by Claire Adams
“So if you can’t tell me anything, why are you still talking?” I snap.
Yeah, it was a little rude, but let’s be fair: this guy just told me that I might not be alive in 10 years. I get that it’s not his fault, but that doesn’t make this any easier to swallow.
“We’d like to go ahead and get you started on your first course of chemotherapy right away,” he says. “That way, we’re on top of it, and it’ll be that much sooner before we can get a better idea which direction this is going to go.”
“Five days?” I ask. “I have to get back to work. I can’t sit here for the next five days while you pump toxic shit into my veins. I have things to do.”
“I really do think it’s best that we get on top of this as soon as we can,” he says. “That said, if you’d like to schedule a time in the coming days that would be better, like I said, this is a slow-growing tumor, so a few days shouldn’t make that great a difference.”
“You’re really inspiring that confidence,” I tell him. “The problem is that I don’t really think a few days is going to be enough of a wait. Why don’t we just all go back to our lives, you can give me a prescription for something that’s going to prevent any more seizures, and we can call that good?”
“I know you’re scared,” he says, “but the sooner we start your treatment, the sooner we’ll have some clearer answers. And I know that I’ve said a few times that this is a slow-growing tumor, but it’s already progressed far enough that you’re having seizures-”
“Seizure,” I interrupt, “singular. What you’re telling me is that I have a brain tumor that it’s in a place where you can’t just go and dig it out, and that even with chemotherapy, you’re not sure how much time I may or may not have left on this planet, so if it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll-”
“It’s your choice whether or not you consent to treatment,” Dr. Churchill says. “This is the best course, in my medical opinion. If we sit back and do nothing, your oligodendroglioma is going to continue to grow unabated, and yes, I’m going to prescribe you something to help prevent seizures, but that’s not going to treat the underlying cause. So, it’s up to you.”
“You know, you’re kind of sexy when you’re frustrated,” I tell him.
It’s a deflection, sure, but I don’t feel the slightest bit comfortable making this decision right now. I don’t know if I ever will be, but right now, I want to make him feel just as uncomfortable as I feel.
The problem is, that’s not really possible given the current situation.
“Thanks?” he says, looking to his colleague who, for some reason, hasn’t yet left the room. “But I think we should talk about your treatment.”
“You said oral chemotherapy, right?” I ask.
“That’s right,” he answers. “It comes in a capsule that you can take at home.”
“So, it’s less effective than the needle-in-the-arm stuff?” I ask.
“Not necessarily,” he answers.
“I thought people came to the hospital when they were taking chemo,” I retort. “Tell me it’s not my particularly rosy demeanor that’s made you decide to send me home instead.”
He smiles with a mouth full of straight, white teeth, saying, “That’s not it at all. I just think that this is the course that would be best in this situation.”
“Then why do other people come in when they get chemo treatment?” I ask.
“There are a few reasons,” he says. “First and foremost, when IVs are involved, it’s best to have as close to a sterile environment as possible. Outside of a sterile or mostly sterile environment, all kinds of nasty things can enter the system through the IV site, and especially with something like chemo that has a profound impact on the white blood cell count, that’s not a risk that’s really worth taking.”
“But oral chemotherapy doesn’t have that problem?” I ask. “I mean, I know there’d be no injection site or whatever, but the white blood cell count — that wouldn’t be knocked-”
“You’ll still want to be careful,” he interrupts. “Stay away from people who are sick, have recently been sick, or are at risk of getting sick — you know, like parents with sick kids and that sort of thing. There are some other things that you’ll want to know before we send you home, but first, I’d like to answer any other questions you may have.”
“Is the treatment any better than the disease?” I ask.
“We’ve found that chemotherapy can be very effective for people with oligodendroglioma,” he answers.
“You didn’t answer my question,” I tell him.
“Chemo’s not without its risks,” he says. “There are side effects, and you’ll need to contact me when or if they happen to you. That said, I’m confident in this course of treatment.”
“Is the treatment any better than the disease?” I ask again.
“With any treatment, it’s important to weigh the risks and the benefits,” he says. “In your case, I feel confident in this course.”
“Yeah, you’ve said that a few times,” I scoff. “You still haven’t answered my-”
“It’s not going to feel better,” he says. “Most people on chemo, oral or intravenous, have serious side effects, many of which are not very pleasant.”
We go on like that for a while. He tries to convince me that chemo’s the way to go and I try to avoid the reality that I’ve got this thing growing in my brain that may or may not kill me before I have a chance to settle down and maybe squeeze out a kid or two.
I’m only 24 years old.
This can’t be happening.
Chapter Two
Being the Entertainment
Jace
I knew when I went into medicine that it wasn’t going to be an easy thing. That’s not why I did it. I’m not a doctor because I have some delusion of always being able to save the day, and I didn’t go into oncology because it’s an easy specialty to deal with.
Still, it never gets easy telling someone they have cancer.
“Hey,” I call to Melissa, my girlfriend, “I’m going to be out for a couple of hours.”
“All right,” she calls back from the other room.
Melissa: she’s been with me since before I graduated med school. We both knew that my life wouldn’t slow down after graduation, but we only knew that intellectually.
The reality has been a bit harder on our relationship than either of us had expected.
It was her idea for me to start telling her that I’m “going out,” rather than “I’m going to work.” In reality, I don’t know if it’s made things any better between us, or if it’s actually changed anything at all.
I’m not headed to the hospital, though.
I didn’t get a page or a phone call. I’m not scheduled to be in, and I’m not on call.
Where I’m going, well, it’s just part of the reality of a recent med school graduate in the second decade of the new millennium in America.
“Recent med school graduate” these days means anyone who’s still looking at six figures in student loan debt. At the rate I’m going, I’m going to be a recent grad for at least another decade.
I’m wearing my finest set of clothes, and I’m just hoping that I don’t get recognized by anyone while I’m out on the town. What I’m doing is a risk in a number of ways, and I’d really rather avoid an awkward situation if at all possible.
“When do you think you’re going to be home?” Melissa asks.
“I don’t know,” I tell her. “I don’t think it’ll be any later than midnight, though.”
“All right,” she says. “Just remember the rules.”
Ah, the rules. I couldn’t forget them.
Where I’m going, what I’m doing tonight…it wasn’t my idea, and it took Melissa a while to open me up to it as a possibility.
You hear things all the time about people who do what I do for my second job, and none of them were things that I saw as being compatible with my station as a doctor or as a man in a committe
d relationship.
Unfortunately, with the way the interest is accruing on those student loans, I had to find something to fill in the gaps.
“A bit heavy on the cologne, don’t you think?” Melissa asks. The fact that she’s asking from the other room is enough for me to wash my wrists and my neck until I can barely smell the stuff.
I dry myself and button my shirt back up before I take one more look in the mirror.
Sure, Melissa may have talked me into doing this initially, but the fact remains that I’ve come to love what I do. If nothing else, it’s a great way to disconnect from my day job.
I walk out into the living room, but I don’t bother asking Melissa how I look. I just give her a kiss on the forehead and tell her that I’ll be back before too long.
I’m an escort and I’m on my way to pick up my date.
I know what you’re thinking, but I’ve never had sex for money. That’s not what I do; I’m simply good arm candy for single women who don’t want to go out alone.
I don’t kiss, and physical contact even on the level of holding hands or putting my arm around my client is a rarity. That’s not to say that I’ve never been propositioned by a client, but I’m content in my relationship.
All right, maybe it’s been a while since I’ve been able to say that I’ve been “happy” in my relationship with Melissa, but I haven’t felt the need yet to risk everything—and I do mean everything—by sleeping with a client.
Melissa is a beautiful woman, and what’s more, she’s intelligent. Even if she didn’t have the long, flowing blonde hair, the big blue eyes, the large—if fake—breasts, and the tight butt, I still would have fallen in love with her mind.
The rest is just a perk: a very, very nice perk.
She purses her lips as she looks down at her crossword, completely ignoring my lingering presence.
This is how it goes before I head out for a job.
The service sometimes springs for a town car, but it looks like I’m stuck in a cab tonight.
I don’t have fancy tastes or anything like that; the problem is that the kind of transportation arranged is indicative of a client’s pocketbook. Town cars are generally somewhere in the middle of the road. Limousines, while one might think they’d only be requested by a wealthy client, are generally reserved for recently-18-year-old girls looking for someone to take them to prom, and those never pay very well.
The best of all possible worlds is when a client asks that I show up driving some exotic sports car, although I’ve only ever gotten that particular call a couple of times in the year that I’ve been doing this. Those are the clients with the deep pockets.
Getting a call to pick someone up in a cab…I’m not expecting a big tip at the end of the night.
I head downstairs and wait for my cab.
The rules for tonight, just like any other night on the job, are simple.
First, never am I to give any kind of physical contact other than incidental touching of the hands. Putting my arm around someone or allowing them to put their arm around me is extra, and that’s as far as it can ever go.
Second, Melissa insists that I don’t have more than two cocktails on any given night while out on the job. I don’t know if she thinks people want to get me drunk to see what happens or what, but I’ve never been in a situation with body shots or beer bongs.
Not since college, anyway.
Third, if we have plans and I get a call, I don’t take the job. This one has never really been an issue, though, as we never seem to have plans anymore.
Finally, at the end of the night, it’s my sworn duty not to tell her anything about what happened on the date — and I mean absolutely nothing.
She doesn’t want to hear where we went or who I was with, she doesn’t want to know if things went well or went poorly. Despite this whole thing being her idea, she’s a little squeamish with the reality of it.
I tried to tell her once a while back that the most anyone’s ever asked me to do is to escort them by the arm — that was a prom thing — but that itself was too much information for her.
To be honest, I don’t know why Melissa suggested that I do this if she feels the way she does about it, but the extra money it’s bringing in has been enough to keep me going out when I get the call.
The cab pulls up and the driver calls my last name out the window.
“Yeah,” I answer, and get in the back.
I pull out the card on which I wrote the address and read it off to the driver.
He starts the meter and we’re on our way.
Tonight is supposed to be a low-key event. What Jenny, my agency contact — that’s not really her title, I just like referring to her like that — told me about the evening was that a young woman needed someone to escort her to “some minor charity event, or an opera performance or something.”
Jenny’s not that great with details.
When we pull up to the building, I’m a bit surprised that my client asked that I show up in a cab. I’ve never been inside, but I’ve lived in the city long enough to know this place is on the upper end of things.
I get out and ask the driver to wait.
He answers with the obligatory, “whatever,” and I make my way to the door.
The doorman stops me and asks where I’m going.
I pull the card back out of my pocket and read off the name. “I’m here to pick up a Miss Miller,” I answer, and he directs me to the elevator.
“You’ll find her on floor 15, apartment 105,” the doorman says as I’m walking away.
I wonder if my client’s just slumming it with the cab. It’s happened before, but if that’s the case, I really should have dressed down a little.
Jenny really needs to get better with specifics.
I get up to the apartment and pop a mint in my mouth before I knock on the door.
“Just a minute!” the muffled voice from inside the apartment calls back.
And so I wait.
I wait for about five minutes before the door opens, but as soon as it has, I’m wishing I was somewhere else.
The woman standing in front of me is a few inches shorter than me, probably 5-foot-7 or 5-foot-8, with long, red hair in a loose updo, emerald eyes, and pouty lips. She’s in a chic, but understated and tight-fitting black dress, just revealing enough to titillate the senses without being risqué, but none of that bothers me.
What bothers me is that she’s been a patient of mine for a few weeks now.
“Dr. Churchill?”
“Grace?” I respond.
“Oh, this is just great,” she says, and throws her arms up before turning and retreating back into the apartment.
I’m just standing in the doorway, not sure whether I should follow her in or make a mad dash for the elevator.
“You may as well come in,” she says, so I do.
The apartment is spacious and well appointed. Her chart says that she’s 24.
“So, what’s up?” she asks.
“I’m sorry?” I ask.
“I’ve got a date coming,” she says. “If you found an aneurism or something, would you mind just letting me know and getting out of here? I haven’t been out once since my last round of chemo, and I was really looking forward to trying out this wig. It looks real, doesn’t it? Here, feel,” she says, and turns her head.
I reach out and awkwardly feel her new hair, saying, “You know, I honestly wouldn’t have even known that it wasn’t yours.”
“You’re just saying that,” she says. “My hair wasn’t this long when you were treating me, and I’m not a redhead.”
“Well, people do dye their hair,” I start.
“Yeah, but their hair doesn’t usually grow six inches in a couple of weeks,” she says. “So, hurry up. Am I dying, or did you screw up the diagnosis and I actually just had some bad sushi, or what?”
“It would have to be pretty bad sushi to cause a seizure,” I laugh, but my attempt at humor isn’t appreciated.
<
br /> “So, I’m dying,” she says. “That’s all right. I kind of figured that out when you started talking about 10-year survival rates. Well, thanks for stopping by to tell me, but unless there’s a solid chance I’m going to keel over at dinner, I think it’s probably for the best that you go.”
So, the good news is that she doesn’t realize that I’m her escort, but I’m in a bit of a dilemma here. I can either come up with some fake medical information to give her and then quickly show myself out, or I can be honest about why I’m here.
For the sake of my job—the day job, that is—it’s probably for the best that I try to find a third option, but I’ve got nothing.
“Why don’t I wait with you?” I ask.
“I don’t think so,” she says. “He shouldn’t be long, and I’d really rather not have him walking in here to find my oncologist. Although,” she continues, “you are quite the looker, and a doctor, no less. Maybe you waiting here with me is just the kind of thing I could use to make my guy jealous. Yeah,” she decides finally, “have a seat.”
I chuckle and sit down. The laugh isn’t so much because I’m confused as it is that I’m trying to hide the fact that I’m a little scared of what’s going to happen here.
The longer I stay, the more likely it’s going to be that she figures out what’s going on. At the same time, though, I’m not doing anything illegal, and I really don’t have any other way to explain my presence here.
“What time is he supposed to pick you up?” I ask, buying myself a little more time to think.
“Any minute now,” she answers. “So, why are you here?”
I guess I didn’t really buy myself that much time at all.
“I was just in the neighborhood,” I tell her. “I thought I’d stop by and see how you’re doing.”
“I’m fine,” she says, but stops. “How do you know where I live? I get that you’ve got that information at the hospital or whatever, but it’s kind of weird that you’d remember it.”
“I didn’t,” I tell her. “I wrote it down.”