Escape Points

by Michele Weldon

  Thirty thousand people with this kind of radiation. Not so many when you consider that was about half of the number of fans who went to any single Chicago Bears football game in Soldier Field, the smallest stadium in the NFL. More than twice as many people lived in Oak Park.

  The brochure did not mention that the total bill at the end of treatment would be more than $90,000 for radiation alone. Insurance covered most of the bill. Thank God and the university for good insurance. The brochure also did not mention what the radiologist told me in person.

  “You should not be around pets or small children during the days of treatment,” said Dr. Adam Dickler, my radiation oncologist.

  What?

  “Just a precaution,” he said.

  “How small of children?” I asked, knowing my boys at ages twelve, fifteen, and seventeen were probably in the “big” category.

  “Newborns or infants, babies,” he answered. “Your boys are OK.”

  Did the radioactive material seep out of me after the treatment?

  I remembered the first X-Men movie where Anna Paquin played a superheroine named Rogue whose mere touch killed people. And then there was The China Syndrome with Faye Dunaway, back when Jack Nicholson was not so old and creepy—oh, so many movies where people died from the radioactive material. So what would happen in five, ten, fifteen years to us, the ones who opted for this kind of radiation? I didn’t want to dwell on the possibility that this treatment was experimental. I read Flowers for Algernon as a kid and saw the movie Charly. He was part of an experiment and he died. The New York Times later ran a front-page story on the experimental treatment. It sat on my desk for days until I had the nerve to read it all the way through.

  Dr. Dowlat endorsed this course of treatment emphatically. On my next visit I asked him about the article.

  “It is not experimental,” he said. “It is effective.”

  I trusted him, I had to.

  Down one hallway, nurses escorted patients who were receiving traditional radiation, the external X-rays, to an area where patients changed into hospital gowns and radiation was aimed at their cancer site, a spot tattooed in their skin. Everyone else in the waiting room was getting this kind; their names were called every few minutes. For the internal radiation, I went down another hallway and I was the only patient there.

  Isn’t anyone else having this kind? Hello?

  A nurse about my age, with a round, pleasant face and reddish-blonde hair to her shoulders, called my name. We went into a patient room where she checked my vital signs and the wound site. She asked me questions and made small talk; we both had sons named Brendan, the same age. She had a daughter, younger than her son. Next I would be going to another area for the radiation.

  “Can I read a book?” I asked her.

  “It’s only ten minutes. Why not just relax?”

  Sure, I can relax while the deadly radiation is inside my body. Sure. Might as well knit a sweater.

  Dr. Dickler directed me to still another room where he told me to lie down on the metal table. I did not need a hospital gown. I wore a shirt that could be lifted up easily. He would insert the tube to deliver the radiation into the catheter that was sticking out of my body like a throwaway pen. I liked Dr. Dickler; he was very friendly, personable. He looked way younger than me. Everyone on this side of the cancer was way younger than me. Except Dr. Dowlat.

  Signs on the door, in the hallway, and on the walls were in bold black letters: DANGER. RADIOACTIVE. DANGER. The round sign had the three-winged symbol for radiation that looked like a kitchen fan. DANGER. I get it: radioactive.

  The flat table had a foam pillow for my head. Dr. Dickler connected my catheter to the machine that would deliver the radioactive pellet, the size of a grain of rice, he explained. The pellet was smaller than the cancer Dr. Dowlat excised. I would be alone in the room while the radioactive seed was inside my body. Dr. Dickler would watch me from another room and he could hear me at any time, he said. I could ask questions, I could speak to him and the technicians monitoring the treatment.

  One of the technicians looked like a character in a Dr. Seuss book with a gentle face and a white bushy mustache. Posters of forest scenes were taped to one wall of the laboratory, which was about the size of my living room. My dentist has posters taped to the ceiling as well, but he also has a chair with a remote that controls heat and massage, really just a vibrating bump that moves from shoulder to knees. And your mouth still hurts.

  Dr. Dickler flipped on the machine, left quickly, and the door clicked shut. The machine that delivered the radiation looked like R2-D2 in Star Wars; it was the size of a shop vac. Looked harmless enough, except it wasn’t. DANGER. RADIOACTIVE. DANGER. It was like a scene in an early Woody Allen movie. Prime time for a panic attack, and I was trying not to have one.

  “We can hear you in the observation room if you need us,” Dr. Dickler said.

  Don’t worry, you’ll be just dandy here with the deadly radioactive material in your chest. No, you stay, just let me get the hell out of here.

  Alone on the table, I couldn’t feel anything going into my body, but I could hear the clicking and whirring of the machine like an electric toothbrush. I tried to relax, picturing the radioactive pellet sitting inside my chest obliterating the cancer site.

  Was it glowing? Was this my kryptonite? If this is so fine, why did all the doctors and technicians run away as soon as they connected the catheter and flipped the switch? Breathe. Stop thinking. Relax. I’ll pretend I’m getting a pedicure, or a massage. That’s it, I’m at the spa. I could pretend I’m at Miraval and waiting for the masseuse to find the hot oil to rub on my legs. This isn’t so bad. But it is quiet, completely quiet, deathly quiet except for the whirring. They should have music piped in, not the wind chiming, wave-rushing relaxation soundtrack played in every spa in every hotel I have ever visited, but maybe a little Motown, some Sheryl Crow, what the heck, Melissa Etheridge—the Cancer Singers. What’s that smell? Is that burning? Did they give me too much? Am I on fire?

  “Something smells burning,” I said out loud, motionless on the table. “Is that me?”

  “Nothing is burning, it’s fine, you are not burning,” Dr. Dickler answered from behind a glass wall, just as he said he would be able to. “Just a few more minutes.”

  I pictured myself cooking from the inside out, like one of those soy burgers in the microwave that did not taste at all like real meat but were only 120 calories. For ten minutes, ten long minutes, this was good. I would do whatever they said. I would take whatever form of therapy they suggested. I would eat it, I would drink it, I would let it sit in my body, I would wear it. I would agree to it all, I would not fight, I would not argue, I would do it. Because the alternative was far worse. My friend Lisa lost a close friend to breast cancer when we first met. Her friend decided she did not want to do the radiation and the chemotherapy. She did not want to go through it all; instead she chose alternative approaches, herbals and teas and acupuncture. She died and she had children.

  Yes, I was scared to die. For the record? I was afraid to die because of my sons.

  When I thought about dying, I really did not think about me. No really, I did not. I was not scared for me, not that I was ready for it or anything. I was scared for my boys. Probably since my thirties, after my father died in 1988, I began to feel this low-pitched drumbeat urgency that this was all there was and I was close to the halfway mark. When my mother died in 2002 she was graceful, had dignity, was unafraid. And it secured my feeling that this was finite, but that it was OK. All of my mother’s children were grown—we were fine, taken care of, on our own. She seemed at peace.

  Because of all of that, I have felt as if I was renting space in the world, had squatter’s rights. I knew none of this here was permanent, knew I wasn’t permanent, knew there was no overtime. I absolutely had better give this my all. Work hard, do all I can, love my children as much as I can, give back to the world. Don’t relax. Work, accomplish, keep going,
say what you mean. Mean what you say. Push for the next project, try to write another book as soon as possible. Be heard. Be good to my family. Be kind to my friends and plenty of strangers. Make a difference somewhere that adds to the cumulative joy of someone. Try. I didn’t own the place, no guarantees. But I didn’t want it to be my time to go just yet.

  Time was up. It did go quickly; it was only ten minutes. Twenty minutes a day, one hundred minutes total. Not bad if one hundred minutes can add years to your life, and that was what they promised. That was what I banked on. I said thank you to Dr. Dickler after he removed the long tube from my catheter. I went back into the patient room, and the nurse with the son named Brendan changed my bandage and told me she would see me later in the afternoon.

  This time I would bring cookies. That would be nice. Be the patient who brought food. When I saw her later she commented on how nice I looked and complimented me on my shoes or my skirt or my jacket. And everyone on the safe side of cancer smiled at me and was pleasant. And why not? They didn’t have cancer. The rest of us did.

  “No need to come back with me, I’m good,” I told Paul.

  “Sure, OK,” he said.

  But I knew he would show up, if not tomorrow then Friday. And he did show up, twice more that week; I walked in and there he was in the waiting room. My sister Maureen came once as well.

  When Paul came to the hospital, we talked and he told me jokes. Paul and I were close mostly because we were just a year and a half apart. I fixed him up on dates in high school, college, and after college. He fixed me up for high school and college formals, and all of them I forgave him for and he forgave me. He was my closest friend. When I was first divorced, he and his wife, Bernie, invited the boys and me over for dinner a lot. We went out to eat often, even vacationed with Bernie and their three. He included me in dinners, parties, and all-couples events and never once made me feel awkward that I was alone. He had a book signing party for my first book, selling copies in his backyard. He had been a champion for the boys and went to their wrestling meets and football games and was always there for us. Since his wife died—“passed” Paul said because I don’t think he could say “died”—we talked almost every day, sometimes more than once. “U.P.” my boys called him, for Uncle Paul. When I got home after the second round of radiation, I told the boys U.P. was there.

  “That’s good, Mom. It’s good you have U.P.,” Brendan said.

  When I started radiation, Paul lent us his Nissan Altima so Weldon could drive himself and Brendan to weights at 5:30 AM and I could sleep another hour before getting up to get Colin ready and get to work myself. Weldon also needed the car to drive to wrestling camp at 5 PM. With one car, that was impossible. I did it one day, raced home from work in an hour, picked up Weldon, drove the hour back, did work in the car while he was at practice, then came back home. That was exhausting, plus a total of five hours in the car for the day. Paul’s generosity was enormously helpful. After a few months, he surprised me with the title to the car; I had thought it was a temporary loan until I had my strength back.

  “It makes me feel good to help you,” Paul said. “I promised Mom I would.”

  12

  Poison

  * * *

  January 2007

  The young woman at the reception desk with the gold bangle bracelets was chirpy. The chairs against the wall were filled with patients. It was my first appointment with the oncologist on the eighth-floor Radiation Oncology Center.

  “Do you have a copy of your last will and testament?” she asked.

  “What did you say?”

  “If you don’t have it, that’s fine. Do you have your insurance card with you?”

  Still numbed from the first question, I fumbled through my purse to find my white insurance card and handed it to her. She continued to process my information, printed out a wristband, attached it to my left wrist, and then handed me my paperwork.

  I was positive she just asked me for a copy of my will. A nurse, doctor, or administrative assistant has never asked me for a copy of my will; not for my emergency appendectomy, the births of my three children, the wisdom teeth extraction when I was twenty-one, even the lumpectomy I just had. Old, sick people need copies of their will when they go to the doctor. I was only forty-eight. And I had cancer. Had. Past tense. I did not have cancer anymore.

  “I’m not planning on dying today, so why do you need to have my last will and testament before I meet the doctor?”

  “We just want it on file.”

  Got cancer? Everyone got right to the point. I was grateful she didn’t ask me if I want to be cremated. If anyone did ask, the answer was no. I would prefer the traditional route, the elaborate casket, the wake from 3 to 9 on two days, not just one, where hopefully the boys would be on time, have neatly pressed shirts, and not chew gum. The funeral could be first thing in the morning, a traditional mass with pretty music, my niece Alyssa could sing, then a printed program done on InDesign, not just thrown together, with hopefully a good picture of me, one where I am laughing maybe and my hair looks good. I hoped Madeleine would help the boys with their eulogies. God knows what they would say. Oh, and no elaborate headstone. I found those obnoxious—the huge statues of angels, the gilded and marble tributes, what was the point. I didn’t visit my mother and father’s graves, though all my brothers and sisters did. Not out of disrespect, of course; I really didn’t want to. It didn’t make me feel better; it made me feel worse. I didn’t need to go to their graves to talk to my parents. I would tell the boys they didn’t have to visit my grave, but I would not bring that up now. That wouldn’t be for a very long time. They probably wouldn’t visit anyway, so it would be better if eventually I told them I didn’t want them to, then they wouldn’t feel any pressure. But I would be old when that happened. I would be ninety, maybe one hundred. I would get very old. Why did she need the will today? I was not going to die today.

  Mike offered to drive me and waited there if I needed him to talk to the doctor; sometimes the doctors spoke in codes. I considered myself an educated person, and I took four years of Latin in high school, but some of the words the doctors said I had never heard before. Like brachytherapy and the drug names. I knew the basics: penicillin, the sulfa drugs the boys have taken for infections, and the drugs my mother took in the last years of her life—Fosamax, Halcion, and a half dozen more. They could just as easily have been the names of cars.

  The waiting room was filled with close to one hundred people waiting for several doctors in the center. Many were older people, some younger, some more were bald. People in wheelchairs, people with walkers, men, women, white, black, Asian, Hispanic—reading the paper, the magazines, drinking coffee, watching TV, staring straight ahead. It was like a gate in the airport terminal, but with oxygen tanks. Like every other element of synchronicity, you got a diagnosis of cancer and suddenly the whole world had cancer. Molly Ivins had cancer. An outspoken newspaper columnist and author, I saw her speak at a conference a few months ago; she was thin and looked weak, but her words could still knock over a charging bull. We both worked at the Dallas Times Herald in the 1980s, and when she was in the newsroom, boy, everyone knew it. She died. Lots of people with cancer died.

  “I like your skirt,” a woman in a turban said as she smiled to me.

  You could gather a lot of compliments in the radiation and oncology waiting rooms, I have found; polite consideration, everyday niceties, warm greetings, kind encounters are the norm. It was as if you arrived in this place after your diagnosis and we all figured life was too short, so why the hell not, might as well be as pleasant as possible; we were all in the same boat.

  “Thank you,” I said. “I like your blouse.”

  Mike and I moved from the reception hall to sit in another crowded area; a few minutes later, a nurse called my name. She was also smiling and bubbly, like a human fruit smoothie.

  “I can’t wait to get away this weekend,” she told me in a familiar tone, like this was not the fi
rst time she weighed me or met me, but we were old school friends. For a second I forgot where I was; it felt like she and I could talk about shoes. Or the weather, or what we each had for dinner the night before. She weighed me, took my blood pressure, and walked me back to a treatment room where I would meet Dr. Ruta Rao. In oncology centers, losing weight is a bad thing. They want your weight to stay the same. I could have started to hyperventilate. But I kept breathing slowly, through my nose.

  Like most every doctor on my support team but my surgeon, Dr. Rao was younger than I was. She was beautiful and petite, polite and soft-spoken. After some small talk, she handed me a printout from Adjuvant! Online. I was not sure why it had an exclamation point in the title; I guess they really mean it.

  Don’t use exclamation points in your writing, I told my students. Save that punctuation to follow the words fire and help.

  On the left-hand side of the single white sheet were boxes the doctor had typed in under the heading PATIENT INFORMATION. For age, 48; for comorbidity, average for age. My ER status—for estrogen receptor—was positive, that was good. Tumor grade was 2. On a 1 to 10 scale, I guessed. That’s good, low side. Tumor size, 0.1 to 1.0 cm. Zero positive nodes. That was also good. My ten-year risk of relapse was 18 percent. Wait, that’s almost a fifth. Four out of five people are alive without a recurrence of cancer in ten years. But one is not so lucky. Was I the one?

  Ten years; that used to seem like a long time. At my ten-year college reunion everyone looked exactly the same except for the former homecoming queen, who had gained about a hundred pounds. Many of us were pleased with that detail, though I knew in my heart it was mean. The twenty-year college reunion was different. The women looked outstanding and the men not so good; they were bald and had bellies that hung out over their belts, and they still couldn’t dance, though they acted as if in all that time no one had told them that simple truth. The men acted like they still were cute, you know, as Colin would say, “like they owned the place.”