Summer Love - Part Six
The rest of the weekend went too fast as far as I was concerned.
Monday morning exploded onto the scene and there I was, flipping eggs, hotcakes, cooking hamburgers, making soups, and the ‘Special of the Day’, Honey-Fried Chicken. One big difference to this Monday from the others; I was smiling more.
“Must have been on heck of a weekend,” Linda commented.
“No, it wasn’t. It was an ex-cell-ant weekend.”
“I take it you both hit it off really well.”
“That’s an understatement. All I have to do is put her dying in the back of my head and keep it there somehow, and just enjoy the time we’ll have, when we have it.”
“Yeah, that has to be rough on both of you. Look, if there is anything I can do, let me know. I like you, Bill. If you need a shoulder or something, just holler. If you ever want to talk, you know I’m here.”
“Thanks, Linda. What kind of something did you have in mind?”
“What do you think?” She winked, turned and went back to work.
I shook my head. I swear, women. Can’t live with them, can’t live without them.
Thank you, God, for making them just the same.
**********
Days, weeks and months passed, three of them to be exact. Nancy and I were able to get together two or three times a week and every other weekend.
Through the week, we would go to Carmody’s and sit by the fire, sip our drinks, hold hands, listen to Margo, the pianist play, as we spoke about the sensible and insensible.
On weekends, we would make love and each time it only seemed to get better. When we weren’t “pressing wrinkles in the sheets,” as Nancy would often say, we would find different things to do.
We went to a circus, a basketball game and even roller-skating. A few times we drove across state lines into Nevada just to spend time in the desert. The desert is perhaps the only place on earth where you won’t be bothered with city noises and people. Quiet.
One time she took me to an antique store. I wasn’t really into that sort of thing but watching her hunt around for a full-length mirror all day was funny. When she finally found the one she wanted, she spent an hour talking the guy down from two-hundred to one-twenty-five. I still think the bottom line was her sexy smile and good looks that convinced the owner to cave in.
We would go to the movies, especially the scary kind. Nancy loves gore and violence. When something too shocking hit the screen, she would grab my arm and hide her face in the crook of my shoulder, asking, “Is it over yet?” Since her fear was really a pretense, I didn’t mind watching these kinds of movies with her.
Beyond making love and all the other things we did, it was our evening walks I enjoyed most. Hand in hand, walking in the park after midnight, the stars twinkling overhead, the moon, sometimes full, would follow our path. The glow would shine down on her, giving her face a look of eternal youth. She was soft to look at, and soft to the touch. On the nights we walked, she never looked like a woman who was going to die, but rather a woman who would live forever.
The Sunday before Halloween, things changed.
Sid left for the weekend as he always did so we could have our alone time. Like always, we involved ourselves with a heady session of passion.
Saturday evening, we had returned back to her apartment from watching a play, ‘1776’. It wasn’t bad, but could have probably been better, but we enjoyed it just the same. As Nancy said, “When you’ve see one revolutionary war play, what’s left to figure.”
After puttering around her apartment, each of us doing the bathroom ritual, I went into the kitchen and poured two glass of red California Oak wine. I had just picked them up to go out to the living room when I heard her scream.
“BILL! OH. GOD! BILL!”
The glasses slipped through my fingers, splintering as they hit the floor as I raced into the living room and found her rolling on the floor clutching at her stomach.
I was on my knees by her side and watched the pain crease angry marks across her beautiful face. I got up, went to the phone and dialed 911. I explained what the situation was and within ten minutes an ambulance showed up and the paramedics took over.
They placed her on a gurney, set up an IV unit and rushed to University Hospital. I rode in the back, holding her hand the entire drive.
“How long has she had this problem,” said a paramedic named Steve.
“A long time is all I can tell you. She’s told me it’s cancer and terminal. What’s going to happen now?”
Tears were streaming down my face and I didn’t bother wiping them away. I knew this day would come, but never expected it to be like this.
“It’s hard to say. They’ll run some tests to determine what treatment she’ll need. Probably chemo would be my guess. The doctor’s will want her to stay a few days to monitor her condition and for signs of progress.”
“Is she going to die?”
“Tonight? No, thanks to your calling in time. But, whatever amount of time she does have left, that’s hard to say. That’s a question to ask the doctor who sees her after she’s been examined.”
I kept holding her hand and kept mumbling close to her ear over and over again, “I love you.”
**********
I called Sid from the hospital and it took him over four hours to arrive. I could see his haggard expression, and I knew he loved Nancy every bit as much as I did, and maybe more.
“What’s happening? Have you heard anything yet? Is she okay? How serious is it? Can I see her?”
“Sid, the doctors are still looking her over. We had just gotten back from watching a play when she went into convulsions and started bleeding all over herself. And no, she isn’t okay. We both know she’s going to die and it doesn’t get much worse than that. You and I have tried to block it from our minds since we each met her. Now, reality has hit her square in the face, and her, you, me … we have to deal with it here and now.”
“You don’t have to tell me what I already know. I took care of her long before you came into the picture, and I’ll be doing it long after you’re gone, too.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means I’ve had it with the way you’ve been with her. I want you out of her life. Gone. These past months, she’s had far too much excitement because of you, and now it’s going to kill her.”
“Are you insane? Look, this hasn’t been a cake-walk for me, for any of us, but it’s been the best thing that could have happened to her; to get her out and go crazy on life. You sound like you want to keep her locked in a closet or in a rocking chair the rest of her life. If you love her, Sid, you have no right to talk this way.”
“Love? LOVE! Don’t talk to me about love. We experienced everything in the world as far as love goes. I’ve sat back many times and let her have her way because I knew it made her happy. I was with her when I finally convinced her to see a specialist about her cancer. I was with her when she found out she’s going to die. I was with her when she tried to kill herself once.”
That caught me by surprise.
“She never told you, did she? Not surprising. I was with her when her parents took her kids away from her. I was with her when she had severe pains. I was with her when ….”
“Excuse me, aren’t you the person that came in with Nancy Baker?”
I looked up at the doctor who had a look on her face that didn’t want to tell me something I was afraid to know.
“Yes. How is she, doctor?”
“She stable for the moment. She sleeping comfortably, and from the looks of you and your friend, I’d say that’s what you both need. There isn’t anything either of you can do. Ms. Baker is under a heavy sedative and anesthetized. In the morning we’ll run several more tests to best determine the next steps to take.
“Doctor,” questioned Sid, “level with me. What are her chances after tonight?”
“I can’t say for certain until we’ve run more tests as I said. I have seen and experienced cases like this before and the prognosis can go either way. Six months, a year, perhaps five years. I wish I could be more definite than that but it’s the best I can tell you until after we run more tests. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a few other patients in emergency that need attention.”
He walked away leaving Sid and myself standing in a brightly-lit corridor like two children without a place to play.
Neither of us left the hospital. Neither of us spoke a word to one another the rest of the night.
I quietly prayed for Nancy to pull through this.
Sometime during the night, I glanced over at Sid and watched as he cried, never making a sound.
I was doing the same thing on the inside.
When Tennyson penned these words, ‘tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all’; he sure got that one wrong.