I maintain a low profile until the second week of August, mostly staying in and licking my wounds. Grace, Liz and Jessica all call, trying to get me to join them for drinks, shopping trips, movies, both individually and collectively, but I always find some excuse to stay in. Justin calls several times too, but I ignore them all and never return any of his messages. I figure he will eventually get the hint and stop calling. On this particular Saturday afternoon however, he calls non-stop. I debate turning my phone off, but he obviously needs to speak with me urgently. Even though I don’t really want to speak to him, I still care for him. I can at least spare a few minutes of my time.
“Hello, Justin,” I say as I answer the call.
“I’m glad you finally decided to answer, Mimi. I need you to meet me as soon as possible. It’s urgent.”
“Is everything okay?” I ask, suddenly feeling alarmed.
“No, but I can’t get into everything right now. I just need you to meet me and I’ll make sure you understand everything later.”
“Are you hurt or anything?”
“No, I’m fine. Will you come, Mimi?” he asks insistently.
“Um, yeah, sure. Do you want me to meet you at your house?”
“On second thought, let me pick you up at your place. Are you home now?” he asks, his voice growing more demanding.
“Yes, I’m home, but it’s really no trouble for me…”
“I’m not far from your place. I’ll be there in twenty minutes. Just let the guard know to let me in.” He hangs up before I can say another word.
After making arrangements with the security guard, I spend the next twenty-five minutes pacing the living room of my apartment. I have no idea what’s going on. Justin’s behavior is beyond curious, but I have this feeling of impending doom that I can’t shake. I nearly jump a foot when I hear the sharp knock on my door then run to open it. Justin stands there, looking very tired and haggard. His normally shaved head has a few days growth on it, as do his cheeks. His eyes are red rimmed with dark circles under them.
“Grab your purse and your keys. We’ll take your car, but I’ll drive,” he says, not wasting any time with formalities.
I do as I’m told, offering no arguments nor asking any questions. His entire being tells me this is not the time to be anything but cooperative, so I follow his instructions and hand over my keys after locking up the apartment.
Justin wheels us out of the complex smoothly and efficiently, not wasting a second. He gets onto the freeway in record time. He isn’t reckless, but more than one traffic law is broken while getting us there. Traffic is light—by Los Angeles standards—given that it’s two in the afternoon on Saturday. Forty-five minutes later, we pull into the parking lot at St. Joseph’s Hospital. I look at Justin in alarm, but he just opens his door and gets out. I follow suit, and continue following him to the front doors, a horrible sinking feeling in my stomach all the way.
As we enter through the sliding doors, I ask quietly, “Justin, why are we here?”
He just looks at me gravely, with the saddest expression I have ever seen on another human being’s face.
My own face crumples in response as the reality I have desperately been trying to deny rushes to the forefront of my consciousness. “It’s Vance, isn’t it?”
He just nods and leads me to the elevators. I weep silently as we enter an empty elevator and ride up to whatever floor he pushes a button for, I don’t notice which. “What happened, Justin?” I finally gather the courage to ask.
“He’s sick, Mimi. He’s been sick for a long time, only we didn’t know it until recently.”
“That’s what he wanted to tell me, isn’t it?” I ask, fearing I already know the answer.
“Yes,” he says simply.
“Oh, no, no, no.” I hang my head, shaking it in denial, crying harder.
The doors open and we walk out onto a patient room floor. As we move down the quiet hall, Justin speaks.
“Before we go in, I have to warn you. I don’t know how he will react to you being here. He could be his normal self and be happy to see you, but he could also be the Vance you know from the last few months you were together. He has a malignant brain tumor…” I gasp in horror. “… that has caused personality changes in him, so you don’t always know who you’re going to get. If he’s hostile, don’t take it personally. Just try to stick it out. The real Vance will eventually come around, okay? Be prepared, though. He looks even worse than when you saw him last.”
I nod in response and do my best to dry my tears as we come to a stop before a room with a closed door. Griffin and Bryant are standing outside with cups of coffee in their hands.
“What is she doing here?” Griffin says to Justin. “You know he doesn’t want her here.”
“He didn’t want her to know at all,” Bryant says.
“You both know keeping it from her is not right. I had to get her before it’s too late. They both deserve to see each other and make things right.”
I look at Justin, confused. “If that’s true, if he didn’t want me to know, why did he come to see me in May?”
Justin sighs. “Initially, he did want you to know. He wanted the chance to explain, to apologize and hopefully get you to forgive him. When you were so adamant that you that didn’t want talk to him, he realized that it was too late, things had gone too far and you hated him. At that point, he felt you deserved to live your life in peace and move on.”
This starts a fresh round of tears, and I need a minute to compose myself. Griffin and Bryant just glare at me as if I am to blame for everything. I suppose I can’t blame them. I should have known something was wrong, rather than being wrapped up in my own feelings. I should have known my Vance would never treat me poorly if he could help it. It was like Justin had said all along, Vance wasn’t like that. Something had been wrong, I just didn’t see it. I shouldn’t have lost faith in him.
I finally pull myself together, because I have to be strong. He needs me whether he wants to see me or not, and I will be there now even if I wasn’t before. I nod at Justin and he opens the door for me.
I do my best to walk inside confidently, but I fail miserably. Miriam, Vance’s mother, is standing by his bedside, holding his hand and shielding him from my view. She turns to look over her shoulder, and when she sees me, her gaze also turns hostile.
“Get her out of here, Justin. She has no right to be here,” she snaps.
A weak voice comes from the other side of her, “Is that Mimi?”
Tired of getting the stink eye from everyone, when so much is on the line, I pull myself up to my full height and look Miriam in the eye. “I’m afraid you’re wrong there. I have every right to be here. In fact, legally I have more right to be here than you do, so I’m going to have to ask you to leave. Now.”
I can’t help it. I can’t take the hostility from these people. They have known about his condition longer than I have. At any time, they could have told me what he was going through. They know most of what he put me through, and no one knew at the time he was sick. Yes, I should have known something was seriously wrong, but if they knew the entirety of what he had done, I don’t think they would look at me as harshly for the way I reacted. Maybe I’m lashing out, but I’m not going to let them get in my way. If I have to be a bitch to all of them, treat them the way they seem to want to treat me, I have no problem with that. Vance is my focus right now.
Miriam sputters, “You don’t have that authority.”
“I do. I am still his wife. I’d prefer it if you left quietly without upsetting your son, but I will call security if I have to.”
I approach Vance’s bedside across from Miriam. He looks…awful. His frame is practically skeletal, his cheeks so sunken in, his eyes look too large for his face. Their once blue gleam are now dull in color, and his skin tone is sallow and pale. His lips are dry and cracked, nothing at all like the soft, supple, plush skin I used to marvel at. None of this matters as I take his other hand in m
ine and look him directly in the eyes. “I’m here, baby.”
He gets the softest look on his face as he looks back at me. We share a long moment, just gazing at each other and I feel our connection blaze to life. Everyone else falls away and it is just the two of us in our protective bubble once again. I squeeze his hand gently, not wanting to hurt him. He looks away from me to his mom and Justin. His voice rasps as he speaks to them.
“Can you guys give us some time alone, please? I have a lot to say to Mimi, and I don’t want an audience.”
Justin smiles and nods. Miriam continues to glare at me, but Justin just takes her by the elbow and steers her out of the room.
“Mimi, you don’t know how glad I am that you came. I…”
“Before you say anything more, I want to apologize for sending you away when you came to see me in May. I should have taken the time to listen to you. I should have seen something was wrong, should have known something was wrong all along. If I weren’t so selfish, weren’t so wrapped up in myself…,” I trail off, my throat clogging with tears.
“Mimi, what I put you through is more than anyone should have to take, and yet for months you suffered through it with love and grace and dignity. You shouldn’t blame yourself for being hurt by the way I treated you and not being able to take it any longer.”
“But I should have known that you would never treat me that way if you could help it. Combined with your headaches…”
“Why would that make you think it was anything more than the work stress I insisted it was? Thousands of people, if not more, get headaches and turn into assholes when they’re under severe pressure. What would ever lead you to suspect it was cancer eating my mind? I hid all the other, more significant signs from you as best I could, mostly by staying away from the house as much as possible. I did a lot of sitting in my office just staring at the wall. I didn’t want you to notice the lack of coordination, the times I couldn’t find the words I wanted to say. Then the seizures started happening…”
“Seizures? How could you hide seizures from me?” I cry, the tears now flowing freely down my face.
“Do you remember the night you found me in the car? I barely made it home that night. I had just enough time to turn into the driveway and turn off the car. Luckily, my seatbelt had locked up when I swung into the drive, and it kept me from injuring myself as I convulsed. Otherwise you probably would have been more suspicious than you were, or at the very least thought I’d been in a bar fight of some kind. After the seizure passed, I just sort of knocked out. It’s happened after every single one since, I just kind of fall asleep for a while, and when I wake up, I’m disoriented. It’s the reason I started sleeping in the guest bedroom.”
“Vance, why would you keep it from me? We could have done something! I would have gotten you help!”
“I didn’t want to face it, Mimi. I knew something was seriously wrong. I spent hours on the internet looking up my symptoms and had a good idea what it could be.” Vance shakes his head in regret. “Sure, I knew there were other potential causes, but my mind went to the worst and knew there was very little to be done, and what could be done, ultimately wouldn’t change the outcome.”
“There are treatments though, right? Something they can do to give you a fighting chance? If not cure you, then give you more time?” I ask trying to cling to any shred of hope I can find.
“If I had sought treatment earlier than I did in May, maybe when the headaches started getting worse or when the other symptoms started showing up, I could have received intervention that would have given me more time. It would have been painful though and reduced my quality of life even further. It wouldn’t necessarily have prevented the symptoms I did have from occurring. What little they have been able to offer me, I have declined.”
“Vance, if I had known, if you had told me, I never would have left. We could have faced this together, like we should have.”
“What, suffering alongside me, feeling sorry for me?” he scoffs.
“No! Loving you. Each and every day I would have spent loving you, understanding what you were going through and putting you first instead of myself and my little hurt feelings.”
Vance’s eyes fill with tears, as he grips my hand as tightly as he can manage. “Mimi…I always wanted you to be first. You and your happiness are, and have always been everything to me. When I think of the way I hurt you… especially that last night…,” his voice chokes up, “it’s my one real regret. From the moment I met you, all I ever wanted was to make you smile that beautiful smile at me. At the end, I was incapable of doing that. When I felt like myself, I would mourn everything I was losing with you. I wanted so desperately to feel our connection, to show you all the love that I have inside me for you, but it always seemed like I was less and less that person when we were together. So, when you finally left, I was relieved. I was crushed that I had finally driven you away and I wanted to die right then and there, but I was relieved that I couldn’t hurt you anymore.”
I am touched by the things he is saying, and I understand what he means, but I’m angry too. I feel like I’ve been robbed. I spent time being angry with him, hating him even, time I could have spent giving him all of my love and devotion. It dawns on me then that I am doing the same thing right now, robbing myself of more time by being angry with him for his choices, when I could be loving him instead.
I take his hand between both of mine and bring it to my lips. “Now that I know, will you let me go back to loving you? I just can’t walk away again. I don’t care if you are not yourself sometimes. I want to be with you, for however long that is, a month, a year, whatever. We promised each other the rest of our lives, Vance. Please keep that promise and give me yours.”
Vance sobs and reaches over with his other hand, wrapping it around our joined fists. We stay like that for a while, both of us crying quietly. I have been mourning the loss of our love for a long time. Now, I realize it was never really gone, but it seems like the cruelest of jokes to know that I am going to lose him for real very soon.
Wiping my tears away, I whisper to him, “I need to be close to you, Vance. Would it hurt you if I moved some of your tubes and wires around and crawled up there with you?”
He smiles at me and I see a bit of that twinkle that always used to pull me in. “I’d pull them all out if it meant I could hold you in my arms again.”
I laugh despite the fresh tears that have made their way onto my face. “I don’t think we need to go those extremes. With a little creativity, I think we can manage it.”
After a maneuvering his IV line and few of the wires monitoring his vitals, I crawl into the bed next to him and snuggle up to his side. I lay my head on his chest as he wraps his arm around my shoulders. I can feel how thin he has become through the flimsy cotton gown, but one thing hasn’t changed about him. He still feels like home.
We lay there like that for hours, talking softly. We talk about everything and nothing, just like we used to do. We pretend he’s not sick and dream about places we’ll go, things we’ll do together, until he eventually drifts off to sleep. I snuggle closer into his side and fall asleep against him too, feeling more at peace than I have in the last five months.
I wake sometime later, when the nurse comes in with his dinner tray. She looks at me somewhat disapprovingly as I get up from the bed and stretch. She informs me that visiting hours have ended, but I politely explain that I’m his wife, and won’t be going anywhere. She doesn’t believe me, so I have to show her ID. I get another disapproving look from her and I assume it’s because he’s been here a while and this is the first time she’s seen me here. I don’t feel the need to explain.
She does all the regular nurse-like things, checking his machines, his vitals, etc. He wakes up in the process and she’s all sunshine and light toward him, raising his bed into a sitting position as she chats away. I decide she’s not so bad, even though she wasn’t particularly pleasant with me. What these people think of me is of no concer
n, as long as they give Vance the best care they can. As she is leaving, she lets us know the doctor will be back in the morning when he does his usual rounds. I am eager to meet him and talk about our options going forward. I may not have been here before now, but I am going to be an active participant in Vance’s medical care from this point forward.
Vance just stares at the tray of what I imagine is bland hospital food. I try to encourage him to eat, but he just looks at me blankly.
“On the best day, I can’t imagine this food being even remotely palatable.” He says to me. “Unfortunately, my sense of taste has been affected by the tumor. Absolutely everything tastes like shit.”
“Well,” I respond, “I suppose there’s always the option of a feeding tube.”
He shakes his head. “No, I’ve already signed papers indicating that I don’t want any measures being taken to prolong my life unnecessarily.”
I gasp. “What? Vance, you can’t mean that.”
“Mimi, I’m going to die, and I’m going to do it sooner rather than later. My condition will deteriorate day by day. There is no point to trying to fight the inevitable. Forcing nourishment on my body is like trying to hold back the tide with a net.”
“Okay, so we don’t force it on you. But please, for me, try to eat while you’re still strong enough to do so? We don’t have to try to reach for more days than you might otherwise have, but we also don’t have to try to reduce the time you could have either, do we? I don’t want to be selfish, but I’m not in a hurry to let you go.”
Vance lets out a sigh and pulls the tray toward him. “Only because I’m not in a hurry to leave you either Mimi, will I consume this vile tray of what can only loosely be described as food. I can’t assure you that it will not actually hasten my demise, however.”
“Oh just eat it, you big baby,” I say removing the napkin from the tray and tossing it at him.
His hands shake as he attempts to take the lid off the bowl of soup they have given him. I come around the side of the bed opposite the tray table and sit down next to him. “Let me,” I say, covering his hand with my own and helping him pop off the top. He relaxes back into the pillows as I dip a spoon into the bowl and come up with a hearty mouthful. He opens his mouth with an amused look in his eyes as I bring it to his lips and tell him “Blow. It may be too hot to put in your mouth.”
Shattered Perfection (The Perfection Series Book 1) Page 23