‘Mr Wilson, you remember when I asked you about your alcohol consumption I asked if you ever felt nauseous with it?’
‘Yes? I mean, yes I do. I mean, I do remember and don’t feel nauseous. Why?’
‘It’s one of the symptoms, that’s all.’
‘One of the symptoms of what?’
‘One of the symptoms of lymphoma.’
‘Which means you now think that’s what it is?’
‘We don’t think it is, but we need to test you to rule it out.’
‘A biopsy through the back?’
‘Yes.’
She began again: ‘And night sweats, do you get those at all?’
‘Another symptom? No, I don’t.’
‘We just have to go down the path I’m afraid. Of asking you everything. In case it is. Which we hope it isn’t.’
And then I couldn’t help myself.
‘Why does the lymph system do this? I mean, make growths, abnormalities, whatever we want to call them, when it’s the system that’s supposed to protect you?’
For the first time she looked upset, the guard dropping a little. She waved her hands in front of her hair, gave a tense smile and briefly caught a glance at the ceiling.
She tried to breathe a chuckle.
‘We. We don’t know, Mr Wilson, to be honest. It’s one of the big questions. What we do know is that for some reason your body has made one and that we need to sort it out for you.’
‘I’m sorry. Thank you.’
‘No, it’s fine, you must ask if you need to.’
‘Usually it works like this.’ She perched on the end of the bed. ‘The body has different sites of lymph nodes, where I examined you yesterday, if you remember. When you’ve an infection or some disease the body needs to fight off, these are what makes the body resist it. And sometimes,’ she patted my arm, ‘the cells which do that go on growing once the infection is over. And that seems to be what’s happened in your case.’ She scanned my face and tried on a smile. ‘We don’t know why it happens.’
‘So when you biopsy me, that’s what you’ll be looking for?’
‘Yes, it is.’
The biopsy was not a quick procedure. The radiologist kept emphasising how I’d need to keep absolutely still while they were taking the plugs of material from me because he was using ‘the biggest needle I’ve got.’
‘Will I feel anything?’
‘No. We’ll jab you first with a local.’
‘Good. Which way will you go in?’
‘Through your back I should think. There are too many organs in the front to get in the way. Your small intestine. One of your main arteries. That sort of thing.’
‘Oh.’
‘And even going through your back we’ve only a fine margin of error. So keep as still as you can and we’ll be fine.’ He reached out to pat my shoulder.
I lay on the ironing board on my stomach, and waited.
They were just about to press the green light when they stopped. ‘Mr Wilson, you can sit up if you like,’ the nurse said. ‘Doctor’s gone out for a chat about which is the best way.’
I sat on the ironing board in my gown, my uncovered back now feeling cold. I looked down at my feet and was surprised to see I’d kept my socks on, a pair of woolly ones my grandmother once knitted me.
‘What’s going on?’ I asked.
‘We don’t really know. They’re talking, it looks like, about whether it’s through your tummy or not.’
‘Oh, I thought they’d decided.’
‘Well, they had. Now they’re talking about it.’
The doctor came back in.
‘Nothing to worry about Mr Wilson. It is the back, as we’ve said all along. My colleagues needed to, er, talk it through with me.’
He was standing in front of me, clearly keen to get on with it.
‘So if you’ll resume your position, if you could, that will be great.’
This time they inserted some bedding, a towel or something, just above my knees and ankles. It made a huge difference. I felt my body go limp. Under my cheek they slotted a large sponge, with a paper towel covering it, I guessed to catch my saliva. Another nurse came round to the other side of the polo, where my head would soon be sticking out.
‘Nice and still now, Mr Wilson, if you would, nice and still from now on,’ I heard from above. I began to slide into the machine. ‘First injection coming now, Mr Wilson. This will give us the image from which we’ll work.’
I prayed I wouldn’t shit myself.
‘That’s lovely, Mr Wilson, you’re doing great.’
The machine slid me back to where I had come from.
‘Now, I’m just going to start prepping your back. Bit cold where I’m rubbing you’ – it was cold – ‘and in a minute a couple of sharp scratches.’
I had made the decision to turn away from the main action as soon as I lay down. My hands were joined above my head, just above the paper-covered sponge. I felt someone else’s fingers interlock with mine. It was the nurse. She began to ask me what I did. I grunted. ‘I train teachers. Primary School ones. You know, at Luke’s.’
‘Oh, Luke’s,’ she said. ‘My daughter wants to do Early Years at Rolle. Well, Plymouth.’
‘Good for her.’
‘How long you done that then?’
‘Three and a half years.’
‘Like it?’
‘Love it. I miss it, actually.’
‘I’m not surprised, love.’ She squeezed my fingers.
I heard a tap gushing, the sound of hands greasing themselves with soap.
‘OK Mr Wilson, some scratches now. It’s the local, in order that we can proceed.’
‘Fine.’
‘I’m just getting my felt tip out a minute, X marks the spot kind of thing, then we’ll get going.’
‘Fine.’ He drew on my back.
‘Here come the scratches, Mr Wilson.’
‘Fire away.’
‘D’you feel that?’
‘Yes. A bit. It’s OK.’
‘You’re doing very well. Here comes the other.’
This was much worse. I felt my whole body wince with the pain. The hands from above kneaded mine.
‘I say, Mr Wilson. You’re doing very well. It should take effect soon. Can you feel that?’
He prodded my back.
‘No not really. Just the pressure of your thumb.’
‘OK. That’s great. You really are doing extremely well. Nice and still now while we go in. Did you feel anything there?’
‘Nothing at all.’
The fingers kneaded.
‘And now?’
‘No.’
‘Great. Just keep it like this and we’ll be done in no time. We’re going to send you in again with another shot into your cannula. Then we’ll take out the material.’
Once again the warm jet into my hand. The polo whirred. The hands had disappeared. ‘Take a deep breath. And. Breathe away.’
I reversed back out of the polo.
‘We’ve taken our photo Mr Wilson. In a second you’ll hear some loud clicks. That’s me taking the material. It won’t hurt.’
‘Good.’
The click was very loud. ‘OK. Nice and still, you’re doing extremely well, here comes click two.’
The hands were back, stroking my fingers up and down.
‘And, just to be sure, we’ll take one more, here it comes now.’
Click!
And that was it.
‘Brilliant, Mr Wilson, you did absolutely wonderfully well. Really well done. Nice and still for one minute more while we tidy you up.’
I felt them wiping me with what felt like a small sponge.
‘Nearly done there Mr Wilson,’ said the nurse.
‘Is the needle out?’ I asked.
‘Oh yes, ages ago. Now we’re just making you comfortable. In a minute you can sit up.’
The doors to the CT room burst open. A bed was wheeled in and parked next to the ir
oning board. A foot started pumping somewhere below the bed and magically it came to rest level with me.
‘So, Mr Wilson, really well done, we’re going to ask you to lift yourself up off the bed and walk your legs across to the bed next to you.’
I felt my legs obey, but my body was not so compliant. Two pairs of arms reached under mine and gently levered me up. I pushed down on the ironing board and slid myself over onto the bed. I looked back at where I’d been lying and was just in time to see a large smear of blood being mopped up.
‘Just a little bleeding,’ the doctor smiled. ‘Really nothing to worry about.’
And then I felt myself being wheeled back through the doors, across the radiology corridor, and into a small bay off it, next to two empty beds.
Tatty was there waiting for me. She bent down and kissed my forehead. ‘I’m so proud of you.’
My doctor came over and smiled at me from his great height. ‘Well, we hope we got enough material. Sometimes it’s just dead cells. We certainly hope not.’
I smiled back, feeling suddenly sore.
For the first time I knew I was scared.
Groggy from the biopsy, and in a little room off the main ward, Tatty brought me a fantastic apricot and custard Danish from the hospital ‘boulangerie’ with a coffee. But I was forbidden to sit up to drink or eat.
Esther appeared in my doorway and asked how it went.
‘First it was through my back, then through my tummy, then my back again. Apparently there were three of them there behind the screen deciding which way to go. It’s obviously not easy to get to.’
I took another mouthful of Danish.
Tatty said, ‘He’ll be hating this. Crumbs in bed drive him mad.’
Esther found this hilarious.
‘Do you want a bit?’ I said.
‘I think you deserve it far more than me.’
‘Tatty’s right. I do hate crumbs. But it’s an amazing Danish. Anyway they got three plugs of stuff in the end. The only thing was, he told me he couldn’t be 100% sure they got enough because of the obliqueness of the angle they had to use. He said they might have got only dead cells, but was hopeful they had enough.’
‘This sometimes happens,’ she said.
She looked down at my hopeless attempts to sip coffee through the lid of my cup.
‘It looks like you need a straw. Straws I can do.’ And she left.
I saw James Bradley for coffee today. He came round half one-ish, just as I finished the kitchen floor.
After the usual banter (Palace lost to Preston in the Cup), we got down to brass tacks. He told me that what happens to the lymph gland is it starts splitting cells – or rather, cells start splitting within it, and this forms a solid mass. Like Dr Esther, he has no idea why this happens.
‘How close is it to the aorta?’
‘Very.’
He frowned.
‘Of course that might not be tricky, the aorta, even though it’s like a hosepipe,’ he made an ‘O’ with his fingers, ‘is extremely flexible. They’ll probably hold it out of the way while they work on the lump.’
‘You’re talking about surgery?’
‘Even if it isn’t malign, they’ll still have to get rid of it, surely,’ he said, matter-of-factly.
‘The good news is,’ he brightened, ‘it doesn’t sound aggressive. No signs anywhere else?’
‘None.’
‘They might not even need to use chemo then.’
He’s such a delight, even though his brain does move so fast. He brought me McGough’s new Penguin Selected, just about the perfect gift for ‘raising a smile’ as he put it.
‘I knew Birkett of Birkett’s Lymphoma fame,’ he told me. ‘Friend of mine at Cambridge. You can see his statue at Dublin airport in a line of famous Irish scientists.’
9 February
Not a bad night last night. Don’t remember waking or sweating. The first night back after hospital was dreadful, waking drenched with sweat and hardly sleeping at all. It took me back to Esther’s methodical questioning. The next night was also sweaty, but less so. Let’s hope it was nothing. It reminded me of Tom Gunn’s poem. I swear I lay awake planning and saying over to myself lines of seven syllables in homage to him: ‘On re-reading “The Man with Night Sweats”’, daft and somehow grand. I’m sure there was even a line there which rhymed ‘plague’ and ‘gay’. Not clever.
I’ve hardly been able to read anything. Hardly any poetry. I just don’t seem to want it. All I have read is the sports pages, and little bits of Jaan Kaplinski:
Death does not come from outside. Death is within.
…
Makes with us our first sexual contacts.
Marries, bears children, quarrels, makes up.
Separates, or perhaps not, with us.
Goes to work, goes to the doctor, goes camping,
To the convalescent home and the sanatorium.
Bizarrely, I find this reassuring, because it is simple and not trying to ‘say’ anything. Almost refreshing in his way, and also because so little of nearly everything spends its time in the circle of the final questions. And he is not afraid to do that – like Carver and Tranströmer, who I also go back to most often. As always, I think when I read him: ‘How does he know so much about me?’
Dictionaries are useless. Under lymphoma it first says ‘tumour of the lymphatic system’. Under ‘tumour’ (I even know what that is!) it says ‘morbid growth’; and under ‘morbid’ all it says is ‘of death, disease’. A diseased growth on my lymphatic nodes, well I knew that. Why doesn’t my dictionary say ‘Anthony you have cancer of the lymphatic system’? I did learn that lymph is pale yellow, apparently, and alkaline, and slightly salty to the taste. Good. I wouldn’t want it to be green and acid and tasting of bile, because that would be really scary.
Saturday 11 February
They told me yesterday.
I saw Alison (a GP) at the school gates with Juliette. As with the others earlier in the week she insisted not having heard was a good sign. I replied I knew it was still a week before they said they’d ring me, but couldn’t dislodge the need to know, nevertheless. Earlier in the week Jasper Hampson had said to me in the street: ‘But if it was good news, why would they delay telling you? It’s completely illogical.’ So I bought Shimi a cake and gave him tea, and once he was ensconced on the computer, called Esther at EMU.
The secretary was efficient, calm. ‘Does she know you?’
I could hear her passing the phone, asking if she needed my notes. I could hear Esther saying No, she wouldn’t.
‘Hello, Esther, I just had one quick question if that’s okay?’
‘Mr Wilson. You’ve saved me a phone call actually. I was going to call you later.’
‘Well, shall I ask my question? You might be answering it anyway, in a minute, if you know what I mean.’
‘Fire away.’
‘Well, I was first wondering, does not having heard anything mean anything one way or the other, I mean, I know you said two weeks.’
‘It’s academic now, in any case. We’ve had your results. It is lymphoma, as we had thought.’
There was a silence.
‘Well thank you for letting me know. That’s good. I mean, it’s not good, it’s good of you to tell me. Thank you.’
‘Do you have a pen? I need to give you some details about next week, who you’re going to see next.’
‘Yes, right, a pen. Thank you.’
Then she told me I was going to see a consultant haematologist, on Tuesday, in area A, Level 1, at 9.30.
‘Thank you for everything.’
‘That’s alright. Goodbye.’
A great blankness came over me as I pressed the red button on the phone. I went to the window overlooking the road and thinking (not at all over-dramatically, I thought): How many more times will I witness this perfectly ordinary scene of people walking back from school, parking their cars and standing talking on the pavement? Then I took another c
ircuit of the room and wondered why I did not feel more anguished. I almost said out loud ‘What am I supposed to do now?’ I plonked myself back down on the sofa, picked up the Guardian I’d been reading five minutes before, and continued scanning the album reviews, as if I’d just put the phone down to my mother. As it happens, I’m not really bothered what the Guardian (or anyone else) thinks about the new Miles Davis outtakes box-set, as it is music not aimed at me, and he doesn’t need me to help him. But at that moment it took on a vital new significance, What the Guardian Thinks Of The New Miles Davis Outtakes Box-Set, as if it had become part of my new and as yet unsaid resistance to having cancer. I cannot remember a syllable of that article. But I do know that the sun came out, briefly, that a car went on being parked, that the house made its usual ticking noises, and that I felt utterly empty, nonplussed, lost in thought and completely thought-less at the same time.
I went and stood by the other window, then sat on the bed for a few pages of The Stone Diaries until I heard Tatty’s key in the door. I haven’t picked it up since.
Later I phoned round the family. Both Mummy and Daddy said, ‘I’m so sorry.’ Mummy cried quite a lot. ‘We love you, darling.’
When I phoned Mart he went even quieter than normal (I can hardly hear him on the phone these days). ‘I’m sorry, Ant.’ Rich said, when I told him it was lymphoma, ‘Wow! Ant! What is it? How are you feeling?’ And Sarah, back at Grove Road, having heard it all on speaker phone, said she was sorry too, and maybe they could come down sometime soon.
Then I went to Robyn and Rory, and the Olsens. All I remember is what they were eating. The Laceys some kind of vegetable broth, with dumplings, all five of them seated round their tiny square table like that Van Gough picture of the potato eaters. Robyn put her arm round me. ‘It’s not the end, Ant. Look at me. I’m still here. You’ve just got to write off a year of your life and get better.’
Adam had three flat fish all ready for the oven: ‘Two Dover Sole and one fat Brill.’
‘I love Brill,’ I said. Since his cooking course he’s obviously going for it, the table full of plates with chopped veg and ingredients. Military planning in his mises. They gave me hugs and said if there was anything they could do, anything, and I said we certainly would. The main thing is that none of them text Bendy, in Germany on her school trip. We have to tell her face to face.
Love for Now Page 2