wouldn’t. We were dirt poor. No insurance. He said he wouldn’t pay any money for another man’s bastard to be born. He sent me outside, where he didn’t have to hear me carrying on. I gave birth to my baby girl in the back garden. She had a cord wrapped around her throat.”

  “Oh no,” says Matilda. “Cleo, I’m so sorry.”

  “She didn’t make it?” asks Gerry.

  “No,” says Cleopatra. “I passed out. Vince buried my baby girl while I was unconscious. When I woke, he wouldn’t tell me where her grave was. Said it was time to forget and move on.”