La Vie en Rose {Life in Pink} (31 page)

He lifted her off the floor, his voice a distant whisper but he never stopped reassuring that somehow they’d get through this. He placed her someplace soft, but she wasn’t sure where. Didn’t care. He couldn’t take her out of this body.

Trapped.

“Shh...shhh...shh...” The tears in his voice gutted her.

He rocked her, holding her so tight, as if the movement could stop her from falling apart. But everything was slipping away.

Her throat burned as she sucked in breath after breath. Not enough. Pulling her hair, her pretty hair that would likely fall out, she silently wept. Why? Why was this happening to her? Why did such a horrible thing exist?

His hands brushed over her head as if she were a child. Out of nowhere, her entire world lost its balance and fell down a rabbit hole, spiraling through infinite darkness. She had no idea how much longer she’d have to fall before she reached the end. Up was down and solid ground was a thing of the past. Nothing could save her from this fall.

Dear God, the thought of telling her parents...

Heaving sob after forceful sob, she cried harder than she’d ever cried before. It was a brutal and painful exorcism she never saw coming. Every weakness she’d kept hidden behind her stoic façade was now exposed in glaring light. She was petrified and lacked the strength to pretend to be anything else.

This
was her first scar. Plenty would follow, but like beauty and grace, all things physical would fade. But not this. This moment of raw agony would always stay raised a little bit higher than the rest of her soul. Her first scar, borne of a diagnosis delivered over the fucking phone!

Silence came in doses. Her shivers interrupted his whispered words she sensed but couldn’t hear.  She blinked, unclear of the time, uncaring of anything happening outside of that moment. Her turbulent thoughts were too chaotic. There was nothing beyond the fear of the unknown and the absolute terror of the little knowledge she had. Cancer.

Down, down, down she fell, losing sight of everything that came before and unclear of what lay ahead. The world never seemed as dark as it did in those fleeting moments that somehow wouldn’t end.

Reality blurred, blending objects of their home with visions of an unpredictable future. Her mind, forced to go where her traitorous body led, pitched into a terrifying place she didn’t know.

She wanted it to be over before it began, but what if the conclusion was truly the end? And with the last of her hope, she wept a bit more, knowing her world was forever changed...the day she earned her first scar.

****

W
hen she was a little girl her mother always made sick days nice. She’d spread the boo-boo blanket on the couch and bring down the pillows from her bedroom. Using one of the tables kept in the corner, she’d set out cough drops, tissues, a glass of orange juice, and the remote. Emma would sleep in between episodes of bad 80’s sitcoms.

She’d always milked that sort of care to the last drop, claiming she was sick a day longer than she actually was. Emma never minded being sick. Staying home from school was a vacation, a coddled escape from childhood responsibility that made her feel special and loved.

Cancer was different.

It didn’t matter that she was still in shock or had yet to accept reality. Cancer moved at its own pace. It didn’t respect age or race or social status. It didn’t care that she had a life or hobbies or a job. It was single-mindedly the most evil enemy she’d ever faced. Being that there was no rest for the wicked, she couldn’t rest until she beat it, knowing full well if she didn’t kill the cancer it would surely kill her.

Plain and simple, she wanted to live.

In a blur she moved from one doctor appointment to the next, having more tests done than she’d ever imagined possible. PET scans, MRIs, Echocardiograms, uncountable screenings of blood work, her body was given to science the moment she consented to putting her fate in her doctors’ hands. A pincushion for those who knew what came next, she was poked, prodded, prepped, and placed in one strange machine after another.

There was no evading the necessity of the attention cancer demanded. Even at home, her phone steadily rang with news and reminders of upcoming appointments.

Everything was urgent. Everything needed her absolute attention. And everything took an incredible amount of time. She wanted to live, but her existence was suddenly a revolving door of exams and procedures, not resembling her previous life at all. This was life with cancer.

As Emma watched the days go by like an outsider looking in, her world was colored in pink. So many shades, so many versions, so many untied dreams wrapped up in a silly little bow.

Why the color sometimes irritated her, she hadn’t a clue. Perhaps it bothered her because pink was merely the offspring of red and she still wanted to be bold. Or maybe she hated the association because pink had always been her favorite color and it now represented the ugliest time of her life.

Blush over a bruise, her life was no longer a story, but a picture book others viewed as pages and pages painted in rose. It was as though everything she’d ever done, every trait she’d ever owned, was washed away by something as delicate as pink. She resented how easily her life fit into a color coded category, how neatly her world became tied up in bows.

She didn’t want to be a soft pastel memory people wore in a race, no longer blonde, no longer a thirty-six C, nothing more than a pale color in a sea of ribbons racing toward a cure that was too late to save her. She wasn’t ready to fade into pink. But the more that delicate color spilled into her world the less the old Emma seemed to exist.

Perhaps she was still in denial.

Her trips to the oncology office were never pleasant. Rather than look around the waiting room at the various women in the process of losing their hair, she buried her nose in a magazine. She could empathize, but it broke a bit of her every time she came face to face with a woman a few steps ahead in her treatment.

Riley was adapting faster than her, but he wasn’t the one suffering every prick and poke either. She couldn’t fault him though. He’d been incredible, adjusting his schedule to drive her to appointments and helping her with the ungodly amount of paperwork. Knowing he was coming off of night shift and surviving on only a few hours sleep, she insisted he rest when he could and they soon developed a reputation for hogging the corners of waiting rooms.

Once she signed in at the desk of her oncologist’s office, she reached into her bag for her latest copy of
Rolling Stone
, finding pop culture a comfortable bridge between her surreal existence and the reality she used to know.

“You sure you’re okay?” Riley asked as he structured a temporary cot out of two chairs.

“I’ll be fine. Take a nap.” The word
fine
had been renovated, its new definition quite different from its old meaning.

As he hunkered down, shifting to find the most comfortable position in an obviously uncomfortable place, she paged through her magazine. Life was all about little compromises, they were coming to learn.

As patients drifted into the back new ones arrived. Sometimes the amount of patients being treated for such a hideous disease was startling, which was another reason she chose not to watch the waiting rooms too closely.

“You waiting?”

Pulling her attention from the article she read, Emma faced a woman who came from the double doors, unsure if she was a nurse or a patient. “I’m sorry?”

“You’ve been here a while. I was wondering if you were waiting for someone or waiting to be seen.”

“Oh. Waiting to be seen,” she explained, hating the pinch that still stung every time she voiced that truth.

The woman smiled. “Mind if I sit?”

Emma waved her to the open seat.

The woman settled in the seat beside her, posture at ease. “What are you in for?”

Dog-earing her page, she tucked her magazine away. “More tests.”

Lips pressed tight, the woman smiled and nodded as if she could relate. Maybe she was here with someone. Maybe she was someone’s Riley.

“It’s a lot,” the woman said. “How are you handling everything so far?”

Though the woman was a stranger, Emma found herself pressed to answer honestly, divulge things she didn’t often say in front of those she loved. “Honestly? I’m terrified.”

She nodded. “It is that—terrifying.”

Emma scrutinized the woman. Her hair was cut in a short, trendy style that took more confidence then attractiveness to pull off. Her calming presence lent an uncategorized beauty to her otherwise ordinary features. And her understated clothing and lack of jewelry didn’t help her discern if she was an employee, a supportive friend or a patient.
Just ask.
“Are you a patient?”

“No. I’m just a helper.”

Like an angel?
There was definitely something soothing in her proximity.

“I used to be a patient though.” She smiled, her expression proud but a little sad, falling short of reaching her eyes. There was something else in her eyes though—a story. “I’ve been cancer free for ten years.”

Goose bumps lifted on Emma’s skin, perhaps pushed into place by a surge of envy. “That’s wonderful.” Would she ever have the chance to make such a statement?

Her gaze dropped to her shirt. She couldn’t tell what was under the loose material. Some women just had smaller frames, though this woman was tall.

“I’m Anna, by the way.” She held out her hand.

“Emma.” Her soft fingers held hers a second longer than most handshakes lasted.

“It’s nice to meet you, Emma. So...does that belong to you?” She tipped her chin at Riley, who was conked out on the chair in the corner.

Her cheeks heated. “Yeah. He works nights and my appointments are always early.”

“Sweet of him to still come to keep you company, even if he’s unconscious.”

She smiled. “Yeah. He’s sort of wonderful like that.”

After a few moments of silence, Anna cut to the chase. “So... How did you get here?”

Startled by her bluntness, which somehow remained in the realms of polite chitchat, Emma snorted and said the first response that came to mind. “I have no idea.”

Anna giggled. “Me neither. But here I am, happy, healthy, and whole—for the most part. Others might debate my sanity. Some say I’m lacking a screw or two.”

“I’d question anyone who went through this and came out totally sane.”

“Right?” She laughed. “It’s not a bad version of crazy though. Cancer definitely has a way of making you see the beauty in things. Makes you ditch all the nonsense in between. It sort of gives you an
I don’t give a fuck
attitude. And no one’s going to criticize you to your face, because you have
cancer,”
she whispered the last word.

“I’m still not able to say it out loud,” she confessed.

Anna’s smile gentled as sympathy filled her eyes. “I’m not making light of it, sweetie. I joke, because laughter blunts the pain. Good medicine and all that.”

Emma nodded. “I’ll take any medicine I can at this point. I just want to get well.”

They chatted a while longer as more patients came and others were called back behind the double doors. Anna never seemed in a rush to be anywhere else and the longer they talked, the more Emma found herself confessing what were unspeakable fears only minutes ago.

Anna listened and sympathized, sharing anecdotes from her own experiences. They weren’t necessarily reassuring, but somehow put her at ease, prepared her in a way nothing else had. There was simply something special about this woman that she found attractive, almost magnetic.

When the nurse called Emma’s name, she found herself reluctant to leave Anna’s side. Riley woke and gave her a questioning look, not expecting her to make friends when she’d been working so hard to be invisible.

As she stood, Anna surprised her with a hug. “You take care of yourself, Emma. We’ll chat again soon.”

She didn’t know if their paths would ever cross again, but it was a comforting thought, one that made the fear of visiting the oncology office a little less intimidating.

At her next appointment, Emma suffered a pinch of disappointment when Anna wasn’t in the waiting room, which made her sudden appearance all the more pleasant. “Anna,” she greeted as the woman came out, holding a bag of popcorn.

“I thought I heard the nurses say you were here. Popcorn?” She tipped the bag as she took a seat.

Riley grinned, knowing she’d hoped to see her friend again, and shut his eyes, catching his usual nap in the corner. And so a new routine was born. She’d arrive and Anna would soon surprise her with some sort of snack or drink and plenty of good conversation.

She was so lovely and feminine, so unmistakably female, and funny too. In truth, she wasn’t traditionally beautiful at all. Her smile was crooked and there wasn’t anything physically striking about her features, but she remained one of the prettiest people Emma knew. Every time she thought of Anna, her chest warmed as if filling with a cozy blush. Anna made her feel...pink.

It took Emma a solid month to realize this radiant woman no longer had breasts, and that was only when Riley brought it to her attention.

“She has boobs, Riley,” she argued on their way to the grocery store.

“Emma, she does not.”

“And how would you know? Did you see her topless?”

“No, I asked her.”

Her steps faltered and he paused, facing her as she stepped out of the way of the surrounding pedestrians. “You
asked
her? How? When?”

“During one of your appointments.”

She wasn’t sure what shocked her more, that he’d had the balls to ask something like that or that he’d actually conversed with Anna. “I didn’t know you two talked.”

“We talk all the time. Awesome person. Terrible at Crazy Eights, but other than that I think she’s great.”

“You played cards with her?”

“Emma, you’re usually back there for over an hour. Am I not allowed to talk to her?”

“No...” Why was she being so weird about this? “Do you talk about me?”