Love and Laughter in the Time of Chemotherapy Page 18

  “Satyavan,” she repeats, emphasizing the first syllable, and then tells me what she remembers of the story. I think it might work. I decide to save Satyavan for my epilogue.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  I eventually progress from the Princess Margaret dental clinic back to my own dentist. He’s pleased to see me after all this time, and all I have been through. His usual practice is to check in briefly after the hygienist finishes her cleaning, but this time he stays longer, to hear how I’m doing. He shakes his head. “We are all tested in this life,” he says solemnly, in response to my update.

  If this is a test, I decide I don’t think much of it. When I had imagined being tested for bravery all those years ago, I had meant in a shining flame of self-sacrifice and glory. I had not pictured a seemingly endless marathon of pointless suffering. That was the real disappointment. That I was enduring all of this without a reason, without benefiting anyone. What is the point of a test like that?

  Then I realize I’m not being tested, I am the test. I’m not the person stepping in front of the speeding car, or bullet, I’m the person being saved. There are many heroes in this story, but none of them are me.

  There are various lessons that could come out of grappling with a life-threatening illness: be more kind; be more patient; spend more time with your family and less time at work. Some of the lessons work against each other. Should you seize the day, or should you stop and smell the roses? You cannot do both. Life is short. Make every second count, but how? By doing more or by doing less?

  All I want is to have my exact same life back, and to be exactly the person I was. Of course I would like to be a better person, but not with this price tag. I don’t want a sneak preview of the hell that is in store for me. I want to forget I ever had the glimpse that I did. I don’t want to prove that now I can wait patiently for that dim sum cart to arrive. I’m writing a book not to exorcise demons, but to be able to say “Oh yes, that time I wrote that book,” not “Oh that time that I had cancer.” Isn’t it enough that a random bad thing happened? Does it also have to redefine who I am?

  “What’s the moral here?” Marge Simpson asks. I’m with Homer when he answers, “It’s just a bunch of stuff that happened.”

  I’m not braver, or more patient, or more resigned to fate. I thought I would be. A radio producer, while prepping me for an interview about stem cell transplants, asks if this experience has changed me as a person. She doesn’t say “for the better,” but I know that is implied. Suddenly I’m angry. No, I say slowly and evenly, trying not to sound upset. I’m not a better person now because of my brush with death. In fact, I want to say that it seems really, really unfair to me that not only do I have to face the pain and trauma and terror of cancer, but I also have to work at being a better person as a result. It’s taking all I have just to try to get back to the person that I was, to do the things I always loved to do. If I can do that, I will be so grateful. Do I really have to do more than that? Isn’t that hard enough to grasp?

  “Let’s do bird puns,” Jack begs. We’ve just gotten out of the car at a conservation area east of Toronto. Anna scuttles out of earshot with Simon; they’re not fans of puns.

  “Okay,” I say. “I went first last time, now it’s your tern.”

  “That’s a fowl one.”

  “Well, I was winging it.”

  “You’ll egret it.”

  We haven’t been here for a couple of years, not since before I got sick. There are quite a few cars in the parking lot, but we don’t see many people because there are several trails through the woods, by the pond, and out to Lake Ontario, so the birdwatchers and families with small children are all spread out. We start on the boardwalk over the pond. We see hundreds of Canada geese, but not much else. Then, by the bridge, Jack spots a large brightly colored duck. He takes a picture of it, to identify it later.

  “It’s probably an accidental,” he says.

  “That’s not very flattering,” Simon remarks.

  “Or maybe it escaped from a farm.”

  We head onto the forest trail. I take out a packet of sunflower seeds from my coat pocket and pass them around.

  “What are these?” Simon asks, surprised. “Are these salted?”

  “They’re salted and roasted,” I mumble. I’m defensive. I had been the one to run into the No Frills on our way out this morning, while the others waited in the car in the grocery store’s parking lot. I grabbed it from the nuts and fruit section at the front. I didn’t have time to find the pet section.

  “I thought animals needed salt. Don’t people set out salt licks for deer?”

  “Chickadees are not deer,” Jack says firmly.

  It turns out Jack and Simon are right—although the chickadees do land on our outstretched palms, they reject the sunflower seeds, even when we peel them. We have better luck with the peanuts I also bought. I love the scritch of their claws on my skin, the whisper of their white breast feathers fluttering in the wind, the almost imperceptible weight on my hand.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  “See you at Homer’s birthday party,” Danielle says, as we rise from the table and put on our coats. We’ve just finished having lunch at a Thai place around the corner from her office.

  “What birthday party?” I pause as I’m reaching for my knapsack.

  “Oh, the surprise party that…” Her voice trails off when she realizes I know nothing about it. I don’t say anything, so she continues to speak.

  “…that Danielle Miller is throwing.”

  I feel a tiny bit better, but not much. At law school twenty years ago I knew Danielle Miller, only slightly, as the “other Danielle,” and I would not expect her to include me at any party she was throwing today. Still, if it’s for Homer, who is my friend not hers (she doesn’t even know him), it doesn’t make sense not to include me. I’m hurt.

  At this point, I open my eyes. Simon is lying on his side, his head inches from my face, gazing at me intently. His eyes look dark gray in the morning light. I often catch him at this if he wakes up before I do.

  “Now I know for sure I’m cured,” I announce with satisfaction as if we were already in the middle of a conversation. He raises the one eyebrow not hidden in his pillow.

  “Because I’m back to my usual dreams, you know, about, about social faux pas and stuff, stuff I used to fret about.” I put my hands together trying to mimic the action Anna does when recounting something socially embarrassing, one hand on top of the other, the thumbs swimming like flippers.

  “You know, ‘awkward turtle’ stuff. Instead of dreaming I was dying, like at Sunnybrook, in the beginning.” Before I got sick, my dreams were always about social missteps, mine or other people’s. In those days, a bad dream meant one where I hosted a dinner party, and no one liked the meal. Despite the fact that what I had served was squid intestines, I still woke up feeling hurt that Kate, who was one of the guests, hadn’t appreciated it. Ever since I told Kate about that dream, whenever she thanks me for anything, she also throws in “And thanks for the squid intestines. They were delicious!”

  “If I’m back to these, I must be better,” I conclude. “Do you think I should mention it at my appointment this morning?”

  “Definitely,” says Simon.

  “You look like you’re going on a date,” Simon tells me when I come down the stairs. We’re about to leave for my now monthly checkup at the transplant clinic. I’m wearing my new gray-flowered pants, burgundy sleeveless blouse, and black leather jacket.

  “I’m celebrating a special occasion,” I protest. “It was exactly two years ago today I got my diagnosis.”

  “Happy anniversary,” he says.

  “Fine, maybe I said that wrong.” I search for another word. “Okay, not celebrating the day, I’m marking the day. Is that better?”

  Really, it’s part of my not-so-secret mission to get my
appointments changed from the morning to the afternoon. The sick people, the ones who have to be carefully monitored, come on Monday or Thursday mornings, sometimes both. The well people, who have passed some yet to be specified (to me, that is) hurdle, are in the Monday afternoon clinic and only come every three months to start, and eventually once a year. I asked about it last time, and the resident just smiled sympathetically and said I still had to be monitored closely for graft-versus-host disease. But I know I don’t belong with all those sick people, with their bald heads, shaky steps, and IV stands. My strategy this time is to dress so well the doctor will say, “Heavens, you look way too good to be a morning patient, go home this instant and don’t come back until Monday afternoon.”

  “I’m planning to start work in October,” I tell the doctor. “That’ll be two years post-transplant.” I am obsessed with anniversaries. Today is two years post-leukemia diagnosis. In exactly six months, I will hit two years post-stem cell transplant. “I’ll be near here, which’ll be convenient.”

  “Yes,” he says absently, flipping through my chart to find the latest blood work to show me, “and by then you’ll be coming on Monday afternoon, instead of Monday morning.”

  “Monday afternoon?” I might as well have shouted it.

  He looks up and smiles. “Yes.” He’s found the blood work and hands it to me. “You see, your white cell count is good.” I look at the closely printed columns of numbers blankly. He points to the right place. “You should know how to read this by now,” he chides. I am unabashed. He seems to think I’m making no effort. He doesn’t realize how much determination it takes to come through something like this unscathed by knowledge that breeds not understanding, but fear.

  I ignore the numbers. Simon’s right, I’m busy thinking, my clothes don’t matter. What I really need is to hang my work ID card around my neck. I had noticed all the hospital staff do that. Then no one would ever guess I’m a patient. I can’t wait for my next appointment.

  Chapter Thirty

  The phone rings in the middle of the afternoon, like it always does. But now my naps are not as sound as they once were. I wake instantly, leap up, and walk around to Simon’s side of the bed. We really should move the phone to my side, I think. I’m the only one who ever uses it.

  “Hi, it’s Judy from Princess Margaret.” My stomach flutters. I know exactly who she is. Judy from Princess Margaret Hospital’s Donor Services Program, to be precise. I had finally signed the consent form to find out who my donor is. You’re allowed to do it once you’re one year post-transplant. I got the forms at that time, but then delayed for a few months because, just like all the medical forms I had to sign for the transplant, they listed all the ways things could go wrong. Meeting your donor may lead to unwelcome publicity; you may find you have nothing in common; your donor may not wish to have contact with you; your donor may seek compensation. The latter, especially, hadn’t occurred to me.

  “I can’t imagine people give a cheek swab hoping for compensation,” I mused to Simon. “I mean the chance is so remote you’re even a match for someone and then it’s remote again that the transplant would work. There must be easier ways to make money.” Simon agreed, but I kept going. “But what if my donor turns out to be homeless or something? And even if he doesn’t ask, or expect, or anything, wouldn’t I be morally obligated to give him our house? I mean, he did save my life, even giving everything I have wouldn’t repay that.”

  “If you think you’re going to give him our house,” Simon said, alarmed, “don’t sign the forms!” But I eventually do.

  “I have the information you requested” is the next thing Judy says. “Do you have a pencil to write it down?”

  “One sec!” I fumble around for something to write with and find a small, wrinkled notepad I’d been using as a coaster for my water glass, but no pencil. I search on Simon’s night table and this time I’m successful. “Go ahead.” I’m awkwardly cradling the phone between my neck and left shoulder so I can hold the pad down with one hand and write with the other. My stomach is now beyond fluttering and is roiling with excitement. This is it. I carefully write down his name, address, phone number, and email. She repeats everything twice.

  “What do you think I should do?” I ask her. “Would it be okay to call? Or should I email first? What do people usually do?”

  “Oh, I don’t think it matters. Since he gave his phone number, I’m sure it would be okay to call.” I put the phone down. There is no way I can return to my nap. I am too excited.

  I tell Simon first.

  “We were both wrong,” I announce.

  “What?”

  “You know, you thought Germany, I thought Brampton. He is Indian, I can tell by the name, Jay Sethna, but he lives in New York City, on Staten Island. What do you think? Should I call first or email?”

  “You could visit.”

  “Ohh, I could! New York’s not that far.” I immediately start planning it. “I could say we were coming to visit New York anyway and wondered if we could meet for a coffee or something. That sounds casual, right? And believable? People from Toronto visit New York all the time, so he wouldn’t think I was stalking him or anything, right? Especially if I say my husband and I were planning a trip, that sounds totally normal, doesn’t it?”

  “Totally.”

  I tell Jack and Anna.

  “Why do you want to visit him?” Jack asks.

  I’m dumbfounded. “Are you kidding me? Wouldn’t you want to meet the person who saved your life?”

  “No!” says Anna. “That would be so awkward.”

  “Awkward!” I’m amazed. Whose children are these? “We’d have so much to talk about! I want to know every single, little thing about him! No detail about his life would be too small! I want to know everything that happened the day he went to give a cheek swab. What made him go? Was it because of an appeal for someone he knew? And did that person end up getting a match? And—”

  “You’re going to ask him all that?” Anna looks pained.

  “Oh, way more than that.” I’m on a roll. “I want to know what went through his mind the moment he got the call that he was a match. I want to know…”

  My mother understands. “Of course, in person!” she agrees.

  “What kind of name is Sethna, do you know?” I spell it for her.

  “I think from Gujarat.” She’s fairly sure, but not positive. That’s the province next to the one I’m from, which makes sense since the people would be close genetically as well.

  “If you meet his mother,” she urges me, “make sure you tell her thank you from me.” She hesitates and clears her throat, “Tell her thank you for raising such a wonderful son.”

  I hadn’t imagined I would be meeting his mother, but you never know. The address had a street number, no apartment number, so it’s probably a house. And I was picturing quite a young man. The age range for acceptable donors is seventeen to thirty-five. So maybe he’s a university student and the address is his parents’ home.

  I tell Peter.

  “Where are you going to live?” He sounds concerned. I don’t know what he’s talking about.

  “What do you mean, where am I going to live?”

  “You were going to give him your house, remember?”

  “Oh, that.” I shrug. “I have a better idea now. Obviously I can’t give him my house, but I was thinking what gift could I give, but it’s so hard. I don’t know what he would like, and a gift basket would be so cheesy, and a gift certificate, or money, even if it was like a thousand dollars, or something, would cheapen it all, make it all sordid. It would trivialize it all, right?”

  Peter doesn’t say anything. Does he think I’m being cheap by thinking money would be a cheap gift? I plow on.

  “Then I had the best idea. I’m going to give him a photo of the four of us—me, Simon, Jack, Anna—in a pool, in Mexico. And
I’ll frame it. Wouldn’t that be perfect?”

  Peter agrees. “That would be perfect.”

  The family photo idea occurred to me after I spoke at a local high school that was doing a “Get Swabbed” campaign for the stem cell registry. I told the students my story, focusing on how you can help not just one person, but all the people who love that person as well. A girl came up to me afterwards to tell me she liked what I said about how you save a whole family, because, she paused, because her father died of cancer last year. What cancer, I asked because I had to say something. Stomach cancer, she replied, and her eyes suddenly brightened with tears that were reflected in the rush of my own.

  I can see it so clearly. He can pull the photo out every once in a while, maybe on a day, or at a time, when things aren’t going so well for him, and he can trace our four faces in the blue water, smiling in the sunshine, and tell people, See this family? See how happy they look? This is the family I saved.

  Then I have another great idea. I wander into the family room where Simon is watching TV, and inform him that I’m thinking of giving Jay my statue of Ganesh reading a book. “Because it’s my most treasured possession, and I need to give him something priceless, right? Something that money can’t buy? What do you think?” Before he can answer, I already have second thoughts. “I don’t know if I can actually give it away though. I might miss it too much. It means too much to me.”

  “If it means that much to you,” Simon responds, “then you have to give it.” I’m worried it’s with my office stuff, all packed away, but luckily I find it easily in one of the boxes a colleague dropped off at home for me, boxes of family photos and Jack and Anna’s artwork— things she was worried would get damaged or lost if I left them in the courthouse storage rooms. I tuck it in a bubble wrap pouch, buy a frame for my photo, and I’m ready.

  “I have his exact blood!” I tell another friend weeks later. “Literally. Every single cell of my blood is being made by the same stem cells that are making his blood. Isn’t that amazing?”