“Cancer,” he says. “I have cancer.”
She looks past him, not understanding the words, although they release images: a bald head, a hospital bed, bags of fluid hanging from an IV pole. A dryness starts in her throat, along with a faint hum in her ears. She feels as though she isn’t quite sitting on the chair anymore but hovering just above it. The backs of her thighs go numb with fear.
“How is that possible?” she says. “You’re young, you’re healthy.”
“Young, yes,” he says. “Healthy, apparently not. I’ve had some symptoms, but nothing I couldn’t explain, and then I fainted when the towers fell. I even ignored that for a week or two, but then I found this lump, and I knew it wasn’t good. I haven’t been to the doctor in years, and I didn’t have one here, so it took me a few days to find one. I had all kinds of tests. I’ll spare you the details, but it’s everywhere, including my bone marrow. They want me to start intensive chemo right away.”
She says nothing. The international drama of the past few weeks has left her feeling pummeled, but this hits her in a new place, a place she can’t protect.
Harlan begins to peel the label off his beer bottle.
“They’re not that hopeful, actually. I don’t have a good chance to survive this.”
She shakes her head. People survive cancer all the time. Years from now, among scores of survivors on a cancer walk, they’ll look back at this conversation and smile with hard-won wisdom. “Remember how you felt back then? Like the world was ending?”
He explains the terms: anaplastic large cell lymphoma, stage four. He describes the experience of entering the doctor’s office, hearing the diagnosis, sitting on his hands to stop them from shaking. The doctor had been reluctant to give him the odds, but Harlan had pressed. Thirty percent.
“Thirty percent die?” she says.
“No, thirty percent survive,” he says. “For five years or more.”
She stays in her chair, unable to move, although she feels strongly that she should do or say something uplifting. Instead, a question forms.
“Was Sylvie with you in the doctor’s office? Was she there?”
He looks uncomfortable, and she wishes she hadn’t asked.
“I haven’t told her yet,” he says. “She’s coming down this weekend. I don’t know how she’ll take it.”
“She’ll be devastated, Harlan,” she says, “but she’ll help you through this. So will I.”
A manic laugh escapes him.
“I’m not prepared for this,” he says, looking down. “It definitely throws a wrench into my retirement plans.”
“THIS IS IT for Nana Mavis. I’m just… I can’t… Call me.”
Lucy returned home in the late afternoon to find a message from her mother on the answering machine. The strangled “call me” acknowledged all that was to come: the bedside vigil, the funeral arrangements, the luncheon, the burial, the distribution of Mavis’s belongings, the final yard sale, the end of a century.
Bertie answered the phone when she called back.
“Dad, I just got the message. Where’s Mom?”
“She’s with Mavis. My heartburn started acting up, so she sent me home.”
“I’ll go keep her company.”
“She’ll be happy to see you, hon.”
Lucy ran a brush through her hair and went to tell Cokie about Mavis.
“Should I come with you?” Cokie said, looking up from a fitness magazine she must have brought with her. Lucy was grateful for the offer, even if she could tell that Cokie was hoping she’d say no.
“I’ll call if you need to be there,” she said. “I left an extra set of house keys on the dining-room table.”
Lucy drove to the nursing home, more worried about her mother than Mavis. Rosalee knew Mavis couldn’t have asked for a longer life, wouldn’t have wanted to live with tubes up her nose or needles in her arm. But that didn’t make losing her any easier. Mavis had been one of Rosalee’s closest allies, her connection to European tradition and an authentic marinara. Rosalee was on her knees, saying the rosary, when Lucy entered the softly lighted room. She stood up with effort, bracing her hands on a small chair near the bedside. Lucy hugged her, pressing her face into her mother’s soft shoulder. Then Mavis shifted slightly, letting out a barely audible sigh, and they both turned toward the bed.
“You know her real name wasn’t Mavis,” Rosalee said. “It was Rosalia, which means ‘melody.’ I was named after her.”
“But everyone called her Mavis.”
“She took it as her American name. It was popular back then, and she wanted to fit in.”
“She never seemed like a conformist to me.”
“Oh, we all conform. But you’re right. She developed independence with age. By the time she was eighty-five, nobody could tell her what to do.”
“How much longer?”
“I’m not sure, but you can say good-bye.”
Lucy kneeled, took Mavis’s hand, and thought of Joseph, Jesus’s father and the patron of happy death. Mavis’s breath was almost inaudible, but Lucy could feel that her hand was still warm, pulsing with the same energy she had carried through more than a hundred years inside a frame that had been thin but muscular as a child, sturdy and straight as a yardstick during her childbearing years, thinner and slightly stooped after menopause, and now brittle, almost weightless, a husk of her former self. Her skin felt powdery.
Lucy rested her forehead on Mavis’s hand, hoping Saint Joseph would lead her to a better place, a place where she could reunite with her dear Willard. Lucy could sense that Mavis was fading, life not draining away, as Harlan feared, as much as running its course, nearing the finish line. But then she heard footsteps and, through the open door, saw Paul run-walk down the hall as the three kids ran-walked behind him. Mavis’s breath resumed at a shallow but steady pace.
“I’m here, Ma. She’s not gone, is she?” Paul yelled before he was even to the door.
“Keep it down,” Rosalee said in a brusque whisper as Paul filled the frame of the doorway. “What if she can hear you?”
Sean, Molly, and Jack found places on the bench seat along the windowsill. Sean took out earphones and wedged them into his ears.
“Put that away,” Paul said. “Show some respect.”
“Just let me hear the rest of this song,” Sean said.
Paul walked over and yanked out the earphones.
“Take it easy, Dad.”
“Watch your mouth, young man.”
Rosalee came over and put her arm around Paul.
“I’ll take them to the cafeteria,” Rosalee said, shooing the kids toward the door. “You spend a little time with Nana.”
Paul went to Mavis’s side, made the sign of the cross, and stood with his head bowed. He couldn’t stay still for more than a few seconds.
“So what’s Cokie telling you,” he said. “Why isn’t she here?”
“Paul,” Lucy said. “Let’s worry about Nana Mavis, okay?”
“She’s a hundred and one,” Paul said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I’m sorry. I just can’t take this with Cokie. Is she leaving me or what? I don’t know what to tell the kids.”
“She’s not leaving you,” Lucy said, although she had no idea what Cokie planned to do. “I think she needs to see someone, a therapist, and talk things out.”
“My medical insurance doesn’t kick in until the first of May.”
“Look, let’s just give it a couple days and see what happens. Maybe she’ll realize what she’s missing and turn things around on her own.”
“Well, she picked a fine time to lose it. We’re starting a new menu and a dessert promotion next week, and I’m up to my butt in ad copy. Did I tell you they made me the manager?”
“No, when?”
“Last week. The old guy took a transfer to a T.G.I. Friday’s in Silver Spring. You wouldn’t believe it, but this place is a gold mine, Luce. I’ll have it doubling its profits in under a year.”
&nb
sp; Paul sat down in a chair near the bed and seemed to see Nana Mavis for the first time.
“She looks so small,” he said quietly. “So frail. When we were growing up, I thought she was a giant. A giant in orthopedic shoes. Remember those big black shoes she always wore? With that rubber tread on the bottom like a waffle iron?”
Lucy nodded. Rosalee brought the three children back into the room and asked each one to say a quick prayer for Mavis. Sean stood quietly at the foot of Mavis’s bed, looking chastened.
“Where’s Cokie?” Rosalee suddenly asked.
The kids looked at their father, who looked at Lucy, who made the sign of the cross again and turned back to Mavis.
“She’s out with some friends,” Paul said. “Away, actually, for a few days.”
Rosalee looked puzzled, but the doctor came in before she could ask any questions. She asked everyone else to wait outside. Ten minutes later, she opened the door and waved them all into the room.
“It seems her heartbeat is slowing, but she’s hanging on,” Rosalee said. “It could be another day or two.”
Paul bit his lip. “I’d better get the kids home,” he said.
“I’ll stay, Ma,” Lucy said.
“No, you go, honey. I want to spend some time with her alone. I’ll call you if anything changes.”
Back at home, Cokie was asleep, and Lucy’s answering machine gave her nothing but a blank stare. Louis had said he would call, but maybe he already regretted approaching her. That would be a first. Normally she had a first date before the phone call that didn’t come.
THE NEXT MORNING, Lucy came downstairs to find that Cokie had fixed her breakfast: toast, an omelet, juice, coffee. Cooking tools she had never used—when had she acquired a whisk?—littered the limited counter space, contributing to the air of neediness that Cokie had brought with her. Once used, these tools would have to be cleaned, returned to their places, recognized for their efforts.
“I hope the eggs in your fridge weren’t too old, because they looked a little gray,” Cokie said in an oddly cheerful way.
“You didn’t have to do this,” Lucy said, trying to remember when she last bought eggs. “I thought you needed a break from taking care of other people.”
“I guess I don’t mind messing up someone else’s kitchen. Now eat before the omelet gets cold.”
They sat at one end of Harlan’s dining-room table, which Cokie had set with place mats and the china Lucy had inherited from the same great-aunt who had left her $10,000. Cokie did all the talking.
“So I sat there thinking, What’s really going on here? and then it hit me. It’s not the money or the kids or Paul. It’s my energy. I’ve been on a low-carb diet, and it’s just sapping the strength right out of me. This is the first piece of bread I’ve had in eight weeks, and let me tell you, it’s like water in the desert.”
“Did anyone call for me last night?”
“Good thing you asked, because I forgot to write it down. The first time, he didn’t leave his name. The second time, we had a nice conversation. He seemed to know who I was. I think his name was Louie.”
“Louis.”
“Is he one of your students? He sounded like a teenager.”
Lucy buttered her toast and took a bite, ignoring her. It embarrassed her, somehow, to imagine what Cokie would think of Louis, who looked even younger than his thirty-two years.
“Oh, and there was another call,” Cokie said. “From a woman with a strange accent. She said she’d call you back today.”
“Yulia?”
“She didn’t say.”
“I better run,” Lucy said. “Thanks for breakfast.”
It was raining, so she threw on a long black raincoat and a beret to keep the water off her hair, which was sure to inflate to the size and texture of a toy poodle. Her hair had always functioned as a fairly reliable psychrometer, expanding and retracting along with the relative humidity. She left the house in a blur, with Cokie standing at the kitchen sink, scrubbing a frying pan. She made it to class just as her students were walking in and got them started on a discussion of the Iraq War, knowing it would tie them up for at least fifteen minutes; then she ran down the hall to her office to call Yulia.
“It’s Lucy. What’s going on? My sister-in-law said you called last night?”
“Good news,” Yulia said. “We move ahead. All paperwork is okay. You go to Murmansk in June.”
“That’s great. How’d it happen so fast?” she said, her breath coming in small bursts. Emotions pummeled her—fear, excitement, love, confusion—in quick succession, leaving her with the stomach-clenching feeling that she had just jumped from a great height.
“I have connections,” Yulia said. “And so you know, I use name of colleague on paperwork.”
“What does that mean?”
“Well, technically, I should not be involved in adoption of relative. I have another call. We talk soon.”
Lucy heard a dial tone before she could even say good-bye. She went back to her students, who were having a heated debate, even though they all seemed to be on the same side. She tried to follow the arguments but kept drifting away on a tide of what-ifs. What if Yulia couldn’t pull this off? What if her brother-in-law interfered? What if Lucy went all the way to Russia only to find out that Mat wouldn’t be coming home with her? Would it be like losing Harlan all over again? Could she shoulder another anvil, or would it crush her completely?
“Professor McVie?”
“Yes?”
“I think we’re out of time.”
She looked at her watch. “I guess you’re right,” she said. “Check your syllabus for the next reading assignment.” The students shuffled out of the room as Angela walked in carrying a pair of frog-shaped rubber boots.
“Nice boots,” Lucy said with a sigh.
“Vern actually tried to wear these to school today. They’re two sizes too small, and I just about had to cut them off his feet. I thought they might fit Mat in a few years.”
“Assuming the adoption goes through,” she said, packing up her book bag.
“Why wouldn’t it?”
“It’s a little complicated.”
“You’ve been walking around in a daze for weeks. Just give me the story. You know you want to.”
Angela sat down at the large central table and folded her arms, waiting. Lucy paced, telling the story from the first meeting in Yulia’s office to the last phone call.
“You can’t go through with it,” Angela said.
“You don’t understand,” she said. “I’ve seen him, seen him playing and heard him talking, and now I can’t start over. I think about him all the time, in that children’s home, eating gruel or whatever they feed them. He needs me, Angela. Not some couple in Boise with a tire swing in the front yard, but me. I can’t explain it, but I have this connection to him. I can’t just write him off and pick some other child. What if someone asked you to trade in Vern? Just say good-bye and start over with another kid.”
Angela looked at the rubber frog boots. “This isn’t a good day to ask me that question,” she said, standing up to go. “I hear what you’re saying, but I’m still worried.” Then she paused. “Heard from Louis lately?”
Lucy flushed and began rooting around in her book bag for some Chapstick.
“Tell me,” Angela said, sitting back down. “Tell me, tell me, tell me. Everything.”
“You’re embarrassing me,” she said.
“Oh, get over it,” Angela said, an edge to her voice. “Grow up and look at what’s in front of you. That man won’t wait around forever.”
“I know,” she said, her temples pulsing. “I’m going to call him right now.”
“You do that,” Angela said as she left the room. “Chocolate-covered peanuts don’t keep you warm at night, and they’re lousy at conversation. Take it from someone who knows.”
ON THE DOOR of Lucy’s office was a note from Dean Humphrey’s secretary.
“The dean would l
ike to see you in his office at ten thirty. Cheryl.”
Lucy threw down her book bag, dialed Louis’s number, and got his answering machine. She hated leaving messages—always wanting to edit and rerecord what she had blurted out—but she didn’t want him to think she was avoiding him.
“Hi, it’s Lucy. My sister-in-law didn’t tell me about your call until this morning. She’s a little wrapped up in her own problems right now… Oh, and my great-grandmother’s dying. Did I tell you that? That’s where I was last night, at the nursing home… and I’m just not sure—”
The machine cut her off.
She thought about calling back, but she couldn’t be late for her meeting with the dean. Dean Humphrey had been known to lock his door and leave if his appointments didn’t show up on time.
THE DEAN’S OFFICE usually smelled of drugstore aftershave and decaying books, but this time she detected something that reminded her of cows. The dean motioned toward his new leather couch, which squeaked as she sat down on it and every time she shifted, as if it were some kind of primitive lie detector.
“Lucy, Lucy, Lucy,” he said, looking back down at some papers on his desk.
“Dean, Dean, Dean,” she replied. Dean Humphrey’s first name was, in fact, Dean, which she and Harlan had always found hilarious.
“I know you’ve had a rough time this year,” he said, “but you haven’t published in quite some time, and your tenure review will begin soon. You know how it is, Lucy. The committee will insist on it.”
“You’re right. I know that. I had every intention of writing an article this year and updating my thesis to submit to a publisher next year.”
“Good plan.”
“Yes, except that things have come up and…”
The dean waved his hand, making it obvious that he didn’t need to know any more.
A Watershed Year Page 11