All You Could Ask For: A Novel (25 page)

We crossed a small bridge with a stream rushing past and then turned into a park, and our feet began to crunch on a gravel path that split into four directions. He pointed to the path on the left and told me to lead the way, he’d be right behind. He wanted me to see it quietly and by myself. He unleashed the dog and she ran ahead, and Stephen pointed and said, “Just follow her, she knows the way.” But I was much too conscious of how my ass would look if I walked before him, so instead I put my arm through his and said, “Let’s go together,” and we did, right into the John Denver sanctuary.

And that was when I entered the most stunningly peaceful, gorgeous, spiritual place I have ever been. There is gentle, rushing water, a trickle from the mountain stream, with large stones that you can sit on spaced deftly about a grassy field, and much larger stones standing proudly, engraved with the words to his songs. And the lyrics, if you do not know them, are beautiful, more like poetry than music.

We sat on the ground in the middle of it all and I closed my eyes and breathed deeply in the mountain air, and then I opened them and Stephen’s face was an inch from mine and he kissed me without asking permission. And I grabbed the back of his head and kissed him back, as hard as I could. We made out right there on the grass, with just enough sunlight left to see and the sound of the stream in our ears. And I thought to myself that I’d never had sex in a public place, but if that’s where this was headed I was in. I absolutely would have done it right there. I would have done anything he wanted, with no concern at all for what anyone might see.

But that wasn’t what he wanted. He kept kissing me for a while and then he scooted closer and wrapped a big arm around my shoulders and squeezed me. He felt so strong, so very good. His hands smelled a little of ketchup and his breath smelled a little of beer, and his shirt smelled as though he had sat in front of a whole lot of campfires in it, and he just held me that way until it was too dark to see the lyrics carved into the stones anymore, and then he kissed me again and popped up to his feet.

“What do you think of it?” he asked, looking around, and I knew he meant the sanctuary but I was referring to absolutely everything when I responded.

I said, “I think it is perfect.”

He smiled. “Shall I take you home?”

I surprised even myself with my answer: “You can take me anywhere you want.”

He took me all right.

He lives in a stunning house on Red Mountain, with startling views, immaculate décor, and a fully lived-in vibe. When we entered, he excused himself to go to the bathroom and as I waited I decided I wanted to marry him. I ran at him the instant he came back. There was never any chance we would make it to a bed.

I was still floating when I left in the morning. Veritably floating. It was almost ten when we piled into his jeep and went back into town, and he dropped me off with a long kiss and said he’d call me late in the afternoon and I knew he would.

I picked up a warm chocolate croissant and café latte from the Main Street Bakery and savored them as I floated back to my room, where the moment I had most been looking forward to was waiting for me. My girlfriend, who was traveling and staying with me, had not heard from me since I’d texted her the previous afternoon that I had a date.

She’d replied:
IF U DON’T CUM BACK 2NITE I’LL KNOW U’RE EITHER GETTING YOUR HEAD CUT OFF OR YOUR BRAINS FUCKED OUT!!!

My apologies for the language, but she texts that way.

Well, I threw open the door as loudly as I could, hoping she’d be exactly where I found her, seated in the living room, reading a trashy magazine.

“I’m back, sweetheart,” I said, loud and sassy, “and my head is still on!”

I told her the entire story, and I think she was even happier for me than I was for me. And, really, is there anything better than that? If there is, I can’t think of it. I can’t think of a single time in my life that I was happier than I was right then, telling my friend Marie every detail of the fabulous sex I had just enjoyed, while drinking the last of my latte and tasting the butter and chocolate on my lips. What more could you ask for?

That is a meditation I have taken great comfort in over the years. I have strived to live by those words, used them as a beacon during my dark moments, but I had never really felt I had
achieved
them until that day. That was the day everything would change, because finally I
was
filled with loving-kindness, I
was
peaceful and at ease, I
was
happy. The only trouble was I wasn’t well. I just didn’t know that yet.

I went back to New York to quit my job, tidy up my affairs, and move back to Aspen for good. Maybe I would marry Stephen, maybe not, but either way I would hike and ski and ride horses and meet other men if this turned out not to be the right one. I was ready. I was expecting to be back in Colorado within two weeks.

When I arrived home, my first appointment was with my therapist, who applauded loudly when I told her my plan. I think she had a tear in her eye; I know I did.

“This is the best decision I have ever known you to make,” she said, “regardless of how it turns out. I will miss you very much, but I hope we will never see each other again.”

Before I left her office, I mentioned, almost off-handedly, that my back had been bothering me, more and more of late, enough that it was beginning to interfere with my exercise. I told her I’d been putting off seeing a doctor because I feared it was some sort of nerve issue or degenerative disc, which might require surgery, which would keep me off my treadmill for longer than I thought I could bear, but now the pain had risen to a level where I felt it was going to limit me sooner rather than later.

“Go see your doctor before you leave New York,” she told me. “Start your new life without anything like that hanging over you.”

Seemed like a good idea.

I saw my doctor the following day. She said I needed to see a physical therapist, that I could probably get an appointment before the end of the month.

“No, Sheila,” I told her, “I’m leaving town much sooner than that, and I don’t plan to be back for a while. We need to figure this out right now.”

She told me she didn’t think there was any way to figure anything out so quickly, but in the interest of skipping a step or two, she would take X-rays and send me for an MRI. She also wrote me a prescription for a painkiller, which she described as “Aleve on steroids,” and told me to take one if the pain got in my way. I took two that night, with a glass of white wine, and fell asleep looking forward to quitting my job.

I woke up feeling great. The painkillers were magical; I hadn’t felt so loose in months. I ran effortlessly and without pain on my treadmill for forty minutes before breakfast. I had a noon appointment with the radiologist, which left just enough time to summon my CEO and offer my resignation. (I should tell you that I was more eager for the opportunity to tell him to his face that I was finished than I was anything else. That’s a long story. A good one, by the way, filled with sex and betrayal, but I don’t have time for it right now.)

I went straight to his office.

“I need to see Phil immediately,” I announced to his troglodytic assistant, loudly enough that anyone in the hall might hear.

“Oh, um, well,” she said, along with a lot of other meaningless words people use when they are startled and helpless.

“That’s insightful,” I said bitchily. “Just push the button and tell him I’m on my way in.”

What happened next was like a scene from a bad sitcom. The assistant, Danielle, rose from behind the desk and started to run to the door that separated her small office from the huge one she was there to protect. I was closer to the door than she was but she had a fairly good angle of pursuit and she wasn’t fooling around. In fact, she would have beaten me there had it not been for the five-inch heels on her Jimmy Choo Lizzy Leather pumps. (I’ve worn those and trust me they are not meant for running.) The woman took three quick steps toward me and then went sprawling face-first into the carpet, landing with a thump directly between me and the door. All I had to do was step over her, which I did with great relish.

But before I did, I knelt beside her. “Everything you may have heard about Phil and me is true,” I hissed, with a smile, “and if you already knew that but insisted on torturing me all these years anyway, all I can say is
fuck you
.”

Then I went inside and told the man who almost ruined my life that I wasn’t working for him anymore. Now, you tell me, can a day possibly start any better than that?

I AM FEELING A little tired and a little sad at the thought of writing about what happened next. If there is anybody out there who wants to know, I will tell you. Write to me. I see there is a Person2Person feature here. If you use it, I will, too. I could use someone to talk to, someone who understands, someone who knows a little bit about days that start really well but don’t remain that way. Because right now I feel like I’m the only one.

Person2Person

From: Samantha R.

To: Katherine E.

BreastCancerForum.org

I’m here.

I’m here to listen. I’m here to cry with you or laugh with you, whichever you need. I’ll be here on the lousy days and on the better days, and I promise you there will be those. And I will be here on the day you come out the other side of this, as I have, and I can promise you it is an even more glorious feeling than you imagine it to be.

My name is Samantha. I was first drawn to your profile because we are from the same town. I grew up in Greenwich, though I haven’t actually lived there since high school; I’m twenty-eight now. My life story isn’t so interesting, not nearly as much as yours. I don’t have a dreamy man waiting for me in Aspen, or anywhere else for that matter. I was married once, but that was brief and ended badly. I was diagnosed a few months after my marriage dissolved, and at the time I was feeling healthier, both physically and spiritually, than I ever had before and I am headed back to that now. In fact, I am going to be better for this. I actually believe this is going to wind up being a wonderful blessing in my life.

You see, nothing I have done has ever felt especially significant. I have been supported by my father all my life, and for a short time by my husband, and nothing I have done ever felt as though it really
mattered
.

Until now.

I was diagnosed with noninvasive cancer in my left breast. I was given a few options but immediately chose to have a double mastectomy and reconstruction. I wanted every shred of the disease out of me, and I was perfectly comfortable going to those lengths to assure it. When I woke up from the surgery, the first face I saw belonged to a nurse I had grown to like, named Jenny, a cute young woman, no older than me, maybe a year or two younger. She was kind and reassuring and made me feel like everything would be all right. I told her so before they wheeled me into the operating room and she smiled and promised me she’d be sitting by the bed when I woke up and sure enough she was. And she smiled at me, and as soon as I saw her dimples I knew it had gone well. And her first words to me were: “Congratulations. You no longer have cancer.”

I can’t repeat those words without crying and I don’t think I ever will. I’m choking up now as I type them. But what I decided that night, in that bed with those words still in my ears and the tears still on my cheeks, was that somewhere in the midst of this I had found my calling. I want to dedicate myself, however I can, to making other women feel the way I felt then. I don’t know all the ways that is possible yet, this is all new for me, but this is my start. I read the message you posted and here I am. What I am offering you is whatever I have that you need. An ear, a shoulder, a ride to the doctor’s office, or the hospital, or the airport, or a Broadway show. If I am able to make one moment of this suck a little bit less for you, I will feel I did my job.

It’s a modest plan, I know. I think of it as a support group without the group. Right now there is only me. I reached out to one other woman here, also from Greenwich, and we had a nice exchange for a while and I’m hopeful that we will go forward together, but for right now I am a group of one inviting you to make it two. How to do that is fully up to you.

Just say the word.

Person2Person

From: Katherine E.

To: Samantha R.

BreastCancerForum.org

I am moved by your compassion and the generosity of your spirit. As a rule, I don’t have a whole lot of faith in the intrinsic decency of mankind, but you have taken a step toward changing that tonight. It may have been a small step for you, but it was giant for me.

I spend almost no time in Greenwich these days. My mother is still there, rattling about the halls of the house in which I grew up. Honestly, it feels more as though she haunts the place than lives in it. My mother has become the sort of person you can sometimes forget is in a room. It’s not the most cheerful time when I see her, and thus I hardly ever do.

I live in Manhattan and quite nicely, though I was—and am—ready to chuck all of it and dash to the mountains. I was about to do it. I was so excited.

Then I went for the MRI.

The first thing I discovered is that I am a tad claustrophobic. I don’t know how better to discover that than lying still in a tube like a sausage with the walls closing in while a horrific clanging deafens you. So that was pretty terrible. I just kept telling myself it was temporary, that I just needed to breathe and keep my eyes closed.

I went home after forty minutes of cylindrical torture and treated myself to a really fine bottle of wine, and waited to hear why my back was hurting me so. I was prepared for nerve damage, disc trouble, stress-related muscle fatigue, arthritis, even a tiny broken bone in a place I couldn’t find with my fingers. In fact, now that I think of it, I believe that is what I was expecting, a broken bone. An arduous rehabilitation. An admonishment to back off significantly from all my exercise. I drank a toast to my treadmill and how little I was going to miss it. So long as I could climb the occasional mountain, I was sure I would be fine.