by J. Benson
I held out the key to put it in the lock, but missed twice. My vision was blurry and I couldn't seem to line up the key, the lock and my hand.
"Emma? What the hell?" He demanded, snatching the keys from my hand and pushing it into the key.
"Taylor..." I murmured. "Something is wrong."
"What? Emma just get inside before you get sick." He ordered.
"No, Taylor, it's something else..." I murmured.
He shook his head. "I can't understand what you're saying. You're not making any sense."
The front porch seemed to shimmer around me, all I could see was Taylor standing less than two feet from me. It was like someone had literally picked me up and tossed me violently in circles. Everything went black, and the last thing I could be sure I heard was Taylor's voice calling me. It sounded miles away.
Chapter 52:
Waking Up Lost
I woke up some time later, with absolutely no sense of how long I had been out for. I felt tired and confused before I was even able to open my eyes. I couldn't move; and the feeling that I was being held down or pushed down by something bigger and stronger than me.
I tried to kick my legs and flail my arms, but I couldn't move. I couldn't even open my mouth to yell.
"Emma?" A familiar voice called to me. I could have recognized the voice anywhere.
"Taylor?" I asked, barely managing to get the worlds out. My voice was hoarse and dry. My head was still pounding with enough force to make even speaking hurt.
"It’s okay... it's me... You're in a hospital..." He said, his voice sounded strained.
My eyes slowly opened, but I couldn't move. My eyes scanned the room. Taylor was right; I was sitting partially upright against a pair of lumpy and uncomfortable hospital pillows. I was held captive by white hospital bedding, the top blanket was knitted with a loose weave, and seemed itchy to the touch. The pale pink curtains hanging over the window did little to block out the light coming through, casting an eerie golden glow around the too white surroundings.
My eyes finally fell on Taylor. He looked exhausted, his eyes were rimmed with pink and there was a faint line of stubble on his face. His hair was standing up in several different directions from him running his hands through his hair.
"Why am I here? What's wrong with me?" I asked meekly. The part of me that had spent most of my teenage years following my father around in a hospital was afraid to ask. And even more afraid of what the answer might be.
"I don't know." He admitted, leaning closer to me. He brought his face within inches of mine His hand reached out lightly, stroking my hair back from my face. His usually warm fingers felt cool to the touch.
"How did I get here?" I asked.
"You fainted." He said carefully. "I brought you home from school because you said you weren't feeling well... before I could even get you in the house, you were talking to me... and I couldn't figure out what you were saying."
"What?" I asked softly. I remembered only part of what he was telling me. I remembered him bringing me home, but I didn't remember getting out of his car. Everything after that was pure darkness, a blurred, hazy memory.
"You were talking to me, and your speech was slurred... like you'd been drinking... and your words were mixed up. It was complete gibberish." He frowned at the memory.
I furrowed my brow in confusion. "What does that mean?"
"They're running tests on you; a brain scan and some blood work... You're going to be okay." He assured, stroking my hair lightly.
"Are you trying to assure me or yourself?" I tried to move my arm, and was finally able to reach for him, but my arm felt like it was weighted down. I reached to him and slipped my hand into his.
Taylor anticipated this movement, and his hand met mine halfway.
He smiled slightly and squeezed my hand. "Your grandmother is here. She just went to get some tea... do you want anything?"
"No." I replied. I was finally able to move my other hand, and as soon as I did, I knew it was a mistake. The back of my hand was killing me. "What?" I demanded, and removed my hand from his to pick at the object in the back of my hand. I squinted at the object sticking into my hand. I knew what it was, but my brain wasn't yet making sense of it.
"It's an IV." Taylor supplied.
"I know. Why? I only fainted..."
"The nurse said it was a precaution. They didn't know what was causing your fainting spells so they gave you an IV full of vitamins and fluids. Apparently it's called a-"
"Banana bag." I finished. "My dad was in and out of the hospital for three years... I know my way around a bit." I concluded. With my non-IV hand free, I reached up and ran my fingers under my nose. Someone had put me on a breathing tube under my nose.
"A nasal cannula?" I asked. "Why?"
"They thought it would help." He shrugged. "Just in case you had trouble breathing while you were unconscious." He explained.
I sighed and jerked it out of my nose, leaving the tubing draped around my neck.
"Emma!" He scolded.
"I don't need it. There's nothing wrong with my breathing, I can breathe fine!" I protested.
He sighed, and nodded slowly, reaching out and taking my hand again.
"How long was I out?" I asked curiously. "Has it been a while?"
"Six of the longest hours of my life." He replied, earnestly.
"So... that makes it... five in the afternoon?"
"Six thirty." He glanced at his watch.
I nodded. "I hate hospitals."
"I know exactly what you mean." He smiled. "I'm not exactly a fan myself." He squeezed my hand gently.
We were interrupted by the door opening and a middle aged man with hair graying at the temples. He was wearing a white coat with a stethoscope around his neck. He pushed his glasses up his nose as he checked the clipboard in his hands. I assumed it was my medical chart. "Emmeline Hatfield? I'm Doctor Johnson."
"How are you feeling?" He asked, checking my IV. He checked my heartbeat and glanced at one of the monitors I couldn't see.
"Horrible." I replied. It wasn't a lie. My whole body felt stiff and heavy, in a way I'd never experienced before. And my head was throbbing. "When can I go home?" I demanded.
Doctor Johnson sighed heavily. "Emmeline, I'm afraid I've got some bad news... There isn't really a protocol or a way of giving bad news properly, so I'm just going to come out and say it, okay?"
Taylor's hand tightened around mine. He looked worried. "Maybe we should wait until your grandmother gets back..."
"No. I want to know." I pressed; I looked up at the doctor. "Please tell me."
The doctor sighed again and sat down on the chair on the other side of my bed.
"Have you had any health problems in the past? Do you smoke?" He asked.
"No, I don't smoke." I glanced at Taylor cautiously. "I've been sick a few times since I moved here from New York, but that's probably just the climate change and the stress of moving to a new place and a new school and everything..." I explained, knowing the excuse was irrational as it was coming out of my mouth.
"Her father was a smoker. He died of cancer." Taylor supplied.Hearing the words coming out of Taylor's mouth nearly made me tear up. A part of me was actually surprised that he had remembered those facts from one of our earliest conversations.
I shook the thoughts from my head. "Why does it matter?" I asked.
"Have you noticed any extended dizziness? Weight-loss? Clumsiness? Fatigue?"
I glanced at Taylor, worriedly.
"Yeah, all of those. She mixed up her speech this morning too." Taylor pressed.
"Those are all symptoms." The doctor nodded.
"Symptoms of what?" I demanded. "What the hell do I have? What's wrong with me?" I demanded.
The doctor drew in a deep breath, a too long pause before he explained. "Okay. We did a scan of your head. And we've found an unusual growth.... It's about the size of a grape on the back of your skull. Just about where your neck meets your skull."
"A tumor..." I breathed. I didn't need to hear the word to know what he was referring to. With my father's illness, I knew all of the medical jargon. There were a lot of different words for it, but it all meant the same inevitable truth. Cancer.
And the diagnosis was never good. There was never a silver lining. Sooner or later, the disease took everyone it claimed in its filthy grasp.
"We aren't sure. We're still waiting on the results of your blood tests. We may have to do a biopsy..."
I sighed. "So if it is a tumor, the worst case scenario is a couple of weeks to a month. The best case could be a year, year and a half."
I wasn't stupid. I knew the facts and statistics, just as well as anyone else.
"We aren't even sure if it is a tumor yet." The doctor advised. "It could just be an abnormal growth...We don't know if it’s malignant or benign yet. We're still waiting on test results. I just thought it would be best to keep you up to speed on what has been discovered so far. But even if this is cancerous, it's not a death sentence. You're young, there's a chance you can beat this."
I nodded, dazed. There may have been a chance I could beat the cancer, but it was a small one. Not many people survived brain cancer. Brain tumors were one of the deadliest types of cancer.
"It's a lot to process, but I wanted to be sure you were up to speed..." He pushed himself up from the chair. "Do you have any questions? Can I get you anything?"
I slowly shook my head.
When the doctor left the room, I sighed and dropped my head into my hands. I was devastated. I was too upset to even cry.
"Emma..." Taylor whispered. "I'm sorry..."
The door opened again and this time my grandmother came in. Already she looked worried, and she couldn't possibly have known the prognosis yet.
"I saw the doctor just leave. What did he say?" She asked, sounding somehow slightly hopeful.
I sniffled and immediately reached for her. I could no longer hold back the tears that I hadn't even realized I'd been holding back.
"Emma..." She murmured, but embraced me tightly. "Emma, honey, tell me. What did the doctor say?" She asked. I could hear the emotion thick in her voice.
"They found... a tumor in my head." I sobbed.
"What kind of a tumor?" She asked without skipping a beat."They don't know yet. It could be cancer, they aren't sure."
"Oh, Emma. It's okay. We'll get through this, okay? I promise I'll be here the whole time..." She said, I could feel her tears dripping into my hair.
I pulled away slightly. "Grandma, don't cry."
"I know, Emma. I know." She wiped at her eyes hastily. "We're going to get through this, I promise."
Grandma sat down and took my other hand, the one with the IV.
"Emma, can I get you anything?" Taylor asked, his voice a dry whisper. "Maybe an orange juice or something to eat?"
I shook my head slowly.
"I'm going to give you two a minute alone, okay?" He whispered, standing. He released my hand slowly and lightly kissed my forehead. He quietly slipped out of the room, and I watched him go.
My bottom lip trembled, and I felt the tears returning.
"Emma, do they know if its cancer for sure?" Grandma asked.
I shook my head slowly, but the movement hurt. "No. The doctors are calling it a growth. But it's all the same. It all means the same thing, Grandma."
"No, honey. It doesn't." Grandma insisted. "It could be anything. It could be just an oversized pimple." Grandma shrugged. She was trying to be supportive, and to make me feel better. But it wasn't helping.
"Grandma, the doctor was pretty serious. I doubt that they're reacting this way over a big zit." I rolled my eyes. Even that hurt.
"Emma, we're going to get through this." She squeezed my hand tightly. A little too tightly, and with more strength than I thought she had. I wondered if she was trying to reassure me or herself.
"I've heard that before, Grandma. We said that to my dad. We all said that." I felt tears bubble to the surface again; I struggled to hold them back.
"Emma, listen to me. You are not your father." She spoke sternly, drawing out every word. "I mean it. You are going to beat this." She spoke slowly and emphasized every word as it came out of her mouth.
"You can't know that." I shut my eyes tightly, but the tears fell anyway, streaming down my cheeks in long straight lines. "No one can know that."
"I love you, Taylor loves you. Your mother... well, she has a funny way of showing it, but she loves you too. And I am not going to lose you. Not just because I can't bear to loose someone else in my life, because I can't bear to lose another child, birth child or grandchild." She insisted. "Because I'm not going to let it happen. We're going to fight this tooth and nail until you come out cancer free."
I opened my eyes slowly to see that my grandmother's eyes were brimming with tears. I sobbed harder, feeling even worse that I had made such a sweet and beautiful person cry.
If the cancer didn't kill me, seeing my loved ones go through the pain of losing me slowly surely would.
Chapter 53:
You are Not Alone
I was sitting up in bed the next morning, trying to process everything that had happened in the last few hours. I had hardly slept all night long, and I was exhausted.
Taylor had stayed until his curfew was up, before leaving unwillingly. My grandmother had stayed with me until she was falling asleep in the chair and I had to practically beg her to go home and get some sleep. She had been back first thing in the morning to bring me clothes and books. She stayed long enough to hear the diagnosis from the doctors, then left to go home and make arrangements. I assumed she was calling my mother, even though I insisted she didn't. Although I was thankful to be out of the itchy hospital gown.
The prognosis wasn't good. The doctors had run tests to discover that it wasn't technically cancer, but a benign tumor. It was very unlikely for the tumor to grow or move to other areas of my body, but the doctor and the oncologist on staff had agreed that I needed to do a round of chemotherapy. It was extensive, and would be very hard on my body, but it was merely a precaution.
In my mind, cancer was still cancer, regardless of the risk. If the doctors managed to cut out this tumor, and eradicate the cancer, it would be back, and much worse. Eventually, the cancer would claim me. It had happened with my father. Just when things started looking up, the cancer always returned. And it always came back stronger, and bigger than before.
My door opened and Taylor slowly poked his head into the room.
"You're awake." He whispered, eagerly.
I nodded slowly, moving my book from my bent knees. I hadn't been able to read anyway. I couldn't focus long enough to decipher a single word.
He crossed the room, dropped his backpack on the empty chair and sat down on the edge of my bed, pulling my hand into his. He picked up my hand and lightly kissed the back.
"How are you feeling? Any better?" He asked.
I nodded slowly.
"I brought your school work." He offered. "But I think you have a pretty good excuse not to do it." He was making a joke, and trying to be funny. But it wasn't working to lighten my mood.
I nodded again, distractedly. I silently chewed at my lips.
"What's wrong, Emma?" He inquired gently. "Everything is going to be okay, I know it will."
"You don't know that." I shook my head and slowly looked up at him. "You can't possibly know that."
He could see the tears in my eyes and reached out to stroke my cheek. "You're right." He whispered. "I can't know that. But I can feel it. And I have hope."
I moved out of his reach, scooting further away from him on the hospital bed. "I think we should talk, Taylor."
Taylor swallowed stiffly. "Okay..."
I hesitated, trying to find the right words to say. "I... I don't think we should see each other anymore.""What?" He demanded, clearly hurt. "Emma, I know you're sick now, but you'll get better and-"
I shook my head.
"No. Taylor, you don't understand... I've been through this before with my dad. When you go through this kind of thing with someone that you love... it changes you. I mean, my father died and my mother is an alcoholic and I'm clearly screwed up. I have trust issues that... I still can't fully understand or get past. I know you love me a lot, but I can't do that to you. I can't stand to watch you fall apart over me... so I think you should just leave now... before things get bad."
Taylor sucked in a deep breath. "So it is cancer then." He said evenly.
I nodded, a lone tear escaping from the corner of my eye. "They're going to put me into surgery tomorrow morning... and then start chemotherapy for four months. They're going to keep scanning my head to make sure it doesn't come back. It's unlikely that the tumor will metastasize to other parts of my body, but there's no guarantee. It's going to be hard, I'm going to be sick...very sick."
"But then you'll be okay again, right?" He asked hopefully.
"They don't know. Even if the surgery gets it all, and even if the chemo works... It's still going to be hard on me. I'll be sick from the chemo..."
"That's it? You're worried about losing all your hair?" He demanded.
"You don't lose your hair from this type of chemotherapy. It's usually radiation that makes you lose your hair." I supplied. "Either way, I'll be sick and throwing up... you don't need to be there for any of that. You don't need to do any of this... that's why I want you to forget about me and move on to someone else." I pressed, "You could get back together with Paige and it will be like I never existed. You can go to dances, and movies, and proms. You can spend time with your family, and enjoy your life. You don't need to be tied down with someone like me. Someone who's going to be sick, and struggling."
I was trying so hard not to cry. I was trying desperately to be strong, and keep my ground. He had to understand that this was the only way. He had to move on; and he had to forget about me.
"Emma!" He scolded; his voice was harsh and sharp. "You think that just because you get a little sick, I'm going to run away? Breaking up with me is not the right thing to do here. I want to be there for you, I want to help you wherever I can until you get better. And you will get better. You will beat this." He captured my hands in his and squeezed it tightly, "I am not going to run from this just because it's scary or hard to deal with. I love you more than that, and I will continue to love you. I'm going to be here; every step of the way. You're not alone in this. You will never be alone in this."