In Five Years(43)

Now I’m the one to laugh.

“Do you think this counts as blowing it with her parents?”

“There’s always the chemo,” I say. And now we’re both in hysterics. A woman knitting a few chairs over from us looks up, annoyed. I can’t help it, though. It feels nearly impossible to get any air, that’s how hard we’re laughing.

“Radiation,” he says, gasping.

“Third time’s a charm.”

It’s Frederick’s stern look that sends us up and out of our seats, sprinting toward the door.

When we’re in the hallway, I take big, gulping breathes. It feels like I haven’t had air in a week.

“We’re going outside,” he says. “You have your cell phone?”

I nod.

“Good. Yours is the update phone. I made sure on the chart.”

We head down the elevators and the double doors spit us out onto the street. There’s a park across the way. Small children dangle from swings, surrounded by planted trees. Nannies and parents bark into their cell phones.

We’re on the sidewalk, the length of Fifth Avenue splayed out before us. Cars push one another forward, egging the others on. The city inhales and inhales and inhales.

“Where are we going?” I ask him. My bones feel tired. I lift my leg up, testing.

“It’s a surprise,” he says.

“I don’t like those.”

Aaron laughs. “You’re gonna be fine,” he says.

He grabs my hand, and we’re turning down Fifth Avenue.





Chapter Twenty-Three


“We can’t go far,” I say. I’m practically running to keep up, he’s moving so quickly.

“We’re not,” he tells me. “Just up. Here.”

We’re at the back entrance of a doorman building on One Hundred First Street. He takes an ID out of his wallet and swipes the key fob. The door opens.

“Are we breaking and entering?”

He laughs. “Just entering.”

We’re in what appears to be a basement storage unit, and I follow Aaron through rows of bikes and giant Tupperware containers with out-of-season items into an elevator in the back.

I check my phone to make sure I still have service. Four bars.

It’s a freight elevator, old and lumbering, and we shuffle our way to the rooftop. When we step off, we’re greeted by a tiny stretch of grass surrounded by a concrete terrace and beyond that, the city splayed out before us. There’s a glass dome behind us, some kind of party venue.

“I just thought you could probably use a little bit of space,” he says.

I walk tentatively toward the terrace, run my hand along the marbled concrete. “How do you have access to this place?”

“It’s a building I’m working on,” he says. He comes to stand beside me. “I like it because it’s so high. Usually buildings on the East Side are pretty squat.”

I look at the hospital, dwarfed below us, imagining Bella lying on a table, her body splayed open somewhere inside. My grip on the concrete tightens.

“I’ve screamed up here before,” Aaron tells me. “I wouldn’t judge if you wanted to.”

I hiccup. “That’s okay,” I say.

I turn to him. His eyes are focused below us. I wonder what he’s thinking, if he sees Bella the way I do.

“What do you love about her?” I ask him. “Will you tell me?”

He smiles immediately. He doesn’t lift his eyes. “Her warmth,” he says. “She’s so damn warm. Do you know what I mean?”

“I do,” I say.

“She’s beautiful, obviously.”

“Boring,” I say.

He smiles. “Stubborn, too. I think you guys have that in -common.”

I laugh. “You’re probably not wrong.”

“And she’s spontaneous in the way people aren’t anymore. She lives for now.”

A ping of recognition in my chest. I look to Aaron. His eyebrows are knit. He looks, all at once, like it’s just occurred to him, what that really means. The possibility ahead. Ding ding ding. And then I realize it’s my cell phone that’s ringing. It’s been in my hand, vibrating and tolling.

“Hello?”

“Ms. Kohan, it’s Dr. Shaw’s associate, Dr. Jeffries. He wanted me to call and give you an update.”

My breath holds. The air stills. From somewhere in the distance, Aaron takes my hand.

“We’re going to take a biopsy of her colon and abdominal tissue. But everything is going according to plan. We still have a few hours ahead of us, but he wanted you to know so far so good.”

“Thank you,” I manage. “Thank you.”

“I’m going to get back now,” he says, and hangs up.

I look to Aaron. I see it there, the love in his eyes. It mirrors mine.

“He said it’s going according to plan.”

He exhales, drops my hand. “We should get back,” he says.

“Yeah.”

We reverse the process. Elevator, door, street. When we get to the lobby of the hospital, someone calls my name: “Dannie!”

I turn to see David jogging toward us.

“Hey,” he says. “I was just trying to check in. How’s it going? Hey man.” He extends his hand to Aaron, who shakes it.