Over the holidays, Van said to Eleni, “Funny, this time of year I usually gain weight. I got on the scale today and I’ve lost ten pounds. But I’ve been eatin like an animal.”
“It’s stress,” said Eleni.
A week later, having experienced periods of low-level fever, he went to the family physician, Dr. Nassarian, for some blood work. Nassarian called the next day and told Van that he had seen something he didn’t like, that it was probably nothing to be too concerned about but that he should have it checked. Nassarian was sending him to a specialist to do another workup and some tests.
“What kind of specialist?” said Van.
“An oncologist up in Wheaton,” said the doctor, and Van’s heart naturally dropped.
There was more blood taken, and an MRI, which led to a follow-up visit with the oncologist, Dr. Veronica Sorenson, in her office overlooking the Westfield Shopping Center, which Van still called Wheaton Plaza. He had played there as a boy, flirted with girls, acted tough around greasers, taunted security guards, and been nailed in the old Monkey Wards for shoplifting, back when the center was an open-air mall.
“You have an intracranial tumor, Mr. Lucas,” said Dr. Sorenson.
“A brain tumor.”
“Yes.”
“Cancer,” he said, almost stuttering on the word.
She tented her hands before her and looked directly into his eyes. She was an attractive brunette in her late thirties with a direct, professional manner that was not cold in the least. Dr. Sorenson had photographs of her children set up on her desk. He idly wondered if she believed in God.
“Let me show you,” she said.
Dr. Sorenson turned off the lights in the office and allowed him to examine his scans displayed on her light board.
“It’s called a GBM,” she said, pointing to the image of the growth. “There. It appears in the form of a lesion.”
“What’s a GBM?”
“Glioblastoma multiforme. We’ll need to do a stereotactic biopsy to confirm, of course.”
“You wouldn’t be telling me this today if you didn’t know.”
“Unfortunately, I’m almost completely certain that this is what we’re looking at.”
“Certain of what, Doctor? What’s my prognosis?”
“I wish I could be more positive. This is a most aggressive cancer. The survival rate is very low.”
He looked down at his hand and saw that he was twisting his wedding band around on his ring finger. “How long would a guy with this thing… how long? Ballpark.”
“I recommend that you opt for treatment. We’ll perform cranial surgery to remove the bulk of the tumor, then radiotherapy and chemotherapy.”
“How long, Doctor?”
“Months,” said Dr. Sorenson.
Van, always known as an easygoing, take-it-as-it-comes guy, played his role well. He refused treatment and decided to live his life as lucidly and with as much dignity as possible until its conclusion. Even in his private moments with Eleni, when they weren’t putting business matters in order, he spoke positively about the time they’d shared together and their good fortune at having found each other, and he didn’t break down when he told Irene and Spero by phone and, most challenging, Leonidas face-to-face. His mind was filled with bitterness, confusion, and anger at his Christ, in whom he had never lost faith, but he was determined to keep up a solid front for his wife and kids. Mostly, like any rational human being, he was frightened of death.
He lasted just over two months. His final days were spent in his bed at home, as he wished. He had lost his parents long ago, but he had many friends, and they came to call. Donna Monroe, now a middle-aged divorcée with kids in college, stopped by, and when Van saw her he told Eleni to hide his wallet, and Donna scolded him and laughed. Irene flew in at one point and he was surprised at her appearance. She had gained weight, and her hair was completely gray. In his presence she checked her BlackBerry often. Though he loved her, he felt little affection for her, but he had no guilt in that regard. She flew back to San Francisco and her law firm after a day. Leonidas visited daily. Spero called often and stayed in e-mail contact with Eleni. His tour was almost up but not quite, and he was trying with futility to get leave and come home.
An in-home hospice nurse was on duty, but Eleni kept her out of the room except to administer and regulate the morphine. Eleni talked to Van as he slept. She slipped popsicles into his mouth and wet his lips with a washcloth when he could no longer drink. On the last night of his life he looked up at her, sitting beside him.
“I’m a failure,” he said hoarsely.
“What do you mean?”
“Where are my children?”
“Leonidas is on his way.” She squeezed his hand. “You’re no failure. Don’t ever think that. You did nothing but good. You’re a good man.”
He drifted in and out of morphine dreams. Leonidas came into the room. He hugged his mother roughly and went to the bedside, where he knelt on the hardwood floor and kissed his father’s hand.
“The best day of my life was the day that lawyer put you in my arms,” said Van, and Leonidas lowered his head as hot tears ran down his face.
“I love you, Pop.”
Van’s cracked lips twitched up into a smile. “Cool Breeze,” he whispered.
Those were the last words he spoke. He died the next morning, just before dawn.
Years passed. Eleni adopted a second dog, called him Yuma, and walked him and Cheyenne twice a day. The outings took a long time, as she stopped to talk to many neighbors on her route and sometimes sat up on their porches and shared tea and, in the evenings, glasses of wine. Deep into her forties she had gotten looks on the street, but now in her sixties she seemed invisible to men. She was still a handsome woman, but she was old.
Eleni no longer had a need for sex, but she was often lonely and would not have minded the companionship of a man. Her attitude was, if it happened, fine. She had her neighborhood friends, her church, her garden, her dogs. And her children.
Her two younger sons called her almost daily. They visited a couple of times a week, mostly at dinnertime, because they liked her cooking and because they knew she loved to feed them.
Leo was a high school teacher in the D.C. public system. Spero did investigative work for a defense attorney down by the courts. When she looked at her sons, she saw Van, and she thought: We did well.
Ours was a life well spent.
Contents
FRONT COVER IMAGE
WELCOME
DEDICATION
BONUS STORY: CHOSEN
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
TWENTY-TWO
TWENTY-THREE
TWENTY-FOUR
TWENTY-FIVE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ALSO BY GEORGE PELECANOS
COPYRIGHT
Also by George Pelecanos
The Way Home
The Turnaround
The Night Gardener
Drama City
Hard Revolution
Soul Circus
Hell to Pay
Right As Rain
Shame the Devil
The Sweet Forever
King Suckerman
The Big Blowdown
Down by the River Where the Dead Men Go
Shoedog
Nick’s Trip
A Firing Offense
Copyright
Copyright © 2011 by George P. Pelecanos
Excerpt from Chosen © 2011 by George P. Pelecanos
> All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
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First eBook Edition: August 2011
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