First Girl Gone(8)

“Ah, don’t get all nostalgic on me, sis,” Allie said.

But it wasn’t just nostalgia for Allie that was getting to Charlie. It was Frank, too. Her uncle had always been larger than life. To start, he was six foot five. The tallest man ever, Charlie had thought when she was a kid. And the strongest—he used to carry a card in his wallet that declared he had the strength of ten men, which Charlie had taken as something official until she was nine or ten. She looked at him now, wiping fast-food grease from his mouth with a napkin. He’d lost so much weight, and the lack of hair and eyebrows only added to the frail appearance. He looked withered and gaunt. Like a tree that someone forgot to water.

He’d maintained a positive attitude since he’d been diagnosed with chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Hadn’t uttered a single complaint throughout the weeks of chemotherapy. And his doctors were still optimistic. But for Charlie, the fear had started to creep in. There was no cure for CLL. The best they could hope for was remission, and that was only if he made it through chemo, which was taking its toll. If they didn’t start to see some progress soon, then what? She’d read up online, of course. If Frank’s cancer didn’t go into remission the first time around, his doctors would likely recommend more chemo. And despite his lack of complaints, Charlie wasn’t sure the old man could take it.

The lump in her throat shifted into something sharp and painful. She wasn’t ready to say goodbye. Not to Frank.

She blinked, struggling to keep the tears in check.

“You OK over there?” Frank asked, wadding the foil wrapper from his sandwich into a ball.

Charlie covered by coughing into her hand. She didn’t want Frank to know she was worried. She had to stay positive, for his sake.

“Yeah, just a tickle in my throat,” she lied.

“Go drink some water, ya turkey.”

She did as he said, using it as an excuse to get herself under control. She pulled her designated glass from the cupboard and filled it with water. Frank had a whole set of collectible McDonald’s glasses circa 1977. She and Allie always used to fight over the Mayor McCheese glass when they were kids, so Frank had scoured the local thrift shops, garage sales, and flea markets until he found another. And even though Charlie was past the age where drinking out of a specific cup was important to her, her hand instinctively went for the one with the anthropomorphic cheeseburger.

“That one’s mine,” Allie said.

Charlie didn’t bother to ask how she could tell the difference between two identical glasses because she knew Allie was only trying to annoy her.

“I’m serious. The copyright symbol on mine is partially worn off,” Allie insisted. “Put it back.”

Ignoring her, Charlie filled the glass and drank. When she was finished, she set the glass in the sink and glanced over at Frank, who was collecting the trash from his meal and placing it in the paper bag it had come in. He would be OK, she told herself. He was strong. If anyone could kick cancer’s ass, it was Frank.

“Do you still have that card? The one that claims you have the strength of ten men?” Charlie asked.

Frank smiled around the straw in his mouth.

“Of course.”

He leaned onto one hip and reached into his back pocket, rifling through the various cards in his wallet until he found the laminated rectangle of cardstock.

“Can I see it?”

He held the card out then snatched it away when she tried to grab it.

“Depends.”

“On what?”

Frank took another swig of Dr. Pepper.

“On what you meant by claims I have the strength of ten men. Are you suggesting the card is fraudulent?”

Charlie rolled her eyes.

“Of course not,” she said with mock earnestness. “Can I see it now?”

“See, I saw that roll of the eyes there. I’m not sure I care for your attitude.”

Charlie blew out a breath.

“Come on. We’re gonna be late if we don’t leave now.”





Chapter Four





They had to drive forty minutes north to Port Huron for Frank’s infusions. The cancer treatment center in East China was closer, only twenty minutes away, but Frank’s insurance wouldn’t cover treatments there. And paying out of pocket wasn’t an option when each treatment cost thousands of dollars.

In the car, Charlie put on the playlist she’d made especially for Frank, full of his favorites: Led Zeppelin, The Allman Brothers, Creedence Clearwater Revival. When “Travelling Riverside Blues” came on, Frank sighed.

“Did I ever tell you about the time I saw Zeppelin at the Grande Ballroom in ’69?”

“Yes,” Charlie said. “Like a hundred times.”

Frank didn’t seem to care. There was a faraway look in his eyes as he gazed out the side window.

“They were all completely wasted. So drunk they could barely play. Robert Plant was slurring off-key. The crowd was furious, and rightly so. It was a disaster of a set, but they made it through, somehow. They walked offstage at the end of the night to the crowd booing. But then they came back for an encore, which was rare for them. They didn’t usually do that. But they came back and played ‘Whole Lotta Love.’”

“And they killed it.”

“Everyone went apeshit! The whole audience, screaming their heads off. It was like they redeemed the whole night with that one song.”