Radiate

by Gibson, Marley

  Most of all, will I ever be the same?

  ***

  Before I go to bed that night, Ginger and Rochelle note all of my vitals and make sure my IV is secure and flowing properly. Even though I’m not allowed to eat anything presurgery, they bring me a dinner tray... for Mom. Bless her heart. Bless their hearts.

  “We’ll see you tomorrow after you’re out of surgery, Hayley,” Ginger says to me.

  Rochelle tightens the blanket around me and pats the bed. “We’re all pulling for you, sweetheart.”

  “Thanks for everything,” I say.

  I toss and turn for a while, trying to settle my brain from the conglomerated mess of information swirling around inside. Words to cheers. Convos with Daniel. All the texts, e-mails, and calls that came in throughout the day from friends, relatives, and acquaintances. So many good wishes. So many prayers. Surely God will hear the large outcry on my behalf and take care of me during the procedure.

  I finally doze off while watching some cooking show demonstrating how to make gourmet cupcakes. I don’t know how long I’ve been asleep when I’m suddenly pulled out of my dream about different-colored cupcake frostings to find an African American woman standing at the foot of my bed. She’s not someone I’ve seen in the hospital before, but she could be a night-shift nurse who checks on patients while we sleep.

  She’s wearing white and her hair is cut short to her chin. From the moonlight cascading through my window I can see her smile is vibrant and warming and her eyes dark and caring.

  Our eyes meet and she lifts a finger to her lips in the “shush” motion. Then, I see her begin to pray. Her right hand reaches out over my covers, and she lightly touches my left leg. I don’t hear her words, but her lips move slowly in reverence. My heart pounds away under my hospital gown and will most certainly set off some sensors at the nurses’ station.

  At this moment, Mom sits up in her cot. “Is everything okay?”

  The nurse doesn’t seem concerned with my blood pressure, temperature, or pulse. Rather, she just stands there at the end of my bed, finishing her prayer.

  Mom watches with wide eyes and then swings her legs off the cot.

  The woman stops her with a hand and a smile.

  Again, Mom asks, “Is everything all right?”

  The nurse puts her hand back on my leg and smiles Mom’s way. “Everything will be just fine. Now, you go back to sleep, shug. It’ll all be okay.”

  Almost trance-like, Mom nods at the woman. I do the same.

  She finishes her prayer, pats my left leg, and winks at me. With that, she turns and walks out of my room, closing the door behind her.

  Mom bolts off her cot and rushes to the door. I watch as she glances left down the hall and then furiously back to the right... and to the left again. Then, she heads off in the direction of the nurses’ station.

  “What’s going on, Mom?” I ask when she returns.

  She closes the door behind her and leans her back against it. “The hall was completely empty.”

  “You mean, that lady just disappeared?”

  “No trace of her.”

  “What about at the nurses’ station?”

  “It was that older woman, Joyce. She was reading a book.”

  My left leg tingles slightly where the mystery woman had patted me.

  “Go back to sleep, Hayley,” Mom instructs.

  As my heartbeat returns to a normal cadence, I wonder if I was just touched by an angel.

  The thought comforts me as I fall back into a deep sleep.

  Chapter Seventeen

  We must embrace pain and burn it as fuel for our journey.

  —Kenji Miyazawa

  I come out of the bathroom the next morning to find Mom and Ginger discussing our visitor from last night. Part of me thinks the woman was just a dream that Mom and I shared, and the rest of me... well, I’m not sure what to believe.

  “She’s an angel,” Ginger says with great confidence.

  “An angel?” Mom repeats.

  “A lot of patients see her before their surgery.”

  I can’t believe it. “No way!”

  Ginger smiles at me. “Believe what you’d like. I’m just telling you what others have said. Same description. Same interaction.”

  Mom puts her hand to her chest. “It’s a blessing, Hayley. We have to look at it that way.”

  “Pretty cool.” And I nod.

  Literally... touched by an angel.

  Suddenly my apprehension over what’s to come today subsides like a wave pulling away from the beach. There’s a zinging sensation up and down my spine, and I’m really not frightened of the surgery. It has to be done. Then I’ll be better and can get back to Maxwell... to cheerleading... to Daniel... to life.

  The door creaks open, and in walks my support posse of Dad, Cliff, and Lily. Of course, Lily has some sort of baked goods in a box with her.

  “Do I smell chocolate chip cookies?” I ask with my empty stomach growling away.

  “They’re for when you’re out of surgery,” Lily says.

  While Mom regales everyone with the story of our angel visit, I zone out a bit, thinking about Lily’s simple words.

  Out of surgery... like saying “when you’re out of the shower.”

  But it is that simple, isn’t it? It’s not as if I can do anything other than lie here while all of this circles around me. I’m helpless to this... thing... growing inside my body. The doctors are here to take care of me. All I want is to get back to the summer I had planned out. This wasn’t supposed to happen. This... this bump—literally—in my road.

  “You all right, Little Kid?” Dad asks, knocking me back to the here and now.

  “Hey, Dad,” I say, smiling and stretching my arms up to him.

  He leans down to hug me and plants a kiss on my cheek. “You’re going to be just fine.”

  “I know I will be, Dad.”

  His eyes meet mine. Dark on dark. Confidence on trepidation. Who wears what is a toss up. Mostly love on love. And that’s really all I need to get through this, right?

  “Dr. Dykema says you may have a long road of rehabilitation ahead of you,” Dad tells me.

  My shoulders lift, then fall. “I’m a cheerleader, Dad. That will be my rehabilitation, believe me.”

  “I know you think that now, baby, but we don’t know what today’s surgery will bring.”

  I flatten my lips. “Are you trying to scare me, Dad?”

  Mom steps up. “No, Hayley. We’re just all here for you. That’s all you need to know, right, Jared?”

  “Right,” Dad says. He seems so tired and stressed out.

  “Is everything okay back home?” I ask him. “You know, with the store and everything.”

  He shakes his head and smiles. “That’s not anything you should worry about.”

  “Dad, I—”

  Ginger strolls back in with her arms full. “We need to get you prepped for surgery, sweetie.”

  “Do we need to clear out?” Cliff asks.

  “No,” I say quickly. I’m not ready to be without my support group yet.

  “Fine with me,” Ginger says.

  She removes the covers from me and places towels under my left leg. Using soap and water, she carefully shaves the leg hairs that have grown over the last few weeks. She slides the razor gently over the protruding bump on my calf. I glare at the spot—the damn lesion that’s trying to stop me in my tracks. Just when I’d hit the pinnacle of my high school life, this stupid, effing cancer had to pick me of all people to attach to. I’m glad I’m having this surgery. Take the icky thing out. Take out the bone. Take out whatever you have to—just make me me again.

  The nurse pulls out a swab and wipes it up and down the length of my leg, turning it a yellow-red hue.

  “Damn!” I exclaim, unable to halt my reaction. “That’s cold as crap!”

  “Sorry,” Ginger says. “That’s why I brought warm blankets for you.”

  “What’s that stuff?” I
ask.

  “Iodine rinse to help sterilize.”

  Ahhh... wonder how long it will take for that to wash off. She finishes up and then covers my leg with the towels. After that, she spreads the toasty covers over me and I burrow into the mattress for warmth, protection, safety. I shudder a bit—I don’t know whether it’s from the coldness on my leg or from nerves. Could be that I haven’t eaten in twelve hours.

  Mom tucks the covers up around my chin since she can see my teeth chattering. “Not much longer.”

  “It’s just all so... surreal,” I say to my parents. “I’ve watched so many medical shows on TV. I just never thought I’d be starring in my own episode.”

  Cliff snickers. “You always wanted to be an actress.”

  “When I was nine!”

  We all laugh together, and it feels good.

  Ginger instructs me to remove my earrings. I pull my hands from under the covers and tug the pierced sterling posts out and plop them into my mom’s outstretched hand for safekeeping. I don’t have any makeup or nail polish on because the nurses told me the doctors have to be able to monitor my status by looking at my eyelids and nail beds. Besides the hospital gown covering me, I am as naked as the day I was born. Au naturel.

  According to the clock on the wall, it’s only seven thirty in the morning. I feel like I’ve been awake for hours.

  My other nurse, Rochelle, joins Ginger, carrying a new IV bag and another syringe. “Good luck to you, Hayley,” she says with her bright smile.

  “Thanks.” I watch as the two nurses connect the fresh glucose to the silver tower attached to my bed that’s feeding me nutrients.

  “We’re going to give you a slight sedative, Hayley, to soothe your nerves before you get to the operating room.”

  I nod my thanks and lift my eyes to the spot on the IV tube where Rochelle inserts the needle. She presses her thumb on the top of the syringe, and the clear liquid empties into the tube. I count, waiting until I can feel the effects.

  Eleven . . . twelve . . . thirteen . . . fourteen . . . oh yeah . . .

  “Are you okay, Hayley?” Dad asks with distress in his eyes.

  I bob my head up and down. My eyes flutter closed momentarily to let the soothing sensation dance over my arms and legs. I’m feeling somewhat rubbery and flexible like a bendy doll. The throbbing in my left leg fades away as I luxuriate in the comforting blankets that cover me.

  I feel Dad’s firm hand stroke my forehead and hair. He rubs in rhythm to the pounding of my heartbeat. A soft kiss. Words of love and encouragement. Mom’s soft hand joins in. Prayers and wishes. Blessings.

  “The orderlies are here to take Hayley to surgery,” Ginger says.

  “Ohhhkay-alll-righty,” I say in my floaty haze.

  The loving touches retreat, and suddenly I’m chilled again. Large hands grip me and slide me from my hospital bed onto the gurney. Ginger instructs the two men to keep me covered and warm. I don’t understand why I’m this cold when it’s mid-July in the Deep South.

  I’m moving now, toward the door and out into the brightly lit hospital corridor.

  As the gurney begins moving, I hear a voice calling out my name. A familiar one. One I never hear other than on those obligatory phone calls on holidays and birthdays. The voice I’ve missed so much. I had wondered why she hadn’t come to see me. But now she has.

  “Wait!” the voice calls out. “That’s my little sister. I have to see her before her surgery!”

  A light of recognition emblazons me. If I had the strength, I’d jerk the covers up, fly off the gurney, and run down the hall to my big sister. Instead, I lie still as she comes to me.

  The orderlies move aside, and soft brown eyes smile down at me. It’s Gretchen. My big sis. The black sheep of our family who never comes home and whom no one really speaks about. The long-lost relative who retreated from our home to make her own in Boston, Massachusetts. But she’s here. Now. Holding my hand and kissing the top of it. The big sis I looked up to so much when I was a little kid, so much so that I’d wear her clothes and jewelry and pretend to be her when she wasn’t around. Now, she’s here with me. Tears pool in the corners of her perfectly lined eyes, and she tightens her lips together.

  “Mom called me yesterday,” she whispers to me. “I got here as fast as I could.”

  My eyes flutter shut in blissful delight. “Gretch... you came.”

  “Nothing would have stopped me, Hay.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.

  —Eleanor Roosevelt

  The gurney is moving again.

  I watch as the ceiling panels pass by overhead; a fluorescent light breaking up the tiles every now and then. We stop, and I hear the ding of the elevator.

  “We gotta go,” one of the orderlies says.

  “We love you, Hayley.” Mom kisses me.

  “I’ve got my watch set, Little Kid. I’ll see you when you get out.” Dad squeezes my hand.

  Cliff and Lily layer kisses on my forehead.

  Gretchen stretches out over my chest and hugs me to her. “I love you so much. Everything will be fine, Hay. I’m here for you.”

  Our hands entwine, and I sense the energy and love from her pouring into me. Fingers drag smoothly against each other as we’re finally separated. The wheels begin moving, and soon the tang of my sister’s sweet perfume is but a memory. My skin tingles in a good way. I’m still covered in my family’s love like an additional blanket on top of me.

  Everyone has told me it’s going to be all right. Why should I be worried, then?

  When the elevator reaches its floor—did we go up or down?—I am being wheeled down another long corridor and into an area where a sign says Hospital Personnel Only. Double doors automatically open for us, and I’m pushed into a room full of people dressed in aqua scrub suits, masks, and hats. Gloved hands begin handling me, sliding me from the gurney onto the operating table.

  “It’s so cold in here,” I say through chattering teeth.

  A nurse with lots of mascara around her hazel eyes smiles down at me. “We have to keep the temperature low for sterile reasons. Don’t worry, we’ll get you more blankets.”

  I hear the clang of instruments being placed on the metal tray. Knives and stuff that are going to be slicing into me. Gack... Why am I thinking of things like that? Is there going to be a lot of blood? How will they clean it up? What will they do with it? Will I need a transfusion?

  These are all questions I should have asked Dr. Dykema—or at least Dr. Stanislovitis—when I had the chance. Stupid me!

  My eyes shift up, and I squint hard at the intensity. Gigamonic circular lights shine down on me. It’s like a dentist’s light on acid. I blink as I try to stare past it. Nothing but gray and white walls, hospital staffers, and the antiseptic smell of sterile cleansers.

  My arms are shaking. My legs are quaking. My body quivers from head to toe.

  The trembling isn’t just from the temperature. I’m downright scared. Shitless. It’s all finally hitting me. The first two surgeries were a simple piece of piss. This one is major.

  What happens if Dr. Dykema opens up my leg and the tumor has taken over too much? Will he really take my leg? The nerves? The bones? I never thought of it before, but will I be able to walk again? Will I be able to cheer? Why hadn’t I pressed these issues more? Was I truly in that much denial?

  The nurses attach sticky pads with cords on them on each of my boobs and one right under my left one. Then they roll me to my side and place them on my back, as well. Some sort of monitors. There are so many of them now that I can’t keep them straight. I just want them to keep putting blankets on me.

  My pulse trills against my temple. My eyelids twitch in anticipation. When I’m back in place on the stretcher, I do my damnedest to slow down my frenetic heartbeat that now I hear echoing throughout the operating room.

  I try to focus on what th
e angel said last night.

  Everything will be just fine.

  Similar words my sister whispered to me.

  Everything has to be fine, and I’ll be cheering again in no time.

  I’ve earned this. I can’t lose it before I’ve experienced it.

  Fear shifts in my veins to utter frustration. This is the stupidest summer I’ve ever experienced. And it’s absolutely the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever had to deal with. Cancer? At seventeen? Are you kidding me? I’m not going to be one of those people who has to have a benefit for them to raise money so they can get back to their regular life. I’m a cheerleader. I will cheer myself up. I will overcome this!

  The angel said I would.

  I know Mom and Dad had to sign a form giving Dr. Dykema permission to “do whatever is necessary” to save my life. However, no one is taking my leg.

  No. One.

  The medical staff flits around me connecting this, that or the other tube or wiring. Machines beep, whir, and hum. Are they all attached to me? So much technology.

  My nose twitches. A fiery itch.

  I pull my hand from under the covers and scratch away.

  “Don’t do that, Hayley,” the nurse instructs in a calming voice.

  “I have to . . .”

  A rubber-gloved hand comes down on my nose. “I’ll do it for you.” She scratches for a moment and I’m fine.

  It returns, though, and so does my hand, scratching away at the annoyance of this whole procedure. Fidgety frustration. Itchy irritation.

  “I’ve got it,” the nurse says, removing my hand once again.

  The third time I reach for my nose, another person steps in to strap my hand down to the operating table.

  My brain screams!

  Echoes of panic fill me like I’m those caged animals at the zoo. Let them be free. Let me be free. Don’t tie me down.