I might burn my bridges and any chance of ever getting a spot here in the Seattle station.
“Jade, I’m sorry to have to do this, but I need to hit the road earlier than planned so I can spend some time with Hannah before…” I start to explain calmly, but emotion clogs my throat and I’m unable to finish the sentence. Jade doesn’t look surprised by this at all, her eyes filling with sympathy and understanding.
“I figured, hun. You need to get home to your family.”
I clamp my palms over her cheeks and hold her face firmly in my gaze. I don’t know what’s more beautiful about Jade. Her face or her heart. They’re both pretty fucking great in my book.
“You are my family, too. You always have my back and you know I have yours. Thank you for being here for me this week. It would’ve sucked without you.”
Tubby the devil dog takes this opportunity to snarl up at me from his dog bed in the corner of the room. I glare at him.
“I could’ve done without you, mister.”
Jade snickers. “I wish my bestie and my baby could get along. Then my life would be perfect.”
Her hands wrap around my neck, and we embrace for the longest time, holding each other through the love and friendship we share. The unbreakable bond forged from years of going through life’s peaks and valleys together.
“I love you, Harp. And please give Hannah and the girls my love. I’ll check in next week, but keep me posted with any news. Okay? And make sure you text me the minute you get home today.”
I nod, the prickle of tears nudging the back of my eyes. I’m trying to hold it together until I get on the road because I don’t want to lose it in front of Jade. She’s always been my safe place and has let me cry on her shoulder when I’ve suffered losses too big for one person to deal with. She’s done everything she can to make the hurt and pain go away even though we both know it’s an impossible task. But it’s never stopped her from trying.
I hope someday, if she ever needs it, I can return the favor.
* * *
“Miss Conrad?”
I look up from the news article I’ve been reading for the past three hours, uncertain even what the topic was. All the words blended in an inky mush. I find the surgeon standing a few feet from me, still wearing his scrubs and looking no worse for wear, while I probably look a mess. Hair in a messy bun, dark bags under my eyes, and a pale complexion underneath these bright hospital lights.
Snatching the earbuds out of my ears, I swallow hard, blinking back tears of dread that threaten to spill.
My stomach churns. The smell of chlorine bleach and sanitizer is making me feel claustrophobic and I want to puke. I can’t breathe.
Suddenly I’m in a full-on panic and my mind rewinds in time with a flashback to that moment I came running into the emergency room in search of my mom and dad after I’d been called to come. But I didn’t got there in time. My dad died after collapsing and falling off the tractor, subsequently getting crushed to death when it ran him over.
It was a terrifying ordeal back then, but at least I had my mom and my sister by my side. I’m terrified again now but have no one. It’s my sister’s life that hangs in the balance and I don’t want to live in this world without my Hannah.
Setting aside my iPad, I stand on shaking legs, running my sweaty palms over the thighs of my jeans.
“Yes, that’s me. I’m the sister of Hannah Sherman.”
My nieces, Holly and Hazel, wanted desperately to come to the hospital to wait with me. It was one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever had to make. In the end, I thought it was best that they stay in school and have something else to occupy their minds and endless energy. I can’t imagine how they would’ve managed the last four hours of uncertainty. I could barely stand it and was practically bouncing off the walls. At seven and four years old, they would’ve driven me crazy.
The surgeon sits down to the left of the seat I just occupied, removing the gossamer hair net that makes visible his head of salt and pepper short hair, a small bald spot on the crown. I take the seat I just vacated, clasping my hands together on my lap, silently praying for good news.
“Your sister is in recovery right now and we’ll know more soon. We were able to successfully remove most of the tumor, but because it was so close to the spinal cord and there are still fragments of the tumor in some brain tissue, we just don’t know yet. To be on the precautionary side, your sister will need to begin radiation treatment for the foreseeable future.”
My heart sinks. This wasn’t the news I really wanted to hear. I wanted an all clear so we could move on with our lives, the chance of losing my sister left behind in the dust.
But life doesn’t work that way. Hopes, dreams, and wishes can all be torn apart by a single dose of reality.
A year ago, Hannah began suffering from seizures, headaches, and blurred vision. She assumed it was simply a vision problem and she went to her eye doctor for a vision checkup. When that proved to be nothing, she moved on to her general practitioner.
With a series of tests and a CT scan, they determined it was a tumor. It was diagnosed as meningioma, which was something I’d never even heard of before. It’s a slowly progressing tumor that is often found in females for no explicable reason. Her doctor indicated it wasn’t life threatening and they were on a wait-and-see basis. She continued to go in every two months for periodic scans.
But the tumor grew rampantly, tripling in size between visits, and it soon became more aggressive, which is what led to the surgery. At the time, they indicated they wouldn’t know if they could remove the entire tumor or whether it was malignant until they got in. Today’s surgery would tell us the official prognosis and her life expectancy.
I nod, trying hard to digest this all. “Okay. Radiation. That’s doable, right? Is that the treatment that makes your hair fall out?”