Henry's Sisters

by Cathy Lamb

  She did the same to me. It covered one eye, but I could still see well enough to rub some into her hair before she did the same to me again.

  I shoved Cecilia and she caught the back of a chair with her heel and I shoved again. She grabbed me on the way down, and it was a rolling, twisting, cherry-gooked mess with Janie pleading with us to ‘be loving, be sisterly.’

  When there was nothing left to smash, we pulled apart, gasping, panting, and I got on all fours and glared at her.

  ‘Well, that worked out well,’ I heaved. ‘Now you can’t eat any more. Most of it is up your nose.’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ she puffed out, struggling up. ‘Perfect. Next time I’m eating too much, make me wear it instead of eat it. That’ll work.’

  Cecilia was covered in cherry filling. I had shown her! I picked a cherry off my forehead and ate it.

  ‘One two three four,’ Janie said. ‘Let’s be loving!’

  I felt hot, hot tears searing their way through the cherry pie on my cheeks. ‘God, I’m going to miss Henry,’ I whispered, choking on my own roaring grief. ‘I’m going to miss him.’

  Cecilia wiped pie off her face as gurgly, strangled sobs erupted. ‘I don’t know what I’m going to do, I don’t know. I can’t stand this. I can’t stand it.’

  ‘Henry’s my favourite person,’ Janie said. She sunk down between us, uncaring that cherry pie was now on her butt. ‘No offence.’ She ate a bit of crust off the floor.

  ‘None taken,’ I weeped out. ‘He’s mine, too.’

  We held each other, tear to tear, right there in that cherry pie.

  A moonbeam lit the porch and I threw a handful of cherries at it. Oh, how I hated those moonbeams.

  The world stops when someone has cancer.

  The days start to swirl around that person as if he’s the centre of a tornado. Your life? Gone. Your schedule? Don’t even think about it. Your plans. Put ’em aside.

  Henry was to rest for a few days before going back to the hospital for chemo.

  The problem was that Henry didn’t want to rest. The morning after leaving the hospital, Henry woke up and insisted on going to pet the dogs and cats.

  ‘They miss me! Even Barkey. He bites! Watch out! Ouch!’

  Janie went with him while I went to the bakery.

  ‘They all love him,’ she told me later. ‘The people in reception, the vet that came in, the other volunteers. He brings light and inner harmony to them all. And the dogs. As soon as we went to the kennels, the dogs went crazy. He takes four dogs at a time and leads them to play in the field out back. It’s spiritual, cosmic love—’

  ‘How did he feel?’

  Her face crumpled a little bit. ‘He didn’t seem like he had his usual energy, but he was so happy. He told everyone there about the cancer.’

  I nodded. I wasn’t surprised. Henry didn’t have a filter. He said what he thought. Most of his thoughts were pretty angelic in nature, so it worked out.

  ‘He went around and said, smiling, “Henry sick. Henry has pancreatic cancer.” You should have seen people’s faces, Is. It was awful. The vet hugged him, then cried into her lab coat. The receptionist kept patting Henry’s arm and blowing his nose, patting his arm and blowing his nose. And one guy in there who came in on his motorcycle wearing leathers – he volunteers with the cats once a week – he put his head in his hands and had to sit down.’

  I could imagine that scene all too clearly.

  ‘So they’re all upset and Henry shouts, “Hey, no crying, no crying or I cry. I cry!” No one stopped, so Henry burst into tears.’

  ‘Sheesh.’

  ‘Yes, absolutely, sheesh. But you know how Henry is. He got upset, but then all of a sudden he was done with all that worldly sadness and he started his job. He got the dogs out and took them into the field.’

  I thought for a minute. ‘You’re doing incredibly well, Janie. You’re a new Janie.’

  She knew what I was referring to. ‘I was scared to death to come to Trillium River, but now I hardly recognise myself. I work in a bakery and I take Henry to the animal shelter. I actually talk to people. You know how I’d get stuck on a scary thought and couldn’t get it out of my head? Like I’d be dying, or you and I would be in a train accident with no help around for miles and you’d be bleeding to death, or Cecilia would have a heart attack and I’d be doing CPR but there was no one to help and what would I do? I’m so busy I don’t even have time for those thoughts to swirl around anymore.’ She pulled at her beige bra strap. ‘I feel a lot better.’

  ‘How’s the writing going?’ I had heard her working on her laptop last night about two in the morning.

  ‘Better. My positive energy is gone and my negative energy is boiling over and somehow all that emotion is coming out in my writing, and I wrote this great scene last night for my book. Jack’s trapped in this ship container, you know the type they load up on boats? The killer locked her in there and she’s going to get loaded up and sent to China and by the time she gets there, she’s gonna be dead, so she’s got to figure her way out before she starves to death or suffocates—’ She went on for another ten minutes and she explained the graphic parts graphically.

  ‘OK, I got it.’ I held up my hands. ‘Please.’

  ‘Well.’ She fumbled a bit, deflated, disappointed. ‘Well, OK.’

  I didn’t want to hurt her feelings. ‘I want to save all that excitement for when I read the book.’

  Her face brightened. ‘Right! I don’t want to spoil it for you.’

  ‘No, no, please don’t.’

  How does she think of these things?

  The next day Henry went to the senior centre to help with lunch and Bunco. I went with him while Janie went to the bakery. He didn’t need me there, but I didn’t want to let him out of my sight yet. He was pale and yellow around the edges.

  It was like being the bodyguard of a celebrity. He was mobbed by senior citizens.

  ‘I have pain-cree-at-ick cancer,’ he announced to a group of older people leaning on canes and in wheelchairs. He smiled. ‘Henry sick. Henry sick.’

  He said this with a smile.

  The room suddenly froze, the quiet rocking off each wall and back into the middle.

  ‘Dear heavens,’ one man muttered, pulling on his tie.

  ‘Oh no, honey,’ a woman with pure white hair whispered.

  ‘I’m sorry, son. I’m sorry,’ an old man, wrinkled as a prune, said.

  ‘Young man!’ a woman shouted. ‘I couldn’t hear you. What did you say?’

  ‘Hi, Grandma Tasha!’ Henry waved. ‘I said I have pain-cree-at-ick cancer! It icky!’

  ‘Holy shit,’ she said, shaking her white head. ‘Holy shit.’

  On Sunday at mass, Father Mike announced a special time of prayer for Henry. We were all there. Cecilia, the girls, Janie, Momma, Velvet, Grandma in her green flight outfit, Dad, and I. Henry got up from the front row and stood beside Father Mike and he smiled and waved at people, smiled and waved.

  ‘Ladies and gentleman,’ Father Mike said, his tone low, gruff. ‘Today we’re going to put our hearts out there to God and we’re gonna pray for Henry.’ He stopped. I saw his jaw working. ‘Henry’ – he cleared his throat – ‘has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer—’

  ‘No, no! You not say it right,’ Henry said, smiling. He put his face close to the microphone. ‘It pain-cree-at-ick. Like that, Father Mike. Pain-cree-at-ick. You have to say the “ick” part because it’s icky.’

  ‘Thank you, Henry,’ Father Mike said. ‘You’re right. Bow your heads. Let’s pray so the good Lord hears us.’

  Father Mike prayed and prayed. He prayed. It was a long prayer, which was surprising, because Father Mike believes that God does not like to listen to prayers that go on and on. ‘Say what you want,’ he told our congregation once. ‘He knows your heart. No need to blather on.’

  I heard muffled snuffles and tiny gasps and little sobs, and they weren’t only from the Bommarito gang. When Father Mike was done
, Henry said, still grinning, ‘Hey! Father Mike. I do a prayer. I pray.’

  Father Mike was a mess, so he wiped his eyes and handed the microphone to Henry.

  Henry grinned at all of us. ‘Hi, everybody.’ He waved. ‘I Henry. I pray now. I pray for you.’ He did not bend his head, he did not shut his eyes.

  ‘Dear Jesus! Hi ya, Jesus! I pray for all my friends and my sisters, Henry’s sisters, and my momma and my dad, my dad back, he right there, my dad back.’ He pointed at Dad. Dad clenched his jaw, but the tears came out on their own accord. Momma reached for his hand.

  ‘I pray for Amelia, we fly the planes together, and Velvet, she my friend, hi, Velvet.’ Velvet waved, then held her lace handkerchief tight to her face.

  ‘And I pray for you. I pray for you. All my friends here I pray for you.’ He grinned. ‘I pray for you to be happy. Happy like me. Henry. I happy. I happy because you all my friends. That why I happy. Not all the people my friend when I little kid. Some bad people. They do mean things to me.’ His face got red and crumpled up a bit, but then, in a flash, it was gone. ‘You my friends.’ He clapped his hands. ‘But I sick. I have pain-cree-at-ick cancer. Like that. Ick. Jesus tell me in my dream I go home to him. I go soon. Up the moonbeam. Up the sun ray. That how you get to heaven.’

  On the altar, Father Mike turned and knelt in front of the cross.

  ‘I love everybody here. Ha Ha! I love you guys. Amen amen.’

  And all those muffled snuffles and tiny gasps and little sobs become big sniffles and big gasps and big sobs.

  ‘Jesus loves you!’ he yelled, waving again. ‘Yeah, yeah! Jesus loves you!’

  It was as if the whole town was rising up in mourning, a giant, screaming wave of pain and all they knew how to do to alleviate that pain was cook.

  We were bombarded with food.

  On the dot at five, the brigade would begin. Lasagnes, casseroles, fruit salads, desserts. It was Henry’s idea to have people come in who were bringing food in on huge platters. ‘Hey! It the Wongs! The Wongs. You come on in!’ he’d shout or, ‘It the kids! From the church! Hey! You brought Henry pizza? I love that pizza.’

  Now, at first, this put Momma into a tizzy. Momma did not entertain. Between Henry, Grandma, a house, and the bakery, she simply didn’t have time and, worse, she didn’t have friends. She was raised in Trillium River, but when she returned, she shut the friendship door.

  If she did entertain, I can assure you it would have been with china and starched white tablecloths. But she couldn’t manage that now. She was grieving, she was sleepless, she was hopeless.

  And yet.

  And yet.

  I saw Momma change over the next few weeks. At first she was anxious about the visitors, uptight, and did not know how to handle them and their gifts and their kindness.

  But as one person in town after another reached out to her, reached out to us, I swear I saw Momma’s heart soften like melting butter. We were brought meals by old high school friends of hers still in the area. Neighbours. Cecilia’s students’ families. Acquaintances.

  For a woman who had seen, close up, the ugliness of humans and human nature, she was seeing the beauty of sincere friendship.

  Under the deluge of generosity and concern and the grief that people felt for her Henry, her special loving boy, who had not always been treated fairly or right, she started to open her heart up.

  When Grandma would march into a room in her flight uniform and announce, ‘The weather’s perfect for flying. Please step outside to admire my new plane,’ or ‘The natives are back. Guard yourselves! They’re usually friendly, but not always. That’s why I carry a spear,’ and no one batted an eye when she did, indeed, swing a spear about, it further softened Momma.

  This was her family. A special-needs boy, a mother who thought she was Amelia Earhart, and three daughters with varying problems who had become infamous during high school for any number of things. She had a history with much that she was ashamed about and needed to keep secret, poverty that almost killed her, and extreme depression she had fought back for years that finally seemed to settle itself out. (With a drug or two. I’d found the bottles.)

  For the first time in her life, she and her quirky family were embraced.

  We sat on the swing together one night after we’d had no fewer than thirty guests and she said, ‘Margaret Tribotti, the woman who owns the bike shop, brought me baked salmon with lemon butter sauce,’ then burst into tears. ‘Eduardo Chavez brought me homemade chocolate chunk ice cream. My girlfriend, Joyce Gonzales, from second grade, brought me a coconut cake made from her grandma Consuelo’s family recipe!’ She covered her face with a hankie.

  I reached out and held her hand. To my surprise her fingers curled around mine, and we kept rocking under the light of the moon.

  Shortly after that I saw Dad kiss Momma on the lips.

  She bent her head after the kiss and I saw a tiny smile. He hugged her close.

  The meals kept on coming.

  Momma’s heart kept softening.

  One morning, before I went to the bakery, I walked down to the river and sat in my usual spot. The windsurfer was there. Gliding, catching air, smooth. Thinking about nothing but the water, the sail, the wind.

  I wanted to be him.

  I really did.

  Momma, Janie, Cecilia, and I took Henry to the hospital to try the chemo. To do or not to do chemo caused an earth-scorching family fight. I can only compare this to Mt St Helens blowing her top. It was pointy before it exploded, but when that giant ash cloud cleared, the top had been neatly slashed off and hellfire had scorched the mountain.

  Our family hit the hellfire stage pretty damn quick.

  Cecilia and Momma wanted him to do it. ‘It could save his life,’ Cecilia hissed, determined. ‘He could be one of the lucky ones, a miracle…’

  ‘Cecilia,’ Janie pleaded, hands twisting, four times this way, four times that way. ‘The doctor said there won’t be any miracles…’

  ‘Doctors schmocktors!’ Momma roared. ‘He’s doing it. My son is doing the chemo.’ She emphasised this by tossing an old purple bevelled bottle to the floor.

  ‘Momma, Henry has a limited number of days left,’ I said, hating the pain that streaked across her face. ‘The chemo is not going to cure him. I don’t want the last weeks of his life filled with doctors’ appointments and needles up his arms and throwing up and fatigue…’

  ‘This could slow the cancer down, Isabelle,’ Cecilia snapped. ‘It’s his only chance!’

  ‘You would rather see him dead?’ Momma shrieked, rising into irrationality at the speed of light. ‘Would you? Would you?’ She stepped over the broken glass to me.

  Is there a worse argument to have with family? Chemo or no chemo for a terminally ill member?

  ‘I don’t want Henry to die, Momma, you know I don’t.’ I clenched my fists. She was awful. Uncontrollable. Critical. Mean. ‘How could you say that to me? How could you? I love Henry, you know that, or have you been so blinded by what you want, what River wants, that you weren’t able to see that?’

  ‘What I see is that you don’t want your brother to have treatment! You’re giving up on my son!’

  ‘Hell, Momma.’ I’d had it. Her son was dying, but I was at my limit with her. No, I’d crossed it. ‘I’m not going to take any more of your cruelty. I won’t. I know you’re hurting, I know you’re lashing out, which is what you’ve done our whole lives when things haven’t gone your way, but I won’t take this shit, your meanness—’

  Momma’s face froze, as if I’d slapped her with a table leg. ‘I am not being mean,’ she insisted, but her voice faltered.

  ‘You are.’ I clenched my fists. ‘You say things, Momma, and they hurt so much, and it lasts forever, but I’m done taking it with my trap shut. I love Henry and I would never give up on him, but I know reality, Momma, I know it and I know the chemo will do little for him, if anything at all.’ I hated being so honest. Hated it. ‘It will probably make him bald
and sick and not add a day to his life.’

  Cecilia slapped both hands to her face in frustration. ‘Argh! You don’t know that.’

  ‘Cecilia, wake up. You know what I know.’ And we knew a lot. We’d done research on the Internet. Now, this drives doctors crazy. People cruise like maniacs through the Internet and suddenly they’re experts on their disease and think they know more than the doctors, but metastasized pancreatic cancer doesn’t have much leeway in terms of survival or treatment, no matter where you cruise to.

  ‘Momma,’ Janie said, her voice surprisingly strident. ‘You heard the doctor. Take a second and think about what you’re asking him to do, how he may suffer! Do you actually want Henry – Henry – to go through this?’

  I turned towards Janie, my breath held. She rarely stood up to Momma. Her usual reaction was to lie down, take the pot-shots Momma threw, and attempt to make peace.

  ‘No!’ Momma yelled, her face a bleak mask of unrelenting loss. ‘No, dammit, I don’t! But I don’t want my son to have cancer, either! I don’t want my son to be sick! I don’t want my son to die, for God’s sakes! Can’t you see that? Can’t you? We should fight. We should fight this cancer!’ She threw a short, red glass bottle to the floor. ‘We have to fight!’

  ‘No, we don’t have to fight,’ I interjected. ‘We have to choose the best possible route for Henry. Not for us. He deserves to live a life worth living as long as possible without the needles and the side effects.’

  Momma’s body was shaking, head to foot. ‘Am I the only one who believes in Henry?’

  Oh my God. Is she the only one who believes in Henry?

  ‘That isn’t fair, Momma!’ Janie raged, face red. ‘We have believed in him our whole lives! Don’t you dare say that!’

  Whoa, Janie!

  ‘We changed his diapers when he was four, believing one day we wouldn’t have to because Henry would choose not to shit his pants!’ She clenched her fists and charged up to within six inches of Momma’s face, crunching glass beneath her feet. ‘We believed he would recover from being attacked by bullies his whole life because we comforted him. We taught him to read when his teachers said he couldn’t. We took him to the doctors for all his health problems and believed he would get better because we took care of him. We believed he would start talking again after Dad left and after he was raped, and he did, because we helped him. We believed that even though you spent half our childhood rotting in bed, or being mean to us three, that Henry would still turn out to be a great man, because we were always there for him! Don’t you accuse us of not believing in Henry! Don’t you do that, Momma!’