A Little Hope(41)
He did it to himself.
And these days he couldn’t feel more imperfect, more inferior than he does now. He wants to unzip his skin and crawl out. Did that lead him to up the ante and make that promise?
Now he has made a vow he may or may not be able to keep. She squeezed his hand that night like she was going to twist it off, and he listened to her get quieter and quieter until her hand felt still, and she sighed as she went to sleep. And then he lay there for another two hours, her body silent against his. His mind raced with guilt, with worry.
Why would he say this? He heard his father’s voice. When are you going to learn enough is enough? His father had said that often—after Greg had signed up for two spring sports in high school, or after he’d stayed up all night working on his speech for student government, or even in college when Greg was doing double shifts in his bar runner job at Sidecar. He lay there that night with Freddie and wished his parents were alive again, for Freddie to forget this promise even though he suspected this had helped her fall asleep. But did she even believe him? She knows he can’t know for sure. But still. She has trusted him all these years. What hubris, what haughtiness, to say that. Everything felt unbearable, even their comfortable bed. He finally brought sleep on by trying to remember all the kids in his third-grade class; then trying to revisit every hotel room he’d ever stayed in. He finally reconciled this ridiculous promise by remembering that most of the promises he has made have been challenging, nearly impossible, mostly out of reach, too. And he has fulfilled all of them. Wasn’t this more of the same?
Now he is at the treatment center. One of those hospital satellite places with imaging and therapy and new signs with crisp logos and doctors’ names. And beyond the sliding doors, standing there in the vestibule is his cancer gang. Rosco holding on to his walker and waving; thin Imogene with her small green hat and drooping earrings, holding a bag of something she probably baked for them; and Brandon in his thrift store overcoat, black nail polish on some of his fingers.
“What a motley bunch,” Greg says. He thinks he’s used that line a few times.
They wave to each other (hugging is too germy, too risky). They tell Greg he looks cold. “Brrr,” Imogene says. They set up camp where they always do in the lounge for the patients receiving radiation. Imogene doesn’t have any treatments prescribed for her (her numbers are good at the moment), and Brandon, whose dark hair is longish because he never had chemo, only has a week to go until he can ring the bell, a celebratory gesture patients do at the end of their treatment. Rosco, a spunky old man who reminds Greg of his grandfather, and Greg have the longest sentences of radiation: five days a week for six more weeks, give or take. This is a breeze compared to chemo, compared to the stem cell transplant the doctors are telling him they might try down the road if the numbers look good and they find a match. Greg’s job now is to stay healthy.
They open the ginger ale Rosco has brought, and Imogene puts out small chocolate cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. They are not supposed to eat anything unhealthy these days, but Fifi, the nurse they all love, said small treats are fine. The group breaks off pieces of cupcakes and says they’re like heaven and wow and thanks. Greg tastes only metal.
They have a good forty-five minutes until Brandon’s appointment, and then Greg and Rosco go in later. Greg always looks at the toys in the corner of the room—one of those abacus-looking things with sliding balls, and Dr. Seuss books, and a small kitchen with plastic dishes and pots and pans. He is grateful every time that the toys seem undisturbed. He hopes they stay that way. He thinks of Addie and what she would do if she were here waiting with him. He imagines her sliding the wooden abacus balls back and forth. He imagines her sitting at the table next to him and resting her face in her hands patiently.
The group makes small talk about the Super Bowl commercials and the snow (just three inches) the other night. How fast it melted, they say. They shake their heads about the bombing on the news, and no one can believe it’s been that many years since Peter Jennings died, and then Fifi pokes her head out to see what Imogene baked. “I might steal the whole tin,” she says, and they smile and sigh and look at each other. What is it about this crowd that Greg so enjoys? He wants to get up and hug each of them. Even Brandon, who is sometimes a little whiny.
“How’s our Addie?” Imogene says to Greg. She dabs her mouth with a Valentine’s cocktail napkin she brought with the cupcakes.
“Good, good,” Greg says. “Getting big.” She likes to rub my bald head, he wants to say. She started writing in a diary, he wants to say. Greg can’t bring himself to read it. He wants to say: What if, despite all we do to distract her, she’s scared and worried that I’ll die? It was always his number-one goal to never have her worry about anything. His parents worked hard to let him be a worry-free kid, and maybe that is what gave him this determination, this unshakable confidence. But Addie stares at him longer than she used to. She hugs him tighter, he thinks. Once he saw her close her eyes in the mirror when she hugged him, and he wondered what that meant—if she was trying to memorize him or something. He silently says a prayer for her—a quick one—and turns back to Imogene. “She joined the glee club at school.”
“Cute,” Rosco says. He coughs, and they can all hear the wetness in his lungs.
Brandon looks out the window and says something about the girl he’s seeing. Selena. He says her name with a touch of an accent, which annoys Greg. Brandon likes drama. He is still young enough to want drama.