Always and Forever

by Lurlene McDaniel

  Melissa refused to listen. All she wanted was to be left alone. She turned to face the blank wall, twisting the bed sheet into a ball under her chin. She wasn’t sure when her mother left, but she sensed she was alone again. She’d hurt her mother. She knew that, but it was too late to change it now. So what? she thought. Life is full of pain.

  “Hello, Melissa.”

  Ricter Davis. Why wouldn’t everybody leave her alone? “Go away,” she mumbled.

  “It’s Ric.”

  “I know who it is. I don’t want to talk to anybody.”

  “Because you have cancer?”

  The word seemed dirty, unclean. She rolled over to face him, enraged and ready to lash out at him. “What I have is none of your business.”

  Ric lifted himself onto her bed and laid the metal crutches across the end of her mattress. “Let’s talk about it.”

  “I don’t want to talk.”

  “Sometimes talking helps.”

  His eyes were empathetic, and for the first time Melissa’s hostility wavered. “You knew what they were testing me for the other night. Why didn’t you tell me?” Her words were accusing.

  “Why didn’t you ask?”

  “I didn’t know enough to ask.”

  “They do bone marrow studies to rule out leukemia. You should have asked your doctor if you were curious.”

  It was as if he’d told her it was her fault she hadn’t been forewarned about her diagnosis. Her anger flared again. “Drop dead.”

  His smile was sardonic. “I might just do that.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning I know where you’re at. I have cancer, too.”

  His revelation left her groping for words. “I … I didn’t know … ”

  “It’s not leukemia, like yours. It’s osteogenic sarcoma—bone cancer. That’s why they cut off my leg.” He motioned to the void below his thigh. She shuddered in spite of herself. “Repulsive, isn’t it? Not to mention the crimp it’s put in my track career.”

  “Track?”

  “I was a marathoner for the University of South Florida. Had a scholarship and everything.” He slapped the stump of his leg. “Not much of an Olympic future for a one-legged runner.”

  “I’m sorry …”

  “I went through the chemo part, too.” His eyes held hers without mercy, without pity. “It’s no picnic, but you can do it.”

  Melissa swallowed hard and wished she could escape her nightmare. This can’t be happening to me. Not me. She sat up and hugged her knees to her chest, suddenly self-conscious that she wore nothing beneath the thin cotton gown. “Why are you in the hospital now?”

  “More tests. Just to see if it’s spread to other parts of my body.”

  “And?”

  “And so far, I’m clean.”

  “That’s good, isn’t it?”

  “Real good.” His voice had dropped so low, she had to lean forward to catch it. “The physical therapist is trying out a new prosthesis on me. That’s an artificial limb. The last one caused skin ulcers because it didn’t fit right.”

  Melissa shut her eyes and sighed. She didn’t want to be hearing about this. There was a horror in it all that nauseated her. Ric was only a few years older than she was—too young for cancer. She raked her hand through her hair, shaking it out of her face. It billowed, comfortingly, against her back. She refleeted on an earlier part of their conversation. “The chemo,” she asked. “What’s it really like?”

  His gaze went guarded. “It doesn’t matter what it’s like. It’s something you have to do.”

  His evasive answer frightened her. “Tell me, Ric. Please.”

  “You’ll be sick.”

  “I understand.”

  “No, you don’t. You’ll be so sick, you’ll wish you could die.”

  Tears welled inside her but she fought them down. She refused to cry in front of him. “Does anything help?”

  “Try to eat, even when you know it won’t stay down. Don’t be a stoic—get mad, cry if you want to. And don’t go through it alone. If your family can’t be with you when you’re heaving up your guts, get a nurse.”

  Coldness crept up her spine and she sat motionless. The one small, weak light over her hospital bed could not dispel the gloom. She felt Ric shift off of her mattress.

  “Where are you going?” Momentary panic set in as she realized she didn’t want to be alone. Her feelings for Ric had done a 180-degree turn. Now she didn’t want him to leave.

  “Back to my room.”

  “Do you have to? I’m scared.”

  Unexpectedly, his hand reached out, caught her chin, and lifted it. His eyes locked onto hers. “Jesus, you’re pretty.”

  There was a sadness in his whispered words she didn’t understand. “So what? What do my looks have to do with anything?”

  “Just an observation.” Ric shrugged, but she felt baffled, as if his remark had a deeper meaning she couldn’t quite grasp. “Your doctors will send someone in to teach you about positive imaging, Melissa. It’s sort of a mind-over-matter approach to healing. Listen to her and do exactly what she tells you. No matter how bad it gets, don’t give up.”

  “Will you come back?”

  A mysterious smile twisted the corner of his mouth. “Of course. We’re alike, you know. Pretty soon you won’t have a whole lot in common with your former world.”

  Images flashed through her mind: home, school, Jory, Brad. A gulf separated them from her and the sterile, bleak walls of the hospital. “I won’t let that happen,” she said.

  “We’ll see.” At the doorway he paused and looked at her with a long, soul-searching stare. “Too bad about your hair.”

  “What about it?”

  “The chemo will take it. It’ll take it all.”

  Chapter Nine

  “You heard me, Jory. Cut it.” Melissa eyed the scissors in her friend’s hand, ignoring Jory’s startled look.

  “When you asked me to sneak a pair of scissors up to your room, I didn’t know you were planning on cutting off your hair. Come on, Melissa … What gives?”

  Sitting cross-legged on her bed, Melissa pressed her lips together in steely determination. Her testing had been completed, and just an hour ago Dr. Rowan had informed her and her mother of the course of treatment he had prescribed for her case.

  “I’ve written down the names of the drugs, their frequency of administration, and their side effects.” He had given Melissa a piece of paper with neatly typed columns, but she had resisted reading it. “You’ll be taking pills, getting injections, and taking some medications intravenously so we can regulate their entrance into your bloodstream more easily. Blood work will be done daily, bone marrow exams once every two weeks during induction. These drugs are very powerful, and by killing off the leukemic cells, they threaten the healthy ones, too.”

  “In short,” Melissa had interrupted. “You’re killing me softly with the medicine.”

  Dr. Rowan had crossed his arms over his broad, barrel-shaped chest. “We’re saving you slowly from your disease,” he had corrected. “You’ll be given your first doses immediately, and you’ll go down to the special chemo room in a little while.”

  Once he’d left, Melissa had taken her pills and endured a stinging shot that instantly nauseated her. She had urged her mother to go to work and stop back later in the afternoon, and then called Jory, catching her before she’d gone off to school. “Come by the hospital first,” she had said. “And bring your scissors.”

  Now, as Jory clutched the scissors tightly, Melissa told her, “They’ll be coming to take me down for my first round of chemo real soon. I want my hair cut before they walk in the door. Are you going to do it for me, or do I have to do it myself?”

  “But, Melissa,” Jory argued, “you’ve had long hair all your life. And it’s so gorgeous. Why chop it off now? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “It’s got to come off,” Melissa said woodenly, fighting fiercely to hold back her tears. “I’d rather
take it off myself than have the chemotherapy do it for me.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Oh, Jory, stop acting so dumb! The chemo will make it all fall out. It’s a side effect. It’s the price I have to pay for a cure. Now do you get it?”

  “I … I didn’t realize … I’m sorry, Melissa. Really sorry.”

  “Yeah—well, so am I. But being sorry won’t change it. By the time they finish giving me the drugs to make me well, I’ll be bald. If I cut it now, myself, maybe that won’t be so horrible.”

  Jory hesitated, studying the scissors. “I’m not a beautician, you know.”

  Melissa punched her friend’s arm playfully. “I’ve seen you take scissors to your own hair plenty of times. Like in freshman year, when you were in your punk phase and you spiked your hair.… Remember?”

  Jory cringed. “That was the only time my parents ever noticed me. My father yelled for a week. It reflected on his image at the country club to have such a spaced-out daughter, you know.”

  Melissa heard the bitterness in Jory’s voice. She closed her hand around Jory’s and whispered, “Let’s get started, okay?”

  Jory flashed an impish smile. “If this works out, maybe I’ll move to Australia and take up sheep shearing.” She combed the dark, thick hair, slipped the scissors into the shining mass next to Melissa’s ear and cut.

  In minutes, the bed was covered with hair. Melissa closed her eyes and sat perfectly straight, feeling her head grow lighter as the hair fell away. Cool air fanned the exposed nape of her neck and she shivered. The silence in the room was broken only by the steady snip of the metal blades. Even Jory, usually bubbling with chatter, was quiet.

  “What the hell is going on!” The roar of Michaels voice made Melissa jump, and Jory squealed as the scissors clattered to the floor.

  Michael grabbed Jory roughly by the shoulders, his face pinched and angry. “What are you doing to my sister?”

  Jory gaped numbly, her eyes round and wide and her hands clenched behind her.

  Melissa reached out and grasped Michael’s arm. “Stop it, Michael! Let go of her. It’s not her fault—I asked her to cut my hair.”

  “You what?” He turned his fury on her. “Why the hell did you do a stupid thing like that?”

  Melissa squared her chin and mustered a steely look. “Because the chemotherapy will make me go bald, and I refuse to let it have my hair. I’m taking it off before the medicine does, and I asked Jory to help me. Now tell her you’re sorry.”

  Jory had turned stiff and ghostly white, obviously shaken by Michael’s outrage. Michael clenched his fists and worked his jaw, clearly trying to control his emotions. “I’m sorry, Jory.” He faced his sister and lifted what was left of her newly cut hair off her forehead. “Are you sure about the chemo?”

  “Dr. Rowan gave me a list of side effects to expect.” She reached for the paper on her night table. “He was very honest. But then, he told us from the start that he would be. Let’s hear it for honestly,” she mumbled under her breath. “Anyway, he said that the chemo causes lots of problems. Losing my hair is only one. But he also said that once I’m in remission and I go on maintenance therapy, my hair will grow back.”

  Michael gently stroked her head.

  “It’s only hair Michael,” she said through clenched teeth.

  “That’s true. And now that I see it short, I like it. Although the style leaves something to be desired.”

  His attempt at humor calmed her. “Jory insisted she wasn’t a beautician, but I made her cut it anyway.”

  “It’s not that bad,” Jory said, stepping closer to the side of the bed. “I mean, with a little mousse, a little curl, it could be really chic.”

  Michael hugged Melissa and she squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m scared, Michael.”

  “Do you want me to stay with you for your treatment?”

  She did and she didn’t. “No. It’s all right.”

  “I’ll stay,” Jory offered.

  “You’re already skipping school.”

  “So what? It’s not like I’ve never done that before, you know.”

  “The nurses will be with me,” Melissa hedged. She began to sense her illness and treatments as a wall rising between herself and the “well” world. She’d been thrown into a different place the others could not fully enter, and she might as well come to terms with that now. She recalled Ric’s message from the night before: You won’t have a whole lot in common with your former world. “You two leave and come back tonight. I’ll probably have oodles to tell you by then,” she said.

  “If you’re sure … ” She saw a guilty look of relief in Michael’s eyes. She knew that hospitals and needles scared him.

  “Go on.” He was almost to the door when she called him back. “I—uh—forgot to ask … How’s Mom?”

  “She’s pretty rung out.”

  Guilt pricked at Melissa’s conscience. “I said some things to her last night I didn’t mean. I’m so sorry. You’ll tell her I’m sorry, won’t you?”

  “You can tell her. She’s planning on coming by during her lunch hour.”

  “I really am sorry, Michael.”

  He nodded, his blue eyes holding hers. “We’re all sorry, Melissa. Everything about this business stinks. But we’re family, and we’ll make it through.”

  Once Michael left, Jory sighed. “Why do I always act like such a fool in front of him?”

  Melissa picked up a lock of hair from the bed and it fell through her fingers. Lucky Jory. Nothing more heavy to think about than acting silly in front of a guy she wants to impress. She asked, “Could you help me clean this up before you go? I don’t want them to bring me back to a hairy bed.”

  Neither of them spoke as they scooped up the wads of hair and threw them into the wastepaper basket. Together they brushed off the mattress until no wayward strands could be found on the clean white sheets. When they hugged each other goodbye, Melissa sensed a tension between them. Jory could walk out the door. Melissa could not. Jory had school and friends and everyday life to return to. Melissa had chemotherapy to face. She ran her fingers through her cropped hair and settled against her pillows to wait for the technicians.

  The chemo room wasn’t anything like Melissa expected. It was painted buttercup yellow, with bold graphic prints on the walls and gray carpeting. There were beige contour chairs that looked to be quite expensive. The only thing that belied the serene comfort of the room was the metal IV stand beside each chair.

  “Hi, Melissa,” a nurse said cheerfully. “I’m DeeDee Thomas, and I’ll be administering your medication.”

  Feeling more terrified than sociable, Melissa forced herself to acknowledge the nurse’s chatter while DeeDee inserted a needlelike contraption of plastic tubing and a rubber plug into a vein in her arm. “This is a heparin lock,” DeeDee explained. “Not very glamorous-looking, but you’ll wear it for the next few days. That way, we have access to your blood supply and can administer your chemo regime without having to jab you so often.”

  Melissa wondered if she was supposed to feel grateful. She lay back in the chair and DeeDee hung a bag of liquid on the IV stand next to her bed. “Relax,” the nurse said. “This will take about an hour.”

  An hour! Melissa saw her days dripping away through snaking lines of flexible tubing. “I feel sick to my stomach,” she said.

  DeeDee patted her shoulder and handed her a small bowl. “In case you need to vomit,” she told her. Her eyes were kind, but they didn’t even attempt to hide the truth from Melissa.

  “It’s going to be bad, isn’t it?”

  “What seems bad now is ultimately for your good. I’ll be here for you if you need me.”

  Melissa swallowed against her own bile and swore to hold back as long as she could. She watched the fluid trickle from the inverted bottle and down the tubing into her arm. She watched as it began its long, steady journey into the microscopic battleground in her body.

  That evening Melissa was too
sick to eat dinner, too sick to receive visitors. Her mother held her through it all, but Michael had to leave because he couldn’t stand to see her hurting. After her mother left, Melissa fell into a fitful sleep, awakening when she had to vomit again.

  In the stillness of her room she sensed someone next to her bed. A hand smoothed her bangs from her brow. “I’m here, Melissa,” Ric said.

  “Go away,” she murmured through parched lips.

  “It’s worse to be alone,” he whispered, blotting her cheek with a damp cloth.

  She didn’t want anyone to see her this way—exposed, vulnerable. Yet his hands were gentle and knowing. “You were right,” she said when the violent nausea had subsided. “I do feel like I want to die.”

  “Haven’t you heard?” he chided tenderly. “Only the good die young.”

  “I hate the way they treat me.”

  “Who?”

  “The doctors. The people here.”

  “How do they treat you?”

  “Like I’m not a person. Like I’m just a blob of cells. Like there’s something unclean inside me and they’ve got to drive it out … no matter how much it hurts.”

  “Should I call up a witch doctor? Or a sorcerer?”

  She managed to smile, despite her discomfort. “During treatment today, the psychologist came and taught me about ‘imaging.’ ”

  “So what will you use to hunt down and destroy your cancer cells? I pretend I’m manning a ship like Luke Skywalker. I close my eyes and zip through my body firing laser shots at any cancer cells trying to hide and multiply.” He demonstrated by pointing his forefinger and making zinging sounds.

  Melissa envisioned his illustration and smiled. “I imagine my cancer cells as hairy toads, all black and bony, with large suction cups for mouths. And they’re sitting inside my bones sucking out my marrow, getting fat and strong while my marrow gets thinner and thinner.”

  Ric arched his eyebrow. “Grim picture. So what are you using to destroy them?”

  “I … I haven’t thought of something yet.”

  “That’s the most important part, Melissa. That’s what imaging is all about. You’ve got to see yourself hunting down the cells and destroying them. That’s how you turn on your inner healing reserves.”